But the point is that Ruth’s motif for telling Joyce is not as much about antagonizing Becky / Dina as much as it is about savoring an expected look of terror on Joyce’s face upon hearing the big news —
Geez the religion topic is so loaded for these two. Why does it feel like Becky has different standards for Joyce’s faith than she does herself? She said in that statement it was okay for Joyce to be friends with an atheist, but somehow it’s not okay for Joyce to be an atheist? Meanwhile Becky can blame Joyce for setting the example that enables her to justify dating Dina, but can’t except her right to embrace her sexual identity without “burning in hell” is partially why Joyce let go of her faith.
What mental gymnastics are going on in their heads to justify all this? Does Becky even still believe she’s going to hell? If she doesn’t why is it still a big deal Joyce doesn’t either?
It’s petty of me, but I really do hope her reaction is underwhelming and that this itself inspires massive amounts of hand-wringing confusion from everyone who was secretly hoping for an explosion about PRE-MARITAL HANKY-PANKY! and disappointed when Joyce does not entertain on deliberate provocation as she has in the past. (Although a cynical part of me expects a non-reaction from Joyce to spur people to get up in her business demanding to know why she’s NOT reacting the way they assumed, because that has very much been the way most of her friends have been treating her for the past few months of storylines. “You used to feel one way, and now feel another! You owe me a reckoning of all your internal thought processes! If you don’t, it’s LYING and KEEPING SECRETS and you’re a bad friend!”)
Regardless what Joyce’s normal reaction would be, her current condition would suggest that finding out now would result in an underwhelming reaction, to this or a volcano erupting, unless Dr. Kaur has some REALLY GOOD pills.
But I, too, am hoping for a response on the lines “congratulations, one of us gives a fuck” and then she just goes back to bed.
And yeah, “Joyce is not responding how I expected and wanted her to, HOW DARE SHE” has become a theme in recent times.
The poor kid seems to be under attack from all angles, lately. Of course, there wouldn’t BE any asspain if Dorothy and Becky hadn’t decided it was Very Important to hunt Joyce Down for the crime of existing near a person other than them. It’s basically their fault they got upset at her, and they’re still acting like she’s the one on the offensive.
I dunno why you can’t understand how terrible it is to do anything without the knowledge and approval of a christian. Why are you so unreasonable, Taffy?
Man, if Archie Sonic was still ongoing and I somehow got hired to draw it (I doodle Sonic a lot) I would totally slip that design into a redrawn-panel flashback to Issue #19.
Yeah, there was a whole big event about five years ago. IDW handles the comics now, and as far as I know it’s in continuity with the games instead of continue the Archie stories. I don’t know a lot about it besides the Metal Virus saga’s broad storyline, so I can’t speak to much of the behind the scenes stuff, but it seems… generally fine and competent, with some nice art.
Ruth still thinks Joyce is Christian? Guess she’s not really keyed in to what’s hip with the kids of today. Am I as a 31 year old saying that Ruth a 21 year old is now “old” to a bunch of 18-19 year olds?….Yes.
to be fair she was kinda going through a whole life crisis when Joyce was going through her de-conversion, and has always kept to herself for the most part.
Last time they interacted Joyce said hell wasn’t real, but Ruth was probably too busy being stunned that Joyce was yelling at her to realize what that means.
I did a quick check through the archives and as far as I can tell she’s never actually been present when Joyce has talked about not being a Christian anymore. She’s been nearby a few times, but never actually in the same strip as her when that happened.
I still really torn on this moment. On one hand I really hate Joyce’s bi erasure here, and hope she learned something and never does this again….One the other hand I think Jason really sucks and don’t want Ruth dating him either!
She isnt doing it on purpose, she is just over correcting, she spent her whole life being told that it was only ok to be straight, so now she makes sure everybody knows its ok to be gay, and they must rejoice with the boys (and girls) in the gay way.
Viewed from an external perspective, Joyce was being unbelievably obnoxious and deserved every fragment of pushback and censure she got for that.
It still kinda makes me a bit *oh*, though, when she articulates the deeper reason for her freakout to Dorothy, after. (If being gay ISNT this rigid and immutable thing, if you CAN date someone into being straight, what I did with Ethan was EVEN WORSE THAN I THOUGHT because it could have WORKED, and Joyce understands, now, how harmful that would be.)
Joyce doesn’t want to hurt people. She cares SO MUCH about not hurting people. This is a fact very easily distorted through the lens of her toxic religious upbringing, but it is true, and it’s impossible to understand Joyce without understanding that about her. (I get fucking CHILLS about that phone conversation she had with Joycelyn where she said “I want to be someone people can trust”. Tell me you want to be a good person who does good things without using the words “good person.”)
It also shows how little she really absorbed from gender studies, even if she can repeat the answers. Bisexuals exist, which she knows about, but she’s filed Ruth under lesbian so her dating a boy is her changing her orientation which means Joyce could have changed Ethan’s. Her brain just short-circuits past the more reasonable “I didn’t know Ruth was bisexual” conclusion.
Partly it’s that fussy rigid black and white thinking Ruth mentions, that she still has even though she’s now an atheist.
Yeah, she’s trying hard, but it takes more than one class to shift the underlying thinking. Sometimes that’s something people grow out of over time; sometimes they don’t. I think Joyce has an admirable commitment to wanting to be better/not a source of harm that is motivating her to keep growing and revisit her assumptions and beliefs! On the other hand she also really hates change. So that’s a fun set of completely incompatible internal drives!
I would argue the “I need to grow” thing is winning, as evidenced by her demonstrable growth, a lot of it in a short period of time. But the hatred of change (as opposed to, say, Jennifer, who LOVES the idea of radically reinventing herself, even if she’s not successful at it) is a brake on that. She’ll change, but slowly, and it will take work. (I think that does mean that her growth is more likely to stick, though—you give things up less lightly when you had to work hard for them.)
Absolutely.
I do think part of her current problem is that with her coming out openly as atheist, she seems to think she’s done. She can settle into this new role and stop changing. She says something similar to Dorothy right before the scene with Ruth – “I’ve now got everything important figured out.”
I wish I could edit comments…I think where Joyce is at right at this moment in time is “I have done the hard work of changing. I hated it, and I’m tired. Haven’t I changed *enough*?” And it’s like…nope! That summit you struggled to ascend was just a foothill on the journey up the mountain.
I agree with Joyce’s sentiment of guys being gross and that Ruth can do better, but not her refusing to realize what a bisexual means, that’s part is pretty lame of her
but she’ll get over it soon enough (like a year for us and a week for her)
Prepare for trouble!
Make it double!
To cause the fundies devastation!
To the destroy the lies that unite our nation!
To denounce the evils of faith and hypocrisy!
To harness the power of animosity!
Ruth!
Jason!
We’re Team RA, blasting off at the speed of light!
Surrender now, or prepare to fight!
It just struck me that these are the two characters that have their nationality as a part of their personality. That’s pretty funny that they’re dating!
I thought that was farther back than just yesterday.
Over on this side of the pond, Jason, we say “the other day” for more than just yesterday, but (generally) less than a week.
At least we do where I’m from.
I feel like this is gonna end in Joyce going “Okay. AND?” which then leads to her practically exploding about how so many of her friends keep treating her like the Fundie she used to be. Might lead into a spiral or Joyce telling everyone to just piss off for a while.
I hope that when somebody does tell Joyce we pay off the setup of her lingering fundamentalist reactions with four panels of an unreadable expression, and then she says “That’s great; I’m going back to bed.”
I have seen that look on Ruth’s on only one other actual human being, ever – and she was a fictional character, too. Her name was Zelda Gilroy, and that’s the sort of look she would get when she was working on some underhanded scheme to snag Dobie Gillis as her boyfriend.
And in a sort of perverse way, I think that’s what made her likeable. Dobie never knew what he was missing.
it’s kind of wild to me that that show’s enduring legacy is spawning the entire Scooby Doo lineage (and all the other shows following the same formula).
No, it goes back to actual pirate days, though Treasure Island might have kept it in popular culture.
It doesn’t seem to be connected to that slang use of “roger”, but it’s not really known where the term comes from.
I love this couple dynamic. I wonder if Jason will be able to stop both Ruth and Carla and say that to Joyce for some weird mistake. I kinda hope he will team up with Sal for stopping the two unstoppables.
I find myself surprisingly rooting for these two, yes. 🙂 Honestly, I think Jason is a much more stable and healthy partner for Ruth than Jennifer’s weird “let’s be awful together” co-dependency.
I wonder just how many of the people who knew Joyce as the fundie Christian have no idea that she’s now an atheist. And I think it’d be funny if Joyce doesn’t have a problem with it at all when she does eventually find out that Becky and Dina had sex.
ngl, I have to agree with Joyce’s sentiment that it was better when Ruth was dating Billie not because I don’t get bisexuality, but because Jason is dull and boring and Ruth can absolutely do better in both genders.
Saying you’ll misbehave and doing a little performative sinister smiling is actually worse than [Insert hyperbolic reference to the least terrible atrocity committed by Americans in the Vietnam War]. I kid, I don’t actually think you actually think that.
(Side note: I looked it up to make sure I was using the proper term for it, and that shit apparently lasted 20 years??? I’d always been under the impression that it was “just” a couple of years and then America got embarrassed and left. They didn’t teach that shit in any school I went to, probably to avoid telling kids “Oh, btw your grandpa probably did a lot of this stuff”.)
After binging this comic the past 3 days I’ve finally caught up and I don’t know what to do with myself. Needless to say I’m really looking forward to tomorrow.
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Love is…
[“chibi” versions of Ruth and Jason, naked]
…recognising her “betraying my authority” smile
Ah, so Ruth doesn’t know about Joyce’s deconversion…. we all know here this is going.
🤡🤡🤡
Well they’re not really friends, and unlike Becky, Joyce isn’t the type to go around announcing unprovoked what her current life status is.
Yeah, very much so.
But the point is that Ruth’s motif for telling Joyce is not as much about antagonizing Becky / Dina as much as it is about savoring an expected look of terror on Joyce’s face upon hearing the big news —
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-5/04-walking-with-dina/item/
Which is why I’m still hoping for a completely apathetic response from Joyce, take the wind out of everyone’s sails here
Joyce may be in too much pain and/or zonked out from exhaustion and/or heavily medicated to give a shit
per previous comment, I’d also accept her fainting dead away.
But Joyce doesnt care and supports them!
its Becky who cares because Joyce Deconverted
Boy, they’ve come a ways since the strip directly following that one! https://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-5/04-walking-with-dina/useta/
Geez the religion topic is so loaded for these two. Why does it feel like Becky has different standards for Joyce’s faith than she does herself? She said in that statement it was okay for Joyce to be friends with an atheist, but somehow it’s not okay for Joyce to be an atheist? Meanwhile Becky can blame Joyce for setting the example that enables her to justify dating Dina, but can’t except her right to embrace her sexual identity without “burning in hell” is partially why Joyce let go of her faith.
What mental gymnastics are going on in their heads to justify all this? Does Becky even still believe she’s going to hell? If she doesn’t why is it still a big deal Joyce doesn’t either?
According to Becky, ROSS is going to heaven, so clearly there are no standards whatsoever and literally everybody’s getting in.
This “Joyce must never know” arc is going to end up with literally everyone disappointed in the outcome, which is what they all deserve.
You’re referring of course to us in the comment section.
Also, yes. ;p
It’s petty of me, but I really do hope her reaction is underwhelming and that this itself inspires massive amounts of hand-wringing confusion from everyone who was secretly hoping for an explosion about PRE-MARITAL HANKY-PANKY! and disappointed when Joyce does not entertain on deliberate provocation as she has in the past. (Although a cynical part of me expects a non-reaction from Joyce to spur people to get up in her business demanding to know why she’s NOT reacting the way they assumed, because that has very much been the way most of her friends have been treating her for the past few months of storylines. “You used to feel one way, and now feel another! You owe me a reckoning of all your internal thought processes! If you don’t, it’s LYING and KEEPING SECRETS and you’re a bad friend!”)
Regardless what Joyce’s normal reaction would be, her current condition would suggest that finding out now would result in an underwhelming reaction, to this or a volcano erupting, unless Dr. Kaur has some REALLY GOOD pills.
But I, too, am hoping for a response on the lines “congratulations, one of us gives a fuck” and then she just goes back to bed.
And yeah, “Joyce is not responding how I expected and wanted her to, HOW DARE SHE” has become a theme in recent times.
The poor kid seems to be under attack from all angles, lately. Of course, there wouldn’t BE any asspain if Dorothy and Becky hadn’t decided it was Very Important to hunt Joyce Down for the crime of existing near a person other than them. It’s basically their fault they got upset at her, and they’re still acting like she’s the one on the offensive.
I dunno why you can’t understand how terrible it is to do anything without the knowledge and approval of a christian. Why are you so unreasonable, Taffy?
Dont Tell Sco- Joyce
Joyce doesnt know
I just got that your new icon is Joyce as a Sonic style hedgehog.
Man, if Archie Sonic was still ongoing and I somehow got hired to draw it (I doodle Sonic a lot) I would totally slip that design into a redrawn-panel flashback to Issue #19.
Isn’t that the one with a huge crowd of alt-universe Sonics? I’m probably wrong, but I think that’s also where Zonic came from.
Oh, did Archie Sonic ended? That’s sad.
Yeah, there was a whole big event about five years ago. IDW handles the comics now, and as far as I know it’s in continuity with the games instead of continue the Archie stories. I don’t know a lot about it besides the Metal Virus saga’s broad storyline, so I can’t speak to much of the behind the scenes stuff, but it seems… generally fine and competent, with some nice art.
Ruth still thinks Joyce is Christian? Guess she’s not really keyed in to what’s hip with the kids of today. Am I as a 31 year old saying that Ruth a 21 year old is now “old” to a bunch of 18-19 year olds?….Yes.
to be fair she was kinda going through a whole life crisis when Joyce was going through her de-conversion, and has always kept to herself for the most part.
Last time they interacted Joyce said hell wasn’t real, but Ruth was probably too busy being stunned that Joyce was yelling at her to realize what that means.
I did a quick check through the archives and as far as I can tell she’s never actually been present when Joyce has talked about not being a Christian anymore. She’s been nearby a few times, but never actually in the same strip as her when that happened.
Wait, when did Joyce and Ruth interact recently? I don’t remember that happening, and I can’t find it.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2021/comic/book-12/02-ill-leave-you-a-phantom/disappointing-2/
Here you go
I still really torn on this moment. On one hand I really hate Joyce’s bi erasure here, and hope she learned something and never does this again….One the other hand I think Jason really sucks and don’t want Ruth dating him either!
She isnt doing it on purpose, she is just over correcting, she spent her whole life being told that it was only ok to be straight, so now she makes sure everybody knows its ok to be gay, and they must rejoice with the boys (and girls) in the gay way.
Viewed from an external perspective, Joyce was being unbelievably obnoxious and deserved every fragment of pushback and censure she got for that.
It still kinda makes me a bit *oh*, though, when she articulates the deeper reason for her freakout to Dorothy, after. (If being gay ISNT this rigid and immutable thing, if you CAN date someone into being straight, what I did with Ethan was EVEN WORSE THAN I THOUGHT because it could have WORKED, and Joyce understands, now, how harmful that would be.)
Joyce doesn’t want to hurt people. She cares SO MUCH about not hurting people. This is a fact very easily distorted through the lens of her toxic religious upbringing, but it is true, and it’s impossible to understand Joyce without understanding that about her. (I get fucking CHILLS about that phone conversation she had with Joycelyn where she said “I want to be someone people can trust”. Tell me you want to be a good person who does good things without using the words “good person.”)
It also shows how little she really absorbed from gender studies, even if she can repeat the answers. Bisexuals exist, which she knows about, but she’s filed Ruth under lesbian so her dating a boy is her changing her orientation which means Joyce could have changed Ethan’s. Her brain just short-circuits past the more reasonable “I didn’t know Ruth was bisexual” conclusion.
Partly it’s that fussy rigid black and white thinking Ruth mentions, that she still has even though she’s now an atheist.
Yeah, she’s trying hard, but it takes more than one class to shift the underlying thinking. Sometimes that’s something people grow out of over time; sometimes they don’t. I think Joyce has an admirable commitment to wanting to be better/not a source of harm that is motivating her to keep growing and revisit her assumptions and beliefs! On the other hand she also really hates change. So that’s a fun set of completely incompatible internal drives!
I would argue the “I need to grow” thing is winning, as evidenced by her demonstrable growth, a lot of it in a short period of time. But the hatred of change (as opposed to, say, Jennifer, who LOVES the idea of radically reinventing herself, even if she’s not successful at it) is a brake on that. She’ll change, but slowly, and it will take work. (I think that does mean that her growth is more likely to stick, though—you give things up less lightly when you had to work hard for them.)
Absolutely.
I do think part of her current problem is that with her coming out openly as atheist, she seems to think she’s done. She can settle into this new role and stop changing. She says something similar to Dorothy right before the scene with Ruth – “I’ve now got everything important figured out.”
Yep, lol. What a freshman year mood!
Life will continue to put paid to THAT belief.
I wish I could edit comments…I think where Joyce is at right at this moment in time is “I have done the hard work of changing. I hated it, and I’m tired. Haven’t I changed *enough*?” And it’s like…nope! That summit you struggled to ascend was just a foothill on the journey up the mountain.
Oh right. I’m pretty sure that was at least two days ago though, no?
*in-universe
Does seem to be. Being locked in Ruth’s room must have messed with Jason’s sense of time.
Definitely saving a screenshot of the “Hell isn’t real, and so you can love whoever you want!” panel in case I need it later
I agree with Joyce’s sentiment of guys being gross and that Ruth can do better, but not her refusing to realize what a bisexual means, that’s part is pretty lame of her
but she’ll get over it soon enough (like a year for us and a week for her)
Last I recall Joyce freaked out that Ruth was dating Jason and accosted her about it because she didn’t realize Ruth is bi
They’re almost like Team Rocket
Prepare for trouble!
Make it double!
To cause the fundies devastation!
To the destroy the lies that unite our nation!
To denounce the evils of faith and hypocrisy!
To harness the power of animosity!
Ruth!
Jason!
We’re Team RA, blasting off at the speed of light!
Surrender now, or prepare to fight!
Eh, sounds about right!
*plays “Team Rocket Theme” on hacked muzak*
Prove it, bowtie. Ruth, call your lawyer.
Big Time! I’m on my way/I’m making it…–Peter Gabriel
Thank you for that.
It just struck me that these are the two characters that have their nationality as a part of their personality. That’s pretty funny that they’re dating!
It’s almost like they specifically bonded over that or something.
“Who the fuck uses Fahrenheit!” – a line that always makes me giggle
My car gets 40 rods to the hogshead and that’s the way I likes it!
They’ve also both engaged in unethical relationships with people they were in a position of power over!
Go for it Ruth, it’ll be hilarious. Besides, what is the worst that could happen?
♫ Give yourself over to absolute pleasure
Swim the warm waters of sins of the fle~esh! ♪
-RHPS
Ruth has her priorities straight.
That was only yesterday?~/i>
It was two days ago in universe (each storyline = 1 day)
Dunno why he said it was yesterday, either a minor continuity error or the days are starting to blur together for Jason
I feel that.
Being cooped up in the murder cave will do that.
I thought that was farther back than just yesterday.
Over on this side of the pond, Jason, we say “the other day” for more than just yesterday, but (generally) less than a week.
At least we do where I’m from.
Yesterda— good heavens
“You can’t prove I’m thinking that” Says the one who thought it out loud yesterday-yesterday 😏
Ruth got an idea. A wonderful, awful idea.
I feel like this is gonna end in Joyce going “Okay. AND?” which then leads to her practically exploding about how so many of her friends keep treating her like the Fundie she used to be. Might lead into a spiral or Joyce telling everyone to just piss off for a while.
I hope that when somebody does tell Joyce we pay off the setup of her lingering fundamentalist reactions with four panels of an unreadable expression, and then she says “That’s great; I’m going back to bed.”
I just realised how much Ruth likes surrounding herself with failure. Jason, the Leafs… it’s just her thing.
First semester Billie fits that bill too…
No doubt that’s why she moved to the US.
She very much did not choose to move to the US
I have seen that look on Ruth’s on only one other actual human being, ever – and she was a fictional character, too. Her name was Zelda Gilroy, and that’s the sort of look she would get when she was working on some underhanded scheme to snag Dobie Gillis as her boyfriend.
And in a sort of perverse way, I think that’s what made her likeable. Dobie never knew what he was missing.
it’s kind of wild to me that that show’s enduring legacy is spawning the entire Scooby Doo lineage (and all the other shows following the same formula).
Jason is so happy to be back on speed with the plot
Ruth is REALLY good at a Grinch smile
Now, just how many sizes did her heart grow this Christmas, if any at all?
um, am I the only one who recalls what “roger” means in British slang?
Nope.
I think “roger”, as in “received”/”read you”, might still barely hang on with those who commonly do radio communications.
But I’m pretty sure that for the typical Briton/UK speaker, “roger” would primarily mean, ahem, “copulate”.
(* waits for actual UK speakers to tell me that I have the wrong end of the stick *)
Tally ho! Pip pip! Do not fret! Your recall hits the spot better than a nice cup of tea.
Puts a whole new spin on the reason why a pirate flag was called the “Jolly Roger”.
I assumed that was a Treasure Island reference, like most common-knowledge pirate stuff.
No, it goes back to actual pirate days, though Treasure Island might have kept it in popular culture.
It doesn’t seem to be connected to that slang use of “roger”, but it’s not really known where the term comes from.
Well, obviously the dude’s name is Roger, and he’s clearly jolly, look at that big wide grin.
Thematically appropriate.
Hard to tell from her suplexing a granny smile.
Grannies presume innate authority from their very existence.
I love this couple dynamic. I wonder if Jason will be able to stop both Ruth and Carla and say that to Joyce for some weird mistake. I kinda hope he will team up with Sal for stopping the two unstoppables.
I find myself surprisingly rooting for these two, yes. 🙂 Honestly, I think Jason is a much more stable and healthy partner for Ruth than Jennifer’s weird “let’s be awful together” co-dependency.
“You know me so well <3"
This is just what Ruth needed, not an enabler… but a Straight Man… well that’s even funnier
I wonder just how many of the people who knew Joyce as the fundie Christian have no idea that she’s now an atheist. And I think it’d be funny if Joyce doesn’t have a problem with it at all when she does eventually find out that Becky and Dina had sex.
ngl, I have to agree with Joyce’s sentiment that it was better when Ruth was dating Billie not because I don’t get bisexuality, but because Jason is dull and boring and Ruth can absolutely do better in both genders.
also Jason is horrible at keeping Ruth as a responsible adult, Jennifer would’ve had her under control with a pouty face like 2 strips ago
I fail to see why “keeping Ruth as a responsible adult” should be Jason’s responsibility and not Ruth’s.
Yesterday, I sarcastically commented that Ruth was a horrible person. I would like to remove the sarcasm from that statement.
Saying you’ll misbehave and doing a little performative sinister smiling is actually worse than [Insert hyperbolic reference to the least terrible atrocity committed by Americans in the Vietnam War]. I kid, I don’t actually think you actually think that.
(Side note: I looked it up to make sure I was using the proper term for it, and that shit apparently lasted 20 years??? I’d always been under the impression that it was “just” a couple of years and then America got embarrassed and left. They didn’t teach that shit in any school I went to, probably to avoid telling kids “Oh, btw your grandpa probably did a lot of this stuff”.)
I’m going to laugh if Joyce finds out and is just like, whatever man
It’s just gonna be 3 panels of silence followed by her saying “good for you I guess”
Ooo, primary colors
This page is so goddamn pretty.
After binging this comic the past 3 days I’ve finally caught up and I don’t know what to do with myself. Needless to say I’m really looking forward to tomorrow.
Welcome to the Caught-Up Club. There are no meetings, but we do have an FC house now. 300k gil and you can open a private chamber/apartment inside it.
Oooo! Must have been some experience! Congratulations!!! 🥳
Would you like to play a game or two based on the comic? 🎮
Would you like to help me make one of those games, through playtesting and other things? 😃
(humans still like video games based on cartoons, right?)