Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson for May 04, 2022

Do any of these magazines have a swimsuit issue?

As Bill pointed out in the 10th Anniversary Book, these barely count as satire given how similar Calvin’s gum magazines are to real magazines about specific topics.

It all depends on what you’re melting..

you sure know marketing when you read it, Calvin

Otherwise known as the classic, “Make money off of someone’s messed up mind” scheme.

Hmm. Does this explain regionalism? The way some people in the US can’t get along with the others? Is it all about BRANDING??

That’s going to gum up the works

Then there’s the “Collector’s” magazine for those who like to source their gum from under tables, chairs, and benches.

This is really something to chew on.

It looks like he predicted Google and Facebook targeted ads. They know what kind of gum you chew.

Good question, Hobbes – the bottom fell out of the melting pot!

The melting pot is now compartmentalized; a “chambered-pot” if you will.

Unfortunately, it’s not something we can wrigley out of!

There was a 1980s UK women’s mag called Options that my boss used to get. I looked into one on a rainy day. Page-size glossy photo ads on every other page. Lots of inserts. Decorating tips facing ads for paint, curtains, furniture etc. Fashion tips facing clothing and makeup ads. The only thing worth reading was Maureen Lipman’s funny column, which was cut after 3 issues.

Calvin, you’re not going to be good consumer, are you?

The melting pot? It melted.

The melting pot was never intended to homogenize food preferences.

Not surprising—there are porn and gun-nut magazines that are of the same purpose!!

I think of our makeup as less of a melting pot, but more of a tossed salad…

Melting Pot Digest?

“Vintage gum collectors”? As the old Australian song said: “Does your chewing gum lose its flavor on the bed post over night?”

Silly Tiger! Chewing gum doesn’t melt.

Local bookstore had about four mags on surfing. I’m in central Canada, over a thousand miles from any ocean.

I adore the “Chewing” strips. Watterson based it off of his own cycling hobby and the resulting horde of different magazines about such a specific topic, then ramped it into comic absurdity perfectly via this “Gum chewing” thing.

And now they have subsets within those subsets to make you feel even more cliquish…

The goal of advertising: convince a person who just got up from eating a full meal that he/she is still hungry.

The way to do that is, sell the sizzle not the steak [Elmer Wheeler, New Yorker Magazine April 8, 1938.]

Do I dare ask, what’s a Gonzo Chewer?

I bet Dad subscribes to half a dozen similar magazines for bicyclists.

Birds of a feather stick together. Common interests draw different people together. I think that’s why there is more than one bar in most towns. (On a related topic. Why can’t I find Black Jack chewing gum anymore?)

the melting pot is the name of a fondu fan site

I’m both amused and saddened at this tactic. Like many others I buy into it.

The Melting Pot was a fondue restaurant here in town a long time ago.

For a decade from my bedroom window i gazed down upon the development from 2 floors up across the alley of the ‘Gum Wall’ https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Gum_Wall ..folks at 3:33am would stand on shoulders to plant that wad as high as possible. funny, i never thought to contribute, perhaps because i never was chewing one as i passed by..

Yes. What ever did happen to the melting pot? Now Dems slice and dice us in so many different ways. Not just political but gender, rhetoric, income, race, – just think of anything and the Dems will want a separate category so they can separate us more. To you Leftists that want to reply that the Republicans do the same thing, they are not the ones who came up with numerous genders, they don’t want to blame Whites for the ills of the world. It was President Trump that gave Blacks the lowest unemployment rate in the history of the country. It was President Trump that pardoned many Blacks that Obama refused to do. Open your eyes and see the real enemy.

“Melting pot”. I remember that.

No money in the melting pot? Nonsense! Get your subscription to Fondue Lovers magazine today!

Bill Watterson sure knew how to show us the ubsurdity of certain aspects of our culture, didn’t he? And when it comes from a precocious 6 year old, it doesn’t sound offensive, just naive and rather vapid.

What is a magazine?

The reason that there is no money in the melting pot is because they took it all out to print those magazines.

Vintage gum? EEEEWWWW.

What I like about today’s strip is that Calvin recognises that his ego is being massaged and that he is being exploited but he enjoys it. He realises that it’s a con but is happy to be conned. This says a lot about human nature and Hobbes is clearly having trouble understanding it.

Subcriptions are free.. they make their money on gullible little boys like Calvin.

On Monday, I stated that this was the start of a week of chewing gum strips. I have since looked in “The Days Are Just Packed” and have seen that the Saturday strip abandoned the chewing gum theme.

Actually the “melting pot” became popular again, once it was legalized. :)

Is there a magazine for gum chewing detectives? Something like Gumshoe Quarterly?

I, too, wonder why we abandoned the concept of a ‘melting pot’ and replaced it with ‘my identity group first’ ?

Waterson like all HOF Artists are timeless with their message.

No more magazines for me after Science News got political

What he says still pretty much applies to social media today, even the melting pot line can be like what TV is, with it’s appeal to a broad audience

How do we know Calvin’s not actually a “gonzo chewer?”

At modeling school eons ago, we were told the only place to chew gum is under your bed.

The melting pot is at the end of the rainbow……you have to go to the ends of the earth to find it.There’s an admission fee.

Wonder this kid with the kind of information on one topic has to waste his time in the school.