"like I’m putting cartoons in bottles and pushing them out to sea"

April 29, 2014 8:14 AM

Jen Sorenson is the first female winner of the Herblock Prize for political cartooning. Among the work that won her the prize were her cartoons on gentrification and paycheck debit cards. Don't miss the Comparison between Janet Yellen and Larry Summers, and so much great commentary on the Affordable Care Act.
posted by Dashy (36 comments total)

Always enjoyed her strip in the local Metro rag, but they dropped her w/o explanation a while back.
posted by Rash at 8:30 AM on April 29, 2014

"Its not about race, Rosa, its about courtesy." Fucking hilarious stuff, great post.
posted by marienbad at 8:31 AM on April 29, 2014 [3 favorites]

Yay for Jen! I always enjoy her work.
I just want to brag and say that I actually met Herb Block once while attending the Reuben awards. One of my heroes. Really nice guy.
posted by Thorzdad at 8:33 AM on April 29, 2014 [3 favorites]

Really great stuff! Hadn't heard of her before. Thanks for posting.
posted by Admiral Haddock at 8:35 AM on April 29, 2014

I know you're not supposed to read the comments, but...the first (only) comment in the first link is "Hey! She's GOOD. Shame that she's only once weekly. Read her stuff at http://jensorensen.com/ Kinda cute, too."

This is so ironic for an article about how she's the first woman cartoonist to win the award. SEXISTS LIKE YOU ARE WHY WOMEN AREN'T TAKEN MORE SERIOUSLY.
posted by Philosopher Dirtbike at 8:43 AM on April 29, 2014 [22 favorites]

I am pleased that she was awarded this prize; she's one of my favorite political cartoonists. It is a shame about that comment on the Post page.

Maybe Sorenson could work that comment into a cartoon.
posted by JDC8 at 8:46 AM on April 29, 2014 [1 favorite]

She's been published frequently on Medium's cartoon section The Nib, curated by Matt Bors. A well-deserved award for her.
posted by Peccable at 8:50 AM on April 29, 2014

This is good
posted by showbiz_liz at 8:59 AM on April 29, 2014 [6 favorites]

Is she the same person who did the aromatherapy cat box cartoon? It's been a long time since I saw it but the art seems similar, and of course now I can't find what I'm thinking of.
posted by phunniemee at 9:07 AM on April 29, 2014

And of course all I had to do was include "metafilter" in with my google search.

No, no she is not. Apparently I'm thinking of Lynda Barry.
posted by phunniemee at 9:10 AM on April 29, 2014

Wow, she is great, thanks for sharing the links to her work.

Why, oh, why can't Democrats respond to Republican attacks on their policies with the kind of succinct and sharp rhetoric she comes up with in her comics? She joins George Takei as the kind of person whose remarks I want to put on banners and fly across every major city in the U.S.
posted by lord_wolf at 9:52 AM on April 29, 2014 [1 favorite]

SEXISTS LIKE YOU ARE WHY WOMEN AREN'T TAKEN MORE SERIOUSLY.

That comment might have been a little tone-deaf, but calling it "sexist" is probably an overreaction.
posted by escape from the potato planet at 9:56 AM on April 29, 2014 [3 favorites]

Wow, she's great! I'll be hunting down her stuff the rest of the day! Her take on things is spot on, which is why I haven't seen her work before. Our local paper is so conservative their editorial cartoonist might as well be Stan Kelly. (Cue crying Statue of Liberty over the news he didn't win again this year.)
posted by TedW at 9:59 AM on April 29, 2014 [1 favorite]

No, it is sexist. It's like how articles about female politicians always have to discuss their appearance - something that you don't see happen with males.
posted by NoxAeternum at 10:01 AM on April 29, 2014 [12 favorites]

No, it is sexist. It's like how articles about female politicians always have to discuss their appearance - something that you don't see happen with males.

If the article said this it could be considered sexist. This is just someone’s opinion in the comments. They think she’s cute. If you think people don’t make comments about about males appearance in the comments then we are reading a different internet.

Why do people always say "I know I shouldn’t read the comments" and then repeat it here? Isn’t that something that’s actively discouraged?
posted by bongo_x at 10:11 AM on April 29, 2014 [1 favorite]

That comment might have been a little tone-deaf, but calling it "sexist" is probably an overreaction.

Do comments about male cartoonists also mention whether they're "kinda cute"? No? So it's something that only happens to one gender?

uh, then that makes it sexist.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:11 AM on April 29, 2014 [13 favorites]

If the article said this it could be considered sexist. This is just someone’s opinion in the comments.

It was the person making that comment who was being described as "sexist". So, yeah.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:12 AM on April 29, 2014 [2 favorites]

I don't really follow cartoonists by name these days, but I've seen her work dozens of times and love it to death. Glad to follow her by name from here on out.
posted by mathowie at 10:15 AM on April 29, 2014 [1 favorite]

I remember her from the MetroTimes back when they dropped Tom Tomorrow; she's gotten much, much better (if still a little on-the-nose at times). She used to be almost direly orthodox liberal, and it meant a lot of her comics came out as BAD THING IS BAD. Her art has gotten better too. Weirdly, I think the election of Obama ended up being a real boon for her, because the evil of the Bush years was just overwhelming.
posted by klangklangston at 10:21 AM on April 29, 2014

Well, and the general, "six more years of being a cartoonist helps with your craft" thing.
posted by klangklangston at 10:21 AM on April 29, 2014 [1 favorite]

That comment might have been a little tone-deaf, but calling it "sexist" is probably an overreaction.

okay lets walk this through

how is it tone deaf. what makes it tone deaf
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 10:22 AM on April 29, 2014 [2 favorites]

How about discussing the cartoons, and the cartoonists achievements rather than the Level-of-ism/was-it-ism derail that is so popular around here
posted by lalochezia at 10:29 AM on April 29, 2014 [12 favorites]

How about discussing the cartoons, and the cartoonists achievements rather than the Level-of-ism/was-it-ism derail that is so popular around here

I agree. It's totally unnecessary for people to come in and say Well That's Kind of Harsh when someone gets frustrated at the (maybe somewhat mild) sexism of a comment under an article about a cartoonist who is the first woman to win the Herblock Prize. The comment is a small instance of the kind of thing she has had to fight past to win her honor; I think we can do better than to pick nits.

I prefer a more visual, less verbal style of political cartooning, but the cartoons are good. They deserve the award. I hope Sorenson keeps putting out good work.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 10:41 AM on April 29, 2014 [2 favorites]

Oh she's the genius behind SLOWPOKE? I've been loving those strips for years! Way to go, Jen!

Also i think I need to start paying more attention to bylines
posted by Doleful Creature at 10:51 AM on April 29, 2014 [1 favorite]

MeTa
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 10:52 AM on April 29, 2014

Re-railing, here's hoping that Roz Chast joins the list soon.
posted by Dashy at 10:55 AM on April 29, 2014 [2 favorites]

She's terrific. This is giving me tiny feelings of hope.
posted by theora55 at 11:03 AM on April 29, 2014

(if still a little on-the-nose at times)

That was definitely my take away from a few of these (a little too much "Here is the point I am making with this cartoon" type explanations instead of letting the reader draw his or her own conclusion). Still, the gentrification cartoon alone is worthy of an award.
posted by The Gooch at 11:05 AM on April 29, 2014

Like her work lots, thanks for the link...
posted by Alexandra Kitty at 11:50 AM on April 29, 2014

She is funny. I almost spit on my screen with Thanksgiving Premium and Thanksgiving Basic. Thanks for sharing this; I'd never heard of her.
posted by shoesietart at 12:27 PM on April 29, 2014

Any enemy of paycheck debit cards is my friend. The fact that she also had a comic panel topped by the sentence "Yes, an army of baby-proofed sluts propelled Obama to victory" seals it. Thanks for bringing her to my attention.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 4:04 PM on April 29, 2014 [3 favorites]

This is great; thanks for bringing it here. I didn't know her work. What a good choice! Go Herblock award choosers.
posted by LobsterMitten at 5:09 PM on April 29, 2014

The Black Friday cartoon is pretty good, too.

She's pretty good at puncturing a few balloons, IMO.
posted by BlueHorse at 6:58 PM on April 29, 2014

We went to school together, but she was unaware of my existence (I knew her from her comic strips in the student papers)! Hooray!

She and M. Wartella kind of seemed like they were a bit of clique when I was in school - their drawings back then shared a few similarities. Jen was more cartoons only, Wartella did a lot of clip dada clip art stuff.
posted by LionIndex at 7:29 PM on April 29, 2014

Good for Jen! I knew her back in school too, at U.Va. She did some stuff for us at the Dec, I'm pretty sure.

Little-known fact: she did a bunch of images for a guidebook to El Salvador that a partner and I put together after graduating.
posted by gottabefunky at 11:06 AM on April 30, 2014

"a giant butt made of 339 billion dollars set on fire"

But how do you and your cohort get rich out of setting 339 billion on fire?

Oh, who am I kidding? They'd find a way.
posted by ODiV at 9:54 AM on May 2, 2014