Sickos Voice Yes Ha Ha Ha Yes
A celebration of The Remnant's editorial cartoon department
So I was back on my bullshit looking through the usual right-wing Catholic media sites to see if there were any especially funny reactions to Joseph Strickland getting fired, so I could write a piece making fun of the outrage and title it after a Tyler the Creator track. I thought that would be fun, but the exercise kind of served as a reminder of why I don’t really talk about right-wing Catholic media anymore: it’s pretty boring out there. LifeSite’s coverage of Strickland’s firing is, like everything that has ever been on LifeSite, very predictable and plodding and free from the tyranny of copy editing. Church Militant hadn’t even run anything on the guy by the time I checked. Traditionalist blog Rorate Coeli had a good start with the headline “STRICKLAND REMOVED - Francis Peron attacks again: to my enemies not even Justice”. Love it so far, got the comparison between Pope Francis and former Argentinian president Juan Peron right there and it already makes no sense, and then the actual text of the story, while incredibly brief, does not skimp on lurid sexual imagery:
“If only Bishop Strickland had been a member of Uncle Ted McCarrick's clique of abusers of minors, or used bodily fluids in chalices (Rupnik) after raping sisters, he might have been named a Cardinal by Francis…”
That’s it. That’s the whole piece. LifeSite just drones on and on about “Francis has removed Strickland and yet he promotes Cardinals who refuse to condemn sodomy or seem willing to bless sinful gay relationships” blah blah blah who cares I got guys out here yelling “OH WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO JIZZ IN A CHALICE TO GET PROMOTED NOW”. That’s what I’m looking for here, but clearly that concept is very thin, thinner even than wine-diluted jizz1, and not enough to sustain a full piece’s worth of outrage.
I also looked at The Remnant’s site, as in the far-right traditionalist Catholic newspaper that seems to mostly exist because they hate Vatican II, and they had a video dissecting the story called ‘CANCELLING CHRIST’ but I did not want to invest the time to watch it:
I was, honestly, just looking for something short and easy and pithy that I could make fun of. And then, I found the editorial cartoon:
Yes, I know, the allegories are subtle, multilayered, and complex, on a par with Gene Wolfe’s densest novels. But that’s all keeping with the medium of editorial cartooning, which serves basically no purpose in 2023 but we keep it around because we all learned in middle school that Thomas Nast was important. But you are, I’m sure, asking the same question that I immediately asked upon seeing the above cartoon: “Does The Remnant regularly run editorial cartoons to illustrate the points they’re making to their audience of pre-Vatican II conspiracy loons?” And the answer is yes2. “Tony, did you read every single one that’s archived on the site and then group them thematically so we could all laugh at them together?” The answer is also yes.
“Church prelate hiding a Satan dragon in plain sight”
Okay but stay with me: what if the dragon…was Chinese:
“Sitting way out on a tree branch and you think you're in the right but you’re actually the one that’s going to fall off”
Again, we’re in the realm of subtle allegory here, and also in the realm of re-using the exact same art of the exact same tree with the knots and branches in the exact same spot. I also appreciate that the artist couldn't be bothered to draw the second set of dubia Cardinals and posted in photos instead, turning the editorial cartoon into an avant-garde pastiche.
“You have made the Virgin Mary cry and also Saint Peter”
My junior year of college the football team went 3-9 so I consider this an upgrade from “Notre Lame”.
“If you are filled with hatred, might I interest you in a subscription to The Remnant”
“Shitting on Rod Dreher but Rod Dreher is a baby”
I’m no stranger to making fun of Rod Dreher, although The Remnant appears to have different critiques of him than I did. They seem to be upset with Dreher that he withdrew from the Roman rite Catholic church because of the abuse scandal, as opposed to, I guess, writing countless 8,000-word hyperventilating columns about it to solve the abuse scandal, just like he solved gayness and trans people. They are also really upset that he did seem to take the COVID pandemic seriously and did not want to die of a respiratory virus that nobody knew anything about in spring of 2020. And they also really did not want to draw two different pictures of Baby Rod Dreher.
“Damn this motherfucker loves the Grinch”
Or, really hates the Grinch, you know what I mean.
“The editors have told me I can't just submit ‘I HATE GAY PEOPLE’ in bubble letters”
Fruitcake! Are you serious! Did you write this in 1920!
See, in this cartoon, Fr. Jim Martin is a fairy, and the cartoonist made Fr. Jim Martin because he was told that labeling him with an actual slur would ‘distract attention from your powerful message’.
“The Completely Inscrutable”
Somebody please tell me who this is supposed to be. This is incredible. There’s nothing here for me to latch onto. Shakespeare is there, and television, and Don Quixote, this is a mad lib. This is like that TikTok video where that guy was like “BABY GRONK RIZZED UP LIVVY, IS HE THE NEW DRIP KING?”, there are just no parts ot this that I recognize.
You know why Jesus dying is the REAL Holocaust, right? I’m asking you, I have no idea.
What is this. Why is Bill Clinton in this. Did the nun give him a blowjob? Why is this a police interrogation? Was the nun hired to carry out a hit on John Paul I? Did John Paul I get a blowjob from a nun that was so good that he literally died?
And finally, “Ones I technically agree with”
Obviously, Bill Maher is awful, this opinion unites both left and right:
And they have one of Bernard Law chilling in the Vatican and avoiding extradition while the arch of Boston falls apart and uh, I gotta give them that one too:
For purposes of this joke it’s pre-transubstantiation wine, I’m not a psychopath.
All Remnant cartoons appear to be credited to “Remnant staff”, so if anybody knows the artist behind any of these, please let me know immediately and I will make sure to credit them properly.