Below is the latest The Pain -- When Will It End?
Updated 9/04/02

Artist's Statement

I believe this to be the lamest cartoon I have allowed to see print since "Tom Cruise, Single Man." I drew it last Monday in desperation, e-mailed it to my friends Boyd and Dave asking whether they thought it was funny enough to run, and Boyd replied, "Man, are you getting lazy. But since nothing we do will ever matter anyway, go ahead and send it in and have a cocktail." I despaired. In the end I hastily drew last week's much funnier cartoon, "How They Get You."

So what happened was I was in new York on a short vacation last week when I got an e-mail from the City Paper announcing an early deadline because of the Labor Day weekend. I did not have time or much inclination to drop everything and draw a cartoon in the few hours left before the deadline, and when I remembered I could still access this file in my "sent mail" file online and get a cartoon in before deadline without doing any work, I found that I did not care all that much anymore whether it was funny or not.

For the record, I do not actually endorse either of the two apparent implications of this cartoon--1.) that scientific studies are a waste of time and money or 2.) that homosexuality is clearly biologically determined. I don't know anything about the evidence to support biological or cultural hypotheses of the causes of homosexuality (except for anecdotal evidence), and I don't see why anyone should care either way. Who cares if it is a choice? It's a completely harmless choice that's nobody's business. Everybody fucking grow up already.
      
I apologize for this dumb cartoon. Next week, the anniversary of September 11th, we'll have something nice for you.