Editing 1761: Blame

{{comic
| number    = 1761
| date      = November 18, 2016
| title     = Blame
| image     = blame.png
| titletext = I bet if I yell at my scared friends I will feel better.
}}

==Explanation==

[[Cueball]] states that he feels sad and links it with his observation that bad things are happening. Sadness is a normal human reaction to perceived bad events<ref>http://www.clinical-depression.co.uk/dlp/depression-information/causes-of-depression/</ref>. (Other emotions that might be felt at such times include anger and guilt.)
 
He then reasons that it must be someone's fault. If the "bad things" in question are not natural calamities or accidents, it is usually logical to surmise that someone is responsible for them taking place.

After some thinking, he has an idea. Ideas are usually the result of thinking (unless they are a result of {{w|computers}}{{Citation needed}}), although it might not always be conscious thinking like Cueball is doing.

He then blames his "friends on {{w|Facebook}}", a social media website and app, for connecting with and talking to friends and family. While there could be possible reasons for bad events (for example if the bad event was nobody wishing him a happy birthday or someone posting compromising pictures,) his friends would not be a likely source for bad events extending beyond a personal or local scope. Most people have a few hundred (or thousand) "friends" on Facebook, most of whom do not have enough influence to cause bad events on a national or global level.{{Citation needed}}

This is a reference to people ranting on {{w|social media}} sites (like Facebook) about various things which are blamed on certain people (or sometimes everyone), but the person doing the ranting never thinks that the problem might be with themselves.

It could possibly also be a reference to how an individual's Facebook news feed has probably been inundated by political posts due to the results of the recent 2016 {{w|United States presidential election}}, and possibly due to state and local elections. One read on this is that, many people, including [http://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2016/07/24/486941582/the-reason-your-feed-became-an-echo-chamber-and-what-to-do-about-it| some news sources], have pointed out that social media forms an "echo chamber", and some sources have claimed that this is responsible both for political polarization (see [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE3j_RHkqJc&t=2s| this video]) and even for [http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/donald-trump-president-social-media-echo-chamber-hypernormalisation-adam-curtis-protests-blame-a7409481.html| the recent victory] of {{w|Donald Trump}}.  Notably, [[Randall]] supported {{w|Hillary Clinton}}, the {{w|Democratic}} nominee in [[1756|a recent comic]].  Therefore, blaming social media for the election can be read as blaming his friends echoing his ideas back to him as causing (partially) Clinton's loss; thus they are (partially) at fault for his presumed sadness over her loss in the election.  A second read on this would be that constant reminders of Clinton's loss only serve to make Randall sadder: again the proximal cause being his friends' posts.  A third read would be that friends with whom Cueball/Randall disagrees are posting things that he finds unpleasant to read, either ideas that he finds offensive or inconvenient, or posts "rubbing in" the victory of the candidate Randall opposed.  

The fourth meta-read is that Cueball (as very much distinct from Randall) is not especially smart, and Cueball's mistake here is something that Randall has seen other people make, and Randall is bitter that many people are making said mistake -- not only will venting on facebook be counterproductive generally, in particular blaming your facebook friends for the loss of your favored candidate will only make your interpersonal relationships more difficult, such venting will do nothing to correct the root cause of the sadness, partly because a small group of people is relatively powerless, and partly because the very nature of self-selecting facebook friend-groupings forms a bubble of insular ideological uniformity.  Convincing yourself that your ideological allies are to blame, and then alienating your ideological allies by unfairly blaming them, is dumb; that is the point of the comic, that this "bright idea" that Cueball comes up with in panel three, is actually so dumb of an idea as to be humourous.  (In real life, where Randall supported Hillary and is sad she lost, one might infer that Randall has seen real-life ideological allies blaming each other:  you should have worked harder for the campaign, you should have donated more, you never should have been mean to that Bernie supporter, you should have listened to me when I said we needed to get out the vote in Michigan, and so on and so on.  Finding a perceived problem, and then blaming your ideological allies as being the cause of that problem, makes is LESS likely that the actual problem will be corrected in future elections, thereby perpetuating the sadness.  Not only is Randall sad that his candidate lost the election, he is sad that facebook 'friends' are accusing each other of being to blame, and he is expecting to remain sad in future election-cycles thanks to the disunity and infighting that were the byproduct of THIS election-cycle.  See also:  'vicious circle'.)  Thus, the comic is actually intended to be entertaining, but also intended to have a moral lesson, like Aesop's fables:  if you lose an election because turnout for your candidate was lower across the board than in was in 2012 and 2008, picking fights with your ideological allies will not help you in 2020, because that will only further disunify the factions within your coalition.  The only way to increase turnout for one's preferred candidate, is to expand the coalition by bringing new voters -- and in some cases re-enticing former voters -- to join with you.  Difficult to do when you spend all your time blaming each other.  Somewhat ironically, this plain message is something that Randall cannot put forth... because telling your ideological allies that they need to stop blaming each other for the problems of the 2016 election-cycle, or they are gonna screw up the 2020 election-cycle, is in itself a way of blaming your allies!  Thus, the comic makes fun of people who blame their ideological allies for not being very bright, but also shows that Randall himself may not have been able to figure out what to do either... which is a cause for sadness, indeed, and one that cannot easily be corrected.  Even though Randall understands the problem, and can make humourous comics which illuminate the trouble, and poke fun at the counterproductive nature of blaming one's local allies for national or global setbacks, that does not mean he can keep people from falling into those counterproductive habits (himself included to some degree). 

The title text refers to people venting. The (humorous) assumption here is that one will feel better after doing so. While some amount of venting might help to relieve stress caused by bad events, alienating people you know by blaming them for bad events usually causes more stress in the long run.  (See above explanation about how blaming ideological allies can become a vicious circle.) The fact that he recognizes his friends are scared, like him, but still thinks yelling at them is a good idea shows he's more interested in making himself feel better rather than caring about the well being on his friends.  Additionally, "yelling" on social media would likely only increase the influx of: 
* Political posts reminding Cueball of his sadness 
* Angry messages back at him 
* Reminders of the reason he's sad, including possibly "rubbing in" the sad feelings 
* Posts designed to offend Cueball, including posts designed to offend his political sensibilities
* new & improved reasons to be sad, such as being unfriended for incorrectly blaming his acquaintances 
* future vicious-circle reasons to be sad, including picking future candidates which are a poor compromise and losing future elections 
All of these would make him feel worse, potentially in relatively short order.

==Transcript==
:Cueball (thinking): I feel sad.
:Bad things are happening.

:Cueball (thinking): They must be someone's fault.
:But whose?

:[Cueball makes several thinking poses before a light bulb appears, indicating he has an idea]

:Cueball (thinking): ''My friends on Facebook.''

==Citations==
<references/>

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]