Thanks to reader Lindsey for sending me this 1956 comic demonstrating that Planned Parenthood was always the home of real family values, if you believe that family values should be about valuing families. If you’re a fan of the overly melodramatic, lurid 50s-era comics, then you’ll probably enjoy this one. While this comic predates the song “Love Will Tear Us Apart” by over 20 years, that’s the general theme.
Divorce! They didn’t tell us about that possible side effect in abstinence-only class! And they promised a pony and a cookie if you swore never, ever to do it unless you were earnestly trying to make a baby.
But if you think that divorce is the worst thing that can happen to you if you suffer from unrequited horniness, think again. You may not just lose a spouse—you may lose a limb.
Luckily, our hero does not actually lose his arm or any other limbs or limb-like protrusions. He is saved in time by a doctor who says, in essence, slap on a condom and fuck your wife before you lose your family or your body parts . Sensible advice, of course. If only all our problems had such pleasant solutions. “This chocolate cake will heal that broken bone.” Some people can’t stand a win-win solution, of course, and the crazies showed up in the comments to complain about the outbreak of common sense in this 52-year-old comic book.
I’m a proud parent of seven great kids, and I find the tone of this comic to be extremely rude and insulting.
It’s worth noting that this woman doesn’t explain why she finds it insulting. Is it because she finds it insulting that other people don’t validate her choices by joining in the pregnancy marathon? It seems that way initially, but I think it’s something else. I think it’s this panel.
In other words, I think our mother of seven doesn’t like to see herself or any member of the douchebag race insulted, especially with these slurs on basic competence at assigned tasks.
Then there’s this:
I agree. How anti-child can a comic get? I wonder how a mother of 10 or 12 kids would feel after reading this.
Quite possibly that she needs to quit douching as a form of birth control. I’m intrigued by the idea that the problem with comprehensive sex education is it might hurt the feelings of people who reject birth control. That’s a new one to me, and I thought I’ve heard them all. “But darling, even though we can’t afford another kid, we have to make one. What if Debbie gives me the stink eye at the next cake walk?” “Don’t worry, my dear. Maybe she won’t realize that we’re using condoms, but think we’ve taken to sleeping in other rooms.” “You’re right, honey. Maybe she’ll feel superior, even!”
I’d make a comment about how ridiculous we’re still fighting the same fight that Planned Parenthood was fighting in the 50s, but I remember what happened in the comments when I put up a pro-segregation comic strip up and the slimy defenders of state-based oppression “states’ rights” crawled out of the woodwork.
23 Responses to “No, no, it’s your hand that will fall off if you go too long without”
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“…but I remember what happened in the comments when I put up a pro-segregation comic strip up and the slimy defenders of state-based oppression “states’ rights” crawled out of the woodwork.”
Amanda, you shouldn’t talk about Dana that way. He can’t help it…
…well he COULD help it, but he chooses not to…
…and he DID say he’d vote for GWB again if he had the chance…
Nevermind. Please do what you need to do…
***
On topic: Have you read any “sex manuals” or “marriage guides” from that era? Talk about odd/frightening/disturbing/etc., especially ones that have a strong religious component.
(I can neither confirm nor deny any possible reading of those books on my part…besides, it was youthful indiscretion…)
Even when solid information is presented, the way it’s presented and the heavy/severe/sacred moral aspects are deeply disturbing. And somehow contraception was conveniently ignored…
Oh, oh, oh - I LOVE Ken and the doc having a good ol heart to heart over a friendly smoke!
They don’t make them like that any more!
I agree. How anti-child can a comic get? I wonder how a mother of 10 or 12 kids would feel after reading this.
If all those children were wanted, I would imagine she’d have no feelings either way, being secure in her decision. Some people want an insane number of kids and all the pills I take in the world won’t stop them, because I don’t have superpowers.
If 7 or 8 of those kids happened because she couldn’t get any BC, I imagine pretty sad.
Gee, and nobody noticed that this woman might become a lesbian as a result of pregnancy fear mixed with horniness?
Oh, but that might imply that women are horny …
The Google ads I’m getting right now are for female libido enhancement, an opportunity to sue the makers of birth control pills if you suffered a blood clot, and a placement agency for open adoption. That’s a whole ‘nother comic right there.
I have Catholic family on both sides, but only my mom’s side was really into it. All of the siblings on my dad’s side are at least 10 years younger than the second oldest in my mom’s family, so we’re talking old school Catholic here.
I’m absolutely convinced that having too many kids broke up my Aunt K’s marriage. Oh, sure, they stayed married until the last kid moved out of the house, but they separated soon after that. Even when I was five years old, I thought it was weird that they slept in twin beds, but they’d probably been forced to give up on sex entirely right around the time kid 9 or 10 showed up and they had to admit that the Church-approved rhythm method wasn’t working. They just drifted apart and once the kids were all gone, there was nothing left to hold them together.
“I wonder how a mother of 10 or 12 kids would feel after reading this.”
If she regrets having those kids, she’ll feel the same way she feels now: pissed, resentful, jealous, and cheated out of a life of her own.
If she doesn’t regret it, she’ll feel the same way she feels now: happy with her lot, and not really giving a damn.
Wingnut: I wonder how a mother of 10 or 12 kids would feel after reading this.
Amanda: Quite possibly that she needs to quit douching as a form of birth control.
Me: BWAHAHAHAHA!!!! Brilliant!
Actually, as an amateur connosiour of overly melodramatic, lurid 50s-era comics, I was both surprised and thrilled to find one where they just come right out and talk directly about birth control usually it’s all codes and hints and general vagueness, if it’s mentioned at all… AND the guy gets his hand mangled. whoa!
Excellent find, reader Lindsay!
Ponies? Cookies?
Let’s fuck instead.
Oh, you gave in you weak girl. Woopsie. Your 1950’s style batshit birth control didn’t work .
Well I’m off then.
Dames. You can’t live with them and…
You know the rest.
Maybe the hyper-fertile moms were insulted by the panels where the couple talks about how having more kids would be unfair to the ones they already have, because it would stretch their financial and personal resources past the breaking point. It does sort of imply that they are doing their own children a disservice by having so many… (And heaven forfend anyone present parenting as anything other than a cavalcade of rainbow-flavored joy.) I suppose I’d have more sympathy for them if I didn’t think that was more or less true.
Maybe I have mentioned it before, but Dumbya’s Grandfather, Prescott Bush, was an early supporter of Planned Parenthood and was one of its lawyers.
As far as I know, no journalist has ever asked the decider guy about that. It shows how backward the Republican Party has become.
Also, I refer you to this disco-licious 1970s comic on Captain V.D. I enjoy the part where it instructs teenagers faced with old-school doctors to just nod and smile and keep asking for penicillin.
Maybe the wingnut was insulted because she thought everybody in the 50s already knew about birth control, despite the laws against it.
This was great. Thanks for sharing.
They’re both smoking in the doctor’s office… lol
I can’t get over the terror in the first panel. We comment a lot about how the wingnuts think pregnancy should be the appropriate punishment for sex, but there comes a point when the terror is so strong, sex itself is a punishment,because it’s no longer about pleasure or communion–it’s just another shit deal you have to live with. I suppose this is their goal.
I’m a proud parent of seven great kids, and I find the tone of this comic to be extremely rude and insulting.
I’m going to agree with Amanda that this just sounds like this woman has to validate her own choices by having everyone else support/follow them. Anything that veers outside of what she knows is offensive, just like for some people who don’t want kids period end up “insulting” people who do. In this society everyone has to follow the same “rules” or else those who do will get pissed at those who don’t because deep down they’re probably second guessing themselves.
“I wonder how a mother of 10 or 12 would feel after reading this?”
Don’t be silly. Mothers of 10 or 12 don’t have time to read. Or think too much. Or finish that degree. Or go for that promotion.
That’s why the wingnuts keep wanting to do away with contraception.
I’m a proud parent of seven great kids, and I find the tone of this comic to be extremely rude and insulting.
I think that perhaps the author of this comment may be less than happy with her “seven great kids,” but doesn’t want to acknowledge that she made a choice to have those kids.
That comic is hysterical. It’s so in keeping with the over-the-top, scare-mongering, “moral hygine” movement of the time. The same basic ideas that gave us “Reefer Madness” and “I Accuse My Parents” among others.
The excellent thing is not just that it’s yoked to the side of angels this time, but that it really gets at the audience that needs to hear it. It’s speaking the language of people who believe that one joint will turn you into drug-crazed murderer or that sex before marriage will leave you a withered, unloveable, crazy cat woman. For the rest of us, it’s just amusingly overwrought (as the whole genre is).
I heard on NPR today that back in the latter 60’s/early 70’s that the Southern Baptist Convention once passed a resolution supporting the legalization of abortion.
Apparently, the shift of the evangelicals happened not over abortion availability during the Carter years, but over the not-for-profit tax status of Bob Jones University being revoked over it’s no-blacks allowed policy.
Later, in preparation for Reagan, they decided that it would be more publicly palatable to pick abortion as their cause. Cuz good old fashioned uncoded racism didn’t sell as well.
Another interesting thing they mentioned is that up until Reagan, evangelicals treated divorce as a subject worthy of ostracizing anyone in the congregation who divorces. With the election of Reagan, suddenly divorce was no longer an issue.
That comic rocked.