at the time, which I think would have been when even ROZ might hesitate to Roz at me, all I knew was I craved some kind of intensity, and that was how to make it happen
So once when I was a tween my mom walked into the bathroom while I was taking a bath (normal in our household) and freaked out and told me to move / move the spout (I no longer remember the specifics) because it was directly over my girly parts and I guess my mom thought I shouldn’t masturbate? This honestly isn’t like her but I guess I was little?
Anyway I had been feeling 0 stimulation because there was the entire bath full of water between the flow and my girly parts. But now that my mom told me about it, I naturally realized I should absolutely try it without the water (with the door locked).
(It’s good, if the pressure and temperature are sufficient)
Joyce: It has to be completely accidental, we can’t do anything to help me along. Now, I need to shift positions so I can imagine I’m on a trapeze, and queue up some Gorillaz tracks on my phone. If you want to help, read me some entries from a recipe blog in Batman’s voice.
I am kind of wondering at this point if Willis is going to show us the entirety of this strange awkward interaction. I mean there’s probably a lot in the way of character moments to be mined from this scenario for both characters involved, but also this does a little bit feel like watching a train wreck occasionally punctuated with sweet moments.
Trainwrecks are interesting to watch, you have to admit. There is something about danger and/or embarassment, being so fascinating to watch that people will stop everything they are doing to watch.
Train wrecks are so interesting to watch that they used to be staged as entertainment (idk if I can post a link but look up “staged train wrecks” on Atlas Obscura and there’s an article about it)
We’re going to see a two-panel comic that’s a supercut of everyone going about their day in one panel, and then in the next, a massive exclamation of pleasure and their collective reactions to hearing it.
Would depend on day of the week and time of day as well. Some hours are a lot slower in the laundry room, in my college experience.
Also in my college experience, laundry rooms had security cameras, but I’m assuming that’s something that’s been considered and found/(decided) not to be the case here.
Cameras were one of my main worries. MAYBE no cameras for privacy reason “since a lotta girls might come down here dressed down, but y’know…this isn’t a changing room/bathroom so I’m not even sure if that holds up.
Yeah cameras in a college laundry room seem a little creepy to me but I guess security differs by location. I would at the very least expect some sort of obvious signage that you’re being filmed.
The only reason why I’d think they might have cameras in the laundry room is that I honestly think it’d be the most likely place for stuff to get stolen.
Yeah, people leave their stuff there unattended all the time, so the security cameras make sense to me. (Also, sometimes people get pissed and take someone’s stuff out of the machines for whatever reason– maybe it’s just been sitting there too long, maybe no machines are available and the person just decides they’re more important– and dump them somewhere else, like on the floor, or once, to a friend of mine, in the trash.)
I would expect security cameras in literally every common area in a dorm – lobby, elevators, study areas, laundry rooms, bicycle racks, the whole shmear – if for no other reason than to protect the university if someone says something went on. Then they’ve got video footage to confirm or refute any allegations. (it would also be useful if someone is breaking-and-entering the laundry machines to rip off coins or tokens, or stealing laundry)
Sorry to say it, but that’s the sort of world we’re living in today.
IIRC there was security footage that absolved Amber for slicing and dicing Ryan’s face with his own knife before the timeskip. As in even when Amber took the knife away Ryan didn’t stop tryin to get it back and hurt someone until Amber made him look like a dimestore Freddy Kruger.
other than being able to go home to your parents once a month or so, i imagine being ‘free’ wouldn’t necessarily make ppl prioritize stuff unless they already had their own habit of doing their own laundry ingrained lol.
Free laundry? I’d assumed this were coin-operated, or token-operated. Though these days you can also use a website or an app. Isn’t that what those pink* rectangles with the blue* circles on the right side of the top of the machine are?
i meant free as in more freedom away from being under ur parents thumb , but it would also be a pain if you had to always keep some spare quarters on you, but i have seen ‘hacks’/tips on like getting a laundry key or those wires that’d let you have free rinses w/o paying lol
As someone who once got majorly sick in the middle of the night and suddenly had to do a bunch of laundry but didn’t have enough quarters on hand… yes, very annoying.
As for the other part, I don’t know, I didn’t really do laundry with any regularity at home, but I found it easy enough to start doing so when I went to college.
I think I was taught how to iron in middle school home economics, but it didn’t stick. As an adult, I’ve gotten a little intimate sewing, and it can be helpful to iron out fabric first, so when I started, I had to be like, “Hey, how do you, uh… know when it’s done…”
i think for most part with some clothes these days you don’t need to separate the darks from the whites, and most college students wouldn’t really own clothes that ‘need’ ironing or going to the dry cleaners other than maybe a fancy/formal suit for some reason but even then as long as it isn’t excessively wrinkled i don’t think most ppl would care either
Could be free. The spots I think you’re referring to (which are blue on blue to me) seem like the could be something else, or they have been how the machines were previously coin operated but weren’t anymore. My college moved to free laundry in the dorm a bit ago… the year I moved to off-campus housing actually.
I imagine they haven’t been there that long yet. It’s been a week for us, but a laundry room that didn’t have anyone come in for 10-15 minutes isn’t that wild.
It’s been a while since I lived in a “dorm” (actually, US Navy Barracks). We were mostly NCOs, and you were “encouraged” to pay for maid service to clean the rooms and do your laundry. It was actually fairly reasonably priced.
The last apartment I lived in had a laundry room, but it was pretty scuzzy, so I never used it. I went over a couple blocks to a coin-op laundry and played Pokemon games vs the owner’s kids whilst laundrifying.
It appears to be early morning, and possibly on a weekend, so most folks in the dorms will be sleeping in. Or, if it’s a weekday, they’d only get up this early for class, not laundry.
The laundry room would often have long periods of no one there when I was in college. Admittedly, I usually hung out and read or sketched or wrote ReBoot fanfic rather than…other extracurriculars, so I didn’t really care if anyone walked in.
I feel like Dorothy is A: leading Joyce down a weird path, B: leading Joyce to expose her see-you-next to countless not-so-innocent women just looking to wash their clothes.
Even that aside, given how she was hesitant about seeing an eyedoctor, it makes me wonder if she’s had a checkup with the gynecologist yet (For some reason I was only taken once and never again lol. tho if we were living in canada/another country for free healthcare maybe it’d be easier)
The closest we got in that visit was the doctor saying perhaps performing a physical examination.
Which seems a reasonable possibility considering she didn’t just go in wanting birth control, but with something clearly wrong.
That’s only sort of the case.
Any doctor can write a birth control prescription. In some states a pharmacist can do it. In some states you can get the prescription online.
But… it’s typically written by a gynecologist, and there’s a general recommendation that everyone with a cervix get an annual pelvic exam to look for cancer, and most gynecologists follow that recommendation and won’t write anything without following it.
There are other routes to the meds if you really don’t want the exam.
If it’s her first time she’s getting an orgasm, I’m sure it will be an explosive sensation. I wonder how could a person could hold it until their 20’s…
Eeeeh, maybe not that explosive. I didn’t fully until I was 18, and maybe it’s because I’m autistic like Joyce likely is, but one day when I was home alone I was like “oh right, people do that. I guess I better figure it out before college.” The result was more of an “oh, for three seconds that felt neat!” than anything explosive. Some things take practice.
She’s actually said in this comic that this ISN’T her first orgasm. “I’ve made it before that way.” Plus, there’s wet dreams. I doubt it’s her FIRST first.
Much easier than you think, honestly. Joyce has it pretty bad but that libido bell curve goes pretty far in both directions, not to mention the number of medications out there these days that will absolutely break your drive, even as a teenager.
It’s not uncommon for SSRI-type antidepressants to dampen your sex drive, but for some unusual people they raise your sex drive (possibly due to being less depressed). Mine didn’t have that side effect in either direction for me. Don’t worry too hard about reputations. Everyone’s different.
One of the problems I had finding an anti-depressant was I was restricted to generics because no insurance, and ones that killed libido made my depression worse for obvious reasons.
Some people can get so in their own head with the rules/shaming that they sort of block off sensations from down there. Probably requires a low natural sex drive too. That was me… In my teens I could definitely get mentally aroused, but I never really connected that with physical arousal, even though I’d get wet. I’d have fantasies in my head, but didn’t feel a connected urge to touch myself or hump things. I was 20 the first time I dared to attempt masturbation, and it took a little while before it felt like anything besides “weird”.
We thought we were past peak Joyce face, but geologists have just uncovered a new Joyce face deposit large enought to power civilisation for 100 years.
Got motion, restrained emotion
Been driving, Detroit leaning
No reason, just seems so pleasing
Gonna make you, make you, make you notice
Gonna use my arms
Gonna use my legs
Gonna use my style
Gonna use my sidestep
Gonna use my fingers
Gonna use my, my, my, imagination–The Pretenders
Ok. TMI but like…
For a really long time I didn’t actually know what I was meant to do when I was aroused. Like I’d discovered porn, I’d watch it but I’d just…it there horny as hell. I just thought that was it. I had to learn from Adult Swim Cartoons.
As noted above, for me it was pillow humping. For a while, it was just nice, but then one time, I felt something happening, so I got up and went to the bathroom because I was worried I was going to pee. And there, sitting on the toilet, I discovered orgasms.
Oh omg. You’re not the only one, it’s like you have a burning feeling in your stomach and the urge to urinate, right? I was having a conversation with an older woman whom I found attractive this one time and ran to the bathroom in the middle.of it. (she was straight and not interested in anyone my age and not even single but that didn’t stop it from happening lol)
Thank goodness that some random comedy show I saw as a kid had a sketch about a sex ed class with a joke were the instructor says that a sperm cell “could go on to fertilize an egg and become a human being, or it could end up in a kleenex,” because I’m honestly not sure I would have come up with using a tissue on my own.
Truly dire that I could learn something about sex from a *parody* sex ed class that I couldn’t have learned from my *actual* sex ed class.
I had a very similar experience. I vaguely knew about masturbation but I’d been looking at porn for about a year just enjoying looking at naked girls and playing porn games online before it even occurred to me to touch myself. Not because I didn’t know it was an option or whatever, I just never thought about doing it myself. One day I was just like “huh, I wonder what that’s like” and my life was changed.
This revelation of course meant I couldn’t enjoy as many porn games as I used to, because for some weird reason they aren’t all made to be played with one hand.
RIGHT? My least favorite kind are the ones that are like…the porn only happens as a lose condition because my natural inclination is to win so I end up getting more into the game than the porn.
Definitely relate to y’all and also Joyce. I used to get really turned on imagining fictional characters when i was quite young but not know what to do what that at all. then b/c religious background i decided it was probably a sin to think about this and so i just… Stopped. I didn’t come back to it until college, when one of the first people i ever made out with said “have you ever had an orgasm” and I was like “a what?” then i had to really practice and do some work to actually figure out how it all worked.
From age 15 to about age 18 I used to wake up with one hand between my legs and be like “WTF ???? AGAIN ???? My hand smells like fish I hate this” and I went to wash my hands and went about my day.
I had no conscious knowledge of masturbation. My body seemed to have decided to overrule the conscious mind. It took me years, litteral YEARS to understand what was going on.
I believe to this day that human sexuality is mostly folklore and has to be transmitted from person to person. Abandon a small child in the woods and, may they survive, they will have no idea how sex works. (But take your child to church so that the priest can explain to them what exactly counts as sin and… they’ll know lol)
DOROTHY. Maybe DON’T FINGER YOURSELF IN THE PUBLIC COMMONS. That just seems like…y’know…a bad idea. And just kinda rude! People gotta do laundry in there. I thought you were gonna warm her up and take it to the dorm, why would you ask her to finger herself here? Are you insane? ARE YOU INSANE?
The trouble with leaving the room is that Joyce might just use it on her back.
And the trouble with inexpensive back massagers is that they can often be too much or too little and don’t have much in the way of adjustable settings. Even then cheapest bullet vibes usually have at least a low and high setting – many have a medium as well.
I mean true but if she does use it on her back, that’ll help relax her. Win-win really. Girl’s been really stressed out.
Also yeah I can assume a back massager makes for a shitty vibrator.
I mean, they CAN make good ones. Once you know what kind of vibes you like, you can generally figure out which ones will work for you. But for a first timer with no experience, it’s harder.
There is one specific model of Wahl back massager which is in my top 3 of vibrators I’ve ever owned, it’s an incredible rumbly powerhouse and cost about £25. Sadly in the newer models they nerfed the motor.
The hitachi magic wand was also originally sold as a back massager. I don’t like wands personally but they are very popular among vibrator afficionados generally
Yeah… I’m on Dorothy’s side with trying to teach Joyce how to do it and actually achieve something. However, I can understand sitting on the dryers to enjoy themselves, but I do not approve of full on masturbation.
Jeez Dorothy, take her to your room or a hotel, but not in the laundry room.
Yeah I could come up with a shortlist of places that’re more ok to masturbate in on a college campus. The prerequisite being y’know…A door that can close/lock and a semblance of privacy. And y’know…preferably not on or near something other people will have to physically touch later.
Yeah but I mean…I’d still find that gross. If you went to a laundrymat and the owner was like “oh someone came on that machine this morning”, even if they sanitized it I feel like you wouldn’t wanna use it anymore. Hell you might never use it again.
Seriously, this is a public place… It makes me super uncomfortable that they’re doing this were anyone from the dorm could just walk in and be exposed to something they did not consent to. And they’re sitting pantsless on these dryers, where people frequently place their clothes… Is it too much to hope Dorothy plans to sanitize the surfaces before they leave?
Convincing Joyce to /actually/ masturbate is going to be an uphill battle, isn’t It?
Although to be fair despite my upbringing, I figured it out quickly by reading an erotic novel I found and definitely was not supposed to see. After that, I had to learn not to do it so much that it causes the skin to rip.
I had more to say, mostly about how annoyed at myself I am for being careless, but I’ve probably already crossed over into TMI saying as much as I have, so I deleted the rest of what I wrote and am putting this in instead.
I know this isn’t joyce’s problem but I’m surprised I never really see anyone talk about how Not Fun using your hands can be when you’re autistic, specifically with texture issues. I can only get so far by myself because I need to keep that barrier of clothing in the way, otherwise the sliminess on my fingers immediately kills the mood
I’m not autistic (at least in my current understanding of myself), but I’m in a similar boat. I think there are a lot of factors in it for me, but I Do Not Enjoy This Tactile Experience is part of it. Used to almost always keep clothing in the way (also thought that made it “not really” masturbating), now tend to use a vibrator.
honestly that’s the one thing that made me hesitate in calling myself bi for so long, because the idea of trying to be sexual with someone with a vagina is just eugh. I can barely deal with myself, never mind someone else. at least with dicks I just take some birth control (that conveniently also gets rid of periods, another sensory nightmare) and go “okay, lets keep all the gross stuff down there where I don’t have to think about it”
I don’t really have an issue with other people’s stuff in the same way, though my experience has been more limited. My mental struggle there is more “I don’t even know how to do this with my hands for myself, how am I going to figure it out on someone else.” Dicks are comparatively easy (for me).
If you find yourself in a situation where you do want to have sex with someone who has a vagina, I suggest buying a box of nitrile gloves. They make things a lot easier to handle.
I’m exactly the opposite – the texture of vaginal transudate is extremely pleasant to my personal brand of autistic reactions. Love that slickness – no artificial lube comes close to matching its tactile perfection.
I do get other negative tactile reactions – unexpected texture changes in my food freak me the hell out – but not when it comes to sex.
I am _probably_ autistic given that my wife is professionally diagnosed autistic and I scored the same as her on the prelim text. However, while she had a mental health professional that she went to, I do not, so I could only do diagnostics second hand.
that explains a lot.
yeah, i don’t like the sliminess either!
i usually just use a vibrator or stay outside on the clit, but here’s a reminder for everyone that you can use gloves for masturbation, too (nitrile is great if the smell of latex overwhelms you).
oh wait shit I just bought a bunch of rubber gloves for christmas baking so I wouldn’t get chocolate and cookie dough all over my hands and now I have a bunch of gloves leftover
Yes, extra lube is a big help with gloves on! Also doctors do tend to use lube when doing pap smears. It’s on the speculum and helps to lube the interior.
I mean I can’t speak for anyone else but I’ve always gotten by just fine without lube for things much bigger than a couple gloved fingers. I only ever need lube when me and my partner are too impatient for proper foreplay. even then I still haven’t needed it since switching meds two years ago
This whole situation has been increasingly uncomfortable to watch. May as well let the uncomfortable spike in a different way.
That’s Joe’s laundry in the dryer. Let’s bring him in here too. Have him enter the laundry room to check if his clothes are done and witness whatever the heck’s going on in here.
Well, there’s probably just one gym in the dorm, but it looks pretty large, so I think there could be multiple laundry rooms. My thinking is that those might be more divided by dorm wings, which may be co-ed across floors, I don’t know.
Well, A: she’s not really teaching Joyce how to give herself permission either, and B: a lesson on how to do mechanically seems like it would be useful and would also further the Joyce-giving-herself-permission progress.
At this point, Dorothy should be starting to realize this is a bad idea, but she probably thinks it’s gone too far to stop now. Even if Dorothy wanted to stop, Joyce would just double down out of pride/curiosity/horniness.
This is a bad idea for all kinds of reasons, but there’s maybe only one that would sink in for you:
You of all people, with your ambitions, should understand the difference between truth and narrative. What do you think it’s gonna do for your political career when you run for office and someone says to the press “oh right I remember walking into the laundry room at college and she was trying to force a clearly reluctant girl to masturbate in public so she could get off on watching?”
Doesn’t even hafta be true. It’ll be the narrative. So long, Presidential aspirations.
The whole “Dorothy must be prosecuted as a criminal or otherwise brought to justice” vibe honestly bothers me more than any of Dorothy’s actions.
Especially considering, like, y’all know this whole “lesson” isn’t gonna work out for Dotty, right? This whole arc is one big slow-motion own goal on Dorothy, because the idea that Joyce having an orgasm will make her stop thinking about Joe is the most nonsense idea in DOA history. If anything, it’s likely to make Joyce MORE interested in pursuing Joe.
I’m not saying she should be prosecuted but her judgement is seriously flawed and if she thinks this is a wise course of course then I worry what she would do to a population, for the greater good of course
This strikes me as less something to be learned and more a default setting.
I mean do you really have to learn that taking someone into a public room and talking them into a form of masturbation is maybe not the best course of action
But Dorothy believes that she knows best, that what she thinks is right and theres no need to second guess herself at all and if talking someone into undressing more than they’re comfortable with, into masturbating in public, into looking up porn for them on their own phone and then holding hands with them while they get off is the right course of action then by golly thats whats going to happen
Nobody is born knowing everything. What the fuck is a college for, other than learning and/by interacting with people? She’s barely halfway to the minimum age required for presidency, why does she have to be fully prepared for it now? Not like it requires a high moral standard.
Okay, that’s pretty asinine isn’t it? Some people don’t learn things when you did and have to experience life a little longer than you did for some things, O anointed one. Goddamn.
Learning to second-guess yourself and learning not to barrel over people with your chosen course of action is a learned skill. It’s called humility, and Dorothy doesn’t know it yet.
Source: I had to learn humility myself by fucking up and hurting people. I had to learn to accept that I could be wrong. I had to learn to listen. These are definitely learned skills that I did not have when I was 18.
I, uh, I think it’s a bit of a slippery slope fallacy to go “19 year old Dorothy is okay with encouraging Joyce to do a technically-public masturbation session, therefore 35 year old Dorothy will commit war crimes/genocide/make public masturbation mandatory and police-enforced or something”.
Don’t be an asshole. I know what a fucking straw man is, aight?
The person I’m responding to literally said “if [Dorothy] thinks this (encouraging Joyce to get off in a semi-public place) is a wise course of action, of course I worry what she would do to a population, for the greater good of course.”
If you can describe that as anything other than a slippery slope fallacy I would love to hear it. Please tell me how it’s somehow not.
I can’t recall a case in which a sex scandal actually prevented someone being elected here. The other party howls nonstop as if it’s worse than murder, the candidate’s own party insists nothing wrong happened, the newspapers make buckets of money, and then it dies down.
“using your fingers makes it real” yep…. damn you willis, why can i relate to all this recovering from religion crap, all the stuff you need to unlearn… all the lies you’ve always told yourself…. *it’s not sin if it happens by accident, it’s not sin if someone else makes me, it’s not sin if i don’t touch ‘it’, …. if there hadn’t been so much taboo around sexuality, maybe i’d have spent more time thinking about god and less time thinking about how to get off without god (and christian people) being mad at me if they knew.
Seriously guys, the amount of time christians discuss pre-marital hanky-panky is WILD. i used to be on a jesus forum as a christian teen and there were a lot of threads discussing what exactly constitutes sex (and therefore sin). i think if everyone had just fucked more, they’d have gotten it out of their system more easily.
Yeah, I knew this. And it’s a torment, because we’re getting all these discussion to find one or another loophole to get some pleasure… It’s exausthing.
This is also why I tend to roll my eyes at all the comments that Joyce needs to just have sex, or get it out of her system, or whatever. There’s so much baggage there that cannot be just tossed out by doing the opposite of what you’ve been taught your whole life. Joyce having sex, with the upbringing and baggage she’s carrying, would not fix a single thing in a healthy way. Eventually she may get past that, but initially it’ll just trigger a shame spiral and existential crisis that she probably can’t deal with right now.
It’s possible that it will be received more as guidance and so more positively than it feels like it’s being received here. But it certainly seems like panel 4 of this strip is when Joyce starts reacting to perceived judgment again.
I can hear that internal monologue now. “My ass is numb and I’m almost done with my book, can you just fucking cum already I’ve got other things to do today.”
Yeah, like, as I imagined Joyce putting it, a bit more crudely, “the dommy mommy attitude was doing it for me, the scathing criticism of my personal technique is not.”
Dorothy got a tendency to go all Disappointed Teacher when things go wrong she gotta work on.
Oh Yeah, this is a good read on why this feels so weird again. Because Dorothy feels so judgemental and kinda over Joyce’s hangups. It would seem a lot better if that weren’t the case :/ i mean still overall a bad location, but much less like being kind of a bad friend as well as having a bad idea that seems totally normal cause we’re horny college girls.
Since this is yet another heavy comic let’s have some levity.
Joyce is reading her favorite fics but what was the first fictional character that gave you your “Awakening” as it were. (Or maybe just your first fictional character crush).
Not my awakening for sexual orientation (fictional characters don’t do much for me in that regard), but the first character that made my gender make a bit more sense was George from Enid Blyton’s Famous Five. I like to think that he/they came out as trans later <3
When I was twelve, I used to “joke” that I was, “gay for Toph” (of Avatar: The Last Airbender). Then when I was thirteen, I was like, “Ooooh, okay. Yeah, I’m seeing some things in hindsight.:
I’ll be honest I think you healed me a bit cuz I’ve been feeling old lately. Just saw an episode of American Dad where Francine lost her memory and thought it was 1985 because that was 20 years ago when that episode came out. And we’re now 2 years away from that episode itself being 20 years old.
That combination sounds like it was very state dependent. Where I am, for example, I believe it went (post-WW2, just because I don’t know much about these things before that time): voting age: 21 + drinking age: 21; voting age: 18 + drinking age: 18; voting age: 18 + drinking age: 21.
Actually, checking on it, for NYS it was 21/21>18/18>18/19>18/21;
drinking age was dropped to match the voting age in 1971, then New York raised it to 19 in 1982. In 1984 the federal government made it 21 by threatening to withhold highway funds for noncompliant states.
It didn’t make much of a difference to me: I’ve never been “”carded” in my life.
I have scars that are old enough to drink that I got after my kids were grown. And my beard is white. It feels really strange to be in here with all these minors talking about sex.
Hmm the earliest I can remember was Robin from the first Teen Titans cartoon. I remember being so excited for a new Robin-centric episode and squirming on the bed from where I was watching the tv, and realizing hey the motion I just did felt really good for some reason, so I just kept grinding against the bed while watching the episode.
I guess I should drop mine too.
At least my earliest memory of being in my cousin’s room watching his copy of Batman & Robin. Uma Thurman as poison Ivy just…Got me. I don’t think I really could put into words why I liked that movie so much at the time but…yeah no that was my decent into degeneracy 😛
It’s funny. All this talk about O-ing. I used to be so oversexed when I was younger. Maybe it’s the IUD, maybe it’s the meds, but now — zero interest. Not even in self-indulgence. It’s like the desire is just completely gone. Even when I’m alone.
And I’m at peace with that. It’s actually a relief.
Between that, JDF dying, and the nobody-ass triplets who played Trey of Triforia going batshit fundie for no reason, the last couple years have been such a downer. I dearly hope the special coming out is gonna be good.
The dudes are well and truly unhinged, and their collective ego is absolutely disproportionate to the 5 minutes of screen time they got. Another guy entirely did all the voice work for the Gold Ranger because their native accent was too thick for the director’s preference, but they go around bragging about being the “OG” Gold Ranger, and they even go as far as to say they’re using the Gold Ranger powers to heal people, megachurch-style. It’s fucking creepy and honestly scary in a few ways.
I was lucky enough to start Thinking Thoughts around the time Yu-Gi-Oh! started airing over here, so I was blessed with Mai Valentine at a very formative age.
Unrelated but I had a similar thing with Amy Wong and Turnaga Leela from Futurama. Insomuch that I had a huge thing for Amy as a kid but now that I’m older I like Leela a lot more.
Valid valid valid shampoo was awful but god i love her.
I had the biggest crush on ryoga when i was a kid. That lil fang of his single handedly carved out my taste in anime crushes
Much later on once i grew up i realized i was head over heels for Ukyo she’s so cute dude
Oh god
Maybe sokka from Avatar? And Zuko? For some reason i felt i had to fein an attraction to Aang bc he was closer to my age (tho still much older) and the only one without a girlfriend. I remember my parents catching me doing some humiliating stuff pretending i was with them.
Trunks was my first like, long term obsession crush, around the same time i got my first arrow through the heart, blushing and stammering mess crush irl.
Oh god i forgot, krillin and Yamcha too
Yamcha was a walking pile of Ls but he was cute, it’s all he had going for him
In adulthood it’s tien and picolo
Trunks was just unfair for Younger Taffy. So this hot buff guy shows up lookin’ like a lesbian with his purple bowl cut, jean jacket, and longsword he chops a cyborg into pieces, atomizes those pieces into stardust, and I’m just not supposed to grow up queer after that?
I got bullied for liking dragon ball as a girl and i (and all the other girls on the nicktoons official forums) was like LOOK AT THIS MAN. AND TELL ME GIRLS ARENT MEANT TO WATCH THIS SHOW.
No disrespect to the classics, of course. 4 just feels like the natural progression, to me. 2 is barely distinguishable, 3 is longer hair and a caveman brow. It didn’t start looking significantly distinct until 4.
ok my Super saiyan hot takes
1. Perfect. With how much it’s built up it was GENIUS to keep changes to a minimal. By giving Goku closed eyes instead of his friendly open eyes it changes his whole demeanor subtly while still feeling very Goku.
2. Honestly only works on Gohan. I’ve always hated Goku and Vegeta taking that form, mostly because the change is so insignificant.
3. Dumb. Looks like shit and has never won a fight. But I respect it because it’s dumb. It’s basically the Saiyan equivelent of 100% Frieza.
4. Design-wise I like it, but I hate that it’s called Super Saiyan 4 cuz it doesn’t at all feel like a progression of super saiyan and just feels like a new form altogether. My big issue is that Goku just…doesn’t feel like Goku in the form, something I praised SSJ1 for. Everytime he transforms he feels like a new person and I don’t like that.
SSG. I like how understated it is. It’s skinny and weak looking while being ethereal looking. That said I hate the dumb ritual they had to do to access it.
SSB. I hated it until I realized it’s just a regular SSJ just with God ki on top of it. Now I just think of it as…adding a little spice to a super saiyan.
Ultra Instinct. Technically not a saiyan form but thought I’d mention it. I liked it when it was omen, felt like it tapped into that mystic element I liked about SSJ without changing Goku’s design but then Ultra Instinct had to ruin it with the white hair. It doesn’t feel like a state of being and more like just another powerup. Lame.
Beast Gohan. It sucks I hate it.
SSJRage. It sucks I hate it.
Whatever Vegeta’s new dumbass form is. It sucks I hate it.
Oh oh Katara was also definitely one of those “wow if girls could like girls I’d be in love with her” moments before i knew what being gay was. Mei too. Mei and Zuko as a couple was just. Unfair.
I usually stayed in the laundry room to do laundry either to prevent someone from taking my clothes out and puting a pile of wet clothes on the floor or stealing them. I never wittness the latter but the former was all to common a few i witnessed someone just take wet clothes out and drop them on the floor litterally after the buzzer went off. Teenagers can be mosnters
I said this the other day, if this were a space where guys ever walk into, there is no fucking way in the universe that Joyce would have taken off her pants.
Ignoring all the problems with this being done in public (which is already a massive undertaking), is anyone else feeling like this is pretty close to/already sexual harassment on the part of Dorothy?
Joyce seems to be into it? I think? So I guess it is fine in that regard. Basically if Joyce is okay with this it is okay. But I do have major reservations as to how this started. This is all ignoring that this is very much a public place.
And for that…no I have nothing. I have no idea why Dorothy thought this is a good idea.
It’s sort of a cop-out answer with a lot of potential holes, but like… Isn’t it only sexual assault if the involved party isn’t okay with it? Joyce seems mostly? Okay with this? Like, she’s pretty easily going along with everything Dorothy suggests, and there’s no predation or manipulation factor here, so it seems fine until Joyce protests and asks to stop.
Barring the injured party being a minor or under the power of the alleged harasser, yeah.
Joyce is neither a child nor in Dorothy’s power, so until she actually indicates she wants it to stop, or until we get a thought bubble that says “help dorothy is controlling my body with her mind”, it’s not harassment.
Yes. That is what it boils down to. Joyce’s opinion is the only one that matters here.
But I am still really worried that someone will walk in on them. That would be so bad. And it would be harassment. Why are they doing this in a collage washing room? This gives me so much second hand anxiety.
Joyce was also ALWAYS free to go at any time. There are no chains, no ropes, no locked doors.
I won’t disagree that Dorothy has been pretty assertive about all this, but she’s been both literally and figuratively extending her hand and Joyce has been both literally and figuratively reaching out and taking it the entire time.
Yes, and I am extremely bothered by the amount of people who are just shrugging and saying (sometimes literally) “well Joyce never explicitly said no” or “well she was just free to leave” – which is a very concerning sentiment to see expressed in response to people saying how they felt at Joyce’s discomfort being ignored.
While she’s been asked to say if she wants to stop, she’s never been asked if this is what she wants, or expressed enthusiasm, excitement, or any positive sentiment at all.
I think people should give this article, She Didn’t Say No, But She Didn’t Say Yes, a read. Like yeah, Joyce doesn’t seem horribly upset, but how okay is she with this? The fact that the only argument for her being okay is that she hasn’t left is not a great one. If this was written with the idea of being a positive example of sexuality it is incredibly poor writing.
A *lot* of people are downplaying the coercion ability Dotty has on Joyce because lesbians.
Like people haven’t done stupid, possibly dangerous things because their friends egged them on or told them to do it. Especially friends they saw as anchors.
For someone as adrift as Joyce currently is? This feels REALLY scummy of Dotty to use her “I’m your bestie, I know best” powers to get Joyce to try and finger herself in a GD laundry.
She’s lost too many points (for me) with how she treated the possible autism diagnostic along with nearly every other way she’s interacted with Joyce’s moving away from her upbringing for me to NOT think she’s basically taking Joyce by the nose and stomping her into what Dotty feels is “normal.”
Considering for the VAST amount of Joyce’s life, she’s been basically trained to *be* lead around by the nose by a higher ranking person (her mom, then her eventual husband as shown in comic form) it all feels really fucking skeevy to me.
Add in the choice of venue, Dotty’s inept teaching skill, and her now apparent “Just get on with it” stance?
She’s not really looking like a person in which one puts any trust in.
That’s what I’ve been saying, but the comment stream has devolved into mocking anyone who thinks Dorothy is out of line here. I just read that article and hope they will read it.
She seems pretty damn fine to me. She’s not once looked upset or uncomfortable since this started and she’s made the continuous decision to stay after confirming multiple times that it’s perfectly okay to not. She’s even looked quite happy a couple times during this
Like, i have been coerced into sexual activity as a vulnerable person and didn’t explicitly say no, but it was clearly a bad thing. This is so incredibly not that and it’s pissing me off how people are watering it down
That’s a good article, but also… not terribly relevant to the situation. Joyce emphatically stated she wanted to continue when Dorothy told her she didn’t have to immediately after leaving the room. After asking if she could leave, and receiving an explicit confirmation that she could, she specifically chose to stay and continue. She’s nervous (because of course she is, with all the religious trauma) but she’s an active participant in this whole thing.
It’s not a flawless example of consent. Joyce hasn’t said explicitly “Why yes, Dorothy, I would be overjoyed to come masturbate with you and furthermore feel no pressure from you to do so.” But also, even using the “yes means yes” or “enthusiastic consent” models, that’s a bit much to ask for.
And yeah, that’s a problem with the enthusiastic consent model. If someone’s nervous, that invalidates consent?
They’re supposed to be better ways to judge consent, not a checklist you have to follow, even if the other person is fine with it.
Put aside the question of how Dorothy’s been approaching it for the moment, does anyone really think Joyce isn’t okay with this?
a bit, it’s toeing the line in my opinion since she was basically peer pressured into it. You would think Dorothy would tell Joyce in length what theyre going to do, what she thinks about it, boundaries, etc and most importantly “we can stop anytime” BEFORE she dragged Joyce into the laundry room.
She did tho. In the hallway, barely a foot from Joyce’s door, “you know you don’t have to do this if you don’t want to”
Before Joyce cut her off saying she wants to.
“You’re free to not do this thing I want you to do.” Says the peer, with the unspoken caveat that they will think lesser of the other for not doing the thing.
Or simply that Joyce *thinks* that Dotty will think less of her, so she does something she doesn’t really want to do (Or doesn’t feel ready to do) instead of disappointing Dotty.
The concern is that Dotty is inadvertently tapping into Joyce’s “follow the leader or be shunned by the congregation” programming.
Or as my aunt told my cousin “Oh you can quit playing piano… if you really don’t want to anymore.”
Assuming we’re talking about the drier thing. If we’re taking about the platonically co masterbation thing, that too, but like, not at the same time. I think. Probably 😅
I could see it happening, I have done like…co-fantasising with a friend but both at similar levels od comfort and experience. When I was younger I remember a lot of pep talks from more experienced folk. I could see a scenario where those things could combine. Definitely pretty outside the ordinary though most people do not have this kind of situation
Oh wait, sorry. That says “reference”, not “difference”. I’ve been so sleep deprived lately the words all look blurry on my phone. And I guess I’m a little on edge from all the moralistic bickering, so I was kinda ready to jump on it. Sorry.
Seems pretty weird to me, but I’ve always tried to avoid doing it in places where people can catch me, and I don’t think I’d be comfortable doing it with a friend in the same room.
Where’s the Joyce who was willing to throw away her oldest friend in order to go against her religious indoctrination? She doesn’t even seem to question why she’s still following these rules against sinful sexual pleasure and their loopholes. Which, I doubt achieving climax is going to offer any sudden revelation either.
Which I think is the real problem with what Dorothy is doing, she thinks Joyce is already there since she has the idea she (Joyce) is trying to bone Joe to prove how liberated she is. So much time and energy to solve an imaginary problem, I’m beginning to suspect the gals are going to fall for each other just so this special bonding time isn’t wasted.
Also it’s easier to reject the more superficial/ obviously ridiculous cognitively held aspects of an old belief system than the engrained, emotion-driven parts. I sincerely think nobody believes in their heart of hearts that Noah built an ark capable of holding 2 of every single animal, it’s a fairy tale people tell their kids. But emotional beliefs? The warmth of imagining you are loved and lovable by something much bigger than you, existential terror of hell, etc? Those are a lot more firmly entrenched. And of those emotions, shame-driven beliefs are the hardest to challenge because it attacks your perceived worth at a subconscious level.
See also why most of the big names in the New Atheist movement didn’t actually change their core social mores and values when they lost their faith – they might not believe in god, but they hold on to the culturally Christian conservative culture and accompanying social values they were raised in, usually. Because rejecting a cognitive opinion is relatively easy (& for Joyce, God wasn’t a belief so much as a “fact” she was taught and bought into until met with what she felt was contradictory evidence), but challenging a true value? That’s hard.
Thats astonishing to me because this is semi autobiographical story of growing up divorcing from religious fundamentalism.
( they even built an ark museum that Atheists visit ) .
Young Earth Creationism is widespread in this country despite the grand Canyon and all the dinosaurs bones dug up here.
I guess if Willis can’t make you believe that they really believe, no way i can.
I think the fact that she is calmly admitting to having orgasmed, intentionally, out loud, to a friend, whilst trying to replicate the experience, shows just how far she’s come.
Orgasms are a lot about mental state as well as physical. If Joyce thinks adding fingers would be too much right now, she’s, uh, probably right.
RE: all the logistics here (given that Joyce mentions “another hour”,) when they first came in, the dryer Joyce was told to sit on was already running/warm according to Dotty. Wouldn’t that imply that someone else is going to come back to that laundry room for that batch of laundry?
All I can think of is a photo of a Warner Bros animator at his drawing board looking into a mirror trying to get just the right facial expression for a Looney Tunes character.
Why would you want a lock on a laundry room? I don’t know how well behaved people are in your neck of the woods, but around here a lock on a communal space is a prime target for some dickhead to come lock people out, wasting everyone’s time while somebody goes to get the key or jimmies the door open manually. If the door opens inward, it can simply be kicked in, causing property damage. If it opens outward, it can easily be blocked off, which is a death sentence in the event of a fire, which can happen more easily than most people are comfortable with, when you have a room full of dryers.
Yeah, it really sorta is. All it takes is one unmanaged lint trap and that laundry room could turn into a crematorium pretty damn fast. And if it’s in the basement like I’ve seen mentioned, I feel like it’s a serious hazard to the entire building.
What brand dryers do people have that’s so good that sitting on dryers is literally a masturbating reference? I mean it takes a lot for me to get off so maybe it’s just me lol
Right? I’ve never understood people who tout the classic stuff like sitting on a dryer, or the electric toothbrush thing… it always takes me so, so much work to get off.
This is why Joyce needs Roz. Roz would have either Taken Joyce to her room, or just taught Joyce in her own room; either way, it would have been private, so Joyce would not feel uncomfortable. Roz would demonstrate to Joyce her own technique, showing that it was perfectly natural, and then let Joyce experiment.
Not to say Roz couldn’t do a better job of teaching, but there’s also a zero percent chance taking Joyce somewhere private and demonstrating technique for her wouldn’t have resulted in orders of magnitude more discomfort than what she’s feeling now.
Dunno what Joyce’s opinion of Roz is, but Roz is a nosy, knoDunno what Joyce’s opinion of Roz is, but Roz is a nosy, know I all on a level that you want to do the opposite of what she says on purpose. She’s not familiar with Joyce, she’s friendly with her but not an actual friend of her. I absolutely can’t see Joyce allow Roz to help her in such a delicate matter. Then wait, take her to her room, the room she shares with Mary???
lol im so so sorry if this is tmi but thats actually how i masturbate. not with the washer, but like shifting my hips and thighs and just rubbing things together. ive tried using my own hands but it just doesnt do anything. its odd.
also ToT im not sure roz would’ve been very helpful. Joyce, for one, does NOT know her very well, and has an equal chance of scarring her. is dorothy doing perfect ? No, but there isn’t exactly a field guide on how to help your friend through sexual repression lmao. shes doing the best she can as a friend. I think the best next step would be to have joyce stop and try another time. maybe even get her a small discreet vibrator to practice alone in her room
That depends on which end of the toothbrush they’re using against the tender bits and how they’re holding it. The toothbrush end held against the tender bits for women needing lots of stimulation, the handle end held and pressed against the bits for those needing much less stimulation.
Why do I feel like, since this scene began, a lot of comments have been needlessly personal and over the top toward actual human beings, instead of being aimed at the characters in the comic? You know the ones I mean, don’t even fucking pretend.
No hang on, I’ll spell this out in no uncertain terms. It feels like we’re a hair’s breath away from certain commenters accusing others of being rape apologists/advocates. Over differing levels of personal comfort with the actions of a fictional teenager. Seems a little fucking excessive, doesn’t it?
Yeah, there have definitely been some taking it too far, especially as it went on. But I feel they’ve also increased in intensity along with other people, who saw no problem with this at any point, attacking those who do. Basically, there’s been a lot of mistreatment of other commenters all around. I’ve mostly disengaged with the more serious comments, though that’s also made easier by not enjoying this arc and so not really caring.
We’re at a point where it’s nothing but pushback to pushback to pushback to pushback to pushback. I don’t really care anymore who started what, it’s gone too far and honestly I should probably disengage as well, because it’s gotten actively harmful to my mental health to read a scene I think is pretty cute and fun, and then when I scroll down there’s a dozen people saying (or almost saying, to maintain plausible deniability) something that rhymes with “If you like this scene you’re a danger to everyone around you”.
It’s basically why I wanted Willis to shut down the comments. Not for censorship, but because it’s been getting worse and worse with commentors. Even if you try to stay as nice as possible, this can end up colouring opinions of others for at least a bit due to how the comments spiral
Yeah i got perhaps too personal earlier and im sorry about that. There’s just something. Really gross about people basically saying “I’m personally uncomfortable which means Dorothy is coercing Joyce into sex.” And that is what the argument boils down to.
I feel like this is sorta what Willis went through internally.
Like Dotty isn’t just a character, at least for this scene, but rather how he saw a way out of his upbringing.
I don’t think that’s Joyce’s I’m-about-to-O face. I think it’s her, “I am speaking about solo hanky-panky, which makes me extremely uncomfortable, so I want this conversation to end immediately” face. We saw her making much the same expression when denying that she’s ever touched herself a few strips back.
I think this is the first time we’ve gotten confirmation Joyce has orgasmed, to say nothing of intentionally (albeit indirectly) causing it, to say nothing of admitting it to a friend. It should be noted how remarkably calm she is about all this. Almost like it’s not the biggest deal to her.
We are receiving a lot of new information here! I appreciate a narrative where you have a weird situation and you learn new information about how the main character has been behaving.
Well, it makes me feel a bit better about this arc – One of the things that I wanted to happen did, a bit of info added that explains why Joyce is more ok with this despite what happened earlier that day and well… In less than a year. She’s done this before
Mary is going to walk in… I m going to call it also heads up just beacuse Mary is terrible doesnt make this situation right it might be funny but not right. Bybnot righ ibmean the public part and Dorothy’s reasoning for this. The masturbation is fine.
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legit used to do it through external pressure (used like a balled-up sock or something, also didn’t wanna touch except to wash it in the bath)
Yeah, that has never worked for me. Rubbing my thighs together (as Joyce is doing) just leads me to chafing.
When I was a tween, I used to hump a pillow – that sometimes worked, and was how I first discovered orgasms, but it wasn’t the best.
Same here! It was so intuitive to me to achieve, it was some years before I discovered what I was doing had a name and all that.
Also I think I accidentally invented anime pillows in my horny wake. 😮
I used to use the heel of my foot.
at the time, which I think would have been when even ROZ might hesitate to Roz at me, all I knew was I craved some kind of intensity, and that was how to make it happen
obvs it feels better doing it a different way =3
Everyone is offering up suggestions, comments, comparisons, and criticisms. Me, I’m just pulling for you Joyce!
As Archer would say… “Phrasing!”
Both definitions of the phrase could be true simultaneously. Which doesn’t negate the admonition.
So once when I was a tween my mom walked into the bathroom while I was taking a bath (normal in our household) and freaked out and told me to move / move the spout (I no longer remember the specifics) because it was directly over my girly parts and I guess my mom thought I shouldn’t masturbate? This honestly isn’t like her but I guess I was little?
Anyway I had been feeling 0 stimulation because there was the entire bath full of water between the flow and my girly parts. But now that my mom told me about it, I naturally realized I should absolutely try it without the water (with the door locked).
(It’s good, if the pressure and temperature are sufficient)
Joyce: It has to be completely accidental, we can’t do anything to help me along. Now, I need to shift positions so I can imagine I’m on a trapeze, and queue up some Gorillaz tracks on my phone. If you want to help, read me some entries from a recipe blog in Batman’s voice.
suspiciously specific …suspecific
am now thinking maybe it happened before while riding with Sal?
I thought there’s be a convenient switch to other rooms and characters. I was wrong.
No, we’re here for the long haul.
Possibly the VERY long haul.
I am kind of wondering at this point if Willis is going to show us the entirety of this strange awkward interaction. I mean there’s probably a lot in the way of character moments to be mined from this scenario for both characters involved, but also this does a little bit feel like watching a train wreck occasionally punctuated with sweet moments.
Trainwrecks are interesting to watch, you have to admit. There is something about danger and/or embarassment, being so fascinating to watch that people will stop everything they are doing to watch.
Train wrecks are so interesting to watch that they used to be staged as entertainment (idk if I can post a link but look up “staged train wrecks” on Atlas Obscura and there’s an article about it)
Here’s the link:
https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/staged-train-wrecks
At some point someone is bound to interrupt. Surely.
Yeah I was expecting a smash cut of some kind.
But who’s going to be smashing?
Mike, your mum, for a nickel.
Mike is Dead!!!!! (Really hoping i get emo ethan as my gravatar for this comment.
Oh-h, let it be Mary!
I was gonna say “MONTAGE!”
but uh, that’d be weird XD
We’re going to see a two-panel comic that’s a supercut of everyone going about their day in one panel, and then in the next, a massive exclamation of pleasure and their collective reactions to hearing it.
reuse of the shot of Sal wondering why the dogs are going nuts, only it’s dark out.
Willis is gonna be mad he didn’t think of that one.
This laundry room must not be very busy which says not good things about their dorm’s hygiene.
I mean, they ARE college students…
Would depend on day of the week and time of day as well. Some hours are a lot slower in the laundry room, in my college experience.
Also in my college experience, laundry rooms had security cameras, but I’m assuming that’s something that’s been considered and found/(decided) not to be the case here.
Cameras were one of my main worries. MAYBE no cameras for privacy reason “since a lotta girls might come down here dressed down, but y’know…this isn’t a changing room/bathroom so I’m not even sure if that holds up.
Yeah cameras in a college laundry room seem a little creepy to me but I guess security differs by location. I would at the very least expect some sort of obvious signage that you’re being filmed.
The only reason why I’d think they might have cameras in the laundry room is that I honestly think it’d be the most likely place for stuff to get stolen.
Yeah, people leave their stuff there unattended all the time, so the security cameras make sense to me. (Also, sometimes people get pissed and take someone’s stuff out of the machines for whatever reason– maybe it’s just been sitting there too long, maybe no machines are available and the person just decides they’re more important– and dump them somewhere else, like on the floor, or once, to a friend of mine, in the trash.)
I would expect security cameras in literally every common area in a dorm – lobby, elevators, study areas, laundry rooms, bicycle racks, the whole shmear – if for no other reason than to protect the university if someone says something went on. Then they’ve got video footage to confirm or refute any allegations. (it would also be useful if someone is breaking-and-entering the laundry machines to rip off coins or tokens, or stealing laundry)
Sorry to say it, but that’s the sort of world we’re living in today.
IIRC there was security footage that absolved Amber for slicing and dicing Ryan’s face with his own knife before the timeskip. As in even when Amber took the knife away Ryan didn’t stop tryin to get it back and hurt someone until Amber made him look like a dimestore Freddy Kruger.
other than being able to go home to your parents once a month or so, i imagine being ‘free’ wouldn’t necessarily make ppl prioritize stuff unless they already had their own habit of doing their own laundry ingrained lol.
Free laundry? I’d assumed this were coin-operated, or token-operated. Though these days you can also use a website or an app. Isn’t that what those pink* rectangles with the blue* circles on the right side of the top of the machine are?
* I’m color-blind, and color-ignorant to boot.
i meant free as in more freedom away from being under ur parents thumb , but it would also be a pain if you had to always keep some spare quarters on you, but i have seen ‘hacks’/tips on like getting a laundry key or those wires that’d let you have free rinses w/o paying lol
As someone who once got majorly sick in the middle of the night and suddenly had to do a bunch of laundry but didn’t have enough quarters on hand… yes, very annoying.
As for the other part, I don’t know, I didn’t really do laundry with any regularity at home, but I found it easy enough to start doing so when I went to college.
I never did laundry until I went to college, but like cooking, had no trouble doing so. You just read the instructions on the box and the machine.
Granted, I never saw the point of ironing or cared about fashion or style.
I think I was taught how to iron in middle school home economics, but it didn’t stick. As an adult, I’ve gotten a little intimate sewing, and it can be helpful to iron out fabric first, so when I started, I had to be like, “Hey, how do you, uh… know when it’s done…”
i think for most part with some clothes these days you don’t need to separate the darks from the whites, and most college students wouldn’t really own clothes that ‘need’ ironing or going to the dry cleaners other than maybe a fancy/formal suit for some reason but even then as long as it isn’t excessively wrinkled i don’t think most ppl would care either
Could be free. The spots I think you’re referring to (which are blue on blue to me) seem like the could be something else, or they have been how the machines were previously coin operated but weren’t anymore. My college moved to free laundry in the dorm a bit ago… the year I moved to off-campus housing actually.
Probably one of those things you can pay with your student ID card, supposing you have money on it.
I imagine they haven’t been there that long yet. It’s been a week for us, but a laundry room that didn’t have anyone come in for 10-15 minutes isn’t that wild.
It’s been a while since I lived in a “dorm” (actually, US Navy Barracks). We were mostly NCOs, and you were “encouraged” to pay for maid service to clean the rooms and do your laundry. It was actually fairly reasonably priced.
The last apartment I lived in had a laundry room, but it was pretty scuzzy, so I never used it. I went over a couple blocks to a coin-op laundry and played Pokemon games vs the owner’s kids whilst laundrifying.
It appears to be early morning, and possibly on a weekend, so most folks in the dorms will be sleeping in. Or, if it’s a weekday, they’d only get up this early for class, not laundry.
It’s not early morning. This is later the same day they went to class and Joyce yelled at Dorothy and Roz for getting all up her business.
The laundry room would often have long periods of no one there when I was in college. Admittedly, I usually hung out and read or sketched or wrote ReBoot fanfic rather than…other extracurriculars, so I didn’t really care if anyone walked in.
I feel like Dorothy is A: leading Joyce down a weird path, B: leading Joyce to expose her see-you-next to countless not-so-innocent women just looking to wash their clothes.
If you want a shorter version, you could go with the latin. Cunnus.
B is why she was volunteering to watch the door. So nothing gets shown to anyone.
Even that aside, given how she was hesitant about seeing an eyedoctor, it makes me wonder if she’s had a checkup with the gynecologist yet (For some reason I was only taken once and never again lol. tho if we were living in canada/another country for free healthcare maybe it’d be easier)
She’s had a checkup with a gynecologist, it’s how she got prescribed the pills
That US doctors make irrelevant pelvic exams a requirement for medication will never stop being surprising to me.
The closest we got in that visit was the doctor saying perhaps performing a physical examination.
Which seems a reasonable possibility considering she didn’t just go in wanting birth control, but with something clearly wrong.
That’s only sort of the case.
Any doctor can write a birth control prescription. In some states a pharmacist can do it. In some states you can get the prescription online.
But… it’s typically written by a gynecologist, and there’s a general recommendation that everyone with a cervix get an annual pelvic exam to look for cancer, and most gynecologists follow that recommendation and won’t write anything without following it.
There are other routes to the meds if you really don’t want the exam.
Since this was a walk-in at the health center, it likely was a general practitioner, not a gynecologist anyway.
Something tells me the IU School of Medicine could find them a gynecologist.
I’m sure they’ve got them, but I’d still guess if you walk in, you’re going to talk to a GP first.
You gotta remember that US States all have different laws and also maybe your insurance requires it.
Neither my state nor my insurance requires this.
Awe look how frustrated she is! Poor Joyce really needs release! 🥺😢
If it’s her first time she’s getting an orgasm, I’m sure it will be an explosive sensation. I wonder how could a person could hold it until their 20’s…
It’s not always a choice.
Eeeeh, maybe not that explosive. I didn’t fully until I was 18, and maybe it’s because I’m autistic like Joyce likely is, but one day when I was home alone I was like “oh right, people do that. I guess I better figure it out before college.” The result was more of an “oh, for three seconds that felt neat!” than anything explosive. Some things take practice.
She’s actually said in this comic that this ISN’T her first orgasm. “I’ve made it before that way.” Plus, there’s wet dreams. I doubt it’s her FIRST first.
Well, she says she *thinks* she’s reached orgasm that way before, but that might not actually be the case
Much easier than you think, honestly. Joyce has it pretty bad but that libido bell curve goes pretty far in both directions, not to mention the number of medications out there these days that will absolutely break your drive, even as a teenager.
Medications? Are you referring to birth control or just prescription drugs in general?
Anti-depressants and other psycho-pharmaceuticals have a brutal reputation for crushing sex drives and even sensitivity.
Makes me all the more grateful I discovered cannabis!
It’s not uncommon for SSRI-type antidepressants to dampen your sex drive, but for some unusual people they raise your sex drive (possibly due to being less depressed). Mine didn’t have that side effect in either direction for me. Don’t worry too hard about reputations. Everyone’s different.
One of the problems I had finding an anti-depressant was I was restricted to generics because no insurance, and ones that killed libido made my depression worse for obvious reasons.
She said it has happened before kind of on accident/from her current strategy, as how I interpreted the strip.
Some people can get so in their own head with the rules/shaming that they sort of block off sensations from down there. Probably requires a low natural sex drive too. That was me… In my teens I could definitely get mentally aroused, but I never really connected that with physical arousal, even though I’d get wet. I’d have fantasies in my head, but didn’t feel a connected urge to touch myself or hump things. I was 20 the first time I dared to attempt masturbation, and it took a little while before it felt like anything besides “weird”.
We’re just getting all great Joyce faces this storyline.
The Joyce faces are a bumper crop, yes
We thought we were past peak Joyce face, but geologists have just uncovered a new Joyce face deposit large enought to power civilisation for 100 years.
Got motion, restrained emotion
Been driving, Detroit leaning
No reason, just seems so pleasing
Gonna make you, make you, make you notice
Gonna use my arms
Gonna use my legs
Gonna use my style
Gonna use my sidestep
Gonna use my fingers
Gonna use my, my, my, imagination–The Pretenders
Well there’s a new mondegreen for me. All these years, I’ve been singing it as “Gonna use my style, Gonna use my senses”. Oops…
Same here.
Also my late wife who was a huge Pretenders fun,
I always thought it was “Gonna use my style, Gonna use my sassy”–which I assumed was a reference to her “sassy” personality.
Mods, ignore the FLAG, did that by accident. I was attempting to reply and say…
It’s an easy lyric to miss. I think everybody I knew got that wrong too.
So Dorothy questions are the Joyce version of thinking about baseball?
Plot twist: Joyce discovers she has an unexpected baseball kink.
“Who’s On First” is triple X erotica to her.
Which only makes the “bases” of hanky panky more complicated.
ObXKCD:
https://xkcd.com/540/
Ok. TMI but like…
For a really long time I didn’t actually know what I was meant to do when I was aroused. Like I’d discovered porn, I’d watch it but I’d just…it there horny as hell. I just thought that was it. I had to learn from Adult Swim Cartoons.
Awe. Thanks for sharing Yoto, that’s so cute!
Adult Swim: educating the youth that watch it without permission.
Ah, yes, a proper education.
Back in my day you had to learn it on the streets. In the snow. Uphill both ways.
That’s a great application of this saying.
same here, no shame in that!!
As noted above, for me it was pillow humping. For a while, it was just nice, but then one time, I felt something happening, so I got up and went to the bathroom because I was worried I was going to pee. And there, sitting on the toilet, I discovered orgasms.
Similar experience tbh.
Oh omg. You’re not the only one, it’s like you have a burning feeling in your stomach and the urge to urinate, right? I was having a conversation with an older woman whom I found attractive this one time and ran to the bathroom in the middle.of it. (she was straight and not interested in anyone my age and not even single but that didn’t stop it from happening lol)
Thank goodness that some random comedy show I saw as a kid had a sketch about a sex ed class with a joke were the instructor says that a sperm cell “could go on to fertilize an egg and become a human being, or it could end up in a kleenex,” because I’m honestly not sure I would have come up with using a tissue on my own.
Truly dire that I could learn something about sex from a *parody* sex ed class that I couldn’t have learned from my *actual* sex ed class.
For real I gotta think about what my gravatar looks like before I post sometimes…
Naw it’s perfect. Iroh is known for dispensing great wisdom.
I’m all-in for sex-positive Uncle Iroh.
LOL at imagining him dispensing wise advice to Zuko who doesn’t want to hear it!
I had a very similar experience. I vaguely knew about masturbation but I’d been looking at porn for about a year just enjoying looking at naked girls and playing porn games online before it even occurred to me to touch myself. Not because I didn’t know it was an option or whatever, I just never thought about doing it myself. One day I was just like “huh, I wonder what that’s like” and my life was changed.
This revelation of course meant I couldn’t enjoy as many porn games as I used to, because for some weird reason they aren’t all made to be played with one hand.
RIGHT? My least favorite kind are the ones that are like…the porn only happens as a lose condition because my natural inclination is to win so I end up getting more into the game than the porn.
Definitely relate to y’all and also Joyce. I used to get really turned on imagining fictional characters when i was quite young but not know what to do what that at all. then b/c religious background i decided it was probably a sin to think about this and so i just… Stopped. I didn’t come back to it until college, when one of the first people i ever made out with said “have you ever had an orgasm” and I was like “a what?” then i had to really practice and do some work to actually figure out how it all worked.
From age 15 to about age 18 I used to wake up with one hand between my legs and be like “WTF ???? AGAIN ???? My hand smells like fish I hate this” and I went to wash my hands and went about my day.
I had no conscious knowledge of masturbation. My body seemed to have decided to overrule the conscious mind. It took me years, litteral YEARS to understand what was going on.
I believe to this day that human sexuality is mostly folklore and has to be transmitted from person to person. Abandon a small child in the woods and, may they survive, they will have no idea how sex works. (But take your child to church so that the priest can explain to them what exactly counts as sin and… they’ll know lol)
DOROTHY. Maybe DON’T FINGER YOURSELF IN THE PUBLIC COMMONS. That just seems like…y’know…a bad idea. And just kinda rude! People gotta do laundry in there. I thought you were gonna warm her up and take it to the dorm, why would you ask her to finger herself here? Are you insane? ARE YOU INSANE?
Seconded.
Still think she shoulda bought Joyce a bullet vibe or other external-use toy that wouldn’t be too intimidating.
Or give her a back massager and then a sly wink as you leave the room. Y’know if you wanna be coy about it.
The trouble with leaving the room is that Joyce might just use it on her back.
And the trouble with inexpensive back massagers is that they can often be too much or too little and don’t have much in the way of adjustable settings. Even then cheapest bullet vibes usually have at least a low and high setting – many have a medium as well.
I mean true but if she does use it on her back, that’ll help relax her. Win-win really. Girl’s been really stressed out.
Also yeah I can assume a back massager makes for a shitty vibrator.
I mean, they CAN make good ones. Once you know what kind of vibes you like, you can generally figure out which ones will work for you. But for a first timer with no experience, it’s harder.
There is one specific model of Wahl back massager which is in my top 3 of vibrators I’ve ever owned, it’s an incredible rumbly powerhouse and cost about £25. Sadly in the newer models they nerfed the motor.
The hitachi magic wand was also originally sold as a back massager. I don’t like wands personally but they are very popular among vibrator afficionados generally
…. I feel the Danny gravatar somewhat reduces how much i sound like I know what I’m talking about
it’s the wink that does it.
The roz really brings it back around
The Magic Wand is a (literally) legendary sex toy that started out as a heavy-duty back massager.
at least Joyce now knows the difference between a vibrator and a karaoke microphone.
I remember that episode! One of the best Chlove has done.
Yeah… I’m on Dorothy’s side with trying to teach Joyce how to do it and actually achieve something. However, I can understand sitting on the dryers to enjoy themselves, but I do not approve of full on masturbation.
Jeez Dorothy, take her to your room or a hotel, but not in the laundry room.
Maybe Dorothy likes to watch?
Maybe she has an exhibitionist kink?
Maybe Joyce does, and Dorothy read between the lines in her writing?
But yeah, don’t jill off in thr laundry room. Locked in a stall i. The bathroom is where you should be doing that.
Yeah I could come up with a shortlist of places that’re more ok to masturbate in on a college campus. The prerequisite being y’know…A door that can close/lock and a semblance of privacy. And y’know…preferably not on or near something other people will have to physically touch later.
I’m sure Dorothy plans to clean up after themselves afterwards.
Yeah but I mean…I’d still find that gross. If you went to a laundrymat and the owner was like “oh someone came on that machine this morning”, even if they sanitized it I feel like you wouldn’t wanna use it anymore. Hell you might never use it again.
Dorothy single-handedly working to get IU a version of that “please masturbate in your own rooms” sign for the laundry area
Only one hand?
I kno, rite? I need at least 3 hands
Seriously, this is a public place… It makes me super uncomfortable that they’re doing this were anyone from the dorm could just walk in and be exposed to something they did not consent to. And they’re sitting pantsless on these dryers, where people frequently place their clothes… Is it too much to hope Dorothy plans to sanitize the surfaces before they leave?
They’re wearing underwear (at least – I think Dorothy’s still in shorts) and not really doing anything anyone who walked in would see.
It’s a college dorm. Far worse things have happened in there.
I get it, this isn’t cool. Don’t do this. But it’s not nearly as serious as people are making it out to be either.
Convincing Joyce to /actually/ masturbate is going to be an uphill battle, isn’t It?
Although to be fair despite my upbringing, I figured it out quickly by reading an erotic novel I found and definitely was not supposed to see. After that, I had to learn not to do it so much that it causes the skin to rip.
Even with learning and experience… labial injuries happens sometimes.
Like today.
T_T
Ow, I am sorry to hear that. I’ve not had great luck either in the past week so I feel your pain.
“Not had great luck either,” referring to the downstairs injuries.
Ah. Sorry to hear that as well.
I had more to say, mostly about how annoyed at myself I am for being careless, but I’ve probably already crossed over into TMI saying as much as I have, so I deleted the rest of what I wrote and am putting this in instead.
I’m sure it isn’t TMI considering all the discussions tonight.
Either way, thank you for sharing and much luck to you to heal quickly.
Thanks!
And yeah, me too.
I’m so annoyed right now. I didn’t climax earlier and now I can’t do anything for at least a day. VERY frustrated.
🥺😖
Oh no! 😧
Super sorry to hear, hope you heal up soon! 😥
I know this isn’t joyce’s problem but I’m surprised I never really see anyone talk about how Not Fun using your hands can be when you’re autistic, specifically with texture issues. I can only get so far by myself because I need to keep that barrier of clothing in the way, otherwise the sliminess on my fingers immediately kills the mood
I’m not autistic (at least in my current understanding of myself), but I’m in a similar boat. I think there are a lot of factors in it for me, but I Do Not Enjoy This Tactile Experience is part of it. Used to almost always keep clothing in the way (also thought that made it “not really” masturbating), now tend to use a vibrator.
honestly that’s the one thing that made me hesitate in calling myself bi for so long, because the idea of trying to be sexual with someone with a vagina is just eugh. I can barely deal with myself, never mind someone else. at least with dicks I just take some birth control (that conveniently also gets rid of periods, another sensory nightmare) and go “okay, lets keep all the gross stuff down there where I don’t have to think about it”
I don’t really have an issue with other people’s stuff in the same way, though my experience has been more limited. My mental struggle there is more “I don’t even know how to do this with my hands for myself, how am I going to figure it out on someone else.” Dicks are comparatively easy (for me).
If you find yourself in a situation where you do want to have sex with someone who has a vagina, I suggest buying a box of nitrile gloves. They make things a lot easier to handle.
I’m exactly the opposite – the texture of vaginal transudate is extremely pleasant to my personal brand of autistic reactions. Love that slickness – no artificial lube comes close to matching its tactile perfection.
I do get other negative tactile reactions – unexpected texture changes in my food freak me the hell out – but not when it comes to sex.
Wait, is this the first time you’ve actually confirmed you’re autistic? 🙃
I am _probably_ autistic given that my wife is professionally diagnosed autistic and I scored the same as her on the prelim text. However, while she had a mental health professional that she went to, I do not, so I could only do diagnostics second hand.
Same, just smooth and warm and pleasant
Idk if I’m autistic but, like, probably
Girl autism is weird and hard to figure out
I have not really though about that but it explains some stuff for me. Geniune thanks!
that explains a lot.
yeah, i don’t like the sliminess either!
i usually just use a vibrator or stay outside on the clit, but here’s a reminder for everyone that you can use gloves for masturbation, too (nitrile is great if the smell of latex overwhelms you).
oh wait shit I just bought a bunch of rubber gloves for christmas baking so I wouldn’t get chocolate and cookie dough all over my hands and now I have a bunch of gloves leftover
…Would you need extra lube for that? I mean, I know doctors with pap smears rarely manage to hurt with their fingers but they don’t rub.
Yes, extra lube is a big help with gloves on! Also doctors do tend to use lube when doing pap smears. It’s on the speculum and helps to lube the interior.
I mean I can’t speak for anyone else but I’ve always gotten by just fine without lube for things much bigger than a couple gloved fingers. I only ever need lube when me and my partner are too impatient for proper foreplay. even then I still haven’t needed it since switching meds two years ago
Would latex gloves resolve this issue? Your fingers would stay dry…
And now I see someone else recommended it and feel dumb for not checking beforehand.
Dorothy, just go to the dorm, put a sock on the handle, this is public af
Evasive action already?
*digs up this strip from 7 years ago as distraction*
*plays Firestarter loud enough outside*
Let ‘er rip.
Weirdly enough going to the gym this morning, Firestarter was one of the first songs that came on shuffle for me 🤔
Just to be certain are we discussing this Firestarter? https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=8MT-9KoR5Pk
because I found several different ones including the theme from the movie,
This whole situation has been increasingly uncomfortable to watch. May as well let the uncomfortable spike in a different way.
That’s Joe’s laundry in the dryer. Let’s bring him in here too. Have him enter the laundry room to check if his clothes are done and witness whatever the heck’s going on in here.
I believe this laundry room is only for the girls, and the boys have one in/near their dorm.
They live in the same dorm, just different wings. Not sure how the laundry rooms are divided up.
Their dorm gym is co-ed, I would think the laundry room would be too. And Danny knew where to go when he did Amber’s laundry that one time.
Well, there’s probably just one gym in the dorm, but it looks pretty large, so I think there could be multiple laundry rooms. My thinking is that those might be more divided by dorm wings, which may be co-ed across floors, I don’t know.
I’d assume the laundry is in the basement like the gym, but I don’t know if we’ve got any direct evidence for that.
I’m pretty sure it’s a mixed-gender dorm, separated by floor.
Mixed-gender dorm, separated by WING.
Honestly if Joe walked in I’d be LESS uncomfortable.
Joe’s “What the fuck Dotty” would be a refreshing change to this scene yes.
Calling Becky though.
can’t help but notice that the “teaching” aspect is very lacking
so far this is more “Forcing her to get there on her own”
Not teaching as in “this is how you do it mechanically,” teaching as in “this is how you give yourself permission to do it.”
Well, A: she’s not really teaching Joyce how to give herself permission either, and B: a lesson on how to do mechanically seems like it would be useful and would also further the Joyce-giving-herself-permission progress.
At this point, Dorothy should be starting to realize this is a bad idea, but she probably thinks it’s gone too far to stop now. Even if Dorothy wanted to stop, Joyce would just double down out of pride/curiosity/horniness.
Teaching her how to allow herself to masturbate would be a frank discussion on sex and trauma and shame, not… whatever this is.
“Forcing” isn’t really how I’d characterize the interaction, but yeah. Teaching is definitely lacking.
it just keeps getting gayer and gayer
They should get closer. These stretched arms looks so uncomfortable as a hell…
Doylist perspective: I imagine they are sitting so far apart so there can be an increase in intimacy when they do, in fact, get closer
Dorothy. Dotty. Dots.
This is a bad idea for all kinds of reasons, but there’s maybe only one that would sink in for you:
You of all people, with your ambitions, should understand the difference between truth and narrative. What do you think it’s gonna do for your political career when you run for office and someone says to the press “oh right I remember walking into the laundry room at college and she was trying to force a clearly reluctant girl to masturbate in public so she could get off on watching?”
Doesn’t even hafta be true. It’ll be the narrative. So long, Presidential aspirations.
Don’t do this.
It should be the end of her presidential aspirations
The whole “Dorothy must be prosecuted as a criminal or otherwise brought to justice” vibe honestly bothers me more than any of Dorothy’s actions.
Especially considering, like, y’all know this whole “lesson” isn’t gonna work out for Dotty, right? This whole arc is one big slow-motion own goal on Dorothy, because the idea that Joyce having an orgasm will make her stop thinking about Joe is the most nonsense idea in DOA history. If anything, it’s likely to make Joyce MORE interested in pursuing Joe.
I’m not saying she should be prosecuted but her judgement is seriously flawed and if she thinks this is a wise course of course then I worry what she would do to a population, for the greater good of course
No room for learning before she hits 35?
This strikes me as less something to be learned and more a default setting.
I mean do you really have to learn that taking someone into a public room and talking them into a form of masturbation is maybe not the best course of action
But Dorothy believes that she knows best, that what she thinks is right and theres no need to second guess herself at all and if talking someone into undressing more than they’re comfortable with, into masturbating in public, into looking up porn for them on their own phone and then holding hands with them while they get off is the right course of action then by golly thats whats going to happen
Nobody is born knowing everything. What the fuck is a college for, other than learning and/by interacting with people? She’s barely halfway to the minimum age required for presidency, why does she have to be fully prepared for it now? Not like it requires a high moral standard.
You need college to learn that public masturbation is probably not a good idea?
Sure, that’s remotely what I said. 🙄
“No room for learning?”
“Nope!”
Okay, that’s pretty asinine isn’t it? Some people don’t learn things when you did and have to experience life a little longer than you did for some things, O anointed one. Goddamn.
Learning to second-guess yourself and learning not to barrel over people with your chosen course of action is a learned skill. It’s called humility, and Dorothy doesn’t know it yet.
Source: I had to learn humility myself by fucking up and hurting people. I had to learn to accept that I could be wrong. I had to learn to listen. These are definitely learned skills that I did not have when I was 18.
No. No learn. Only perfect. Otherwise tainted.
I, uh, I think it’s a bit of a slippery slope fallacy to go “19 year old Dorothy is okay with encouraging Joyce to do a technically-public masturbation session, therefore 35 year old Dorothy will commit war crimes/genocide/make public masturbation mandatory and police-enforced or something”.
I mean, she wants to be President so that’s probably gonna happen anyway, AM I RIGHT FOLKS?? Nyuk nyuk nyuk!
Hey while we’re looking up fallacies, you should look at “Straw man”
Don’t be an asshole. I know what a fucking straw man is, aight?
The person I’m responding to literally said “if [Dorothy] thinks this (encouraging Joyce to get off in a semi-public place) is a wise course of action, of course I worry what she would do to a population, for the greater good of course.”
If you can describe that as anything other than a slippery slope fallacy I would love to hear it. Please tell me how it’s somehow not.
Sorry, I missed that post. Wow.
Sure but I could imagine President Keener wanting to control other aspects of people’s lives, because she knows best
She’s just getting her sexual assault acquittal out the way early. It’s a staple of politics.
I can’t recall a case in which a sex scandal actually prevented someone being elected here. The other party howls nonstop as if it’s worse than murder, the candidate’s own party insists nothing wrong happened, the newspapers make buckets of money, and then it dies down.
Gary Hart was a big one, if you really wanna see how things have changed. He dropped out of the race before he had a chance to lose.
“using your fingers makes it real” yep…. damn you willis, why can i relate to all this recovering from religion crap, all the stuff you need to unlearn… all the lies you’ve always told yourself…. *it’s not sin if it happens by accident, it’s not sin if someone else makes me, it’s not sin if i don’t touch ‘it’, …. if there hadn’t been so much taboo around sexuality, maybe i’d have spent more time thinking about god and less time thinking about how to get off without god (and christian people) being mad at me if they knew.
Seriously guys, the amount of time christians discuss pre-marital hanky-panky is WILD. i used to be on a jesus forum as a christian teen and there were a lot of threads discussing what exactly constitutes sex (and therefore sin). i think if everyone had just fucked more, they’d have gotten it out of their system more easily.
🙁
I’m so sorry you had to deal with all that crap.
Yeah, I knew this. And it’s a torment, because we’re getting all these discussion to find one or another loophole to get some pleasure… It’s exausthing.
And then the next week you get a sermon against legalism.
This is also why I tend to roll my eyes at all the comments that Joyce needs to just have sex, or get it out of her system, or whatever. There’s so much baggage there that cannot be just tossed out by doing the opposite of what you’ve been taught your whole life. Joyce having sex, with the upbringing and baggage she’s carrying, would not fix a single thing in a healthy way. Eventually she may get past that, but initially it’ll just trigger a shame spiral and existential crisis that she probably can’t deal with right now.
Turth
“Truth” *sigh* didn’t proofread
This is why the Pagan group I used to attend had a group for Recovering Xtians. Because so many of them were damaged by their religion.
Remember how yesterday I commented that Joyce was much more receptive to sex talk and situations when they didn’t feel judgmental?
The judgmental vibe has returned.
It’s possible that it will be received more as guidance and so more positively than it feels like it’s being received here. But it certainly seems like panel 4 of this strip is when Joyce starts reacting to perceived judgment again.
I can hear that internal monologue now. “My ass is numb and I’m almost done with my book, can you just fucking cum already I’ve got other things to do today.”
Yeah, like, as I imagined Joyce putting it, a bit more crudely, “the dommy mommy attitude was doing it for me, the scathing criticism of my personal technique is not.”
Dorothy got a tendency to go all Disappointed Teacher when things go wrong she gotta work on.
Oh Yeah, this is a good read on why this feels so weird again. Because Dorothy feels so judgemental and kinda over Joyce’s hangups. It would seem a lot better if that weren’t the case :/ i mean still overall a bad location, but much less like being kind of a bad friend as well as having a bad idea that seems totally normal cause we’re horny college girls.
Since this is yet another heavy comic let’s have some levity.
Joyce is reading her favorite fics but what was the first fictional character that gave you your “Awakening” as it were. (Or maybe just your first fictional character crush).
Not my awakening for sexual orientation (fictional characters don’t do much for me in that regard), but the first character that made my gender make a bit more sense was George from Enid Blyton’s Famous Five. I like to think that he/they came out as trans later <3
Bananarama – Venus music video
When I was twelve, I used to “joke” that I was, “gay for Toph” (of Avatar: The Last Airbender). Then when I was thirteen, I was like, “Ooooh, okay. Yeah, I’m seeing some things in hindsight.:
Toph existed when you were twelve? Jeebus crimmus, I think you just made several hairs spontaneously go gray.
I’ll be honest I think you healed me a bit cuz I’ve been feeling old lately. Just saw an episode of American Dad where Francine lost her memory and thought it was 1985 because that was 20 years ago when that episode came out. And we’re now 2 years away from that episode itself being 20 years old.
Toph has been around for nearly seventeen years now. I work with kids who are fans of the show and were born well after it ended.
Jeez, you’re gonna turn Azhrei’s hair WHITE.
The drinking age is 2001 now in the US.
*Grows more grey hair*
2002.
Damn…It’s gonna be another 2 millennia until I can drink again…
Heh. In my day it was 18 to drink, 21 to vote. Somehow over the past half-century that got switched around.
(It just occurred to me, not that it mattered at the time, that I was still 17 my only semester in a dorm. Weird.)
That combination sounds like it was very state dependent. Where I am, for example, I believe it went (post-WW2, just because I don’t know much about these things before that time): voting age: 21 + drinking age: 21; voting age: 18 + drinking age: 18; voting age: 18 + drinking age: 21.
Dunno. New York City. It may have been 21/21>18/18>18/21, but I don’t remember it that way.
Not much drinking in the dorm, as I recall, but a fair anount of dope smoking.
Actually, checking on it, for NYS it was 21/21>18/18>18/19>18/21;
drinking age was dropped to match the voting age in 1971, then New York raised it to 19 in 1982. In 1984 the federal government made it 21 by threatening to withhold highway funds for noncompliant states.
It didn’t make much of a difference to me: I’ve never been “”carded” in my life.
I have scars that are old enough to drink that I got after my kids were grown. And my beard is white. It feels really strange to be in here with all these minors talking about sex.
Toph was one of my boyfriend’s first crushes too
Also @azhrei if you think that’s bad, avatar ended when i was 8 and I’m pretty sure i watched it off pure reruns
Sokka for me, in Avatar. When he gets shirtless to forge his own sword? So manly.
What does manly even mean, nowadays? It seems like an outdated term.
That man was so fine avatar had NO RIGHT
Hmm the earliest I can remember was Robin from the first Teen Titans cartoon. I remember being so excited for a new Robin-centric episode and squirming on the bed from where I was watching the tv, and realizing hey the motion I just did felt really good for some reason, so I just kept grinding against the bed while watching the episode.
Beast Boy was more my style lol. Such a sweet guy.
I definitely had a “manic pixie dreamgirl”-esque crush on Terra.
I guess I should drop mine too.
At least my earliest memory of being in my cousin’s room watching his copy of Batman & Robin. Uma Thurman as poison Ivy just…Got me. I don’t think I really could put into words why I liked that movie so much at the time but…yeah no that was my decent into degeneracy 😛
Had to be She-Ra / Adora.
It’s funny. All this talk about O-ing. I used to be so oversexed when I was younger. Maybe it’s the IUD, maybe it’s the meds, but now — zero interest. Not even in self-indulgence. It’s like the desire is just completely gone. Even when I’m alone.
And I’m at peace with that. It’s actually a relief.
The OG I’m assuming?
Of course!
Original flavor or New Coke version?
Original, all the way. Just the dreamy sparklies.
I have recently discovered that there are basically all the Power Rangers episodes on YouTube, and they aren’t even bootleg!
That is to say, the answer to your question is Austin St. John.
Golly, is that ever unfortunate, after his whole “Stealing thousands of dollars on COVID relief funds with some buddies” incident.
yeah I read about that and got sad. never meet your heroes. or read about them on wikipedia.
Between that, JDF dying, and the nobody-ass triplets who played Trey of Triforia going batshit fundie for no reason, the last couple years have been such a downer. I dearly hope the special coming out is gonna be good.
oh noooooooooooo I didn’t know about the Treys
I JUST watched the gold ranger episodes too
The dudes are well and truly unhinged, and their collective ego is absolutely disproportionate to the 5 minutes of screen time they got. Another guy entirely did all the voice work for the Gold Ranger because their native accent was too thick for the director’s preference, but they go around bragging about being the “OG” Gold Ranger, and they even go as far as to say they’re using the Gold Ranger powers to heal people, megachurch-style. It’s fucking creepy and honestly scary in a few ways.
Welp, not gonna waste this opportunity. Pikachu and Arbok from Pokemon.
Interesting. Would not have suspected those two pokemon.
Jynx was/is my guilty pleasureAs you humans say, tight! 😆
Wilhemina “Mina” Murray (then Harker, once married) was my first real fictional crush with any kind of a sexual element to it.
Dracula was my favorite book through the vast majority of my childhood, and she’s far and away the best character, so it was bound to happen.
Earliest I can remember is Katt from Breath of Fire 2.
Ooooh, she was a cutie! You had good taste.
It was that spunky attitude as well. But I think the whole “not wearing pants” was a big part of it too 😂
I was lucky enough to start Thinking Thoughts around the time Yu-Gi-Oh! started airing over here, so I was blessed with Mai Valentine at a very formative age.
My first fictional crushes were Jadzia Dax and Mary-Ann from Gilligan’s Island reruns.
I said “Jadzia Dax” like anybody would know who that is. Jadzia Dax is from Star Trek Deep Space Nine
Funnily enough, as an adult I think Major Kira is the more interesting character.
Unrelated but I had a similar thing with Amy Wong and Turnaga Leela from Futurama. Insomuch that I had a huge thing for Amy as a kid but now that I’m older I like Leela a lot more.
I knew who she was. She was hawt. Never liked Ezri as much.
People who don’t know who Jadzia Dax and Kira Nerys are need to LEARN
there’s a lot but i guess the very very first one was Shampoo from Ranma 1/2
Shego made me feel unholy though
I haven’t read Ranma. Is Shego one of the characters in it?
I think that was the extremely sexy Shego from Kim Possible.
Valid valid valid shampoo was awful but god i love her.
I had the biggest crush on ryoga when i was a kid. That lil fang of his single handedly carved out my taste in anime crushes
Much later on once i grew up i realized i was head over heels for Ukyo she’s so cute dude
Oh god
Maybe sokka from Avatar? And Zuko? For some reason i felt i had to fein an attraction to Aang bc he was closer to my age (tho still much older) and the only one without a girlfriend. I remember my parents catching me doing some humiliating stuff pretending i was with them.
Trunks was my first like, long term obsession crush, around the same time i got my first arrow through the heart, blushing and stammering mess crush irl.
So average 2000s kid shit ig?
Oh god i forgot, krillin and Yamcha too
Yamcha was a walking pile of Ls but he was cute, it’s all he had going for him
In adulthood it’s tien and picolo
Yamcha has more unnecessary Ls than the word Guillotine.
Trunks was just unfair for Younger Taffy. So this hot buff guy shows up lookin’ like a lesbian with his purple bowl cut, jean jacket, and longsword he chops a cyborg into pieces, atomizes those pieces into stardust, and I’m just not supposed to grow up queer after that?
I got bullied for liking dragon ball as a girl and i (and all the other girls on the nicktoons official forums) was like LOOK AT THIS MAN. AND TELL ME GIRLS ARENT MEANT TO WATCH THIS SHOW.
If anyone ever questions you on it again, look them in the eye and say one name, I guarantee they’ll understand.
Go. Ge. Ta. 😠
…..hey. is it a bad sign that. The first thing i thought of was SS4 Gogeta
(Or, really any of the ss4s they were unfairly hot.)
Super Saiyan 4 is the best transformation in the series. If anything, that’s a good sign. Shows you have superior taste.
Listen I’m not saying you’re wrong. But Super Saiyan 1 rules.
No disrespect to the classics, of course. 4 just feels like the natural progression, to me. 2 is barely distinguishable, 3 is longer hair and a caveman brow. It didn’t start looking significantly distinct until 4.
ok my Super saiyan hot takes
1. Perfect. With how much it’s built up it was GENIUS to keep changes to a minimal. By giving Goku closed eyes instead of his friendly open eyes it changes his whole demeanor subtly while still feeling very Goku.
2. Honestly only works on Gohan. I’ve always hated Goku and Vegeta taking that form, mostly because the change is so insignificant.
3. Dumb. Looks like shit and has never won a fight. But I respect it because it’s dumb. It’s basically the Saiyan equivelent of 100% Frieza.
4. Design-wise I like it, but I hate that it’s called Super Saiyan 4 cuz it doesn’t at all feel like a progression of super saiyan and just feels like a new form altogether. My big issue is that Goku just…doesn’t feel like Goku in the form, something I praised SSJ1 for. Everytime he transforms he feels like a new person and I don’t like that.
SSG. I like how understated it is. It’s skinny and weak looking while being ethereal looking. That said I hate the dumb ritual they had to do to access it.
SSB. I hated it until I realized it’s just a regular SSJ just with God ki on top of it. Now I just think of it as…adding a little spice to a super saiyan.
Ultra Instinct. Technically not a saiyan form but thought I’d mention it. I liked it when it was omen, felt like it tapped into that mystic element I liked about SSJ without changing Goku’s design but then Ultra Instinct had to ruin it with the white hair. It doesn’t feel like a state of being and more like just another powerup. Lame.
Beast Gohan. It sucks I hate it.
SSJRage. It sucks I hate it.
Whatever Vegeta’s new dumbass form is. It sucks I hate it.
Oh and Oozaru. Cool because it’s a giant monkey. I love it. Love the werewolf aspects It’s always cool when someone returns to monkey.
@taffy ss2 is so similar to ss1 toriyama forgot he made it and made ss3, which in his mind was the second
Oh oh Katara was also definitely one of those “wow if girls could like girls I’d be in love with her” moments before i knew what being gay was. Mei too. Mei and Zuko as a couple was just. Unfair.
@Yoto: Relena Darlian/Peacecraft from Gundam Wing when I was like 10-11ish
Rao from Okami, age 12.
Shouldn’t you have had a lookout to begin with? You know what? I am begining to think Dorothy didnt think this whole plan through.
maybe she picked a time she knew didn’t have a lot of heavy foot traffic
She literally knows someone is coming back for their dryer. they have at best 45 mins from siting down.
You can get a lot done in 45 minutes. It’s fine.
I usually stayed in the laundry room to do laundry either to prevent someone from taking my clothes out and puting a pile of wet clothes on the floor or stealing them. I never wittness the latter but the former was all to common a few i witnessed someone just take wet clothes out and drop them on the floor litterally after the buzzer went off. Teenagers can be mosnters
Calling it now: Cue *Joe walks in to do his laundry*
“Hilarity ensues”
i’d assume they have their own separate laundry rooms unless it’s all in a coed area/part of the common space like the cafeteria is
I said this the other day, if this were a space where guys ever walk into, there is no fucking way in the universe that Joyce would have taken off her pants.
Joyce, about the clitoris: “I DON’T KNOW HER”
Clitoris? I don’t know ‘er is.
“I don’t know whodatis” was right there…
“THAT’S MY PURSE!”
Ignoring all the problems with this being done in public (which is already a massive undertaking), is anyone else feeling like this is pretty close to/already sexual harassment on the part of Dorothy?
No.
Not even a little bit.
It’s definitely in the same ballpark
Eh, I’m here just wondering when Willis is gonna pull a fast one on us.
“Ya ready readers? This one has some mustard on it!”
Absolutely not.
Joyce seems to be into it? I think? So I guess it is fine in that regard. Basically if Joyce is okay with this it is okay. But I do have major reservations as to how this started. This is all ignoring that this is very much a public place.
And for that…no I have nothing. I have no idea why Dorothy thought this is a good idea.
It’s sort of a cop-out answer with a lot of potential holes, but like… Isn’t it only sexual assault if the involved party isn’t okay with it? Joyce seems mostly? Okay with this? Like, she’s pretty easily going along with everything Dorothy suggests, and there’s no predation or manipulation factor here, so it seems fine until Joyce protests and asks to stop.
Barring the injured party being a minor or under the power of the alleged harasser, yeah.
Joyce is neither a child nor in Dorothy’s power, so until she actually indicates she wants it to stop, or until we get a thought bubble that says “help dorothy is controlling my body with her mind”, it’s not harassment.
also, excellent roegadame
My daughter is perfect and I will die for her.
Yes. That is what it boils down to. Joyce’s opinion is the only one that matters here.
But I am still really worried that someone will walk in on them. That would be so bad. And it would be harassment. Why are they doing this in a collage washing room? This gives me so much second hand anxiety.
Honestly, if someone walked in now, what would they really see?
And Dorothy is offering to watch the door if Joyce wants to do anything more direct.
A lot of people were freaking out about it like a couple strips ago until Dorothy explicitly said that Joyce was free to go at any time
Joyce was also ALWAYS free to go at any time. There are no chains, no ropes, no locked doors.
I won’t disagree that Dorothy has been pretty assertive about all this, but she’s been both literally and figuratively extending her hand and Joyce has been both literally and figuratively reaching out and taking it the entire time.
The things that happened before that point could very well have been read as coercion.
Yeah, and that reading is still pretty infantilizing to Joyce.
No, still long after Dorothy said that…
No.
No.
Yes, and I am extremely bothered by the amount of people who are just shrugging and saying (sometimes literally) “well Joyce never explicitly said no” or “well she was just free to leave” – which is a very concerning sentiment to see expressed in response to people saying how they felt at Joyce’s discomfort being ignored.
While she’s been asked to say if she wants to stop, she’s never been asked if this is what she wants, or expressed enthusiasm, excitement, or any positive sentiment at all.
I think people should give this article, She Didn’t Say No, But She Didn’t Say Yes, a read. Like yeah, Joyce doesn’t seem horribly upset, but how okay is she with this? The fact that the only argument for her being okay is that she hasn’t left is not a great one. If this was written with the idea of being a positive example of sexuality it is incredibly poor writing.
A *lot* of people are downplaying the coercion ability Dotty has on Joyce because lesbians.
Like people haven’t done stupid, possibly dangerous things because their friends egged them on or told them to do it. Especially friends they saw as anchors.
For someone as adrift as Joyce currently is? This feels REALLY scummy of Dotty to use her “I’m your bestie, I know best” powers to get Joyce to try and finger herself in a GD laundry.
Joyce isn’t being coerced. And what’s with this idea that people only don’t see it that way because they’ve got shipping goggles on?
She’s expressed the idea that this is OK but not if she uses her fingers right in this comic. Second panel.
Because it’s not coercion. Dorothy isn’t Joyce’s mom, she has no power over her, this isnt a fucked up imbalance for fucks sake
It all depends on how you view Dotty really.
She’s lost too many points (for me) with how she treated the possible autism diagnostic along with nearly every other way she’s interacted with Joyce’s moving away from her upbringing for me to NOT think she’s basically taking Joyce by the nose and stomping her into what Dotty feels is “normal.”
Considering for the VAST amount of Joyce’s life, she’s been basically trained to *be* lead around by the nose by a higher ranking person (her mom, then her eventual husband as shown in comic form) it all feels really fucking skeevy to me.
Add in the choice of venue, Dotty’s inept teaching skill, and her now apparent “Just get on with it” stance?
She’s not really looking like a person in which one puts any trust in.
Her guiding force is either Dorothy or the optometrist, and he’s already got what she needs from the optometrist.
Okay, the macaroni and cheese box can be the authoritative guiding force before dinner.
Maybe we should stop denying people’s headcanons like this. If they wanna write their Tyrannical Joyce-Molester Dorothy fanfic, who are we to judge?
That’s what I’ve been saying, but the comment stream has devolved into mocking anyone who thinks Dorothy is out of line here. I just read that article and hope they will read it.
Speaking, the link didn’t work for me so I Googled it and here’s a new link: She didn’t say no, but she didn’t say yes
Okay but
She literally is free to leave. She asked. Dorothy confirmed. It’s been spelled out.
She seems pretty damn fine to me. She’s not once looked upset or uncomfortable since this started and she’s made the continuous decision to stay after confirming multiple times that it’s perfectly okay to not. She’s even looked quite happy a couple times during this
Like, i have been coerced into sexual activity as a vulnerable person and didn’t explicitly say no, but it was clearly a bad thing. This is so incredibly not that and it’s pissing me off how people are watering it down
That’s a good article, but also… not terribly relevant to the situation. Joyce emphatically stated she wanted to continue when Dorothy told her she didn’t have to immediately after leaving the room. After asking if she could leave, and receiving an explicit confirmation that she could, she specifically chose to stay and continue. She’s nervous (because of course she is, with all the religious trauma) but she’s an active participant in this whole thing.
It’s not a flawless example of consent. Joyce hasn’t said explicitly “Why yes, Dorothy, I would be overjoyed to come masturbate with you and furthermore feel no pressure from you to do so.” But also, even using the “yes means yes” or “enthusiastic consent” models, that’s a bit much to ask for.
And yeah, that’s a problem with the enthusiastic consent model. If someone’s nervous, that invalidates consent?
They’re supposed to be better ways to judge consent, not a checklist you have to follow, even if the other person is fine with it.
Put aside the question of how Dorothy’s been approaching it for the moment, does anyone really think Joyce isn’t okay with this?
a bit, it’s toeing the line in my opinion since she was basically peer pressured into it. You would think Dorothy would tell Joyce in length what theyre going to do, what she thinks about it, boundaries, etc and most importantly “we can stop anytime” BEFORE she dragged Joyce into the laundry room.
She did tho. In the hallway, barely a foot from Joyce’s door, “you know you don’t have to do this if you don’t want to”
Before Joyce cut her off saying she wants to.
Yes, that’s what peer pressure *is.*
“You’re free to not do this thing I want you to do.” Says the peer, with the unspoken caveat that they will think lesser of the other for not doing the thing.
Or simply that Joyce *thinks* that Dotty will think less of her, so she does something she doesn’t really want to do (Or doesn’t feel ready to do) instead of disappointing Dotty.
The concern is that Dotty is inadvertently tapping into Joyce’s “follow the leader or be shunned by the congregation” programming.
Or as my aunt told my cousin “Oh you can quit playing piano… if you really don’t want to anymore.”
Definitely. Maybe it’s just someone’s wet dream. Otherwise it’s prettu squicky.
Read your book, Dorothy
Yes, Dorothy. Live up to that boffo shirt!
Heh! That’s such a boffo shirt
This is fucking weird right?
As a man, I would say this is *extremely* weird, but I’m willing to hear from ten women saying this is normal, silly boys.
I might have missed one but I’m pretty sure there hasn’t been a single comment over the last couple of days saying yeah I’ve done similar
yeah and I’ve been looking for them
Maybe people are afraid to speak up because they’re worried they’ll get called predators.
I’ve done that, I literally thought it was just me before it came up in the comic though
Assuming we’re talking about the drier thing. If we’re taking about the platonically co masterbation thing, that too, but like, not at the same time. I think. Probably 😅
Like idk I talked about it on the phone once I’m trying to think if it was during. (if not being in person doesn’t count it doesn’t count)
I could see it happening, I have done like…co-fantasising with a friend but both at similar levels od comfort and experience. When I was younger I remember a lot of pep talks from more experienced folk. I could see a scenario where those things could combine. Definitely pretty outside the ordinary though most people do not have this kind of situation
Not as weird as being forced to watch porn by your alien abductors
er… what is the reference?
The word “forced” stands out.
Oh wait, sorry. That says “reference”, not “difference”. I’ve been so sleep deprived lately the words all look blurry on my phone. And I guess I’m a little on edge from all the moralistic bickering, so I was kinda ready to jump on it. Sorry.
Happened to Joyce in a different Willis comic.
Previous version of Joyce in another universe. Search for Roomies! by David Willis if you’re interested.
The fingers part yeah
Seems pretty weird to me, but I’ve always tried to avoid doing it in places where people can catch me, and I don’t think I’d be comfortable doing it with a friend in the same room.
Meh, as a guy, it really isn’t.
Where’s the Joyce who was willing to throw away her oldest friend in order to go against her religious indoctrination? She doesn’t even seem to question why she’s still following these rules against sinful sexual pleasure and their loopholes. Which, I doubt achieving climax is going to offer any sudden revelation either.
Which I think is the real problem with what Dorothy is doing, she thinks Joyce is already there since she has the idea she (Joyce) is trying to bone Joe to prove how liberated she is. So much time and energy to solve an imaginary problem, I’m beginning to suspect the gals are going to fall for each other just so this special bonding time isn’t wasted.
Old habit die hard. I am sure Joyce would go all in (for lack of a better way to say it) if it somehow resulted in protecting Becky.
It’s easier to stand up for other people, people you hold dear, than it is to stand up for ourselves sometimes. This includes standing up TO herself.
When you don’t value yourself, it’s incredibly difficult to fight for yourself.
Also it’s easier to reject the more superficial/ obviously ridiculous cognitively held aspects of an old belief system than the engrained, emotion-driven parts. I sincerely think nobody believes in their heart of hearts that Noah built an ark capable of holding 2 of every single animal, it’s a fairy tale people tell their kids. But emotional beliefs? The warmth of imagining you are loved and lovable by something much bigger than you, existential terror of hell, etc? Those are a lot more firmly entrenched. And of those emotions, shame-driven beliefs are the hardest to challenge because it attacks your perceived worth at a subconscious level.
See also why most of the big names in the New Atheist movement didn’t actually change their core social mores and values when they lost their faith – they might not believe in god, but they hold on to the culturally Christian conservative culture and accompanying social values they were raised in, usually. Because rejecting a cognitive opinion is relatively easy (& for Joyce, God wasn’t a belief so much as a “fact” she was taught and bought into until met with what she felt was contradictory evidence), but challenging a true value? That’s hard.
“I think nobody”
Thats astonishing to me because this is semi autobiographical story of growing up divorcing from religious fundamentalism.
( they even built an ark museum that Atheists visit ) .
Young Earth Creationism is widespread in this country despite the grand Canyon and all the dinosaurs bones dug up here.
I guess if Willis can’t make you believe that they really believe, no way i can.
Joyce has religious trauma that caused her to have sexual repression. That was never a choice she made for herself.
I think the fact that she is calmly admitting to having orgasmed, intentionally, out loud, to a friend, whilst trying to replicate the experience, shows just how far she’s come.
Orgasms are a lot about mental state as well as physical. If Joyce thinks adding fingers would be too much right now, she’s, uh, probably right.
Joyce hasn’t ever wanted to throw Becky away. She wanted Becky to escape with her.
Well at least she is doing the… what was the term again, soaking?
Nah, not Soaking. This is totally different from that. If this has a name other than ‘riding a dryer’, I don’t know it.
Improv Vibrator comes to mind.
Trying to think of a really good “yes, and” joke, but it’s not happening.
It doesn’t seem to be happening for Joyce either.
Yes and yes and yes and yes~!
She’s on the edge… of the dryer
Will she come or will she come off the dryer… by falling on her face.
It’s called “gooning”. They’re using the laundromat as a goon cave.
If somebody does this “soaking” thing underwater, does that make them a super soaker?
Not masturbating because no hands, as long as she doesn’t actually touch herself she’s not “self-stimulating”.
RE: all the logistics here (given that Joyce mentions “another hour”,) when they first came in, the dryer Joyce was told to sit on was already running/warm according to Dotty. Wouldn’t that imply that someone else is going to come back to that laundry room for that batch of laundry?
Maybe it’s towels
Alternatively she came in earlier with a bunch of quarters and prepared them in advance
Oh Joyce, if using your fingers wigs you out, you need to learn the joys of silk charmeuse.
Oh joy, Sex Toy!
Gramma is watching you from heaven.
And she’s laughing her ass off.
It must’ve been fun drawing those scrunchly mouths
All I can think of is a photo of a Warner Bros animator at his drawing board looking into a mirror trying to get just the right facial expression for a Looney Tunes character.
“Hes been sitting on the dryer for DAYS! there might be permanent damage!”
“to his junk?”
“to the dryer!”
I’m getting the impression Dorothy really has no clue about internalized shame.
I mean – that’s a good thing, in that her parents raised her in a supportive community, but she’s way out of her neighborhood right now.
My kingdom for an edit button /
This is very unsexy 😀
The tumble dryer is very powerful, if anybody can get off under such circumstances… unless Joyce’s kink is awkward social situations.
Oh, good, the door in fact does not lock! That’s totally what we want!
Why would you want a lock on a laundry room? I don’t know how well behaved people are in your neck of the woods, but around here a lock on a communal space is a prime target for some dickhead to come lock people out, wasting everyone’s time while somebody goes to get the key or jimmies the door open manually. If the door opens inward, it can simply be kicked in, causing property damage. If it opens outward, it can easily be blocked off, which is a death sentence in the event of a fire, which can happen more easily than most people are comfortable with, when you have a room full of dryers.
Yeah, it really sorta is. All it takes is one unmanaged lint trap and that laundry room could turn into a crematorium pretty damn fast. And if it’s in the basement like I’ve seen mentioned, I feel like it’s a serious hazard to the entire building.
What brand dryers do people have that’s so good that sitting on dryers is literally a masturbating reference? I mean it takes a lot for me to get off so maybe it’s just me lol
Based on the shape of the machines, I’d say they’re probably Hyundai brand. Ya know, “Zoom zoom” and all that.
Right? I’ve never understood people who tout the classic stuff like sitting on a dryer, or the electric toothbrush thing… it always takes me so, so much work to get off.
Dorothy’s such a control freak she’ll neg you about how to masturbate, how surprising
Dorothy: you need to find out what you like and not be influenced by others.
Also Dorothy: what you are doing is wrong. Let me micromanage how you masturbate.
FFS.
This is why Joyce needs Roz. Roz would have either Taken Joyce to her room, or just taught Joyce in her own room; either way, it would have been private, so Joyce would not feel uncomfortable. Roz would demonstrate to Joyce her own technique, showing that it was perfectly natural, and then let Joyce experiment.
Not to say Roz couldn’t do a better job of teaching, but there’s also a zero percent chance taking Joyce somewhere private and demonstrating technique for her wouldn’t have resulted in orders of magnitude more discomfort than what she’s feeling now.
Dunno what Joyce’s opinion of Roz is, but Roz is a nosy, knoDunno what Joyce’s opinion of Roz is, but Roz is a nosy, know I all on a level that you want to do the opposite of what she says on purpose. She’s not familiar with Joyce, she’s friendly with her but not an actual friend of her. I absolutely can’t see Joyce allow Roz to help her in such a delicate matter. Then wait, take her to her room, the room she shares with Mary???
lol im so so sorry if this is tmi but thats actually how i masturbate. not with the washer, but like shifting my hips and thighs and just rubbing things together. ive tried using my own hands but it just doesnt do anything. its odd.
also ToT im not sure roz would’ve been very helpful. Joyce, for one, does NOT know her very well, and has an equal chance of scarring her. is dorothy doing perfect ? No, but there isn’t exactly a field guide on how to help your friend through sexual repression lmao. shes doing the best she can as a friend. I think the best next step would be to have joyce stop and try another time. maybe even get her a small discreet vibrator to practice alone in her room
*a LOW SETTING vibrator. actually she could probably just do with an electric toothbrush lmao
That depends on which end of the toothbrush they’re using against the tender bits and how they’re holding it. The toothbrush end held against the tender bits for women needing lots of stimulation, the handle end held and pressed against the bits for those needing much less stimulation.
Why do I feel like, since this scene began, a lot of comments have been needlessly personal and over the top toward actual human beings, instead of being aimed at the characters in the comic? You know the ones I mean, don’t even fucking pretend.
No hang on, I’ll spell this out in no uncertain terms. It feels like we’re a hair’s breath away from certain commenters accusing others of being rape apologists/advocates. Over differing levels of personal comfort with the actions of a fictional teenager. Seems a little fucking excessive, doesn’t it?
Yeah, there have definitely been some taking it too far, especially as it went on. But I feel they’ve also increased in intensity along with other people, who saw no problem with this at any point, attacking those who do. Basically, there’s been a lot of mistreatment of other commenters all around. I’ve mostly disengaged with the more serious comments, though that’s also made easier by not enjoying this arc and so not really caring.
We’re at a point where it’s nothing but pushback to pushback to pushback to pushback to pushback. I don’t really care anymore who started what, it’s gone too far and honestly I should probably disengage as well, because it’s gotten actively harmful to my mental health to read a scene I think is pretty cute and fun, and then when I scroll down there’s a dozen people saying (or almost saying, to maintain plausible deniability) something that rhymes with “If you like this scene you’re a danger to everyone around you”.
Literally nobody has said anything like that it
Respectfully, I’m not going to argue on or engage with that specific point for my own sake.
It’s basically why I wanted Willis to shut down the comments. Not for censorship, but because it’s been getting worse and worse with commentors. Even if you try to stay as nice as possible, this can end up colouring opinions of others for at least a bit due to how the comments spiral
That may be true, but mind you he said he needs a comments section so he can have an easy way of knowing whether he did anything wrong.
That I did not know
Sounds more like the problem is people taking things too personally IMHO.
Aren’t you one of the people who’s acting that way, though?
So what? Does that mean nobody else is?
Yeah i got perhaps too personal earlier and im sorry about that. There’s just something. Really gross about people basically saying “I’m personally uncomfortable which means Dorothy is coercing Joyce into sex.” And that is what the argument boils down to.
Is female sexuality wrong? More at eleven.
Did anyone notice that Dorothy’s shirt changed from “Well-Read U” to “Well-Read AF”?
It always said that
welp okay no the comments were right, dorothy is rightfully insane
So she’s insane in a morally/legally correct way?
I feel like this is sorta what Willis went through internally.
Like Dotty isn’t just a character, at least for this scene, but rather how he saw a way out of his upbringing.
I’ve noticed that it sometimes seems like Dorothy is there to tell Joyce what Willis wants to say to his past self. :0
Probably. Willis has stated that Joyce’s character is autobiographical, so it wouldn’t surprise me.
Joyce talks about hours, but her expression in the last panel seems to indicate just a few more minutes.
Masturbation can be a lot like long haul trucking. 99% of the trip can be smooth sailing, but that final mile can be a real slog.
I don’t think that’s Joyce’s I’m-about-to-O face. I think it’s her, “I am speaking about solo hanky-panky, which makes me extremely uncomfortable, so I want this conversation to end immediately” face. We saw her making much the same expression when denying that she’s ever touched herself a few strips back.
Actually, that was a very different expression.
You know the sound Yoshi makes when he jumps? That’s the noise I’m imagining Joyce making here
I think this is the first time we’ve gotten confirmation Joyce has orgasmed, to say nothing of intentionally (albeit indirectly) causing it, to say nothing of admitting it to a friend. It should be noted how remarkably calm she is about all this. Almost like it’s not the biggest deal to her.
We are receiving a lot of new information here! I appreciate a narrative where you have a weird situation and you learn new information about how the main character has been behaving.
Though she does say “I think”, so if this scene isn’t interrupted, we (and she) may find out she hasn’t really made it before.
Well, it makes me feel a bit better about this arc – One of the things that I wanted to happen did, a bit of info added that explains why Joyce is more ok with this despite what happened earlier that day and well… In less than a year. She’s done this before
Joyce: it has to be accidental or it’s bad
Dorothy: … so is that from religion or autism?
Joyce: YES NOW SHUT UP
Mary is going to walk in… I m going to call it also heads up just beacuse Mary is terrible doesnt make this situation right it might be funny but not right. Bybnot righ ibmean the public part and Dorothy’s reasoning for this. The masturbation is fine.
The b is bellow the space bar.
I do not understand. Is this space bar thing a human meme thing I missed?
It’s is where you go to get good advice to forward the plot and get a drink from Guinan.
Ah, Star Trek! 😆
No the b button is bellow space bar on my phone and my thumbs sometimes brushes up against the b button