Cartoonists tend to be interested in things which are not what they appear to be and this interest often has a great relevance to human behaviour. In contemporary observation, Gordon Brown is not prudent and George Osborne is not obviously past puberty. This interest applies in day-to-day life and also, on the interweb. So, responsible and reputable blogs and websites have comment moderation (no, it is registration*) turned on so that people have to identify themselves before unburdening themselves of their knowledge or opinions.

The practice of deception, or, anonymous commenting on the interweb is a simple manifestation of playful human behaviour and the paraphrase, sock-puppeting is an extremely accurate dissection of what the anonymous commenter is doing.

Just like physical sock-puppeting, it can be harmless and fun, but, there are people who still like to ball the sock into a fist and then, anonymously, smash someone elses’ head in. I think this is deeply regrettable behaviour.

So, if anyone reading this would like to use the following pictures of sock puppets, whenever they spot this sort of anonymous behaviour going on, they should feel free to use these three drawings which I am returning to human nature.

CORRECTION and CLARIFICATION in the bold type; made at 15.30 Tuesday 25th November

Addition: 2nd September 2012 – Added colour Sock Puppet version

FREE! I spotted a sock puppet Cartoon graphic - Please use this image as you will