One of the best of the Donald shorts is Self-Control. While relaxing on a hammock in the yard, Donald listens to a radio show about anger management. Despite the swirling eyeballs and spastic babbling, Donald denies that he has a problem (and hey, he actually thinks the radio is speaking to him!) He’s told that if one counts to 10, all their anger will fade away. As insects keep pestering the resting Donald, he tries counting and initially it works. But by the end, he snaps and shouts, “I CAN’T STAND IT” and beats the radio with a club.

Donald is so swayed by the dark side that even his angelic side snaps (Donald’s Better Half) and beats the tar out of his demonic colleague.

In Donald’s Nephews, we are introduced to Huey, Duey and Louie. Why Donald’s sister would ever leave her kids with Donald is beyond logic? Perhaps she’s being hospitalized for drug related problems. Anyway… the guy is clearly irresponsible. He’s manic-depressive, has a speech problem, not to mention socio- and psycho-pathic tendencies. Why on earth would you leave your kids with him? To make matters worse… the kids — not surprisingly — are hyper little shit in need of some umm… guidance (as we also see in Good Scouts and Hockey Champ). The trio actually manages to out-asshole Donald in most of the shorts. I stopped with Hockey Champ. It just becomes too much. It’s prolly like trying to eat a big ass bowl of caviar like those in Amazing Race had to do (speaking of which… there were some MAJOR assholes on that show).

And really, Donald is no different than any other cartoon character. The situations change, the personalities don’t. Goofy is always an idiot. Bugs a wise-ass. Daffy a maniac, Popeye a tough guy, and Donald an asshole. There is no self-awareness (except maybe with Bugs) and as such no desire to change. And of course…. that’s part of the comedy and joy of it all. These are caricatures, personalities taken to extremes. We’re drawn to Donald for the same reasons we abhor David Brent (The Office): we recognize our own faults and momentary shortcomings in those characters. Every one of us has an asshole inside us or loses their cool when they become frustrated with the ways of the world around us. It’s a predicament of capitalism… and life. How do we resolve our quest of individual self-fulfillment and harmony WHILE respecting and recognizing that others have the right to do the same damn thing?

I started this piece hating Donald. I questioned those who found this utterly contemptuous piece of shit remotely redeemable, funny or — gadzooks — loveable. But I started thinking about how much more realistic (even getting mad at an inanimate object is actually pretty normal) and somehow honest Donald’s character is than say other asshole characters like Larry David, the Seinfeld characters, or Alan Partridge (Steve Coogan character on British TV). Most of these assholes are ultimately likeable and always seem to manage to come away unscathed (even the Seinfeld prison finale was a bit of a compromise), learning nothing from their experiences.

True, Donald doesn’t ever appear to learn anything, but he never goes unpunished. Virtually every episode ends with Donald going apeshit over some failure. He almost never gets what he seeks… and just keeps repeating the same mistakes over and over again. Like the solipsistic David Brent, Donald is painfully unaware of the world around him and the emotions of those within it. Yet Donald (maybe a symptom of the rise of consumer society) — for all his anti-social behavior — is desperately seeking identity, something that will give him a role in this new world. Something that will allow him to be accepted and maybe even loved. His crazed response to his inevitable failure is the scream of the dislocated individual at odds with a society drenched with simulacra. Donald’s great tragedy — like it is for so many of us — is that he seeks something that doesn’t exist to begin with.

Chris Robinson is little more than a man. In his spare time he cares for the elderly. www.animationpimp.com.