Honestly, divorce would be a lot easier to deal with if everyone got to take a cool video game home as a consolation prize. Like losing on a game show.
Judge: “Our contestants lost at marriage today, but they each get to take home a copy of System Shock, a year’s supply of Rice-A-Roni, and a set of hubcaps.”
My parents stayed together till the end, but I had nightmares about them divorcing, when I was away in the military. I’d come home and it’d just be my mom, with seven new little brothers and sisters. I already had eight. Oddly, they were always brown.
Well actually, I knew they were *going* to move. But I went home on leave one time and didn’t realize that they already had moved until I got there and the house was empty.
My parents were fighting every day. Every. Day. And it hurt me as a child badly, I went to sleep at least twice a week with real, painful, physical heartache. It was soooo much better when they separated and for my sake, they did everything to keep it amicably.
They did have a prenub, so there wasn’t much fighting involved over who got what (at least I did not notice much) and it really helped their relationship with each other as parents.
That was 25 years ago… last year all 4 of my parents started to vacation together, they’re all pensioners so they have much free time and both sides own caravans, so their interest in campsites are similar. It’s still blowing my mind, they get along so well, that they voluntarily spend their free time with each other and each others new husband and wife, without me even there.
tbh i WISH my parents would get a divorce. They aren’t even actively fighting, they’re just…. lukewarm and not interested in each other anymore. I think they would both be happier in the long run without each other.
But they’ve been together for 35 years, so….. i also understand that that would be a super scary situation for them to go through. Especially since lots of their friends are Christian and Judgmental.
But hopefully (temporarily disregarding that factule about the most dangerous time statistically being right after you leave an abuser, assuming we’re talking physical abuse) afterwards you get to heal and recover physically/emotionally/financially, and rebuild a better life where you get to be safe.
But yeah. That doesn’t mean that “just leaving” is easy, safe, or risk-free 😢
Divorce sucks, even when you are escaping abuse. It sucks worse when the abuse has been mental and emotional and no one believes it occurred because your abuser knows how to lie and manipulate.
It can suck and still be the right thing to do. It can suck and still save you. I lost more than half my friends in the divorce, probably close to 3 quarters of them. Both our families were mad at me – even though his KNEW it was the right thing for me to do. I had like 2 people in my corner at the time and everyone was either mad at me or at best neutral and disappointed. He had all the support in the world while stealing from me and cheating on me and telling everyone that I was holding him back.
Want to know what doesn’t suck? A decade later, when you are living your best life and someone who did not believe you contacts you out of the blue to apologize for not believing you.
100% Yes other things around it sucks, but in this scenario it’s a trolley problem. On one track is a life of physical and emotional abuse, suicidal ideation, degraded opportunity in life, and earlier death, on the other track is a life free of that where you (as the kid) or your kids AND you get to experience love free of abuse, living free of wanting to die every. single. day. and not having to wonder what invented chaos is waiting for you when you walk in the door each day.
My parent’s divorce saved me from my mother’s abuse (more than them being together possibly could have). My divorce has saved me from suicidal ideation. And it’s allowing me to provide my kids a safe space where they can know unconditional love and acceptance.
I’ve had pneumonia twice in my life. Both times was right before I finally stopped investing in relationships that had become highly abusive. Divorce, even with all the costs and headaches, is literally life-saving.
And for the cases where people *aren’t* abusive? Do you think they should stay together until the above are their choices?
Naw. Divorce doesn’t suck. But the alternatives sure do.
Tbh, even as someone whose parents stayed together when they really shouldn’t have, I have to push back: sometimes all the viable options are bad (fraught, stressful, overwhelming, traumatic, etc) and you’re left picking the least bad. Bankruptcy sucks, but it’s better than dealing with insurmountable debt. Amputation sucks, but it’s better than leaving osteosarcoma to fester. Putting abusive parents on an information diet sucks, but it’s better than giving them ammunition to continue behaving abusively.
It’s okay for folks to feel that divorce sucks and that it’s lifesaving. Both of these can be true.
Just had a terrible break up with my abusive ex and I can confirm that there is no such thing as a good split from terrible people. While better than the alternative, the sort of harm they can and will do to you in your attempt to escape can carry with you for years.
Joyce needed to hear her say “you’re more important to me than anything”, but she’ll never say it, because the church as an institution takes precedence over anything else in Carol’s world.
That’s what made the strip the other day so heart-wrenching to me; Joyce knew she wasn’t going to get the answer she wanted to hear, but had to ask anyway.
The process is unnecessarily long and fraught with ill emotions. It should be easy like Steve Martin’s version of breaking up: “You say, ‘I break with thee, I break with thee’, and then throw dog poop on her shoes.”
Things can be better after divorce, but that doesn’t stop it from still being sucky. It is merely the least sucky option.
Also I’d argue the ‘divorce sucks’ sentiment isn’t only about the finalization of the divorce, but also the general state of affairs leading to that divorce.
Divorce rarely happens because things are going well after all. It’s not just the actual parting that sucks, but also the loss of the ability to be happy together.
It’s not that half of every married couples break up though. Most people stay married. It’s just that if you have one divorce and get married again you’re more likely to get divorced again, and so on. Some people have 3-4 or more divorces in their lifetime.
Thr 50% Stat is also not true anymore, and depending which source you look at, may have never been true. I did a quick Google and got a bunch of articles from a few years ago, but it seems like the number is more like 40%, even including the people go get divorced repeatedly.
The 50% stat is actually an underestimate, not an overestimate. Roughly 50% of all *first marriages* end in divorce, although that percent has gone down somewhat of late…
Meanwhile almost 2/3rds of 2nd marriages end in divorce, and the percentage keeps going up for tertiary, etc marriages. The aggregate is well above 50%, even though the first- marriage divorce rate has gone down somewhat.
Mind you, a huge percentage of the decrease in first marriage divorce has nothing to do with divorce, and everything to do with the massive decrease in marriage rate- basically most people are just opting to live with their SO, and only the most “certain” are choosing marriage.
my hypothesis would be it depends on religiosity. communities where marriage is more strongly encouraged tend to also be those where divorce is least tolerated.
another hypothesis i have is, it depends on wealth/socioeconomic class. maybe marriage still makes sense in some classes (either very rich or very poor), and the reasons for entering into marriage would mostly hold true throughout life and therefore also make divorcing less likely.
but i don’t actually know, it’s just that “certainty” feels like a dodgy yardstick of marriage durability.
I chose the word “certain”only as a placeholder (a variety of other word choices could be used in its place), hence the quotation marks.
Basically, most people are not opting to get married, but the people who feel very strongly about it; either from a religious perspective, or from a personal belief in the solidity of their relationship (“I know this person is the one I want to spend the rest of my life with!”), are still choosing to get married.
In either case, those people are less likely to become divorced than marriages of convenience and/or marriage based on a weakly held sense of it being the right thing- such as shotgun marriages (which do still occur quite often).
i get that you were using “certain” loosely but i’m saying the reasons might not be to do with feelings at all but with external pressure or legal-financial concerns.
anecdotally, many of the weddings that happened in my friend circle the last few years had to do with residency, one of the spouse’s being from the EU and the other holding some less, ah, convenient passport, say senegalese or colombian. this sort of weddings i’d say are as likely as any to end in divorce because in all the countries i mentioned the law essentially allows the foreign spouse to keep their residency after the divorce… for now at least.
That stat was actually about the marriage and divorce rates. When it was cited, the divorce rate was 50% of the marriage rate. there were half as many divorces happening as marriages, At That Time. obviously, the divorcees had been married Some amount of the time in the past, and the fates of the marriages that built that statistic were as yet unknown.
Because a given couple’s marriage and divorce are separated by an often substantial amount of time, any stat about how many marriages end in divorce is necessarily based on old data.
Now, x percent of marriages signed in 2020 had already ended in divorce by 2023, that’s a stat that might be current.
Also, divorce rates went up drastically with the advent of no-fault divorce because it was now more accessible and legal to leave marriages you were unhappy with, as opposed to having to prove abuse or unfaithfulness or whatever other handful of allowed circumstances there were in whatever state you were in.
One thing I learned in a “Women and America” course back in the 80s was that besides this (when divorces went no-fault you had a backlog of bad marriages to work through), there were also a lot of de facto divorces where someone moved out and you had little or nothing to do with each other for the rest of your lives, even though you were technically still married.
There’s at least some evidence that while no-fault divorce did boost divorce rates, that was a short term effect and rates now are actually below what they were before.
Albeit Carol’s left, that actually only leaves me all the more concerned. You know about the scape-goated trans people earlier? To us the interaction might seem like it’s over, but to folks on the far right, it often isn’t. Considering Carol’s track record, this means someone on the campus could be in actual danger.
But she doesn’t have a specific trans person to target vis-a-vis Joyce, and it’s not as if some random trans person is just going to introduce themselves to Carol for no reason whatsoeocrapcarla.
Don’t worry! Carol wouldn’t recognize a trans person if they lived under her roof and sat with her at breakfast. And any trans person she might encounter at the dorm would spin circles around her.
Fun timing – my father (Carol’s real-life counterpart) is back in town knowing that he’ll get reported to the police for trespassing if he shows up at my place.
If you’re actually afraid of being shot, invest in a bulletproof vest. You’re not automatically faster at the draw because you’re the good guy or something.
I’m sorry that’s what you were allocated at birth, hope you have found family with deep, shared, loving, supporting, nurture-bonds, and hope that he doesn’t cause you more pain, stress or aggravation. Good luck.
Oh, Joyce. Once they stop being your mom, they never are again. They can try but it’s always there between you. I’ve tried three times to repair things with my own mom, especially after having my son but she’s always reverted back to the same self centered you know what that drove us apart in the first place.
Be strong, Joyce. Be strong. It gets easier. Never better, but easier.
I got lucky. My parents just decided they couldn’t stand living together anymore, they refused to fight while I was in the house (I spent a LOT of time with my grandparents at this point), and they ended up splitting amicably. They fully divorced 4 years later, but had been living in separate states until that point.
Too many generalizations here. Divorce can suck. It can also be a lifesaving alternative to many horrors. My first divorce was painful, but in the long run, it worked out well for all involved. My second divorce, after 14 years of marriage to a bipolar malignant narcissist, came 10 years too late. I kept trying to fix something irreparable. My third wife and I have been married for 21 years and going strong.
Rude and kind of disgusting to say considering you have know idea what their father is like. Would have the same effect as someone saying ‘be happy yours is dead’. Don’t say shit like this.
Haha, someone else noticed Carol’s highly inappropriate and much too sexy outfit. A trench coat and a nighty? She’s really lost it. Their pastor may be abusing his position of power in other ways we haven’t learned about yet.
I think that’s a dress, not a nighty, and an overcoat. She’s been driving for like 4-5 hours I think. Dress for comfort in the car, instead of layering. So a heavy coat when out in the cold.
Haha the sad part is I drew it long by mistake and just didn’t even notice until you pointed it out.
Guess we’ll need a storyline where she has to wear a really long wig for some reason.
Just go back and redo all the strips with Dina in them and substitute them in. No one will ever notice.
Alternately, we see our favorite biology professor leaving his office with the door open. Dina passes by and looks in. On his desk is a bottle labeled “SAURIAN HAIR GROWTH SERUM.” Thereafter Dina has long hair with no explanation ever given.
Alternately, Dina is studying and looks up. Long haired Dina is standing there. Long hair Dina says, “it’s time.” Short hair Dina asks, “Already?” Next strip with Dina and Becky, Becky asks “Didn’t you used to have short hair?” Dina says, “Maybe.”
Alternately, after the current story line we get a time skip to April 1.
All you have to do is be a hack for 5 minutes, write in another time-skip, and refuse to elaborate on what happened during. Long-haired Dina. We’ll forgive you.
Well it’s already been established that Joyce can grow hair on Joe’s face at will, not to mention the fact that Becky’s hair has exploded in a short order in IRL time
A viable solution may involve just growing everyone’s hair including Dina’s at such a rate that doesn’t suspend disbelief by too much
It’s interesting because my mom has been single basically my whole life. I simply cannot even picture what a nuclear family is supposed to look or feel like, despite spending my whole life consuming media filled with that. So I can’t fathom how disorienting and weird it feels to have your parents split. Not just because it’s frustrating and sad but also because it’s probably one of the most significant times you become aware of your parents as “people”.
Oh it absolutely sucks.
A lot of it is trying to figure out if you should even blame your parents because you love them and don’t want either to be stuck in a situation where’d they be unhappy. But at the same time, they let the emotional pain of what they’re going through land on the kids. And it leads to you feeling like you’re unsure of where to ever place your valid anger because you want to be better than either of them at handling things but there’s no valid outlet.
My parents got divorced, I really fuckin wish my mom left her boyfriend after the divorce he was a real conga bastard, I never wanted to have anything to do with either and for forcing me to have a relationshipwith both until I moved out when I tyrned 18. I haven’t spoken to my mom since. For people like me divorce is the fucking greatest thing a parent can do for their kid
Oh, you meant to type conga instead of conga. Got it. Yeah, the filter replaced conga with conga, because there’s really no need for that conga of potty language here.
Mmmm I feel like this isn’t about divorce. Or maybe only partially. Selling the house is divorce-related, sure. But selling the house *in order to give the money to the church that facilitated Joyce’s kidnapping and her friend’s death* really adds another layer to this and it’s not divorce-related at all.
I guess Joe’s mom decided not to be in his life anymore. While I can’t pass judgment on if this was to his benefit, his detriment, or both, it’d definitely be for the best for Joyce, given that Carol said she’d do anything for her like Ross did for Becky, which was absolutely horrifying.
She took him to orientation and then Joe’s dad came for Freshman Family Weekend. Assuming the pattern holds, he probably spent parts of Thanksgiving and winter break with both of them.
He’s paying for Amber’s defense lawyer. He’s paying for her college now. He wants her to feel like part of their new blended family, and feel secure and safe and loved. He’s FAR from perfect (he hit on SARAH who is basically his son’s age) but compared to Carol and Linda he’s great!
I feel like you either hold out hope forever or you accept you want changes that will not happen and grieve the relationship you wish for but do not have.
im pretty sure that no-one’s mum stays ‘just’ their mum. eventually you grow up enough to perceive them as just another bumbling human person with baggage and good intentions and fuckups. and they can’t be just your mum because you’re too big, and ‘just mum’ is too small. You’re a whole-ass bumbling human person and you can see them too well and too clearly.
I imagine that for some people it’s idk, cathartic rather than traumatic. like maybe you have kids and your perspective shifts even as they continue to be there for you. Or there’s this slow gradual readjustment and one day you look at each other like, oh, role reversal, haha, anyway I got the bill lets bounce or we’ll miss the show.
The hardest part is setting and enforcing boundaries.
Carol got what she came for — dropping off the boxes and making snide remarks at Joyce. She managed to remain an intrusive, obnoxious, influence in her life, and she’s definitely going to show up again — because Joyce didn’t set and enforce a boundary.
People like Carol act like you’re a monster if you try to set boundaries. Because what they really want is control, and they absolutely cannot tolerate it being taken away.
But it needs to be done, sooner rather than later, or things will just get worse and worse until there is a huge blowout and they never see each other again.
Man am i glad my parents divorced when i was a baby
I don’t think i could handle the emotional turmoil of your family being torn. Adapting to that is always the hardest part.
On the other hand, my parents staying married implies living with my dad, and i don’t need that, ever.
Speaking as a child stayed together for, even if you avoid the nastier aspects, you grow up not believing love is real, because in the case right in front of you, it wasn’t.
There have definitely been people on reddit that stayed together for the kids or only due to X getting a terminal illness, then three months after the divorce or death in some cases, are dating someone else, and the kids throw a fit as if they are still 10 years old and you have just revealed to them that True Love is a Lie.
Which doesn’t make their reactions less childish when a 30 year old is Big Mad that Mum is dating a New Boyfriend and wants to bring him to Family Events. But it would be a lot less of a bombshell if the parents had been somewhat honest, without overly involving them, that they might separate in the future.
Divorce sucks generally, but staying together with someone that makes you miserable sucks way more and as does painting a picture perfect relationship, as it makes it hit your kids like a truck when you do divorce later then as it comes as a surprise.
Kids need enough honesty to understand what is happening, but don’t need to be privy to the worst details or see shouting matches.
Kids don’t celebrate divorces generally, but when they do, that says that relationship really needed to end. Even if not full of shouting, if the house is full of tension, the kid will feel it and feel stressed too.
Carol isn’t who she was a decade ago. She changed enough that Hank left. That her other daughter hides from her. That Joyce almost doesn’t recognize her. People change and not always for the better. She’s gonna end up alone and bitter. And it’ll be her choice. That sucks. So does all the damage she’ll do.
Yeah, Hank’s facial reactions speak volumes about his own journey. His monologue to the Keeners. How, at the start of the strip, he was all about dat Atheists R Nazis life.
Hank *almost* drank the kool-aide, but his “It’s the people that are important, not the structure”stance let him see the cracks in the foundation. He feels like he’s an “Actually understands the ‘love everyone’ part of the bible” Christian.
Rather then Carol’s “Everyone is Satan but us” ‘christian.’
Hank has definitely changed in the opposite direction from Carol, but it’s hard to say who changed more without knowing more about the center where they were when they met (if they were ever at the same place to begin with). Hank has become more accepting and Carol more hard-line, but their origins are a mystery
How they changed since they got married maybe, but Carol is a lot more like she was at the start of the comic than Hank is.
A decade ago? It’s hard to say, but she and Hank didn’t seem to far apart in the first conflicts on Parent’s weekend. Hank talks after that about trying to reevaluate based on what Joyce had said.
owner of a shitload of media too.
he was the italian Murdoch and Trump rolled into one. a TV personality who kept getting re-elected on the strength of his populism and dumb antics, and because italian politics were (and still very much are) a scary wasteland
Hmm. My mom and dad got divorced before I could ever remember, and my sister’s dad actively rejected me as a human, so I can’t remember ever feeling emotional turmoil over divorce. I know my sister suffered a lot due to the divorce, but only because her dad was a controlling piece of shit. We got a judge who didn’t believe children should have an opinion on when they wanted to stop visiting their other parent, so she had to go stay with her opiate-addicted father who pissed in bottles and refused to let her flush the toilet.
Divorce doesn’t have to suck for the kids, if it’s a decision made by competent adults who are parents together despite not being a couple any longer.
If you aren’t shitty to each other, your kids can grow up with divorced parents and it will be fine. Just don’t have a War of the Roses, don’t use your kids to get back at your ex spouse. You are now business partners with the shared interest of raising those kids well.
Divorce probably sucks for everyone it affects. It probably also brings quite a bit of relief – things generally aren’t either/or good or bad, but some complicated mixture.
Being perpetually single is no picnic either, though, believe me…
Starting to think Joe has been forgetting to add up his experience points this whole time and when reminded just dumped everything into leveling up his “good boyfriend” stats cause bro is killing it.
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“and in my experience, everyone in a divorce gets fallout”
That’s what happens when split a nuclear family.
i feel bad for thinking that is an amazing play on the concept 😀
Honestly, divorce would be a lot easier to deal with if everyone got to take a cool video game home as a consolation prize. Like losing on a game show.
Judge: “Our contestants lost at marriage today, but they each get to take home a copy of System Shock, a year’s supply of Rice-A-Roni, and a set of hubcaps.”
Oh man! System Shock *and* The San Francisco treat?! I’m going to go get married just so I can get a divorce! Aww yeah!
When my wife left I bought a Playstation and played Air Combat 18 hours a day for a week.
My parents stayed together till the end, but I had nightmares about them divorcing, when I was away in the military. I’d come home and it’d just be my mom, with seven new little brothers and sisters. I already had eight. Oddly, they were always brown.
Well, when I was in the US Navy my parents moved to another state without telling me.
hi quick question
what the hell
In the navy, you can sail the seven seas. In the navy, your parents run away with ease.
Well actually, I knew they were *going* to move. But I went home on leave one time and didn’t realize that they already had moved until I got there and the house was empty.
Man, that’s cold.
My parents’ separation and subsequent divorce was such a relief for me. I regularly have nightmares about them getting back together.
My parents were fighting every day. Every. Day. And it hurt me as a child badly, I went to sleep at least twice a week with real, painful, physical heartache. It was soooo much better when they separated and for my sake, they did everything to keep it amicably.
They did have a prenub, so there wasn’t much fighting involved over who got what (at least I did not notice much) and it really helped their relationship with each other as parents.
That was 25 years ago… last year all 4 of my parents started to vacation together, they’re all pensioners so they have much free time and both sides own caravans, so their interest in campsites are similar. It’s still blowing my mind, they get along so well, that they voluntarily spend their free time with each other and each others new husband and wife, without me even there.
WTF is going on?
There’s an anime you should try. It’s called “Marmalade Boy”.
There’s a movie. It’s called Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice.
tbh i WISH my parents would get a divorce. They aren’t even actively fighting, they’re just…. lukewarm and not interested in each other anymore. I think they would both be happier in the long run without each other.
But they’ve been together for 35 years, so….. i also understand that that would be a super scary situation for them to go through. Especially since lots of their friends are Christian and Judgmental.
Fallout 2? 3? New Vegas? 4? 76?
76, because divorce sucks.
I knew someone would bite on the fallout comment. And I was not disappointed.
Only if the divorce is caused by something/someone
No-fault divorces are usually pretty chill
Joe has not had that experience
“Divorce sucks, unless you’re escaping an abusive fucker.”
No, honestly it still sucks even then.
Yeah, I mean, moving sucks, and you often have to move post-divorce, among other complications, before even getting into the emotional aspects.
Agreed. I’m very happy to be out of that abusive relationship, but the economic and emotional scars will never fade.
Seconded
But hopefully (temporarily disregarding that factule about the most dangerous time statistically being right after you leave an abuser, assuming we’re talking physical abuse) afterwards you get to heal and recover physically/emotionally/financially, and rebuild a better life where you get to be safe.
But yeah. That doesn’t mean that “just leaving” is easy, safe, or risk-free 😢
I mean, it can both be a necessary change that is preferable to the alternative and suck nevertheless.
Can confirm, it still sucks then.
Absolutely fucking endorsed. Goddamn party time it was.
I am willing to grant it the status of “lesser of two suctions”.
…
YES THAT IS TOO HOW YOU NOUN THAT VERB.
Verbing weirds language.
English is weird enough already. Trust me, no one will notice.
Some kid named Calvin told me that once…
Divorce sucks, even when you need it.
Divorce sucks, even when you are escaping abuse. It sucks worse when the abuse has been mental and emotional and no one believes it occurred because your abuser knows how to lie and manipulate.
It can suck and still be the right thing to do. It can suck and still save you. I lost more than half my friends in the divorce, probably close to 3 quarters of them. Both our families were mad at me – even though his KNEW it was the right thing for me to do. I had like 2 people in my corner at the time and everyone was either mad at me or at best neutral and disappointed. He had all the support in the world while stealing from me and cheating on me and telling everyone that I was holding him back.
Want to know what doesn’t suck? A decade later, when you are living your best life and someone who did not believe you contacts you out of the blue to apologize for not believing you.
TW Bad shit
100% Yes other things around it sucks, but in this scenario it’s a trolley problem. On one track is a life of physical and emotional abuse, suicidal ideation, degraded opportunity in life, and earlier death, on the other track is a life free of that where you (as the kid) or your kids AND you get to experience love free of abuse, living free of wanting to die every. single. day. and not having to wonder what invented chaos is waiting for you when you walk in the door each day.
My parent’s divorce saved me from my mother’s abuse (more than them being together possibly could have). My divorce has saved me from suicidal ideation. And it’s allowing me to provide my kids a safe space where they can know unconditional love and acceptance.
I’ve had pneumonia twice in my life. Both times was right before I finally stopped investing in relationships that had become highly abusive. Divorce, even with all the costs and headaches, is literally life-saving.
And for the cases where people *aren’t* abusive? Do you think they should stay together until the above are their choices?
Naw. Divorce doesn’t suck. But the alternatives sure do.
Tbh, even as someone whose parents stayed together when they really shouldn’t have, I have to push back: sometimes all the viable options are bad (fraught, stressful, overwhelming, traumatic, etc) and you’re left picking the least bad. Bankruptcy sucks, but it’s better than dealing with insurmountable debt. Amputation sucks, but it’s better than leaving osteosarcoma to fester. Putting abusive parents on an information diet sucks, but it’s better than giving them ammunition to continue behaving abusively.
It’s okay for folks to feel that divorce sucks and that it’s lifesaving. Both of these can be true.
Just had a terrible break up with my abusive ex and I can confirm that there is no such thing as a good split from terrible people. While better than the alternative, the sort of harm they can and will do to you in your attempt to escape can carry with you for years.
Oh man, that 2nd panel hits hard.
I know I feel so bad for Joyce. A need for a mother is primal and having one almost-sort-of abandon you like that must be soul wrenching.
Joyce needed to hear her say “you’re more important to me than anything”, but she’ll never say it, because the church as an institution takes precedence over anything else in Carol’s world.
That’s what made the strip the other day so heart-wrenching to me; Joyce knew she wasn’t going to get the answer she wanted to hear, but had to ask anyway.
Maybe for you two losers. I happen to know a few people that are better after divorce.
Divorce in general does kind of suck though.
The process is unnecessarily long and fraught with ill emotions. It should be easy like Steve Martin’s version of breaking up: “You say, ‘I break with thee, I break with thee’, and then throw dog poop on her shoes.”
See? Easy-peasy!
Depends on how you do it. I managed to pull it off in about a month, and good riddance.
It is often necessary and for the best, but it is rarely a pleasant experience for all involved
Things can be better after divorce, but that doesn’t stop it from still being sucky. It is merely the least sucky option.
Also I’d argue the ‘divorce sucks’ sentiment isn’t only about the finalization of the divorce, but also the general state of affairs leading to that divorce.
Divorce rarely happens because things are going well after all. It’s not just the actual parting that sucks, but also the loss of the ability to be happy together.
Divorce is like surgery: It sucks, but its sometimes required.
Divorce, it’s like using a handgrenade to solve an argument-everyone around you gets hit with the shrapnel too.
wait is joe biting his lip in the first panel
“I love to see you go and I love to watch you leave.”
(I screwed up the html tags lol, only the “and” was supposed to be italicized)
It’s a little depressing that 50% of marriages end in divorce.
Of course, the other 50% end in death.
No one talks about all the couples that tragically die still married to each other.
How many end in annulment?
Luckily, Reitzik, 0% of all marriages end with an annulment. Retroactively, I mean.
i see and appreciate what you did, there.
Almost none.
It’s not that half of every married couples break up though. Most people stay married. It’s just that if you have one divorce and get married again you’re more likely to get divorced again, and so on. Some people have 3-4 or more divorces in their lifetime.
And others get married once, divorced once, and never try it again.
Thr 50% Stat is also not true anymore, and depending which source you look at, may have never been true. I did a quick Google and got a bunch of articles from a few years ago, but it seems like the number is more like 40%, even including the people go get divorced repeatedly.
Marriage rates are down significantly, however, as newer generations learn a bit from the example set.
The 50% stat is actually an underestimate, not an overestimate. Roughly 50% of all *first marriages* end in divorce, although that percent has gone down somewhat of late…
Meanwhile almost 2/3rds of 2nd marriages end in divorce, and the percentage keeps going up for tertiary, etc marriages. The aggregate is well above 50%, even though the first- marriage divorce rate has gone down somewhat.
Mind you, a huge percentage of the decrease in first marriage divorce has nothing to do with divorce, and everything to do with the massive decrease in marriage rate- basically most people are just opting to live with their SO, and only the most “certain” are choosing marriage.
“only the most “certain” are choosing marriage.”
hm. does it have to do with “certainty” really?
my hypothesis would be it depends on religiosity. communities where marriage is more strongly encouraged tend to also be those where divorce is least tolerated.
another hypothesis i have is, it depends on wealth/socioeconomic class. maybe marriage still makes sense in some classes (either very rich or very poor), and the reasons for entering into marriage would mostly hold true throughout life and therefore also make divorcing less likely.
but i don’t actually know, it’s just that “certainty” feels like a dodgy yardstick of marriage durability.
I chose the word “certain”only as a placeholder (a variety of other word choices could be used in its place), hence the quotation marks.
Basically, most people are not opting to get married, but the people who feel very strongly about it; either from a religious perspective, or from a personal belief in the solidity of their relationship (“I know this person is the one I want to spend the rest of my life with!”), are still choosing to get married.
In either case, those people are less likely to become divorced than marriages of convenience and/or marriage based on a weakly held sense of it being the right thing- such as shotgun marriages (which do still occur quite often).
i get that you were using “certain” loosely but i’m saying the reasons might not be to do with feelings at all but with external pressure or legal-financial concerns.
anecdotally, many of the weddings that happened in my friend circle the last few years had to do with residency, one of the spouse’s being from the EU and the other holding some less, ah, convenient passport, say senegalese or colombian. this sort of weddings i’d say are as likely as any to end in divorce because in all the countries i mentioned the law essentially allows the foreign spouse to keep their residency after the divorce… for now at least.
That stat was actually about the marriage and divorce rates. When it was cited, the divorce rate was 50% of the marriage rate. there were half as many divorces happening as marriages, At That Time. obviously, the divorcees had been married Some amount of the time in the past, and the fates of the marriages that built that statistic were as yet unknown.
Because a given couple’s marriage and divorce are separated by an often substantial amount of time, any stat about how many marriages end in divorce is necessarily based on old data.
Now, x percent of marriages signed in 2020 had already ended in divorce by 2023, that’s a stat that might be current.
Also, divorce rates went up drastically with the advent of no-fault divorce because it was now more accessible and legal to leave marriages you were unhappy with, as opposed to having to prove abuse or unfaithfulness or whatever other handful of allowed circumstances there were in whatever state you were in.
One thing I learned in a “Women and America” course back in the 80s was that besides this (when divorces went no-fault you had a backlog of bad marriages to work through), there were also a lot of de facto divorces where someone moved out and you had little or nothing to do with each other for the rest of your lives, even though you were technically still married.
There’s at least some evidence that while no-fault divorce did boost divorce rates, that was a short term effect and rates now are actually below what they were before.
Why did my comments get eaten?
Maybe they were too sweet for the Dell-oceraptors to resist? Try making them meaner.
Because the algorithm thought they were tasteful. Tasty. Something like that.
Did they have multiple links in them? I can’t remember if this is one of the places that automatically puts comments into moderation stasis for…
Comicpress was hungry.
If you put more than two links in them, even if they’re links to other DoA strips, they’d automatically go into the moderation queue.
That’s the strangest part, no links whatsoever this time. :3
-casually learn against those rock-hard abs-
There’s that comic of Joyce hugging Ethan and immediately imagining his abs.
Albeit Carol’s left, that actually only leaves me all the more concerned. You know about the scape-goated trans people earlier? To us the interaction might seem like it’s over, but to folks on the far right, it often isn’t. Considering Carol’s track record, this means someone on the campus could be in actual danger.
But she doesn’t have a specific trans person to target vis-a-vis Joyce, and it’s not as if some random trans person is just going to introduce themselves to Carol for no reason whatsoeocrapcarla.
She always knew Becky was a bad influence on Joyce.And what are the odds someone sueing the church is right there on campus?
Don’t worry! Carol wouldn’t recognize a trans person if they lived under her roof and sat with her at breakfast. And any trans person she might encounter at the dorm would spin circles around her.
Carla WOULD skate in a circle around her.
…. Five times before she ever learned that Carol might deserve it.
Did she acknowledge Carla by name? No? Then obviously she deserved it.
Fun timing – my father (Carol’s real-life counterpart) is back in town knowing that he’ll get reported to the police for trespassing if he shows up at my place.
Stay strong.
Stay strong and go armed.
If you’re actually afraid of being shot, invest in a bulletproof vest. You’re not automatically faster at the draw because you’re the good guy or something.
Armed with knowledge and training, maybe a tazer, right?
Stay strong.
Yikes. I hope it goes well for you. And he stays away.
I’m sorry that’s what you were allocated at birth, hope you have found family with deep, shared, loving, supporting, nurture-bonds, and hope that he doesn’t cause you more pain, stress or aggravation. Good luck.
Oh, Joyce. Once they stop being your mom, they never are again. They can try but it’s always there between you. I’ve tried three times to repair things with my own mom, especially after having my son but she’s always reverted back to the same self centered you know what that drove us apart in the first place.
Be strong, Joyce. Be strong. It gets easier. Never better, but easier.
That third panel has the feeling of “But she’s still my mom though” kind of but I don’t want it to be like this.
So lunch at Benihana’s is definitely off is what I’m gathering.
Knife juggling and a hot griddle within arm’s reach sounds like a Bad Idea with this crowd.
Divorce sucks for the kids stuck in the middle of it. For the parents, not so much.
I’m only speaking from personal experience, of course. For all I know, all the other kids threw a party when Dad moved out.
Joyce.
How can you even ask that.
I got lucky. My parents just decided they couldn’t stand living together anymore, they refused to fight while I was in the house (I spent a LOT of time with my grandparents at this point), and they ended up splitting amicably. They fully divorced 4 years later, but had been living in separate states until that point.
Now Joe, I need the messy hair and the beard shadow again!
Joe did good, in his way. He definitely helped peel the band-aid off, so to speak.
I really love these two for one another.
Too many generalizations here. Divorce can suck. It can also be a lifesaving alternative to many horrors. My first divorce was painful, but in the long run, it worked out well for all involved. My second divorce, after 14 years of marriage to a bipolar malignant narcissist, came 10 years too late. I kept trying to fix something irreparable. My third wife and I have been married for 21 years and going strong.
Most people are saying the process of divorce sucks. Which would be true even if the outcome doesn’t suck?
Omg I can’t believe the comments on a strip involving a sucky divorce aren’t covering every possible nuance of divorce. Y’all are clearly slacking.
at least you’ve still got your dad
Rude and kind of disgusting to say considering you have know idea what their father is like. Would have the same effect as someone saying ‘be happy yours is dead’. Don’t say shit like this.
no idea*
https://imgur.com/a/CmRrDMR
HEY. WHO’S IN THE MOOD FOR SOME CURSED ART I DID?
Cursed, hot, not-gilf, with shitty beliefs is problematic, Yoto!
That is indeed cursed. Something like, “Holy shit, I’d hit that.”
Honestly, anything involving Carol is cursed.
Haha, someone else noticed Carol’s highly inappropriate and much too sexy outfit. A trench coat and a nighty? She’s really lost it. Their pastor may be abusing his position of power in other ways we haven’t learned about yet.
I think that’s a dress, not a nighty, and an overcoat. She’s been driving for like 4-5 hours I think. Dress for comfort in the car, instead of layering. So a heavy coat when out in the cold.
Who is kissing Carol? Ruth or Becky? Both would be fucked up, but I can’t tell for sure.
Linda. Bad moms should make out.
Then what are Charles and Hank doing?
Hmmm Either watching or making out themselves.
Their best.
The League Of Evil Moms?
Should we add Ethans mom to that group?
Ohhh. I thought it was Leslie.
YOTO, NO.
dina’s hair looks good that long and i’m upset i can’t feasibly make it grow to that length in comic time
Haha the sad part is I drew it long by mistake and just didn’t even notice until you pointed it out.
Guess we’ll need a storyline where she has to wear a really long wig for some reason.
i could’ve done it over the timeskip
I COULD’VE DONE IT OVER THE TIMESKIP
*rends garments*
Did you just get hit with “Amazi-Girl’s hair is amazing while Amber is stuck with this ‘do she got for prom” IRL?
Just go back and redo all the strips with Dina in them and substitute them in. No one will ever notice.
Alternately, we see our favorite biology professor leaving his office with the door open. Dina passes by and looks in. On his desk is a bottle labeled “SAURIAN HAIR GROWTH SERUM.” Thereafter Dina has long hair with no explanation ever given.
Alternately, Dina is studying and looks up. Long haired Dina is standing there. Long hair Dina says, “it’s time.” Short hair Dina asks, “Already?” Next strip with Dina and Becky, Becky asks “Didn’t you used to have short hair?” Dina says, “Maybe.”
Alternately, after the current story line we get a time skip to April 1.
Alternatively …
All you have to do is be a hack for 5 minutes, write in another time-skip, and refuse to elaborate on what happened during. Long-haired Dina. We’ll forgive you.
Well it’s already been established that Joyce can grow hair on Joe’s face at will, not to mention the fact that Becky’s hair has exploded in a short order in IRL time
A viable solution may involve just growing everyone’s hair including Dina’s at such a rate that doesn’t suspend disbelief by too much
Just have her pull up her hat and it will spill out, it was that long all along
It’s cursed, but we all here for this.
I am surprisingly down for this.
Counterpoint:
http://www(.)itswalky(.)com/comic/divorce-is-awesome/
It’s interesting because my mom has been single basically my whole life. I simply cannot even picture what a nuclear family is supposed to look or feel like, despite spending my whole life consuming media filled with that. So I can’t fathom how disorienting and weird it feels to have your parents split. Not just because it’s frustrating and sad but also because it’s probably one of the most significant times you become aware of your parents as “people”.
Oh it absolutely sucks.
A lot of it is trying to figure out if you should even blame your parents because you love them and don’t want either to be stuck in a situation where’d they be unhappy. But at the same time, they let the emotional pain of what they’re going through land on the kids. And it leads to you feeling like you’re unsure of where to ever place your valid anger because you want to be better than either of them at handling things but there’s no valid outlet.
At least for me.
Things petered out, but it does ABSOLUTELY suck.
divorce is good, actually, when your parents are shitty
As others have said, it’s still pretty rough.
Everyone is right. Including Amber.
At least you have each other.
Hopefully that’s one evil mom down this weekend. One to go.
My parents got divorced, I really fuckin wish my mom left her boyfriend after the divorce he was a real conga bastard, I never wanted to have anything to do with either and for forcing me to have a relationshipwith both until I moved out when I tyrned 18. I haven’t spoken to my mom since. For people like me divorce is the fucking greatest thing a parent can do for their kid
conga* not conga
Is this another substitution like apparently bongos appear when people call people a rude word beginning with b?
Yes.
Oh, you meant to type conga instead of conga. Got it. Yeah, the filter replaced conga with conga, because there’s really no need for that conga of potty language here.
ngl I like seeing this depth to Joe.
And I want to give both of them an enormous hug right about now.
Joe, you big dumb ass, the poor girl needs a hug right now, not conversation.
so you’re saying
a little less conversation, a little more action please?
Mmmm I feel like this isn’t about divorce. Or maybe only partially. Selling the house is divorce-related, sure. But selling the house *in order to give the money to the church that facilitated Joyce’s kidnapping and her friend’s death* really adds another layer to this and it’s not divorce-related at all.
It’s divorce-related in that her husband is divorcing her because of exactly this behavior.
Remember, Carol is deeply indoctrinated.
I guess Joe’s mom decided not to be in his life anymore. While I can’t pass judgment on if this was to his benefit, his detriment, or both, it’d definitely be for the best for Joyce, given that Carol said she’d do anything for her like Ross did for Becky, which was absolutely horrifying.
Joe’s mom called the room at the beginning of the semester to make sure Joe got in OK. So she’s in touch, but just hasn’t been in any of the stories Willis has presented to us. https://www.dumbingofage.com/2020/comic/book-11/01-this-bright-millennium/msr/
She took him to orientation and then Joe’s dad came for Freshman Family Weekend. Assuming the pattern holds, he probably spent parts of Thanksgiving and winter break with both of them.
… so how many strips until Carol bumps into Mary?
If they do, I feel like a Carol-Mary arc would further Mary’s development towards a breakdown.
Everything sucks!
Burning of Age… until the holidays kick in.
I still want to see some good parents make an appearance, as a sort of palate cleanser. Maybe Mr. Joe’s Dad can show up and be surprisingly cool.
He’s paying for Amber’s defense lawyer. He’s paying for her college now. He wants her to feel like part of their new blended family, and feel secure and safe and loved. He’s FAR from perfect (he hit on SARAH who is basically his son’s age) but compared to Carol and Linda he’s great!
He’s trying!
Very trying!
But trying!
Joyce.
Your mom isn’t like this because she’s getting a divorce. They’re getting divorced because your dad realized your mom is like this.
So we can expect a visit from Joyce’s brother then for an intervention…the missionairy brother I mean
he better hurry, he has to fake leave for his fake mission trip by the end of January.
I support these two and their support of each other.
“is she ever gonna be my mom again?”
No, but you will believe in this forever.
Like I believe my parents will be better one day. Nicer, respectful. Will let me free. Or even getting a divorce. Even knowing they won’t, never.
And that’s the worst feeling ever.
sympathy. i don’t know what else to say.
I feel like you either hold out hope forever or you accept you want changes that will not happen and grieve the relationship you wish for but do not have.
ehh..both
im pretty sure that no-one’s mum stays ‘just’ their mum. eventually you grow up enough to perceive them as just another bumbling human person with baggage and good intentions and fuckups. and they can’t be just your mum because you’re too big, and ‘just mum’ is too small. You’re a whole-ass bumbling human person and you can see them too well and too clearly.
I imagine that for some people it’s idk, cathartic rather than traumatic. like maybe you have kids and your perspective shifts even as they continue to be there for you. Or there’s this slow gradual readjustment and one day you look at each other like, oh, role reversal, haha, anyway I got the bill lets bounce or we’ll miss the show.
I am suprised in that, I expected this to go down… somewhat differently.
This went quite well for everyone (everyone not named Carol cause f Carol).
Joyce can be fully open in her trying to find her theism and her relationship with Joe is strengthened.
I have a feeling that Carol is sub-consciously thinking, “this is not real, this conversation can’t be real, I’m leaving to go find reality.”
The hardest part is setting and enforcing boundaries.
Carol got what she came for — dropping off the boxes and making snide remarks at Joyce. She managed to remain an intrusive, obnoxious, influence in her life, and she’s definitely going to show up again — because Joyce didn’t set and enforce a boundary.
People like Carol act like you’re a monster if you try to set boundaries. Because what they really want is control, and they absolutely cannot tolerate it being taken away.
But it needs to be done, sooner rather than later, or things will just get worse and worse until there is a huge blowout and they never see each other again.
YUP.
Man am i glad my parents divorced when i was a baby
I don’t think i could handle the emotional turmoil of your family being torn. Adapting to that is always the hardest part.
On the other hand, my parents staying married implies living with my dad, and i don’t need that, ever.
Speaking as a child stayed together for, even if you avoid the nastier aspects, you grow up not believing love is real, because in the case right in front of you, it wasn’t.
There have definitely been people on reddit that stayed together for the kids or only due to X getting a terminal illness, then three months after the divorce or death in some cases, are dating someone else, and the kids throw a fit as if they are still 10 years old and you have just revealed to them that True Love is a Lie.
Which doesn’t make their reactions less childish when a 30 year old is Big Mad that Mum is dating a New Boyfriend and wants to bring him to Family Events. But it would be a lot less of a bombshell if the parents had been somewhat honest, without overly involving them, that they might separate in the future.
All happy families are equal and all that.
“well time to start making out, I guess”
Carol never changed, only Joyce did
Happy Valentine for all DoA brazilians fans
, for other countries, whatever. S2Also, for all portuguese fans, it will be on June 14th.
Remember: we don’t talk spanish. XOXO.
of course! you talk dozens of languages including Nheengatu, Libras, Hunsrik and Pirahã!
Oh, and portuguese i guess =P
Divorce sucks generally, but staying together with someone that makes you miserable sucks way more and as does painting a picture perfect relationship, as it makes it hit your kids like a truck when you do divorce later then as it comes as a surprise.
Kids need enough honesty to understand what is happening, but don’t need to be privy to the worst details or see shouting matches.
Kids don’t celebrate divorces generally, but when they do, that says that relationship really needed to end. Even if not full of shouting, if the house is full of tension, the kid will feel it and feel stressed too.
..so is Carol still expecting them to take her to dinner or…?
Divorce sucks but it’d suck less if parents weren’t terrible too.
ooooooooof
These poor kids. 🙁
Carol isn’t who she was a decade ago. She changed enough that Hank left. That her other daughter hides from her. That Joyce almost doesn’t recognize her. People change and not always for the better. She’s gonna end up alone and bitter. And it’ll be her choice. That sucks. So does all the damage she’ll do.
Your Gravatar makes this especially poignant.
Maybe. I think Hank and especially Joyce have changed more.
Yeah, Hank’s facial reactions speak volumes about his own journey. His monologue to the Keeners. How, at the start of the strip, he was all about dat Atheists R Nazis life.
Hank *almost* drank the kool-aide, but his “It’s the people that are important, not the structure”stance let him see the cracks in the foundation. He feels like he’s an “Actually understands the ‘love everyone’ part of the bible” Christian.
Rather then Carol’s “Everyone is Satan but us” ‘christian.’
Hank has definitely changed in the opposite direction from Carol, but it’s hard to say who changed more without knowing more about the center where they were when they met (if they were ever at the same place to begin with). Hank has become more accepting and Carol more hard-line, but their origins are a mystery
How they changed since they got married maybe, but Carol is a lot more like she was at the start of the comic than Hank is.
A decade ago? It’s hard to say, but she and Hank didn’t seem to far apart in the first conflicts on Parent’s weekend. Hank talks after that about trying to reevaluate based on what Joyce had said.
I’m sure I’ve seen a flashback strip which showed them meeting for the first time, at IU, at the fountain.
oh btw yayyyy Berlusconi’s ass is deaddddd piu piu piuuuuuuu
(PS you start explaining how this is actually sad somehow i’ll just blast my airhorn at you so don’t you bother)
Sorry, who is that? It’s hard to keep track of people
Silvio Berlusconi, former really corrupt prime minister of Italy
owner of a shitload of media too.
he was the italian Murdoch and Trump rolled into one. a TV personality who kept getting re-elected on the strength of his populism and dumb antics, and because italian politics were (and still very much are) a scary wasteland
Hope Italy heals fast from him…
Hmm. My mom and dad got divorced before I could ever remember, and my sister’s dad actively rejected me as a human, so I can’t remember ever feeling emotional turmoil over divorce. I know my sister suffered a lot due to the divorce, but only because her dad was a controlling piece of shit. We got a judge who didn’t believe children should have an opinion on when they wanted to stop visiting their other parent, so she had to go stay with her opiate-addicted father who pissed in bottles and refused to let her flush the toilet.
Divorce doesn’t have to suck for the kids, if it’s a decision made by competent adults who are parents together despite not being a couple any longer.
If you aren’t shitty to each other, your kids can grow up with divorced parents and it will be fine. Just don’t have a War of the Roses, don’t use your kids to get back at your ex spouse. You are now business partners with the shared interest of raising those kids well.
et tu, Joe?
https://www.itswalky.com/comic/divorce-is-awesome/
My mom managed to just be my mom again. In hospice.
I’m sorry.
I’m sorry it took so long but I’m glad she got back to just being your mom.
haha yeah. Bitter sweet that.
I guess she had been just my mom for short stints of time before.
Divorce probably sucks for everyone it affects. It probably also brings quite a bit of relief – things generally aren’t either/or good or bad, but some complicated mixture.
Being perpetually single is no picnic either, though, believe me…
To alt text, it can still suck there, even then, but NOWHERE near as much as not divorce.
Comments keep gdtting eaten and i dont know why
are you trying to tell a forbidden joke?
*Knock knock*
Who’s there?
♎🔁💎🧴🧽
Wenn ist das Nunstück git und Slotermeyer?
Ja! Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput!
Starting to think Joe has been forgetting to add up his experience points this whole time and when reminded just dumped everything into leveling up his “good boyfriend” stats cause bro is killing it.
That….
Reminds me of when I told my grandmother I wasn’t Christian anymore.