It would be like DBZ, but with hugging instead of fighting. Just as intense, and just as uncomfortably long.
Also, glad she went with classic Teen Titans Starfire and not Teen Titans Go Starfire. While I don’t think TTG is NEARLY as bad as a lot of people say (Quite a few of the jokes do give me a chuckle), it’s a pretty unremarkable series overall, and I can’t really watch more than a clip or two from YouTube at a time. Old Teen Titans, on the other hand, I could binge-watch for hours. And if I weren’t binge-watching Halloween stuff right now, I’d do just that.
What bothers me about TTG, besides comprising over 50% of CN’s schedule, is the way they received feedback about the show being mediocre and the characters one-dimensional and basically went “haha you’re exactly right!” And instead of striving to create better content, they added a few self-deprecating jokes to the show and called it a day. Imo that’s lazy as hell.
TTG exists to be lazy, it’s cheap and easy to produce and has a big audience, that’s all they were going for.
I mean, I can’t blame them, quality takes time, effort and money, gotta make up for the quality shows using all that somewhere. I just wish they’d done a unique show instead.
Personally I have my issues with both cartoons, but I’m old enough to have largely grown up on the Wolfman/Perez run of the comics so that’s hardly surprising.
I’m too old to have grown up on the Wolfman/Perez run of the comics. Fortunately for me, I did start reading Teen Titans during that run, shortly before the name changed to just “Titans”.
The animation style is smooth and I like some of the gags and references they sneak in (in the American Idol parody clip on YouTube, Cyborg’s neck extended after a Wonder Woman dream sequence, and they threw some obscure old characters into the crowd), but it seems like the show’s a constant barrage of these moments. None of them have any impact.
I ran out of patience for rapid-fire “lol wacky random moments” humor years ago. (Thanks, Newgrounds and classmates who never stopped quoting GIR.)
Nahhh
I’m REALLY old and I actually quite enjoy TTG.
(But then this is the only incarnation of them I’ve ever seen)
It’s just simple knock-down slapstick, which always has it’s place.
While this is true, I submit that “40%, 20%, 20%” is not representative of the quality of the series as a whole. That’s like using “The Inner Light” or “The Visitor”, or contrariwise “Spock’s Brain” or “Threshold”, as the standard to judge all of Star Trek.
OMG I remenber watching the FIRST RUN of TNG, then the reruns, movies, later series… Iike Star Trek just fine, but I can’t just rattle off episode titles, or even remember episodes when I see titles. I bow to your vastly superior geektitude.
I’m not sure what “pink horse” means and you’re probably right, but at the same time, it was partly her fault. Her overenthusiastic “we’re going to be best friends” and lack of boundaries certainly drove Malaya crazy and doesn’t look like it’s going to go over much better with Billie.
I personally suspect that Malaya made more…Lucy than she may have started off being, or at least is an influencing factor in her acting so at this moment. I mean, in panel three she admits to being anxious, in panel four she says, “I am not going to fall short, not again,”…and like, that gives me the sense that she blames herself for things not working with Malaya, like maybe if she could just act more likable things would have gone better, so goddammit she’s going to be as likable as she can with her second chance… unfortunately she only has one kind of idea of what “likable” can look like for her.
Yes, this. It’s one thing I try and instill in my kids. That they shouldn’t grab each other or each other’s things without permission and consent, because I feel that is the foundation that makes non-consensual sexual touch in the future so normalized.
while i agree, you also shouldn’t get too picky about smaller issues like these- we don’t want to create a society where every single social issue is something *huge*. if someone hugs you and it’s uncomfortable, you can go “please don’t do that”, but making every super wary of everything is also not exactly preferrable.
Establishing boundaries is important. I have met people who are very touchy, friendly people. They will continue to touch you/hug you if you don’t put down some strong boundaries. Plus most of them in my experience have a strong reaction to being told they can’t touch you. This is after I explain in a polite, calm manner that I’m not comfortable with them doing that.
I’ve found that I can redirect huggy people to give me high-fives instead when I’m not feeling huggy, which softens the rejection and makes us both happy. Most everyone likes high-fives!
(Only one person *ever* was a pouty jerk about this, which told me he’s creepy, and this was good info.)
However, I don’t know if this helps for when you have people who are touchy in general, and you aren’t into having any touches. Being non-touchy is legit, and common, I wish touchy people would be far more sensitive to this possibility.
Notlegato It’s not making it a huge deal. I have a friend who was raised on ‘no non consensual touching’ and every time she is saying bye to everyone she just says ‘do you hug?’ first to strangers and just ‘hug?’ to people she knows. I was so relieved because I hate physical contact. I think even a child can manage ‘hug, no hug’. It’s a smaller issue to you. Not to me
As someone who has never felt comfortable taking the initiative to hug others (due to social anxiety I have no idea?), being hugged by others makes me feel really, really, really happy (… and loved haha).
You can always tell people you don’t like being hugged. It would make me sad to live in a world without spontaneous hugs.
You can always tell people you want a hug. The default in most social interactions is to ask for what you want, or offer what you want to give. Not lay out all the ways that you don’t want to be bothered.
Why should your discomfort when asking for what you want, be considered worse than the significant downturn in my day from a single incident using up a significant amount of my social energy, or someone with PTSD being triggered because they were unexpectedly reminded of their trauma. Or our discomfort on saying ‘no, we reject this particular form of social interaction’, given the fact that that is likely to have all social interaction cut off, or else getting labeled as ‘anti-social’ and having all social boundaries ignored in an effort to help us.
>You can always tell people you want a hug. The default in most social interactions is to ask for what you want, or offer what you want to give. Not lay out all the ways that you don’t want to be bothered.
I don’t think this is the case. I never ask people to buy me gifts. Actually I specifically tell them not to, and I have no problem making that request. Telling people you’re okay being hugged just comes off as being weird in normal social situations, whereas people usually respect people who don’t wish to be touched.
No, people do not respect people who don’t want to be touched.
I am speaking from personal experience. Never, in my life, has ‘please don’t touch me’ been respected. Either I get touched anyway (usually by people who think they’re respecting my request, because it’s not a full-on hug, or they’re avoiding certain body parts), or I get insulted for being ‘anti-social’.
And do you seriously live in a world where people are spontaneously giving out presents day in and day out without warning, which would make it actually a good analogy for random unsolicited touches, and not one of the very rare exceptions, where the usual social contracts dictate ‘give’. Do you have people shoving random product into your hands the moment you enter the mall? Do people you hardly know drag you into restaurants because they haven’t seen you in a while?
No, you do not.
And do you introduce yourself with ‘Hi, I’m Edmund, and I don’t accept gifts’? Or do you wait until you get to a point where you would be expected to accept one, and tell people that you don’t want them? Because I am rarely given that option. I have to tell people I don’t like being touched randomly after I’ve jerked away from them, because they’ve put a hand on my shoulder, or randomly hugged me.
You think it’s awkward saying ‘give me a hug’? Try ‘sorry, it’s not you, it’s me, I don’t like touching except under certain circumstances that I control’.
While true, some of her dialogue comes off as almost creepy about it. “I won’t fail again” is a pretty dramatic way of phrasing it. At this point I’m not sure which way the character will go.
Eh, it’s the first couple months of freshman year for a lot of them, so I can see the ritual of it still having some impact on overall church going, and since religion is a part of what this comic’s about, it makes sense that more of the characters we see might be regularly involved in churches than the general population. Also, perception could be skewed by recent plot lines, because there are also plenty of characters who don’t attend church.
What I do find interesting is that there hasn’t been mention of religious student organizations on campus that they might get involved in. I don’t know how many students actually do that sort of thing, but it honestly seemed pretty prominent in my college. Oh, DO THEY HAVE A Q-CROSS (OR WHATEVER THEY MIGHT CALL IT)??? I WANT TO SEE BECKY AT A Q-CROSS MEETING.
Yeah, plus there’s a lot we just don’t know well enough to know if they do. Like, it’s a lot easier to confirm that someone does something than that they don’t, which can probably also contribute the percentage seeking larger than it is.
The irony is we still get folks who come in from time to time complaining about how there aren’t enough Christian characters and how “only the bad people” are Christian.
So, since Teen Titans is currently relevant:
1. When I was eleven I went as Raven for Halloween.
2. Thoughts on the episode “Things Change,” especially as the last episode of the series? (And then there was the movie and all that, but you probably know what I mean.)
I think it was an important episode. I think it sent the message to fans that it was ok for their favorite show to end and for them to grow and move on from it and let the characters grow and change from it as well.
Additionally, I think it hammered home an exceedingly important lesson about romantic feelings which is acceptance of when things are over and no longer pursuing someone who doesn’t want to be pursued, especially in the context of male nerd culture where this idea of persistent stalking is proof of true love is in so many other cartoons including a lot of the anime Teen Titans took its inspiration from.
I think in many ways it could have only worked as a final episode and provided a nice thematic tie that aided the mourning process of it being over a lot.
This is some great commentary on it (though what else should I expect). I remember when I was a child and it first aired, I was pissed that that was how it ended. Over time, though, I grew to love it.
I want to show her the Shortpacked! strip with her in it even though that makes no sense on like, six whole levels, just because it seems like she’s get a kick out of it.
Eh, it’s a confusing term, and it’d be fair to say, “I’ve heard it both ways.” Actually reading into it takes you down a kind of interesting linguistic rabbit hole.
I know she’s being too much right now (probably because she feels bad it didn’t work out with Malaya, as others have said), but I just love her so much. She’s so cheerful.
Lucy strikes me as a 100% nice girl to know. She’s honestly cheerful and friendly.
However, being something of an introvert, I can also foresee that Billie may find her a little exhausting to know on an emotional level. She may be a bit needy and need continual attention and close contact of the sort that might make some people uncomfortable.
Poor Lucy. I love her, and I hope Billie gets used to the new environment and can come to enjoy the others’ company — at least sooner or later. Also, Billie’s little smile in the first panel is super cute.
This is rapidly approaching creepy territory. when fate is playing this nice with you, you just know she’s winding up one hell of a curve ball to toss at you later on.
I won’t go into too many details but I know a Lucy.
She’s the sweetest and most genuinely kind human being that I’ve ever met. If you have any problem, you know that she will have time for you. That said, she has problems with the concept of ‘personal space’ and is an expert with ambush hugs. She’s a great person but she is enormously emotionally draining to spend time with on some days.
Panel 3: Aw, Lucy is an anxious extrovert. But I also feel Billie’s awkward expression at the onslaught of super friendly people. Like, I was very similar in college. I had just come from a culture where people being performatively friendly was usually a sign they were about to start trying to convert me. Plus, it can create a lot of social pressure to “measure up”.
And that often means performing normativity, being extroverted, and feeling bad about pockets of low self-esteem or self-hatred or internal flaws.
And for Billie, there’s a lot to worry about even as she enjoys the friendliness. We know she already struggles with not feeling good enough and this ups the ante again. Also, she struggles with demons that are not going to go well in this environment.
Like, the main one being her drinking. We know that Billie hasn’t actually stopped drinking at any point and that’s going to be impossible to hide with a roommate this eager and excited to be entangled with her life.
Panel 4: Oh Lucy, no, a social interaction that goes poorly doesn’t mean that you personally fucked up (says the hypocrite who always blames herself when a social interaction goes south).
And more importantly, doesn’t mean you need to increase the thing you were doing before so that you can now magically do it more “right”. Especially as it ignores the issues with that approach.
Like, Lucy is friendly and nice and I wish her less anxiety, but I can totally see why Malaya was so off-put by her. Overly friendly people can be scary or trigger bad memories of folks trying to save you.
And in a living situation, someone desperate to become immediate best friends can be a very offputting situation. I know personally, I greatly value privacy in home spaces and having space to just focus on my own thing, so a roommate being very loose with boundaries and trying to force a friendship would be very likely to trigger defensiveness on my part.
Panel 5: And that’s exemplified here. Lucy is so focused on the optics of friendship. OMG, we’re so best friends, look at our instagram together, I’m really nailing this roommate thing.
But in doing so, she ignores the purpose behind those optics. Here she doesn’t ask permission before initiating touch (something I’ve blown up at Joe about in the past) and she ignores clear body language on Billie’s part that she’s uncomfortable here. Like, those are not subtle cues and Lucy has no excuse for ignoring them.
And the thing is that can be a thing friendly people trip over. We so normalize the idea that grabbing or hugging people without consent is okay if you’re “friendly”. But it should be a thing that changes because it so often papers over and normalizes assault and allows a space for folks to publicly sexually harass and assault people under the guise of “being friendly”.
Lucy is also just violating all sorts of common sense rules for how to treat people you don’t know, even with the best of intentions. Some people, myself being one of them, aren’t okay with being touched no matter how friendly with a person they are and also wouldn’t want a picture of themselves on social media for public scrutiny. Her real mistake with all of this is her assumption that she can and needs to force a relationship with someone just because they’re in the same living space.
Those folks are way too friendly and nice. I prefer when people wear their imperfections on their sleeves. Welcome to gossip land, Billie, where everyone acts cool and pretty when you’re there but talk shit behind your back as soon as you look the other way.
Yeah, this. Being an asshole doesn’t mean you’re honest, it can be a pose covering other social vices as well, including malicious gossip. Surely you’ve met people who have one set of “imperfections” for public, and then a different set in private?
Conversely, being cheerful isn’t the opposite of being an asshole.
Aside from the fact that it can be a front, it can be assholish in itself, in situations like this, where it involves ignoring boundaries.
Not that I think Lucy is a bad person, per se, she’s just an extreme extrovert without any serious trauma, who hasn’t been taught (or had enough experience to really absorb) the lesson that this is not always appropriate behaviour – it is extremely taxing for introverts, could be triggering for people with traumas, and is really, really jumping the gun on the friendliness level for most other people.
If Lucy met Joyce and they instantly started LucyJoycing each other that’d be great (so long they didn’t reenforce each other’s belief that this is the right way to act with everybody). But Lucy needs to learn to read a room and adjust appropriately (so does Joyce, still, but she’s begun that process).
“it is extremely taxing for introverts, could be triggering for people with traumas, and is really, really jumping the gun on the friendliness level for most other people.”
Well, as an introvert with minor traumas, first reaction if I was in Billie’s place would be “ohmagad will she let me breathe a second I swear if she gets closer I punch her what’s with the photo get off me aaaugh! D: ”
Second line of thought, well you got it in OP: “those people are too lovely, that’s probably compensating or hiding something huge, maybe I’m in purgatory please let me out!” :/
Or you can just be a whole person trying to understand and respect others without being an asshole or invading their personal space.
And it’s totally plausible that Lucy is just a cheerful, overly friendly and optimistic person; the fact is, before Billie even arrived, the dorm have been gossiping and forging a preconceived idea about her. We’ll see how this friendliness fares before the fact that Billie actually has flaws, like everyone.
It’s not about being mean or not. It’s about making up a false idea about a person you’ve never met, which almost inevitably creates drama when this preconceived idea collides with the actual, real, person. Billie has not even finished moving in that she already has to measure to expectations based on collective consensus from second hand info. People may be cheerful and helpful now, but they’ve already set up a toxic environment for the newcomer and a potential drama bomb if she fails to conform or if they feil to accept reality.
This IS wearing her imperfections on her sleeve. She’s making it blatantly obvious she’s incapable of perceiving boundaries. (Or worse, intent on ignoring them.)
Yep, maybe it’s simply that: Lucy may live in a world of rainbows and ponies and don’t understand what is personal space or why people would even need that. Still some form of hell imho :p
I love Lucy’s spirit and cheer but as someone who is introverted if I was Billie I’d have to lay down ground rules and explain that I need quiet time/alone time because man, reading today’s strip made me super tired just thinking about the sheer amount of energy Lucy has. She clearly means well and may be trying much harder than normal (as I didn’t find her this intense before) because of losing the first roommate who “clearly didn’t like her” that is coming off as more intensity than usual.
Especially now that I think about it, she was always respectful (or at least shown to be) to Malaya when she was around. Granted they didn’t acknowledge her when she was speaking to her, but she DID take the hints and back off when Mal was with Marcie in their room.
uh
is Lucy okay?
“I am not going to fall short, not again”
Is this about Malaya??? Was there some other drama???
I mean, Malaya wanted her to be less friendly, so ‘falling short’ does not sound right?…
‘Give people space’ isn’t common messaging in our society.
‘She’s being anti-social, you need to pull her out of her shell, whether she likes it or not, for her own good’ is.
So, she’s been taught that in a situation like this, her failure isn’t ‘not respecting Malaya’s desires’, it’s ‘not being outgoing enough to make Malaya realize she’s hurting herself’. (And forget realizing that some people just don’t click – that’s heresy. Even the MLP episode that tried to make that the Aesop screwed it up.)
That… is the sort of thing that would have me a bit freaked out. Blame a fucked-up childhood and teenagehood for that. If it were me, I’d be withdrawing even more into my shell, because of being startled.
Her Starfire avatar is the panel from the Shortpacked! comic she was introduced in, before she was even a main character! D’awww. Willis, you’ve done it again!
A disproportionate amount of Dumbing of Age IU students attend church compared to actual IU students. When I lived in Read, only 2 or 3 girls went to some sort of service…
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“Next we’ll add the dog face filter!”
“kill me now”
Has anyone ever told you that you pick the best Gravatar pics? Cause you do Ana Chronistic. You really do
maybe I should pick the worst sometime to switch things up
like… um… Toedad’s ass? idk
“No, silly! I can’t kill you now, it’s not face mask o’clock yet!”
It just goes to show, Malaya was right again.
If she and Joyce ever meet, the resulting hug might be so powerful as to fuse their atoms and destroy the campus.
“I’m not letting you go until I hear ribs cracking. Cracking with love!”
(That’s actually both Joyce and Lucy thinking that.)
It would be like DBZ, but with hugging instead of fighting. Just as intense, and just as uncomfortably long.
Also, glad she went with classic Teen Titans Starfire and not Teen Titans Go Starfire. While I don’t think TTG is NEARLY as bad as a lot of people say (Quite a few of the jokes do give me a chuckle), it’s a pretty unremarkable series overall, and I can’t really watch more than a clip or two from YouTube at a time. Old Teen Titans, on the other hand, I could binge-watch for hours. And if I weren’t binge-watching Halloween stuff right now, I’d do just that.
What bothers me about TTG, besides comprising over 50% of CN’s schedule, is the way they received feedback about the show being mediocre and the characters one-dimensional and basically went “haha you’re exactly right!” And instead of striving to create better content, they added a few self-deprecating jokes to the show and called it a day. Imo that’s lazy as hell.
yup. 🙁
TTG exists to be lazy, it’s cheap and easy to produce and has a big audience, that’s all they were going for.
I mean, I can’t blame them, quality takes time, effort and money, gotta make up for the quality shows using all that somewhere. I just wish they’d done a unique show instead.
Personally I have my issues with both cartoons, but I’m old enough to have largely grown up on the Wolfman/Perez run of the comics so that’s hardly surprising.
Ah, those were the days. The best stuff since the Claremont / Byrne / Austin run on X-Men.
I’m too old to have grown up on the Wolfman/Perez run of the comics. Fortunately for me, I did start reading Teen Titans during that run, shortly before the name changed to just “Titans”.
The animation style is smooth and I like some of the gags and references they sneak in (in the American Idol parody clip on YouTube, Cyborg’s neck extended after a Wonder Woman dream sequence, and they threw some obscure old characters into the crowd), but it seems like the show’s a constant barrage of these moments. None of them have any impact.
I ran out of patience for rapid-fire “lol wacky random moments” humor years ago. (Thanks, Newgrounds and classmates who never stopped quoting GIR.)
Is… Is this what it’s like to be Old?
My commiserations. It all goes downhill from here.
Nahhh
I’m REALLY old and I actually quite enjoy TTG.
(But then this is the only incarnation of them I’ve ever seen)
It’s just simple knock-down slapstick, which always has it’s place.
True, I don’t think I could binge on it though!
Yeah, I’ll never get ‘The Night Begins to Shine’ out of my head ever. And I kind of don’t want to.
While this is true, I submit that “40%, 20%, 20%” is not representative of the quality of the series as a whole. That’s like using “The Inner Light” or “The Visitor”, or contrariwise “Spock’s Brain” or “Threshold”, as the standard to judge all of Star Trek.
… God, I’m such a geek.
OMG I remenber watching the FIRST RUN of TNG, then the reruns, movies, later series… Iike Star Trek just fine, but I can’t just rattle off episode titles, or even remember episodes when I see titles. I bow to your vastly superior geektitude.
I want them to meet and become traumatized because they’re actually annoyed by each other’s supper happy innocence thing XD
MEGA-HUG
NOT LUCY ENOUGH
I’m gonna say it: I love Lucy.
Cheers!
Friends?
Perfect Strangers.
Happy Endings.
One Day at a Time.
Kernanator,
you got some ‘splaining to do–
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_CzPL_7LuQ
Oh, this Lucy likes Starfire, too?
NEW FAVORITE CHARACTER!
She loved Starfire in Shortpacked!, too.
In her defense, everyone loves Starfire- at least the Teen Titans version of her
Billie: “So…you and the curtains had some sort of argument?”
Lucy: “Uh, yes. Today is…GorbGorb, the Tamaranian festival of berating drapery! STUPID CURTAINS!”
And yes, I’m totally imagining Billie and Lucy as having the voices of Raven and Starfire now.
Now I want to see Billie as Raven…
I was always more of a Raven fan. I’m always drawn to strong female tsunderacters.
Lucy is delightful. I want to put her and Joyce in a room and watch it fill with sunshine.
Yes please!
to quote a Boulet comic:
“THEY’RE RESONATING!!!”
*duck and cover*
And Billie and Sarah, desperately hiding in the corner,
Wallpaper that room with solar panels, and the world’s energy problem will be solved!
For a second, I misread that as “watch it fill with Slipshine”…
I love that Lucy is still a Starfire fan!
I ship it.
And Billie wanted to drink BEFORE she met Lucy.
Good news, Billie, you’ve moved in with nerdy-Joyce. What was it you hated again?
Titans Starfire forever <3
lucys nice!
*plays the WE BARE BEARS theme on the hacked Muzak*
Lucy is so happy.
Don’t let her meet Joyce. The resulting happiness and sunshine would cause nuclear fusion and kill everyone.
I mean…she’s sunny, she’s upbeat, she’s animated, she’s jovial…just from this strip I wouldn’t necessarily say “happy.”
See Doctor_Who’s above comment
I’m getting a Pink horse signal here; she blames herself when someone else is not happy.
I’m not sure what “pink horse” means and you’re probably right, but at the same time, it was partly her fault. Her overenthusiastic “we’re going to be best friends” and lack of boundaries certainly drove Malaya crazy and doesn’t look like it’s going to go over much better with Billie.
I should have said Pink pony, but there’s no edit function. You perfectly described Pinkie Pie so you knew just what I meant anyway.
Wait, that doesn’t sound right. I mean, even though the example I used wasn’t clear you nailed it anyway!
Lucy: the uberfriend (somehow even more than joyce. o-o).
In my opinion, Lucy seems like a bit much, but also…Starfire, y’know? So she’s still okay in my book.
Also, some of what she says in this strip is deeply sad. Poor Luce.
OH MY GOD LUCY WHAT DID THE PEOPLE AT THAT CHURCH DO TO YOUR POOR FINGERS?!
All that snake handling, it takes some time for the antivenom to kick in.
Billie’s hopeful, happy smile in the first panel <3
And her dawning realization that this dorm was designed by Sebastian Cabot.
Anyone that loves Starfire is a great person in my book.
You are a good person in my book 🙂
Beast Boy is best titan tho
Is this Faceook? Twitter? Instagram? Something else?
And what’s a Starfire?
Remember when Michael Jackson’s hair went ablaze? That’s a starfire.
*TTS Rogal Dorn voice*
No.
You know….much as I find Lucy adorable, I’m kind of seeing where Malaya is coming from.
I personally suspect that Malaya made more…Lucy than she may have started off being, or at least is an influencing factor in her acting so at this moment. I mean, in panel three she admits to being anxious, in panel four she says, “I am not going to fall short, not again,”…and like, that gives me the sense that she blames herself for things not working with Malaya, like maybe if she could just act more likable things would have gone better, so goddammit she’s going to be as likable as she can with her second chance… unfortunately she only has one kind of idea of what “likable” can look like for her.
If at first you don’t succeed, do it harder.
The problem wasn’t the approach itself, but the fact that you didn’t give at least 110.329%.
This is super dumb, but I find it stupidly funny that you randomly chose my birthday, March 29th, and Lucy’s EXTRA percentage.
Kinda forgot that Malaya was Lucy’s previous roommate, so I was first like “What kind of dark and troubled past is Lucy alluding to?”
Yeah, this is “have lunch together when you need a pick-me-up” happy, not “spend your downtime in close proximity because you live together” happy.
Lucy is adorkable.
Is this the dorm where the Stepford Wives lived?
No, that’s the dorm Billie moved from
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2016/comic/book-6/03-when-god-closes-the-door/tongue/
Also http://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-6/01-to-those-whod-ground-me/goodmorning-2/
for a second I thought Lucy was going to pull the line “this is the moment you’ve been waiting for your whole life because JESUS WILL SAVE YOU”
it would be an interesting dynamic to have Lucy be the anti-Mary: proselytizer that’s not an arsehole
I think Joyce is the anti-Mary in that respect?
I thought Joyce stopped proselytizing after Ethan?
I’m hoping she keeps a hug photo album.
Lucy. Lucy darlin’. You’re at, like, a ten.
Dial it back. Let Billie ease into it. Give her, like, a 6 or so.
Too much Lucy, Lucy.
No! That was the mistake the first time!
Turn it up to 11!
I love that you make this post with a Lucy ava.
Lucy’s a good egg.
Lucy, hon, ‘no non-consensual touching’ applies to non-sexy touching, too.
Yes, this. It’s one thing I try and instill in my kids. That they shouldn’t grab each other or each other’s things without permission and consent, because I feel that is the foundation that makes non-consensual sexual touch in the future so normalized.
while i agree, you also shouldn’t get too picky about smaller issues like these- we don’t want to create a society where every single social issue is something *huge*. if someone hugs you and it’s uncomfortable, you can go “please don’t do that”, but making every super wary of everything is also not exactly preferrable.
Establishing boundaries is important. I have met people who are very touchy, friendly people. They will continue to touch you/hug you if you don’t put down some strong boundaries. Plus most of them in my experience have a strong reaction to being told they can’t touch you. This is after I explain in a polite, calm manner that I’m not comfortable with them doing that.
Honestly, Lucy is being a bad roommate right now.
I’ve found that I can redirect huggy people to give me high-fives instead when I’m not feeling huggy, which softens the rejection and makes us both happy. Most everyone likes high-fives!
(Only one person *ever* was a pouty jerk about this, which told me he’s creepy, and this was good info.)
However, I don’t know if this helps for when you have people who are touchy in general, and you aren’t into having any touches. Being non-touchy is legit, and common, I wish touchy people would be far more sensitive to this possibility.
Notlegato It’s not making it a huge deal. I have a friend who was raised on ‘no non consensual touching’ and every time she is saying bye to everyone she just says ‘do you hug?’ first to strangers and just ‘hug?’ to people she knows. I was so relieved because I hate physical contact. I think even a child can manage ‘hug, no hug’. It’s a smaller issue to you. Not to me
As someone who has never felt comfortable taking the initiative to hug others (due to social anxiety I have no idea?), being hugged by others makes me feel really, really, really happy (… and loved haha).
You can always tell people you don’t like being hugged. It would make me sad to live in a world without spontaneous hugs.
You can always tell people you want a hug. The default in most social interactions is to ask for what you want, or offer what you want to give. Not lay out all the ways that you don’t want to be bothered.
Why should your discomfort when asking for what you want, be considered worse than the significant downturn in my day from a single incident using up a significant amount of my social energy, or someone with PTSD being triggered because they were unexpectedly reminded of their trauma. Or our discomfort on saying ‘no, we reject this particular form of social interaction’, given the fact that that is likely to have all social interaction cut off, or else getting labeled as ‘anti-social’ and having all social boundaries ignored in an effort to help us.
>You can always tell people you want a hug. The default in most social interactions is to ask for what you want, or offer what you want to give. Not lay out all the ways that you don’t want to be bothered.
I don’t think this is the case. I never ask people to buy me gifts. Actually I specifically tell them not to, and I have no problem making that request. Telling people you’re okay being hugged just comes off as being weird in normal social situations, whereas people usually respect people who don’t wish to be touched.
No, people do not respect people who don’t want to be touched.
I am speaking from personal experience. Never, in my life, has ‘please don’t touch me’ been respected. Either I get touched anyway (usually by people who think they’re respecting my request, because it’s not a full-on hug, or they’re avoiding certain body parts), or I get insulted for being ‘anti-social’.
And do you seriously live in a world where people are spontaneously giving out presents day in and day out without warning, which would make it actually a good analogy for random unsolicited touches, and not one of the very rare exceptions, where the usual social contracts dictate ‘give’. Do you have people shoving random product into your hands the moment you enter the mall? Do people you hardly know drag you into restaurants because they haven’t seen you in a while?
No, you do not.
And do you introduce yourself with ‘Hi, I’m Edmund, and I don’t accept gifts’? Or do you wait until you get to a point where you would be expected to accept one, and tell people that you don’t want them? Because I am rarely given that option. I have to tell people I don’t like being touched randomly after I’ve jerked away from them, because they’ve put a hand on my shoulder, or randomly hugged me.
You think it’s awkward saying ‘give me a hug’? Try ‘sorry, it’s not you, it’s me, I don’t like touching except under certain circumstances that I control’.
Aw man, poor Lucy, she feels really bad about how things went with Malaya.
Yay, okay, glad that’s not just me.
While true, some of her dialogue comes off as almost creepy about it. “I won’t fail again” is a pretty dramatic way of phrasing it. At this point I’m not sure which way the character will go.
I suspect it’ll be ‘goodhearted, but poorly socialized’, like Joyce. Just with a different source for her poor perception of boundaries.
I read or hear “Starfire”, I still think first to the Getter Robo II English dub from the eraly ’80s…
So, I actually work at a Baptist college and I STILL think the number of kids in this comic that go to church regularly is unrealistic.
Eh, it’s the first couple months of freshman year for a lot of them, so I can see the ritual of it still having some impact on overall church going, and since religion is a part of what this comic’s about, it makes sense that more of the characters we see might be regularly involved in churches than the general population. Also, perception could be skewed by recent plot lines, because there are also plenty of characters who don’t attend church.
What I do find interesting is that there hasn’t been mention of religious student organizations on campus that they might get involved in. I don’t know how many students actually do that sort of thing, but it honestly seemed pretty prominent in my college. Oh, DO THEY HAVE A Q-CROSS (OR WHATEVER THEY MIGHT CALL IT)??? I WANT TO SEE BECKY AT A Q-CROSS MEETING.
Kids that go regularly
– Joyce
– Becky
– Mary
– Jacob
– Lucy
Out of the major kid characters, that’s only 5 out of 22 (counting Raidah and Mary as major because they have profiles in the books).
-Sierra
Well, BBCC did specify major characters. If you want to expand that, there’s Agatha as well.
Well, if we’re expanding to include all characters, I imagine it’s still a small percentage.
Yeah, plus there’s a lot we just don’t know well enough to know if they do. Like, it’s a lot easier to confirm that someone does something than that they don’t, which can probably also contribute the percentage seeking larger than it is.
Yeah, that’s true. Also, 37% of adults in Indiana attend services weekly, so as long as it’s beneath that percentage, it’d still be accurate.
* around that percentage.
That’s five MORE than I would expect…
The irony is we still get folks who come in from time to time complaining about how there aren’t enough Christian characters and how “only the bad people” are Christian.
Look, while we might not agree on what the CORRECT number is, the number of cast attending is obviously INCORRECT.
It doesn’t have an imaginary component at all!
I think Joyce is the anti-Mary in that respect?
Supposed to reply to Derek
So, since Teen Titans is currently relevant:
1. When I was eleven I went as Raven for Halloween.
2. Thoughts on the episode “Things Change,” especially as the last episode of the series? (And then there was the movie and all that, but you probably know what I mean.)
I think it was an important episode. I think it sent the message to fans that it was ok for their favorite show to end and for them to grow and move on from it and let the characters grow and change from it as well.
Additionally, I think it hammered home an exceedingly important lesson about romantic feelings which is acceptance of when things are over and no longer pursuing someone who doesn’t want to be pursued, especially in the context of male nerd culture where this idea of persistent stalking is proof of true love is in so many other cartoons including a lot of the anime Teen Titans took its inspiration from.
I think in many ways it could have only worked as a final episode and provided a nice thematic tie that aided the mourning process of it being over a lot.
This is some great commentary on it (though what else should I expect). I remember when I was a child and it first aired, I was pissed that that was how it ended. Over time, though, I grew to love it.
…and all my annoyance at this week’s strips melts away.
Bonus points that she’s a Starfire fan here, as well as in one of my favorite Walkyverse strips of all. 🙂
Lucy’s ringtone is It’s A Small World
BOUNDARIES, LUCY!
Actually, I think she framed that selfie very nicely
…fine. That was pretty funny.
Yeah, she’s good at that. She probably has a whole crop of good selfies.
I want to show her the Shortpacked! strip with her in it even though that makes no sense on like, six whole levels, just because it seems like she’s get a kick out of it.
Hush… This is what our lives were meant for.
she’s like a font of distilled joy threatening to drown you
You mean a “fountain” of distilled joy, right?
No, she’s Comic Sans come to life.
Ouch. That’s a little harsh. Bradley Hand, maybe?
Well, fucked that up.
Let’s just drop this here:
http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_luvdkkb3ca1qj6xzto1_500.gif
Do I?
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/font?s=t
D’oh! I used to be so good at English.
Eh, it’s a confusing term, and it’d be fair to say, “I’ve heard it both ways.” Actually reading into it takes you down a kind of interesting linguistic rabbit hole.
Yay, more Lucy! I give Billie two days in-universe to change halls again.
So 2020 then?
No, we’re talking about something that requires corrective measures.
LUUUCYYYY!
I know she’s being too much right now (probably because she feels bad it didn’t work out with Malaya, as others have said), but I just love her so much. She’s so cheerful.
She reminds me a bit of Cadet Tilly of ST:D
She…reminds you of an STD?
Star Trek Discovery. Although many of the show’s more vitriolic critics have adopted this acronym.
The RPGs “Werewolf: The Forsaken” and “Fire, Fusion, and Steel” had similar issues. 😉
She’s such a Tilly, it’s really eerie. +1
I mean, there are differences. Tilly is more on the anxious side, at least in the first episodes, and not quite so bubbly.
Tilly…Tilly…Oh, Michael’s bunkmate?
That one.
“F-Bomb Girl” as she will forever be known…
Oh no she wants to be insta-bffs
Personal space, Lucy! PERSONAL SPACE!
But respecting personal space means fewer hugs!
No, it means MORE hugs when you wait for permission because you don’t have them screaming at and/or avoiding you after your first three hugs!
Yeah, try telling Lucy that. I think that she’d look at you if you were suddenly talking gibberish!
That feels pretty much like what happened between her and Malaya.
That, and a difference in opinon regarding the optimal number of hugs.
Obviously “zero” was too many.
Billie will have a metdown with these guys at some point and will want to go back to her previous dorm, won’t she?
Good. She can spend all her time at Ruth’s.
Which was the original plan.
Lucy strikes me as a 100% nice girl to know. She’s honestly cheerful and friendly.
However, being something of an introvert, I can also foresee that Billie may find her a little exhausting to know on an emotional level. She may be a bit needy and need continual attention and close contact of the sort that might make some people uncomfortable.
I dig the Starfire logo for Lucy. Remember where you started buddy.
I’m starting to understand why Malaya was so eager to swap rooms…
Poor Lucy. I love her, and I hope Billie gets used to the new environment and can come to enjoy the others’ company — at least sooner or later. Also, Billie’s little smile in the first panel is super cute.
I suspect Billie is more of a Raven fan.
No… Terra. Definitely Terra.
I expect Billie is going to spend a lot of time in Ruth’s room.
That was going to happen anyway.
This is rapidly approaching creepy territory. when fate is playing this nice with you, you just know she’s winding up one hell of a curve ball to toss at you later on.
Nonononono.
Screwball.
Fate is ALWAYS screwy.
What are the odds that the version with Malaya involved her palming Lucy’s face and pushing her away in rage?
I doubt that it ever got that far. Malaya would probably have shoved Lucy off rather than let her get too close.
Shaking a baseball bat at her probably…
Billie if you hurt this wonderful human being I will end you.
You’ll feed her to your hair?
I won’t go into too many details but I know a Lucy.
She’s the sweetest and most genuinely kind human being that I’ve ever met. If you have any problem, you know that she will have time for you. That said, she has problems with the concept of ‘personal space’ and is an expert with ambush hugs. She’s a great person but she is enormously emotionally draining to spend time with on some days.
Oh, Lucy…
…. I have no idea why, but her screen name reminded me of Snowflame, the DC supervillain who was powered by cocaine
Which is weird cuz Starfire is a DC superhero. Why did it remind me of the campy gloriousness of Snowflame?
(seriously, look up Snowflame. Late 80s camp ridiculousness at its best)
SNOWFLAME FEELS NO PANTS
*sees snow outside* Wh-…WH-
YAAAAAY! SNNOOWWFLAAAMEEE! COCAINE EVERYWHERE!
Some well-intentioned people cannot imagine that a hug might not be welcome. I have to keep reminding myself that they mean well.
Comic Reactions:
Panel 3: Aw, Lucy is an anxious extrovert. But I also feel Billie’s awkward expression at the onslaught of super friendly people. Like, I was very similar in college. I had just come from a culture where people being performatively friendly was usually a sign they were about to start trying to convert me. Plus, it can create a lot of social pressure to “measure up”.
And that often means performing normativity, being extroverted, and feeling bad about pockets of low self-esteem or self-hatred or internal flaws.
And for Billie, there’s a lot to worry about even as she enjoys the friendliness. We know she already struggles with not feeling good enough and this ups the ante again. Also, she struggles with demons that are not going to go well in this environment.
Like, the main one being her drinking. We know that Billie hasn’t actually stopped drinking at any point and that’s going to be impossible to hide with a roommate this eager and excited to be entangled with her life.
Panel 4: Oh Lucy, no, a social interaction that goes poorly doesn’t mean that you personally fucked up (says the hypocrite who always blames herself when a social interaction goes south).
And more importantly, doesn’t mean you need to increase the thing you were doing before so that you can now magically do it more “right”. Especially as it ignores the issues with that approach.
Like, Lucy is friendly and nice and I wish her less anxiety, but I can totally see why Malaya was so off-put by her. Overly friendly people can be scary or trigger bad memories of folks trying to save you.
And in a living situation, someone desperate to become immediate best friends can be a very offputting situation. I know personally, I greatly value privacy in home spaces and having space to just focus on my own thing, so a roommate being very loose with boundaries and trying to force a friendship would be very likely to trigger defensiveness on my part.
Panel 5: And that’s exemplified here. Lucy is so focused on the optics of friendship. OMG, we’re so best friends, look at our instagram together, I’m really nailing this roommate thing.
But in doing so, she ignores the purpose behind those optics. Here she doesn’t ask permission before initiating touch (something I’ve blown up at Joe about in the past) and she ignores clear body language on Billie’s part that she’s uncomfortable here. Like, those are not subtle cues and Lucy has no excuse for ignoring them.
And the thing is that can be a thing friendly people trip over. We so normalize the idea that grabbing or hugging people without consent is okay if you’re “friendly”. But it should be a thing that changes because it so often papers over and normalizes assault and allows a space for folks to publicly sexually harass and assault people under the guise of “being friendly”.
Lucy is also just violating all sorts of common sense rules for how to treat people you don’t know, even with the best of intentions. Some people, myself being one of them, aren’t okay with being touched no matter how friendly with a person they are and also wouldn’t want a picture of themselves on social media for public scrutiny. Her real mistake with all of this is her assumption that she can and needs to force a relationship with someone just because they’re in the same living space.
Yeah, Billie shut put her foot down.
Yay.
I was worried she was going to be comically horrible to Lucy like everyone else we have seen her with, but it looks like they might get on.
I love everything about her immediately.
But is anyone else weirded out by the way her fingers are drawn in panel two?
I’m starting to hate this dorm.
Those folks are way too friendly and nice. I prefer when people wear their imperfections on their sleeves. Welcome to gossip land, Billie, where everyone acts cool and pretty when you’re there but talk shit behind your back as soon as you look the other way.
What a sad world do we live in. Where friendliness is seen as a mask of betrayal while being an asshole is seen as a virtue.
Yeah, this. Being an asshole doesn’t mean you’re honest, it can be a pose covering other social vices as well, including malicious gossip. Surely you’ve met people who have one set of “imperfections” for public, and then a different set in private?
Conversely, being cheerful isn’t the opposite of being an asshole.
Aside from the fact that it can be a front, it can be assholish in itself, in situations like this, where it involves ignoring boundaries.
Not that I think Lucy is a bad person, per se, she’s just an extreme extrovert without any serious trauma, who hasn’t been taught (or had enough experience to really absorb) the lesson that this is not always appropriate behaviour – it is extremely taxing for introverts, could be triggering for people with traumas, and is really, really jumping the gun on the friendliness level for most other people.
If Lucy met Joyce and they instantly started LucyJoycing each other that’d be great (so long they didn’t reenforce each other’s belief that this is the right way to act with everybody). But Lucy needs to learn to read a room and adjust appropriately (so does Joyce, still, but she’s begun that process).
“it is extremely taxing for introverts, could be triggering for people with traumas, and is really, really jumping the gun on the friendliness level for most other people.”
Well, as an introvert with minor traumas, first reaction if I was in Billie’s place would be “ohmagad will she let me breathe a second I swear if she gets closer I punch her what’s with the photo get off me aaaugh! D: ”
Second line of thought, well you got it in OP: “those people are too lovely, that’s probably compensating or hiding something huge, maybe I’m in purgatory please let me out!” :/
I have never found any external marker of trustworthiness.
Or you can just be a whole person trying to understand and respect others without being an asshole or invading their personal space.
And it’s totally plausible that Lucy is just a cheerful, overly friendly and optimistic person; the fact is, before Billie even arrived, the dorm have been gossiping and forging a preconceived idea about her. We’ll see how this friendliness fares before the fact that Billie actually has flaws, like everyone.
Not…necessarily? I mean: (a) not all people gossip, and (b) not all gossip is mean. I’m sorry your experiences suggest otherwise though.
It’s not about being mean or not. It’s about making up a false idea about a person you’ve never met, which almost inevitably creates drama when this preconceived idea collides with the actual, real, person. Billie has not even finished moving in that she already has to measure to expectations based on collective consensus from second hand info. People may be cheerful and helpful now, but they’ve already set up a toxic environment for the newcomer and a potential drama bomb if she fails to conform or if they feil to accept reality.
This IS wearing her imperfections on her sleeve. She’s making it blatantly obvious she’s incapable of perceiving boundaries. (Or worse, intent on ignoring them.)
Joyce hugging Billie had more boundaries than Lucy. (And Joyce and Billie knew each other already then.)
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2014/comic/book-5/01-when-somebody-loved-me/better-3/
Yep, maybe it’s simply that: Lucy may live in a world of rainbows and ponies and don’t understand what is personal space or why people would even need that. Still some form of hell imho :p
…how is anyone reading this strip and not thinking “Misery”?
I guess because I kind of like enthusiasm even when it’s not mine?
Nah, I’m thinking more along the lines of it being either “theater kids” or “cult”.
Sure looks like some weird cult to me. This cursed dorm must be brainwashing people! D:
I love Lucy’s spirit and cheer but as someone who is introverted if I was Billie I’d have to lay down ground rules and explain that I need quiet time/alone time because man, reading today’s strip made me super tired just thinking about the sheer amount of energy Lucy has. She clearly means well and may be trying much harder than normal (as I didn’t find her this intense before) because of losing the first roommate who “clearly didn’t like her” that is coming off as more intensity than usual.
Especially now that I think about it, she was always respectful (or at least shown to be) to Malaya when she was around. Granted they didn’t acknowledge her when she was speaking to her, but she DID take the hints and back off when Mal was with Marcie in their room.
I am interested to see how this goes though. 🙂
uh
is Lucy okay?
“I am not going to fall short, not again”
Is this about Malaya??? Was there some other drama???
I mean, Malaya wanted her to be less friendly, so ‘falling short’ does not sound right?…
Lucy seems to be very friendly and I guess Malaya moving out to avoid her hurt her feelings.
‘Give people space’ isn’t common messaging in our society.
‘She’s being anti-social, you need to pull her out of her shell, whether she likes it or not, for her own good’ is.
So, she’s been taught that in a situation like this, her failure isn’t ‘not respecting Malaya’s desires’, it’s ‘not being outgoing enough to make Malaya realize she’s hurting herself’. (And forget realizing that some people just don’t click – that’s heresy. Even the MLP episode that tried to make that the Aesop screwed it up.)
God, I love Lucy!!! I wish more people were like her! 🙂
I keep misreading her Instatwitbook handle as “Starfleet1”, now I want to know who’s the secret Trekkie in DoA.
Lucy would annoy me too which says more about me than it does her. She is a perfectly nice person.
Ack. She touched me. Get it off, get it off, get it off!
Lucy and I would… not get along (to put it VERY lightly).
This house is secretly a cult.
Oh, right, she has glasses too.
I’m loving how heavily the traditional symbolism on that is being skewered.
That… is the sort of thing that would have me a bit freaked out. Blame a fucked-up childhood and teenagehood for that. If it were me, I’d be withdrawing even more into my shell, because of being startled.
She’s… interesting?
Her Starfire avatar is the panel from the Shortpacked! comic she was introduced in, before she was even a main character! D’awww. Willis, you’ve done it again!
No-no, Glenn Coco!
A disproportionate amount of Dumbing of Age IU students attend church compared to actual IU students. When I lived in Read, only 2 or 3 girls went to some sort of service…