Language
Original: Language on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1:
Man with flame-like (orange) hair: You ever notice how language is getting more abstract?
Bespectacled man: Hm?
Panel 2:
Orange-haired man: Like, people say "let's kick ass!"
Panel 3:
Orange-haired man: Originally, "to kick ass" means to do violence to a particular ass-haver. Later it acquires the sense of "to do well at a particular task."
Panel 4:
Orange-haired man: In modern usage, "ass" doesn't refer to a particular ass, but a generalized Platonic ass. A universal ass-adversary.
Panel 5:
Orange-haired man: A transcendent WORLD-ASS, against which all must struggle.
Panel 6:
Bespectacled man: Please leave and never return.
Panel 7 (flashback, captioned "EARLIER..."):
Bespectacled man: So, what makes you feel you'd contribute to our middle school English department?
Orange-haired man: I LOVE language.
Votey:
Orange-haired man (off-panel, to a close-up of his own face): The Germans call it "Weltarsch"
Man with flame-like (orange) hair: You ever notice how language is getting more abstract?
Bespectacled man: Hm?
Panel 2:
Orange-haired man: Like, people say "let's kick ass!"
Panel 3:
Orange-haired man: Originally, "to kick ass" means to do violence to a particular ass-haver. Later it acquires the sense of "to do well at a particular task."
Panel 4:
Orange-haired man: In modern usage, "ass" doesn't refer to a particular ass, but a generalized Platonic ass. A universal ass-adversary.
Panel 5:
Orange-haired man: A transcendent WORLD-ASS, against which all must struggle.
Panel 6:
Bespectacled man: Please leave and never return.
Panel 7 (flashback, captioned "EARLIER..."):
Bespectacled man: So, what makes you feel you'd contribute to our middle school English department?
Orange-haired man: I LOVE language.
Votey:
Orange-haired man (off-panel, to a close-up of his own face): The Germans call it "Weltarsch"
Alt text
A six-panel SMBC comic. An orange, flame-haired man tells a bespectacled man about how language is getting more abstract. He explains that "to kick ass" originally meant doing violence to a particular ass-haver, then came to mean doing well at a task, and in modern usage refers not to a specific ass but a "generalized Platonic ass, a universal ass-adversary," escalating to "a transcendent WORLD-ASS, against which all must struggle." The bespectacled man, deadpan and adjusting his glasses, replies: "Please leave and never return." A final captioned flashback ("EARLIER...") reveals this was a job interview: the bespectacled man asked what the flame-haired man would contribute to their middle school English department, and he enthusiastically answered "I LOVE language." Votey: a hand-drawn close-up of the flame-haired man's face adding, "The Germans call it 'Weltarsch'" (a mock German compound meaning world-ass).
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.