Explain SMBC — the wiki for Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

Dox

2020-10-21 View on smbc-comics.com → 1 revision
Dox
Votey panel for Dox
This explanation is incomplete or may contain errors. It was generated by AI and has not yet been reviewed by a human editor.

Explanation

The Joke

The comic presents a series of definitions that play on the prefix "dox" (from "doxxing," the act of releasing someone's private information online). The first panel defines "doxxing" straightforwardly as releasing private information online. The second defines "paradoxxing" as proving someone's non-existence — a play on "paradox," suggesting that if you reveal enough about someone, you somehow prove they do not exist. The third panel notes that "the fact that reality seems real is proof that it isn't real, because most things that seem real are illusions" — a philosophical tangent riffing on the paradox concept.

The final panel defines "orthodoxing" as getting someone to join a small, insular religious community. This is a pun on "Orthodox" (as in Orthodox Judaism, Orthodox Christianity, etc.). The person who has been "orthodoxed" is shown wearing traditional Orthodox Jewish attire and saying "The community spirit is incredible but I miss bacon" — referencing the kosher dietary laws that prohibit pork.

The Humor

The comic is built entirely on wordplay, taking the internet slang term "dox" and extending it by attaching real prefixes (para-, ortho-) to create fake compound words. Each definition gets progressively more absurd and further removed from the original concept of doxxing. The "orthodoxing" punchline works particularly well because it sounds like it could be a real internet term (getting someone pulled into an insular online community is a recognizable phenomenon), but the visual gag reveals it to be about literal religious orthodoxy. The bacon line serves as a relatable, humanizing detail that grounds the absurdity.

View History (1) Original Comic
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