Donkey Dyslexia: The Commentary

You can read the complete comic strip in the Full-Length Comic Strip Section: Page #7


Jack "Asso" Donkey sometimes goes into the wrong public bathrooms. Why? Well, he finally reveals the reason in this episode! Jack has a disability that prevents him from reading well called dyslexia. A person with dyslexia sees letters differently. For example, they may get confused with the letters E, M & W, plus the digit 3. Dyslexics may also get confused with the lowercase letters b, d, p & q. It just so happens that the words "men" & "women" have M's & 1 of them has a W. That is what confused poor Jack. He also isn't very good at spelling words, but at least he can count. (He has dyslexia, not dyscalculia!) He knows that the word "woman" has 5 letters & the word "man" has 3 letters. But the word "male" has 4 letters & the word "female" also has 5 letters. Depending on which words are used on the signs, Jack still gets a little confused about which public bathroom is reserved for which gender. Hence, he has this terrible problem.

The walls with arrow-themed patterns show the direction of gravity of the gravity fields. The blue & periwinkle field is up; the red, orange & pink field is down!

After the poor male donkey goes into the wrong bathroom again, Sally Brittany Martin sees him in there & chases him back out! In a later scene, Sally & Danielle Stephanie Lipstick ask him why does he keep going into the ladies' bathroom. He was too embarrassed to tell them the reason at first, but finally he admits that he has dyslexia. The Brass Ladies start to think that they may have judged Jack too harshly. But since Jack told the others about his problem, they could figure out how to help him. And so, with assistance, Jack could stop making this mistake, not to mention avoiding misjudgment from women in a ladies' bathroom! (Who may not necessarily be misandristic.)

  

Besides dyslexics, blind people might also go into the wrong public bathrooms by mistake! (Obviously, you have to see to read!) If a blind man goes into a ladies' bathroom by mistake, the ladies inside the bathroom may feel embarrassed about it but since the man is blind, he can't see what they're doing in there! So his blindness should make it less embarrassing for the ladies. But seriously, even if you have a visual disability, you still want to stay out of the wrong bathrooms (or anywhere else you're not invited in) because unfortunately, some people are too quick to pass out judgments on others. In other words, some people are very judgmental. Speaking of judgment, you should never judge others too quickly before you get to know them; otherwise, you'll end up misjudging them. That's the moral of this episode's story. Before you slap, punch, kick or beat up a man who enters the wrong bathroom, ladies, maybe you should think about whether he has a visual disability or not.

  

P.S.: There's something called Braille that blind people use to "read" with their sense of touch. They can rely on their other senses to stay out of the wrong places!

Back to the Extra Section

Back to the Index page

© Derek Cumberbatch