Unca $crooge sends this one in, noting “This seems like two different conversations but maybe there is a connection that I don’t get.”
The Dinette Set is in reruns, so this could refer to some current event we’ve forgotten, although this comic didn’t tend to refer to current events.
Comics I Don't Understand 
The two … figures? … standing by the grill are apparently drawn as male, but the comic seems to want to raise issues of gender uncertainty. One is wearing a Vassar shirt (Vassar was originally an all-women’s college) and the other is inexplicably labeling himself as “100% male”, as if there would otherwise be doubt. Meanwhile the two people in the foreground are talking about women violating gender stereotypes (women smoking cigars). And the Vassar-shirted person is grilling cigars, according to the art, and is putting his/her/their bare hand on a hot grill.
Yeah, I got nothing.
After reading through a week’s worth of totally unfunny “The Dinette Set” comics, I have come to the conclusion that the only point to most of the panels is the obscure “find the random Easter egg”. Sometimes syndicates cancel comics for good reasons.
As Carl Fink points out, if this were coming out new today, we would see it as some attempt at commentary on gender activism. Advocates of TWAW might point to AMAB burly bearded cigar smokers who identify as women. And likely also AFAB men who have taken up cigars as another step in presenting masculine – although on the activists’ terms these individuals would not be counted in “Women smoking cigars”.
The boys are dreaming of having jobs with high powered women around because they are attracted to that.
@Kilby has it, I think — I see “Find-It dog bone” at top left and a poorly drawn bone straddling the fence. Also wondering what the white thing sticking out of Mr. Vassar’s leg is supposed to be. Not sure I want to know, actually.
The premise of the The Dinette Set was to present tacky, lower class petite bourgeoisie in their native habitat and
make fun of thempay respectful homage to them; as such, the premises are endless: cigars becoming more popular in popular culture? How would our paragons of bad taste react? Women smoking said cigars? What do our adorably undereducated naifs have to say? And it’s so crudely drawn that any criticism of mean-spiritedness can blithely be blinked away because you see, this is not a cynical appropriation, this is genuine naïve primitivism [wink! wink!] 😜While I do not fully understand what is going on in this particular strip, it may be helpful to remember that the joke in Dinette Set is always the same: “Dumb lower middle class suburbanites sure are dumb.“
@phsiiicidu
(my 2c)
the “thing sticking out” is his shoe.
the peach colored thing under it is the other woman’s cup
Rammy M: You’re probably right. It looks like it’s in the middle of his leg the way it’s colored/drawn! If the cup were a different color it might be clearer. Thanks.
I think “Vassar” hears the women talking, starts to make a comment, then thinks again (“No… wait…”), decides that cigar-smoking women are virtually men, which must make his non-cigar-smoking self a woman, so he should raise his stature with
a less-old-fashionedly-womanly job, but Burl is having no such uppitiness.
Which is a stretch, to say the least, but sort of hold together.
I like the Dinette Ste alot and think it was consistently funny. I especially like the t-shirts that sometimes make you say OMG (e.g. “Sag Harbor” or “Psycho – on Ice”). It does satirizes middle class perceptions and that can make it uncomfortable for some. But it had a nice 25-year run, only ending when Julie Larson, who passed last year, retired. Not everybody’s cup of tea but it still has more followers in reruns that a lot of other strips. Usually the joke isn’t hard to understand but this one didn’t seem to make sense. And those are hot dogs on the grill, not cigars.
I think Anonymous is closest. Vassar is likely repulsed by the idea of cigar smoking women. So he suggests getting high paying jobs as it will attract a better class of women. 100% Male is worried that the women will hear it and not be happy.
“King of the Hill” shows you can do this kind of humor without contempt for the characters.