The annual Countdown of the Top Tom the Dancing Bugs of the Year has been completed, and is now available for your convenience in its entirety on one page, HERE.
THRILL to the mathematical, scientifically determined rankings, right up to the shocking conclusion, as an unprecedented development has led to the most astonishing #1 pick in Tom the Dancing Bug's Countdown History!
This holiday season, you can give that special someone(s) a Gift Membership(s) to Tom the Dancing Bug's INNER HIVE.
That's right, you can give a loved one / friend / frenemy a membership to the INNER HIVE, and from the moment you sign them up and throughout 2022 they will receive the weekly INNER HIVE emails containing:
- that week's Tom the Dancing Bug comic, at least a day before it's published online; and
- exclusive commentary, extra comics, contests, giveaways, word-find puzzles, and advice for the lovelorn
and all other benefits and privileges of membership will be conferred up on them.
$29.99. Simply sign up here, by entering the recipient's name and the email address the INNER HIVE mailings should be sent to:
It is for you to inform the recipient of the gift. The recipient will simply receive the next INNER HIVE email after you sign them up.
You can also use the above form to RENEW an existing gift membership.
More info on the INNER HIVE is here.
IT'S THE GIFT THAT KEEPS GIVING, EVERY DING-DONG WEEK, UNTIL IT STOPS.
Thank you, and have a Merry Everything.
Rb
Terms and Conditions apply. They always do.
The Gift Membership will end 12/31/22.
Payment is for starting the membership. Recipient may cancel at any time (there's no accounting for taste).
This $29.99 offer is for an Inner Hive membership through MailChimp. $77.00 Inner Hive Gift Memberships through Substack can be purchased here.
If you purchased a $77 Substack gift membership prior to the date of this announcement and would like to switch to a $29.99 MailChimp gift membership, contact me at tomdbug at gmail dot com
Any other questions, also contact me at tomdbug at gmail dot com
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Hey, Tom the Dancing Bug just won the Berryman Award from the National Press Foundation!
I'll be traveling to Washington, DC on February 9 to accept the award at a gala dinner. I hope there are tacos!
I'm really honored, and I know I'm repeating myself, but I don't care: Anytime I'm given any honor I only want it to reflect on the people and entities who partner with and support me and Tom the Dancing Bug:
Anyway, my thanks to the National Press Foundation. I'm grateful to the judges for finding something worthy in my comics, and for finding that cartooning in general is worthy, apparently a view that is not universally shared among judges of cartooning awards.
So I appreciate the recognition, but I want to give a shout-out to my colleagues in the U.S. and all over the world, doing some of the most groundbreaking, innovative, brave cartooning in the history of the medium, in increasingly dark and difficult times! I'm proud to be with you!
One of the comics in the package cited by the Berryman judges:
(From January, 2021)
Oh, and new Tom the Dancing Bug books are coming out!
Here's the About Tom the Dancing Bug page in the new book, Tom the Dancing Bug Awakens:
And the Back Cover:
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LINK FOR INFO AND TO ORDER THE TWO NEW TOM THE DANCING BUG BOOKS
Other links:
To join Tom the Dancing Bug's INNER HIVE
To sign up for the free Tom the Dancing Bug Newsletter
Tom the Dancing Bug comics on GoComics.com
Tom the Dancing Bug comics on BoingBoing.com
Tom the Dancing Bug comics on DailyKos.com
Ruben Bolling's speech accepting the Herblock Prize
A recent Ruben Bolling podcast appearance
Another recent Ruben Bolling podcast appearance
11/1/21 Announcement of Ruben Bolling's win of the National Press Foundation's 2021 Berryman Award
I'm happy to announce that the winner of the random drawing in the Book Contest to Benefit Cartoonists Rights Network International is Colin Maroney. He will be getting a copy of the 2020 book Tom the Dancing Bug: Into the Trumpverse.
My heartfelt THANKS to all who donated and participated in the contest. As I said in announcing it, the proof of the cartooning art form's vitality and impact is the fact that authoritarians and extremists all over the world are threatening, persecuting, and even killing satirical cartoonists for creating their art. And yet here in the U.S., cartoonists are marginalized in just about every possible way by the world of Journalism of which we are supposed to be a part. In my own tiny, inconsequential corner of this issue, no Pulitzer Prize was awarded this year in the cartooning category, despite two very deserving cartoonists (and, yes, myself) being named Finalists, not to mention the amazing work done by many, many of my colleagues in a year of unprecedented events.
I started this contest on the spur of the moment, to help cartoonists in real danger in any small way, and I'm so heartened by my readers' response. I can't tell you how much I appreciate the outpouring of support for these brave artists.
The contest is over, but of course you can donate to CRNI any time you like!
THANK YOU,
Rb
"Behold the wondrous, whimsical, witty world that is Tom the Dancing Bug!" -Mark Hamill
"This fine collection of work by Mr. Bolling provides ample evidence as to why he is unanimously considered one of the greatest cartoonists in the known universe." -"Weird Al" Yankovic
"God Bless Tom the Dancing Bug!" -David Cross
"The fact that Tom the bug can keep dancing in this day and age is a testament to Ruben Bolling’s skills as a cartoonist!" - Seth Meyers
"All hail Tom the Dancing Bug!" -Matt Groening
"Ruben Bolling's craft and commentary are as powerful and as pointed, as capable of making you laugh while breaking your heart as they were when we were all so very young." -Neil Gaiman
Two-Time Pulitzer Prize Finalist (2019 and 2021)
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B. THE TRUMPVERSE/AWAKENS PACKAGE
Volumes 6 and 7 in The Complete Tom the Dancing Bug
Both books signed/sketched/dated, if requested, with exclusive pdfs, and with AWAKENS bookmark, and possibly* with TRUMPVERSE bookmark
C. THE GRAND SLAM PACKAGE
ALL FOUR books signed/sketched/dated, if requested, with exclusive pdfs, and with AWAKENS and WITHOUT THE BAD ONES bookmarks, and possibly* with TRUMPVERSE and SFPC bookmark
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UPDATE 12/24/21:
Yes, the books have finally broken through the clogged supply chain and are in my hot little hands, ready to be signed, sketched in, and sent out to YOU!
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1.
First of all, I am only deeply thrilled and honored by the decision by the Editorial Cartooning Pulitzer Jury to name me a Finalist for the 2021 Pulitzer Award (for the second time), along with such amazing talents as Lalo Alcaraz and Marty Two Bulls, Sr. And I don’t want anything else I say to diminish my appreciation for that.
And whenever I'm recognized in any way, I always want to thank my syndicate, Andrews McMeel Syndication, all of Tom the Dancing Bug's print clients, its web clients BoingBoing.net, DailyKos.com, and GoComics.com, and the fantastic, indispensable, proud & mighty Inner Hive. I am so deeply grateful for these entities, and the people behind them, for sustaining Tom the Dancing Bug, and I make it my entire professional goal to give them more than they give to me.
At the end of this post are some of my comics from 2020 that the Pulitzer Prize Jury considered in naming me a Finalist.
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2.
But the decision by the Pulitzer Prize Board to refuse to name a winner from among those Finalists, as is the custom, or from among any other cartoonists, as is their right, is frustrating, baffling, and wrongheaded.
I don’t know what happened that the Board was unable to name a winner. But it sure looks like they were saying that no cartoonist did work that was Pulitzer-worthy this year.
I’ve never begrudged a judging panel their decision for an award. Not in cartooning, not for my favorite movie at the Oscars, not for best pie at the county fair. I've always been ambivalent about the whole Awards idea. There aren't many kinds of human endeavors less suited to comparative judging than the arts. But I understand their role in marketing, and I've certainly been a beneficiary of the whole thing -- I've been fortunate enough to have won some1 -- so I'm happy to play along.
I do think it’s silly, childish and arrogant to think there’s an objectively correct comparative winner of any award in the arts; judges simply make their best subjective call, and we all move on.
But this looks like it’s the Pulitzer Board members who are the silly, childish and arrogant ones, effectively declaring that there’s some objective standard of Pulitzer-worthiness, and going far, far out of their way to make a grandiose statement that nothing in an entire field was at that level. In a year in which, my comics aside, I think some of the best and most vital work in the history of the artform was done.
As though you can look back at the 100 years of editorial cartooning work that has been awarded Pulitzer Prizes and sniff that nothing done this year was of even a similar "quality." When it comes to subjective award-judging in the arts, I don’t think there’s much you can say that is wrong. But that is just wrong.
I don’t mind anyone saying this or that cartoonist's work is better than mine. They're probably right, and who's to say? But I absolutely resent the Pulitzer Board saying that my work is definitionally not worthy of a Pulitzer and neither is any of my colleagues’ in the entire artform.
I’ve honestly never been insulted by losing an award; I try to think about them as little as possible, and I don’t feel I’ve ever deserved anything. But I am insulted by this decision by the Board, on behalf of myself and all cartoonists.
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1 I cringe to do this, but the Pulitzer Board has me feeling defensive. In addition to Pulitzer Prize panels of jurors (twice), the following organizations in the past did not find my work categorically unworthy of an award, and somehow found themselves a way to bestow a top award on Tom the Dancing Bug: The Association of Alternative Newsweeklies, The Society of Professional Journalists, the National Cartoonists Society, The Society of Illustrators, The Herblock Foundation, and The Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights. And by the way, of course the other Finalists, Lalo Alcaraz and Marty Two Bulls, Sr. have both received numerous honors, and are clearly far from definitionally unworthy of a top award.
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6/15 UPDATE: A Washington Post article about the controversy here.
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3.
Finally, not that any tragedy has befallen me, or that I'm in any dire need of Support Through This Difficult Time, but if this feels like a good time to join the INNER HIVE, to get each week's Pulitzer-unworthy Tom the Dancing Bug comic at least a day before it's published anywhere, with commentary and other exclusive comics, and to join the team that literally makes Tom the Dancing Bug possible...
Thank you, I hope to see you there.
Rb
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Some of the 2020 Tom the Dancing Bug comics nominated by the Pulitzer Prize Jury:
4/6/20
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4/20/20
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5/4/20
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6/22/20
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8/17/20
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9/21/20
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9/28/20
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6/16/21 UPDATE:
In the U.S., editorial/political/topical/satirical cartoonists get very little respect in the journalism world that’s supposed to support us. But for some reason, the world over, these cartoonists are on the front lines of threats, censorship, prosecution, and even murder, for their work. From the cartoonists killed for the Mohammed cartoons, to the Charlie Hebdo massacre, to jailed and/or tortured cartoonists in Turkey, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Egypt, etc., etc.
Maybe that’s because what cartoonists do is vital, popular, and effective.
American mainstream journalism dismisses cartoons, firing cartoonists for financial and political reasons, and repeatedly marginalizing their contribution. Yet cartoons always are among the most popular, best-read features on any outlet that runs them, and somehow effective enough to draw the targeted ire and even violence of authoritarians and extremists.
The refusal of an awards judging board, representing the behemoths of American mainstream journalism, to name a winner in the 100 year old cartooning category, and thus (in my view) insulting the cartooning art form and profession, is a silly, meaningless imbroglio, and what should be called a First World Problem.
But I thought I’d turn it around in some tiny, personal way and announce a contest benefitting Cartoonists Rights Network International (CRNI), which "Defends Political Cartoonists on the Front Lines of Free Speech" around the world.
Most recently, they’re defending Malaysian cartoonist Zunar, who’s been jailed, released, and is now under investigation by police again. And Bangladeshi cartoonist Ahmed Kabir Kishore, jailed for ten months, during which he was beaten and tortured.
Egyptian cartoonist Ashraf Hamdi was arrested in January for “spreading false information and misusing social networks,” and he hasn't been seen or heard from since.
If you join me in making a contribution, of any amount, to CRNI and send the screenshot of the receipt to me at teamdancingbug@gmail.com with the subject “CRNI DONATION” by 6/25/21 11:59pm ET, you’ll be entered in a random drawing for a free Tom the Dancing Bug: Into the Trumpverse (2020) book.
Thanks.
<
To raise money for Alice's Kids, I'm offering to re-draw one of two comics for $1,100 ($1,000 to Alice's Kids, $100 for my expenses including shipping).
You can choose one of these two comics, and I'll re-draw* it on 11x14 bristol board, pencil/pen/ink (so black and white line art, not color), and sign it however you like:
Lucky Ducky, in "Red Flags"
or It's the Great Storm, Charlie Brown
Alice's Kids' mission is to "enhance the self-esteem of children in need by providing them targeted financial assistance that will facilitate their participation in scholastic, recreational and social activities."
"Over the years we have built a network of hundreds of teachers, social workers, police department personnel, homeless shelter staff and others who, upon identifying a child with a specific need, send us a request form for assistance. The child might need a winter coat or glasses, They might hide in the back of the classroom as others are exchanging senior yearbooks that they could not afford or cannot attend school because they cannot afford the school uniform. The teacher asks for help and we process the request within 24 hours. In the case of a gift card (e.g., the child needs track shoes), we might send the teacher a Dick's Sporting Goods gift card. The teacher prints it out and presents it to the parent who then can proudly announce to their child that they are going shopping for those shoes! All of our assistance is provided anonymously to help preserve the dignity of the child."
Email me at tomdbug at gmail dot com to let me know you'd like to purchase this commission and help Alice's Kids!
Thanks, Rb
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*Because I'm re-drawing the comic, it may not look exactly the same as the published comic; I'll be doing my best to re-draw to it as faithfully as possible, but there will certainly be small differences.
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5/1/21 UPDATE:
Many thanks to @cdsaether who purchased this commission! (Thanks go to Patton Oswalt, who inspired the commission because of his work in helping and publicizing Alice's Kids.)
Okay, ya filthy landlubbers. As I told ya in this week's "Uncle Cap'n's Nifty N.F.T.s," you can actually bid on this here picture I drew of myself, as an NON-FUNGIBLE TOKEN.
A few things:
The varmints at Rarible don't seem to allow a real auction: they only allow an auction that takes bids forever, and it's up to me to accept one, or not. So to make this more like a real auction, I'll take the highest bid as of Friday, April 16, 11am ET or thereabouts. I'm told that because I'm not going to accept a set Sale Price, I pay the "gas fee" (?) on the sale instead of you, so take that into account when ya bid, ya stingy skinflints.
I'm also sendin' the winner a 2 inch by 2.5 inch drawing of the NFT image, by actual physical mail, drawn by me, yer ol' pal Uncle Cap'n.
Tom the Dancing Bug, that low-down, do-gooder, tree-hugging' comic strip, is taking 50% of the dollar amount I net out of this thing, and is donating it to The Carbon Fund.
You can bid on this NFT of my glorious mug, a real piece of Digital Art, RIGHT HERE, ON RARIBLE.COM
The rules are up to me, so don't be a bellyacher.
-Uncle Cap'n
UPDATE: This here auction has been switched over a straight-up sale of the NFT. Anybody wants to pony up 0.10 ETH (something like $240) can just buy the damn thing.
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After spending the morning wrestling with The New York Times, I can point people to this article about Facebook moderation and the problem they have with satire.
The example they printed of a comic strip that Facebook mistakenly removed from its site, and then allowed back on, was one of mine, the one I did on masks last summer.
Somehow Facebook flagged this comic's appearance on The Nib as a dangerous statement about Covid and masks, and removed it from The Nib's page. It wasn't long before it was reinstated, because the concern was obviously an error in failing to see the irony, but it did reveal a blind spot in Facebook's efforts to moderate its content.
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But I was totally blindsided by the article this morning. I was happily reading it because it was about my pal Matt Bors and his site The Nib, and then suddenly there was my comic, but without the Tom the Dancing Bug header, without the By Ruben Bolling byline, and without any attribution at all. No mention of me, as though the comic was created by some kind of Nib algorithm.
I had to spend the morning wrestling with the situation, but I finally did get in touch with the editor of the article, who was very apologetic and took full responsibility. They added an attribution, and they said they'd look into replacing the image with the full image, as the comic originally ran, including the header and byline. We'll see.
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Anyway, I've been focused on my own little drama of attribution, but the problem for The Nib explained in the article is an existential one for The Nib. And the good news is that Matt tells me that The Times getting in touch with Facebook for the article caused Facebook to finally take The Nib off "restricted distribution" probation status.
For now.