2014-11-03
Explanation
The Joke
A parent observes that the longer they are a parent, the more adults seem like babies with a greater capacity for evil. This sets up a series of panels demonstrating the point.
In the first example, an adult man throws a tantrum: "I wanted my cookie! MY! THE COOKIE! BUT I--" and another adult steps in to explain, "Of course. It is not about the cookie. It is about the low quality of workmanship among your generation." The joke here is that the adult is behaving exactly like a toddler having a meltdown over a cookie, but rationalizes it with adult-sounding grievances about generational decline -- dressing up infantile behavior in intellectual language.
The next panel notes that "this is generally a good thing" and shows adults comforting each other the same way you would comfort a child: "What is it?" "Jesus Christ, dude." "Awww, look at his pouty lower lip." The humor is in seeing adult emotional support reduced to the same cooing and soothing you would give to a fussy baby.
The final panels show the dark side: "But it has led to some problems." An adult is tickling another adult, saying "You just had bad dreams. You need... a tickle tickle tickle!" and the person being tickled screams "POLICE! POLICE!" -- because unlike with actual children, uninvited physical contact between adults is a serious boundary violation.
The Humor
The comic works by taking the familiar parenting observation that "adults are just big children" and pushing it to its logical extremes. The progression from relatable (adults throw tantrums but rationalize them) to wholesome (adults comfort each other like babies) to dark (treating another adult like a child leads to assault) creates a satisfying comedic arc. The final panel lands as a punchline because it takes the same behavior that is perfectly normal with a toddler and shows how it becomes genuinely threatening when applied to adult relationships.