2012-05-02
Explanation
This comic mocks a certain type of complaint about Valentine'''s Day. In the first panel, a man grumbles, "Valentine'''s Day is all a bullshit holiday for women! It'''s dumb! Why isn'''t there a holiday for people like me?" This captures the attitude of people who dismiss Valentine'''s Day not out of any principled objection, but out of bitterness that the holiday does not cater to them.
The second panel delivers the punchline by granting his wish in the most unflattering way possible: a banner reads "Unproductive Resentment Day!" and the same man sits alone at a table wearing a party hat with a single cupcake and candle. The joke is that Weinersmith is labeling this attitude for exactly what it is -- unproductive resentment -- and imagining what a holiday celebrating that mindset would actually look like. The lonely, pathetic celebration underscores the self-defeating nature of the complaint.
The votey panel has the man cheerfully saying, "For me, every day'''s a holiday!" -- a final twist that implies he lives in a perpetual state of unproductive resentment, doubling down on the comic'''s portrait of someone whose bitterness is more of a lifestyle than a seasonal grievance.