Where I get my ideas

People have asked me where I get my ideas. I do a lot of reading, for one thing. I listen to podcasts. Alex Jones inspired many of my cartoons because he often speaks using vivid metaphors. I get many ideas when I go on a daily walk. They often come in a flash. If I try to 'force' an idea, it never comes. I call it vertical vs. horizontal thinking. Artists use vertical thinking. Sometimes the ideas are somewhat vague at first, then they develop on their own in a random way.

Here is a case where I was inspired by a Star Trek episode, 'The Apple.' The inhabitants of the planet feed and pay tribute to 'Vol' who takes care of them in return. In our case, people often expect government to meet all needs and solve all problems, but in exchange people lose all freedom. The country becomes a banana republic. That's what the cartoon is about.

I have a cheap notebook in which I chicken scratch out some basic ideas. I've had many good ideas that have gone undrawn simply because of no time. I make no money from the cartoons and commercial art must come first.

Trolls such as Andrew Anglin claim I 'copy' a racist, anonymous cartoonist now known as Nick Bougas. It's a lie. Just because Bougas once drew a train means nobody else can ever draw a train? That's absurd. It’s my contention that Andrew Anglin is not a Nazi at all. He uses his silly, cartoon Nazi schtick as a means to troll. He knows hate pays and figured out he could make a living from doing what he loves best in life—trolling. That's why he drives hard to the donation hoop. You’ll see him often call his ‘troops’ out to troll various targets. When he himself is trolled he cries crocodile tears and fails to see the irony in his own hypocrisy. My lawyer said what he’s doing can be considered satire, but pasting my name onto A. Wyatt Mann cartoons and claiming I drew them crosses the line. He also publishes defaced cartoons which he claims are ‘originals’ and that is clearly libel. Again, I don’t want to censor anyone and they’re free to call me every name in the book. They can ridicule my cartoons all they like. Fine. I can take that. I can’t take them defacing my work and leaving my name on it and then claim it’s the original while mine are fake. If that’s not libel then libel does not exist. --Ben Garrison