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“something something capitalism”? it’s good she’s able to have some time off to herself versus like “working here contributes to your credits so we rarely give time off”
The whole protests have escalated thing is gonna build to something big isn’t it? Jocelyne’s there, Dorothy is likely either there or up to something, Daisy is actually being professional with her work, and now our resident background desk lady is also gone, all at the same time. Just as Amazi-Girl is coming off a brief hiatus and is comfortable being active again, and with a fresh new costume too.
This was my immediate reaction. My brain has not yet decided whether it feels excited about the potential protest plot or terrified because my current existence feels like a constant struggle against panic and despair.
… there will be no peaceful resolution to the disaster to come, there will be no going back to “”normal””.
Obligatory reminder that your value as an ally does not hing upon whether or not you can change the mind of a bigot.
I cannot stress how important it is for us to spend much less time trying to win back bigots, and much more time trying to win back the people they’re bigoted against.
(stay off of Twitter, and in general take care of yourself. You can’t help nobody if you go insane @-@)
Also the idea that more than one person works the front desk is BULLSHIT. Look at that desk! One person wide! This guy is obviously lying. Asma belongs in that position and can never leave ever.
I’d like to be as aware of my limits as Dina is. My usual experience is to realise I’ve run out of social energy a while ago, haven’t properly registered what people had said for the last few minutes, and will now have to find an excuse to escape and avoid people for an indeterminate period (a task often hampered by my having lost track of the conversation).
Fun!
The other half sees a white rabbit of idle curiosity that distracts me from whatever I was supposed to be focusing on and I chase it down the rabbit hole and start another adventure in ADHDland.
I too am curious, but as long as this isn’t Se7en thing I am satisfied. That was a movie with truly star studded cast, yet, ironically, it managed to be near unwatchably dark.
Although if anyone has Gwyneth Pawltrow head in a box in this universe, my money would be on either Raidah or Dina. Raidah would have for social climbing purposes while Dina would have it in order to properly study the batshit crazy things Gwyneth says claiming they’re miracle cures.
Given it was expedited, I’m willing to bet it is something to help comfort Becky with her current sexuality security / suicidal idioms relating to her mom struggles.
Well, either comfort or engage in a series of experiments to figure things out. You know. Sexy science.
The suit suggestion below fits both of those bills. I like it. Plus Dina had mentioned it the previous day in response to Becky’s most recent thought pattern, and Becky seemed very excited about it. It fits so well I would be surprised if it wasn’t.
* Something for Becky / for herself to further arouse Becky
* Something for taking part in the protest she just learned about 24 hours ago
* A hat for Charlie
Oh, no, Dina! Your brief social interaction has caused a philosophical zombie npc no-name background person to suddenly be at risk of getting a name! To be brought with name into the DoA world is a terrible sentence! How could you do that!??! :O
It’s like if I went to my usual gas station and was like “oh hey, the guy I usually see isn’t here”
“He has a LIFE! Other people work here!!”
“…”
“WHY AREN’T YOU RESPONDING?”
like what the hell is she supposed to say back, man? The ‘social script’ option might be apologizing but she objectively has nothing to apologize for in this interaction.
a great thing to say upon receiving new information is “oh, ok.” or in this case maybe “yeah, sure.” very non-committal! doesn’t really invite further conversation if you don’t want it, either.
also it would be really weird for the gas station guy to yell at you, as opposed to this bald one trying to follow up on a conversation he thought they were having and being like, slightly snippy.
Also, unless I’ve got the geography wrong, in that bonus comic Alice looks like she’s awkwardly waiting around for someone in the Read Hall Cafeteria despite living in Forest Quad? Feels like that means something, although I’m not sure what.
I’d figured more like “from florida but *really into* Norse iconography if you know what I mean” kinda weird, because that’s kinda par for the course in this webcomic, with precious few exceptions
Likely an unpopular opinion, but Dina *OFTEN* seems too perfect; basically non-stop given the perfect response, the perfect idea, the perfect ability… like, can almost always do no wrong, and frequently displays superpowers matched precisely to her immediate need.
It’s nice to see Dina having an actual struggle- even nicer to see it being one that isn’t related to her one recurring insecurity (Becky).
I think I understand where you’re coming from, but I think that’s just a very, very recent thing. Dina spent much of the strip being the oddball that nobody noticed, who didn’t get social cues, got mistaken for a child, had to be taught basic things like “how to provide comfort by offering a light physical touch,” etc. Heck she got herself “kidnapped” because she saw everyone else going with Toedad and ‘followed social cues.’
The successes she has today I think are partially the result of her working tirelessly to broaden her social scope; and partially because we often see her through the lens of Joyce, who is both parallel and opposite. But I think it’s also because they all have such a strong friend group that accepts everyone where they are, for who they are, and aren’t thrown off when they struggle.
Today is the February 28 boycott. Seems appropriate to mention it here given the Bulmeria Protest. Don’t buy anything from major retailers today or places like Amazon/Walmart/Target and maybe they’ll notice the dip.
Well, shoot. I went and bought a couple of guitar stands off eBay before I saw this post. Does that make me a scab if I never agreed to take part in the boycott?
I thought that it was already understood economically that a single-day boycott of a vendor will *never* be noticed. Because you’re not changing your buying habits at all, you’re still going to buy whatever you were going to buy either the day before, or the day after, and all of these places calculate profits on a month-by-month basis anyways. That the entire idea of a lack of sales on a single day being somehow so massive that someone notices and takes action to prevent it, is based off an incorrect assumption that this much lost profits on one day would be catestrophic.
I’m not saying don’t boycott; I am saying, if you boycott, go big or go home. If it doesn’t inconvenience you in the least, how can you expect it to inconvenience them? Don’t make the ask smaller so that you can get more people on board; make the ask larger, and fire people up so that they *want* to do more.
The idea is to boycott the United States. Nobody in the country buys anything, nobody anywhere else buy American imports. Would be hard to keep that up for long, but the hope is that Washington will get the point.
So like, if nobody buys anything for a month (as an arbitrary example), does that crash the entire economy? Or would that just pause it, since everyone is keeping the money they already have?
It’s hard to imagine how much irreparable damage you could do in a month. For instance, I believe the oil industry would collapse if nobody fuels their personal car in a week or less, due to how supply lines are designed to operate constantly. We can guess any highly profitable, highly centralized industry has similar vulnerabilities due to cutting all slack they can from the system.
Though as BorkBorkBork points out a one day boycott has no significant economic impact on anything. In this case I think we just want to put the government on notice.
Sure, but we can’t do that. We can’t just not buy anything for a month. We need stuff. We can buy less, but not nothing. Most people, for example, can’t make it work for a week without buying gas – and it kind of defeats the purpose if everyone tops up beforehand so they can make it that long.
Boycotts can work against single companies, if they’re widely supported. Things like this are mostly symbolic and frankly, it’s probably a small percentage of the country that’s even heard of it, much less taking part.
I thought I had a line in there about how that was very hypothetical. But it leads me to another point I thought people should know, for the next time if nothing else: that boycotts don’t have to be absolute. If someone can cut their gas usage by 25%, in this scenario where we tried a gas boycott, that still helps to hurt their profit. You’ve got to think that every bit helps rather than that you have to cut the evil things out of your life to be a good person.
I didn’t hear about it until today. Then again, I usually just center around frivolous video gamey parts of the Internet.
But yeah. One day, one week, whatever. Let’s use gas as an example. If you’re boycotting BP, and you’re not going to fill up your car for FIVE WHOLE DAYS… what do you do? You top off your tank the day before, and then after those five days you fill it again. You bought the same amount of gas. Woo hoo.
What they REALLY notice, is if you change your habits. Bike to work. Take public transport. Don’t go out on vacation. Spend your Friday at home instead of out. Then do it consistently, week after week, month after month. Don’t go back to “normal.” No strike was ever won by an afternoon’s worth of protest; no boycott is noticed if you don’t stop buying the product.
I swear – I almost feel like these “one day protests” that circulate, started from the very companies themselves. A way to make people *feel* like they’re protesting and making a difference, so they walk away happy, while not impacting the bottom line.
Boycotts can work on individual companies, since you switch your purchases elsewhere. Even temporary one – like a few years ago the union at the grocery store I usually go to went on strike, so I went elsewhere until it was over. That’s got a measurable effect.
The other problem with these broad boycotts of the economy is that what that looks like in the larger picture is a drop in consumer confidence which if prolonged leads directly into recession. That voluntary change in habits leads to economic contraction, which leads to job cuts and growing unemployment, building a snowball effect of people who now can’t afford to spend, worsening the problem.
nobody buying anything for a month would absolutely crash the economy and there would be no easy recovery. How bad it would be would depend on how seriously we take “nobody” and “anything”: Taken literally it would be mass starvation and death, so it’s a question of how much could people really cut back.
A multi-day boycott actually wouldn’t work at all because the businesses are unlikely to KNOW that their politics are responsible for events. The one day boycott is meant to simply first let them know they’re being targeted at all.
At this point, its needed to first get their attention.
Again, normal business has peaks and dips day by day. No company, other than a small business, is so stretched thin that one day of significantly lower profits is noticeable. That’s why shareholders pay attention by quarter.
Say you convinced 100,000 people to not shop at Target for one day. Well, Target’s got about 2,000 stores in the US, so that’s 50 less people that day. And that might sound like an awful lot – I mean, fifty people can buy an awful lot! – but realistically that’s just like four less people per hour. And if you’re not ultimately changing your buying habits – then that day where you get 50 less customers, is going to have 25 *more* customers the day before and after.
Meanwhile those 100,000 people all felt like they did something monumental, like they made the big companies take notice, and so then have fulfilled that inner drive to protest with something that had no impact at all.
I’m into this, but I hope the folks participating in it don’t just go to Amazon a day or two days after and buy the thing they didn’t buy today, because they’ll make back the lost income that way.
I’d suggest people participating that they also plan where they’re going to buy the thing they’re not buying at Amazon today? Hell, if you’re feeling really ambitious, make a list of places where you might buy your last ten purchases that aren’t the top megacorps!
The general point is to make the companies notice more than actually affect things at this point. Because if it happens on this day, they KNOW it’s because of the boycott. If they don’t buy X on February 8th and then don’t buy it on the 10th too, it’s not going to be registered at all.
What happens if they’re aware of the protest, they dig down into the day-by-day earnings, and *don’t* see a dip outside of the normal peaks and valleys of business?
I think what I’ve trained myself to do in this kind of situation is spit out what Ive started thinking as ‘Buffer responses’. Reasonable or vaugely appropriate enough chunks of social script applied until I can leave the room.
Unless its someone I know, then I feel free to just. Wander off once the conversation is over
friends usually aren’t pissed off by this and a lot of people don’t want to piss off strangers
guy at the front desk also isn’t someone you won’t ever interact with again
you know, I HATE that I had this thought this morning, but if Asma were to make no further appearances that’d be in keeping with how there’s a sliding timescale to reality.
yeah, although other than us being shown us flashbacks of her being more engaged in convo with asma, i can imagine ppl consistently wanting the same receptionist since she might be used to dina’s sense of distance(?) to where she wouldn’t force small talk , tho i never rly went outta my way to make small talk with cashiers even if i recognize them
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his name should be Guy
Is this a Principal Amzy situation where he’s Asma in a bad disguise that everyone sees through?
She’s Ms. Amsa, and she’s from someplace very far away. She thinks we should reinvest all the money back into the
power plantfront desk.I like the way Amsa thinks!
His response is a great call back to when Walky was confused Asma had a life outside the front desk.
I second this suggestion.
Guy… Luthor. Gotta be.
Amsa?
Remember Thad Guy?
He wasn’t actually named Thad Guy but we all remember him as such.
I agree, his name should be Guy
look i already have a Thad Guy
How about Gene? Gene Eric Mann. Gen if you’re his friend.
His friends call him Slick. He’s been bald since middle school.
I love this one
Imogen Eric Mann? I keep on forgetting what he looks like.
I LIKE it!
What about Tadd Guy?
Brad Guy? Chad Guy?
Wait I’ve got it! This is Reginald, Duke of Thingley! But the real one this time.
Sam Guy
Calvin, for it’s a bilingual wordplay on calvo.
Him bald and it’s a name that brings forth shenanigans.
he’s clearly a Brian, Brian Duffy. ~<3
I propose “Logan”. So if he shows up again, he can say ‘lo again.
His name is Rice Phillip. It’s a name that pisses off redditors.
Taffy, your icon is a delight and also A++ hot, pls tell me. Is it an edit, or did Willis post it somewhere?:33
Dina wearing a suit? Bluesky.
Not wearing a suit, totally rockin’ a suit.
If he’s covering for Asma, his name should be Allarji.
or Dustin Hale
Al Buterhol
Pronounced “gee” with a hard “g”.
“Unnamed counter-guy” he’s actually the enemy of Unnamed Guy.
can we pronounce it “Ghee”?
That name would clarify things.
Guy Mann
Guy Persons
Guy Guysson
+1 Guy Mann, pronounced “Gee Mon”.
Guy Fleegman
(no, wait, that’s taken)
She’s Asma. He can be TB.
Who said people were allowed to change shifts???
Emile Levassor and Louis-Rene Panhard.
Don’t forget Jean Loubeyre.
“something something capitalism”? it’s good she’s able to have some time off to herself versus like “working here contributes to your credits so we rarely give time off”
Asma is at the Bulmerian protest I bet! Maybe she’s Bulmerian American herself!
But you know what this could mean?
Jocelyn/Asma!
Yes, I am reducing the politics to mindless shipping.
My mind immediately went to her being at the protest as well. Her absence almost seems… ominous.
Your avatar bodes ill.
Surely the protest will just result in the university stopping its investments in Bulmerian war crimes and milkshakes for all!
The whole protests have escalated thing is gonna build to something big isn’t it? Jocelyne’s there, Dorothy is likely either there or up to something, Daisy is actually being professional with her work, and now our resident background desk lady is also gone, all at the same time. Just as Amazi-Girl is coming off a brief hiatus and is comfortable being active again, and with a fresh new costume too.
This was my immediate reaction. My brain has not yet decided whether it feels excited about the potential protest plot or terrified because my current existence feels like a constant struggle against panic and despair.
You, too? I have trans friends of many genders that I’m absolutely terrified for. Especially now that they are cancelling trans people’s passports.
… there will be no peaceful resolution to the disaster to come, there will be no going back to “”normal””.
Obligatory reminder that your value as an ally does not hing upon whether or not you can change the mind of a bigot.
I cannot stress how important it is for us to spend much less time trying to win back bigots, and much more time trying to win back the people they’re bigoted against.
(stay off of Twitter, and in general take care of yourself. You can’t help nobody if you go insane @-@)
It worked for the Hapsburgs?
*Habsburgs
Hapsburgs (eng) or Habsbürger (ger)
Background characters have lives of their own? I call bullshit on that.
Next you’ll tell me that other people continue to exist when I’m not looking at them!
Only if the plot demands it.
Also the idea that more than one person works the front desk is BULLSHIT. Look at that desk! One person wide! This guy is obviously lying. Asma belongs in that position and can never leave ever.
NPCs have their own lives off-screen? What crazy dark sorcery is this???
I feel you Dina; all I want is the answer. I don’t need extra info. Anybody else like this?
An autista myself, i feel this too :/
I’d like to be as aware of my limits as Dina is. My usual experience is to realise I’ve run out of social energy a while ago, haven’t properly registered what people had said for the last few minutes, and will now have to find an excuse to escape and avoid people for an indeterminate period (a task often hampered by my having lost track of the conversation).
Fun!
I’m half like this.
The other half sees a white rabbit of idle curiosity that distracts me from whatever I was supposed to be focusing on and I chase it down the rabbit hole and start another adventure in ADHDland.
The two halves don’t get along well.
Wonder what’s in that package?
Cereal.
A hat for Charlie.
I too am curious, but as long as this isn’t Se7en thing I am satisfied. That was a movie with truly star studded cast, yet, ironically, it managed to be near unwatchably dark.
That box made a cameo in FFXVI. So it’s possible this is also a crossover with that box.
Although if anyone has Gwyneth Pawltrow head in a box in this universe, my money would be on either Raidah or Dina. Raidah would have for social climbing purposes while Dina would have it in order to properly study the batshit crazy things Gwyneth says claiming they’re miracle cures.
The cure for the condition of too much money and not enough sense.
I once saw Gwenneth Paltrow squeezing her boyfriend’s zits. It was not a pretty sight.
A suit. ♦️♣️
I’m also guessing a suit.
Is that an Amazon swoosh on it? I’m not up on box taxonomy.
Sí, look like it
Given it was expedited, I’m willing to bet it is something to help comfort Becky with her current sexuality security / suicidal idioms relating to her mom struggles.
Well, either comfort or engage in a series of experiments to figure things out. You know. Sexy science.
The suit suggestion below fits both of those bills. I like it. Plus Dina had mentioned it the previous day in response to Becky’s most recent thought pattern, and Becky seemed very excited about it. It fits so well I would be surprised if it wasn’t.
I’m guessing it’s either:
* Something for Becky / for herself to further arouse Becky
* Something for taking part in the protest she just learned about 24 hours ago
* A hat for Charlie
Just Dina, being relatable.
Dina: He doesn’t have a tag. He’s not really a being with sentient consciousness.
This comment will be really funny if this guy gets tagged.
Oh, no, Dina! Your brief social interaction has caused a philosophical zombie npc no-name background person to suddenly be at risk of getting a name! To be brought with name into the DoA world is a terrible sentence! How could you do that!??! :O
If this were Scott Pilgrim, she’d conjure a sword and stab him so he exploded into coins.
Coins for cereal upgrades.
Been there. Also didn’t do that.
I’m thinking he looks like a Pete.
Yeah, I see it.
She’s getting better at this
Is there a Randy? He should be a Randy.
His reaction does make me think he’s been getting this question a lot, like there is a defensiveness to it.
I don’t think he should have a name until we confirm that Catch Phrase girl is Cathy Fraizer.
I hate it when I do this, i.e. write a social interaction check I am unable to cash.
Vincent?
*plays “Cats on Mars” by The Seatbelts on hacked muzak*
+1 for that deep cut from Cowboy Beebop.
He looks like a Greg.
Yeah, but which one? D n’ D Greg? Sci-Fi Greg? Open Source Greg? Japanese Culture Greg? Old Gregg?
oooh a packidge
Honestly his response was way more confrontational than it needed to be, I’d shut down and skuttle away too.
Right? Oh, no thank you, I wanted to ask a question not volunteer to deal with your attitude.
It’s like if I went to my usual gas station and was like “oh hey, the guy I usually see isn’t here”
“He has a LIFE! Other people work here!!”
“…”
“WHY AREN’T YOU RESPONDING?”
like what the hell is she supposed to say back, man? The ‘social script’ option might be apologizing but she objectively has nothing to apologize for in this interaction.
a great thing to say upon receiving new information is “oh, ok.” or in this case maybe “yeah, sure.” very non-committal! doesn’t really invite further conversation if you don’t want it, either.
also it would be really weird for the gas station guy to yell at you, as opposed to this bald one trying to follow up on a conversation he thought they were having and being like, slightly snippy.
Both examples should be nailed to a cross in the middle of town, as an example.
Too real.
🤨
Did Dina mention expecting a package or ordering something and I just forgot?
No.
The Alice/Dina bonus strip needs to be canonized in the main comic.
The package must directly relate, I’m sure!
(Don’t know what I mean? Buy a Patreon!)
Pretty sure the bonus strips are already canon?
Also, unless I’ve got the geography wrong, in that bonus comic Alice looks like she’s awkwardly waiting around for someone in the Read Hall Cafeteria despite living in Forest Quad? Feels like that means something, although I’m not sure what.
My brain is calling him either Amir or Grant.
I vote for Grant, in memory of Mr. Imahara.
Damn, if that’s not. Painfully true.
Elisha, in honor of his bald head. If you laugh at him you get mauled by two bears.
He doesn’t really look like an Elisha. I just think that story is wacky.
Probably some normie name like Greg or Owen or Gregory Owens.
The bear guy in the Bible was Elijah. And he was an asshole getting kids killed for making fun of his bald head.
No, Elisha.
It’s Elisha.
Not contesting that it was totally a jerk thing to do, though.
Baldur
he had weird parents
Or potentially just Icelandic ones.
I met several Baldurs there, some were statues but not all.
I’d figured more like “from florida but *really into* Norse iconography if you know what I mean” kinda weird, because that’s kinda par for the course in this webcomic, with precious few exceptions
His younger brother looks just like him, but has no eyebrows. His name is Baldest.
Gigglesnort…
boo hiss etc
mood
Mood
something something Dina is my spirit animal something something use as reaction image
I recommend we call him “Sam A.”
Notasma Bulmeria Azhent.
I christen him “Not Asma”.
Yesss
If Not Asma then maybe COPD?
Maybe they gave him a number and took away his name…
I’d been wondering whatever became of #6.
I am not a number, I am a Fremen.
This guy should be named Alfonze ‘other people’ LeBaconator… The Third
Colvin Shifts
Mike, because the name is freed up now.
Amos?
no, he has a chin
I’m just going to assume that every character without an established name is called “Chungus”.
Asma and Wee Zing, classic duo.
Silly front deskers, always trying to make the characters care about their personal lives
His name’s EDGAR
He is Amsa.
Call him Hamza and we have a deal.
Likely an unpopular opinion, but Dina *OFTEN* seems too perfect; basically non-stop given the perfect response, the perfect idea, the perfect ability… like, can almost always do no wrong, and frequently displays superpowers matched precisely to her immediate need.
It’s nice to see Dina having an actual struggle- even nicer to see it being one that isn’t related to her one recurring insecurity (Becky).
I think I understand where you’re coming from, but I think that’s just a very, very recent thing. Dina spent much of the strip being the oddball that nobody noticed, who didn’t get social cues, got mistaken for a child, had to be taught basic things like “how to provide comfort by offering a light physical touch,” etc. Heck she got herself “kidnapped” because she saw everyone else going with Toedad and ‘followed social cues.’
The successes she has today I think are partially the result of her working tirelessly to broaden her social scope; and partially because we often see her through the lens of Joyce, who is both parallel and opposite. But I think it’s also because they all have such a strong friend group that accepts everyone where they are, for who they are, and aren’t thrown off when they struggle.
Judt name him Guy and be done with it.
lol that just makes me think of the Buddy/Guy banter from SP xD
He seems like a Derek.
also Dina that’s so valid.
He does look like a guy who’d frequently have terrible opinions. It’s a fitting name.
Asman? Isntma?
Man, I can so relate to this.
This is so incredibly relatable, asking a question and immediately realizing you don’t have enough social RAM to deal with the response.
Same, Dina.
Asma-Beta needs a name!
“Asma” begins with “A”. Thus her stand-in needs a “B” name.
Basma, for example.
Barak. Or Bil.
Ben Dover.
I saw that actor in a Chevy Chase movie!
Barold.
Bichael.
His friends call him “Bike”.
I’m gonna call this guy Steve until he gets an official name.
Only if we see him eating cereal at some point.
Dina can encounter him eating cereal in the cafeteria.
They can have a brief discussion about cereal texture, carbohydrate vs protein content, and best milks to use.
Is she taking off for Ramadon?
I don’t know what date it is in the comic, but I don’t think it’s quite Ramadan yet for them. I think she’s just not on duty 24/7 like the man says.
I feel ya, Dina.
Today is the February 28 boycott. Seems appropriate to mention it here given the Bulmeria Protest. Don’t buy anything from major retailers today or places like Amazon/Walmart/Target and maybe they’ll notice the dip.
It’s what Jocelyn would do if she had any money.
Well, shoot. I went and bought a couple of guitar stands off eBay before I saw this post. Does that make me a scab if I never agreed to take part in the boycott?
No, it means you love evil and are a servant of the Dark Lord.
Yeah, that scans.
I thought that it was already understood economically that a single-day boycott of a vendor will *never* be noticed. Because you’re not changing your buying habits at all, you’re still going to buy whatever you were going to buy either the day before, or the day after, and all of these places calculate profits on a month-by-month basis anyways. That the entire idea of a lack of sales on a single day being somehow so massive that someone notices and takes action to prevent it, is based off an incorrect assumption that this much lost profits on one day would be catestrophic.
I’m not saying don’t boycott; I am saying, if you boycott, go big or go home. If it doesn’t inconvenience you in the least, how can you expect it to inconvenience them? Don’t make the ask smaller so that you can get more people on board; make the ask larger, and fire people up so that they *want* to do more.
The idea is to boycott the United States. Nobody in the country buys anything, nobody anywhere else buy American imports. Would be hard to keep that up for long, but the hope is that Washington will get the point.
So like, if nobody buys anything for a month (as an arbitrary example), does that crash the entire economy? Or would that just pause it, since everyone is keeping the money they already have?
It’s hard to imagine how much irreparable damage you could do in a month. For instance, I believe the oil industry would collapse if nobody fuels their personal car in a week or less, due to how supply lines are designed to operate constantly. We can guess any highly profitable, highly centralized industry has similar vulnerabilities due to cutting all slack they can from the system.
Though as BorkBorkBork points out a one day boycott has no significant economic impact on anything. In this case I think we just want to put the government on notice.
Sure, but we can’t do that. We can’t just not buy anything for a month. We need stuff. We can buy less, but not nothing. Most people, for example, can’t make it work for a week without buying gas – and it kind of defeats the purpose if everyone tops up beforehand so they can make it that long.
Boycotts can work against single companies, if they’re widely supported. Things like this are mostly symbolic and frankly, it’s probably a small percentage of the country that’s even heard of it, much less taking part.
I thought I had a line in there about how that was very hypothetical. But it leads me to another point I thought people should know, for the next time if nothing else: that boycotts don’t have to be absolute. If someone can cut their gas usage by 25%, in this scenario where we tried a gas boycott, that still helps to hurt their profit. You’ve got to think that every bit helps rather than that you have to cut the evil things out of your life to be a good person.
I didn’t hear about it until today. Then again, I usually just center around frivolous video gamey parts of the Internet.
But yeah. One day, one week, whatever. Let’s use gas as an example. If you’re boycotting BP, and you’re not going to fill up your car for FIVE WHOLE DAYS… what do you do? You top off your tank the day before, and then after those five days you fill it again. You bought the same amount of gas. Woo hoo.
What they REALLY notice, is if you change your habits. Bike to work. Take public transport. Don’t go out on vacation. Spend your Friday at home instead of out. Then do it consistently, week after week, month after month. Don’t go back to “normal.” No strike was ever won by an afternoon’s worth of protest; no boycott is noticed if you don’t stop buying the product.
I swear – I almost feel like these “one day protests” that circulate, started from the very companies themselves. A way to make people *feel* like they’re protesting and making a difference, so they walk away happy, while not impacting the bottom line.
Boycotts can work on individual companies, since you switch your purchases elsewhere. Even temporary one – like a few years ago the union at the grocery store I usually go to went on strike, so I went elsewhere until it was over. That’s got a measurable effect.
The other problem with these broad boycotts of the economy is that what that looks like in the larger picture is a drop in consumer confidence which if prolonged leads directly into recession. That voluntary change in habits leads to economic contraction, which leads to job cuts and growing unemployment, building a snowball effect of people who now can’t afford to spend, worsening the problem.
nobody buying anything for a month would absolutely crash the economy and there would be no easy recovery. How bad it would be would depend on how seriously we take “nobody” and “anything”: Taken literally it would be mass starvation and death, so it’s a question of how much could people really cut back.
At this point, if it kills McDonald’s off for good, I’ll take it.
A multi-day boycott actually wouldn’t work at all because the businesses are unlikely to KNOW that their politics are responsible for events. The one day boycott is meant to simply first let them know they’re being targeted at all.
At this point, its needed to first get their attention.
Again, normal business has peaks and dips day by day. No company, other than a small business, is so stretched thin that one day of significantly lower profits is noticeable. That’s why shareholders pay attention by quarter.
Say you convinced 100,000 people to not shop at Target for one day. Well, Target’s got about 2,000 stores in the US, so that’s 50 less people that day. And that might sound like an awful lot – I mean, fifty people can buy an awful lot! – but realistically that’s just like four less people per hour. And if you’re not ultimately changing your buying habits – then that day where you get 50 less customers, is going to have 25 *more* customers the day before and after.
Meanwhile those 100,000 people all felt like they did something monumental, like they made the big companies take notice, and so then have fulfilled that inner drive to protest with something that had no impact at all.
I’m into this, but I hope the folks participating in it don’t just go to Amazon a day or two days after and buy the thing they didn’t buy today, because they’ll make back the lost income that way.
I’d suggest people participating that they also plan where they’re going to buy the thing they’re not buying at Amazon today? Hell, if you’re feeling really ambitious, make a list of places where you might buy your last ten purchases that aren’t the top megacorps!
The general point is to make the companies notice more than actually affect things at this point. Because if it happens on this day, they KNOW it’s because of the boycott. If they don’t buy X on February 8th and then don’t buy it on the 10th too, it’s not going to be registered at all.
What happens if they’re aware of the protest, they dig down into the day-by-day earnings, and *don’t* see a dip outside of the normal peaks and valleys of business?
What does that communicate then?
I think what I’ve trained myself to do in this kind of situation is spit out what Ive started thinking as ‘Buffer responses’. Reasonable or vaugely appropriate enough chunks of social script applied until I can leave the room.
Unless its someone I know, then I feel free to just. Wander off once the conversation is over
That last bit is interesting to me. Do you not feel free to piss off around strangers?
someone who already knows the deal is less likely to be offended about it
Right, but strangers don’t matter. I can piss off half a Walmart at once and feel nothing, because those people have no pull on my life.
friends usually aren’t pissed off by this and a lot of people don’t want to piss off strangers
guy at the front desk also isn’t someone you won’t ever interact with again
you know, I HATE that I had this thought this morning, but if Asma were to make no further appearances that’d be in keeping with how there’s a sliding timescale to reality.
Are you implying Asma gets killed off-screen in this scenario?
Deported is possible too.
Even if she was born in the USA.
But this being Willis, I expect Sal and Amazi-Girl to defeat them with Sarah’s burgeoning lawyer skills.
“I have a very particular….set of skills.”
Defeat the people who deported her, not Asma, if that wasn’t obvious.
Hey if Yujiro can bully the Orange and Melon in charge so can the gang XD
Robin Desantos could have been a vote against President Chet Manley.
And Dina is again relatable, even at my advanced age.
asma/dina friendship arc? :3
I think most of Dina’s reaction here is more that she’s used to it being Asma so is more comfortable when it is Asma working there than when she’s not
That being said hell yeah it’d be great if they hung out
yeah, although other than us being shown us flashbacks of her being more engaged in convo with asma, i can imagine ppl consistently wanting the same receptionist since she might be used to dina’s sense of distance(?) to where she wouldn’t force small talk , tho i never rly went outta my way to make small talk with cashiers even if i recognize them