It's Iimi! The Untied States of America?

Najiyah encounters Iimi near the town center and sees it as an opportunity to handle an assignment from her citizenship classes, especially as she can see a country that seems to be coming apart. Can Iimi use her Catholic beliefs to help explain the nature of… The Untied States of America?

Pre-Comic Notes:

If you think I have a typo in the title… no, I haven’t.

Post-Comic Notes:

To learn more about freedom in Qatar, see the report from Freedom House: https://freedomhouse.org/country/qatar/freedom-world/2023.

The Oath of Allegiance Najiyah references is: 

“I hereby declare, on oath, that I absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty, of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen; that I will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I will bear arms on behalf of the United States when required by the law; that I will perform noncombatant service in the Armed Forces of the United States when required by the law; that I will perform work of national importance under civilian direction when required by the law; and that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; so help me God.”

Further notes on ﷺ vs. (SAW): As mentioned in the comic, I recently learned that while the same salutation (“Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam” or “Peace Be Upon Him”) is also used for others besides Muhammad, the ﷺ symbol (which means the same thing) is only supposed to be used for Muhammad.

While that’s immaterial to me, who professes Jesus as True God and True Man, I figure, when it does not involve denying what I believe, it is simply good manners to respect Muslim conventions when portraying a Muslim speaker in the comic.

Image Credits

The pair of superheroine flagbearers on the cover is © Jeshields, used under license. I thought they would make a nice diptych reflecting the differences among Americans while sharing citizenship.

The banners used for the Act headers are by Art Fantasies.

The image in the campaign poster for Alan R. Rogant is © 2006 Bradley K McDevitt.

The image in the campaign poster for Mayor Abigail Taylor-Loville is Copyright ©2017 Steve Miller. All Rights Reserved.

The Revolutionary War painting on page 13 is “The Battle of Long Island” by Alonzo Chappel (1828-1887)

The Civil War painting on page 14 is “The Battle of Shiloh” by Thure de Thulstrup (1848-1930).

Some images used in this comic were AI drafted by the author using NightCafe and then edited by the same. No artist names were used in the prompts.