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nyt

2023-11-06 View on smbc-comics.com → 1 revision
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nyt
Votey panel for nyt
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Explanation

This comic is a promotional image celebrating an opinion piece published in The New York Times by Zach and Kelly Weinersmith. The image shows a screenshot of the NYT website displaying their guest essay titled "Space Billionaires Should Spend More Time Thinking About Sex," with enthusiastic hand-written annotations like "Holy crap!", "By me and Kelly!", and "click to read!"

The humor here operates on multiple levels. First, the essay title itself is classically Weinersmith -- taking a serious topic (space colonization by billionaires like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos) and framing it through an unexpectedly provocative lens (reproduction and sex in space). The title is designed to be attention-grabbing and slightly absurd while actually pointing to a legitimate scientific concern: the challenges of human reproduction in space environments, which is a topic covered in their book "A City on Mars."

Second, there is a charming, self-deprecating humor in Weinersmith's genuine excitement about being published in the Times. The hand-scrawled annotations convey an almost childlike enthusiasm that contrasts with the prestigious venue, making the whole thing feel endearingly honest rather than boastful. The comic serves as both celebration and advertisement for the essay and, by extension, the Weinersmiths' book.

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