June 2022 Skin Horse Wallpapers: Hello and Goodbye
Shaenon: Could these be…our final wallpaper designs? I made wallpapers based on the covers for the upcoming Volume 11 and Volume 12. (By the way, these volumes are funding now on Zoop, and if we hit the next stretch goal I’ll draw another season of my X-Files comic, Monster of the Week.)
As usual, if you make a donation in any amount to the Skin Horse Tip Jar, or contribute any amount to our Patreon, we’ll give you a link to these wallpapers, designed for two computer desktop sizes and cell phones. Thanks, everyone!
Channing: While you’ll obviously want this art in lovely physical form on the covers of the last two volumes, you will obviously also want them on your computer as well!
Now I want all 12 covers rendered as a Dodecahedron!
So … Just found this out, thanks to Ricky and Eliot.
Californian bees are fish.
OK … sorta says it all really. What a world.
The law protecting endangered species left out land invertebrates likes, but the description of fish includes marine invertebrates. shellfish and cephalopods being important to California fishermen. It really wasn’t much of a stretch to add in bees as equally in need of a loose interpretation.
Yes, I know the overarching reasons for the decision. What I am put out by is;
1) The lack of foresight of the legislators not including invertebrates in
ARTICLE 1. General Provisions [2062] of the California Endangered Species Act.
All they really had to put was “Californias native flora and fauna” to cover everything.
2) The slipperiness of the judiciary to mix and match legal code to get whatever outcome they desire.
I know that it is good that bees are now covered as endangered and I know that the judiciary took this path to forestall legislators faffing around creating/editing a law. The doublethink however is worrisome and open to misuse. A cursory glance at the California Fish and Game Code seems to imply that beehives now fall under aquaculture which could provoke some interesting future lawsuits.
Important points to consider:
1. Generally, the idea that arthropods, mollusks, and other invertebrates are NOT disgusting vermin in need of a swatting or spraying is relatively recent; when Rachel Carson spoke of entolomologists in Silent Spring (1962), for example, it is almost invariably in the context of pesticide manufacturers who were then the biggest employers of entomologists. Given that legislators tend to be older, and the relevant act was enacted in 1970… it isn’t lack of foresight so much as “Ew! Protect those disgusting buzzing crawling vermin?!” Hence this nonsense.
2. In general, while environmental protection was not originally a political partisan issue, species protection almost always has been (TVA v. Hill w/Snail darter, Spotted owl and logging). As a result, trying to add species within existing frameworks, let alone adding new frameworks, will face political and popular opposition as a matter of course. The question becomes, what will get protection for bees faster? Factor bees under fish protections or try to convince the surprisingly high number of fashionably anti-environmentalism legislators in California to expand protections? Hence this nonsense.
3. State and federal agencies are executive branch entities delegated power by the legislature to act as subject matter experts. At any point, either one can strip an agency of its ability and authority to act, change what it can do, or abolish it entirely. Agencies and courts are very much aware of this, and agencies will try to avoid drawing undue attention to themselves from the electorate. Hence this nonsense.
If I recall the story right…back in the late nineteenth century, maybe early twentieth, there were “cruelty to animals” laws, but none protecting children. In the case of one abused child, the authorities couldn’t come up with anything other than those “cruelty to animals” laws to prosecute the parents. The head of the local SPCA stood up in court and said “That child is an animal.”
I’m not thrilled that this mangling of language is being used here—I’m not sure it serves any purpose, or that the purpose is worth serving—but I can see where it came from.
The Mary Ellen Wilson abuse case…
Yup, that’s the one.
Is the last cover an Oz reference? I’m not very familiar with Ozian art, but Tip’s SH logo sceptre very much puts me in mind of Ozma’s OZ sceptre.
Oh, and, um, I’m very bad at self promotion, and I was really hoping to have more of this story done before I mentioned it here, but it’s gradually dawning me we’re running out of time. So …if you think you might be interested in the first chapter of a Skin Horse fanfic that features precisely none of the canonical characters, you can find one here:
https://archiveofourown.org/works/38273311/chapters/95632396
The second chapter should be ready at some point in the next week. After that, I’m not sure.
Yep, it’s a reference to one of the cover designs of Ozma of Oz: https://i.imgur.com/gUgrvwo.png
That’s a 1980s reissue cover. This is closer to the John R. Neill original: https://www.flickr.com/photos/lvsutton/3607165402/
Oh, well, you know. The late 70s early 80s Sci-Fi, comic splash page inspired covers of the Del Rey reissues are now classics in their own right.
Yeah. I said last time, when the cover art went up, there’s one character, right behind Dr. Lee, almost out of sight, that I can’t figure out who it is.
Oh, wait… I know who that is… she’s that .. you know…. okay. …
This will take a while….
Okay… I thought she might but the Notary Abbess but going back I was certainly mistaken.
I might’a thought Dr. Lee if Dr. Lee wasn’t standing right in front of her.
Looks like that’s Jonah and Nera, except I don’t remember Jonah ever wearing glasses.
Months, many months later…staring at the actual covers now that I have the books…I can put a name to the face.
Remy!
It’s a big Skin-Horse wallpaper feast. A character grouping, at least. For these phenomena, it’s one last hurrah, since the strip that we see will have ceased.