Is Comic Sans the “plague of our time”?
By Emily Price
Fifteen years ago Vincent Connare was working at Microsoft and created the typeface Comic Sans. The comic strip inspired typeface quickly found its way onto signs, school papers, and restaurant menus and has become a pretty common typeface to see almost everywhere. Close to a decade ago a group started with the sole mission of banning the typeface, and now thanks to the Internet they are growing stronger.
So what’s so bad about Comic Sans?
According to the group trying to eradicate it:
We believe in the sanctity of typography and that the traditions and established standards of this craft should be upheld throughout all time. From Gutenberg’s letterpress to the digital age, type in all forms is sacred and indispensable.
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Technological advances have transformed typography into a tawdry triviality. The patriarchs of this profession were highly educated men.
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Clearly, Comic Sans as a voice conveys silliness, childish naivete, irreverence, and is far too casual for such a purpose. It is analogous to showing up for a black tie event in a clown costume.
We are summoning forth the proletariat around the globe to aid us in this revolution. We call on the common man to rise up in revolt against this evil of typographical ignorance. … By banding together to eradicate this font from the face of the earth we strive to ensure that future generations will be liberated from this epidemic and never suffer this scourge that is the plague of our time.
While I can get behind the idea that the typeface may not be the most appropriate choice sometimes, I think that it hardly qualifies as “the plague of our time” The group has created an online petition for supporters to sign, has Flickr group for people to upload offending Comic Sans pictures, and has a special webpage where you can download “Ban Comic Sans” propaganda to distribute.
In a recent Wall Street Journal article Connare, the creator of the typeface was asked what he thought about the movement and said, “If you love it, you don’t know much about typography…if you hate it, you really don’t know much about typography, either, and you should get another hobby.”
I personally couldn’t agree more.
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April 19th, 2009
I think these elitist buffoons need to get a life.
April 19th, 2009
wow…who cares. It is an ugly font, but someone people use and like it.
April 19th, 2009
Really, is this what we have come down to…I would think that the generations that have created everything from instant coffee to touch screen computers would have something better to do. Honestly, do we have nothing better to do with our time than to complain about a font?? Its AMERICA, whoever can use the font for whatever they want! ITS OUR RIGHT!! Banning a font isn’t any better than banning a race, to me its the same concept. GET OVER IT!!! I will not be surprised if someone makes an EXIT sign using that font now, and if anyone wants to I will personally contribute to the cost of doing so…seriously people COME ON!
April 20th, 2009
I’m outraged by this group that wants to ban the much loved Comic Sans font, and will therefore be setting up a petition calling for such groups to be banned.