Joyce is being super wholesome. I like that she’s completely on-board with Joe’s redemption arc. Where everybody else in his life rolls their eyes and figures he’ll be back to normal in no time, Joyce sincerely believes in his ability to be better.
Ironically, Joyce was at her most Christian after she became an Atheist and stopped worrying about judging people. Good on you, Joyce.
dude i’m honestly not mad at you, i just think you’ve proven yourself less than respectful in the past, maybe don’t advertise how skilled you are at getting people riled up.
If I remember correctly they were really stuck on Dorothy not believing in capital G God and didn’t like the implication that works were what being a Christian was really about.
Well, that’s because no major Christian denomination believes that “works are what being a Christian [is] really about.” In fact, quite the opposite. That’s about as wrong as saying “Eating ham and cheese sandwiches is what being an Orthodox Jew is all about.” (See Ephesians 1:9)
Oh wait, I fucked that up hard, James is not one of the Gospels. Still, Paul’s shotgun approach of lowering the bar as much as possible is what lets monsters like Kenneth Copeland call themselves Christian while exhibiting none of Christ’s qualties and still be taken seriously. Faith without works is dead.
James isn’t Christ either. Nor were any of the Gospel writers. James is traditionally considered to be the brother of Jesus and that’s not as widely rejected by mainstream scholars as the traditional authorship of the Gospels (or of the non-Pauline epistles). It’s actually possible, though not too likely, that James is the only piece of writing we have by someone who actually knew Jesus.
That said, most of Paul’s approach is completely misread by critics of Christianity today – and by many Christians. The entire faith vs deeds argument wasn’t about what we’d think of as good deeds – feeding the poor and the like, but about keeping Torah Law. Jesus, Paul and James all agree on the importance of doing good. Paul disagreed with James on things like circumcision and dietary laws.
The Gospel writers disagreed with each other too and were happy to attribute sayings to Jesus to back themselves up.
Was it, perchance, because saying that Dorothy is the best christian in the comic means you’re also implying that being nice and kind are characteristics one arrives at via christianity? Just guessing here.
Dorothy is kind, self-sacrificing, and looks for the good in people to a fault. There were no other characters in the fall semester (besides maybe Leslie) that followed Christ’s “turn the other cheek” philosophy as well as Dorothy did. She’s the Good Samaritan stretched out into a full(er) character.
The good Samaritan, you’ll note, is very much not christian. VERY SPECIFICALLY not christian. In fact, one might say that the good Samaritan not being christian is a fundamental point of the parable, because it’s true.
.I mean there weren’t any Christians then so of course they weren’t Christian. They were also a hypothetical person. It is a teaching to to Christians about how they are supposed to act. Christians are supposed to act like/be the good Samaritan. Now that doesn’t mean they historically have been, or followed many of Jesus’s other teachings, but that is a more complicated conversation.
True that of course they weren’t Christian, though the idea of what JBento said was there… The Good Samaritan wasn’t Jewish, and the traveler they helped was. In fact, Samaritans and Jews were enemies at this time, but a couple Jewish people who came upon the traveler before the Samaritan didn’t help.
It does work as an example of goodness and compassion not being defined by one’s religion.
Like Yumi pointed out, it’s not just that the Samaritan wasn’t christian, but he was, very specifically, Samaritan, people who, at that point, had, uh, *stern divergences* with jews.
Actually I think the character in the parable was made a Samaritan because they were Jews, ones who had rebelled and followed a would-be usurper to set up their own kingdom, turning their backs on their heritage. See the little dispute between Jeroboam and Rehoboam.
I suppose it depends on how you define these terms….
doesn’t that support Schpoon’s ‘works’ argument? The good Samaritan is not Christian (or Jewish) and yet is held up as an example by Christ to his people. ‘To follow my teaching, be like this guy’ -> ‘this guy is acting in accordance with my teachings’.
I mean, i think there might be other bits where its more like ‘doesn’t count if he gave the shirt off his back unless he mentioned that I sent him’, but idk.
Depends on what Schpoon’s argument actually is, but I think JBento, along with myself and others, takes issue with the automatic linking of “being good” with “being Christian.” The Good Samaritan could be used as an example to how “goodness” is not tied to a specific religion.
I don’t know for sure what Hue’s full meaning was, but I agree that that’s not what being Christian means, and I mean that from the opposite of a gatekeeping way. If you do not consider yourself Christian, do not want to be Christian, then you are not Christian.
I know there are debates over what defines Christianity or what is required to be “saved” in Christianity or whatever, but it’s ridiculous to me that “Christian” could be assigned to someone who does not believe in things like Jesus and the Christian God just because they are a good person.
If you want to argue that fall semester Dorothy best exhibited the character values of Christianity, okay, but if you’re calling her “Christian” as a shorthand for that, OF COURSE some people are going to disagree with what you’re saying.
C.S. Lewis discussed this at length in the preface to _Mere Christianity_ if you want to dig deeper. Summary, “[w]e must therefore stick to the original, obvious meaning. The name Christians was first given at Antioch (Acts xi. 26) to “the disciples,” to those who accepted the teaching of the apostles.”
Christian means (narrowly) agreeing with the Nicene Creed, or (broadly) with the Apostles Creed. Without getting into specifics, there is theology involved. Using it as a synonym for “wholesome” or “empathetic” or “supportive” or “good” implies that those traits are owned by Christianity and that non-Christians are by default bad in whatever way that Christians are good. None of those positive traits are dependent on any version of Christian theology, or any theology at all.
Whether or not someone is good/wholesome/empathetic is not related to if they adhere to Christianity. There are Christians who do good things and Christians who do bad things, and non-Christians who do good things and non-Christians who do bad things.
Actually, there are Christian traditions which don’t adhere to those creeds, or any creed saying that Christianity requires Creeds would be to say that Quakers, like myself are not Christian.
It also makes the argument that pre-Credal Christians were not Christian.
Not just assigning someone as Christian because they’re good, but the implication that non-Christians aren’t good is the real problem. That a good non-Christian must really be somehow Christian.
It’s colonialist language, used to “complement” non-Christian locals who please the overlords.
Agreed, thejeff. Imagine calling Joe a good Christian because he believes in Joyce’s ability to change for the better. That would be incredibly gross.
Non-Christians are often good people who display traits that some Christians value. It doesn’t make them “better Christians” than Christians who behave badly. Human goodness is not derived from Christianity.
While I concede the point with Joe because he’s Jewish; the idea is that Joyce as an atheist is acting more in line with Christ’s teachings as an atheist then she was as a Christian. It’s specifically about Joyce.
They go hand in hand; they’re both “real” problems. It’s definitely been annoying to me when people have assumed I’m Christian because I [help out a stranger/donate to someone in need/express values of compassion/whatever]. Doubly so when these interactions turn into, “Oh, then maybe I can convert you!”
There are also those religious groups who baptize others after their deaths. Ugh.
If anyone knows about the capacity for meaningful change its Joyce. She’s extending him the same courtesy her friends gave her back when she was the Joyce who tried to date a gay man into being straight
Hard disagree on your parentheses… Walky’s actions have been, albeit in similar fashion to Mike’s, the most effective at getting people to be honest and kind/caring to each other of anyone’s so far in the story-arc… Joyce just about admitted that she does like Joe there, something that she would not have done otherwise.
Maybe he’s genuinely trying to help. Joe has been broadcasting “I’m a hot asshole” far and wide for as long as he’s known him, while Joyce has been noticeably naive about a lot of things.
What Milu said, and also, as at least 8 people are fond of saying every single time Joe’s on panel and someone’s the least bit apprehensive (especially Dorothy), Walky doesn’t know about Joe’s secret (to non-Joyce people) character arc, yadda yadda yadda. So if he doesn’t know Joe’s not still a dickass, why should he stop treating Joe as a dickass?
Sometimes people say things they don’t mean for the sake of comedy. It’s called “joking”.
God dude your hate boner for walky is making it hard to take anything you say about him seriously. It’s exhausting. You’re getting worse than a certain infamous walky hater back in the day
Hard to tell if he meant to make Joe feel bad, Joe pretends not to have feelings. What Walky said was a lot like what Mike said to make him feel like he wasn’t worth dating Dorothy.
If he’s treating Joyce like she’s still on her religiously inspired husband hunt. Maybe he’s trying to warn her in a goofball way, and maybe the rudeness wouldn’t cross the line for one reader or another, or Joyce or Joe, but it is rude because he’s making her the punchline of his joke. And it is rude because he’s insulting Joe even if he thinks it will roll of Joe’s back. I get why some folks thinks that rudeness crosses a line.
Walky doesn’t seem to me to be the kind of person interested in making people feel bad. Like, it’ll happen, but he mostly wants to be seen as clever and if the way to do that is executing a sick burn, he’ll go for it. But if he anticipates the burn will actually hurt, I think he’d back away from it.
A lot of people have a few layers of mud mixed in with their snow.
But most people are still snow hills and fun to sled with and have snowball fights with.
I’m glad Joyce looks nearly as bothered by all her friends’ insistence that Joe can’t change. Also Joe perking up at Joyce defending him followed by Joyce’s smile.
It might be that in saying Joe can’t change, Joyce is seeing it as them saying she can’t change also. She is trying to leave behind a lot of habits and stuff that she was taught when she was younger that she doesn’t like as well. She has gotten pressure from her friends on how she has been changing (some more well intentioned than others). Having someone who wants to change himself for the better right beside her (sharing that goal) is encouraging to her.
I don’t think anyone has said or even implied that Joe can’t change. Neither Joe nor Joyce have even claimed that he’s trying to change to any of their critics.
They’re assuming that he hasn’t changed, because the only reason they’d have to think otherwise is that the naive ex-fundie is crushing on him.
He said that a girl finding a hot asshole and changing him was wish fullfilment and he’s absolutely right there. That’s entirely different from whether someone can change themselves.
And I think that’s the real kicker- Joe is making his own choices and changes, without being asked, manipulated, or compelled. That Joyce is at least part of his catalyst is true, but she’s just there appreciating the process, not pushing it.
I think what Joe is missing is that he’s actually not changing at all. He’s just taking off the layers of mask and armor he’s been hunkered down in. He’s being actually himself for the first time in who knows how long. Which is scary and a change for him, but not so much a change IN him. If that makes sense.
The layer of mud could have also been a defensive layer due to something from his childhood, or a learned layer from family or society/entertainment. He’s still young enough and probably still maturing his brain (aren’t brains considered fully developed at 21 or something like that) that he can still be learning and becoming a better person. Changing anything about yourself is hard though, especially when it has become a habit. It is too easy to fall back into the rutt of the habit that you spent years digging. Doesn’t mean that you are worthless or can’t change. Having support makes it a lot easier.
I don’t have a source on this, but I picked up somewhere that the brain isn’t fully cooked until 25. Meanwhile folks reliably get nasolabial folds before then, so that’s bullshit.
So I used to find this 25-year old brain maturity claim fishy but then i, uh, checked whether Wikipedia had references linked for that claim and found it did link to some serious sounding science papers, so I guess it has some factual basis 😉
But, for what it’s worth, i think on an individual basis it’s not all that useful. For one thing, lets be honest, we don’t actually know what that means exactly. None of us know how brains work. People who study brains don’t really know how brains work. And like most science-based folk knowledge, that soundbite almost definitely is a dumbed-down, headline-friendly version of the actual research
For another, maturity is extremely and obviously socialized anyway. Some 16-year olds will always be better at impulse control than a lot of fully grown adult brains. Like, i wonder whose accountability we tend to obfuscate by using that rhetoric, and whether it’s really not muddling i issues that are social and political in nature, not biological.
Maybe lawmakers and judges and educators should take that 25-year old thing into account in some circumstances but I think the rest of us ought to think of brain research as mostly irrelevant trivia.
maybe. i’m personally not literate about psychology or neurology, though i hope i’ll eventually catch an obsession about some of these topics and start educating myself.
for now, i’ll contend with sociological hypotheses: teenagers form their own social groups, some practicing various forms of oppositional thinking, others aligning more or less with their primary socialization (in the family), more often a blend of both. they enjoy a level of autonomy from the adult world that allows them to experiment with different values and attitudes.
between the ages of 18 and 25, roughly, the average american and european will enter the workforce and a stable monogamous relationship, and while becoming financially autonomous they will also become alienated by capitalism and heteronormativity as structures that will typically claim them for the rest of their lives, and therefore tend to stabilize their identity around these pressures.
that broad pattern seems to account nicely for a lot of individual and social phenomena without needing to resort to neuroscience, which is not to disparage neuroscience but let’s keep things in perspective.
my understanding of the “brain finishes developing at 25” thing is that it’s kind of like getting taller. your body will continue to change and grow in different ways for the rest of your life, but there is a point eventually when it “finishes growing” because you’re not getting any taller. brains will change and grow your entire life too, but around 25 is when it becomes a “fully grown” brain. it’s just one axis of measuring development. I wouldn’t be surprised if the difference it makes towards the end is comparable to gaining those last few cm of height
My understanding is that scientists kept expecting the brain to stop growing at SOME point and got up to 25 in proving it’s not earlier than that. But there’s no evidence it stops at that point, either.
That’s my understanding too; they just stopped checking past 25.
I think the obvious answer is that your brain doesn’t really stop growing or maturing… Ever. Until you die or get dementia at least. But it could also be said to slow down?
That’s technically true of the rest of our bodies, it’s been shown that the pelvis widens slightly over time in elders. And that’s bone growth…
No, changelings do not in fact change, they are just moved from their normal birth environment in Faery to the mundane world, as part of the illegal abduction of mortal children. The agency is all from the adult fairies and their blatant child abuse.
lol that might make for a fun pinup shot of joe being covered in mud lol.
idk about the ‘clay/mud’ facial masks tho even if it’s supposed to be good for your skin, even the dollar store ones are uncomfortable sticky (tho my skin is basically in the middle but i suppose closer to dry than oily if i had to pick which end, so the ‘stickiness’ being peeled off might be more beneficial to greasier skin because i’ve def had dried skin the next night after even with ‘skincare’ routinse lol) compared to the paper sheet masks or the ‘gel’ kinda ones sorry kinda tangented haha
well, at least they’re both changing each other steadily now rather than in their 40s. not that it’s impossible but i imagine at that age if your personality is set a certain way, other than trying to change and working on it consciously, it’d be harder versus while they’re still young at least from what i’ve seen
Joe’s hoe-ness always rang as a defense mechanism for catching feelings to me. Like his dad was/is a wandering dick on wheels, so there was a conga line of women in Joe’s life trying to mom him, only to leave because the dad fucked up. That’s GOT to fuck his mindset up a fair bit.
and he def isn’t just some ‘hot asshole’ anymore otherwise he wouldn’t care if she rejected him and would just move on
though be cute for them to go on semi-casual platonic hangouts/’dates’ before her actually confirming she likes him
wasn’t rly the type to date back in the day but i would’ve been happy just befriending a crush versus just watching someone from afar (tho i might be more demi leaning so more likely to feel attached to someone after being in a friend group together as opposed to thinking some rando is hot lol)
I think they both need to go slow, each for their own reasons. So that’s convenient. Wouldn’t be surprised if they go too fast anyway, for drama’s sake.
Well, he’s definitely caught feelings, but you can have feelings and still be an asshole. His basic fear is that, like his dad, regardless of whether he has feelings or not, he’ll be unable to resist temptation and wind up cheating.
That’s what he thinks he can’t change.
I kind of hope we get far enough in this relationship, once it’s serious, to see him actually struggle with that, rather than just have all the conflict be about starting the relationship.
His change might be temporary, or it might be permanent. He’s not done and it could go either way. He has an sleaze-bag comfort zone, and he retreats to it with most people. Even if they don’t end up having a romance, they’re good friends for each other.
Several characters uncomfortable about shedding an identity they could be outgrowing.
Honestly the fact Joe is even worried about this demonstrates growth, garbage people don’t worry about being garbage so he’s certainly taken the first steps in wanting to be better. Nothing happens till you do that.
I don’t know, some garbage people definitely know they suck and wish they didn’t. That moment here actually fits perfectly within the Jane Eyre-ey trope Walky was bringing up. (I haven’t read or seen Twilight). M. Rochester keeps saying he’s a cold-heated piece of shit and, i mean, he kind of is.
yes! as i remember it the ending is quite satisfying. /SPOILER except that the mad wife dies i think? that character gets treated so roughly omg /END SPOILER
Jane does go through a lot before that, even as she tries to protect herself as best she can from his heavy-handed flirtation and manipulation, like what was that thing where he dresses up as a fortune-teller? egh, it’s been a while since i’ve read it. i should read it again, i really enjoyed it. (mostly because of how cheeky and smart Jane is <3) (Rochester is a jerk, mostly) (as far as i remember)
But as soon as she finds out he’s been a douche, she dumps him, finds her extended family, has adventures, says no to another kind of douche, gets money, and comes back as a really strong person who doesn’t need any man. Rochester is totally humbled and no longer sees himself as a savior, but as someone who doesn’t deserve her. Personally, I preferred Mr. Darcy, but to each their own. /END SPOILER
yeah my memories of Darcy are pretty fuzzy as well… i mostly remember finding Lizzie delightful, again, and Darcy mostly kind of a bore? i think? totally a good upstanding and unfairly maligned guy and whatnot but just not a lot of fun. but yeah that’s another one i could definitely see myself rereading =D
Highly recommend the Lizzie Bennet Diaries on Youtube. It’s a great updated take, and really illuminates who Darcy is in the same way Clueless made the character of Emma understandable.
Mud is great. We love mud. It’s fun and messy and it grows heaps of cool stuff like moss and flowers and mushrooms. It hides worms and larvae that turn into even cooler beetles and bugs. Snow is just all the stuff that piles on top we don’t have much control over, but while snow is there all the life is incubating and growing underneath. Then snow melts and it enriches everything and hydrates it so it can finally form.
At the soccer fields down past my old house there was a mound of dirt from digging new fields. It was ugly to look at for a while, but then it grew grass and flowers and kids would roll down it or fly kites and drive remote cars on it. People would have picnics on the top during the day and at night I’d take a bottle of wine and sit on to to watch the stars.
Joe’s not a snow hill with mud on (insubstantial and fleetingly beautiful). He’s a perfectly great mound with two extra great mounds Joyce appreciates in a purely empirically aesthetic way.
You are made of mud, and you’re made of stars, and you’re made of the unknowable stuff out of which the universe condensed at the dawn of time. Stay humble Joe, but also don’t forget you’re so bright and so curious.
As Joe fuses more and more of his core snow, he expands and the closely orbiting Joyce siphons off more and more of his halo of horniness, leading ultimately to a supernova explosion.
Growing up, Joe modeled himself after his father, who could charitably be called a ‘womanizer’. As soon as he got to college though, he collided with reality and began to see things differently. A garbage person would double down, maybe start a podcast defending misogyny or something.
(Yeah I’m a sucker for redemption narratives. I loved The Good Place. Maybe DOA is a ‘neighborhood’.)
interesting, because i think The Good Place had sort of the same problem as Joe’s current arc. there’s this emphasis on redemption, and the philosophical conceit means it’s trying for metaphorical relevance, but none of the characters are really bad in a way that gives their redemption arcs any deeper meaning or any ambiguity to munch on. they’re all, to a fault, entirely sympathetic from the get-go. (let us not speak of season 4. it made a courageous half-assed effort to address that issue, and did nothing of substance with it.) it honestly feels like the points system the show picked and ran with (and which provides many hilarious gags) is a retrofit to allow them to cast some perfectly fine people as in need of some grand cosmic redemption.
it’s a great show (aside from season 4), but it falls way short of its own ambition and really has no bite as a social satire imo.
The point system was deliberately ridiculous. The show starts out with people being eternally tortured for, essentially, annoying personal foibles, then calls out the injustice of that, and in season four Michael tells the judge straight out; “No one is beyond redemption.” And he was clearly referring to Vicki, Treavor, and Sean.
No, it’s not The Divine Comedy; it takes a different approach. As gentle humor, it’s just a little subversive. I think it accomplished something biting satire would not have.
I’m not literally proposing that DOA is a neighborhood, only that there are conceptual parallels.
hm. i don’t remember how vicky and trevor get switched around, but sean becomes good purely because he’s bored of being bad. that didn’t feel subversive at all, it felt like narrative contrivance and a cheap lol. Michael is the only one that i can remember whose redemption arc is actually interesting and engaging (but “power of friendship” narratives have been done to death so i don’t think that one’s very relevant either. then again full disclosure, i’m coming at this with the opposite bias of being very bored with redemption narratives, no offense, just personal (dis)taste)
but anyway my deeper issue with both Joe and TGP is that, no i don’t believe that saying “everyone deserves redemption” is meaningfully subversive without some grounding in social reality, be it metaphorical. Joe’s misogyny was always skin-deep, and now that he got rid of that baggage he’s actually a-ok and only has (self-)image issues that need “redeeming”. that’s not subversive, because what’s the message? give dudes with a history of toxic behaviour a second chance, just in case? (painting broad strokes here, forgive me)
regarding TGP, if we want to take it seriously as a metaphor of either christian dogma or the criminal justice system, it has to give us one of two things: punishment is a bad system across the board regardless of people’s “goodness levels” (extremely subversive and would’ve been wildly exciting but a totally different show), or credible redemption arcs for really shitty people to prove that, if they can get good, there’s hope for everyone (still subversive, or at least morally stimulating).
But besides Michael whose redemption is well-earned within the framing of the story but boils down to “being evil is less fun than friendship!” (meh), everyone is already good. or they’re bad but they suddenly switch to being good for the hell of it. that’s not anything. it’s fun, maybe, but it’s completely apolitical. it’s disney-level ethics. Which, for a sitcom is fine; for a show that bills itself as a sitcom about ethics… is disappointing.
idk, am i being unfair again? i’m probably being unfair. i feel like i should hedge and split hairs and add a lot of certainly’s and however’s. but maybe sometimes it’s better to be wrong and readable and hopefully slightly insightful, than right and extremely boring
I don’t know about unfair, just… a person who writes a small book about how much they hate a show under some dude’s offhand comment about how he liked it. I recommend a hobby.
It’s really hard to forgive someone who you think has done something truly evil, and generally people don’t react well to media that makes them do serious emotional work, especially if it’s a comedy. That’s why most redemption arcs are weaksauce in this way.
I think there’s hope for Joe. maybe not them being together but there is hope for him being a better person. sometimes it just takes someone seeing the good in you to remind you there IS good in you
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how about a solid sack of shit
Joe seem sad to realise he’s a sparkly vampire?
Joe: an Everlasting Hearthrobstopper.
Snow piles have layers and Joes have layers. You get it? They both have layers!
You know what also has layers parfaits.
cake! everybody likes cake.
So is Joe a Snowpile Cake or Parfait? Or D all of the above?
Honestly Joyce’s description is giving me a craving for tartufo.
me it reminds v much of onions … see alt text ^^
And you can even hide some dirt in cake too if ya want! Its greate solution!
Don’t put dirt in the cake, you’ll piss off Rapunzel.
I DON’T CARE what everyone likes! Snow piles are not like cakes!
I specifically like donuts.
Hey now.
–you’re an all-star, get your game on, go playyy
Best comment of the evening.
Why you never try to drive over a snow pile. There is probably an iceberg underneath that will damage the vehicle since it’s as hard as a rock.
You also don’t know what’s underneath. It could be a void, or a big rock, or some shopping carts…
And after a few warm days, they develop a sharp crust.
Are we still talking about Joe?
Joe’s butt. Don’t ask about the crust. Or do. I don’t kink shame.
Joe: I’m not sure I’m ready to accept that I might be capable of being an okay person, can I just keep being a hot mess please?
“But working to be a good person is haaaaard.”
“What is better – To be born good, or to overcome your evil nature through great effort?” –Party Snacks
Joyce is being super wholesome. I like that she’s completely on-board with Joe’s redemption arc. Where everybody else in his life rolls their eyes and figures he’ll be back to normal in no time, Joyce sincerely believes in his ability to be better.
Ironically, Joyce was at her most Christian after she became an Atheist and stopped worrying about judging people. Good on you, Joyce.
I once made someone FURIOUS when I called fall semester Dorothy the best Christian in the comic. That was fun.
Sauce or it didn’t happen.
…okay, I don’t mean that, but I’d love to see it.
I really should have taken a screenshot of it.
What was going on in the comic where you made the comment?
Interesting. I can see a few angles where a radical would lose their shit at that. What was it?
PSA Schpoon is a bit of a troll. maybe take their claims with a grain of salt. (also maybe don’t enable them)
Eat shit.
dude i’m honestly not mad at you, i just think you’ve proven yourself less than respectful in the past, maybe don’t advertise how skilled you are at getting people riled up.
Cheers. How delightful of them to prove the adage about remaining silent and being thought a fool.
If I remember correctly they were really stuck on Dorothy not believing in capital G God and didn’t like the implication that works were what being a Christian was really about.
Well, that’s because no major Christian denomination believes that “works are what being a Christian [is] really about.” In fact, quite the opposite. That’s about as wrong as saying “Eating ham and cheese sandwiches is what being an Orthodox Jew is all about.” (See Ephesians 1:9)
Sorry, Eph 2:9.
I am so much less interested in what Paul had to say than Christ. Try James 2:14-26.
Oh wait, I fucked that up hard, James is not one of the Gospels. Still, Paul’s shotgun approach of lowering the bar as much as possible is what lets monsters like Kenneth Copeland call themselves Christian while exhibiting none of Christ’s qualties and still be taken seriously. Faith without works is dead.
James isn’t Christ either. Nor were any of the Gospel writers. James is traditionally considered to be the brother of Jesus and that’s not as widely rejected by mainstream scholars as the traditional authorship of the Gospels (or of the non-Pauline epistles). It’s actually possible, though not too likely, that James is the only piece of writing we have by someone who actually knew Jesus.
That said, most of Paul’s approach is completely misread by critics of Christianity today – and by many Christians. The entire faith vs deeds argument wasn’t about what we’d think of as good deeds – feeding the poor and the like, but about keeping Torah Law. Jesus, Paul and James all agree on the importance of doing good. Paul disagreed with James on things like circumcision and dietary laws.
The Gospel writers disagreed with each other too and were happy to attribute sayings to Jesus to back themselves up.
Found a example actually from Christ’s mouth, though it’s not as direct. Matthew 7:15-20.
Was it, perchance, because saying that Dorothy is the best christian in the comic means you’re also implying that being nice and kind are characteristics one arrives at via christianity? Just guessing here.
Dorothy is kind, self-sacrificing, and looks for the good in people to a fault. There were no other characters in the fall semester (besides maybe Leslie) that followed Christ’s “turn the other cheek” philosophy as well as Dorothy did. She’s the Good Samaritan stretched out into a full(er) character.
The good Samaritan, you’ll note, is very much not christian. VERY SPECIFICALLY not christian. In fact, one might say that the good Samaritan not being christian is a fundamental point of the parable, because it’s true.
.I mean there weren’t any Christians then so of course they weren’t Christian. They were also a hypothetical person. It is a teaching to to Christians about how they are supposed to act. Christians are supposed to act like/be the good Samaritan. Now that doesn’t mean they historically have been, or followed many of Jesus’s other teachings, but that is a more complicated conversation.
True that of course they weren’t Christian, though the idea of what JBento said was there… The Good Samaritan wasn’t Jewish, and the traveler they helped was. In fact, Samaritans and Jews were enemies at this time, but a couple Jewish people who came upon the traveler before the Samaritan didn’t help.
It does work as an example of goodness and compassion not being defined by one’s religion.
Like Yumi pointed out, it’s not just that the Samaritan wasn’t christian, but he was, very specifically, Samaritan, people who, at that point, had, uh, *stern divergences* with jews.
Actually I think the character in the parable was made a Samaritan because they were Jews, ones who had rebelled and followed a would-be usurper to set up their own kingdom, turning their backs on their heritage. See the little dispute between Jeroboam and Rehoboam.
I suppose it depends on how you define these terms….
doesn’t that support Schpoon’s ‘works’ argument? The good Samaritan is not Christian (or Jewish) and yet is held up as an example by Christ to his people. ‘To follow my teaching, be like this guy’ -> ‘this guy is acting in accordance with my teachings’.
I mean, i think there might be other bits where its more like ‘doesn’t count if he gave the shirt off his back unless he mentioned that I sent him’, but idk.
Depends on what Schpoon’s argument actually is, but I think JBento, along with myself and others, takes issue with the automatic linking of “being good” with “being Christian.” The Good Samaritan could be used as an example to how “goodness” is not tied to a specific religion.
Christianity creeps me out
but does it creep you out in a fun, would dress up as the virgin mary except with black contacts for halloween kind of way, or in a ..not fun way?
…i’m honestly blown away by my own costume idea rn
Also, she’s far from naive to Joe’s worse tendencies. If he backslides she’s perfectly able to call him out on it. I imagine he values that in her.
Kinda funny how the whole “everything I was ever led to believe was wrong and hateful” thing ended up helping her believe in redemption.
That’s not what Christian means.
Christian has too many meanings for gatekeeping. Not that it’s ever stopped anybody.
No, but it’s a particularly toxic one, rooted deep in religious prejudice.
I don’t know for sure what Hue’s full meaning was, but I agree that that’s not what being Christian means, and I mean that from the opposite of a gatekeeping way. If you do not consider yourself Christian, do not want to be Christian, then you are not Christian.
I know there are debates over what defines Christianity or what is required to be “saved” in Christianity or whatever, but it’s ridiculous to me that “Christian” could be assigned to someone who does not believe in things like Jesus and the Christian God just because they are a good person.
If you want to argue that fall semester Dorothy best exhibited the character values of Christianity, okay, but if you’re calling her “Christian” as a shorthand for that, OF COURSE some people are going to disagree with what you’re saying.
C.S. Lewis discussed this at length in the preface to _Mere Christianity_ if you want to dig deeper. Summary, “[w]e must therefore stick to the original, obvious meaning. The name Christians was first given at Antioch (Acts xi. 26) to “the disciples,” to those who accepted the teaching of the apostles.”
Christian means (narrowly) agreeing with the Nicene Creed, or (broadly) with the Apostles Creed. Without getting into specifics, there is theology involved. Using it as a synonym for “wholesome” or “empathetic” or “supportive” or “good” implies that those traits are owned by Christianity and that non-Christians are by default bad in whatever way that Christians are good. None of those positive traits are dependent on any version of Christian theology, or any theology at all.
It’s this: https://www.dumbingofage.com/accounts/
Whether or not someone is good/wholesome/empathetic is not related to if they adhere to Christianity. There are Christians who do good things and Christians who do bad things, and non-Christians who do good things and non-Christians who do bad things.
I had forgotten what a sad encounter that was. What a story.
Actually, there are Christian traditions which don’t adhere to those creeds, or any creed saying that Christianity requires Creeds would be to say that Quakers, like myself are not Christian.
It also makes the argument that pre-Credal Christians were not Christian.
Not just assigning someone as Christian because they’re good, but the implication that non-Christians aren’t good is the real problem. That a good non-Christian must really be somehow Christian.
It’s colonialist language, used to “complement” non-Christian locals who please the overlords.
Agreed, thejeff. Imagine calling Joe a good Christian because he believes in Joyce’s ability to change for the better. That would be incredibly gross.
Non-Christians are often good people who display traits that some Christians value. It doesn’t make them “better Christians” than Christians who behave badly. Human goodness is not derived from Christianity.
While I concede the point with Joe because he’s Jewish; the idea is that Joyce as an atheist is acting more in line with Christ’s teachings as an atheist then she was as a Christian. It’s specifically about Joyce.
They go hand in hand; they’re both “real” problems. It’s definitely been annoying to me when people have assumed I’m Christian because I [help out a stranger/donate to someone in need/express values of compassion/whatever]. Doubly so when these interactions turn into, “Oh, then maybe I can convert you!”
There are also those religious groups who baptize others after their deaths. Ugh.
I agree with you it’s really creepy.
Something virtuous pagans something.
Ayyy.
Depends on what kind of Christian you’re talking about, whether they follow Jesus or Jeezus.
If anyone knows about the capacity for meaningful change its Joyce. She’s extending him the same courtesy her friends gave her back when she was the Joyce who tried to date a gay man into being straight
So in a way, Lumino, you’re saying that the Christian ideal is the default.
Ironically, this is exactly what Dorothy liked about Walky.
Well he is pretty hot. And he’s a mess.
that’s actually kind of sweet
Joyce is a good kid.
Even if she’s causing a dorm-wide BO epidemic by wearing out every machine in the laundry room.
she’s got stock in Fabreeze and Axe, it’s all a ploy by big stank to make bank.
Headline: Joyce Spank to Make Bank for Big Stank, Students Rank
Had I an internet to bestow, it would be yours.
Like with pie. So you gonna see him again?
Been a while since I heard a Dr. Horrible quote.
I came here for this and was not disappointed.
“They were loud; they were layer-y! They were ROTTEN and VICIOUS!”–Jeremy Clarkson
Oh my god I love this ship so much.
Panel 3 Joyce for the win!
(Also fuck you Walky)
Hard disagree on your parentheses… Walky’s actions have been, albeit in similar fashion to Mike’s, the most effective at getting people to be honest and kind/caring to each other of anyone’s so far in the story-arc… Joyce just about admitted that she does like Joe there, something that she would not have done otherwise.
Just because something good came from it doesn’t make it any less of a dick thing Walky said
Sure, if you take it directly at face value as something he really truly meant.
So why did he say it?
Because it was there.
Because he’s a little d bag that thinks he has permission to be a jerk
Maybe he’s genuinely trying to help. Joe has been broadcasting “I’m a hot asshole” far and wide for as long as he’s known him, while Joyce has been noticeably naive about a lot of things.
What Milu said, and also, as at least 8 people are fond of saying every single time Joe’s on panel and someone’s the least bit apprehensive (especially Dorothy), Walky doesn’t know about Joe’s secret (to non-Joyce people) character arc, yadda yadda yadda. So if he doesn’t know Joe’s not still a dickass, why should he stop treating Joe as a dickass?
Sometimes people say things they don’t mean for the sake of comedy. It’s called “joking”.
God dude your hate boner for walky is making it hard to take anything you say about him seriously. It’s exhausting. You’re getting worse than a certain infamous walky hater back in the day
Was anyone laughing?
Hard to tell if he meant to make Joe feel bad, Joe pretends not to have feelings. What Walky said was a lot like what Mike said to make him feel like he wasn’t worth dating Dorothy.
If he’s treating Joyce like she’s still on her religiously inspired husband hunt. Maybe he’s trying to warn her in a goofball way, and maybe the rudeness wouldn’t cross the line for one reader or another, or Joyce or Joe, but it is rude because he’s making her the punchline of his joke. And it is rude because he’s insulting Joe even if he thinks it will roll of Joe’s back. I get why some folks thinks that rudeness crosses a line.
From that angle, I suppose it makes sense.
I’m high as I type this, so take that positively.
Walky doesn’t seem to me to be the kind of person interested in making people feel bad. Like, it’ll happen, but he mostly wants to be seen as clever and if the way to do that is executing a sick burn, he’ll go for it. But if he anticipates the burn will actually hurt, I think he’d back away from it.
A lot of people have a few layers of mud mixed in with their snow.
But most people are still snow hills and fun to sled with and have snowball fights with.
I’m glad Joyce looks nearly as bothered by all her friends’ insistence that Joe can’t change. Also Joe perking up at Joyce defending him followed by Joyce’s smile.
JoJo strips continue to have healing properties.
It might be that in saying Joe can’t change, Joyce is seeing it as them saying she can’t change also. She is trying to leave behind a lot of habits and stuff that she was taught when she was younger that she doesn’t like as well. She has gotten pressure from her friends on how she has been changing (some more well intentioned than others). Having someone who wants to change himself for the better right beside her (sharing that goal) is encouraging to her.
I’d love to see Joyce lay all that out in an outburst toward Dorothy.
A+ take, I love it.
That’s a new perspective to me: that Joyce may know Joe can’t change. It’s all for her own pleasure.
Nice.
I don’t think anyone has said or even implied that Joe can’t change. Neither Joe nor Joyce have even claimed that he’s trying to change to any of their critics.
They’re assuming that he hasn’t changed, because the only reason they’d have to think otherwise is that the naive ex-fundie is crushing on him.
I mean Walky did imply that, to be fair, but moreso just to needle at Joyce.
He said that a girl finding a hot asshole and changing him was wish fullfilment and he’s absolutely right there. That’s entirely different from whether someone can change themselves.
And I think that’s the real kicker- Joe is making his own choices and changes, without being asked, manipulated, or compelled. That Joyce is at least part of his catalyst is true, but she’s just there appreciating the process, not pushing it.
I think what Joe is missing is that he’s actually not changing at all. He’s just taking off the layers of mask and armor he’s been hunkered down in. He’s being actually himself for the first time in who knows how long. Which is scary and a change for him, but not so much a change IN him. If that makes sense.
Yes.
Joyce has put forth a new theory of Joenetary physics.
I was thinking of a comet nucleus…
So you’re saying Joe will evaporate in the face sufficient burn?
The layer of mud could have also been a defensive layer due to something from his childhood, or a learned layer from family or society/entertainment. He’s still young enough and probably still maturing his brain (aren’t brains considered fully developed at 21 or something like that) that he can still be learning and becoming a better person. Changing anything about yourself is hard though, especially when it has become a habit. It is too easy to fall back into the rutt of the habit that you spent years digging. Doesn’t mean that you are worthless or can’t change. Having support makes it a lot easier.
I don’t have a source on this, but I picked up somewhere that the brain isn’t fully cooked until 25. Meanwhile folks reliably get nasolabial folds before then, so that’s bullshit.
So I used to find this 25-year old brain maturity claim fishy but then i, uh, checked whether Wikipedia had references linked for that claim and found it did link to some serious sounding science papers, so I guess it has some factual basis 😉
But, for what it’s worth, i think on an individual basis it’s not all that useful. For one thing, lets be honest, we don’t actually know what that means exactly. None of us know how brains work. People who study brains don’t really know how brains work. And like most science-based folk knowledge, that soundbite almost definitely is a dumbed-down, headline-friendly version of the actual research
For another, maturity is extremely and obviously socialized anyway. Some 16-year olds will always be better at impulse control than a lot of fully grown adult brains. Like, i wonder whose accountability we tend to obfuscate by using that rhetoric, and whether it’s really not muddling i issues that are social and political in nature, not biological.
Maybe lawmakers and judges and educators should take that 25-year old thing into account in some circumstances but I think the rest of us ought to think of brain research as mostly irrelevant trivia.
Yeah, but once you factor neurodivergence in it kinda falls apart again. xD
Also careful how you date those papers backing it up. Mind you AFABs and minorities weren’t required to be part of clinical studies until 1993.
Oh feel free to debunk that brain claim, i would enjoy nothing more ^^
Anyway my main point was precisely that that soundbite about brain maturity should be retired from casual conversation
It’s probably more useful to say it gets harder to change the way you think the less you practice doing it.
maybe. i’m personally not literate about psychology or neurology, though i hope i’ll eventually catch an obsession about some of these topics and start educating myself.
for now, i’ll contend with sociological hypotheses: teenagers form their own social groups, some practicing various forms of oppositional thinking, others aligning more or less with their primary socialization (in the family), more often a blend of both. they enjoy a level of autonomy from the adult world that allows them to experiment with different values and attitudes.
between the ages of 18 and 25, roughly, the average american and european will enter the workforce and a stable monogamous relationship, and while becoming financially autonomous they will also become alienated by capitalism and heteronormativity as structures that will typically claim them for the rest of their lives, and therefore tend to stabilize their identity around these pressures.
that broad pattern seems to account nicely for a lot of individual and social phenomena without needing to resort to neuroscience, which is not to disparage neuroscience but let’s keep things in perspective.
my understanding of the “brain finishes developing at 25” thing is that it’s kind of like getting taller. your body will continue to change and grow in different ways for the rest of your life, but there is a point eventually when it “finishes growing” because you’re not getting any taller. brains will change and grow your entire life too, but around 25 is when it becomes a “fully grown” brain. it’s just one axis of measuring development. I wouldn’t be surprised if the difference it makes towards the end is comparable to gaining those last few cm of height
My understanding is that scientists kept expecting the brain to stop growing at SOME point and got up to 25 in proving it’s not earlier than that. But there’s no evidence it stops at that point, either.
That’s my understanding too; they just stopped checking past 25.
I think the obvious answer is that your brain doesn’t really stop growing or maturing… Ever. Until you die or get dementia at least. But it could also be said to slow down?
That’s technically true of the rest of our bodies, it’s been shown that the pelvis widens slightly over time in elders. And that’s bone growth…
People don’t Change. You’re thinking of changelings.
Hmph.
I learned about changelings and now I got scared of them…
That’s just anti changeling propaganda
What kind of Changeling are you?
No, changelings do not in fact change, they are just moved from their normal birth environment in Faery to the mundane world, as part of the illegal abduction of mortal children. The agency is all from the adult fairies and their blatant child abuse.
It’s fancy spa mud that’s been fortified with minerals, Joe!
lol that might make for a fun pinup shot of joe being covered in mud lol.
idk about the ‘clay/mud’ facial masks tho even if it’s supposed to be good for your skin, even the dollar store ones are uncomfortable sticky (tho my skin is basically in the middle but i suppose closer to dry than oily if i had to pick which end, so the ‘stickiness’ being peeled off might be more beneficial to greasier skin because i’ve def had dried skin the next night after even with ‘skincare’ routinse lol) compared to the paper sheet masks or the ‘gel’ kinda ones sorry kinda tangented haha
Bronze statue with a bit of a patina.
Outer layer of snow, then a layer of mud under that, then another layer of snow under that, then another layer of mud, and another layer of snow, and…
Tenderness, shrouded in fear, shoved in emotionally numbing sexual machismo. It’s an insecurity turducken.
Built like an ogre, too.
Either Joe is a Cornetto or a beef wellington, no in-between
Joe is a beef wellington with a cornetto glued on.
well, at least they’re both changing each other steadily now rather than in their 40s. not that it’s impossible but i imagine at that age if your personality is set a certain way, other than trying to change and working on it consciously, it’d be harder versus while they’re still young at least from what i’ve seen
This is adorable. I hope she’s right. (And i think we have evidence to back it up.)
Joe’s hoe-ness always rang as a defense mechanism for catching feelings to me. Like his dad was/is a wandering dick on wheels, so there was a conga line of women in Joe’s life trying to mom him, only to leave because the dad fucked up. That’s GOT to fuck his mindset up a fair bit.
Joe, she wouldn’t tell you she liked you back out of a combination of also being afraid of feelings and of enjoying teasing you.
and he def isn’t just some ‘hot asshole’ anymore otherwise he wouldn’t care if she rejected him and would just move on
though be cute for them to go on semi-casual platonic hangouts/’dates’ before her actually confirming she likes him
wasn’t rly the type to date back in the day but i would’ve been happy just befriending a crush versus just watching someone from afar (tho i might be more demi leaning so more likely to feel attached to someone after being in a friend group together as opposed to thinking some rando is hot lol)
I think they both need to go slow, each for their own reasons. So that’s convenient. Wouldn’t be surprised if they go too fast anyway, for drama’s sake.
Well, he’s definitely caught feelings, but you can have feelings and still be an asshole. His basic fear is that, like his dad, regardless of whether he has feelings or not, he’ll be unable to resist temptation and wind up cheating.
That’s what he thinks he can’t change.
I kind of hope we get far enough in this relationship, once it’s serious, to see him actually struggle with that, rather than just have all the conflict be about starting the relationship.
You have LAYERS! 😀 Shrek says that’s a good thing.
All this talk about Joe having layers, when in reality it’s Joe all the way down.
What Joyce is saying, is that he has too many layers. she’d like to peel them off now please
Like an onion? So if you get cut, that makes others cry?
Wait, that works.
So Joe deduces that snow is more solid and compact than mud hence being more linked to muscle?
So goshdang sweet. I love.
He’s a parfait.
Or an onion.
AWWWWWW <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3
His change might be temporary, or it might be permanent. He’s not done and it could go either way. He has an sleaze-bag comfort zone, and he retreats to it with most people. Even if they don’t end up having a romance, they’re good friends for each other.
Several characters uncomfortable about shedding an identity they could be outgrowing.
A hot core of liquid snow forms as the Joe truly becomes a planet
…Joe is the planet of Naboo?
Capillary action, nerds.
He’s a diamond in the rough inside of a larger, hotter diamond.
And the outside diamond uses shallow hedonistic sexual relationships to avoid recognizing its own feelings.
O N I O N S
Most snow hills have perfectly nice hills underneath. Joe is a known layer but also a grassy knoll. You could build an army base on him.
Honestly the fact Joe is even worried about this demonstrates growth, garbage people don’t worry about being garbage so he’s certainly taken the first steps in wanting to be better. Nothing happens till you do that.
I don’t know, some garbage people definitely know they suck and wish they didn’t. That moment here actually fits perfectly within the Jane Eyre-ey trope Walky was bringing up. (I haven’t read or seen Twilight). M. Rochester keeps saying he’s a cold-heated piece of shit and, i mean, he kind of is.
*Cold-hearted. Ok he turns out not to be cold-hearted but he’s still a piece of garbage
I do really like how he gets humbled in the end.
SPOILER: Jayne is like, sure we can be together, but only after I have the power in the relationship./END SPOILER
*Jane
yes! as i remember it the ending is quite satisfying. /SPOILER except that the mad wife dies i think? that character gets treated so roughly omg /END SPOILER
Jane does go through a lot before that, even as she tries to protect herself as best she can from his heavy-handed flirtation and manipulation, like what was that thing where he dresses up as a fortune-teller? egh, it’s been a while since i’ve read it. i should read it again, i really enjoyed it. (mostly because of how cheeky and smart Jane is <3) (Rochester is a jerk, mostly) (as far as i remember)
SPOILER:
But as soon as she finds out he’s been a douche, she dumps him, finds her extended family, has adventures, says no to another kind of douche, gets money, and comes back as a really strong person who doesn’t need any man. Rochester is totally humbled and no longer sees himself as a savior, but as someone who doesn’t deserve her. Personally, I preferred Mr. Darcy, but to each their own. /END SPOILER
yeah my memories of Darcy are pretty fuzzy as well… i mostly remember finding Lizzie delightful, again, and Darcy mostly kind of a bore? i think? totally a good upstanding and unfairly maligned guy and whatnot but just not a lot of fun. but yeah that’s another one i could definitely see myself rereading =D
Highly recommend the Lizzie Bennet Diaries on Youtube. It’s a great updated take, and really illuminates who Darcy is in the same way Clueless made the character of Emma understandable.
ooooh thank you for the recommendation, i will definitely look that up!!
in turn may i suggest this Jane Eyre/Bertha slashfic i read recently which has definitely coloured my distant memories of the book XD
but seriously, i loved it.
Mud is great. We love mud. It’s fun and messy and it grows heaps of cool stuff like moss and flowers and mushrooms. It hides worms and larvae that turn into even cooler beetles and bugs. Snow is just all the stuff that piles on top we don’t have much control over, but while snow is there all the life is incubating and growing underneath. Then snow melts and it enriches everything and hydrates it so it can finally form.
At the soccer fields down past my old house there was a mound of dirt from digging new fields. It was ugly to look at for a while, but then it grew grass and flowers and kids would roll down it or fly kites and drive remote cars on it. People would have picnics on the top during the day and at night I’d take a bottle of wine and sit on to to watch the stars.
Joe’s not a snow hill with mud on (insubstantial and fleetingly beautiful). He’s a perfectly great mound with two extra great mounds Joyce appreciates in a purely empirically aesthetic way.
“And sometimes there’s a third, even deeper level, and that one is the same as the top surface one[…] Like with pie.”
You are made of mud, and you’re made of stars, and you’re made of the unknowable stuff out of which the universe condensed at the dawn of time. Stay humble Joe, but also don’t forget you’re so bright and so curious.
And if you’re sufficiently dense you become a black hole, sucking in and crushing everything that crosses your event horizon?
As Joe fuses more and more of his core snow, he expands and the closely orbiting Joyce siphons off more and more of his halo of horniness, leading ultimately to a supernova explosion.
like a horny Shrek ?
Bold of you to assume Shrek is ever not horny.
Man, walky was right, that pile had a ton of metaphors
I ship these two so hard aaagh
No, Joe is toasted coconut covering marshmallow over chocolate cake with a cream center.
well, compared to joyce he is basically ogre-sized
I love the coloring here.
Like with pie.
In my gospel, the usual ogre’s name is Kevin.
Growing up, Joe modeled himself after his father, who could charitably be called a ‘womanizer’. As soon as he got to college though, he collided with reality and began to see things differently. A garbage person would double down, maybe start a podcast defending misogyny or something.
(Yeah I’m a sucker for redemption narratives. I loved The Good Place. Maybe DOA is a ‘neighborhood’.)
interesting, because i think The Good Place had sort of the same problem as Joe’s current arc. there’s this emphasis on redemption, and the philosophical conceit means it’s trying for metaphorical relevance, but none of the characters are really bad in a way that gives their redemption arcs any deeper meaning or any ambiguity to munch on. they’re all, to a fault, entirely sympathetic from the get-go. (let us not speak of season 4. it made a courageous half-assed effort to address that issue, and did nothing of substance with it.) it honestly feels like the points system the show picked and ran with (and which provides many hilarious gags) is a retrofit to allow them to cast some perfectly fine people as in need of some grand cosmic redemption.
it’s a great show (aside from season 4), but it falls way short of its own ambition and really has no bite as a social satire imo.
The point system was deliberately ridiculous. The show starts out with people being eternally tortured for, essentially, annoying personal foibles, then calls out the injustice of that, and in season four Michael tells the judge straight out; “No one is beyond redemption.” And he was clearly referring to Vicki, Treavor, and Sean.
No, it’s not The Divine Comedy; it takes a different approach. As gentle humor, it’s just a little subversive. I think it accomplished something biting satire would not have.
I’m not literally proposing that DOA is a neighborhood, only that there are conceptual parallels.
hm. i don’t remember how vicky and trevor get switched around, but sean becomes good purely because he’s bored of being bad. that didn’t feel subversive at all, it felt like narrative contrivance and a cheap lol. Michael is the only one that i can remember whose redemption arc is actually interesting and engaging (but “power of friendship” narratives have been done to death so i don’t think that one’s very relevant either. then again full disclosure, i’m coming at this with the opposite bias of being very bored with redemption narratives, no offense, just personal (dis)taste)
but anyway my deeper issue with both Joe and TGP is that, no i don’t believe that saying “everyone deserves redemption” is meaningfully subversive without some grounding in social reality, be it metaphorical. Joe’s misogyny was always skin-deep, and now that he got rid of that baggage he’s actually a-ok and only has (self-)image issues that need “redeeming”. that’s not subversive, because what’s the message? give dudes with a history of toxic behaviour a second chance, just in case? (painting broad strokes here, forgive me)
regarding TGP, if we want to take it seriously as a metaphor of either christian dogma or the criminal justice system, it has to give us one of two things: punishment is a bad system across the board regardless of people’s “goodness levels” (extremely subversive and would’ve been wildly exciting but a totally different show), or credible redemption arcs for really shitty people to prove that, if they can get good, there’s hope for everyone (still subversive, or at least morally stimulating).
But besides Michael whose redemption is well-earned within the framing of the story but boils down to “being evil is less fun than friendship!” (meh), everyone is already good. or they’re bad but they suddenly switch to being good for the hell of it. that’s not anything. it’s fun, maybe, but it’s completely apolitical. it’s disney-level ethics. Which, for a sitcom is fine; for a show that bills itself as a sitcom about ethics… is disappointing.
idk, am i being unfair again? i’m probably being unfair. i feel like i should hedge and split hairs and add a lot of certainly’s and however’s. but maybe sometimes it’s better to be wrong and readable and hopefully slightly insightful, than right and extremely boring
I don’t know about unfair, just… a person who writes a small book about how much they hate a show under some dude’s offhand comment about how he liked it. I recommend a hobby.
I don’t hate the show, i really enjoyed it generally, but i take your point… Sorry yeah, i did get carried away there
It’s really hard to forgive someone who you think has done something truly evil, and generally people don’t react well to media that makes them do serious emotional work, especially if it’s a comedy. That’s why most redemption arcs are weaksauce in this way.
I feel like the metaphor is starting to no longer make sense.
If you keep picking at a metaphor it will never heal.
I think there’s hope for Joe. maybe not them being together but there is hope for him being a better person. sometimes it just takes someone seeing the good in you to remind you there IS good in you
They’re TALKING!
About how they FEEL about each other!
CONSTRUCTIVELY!
**faints**
Onion
Onion
onion
now I’m hungry for onions 😆😋
Honestly a pretty creative metaphor from Joyce.
Good job Joyce!
That is kind of a cute metaphor <3