No, I left because i was disgusted at how pathetic your attempt to get rid of me was! you didnt even put a single state line between us! Its like you werent even trying!
I’d say I’m glad Willis doesn’t do Friday cliff-hangers. But they’ve absokutely slammed us before, and I don’t want to tempt them into pulling out this pin and then cutting away while the grenade is rolling on the ground.
I would pay to read those strips…especially if AT LEAST ONE of those tries was Carla. (Could accidentally get the same person more than once for added awkwardness… “All I want to say is…” “—nope sorry, just me again, carry on…”
Its true. I grew up where fire works are illegal. Every New Year’s, Fourth of July, and and sometimes even holidays like Memorial Day are still sounded like a war zone. You cannot keep Americans away from gunpowder and shiny lights. (Its why the Canadian border has those giant fly-zapper put in front of all the gun stores. You didn’t think they were really relying on mounted police to keep us out did you?).
We had fireworks going off often enough that I just started pulling up a “what holiday is today” site to see what we were celebrating. It’s gotten some pretty random stuff.
Not a clear distinction in many places. Assholes around the world like “happy fire” where you fire live ammunition into the air in celebration of something or other. And yes, people do sometimes get killed by this.
Life is a journey.
Time is a circle.
The door is ajar.
And its this, or we start the Joyce/Joe romance, where we watch Joe lose his mind from lack of intercourse in the longest character backslide since Jaime Lannister.
I don’t actually think Joe is that horny. He hasn’t had a hook up since coming back off break and he seems to be holding up okay. Plus haven’t you heard? Joyce is on hussy pills and has chosen to be free of her former self identified baggage.
At least she’s finally owning up to being angry and not burying it under 2 feet of cement. Doesn’t mean it’s not a really bullshit thing to say, but some of the stuff we feel is indeed bullshit.
“Obese” has meaning and connotations. She’s a little on the round side, but only in all the extra-fun places and only compared to the toothpicks she’s surrounded by. Boney-ass white chicks all over the place.
This is extremely true. We had a potluck with some friends last night, nothing super fancy really, and one person just… didn’t eat. We were told ahead of time that they might not, and asked not to Make A Thing about it, and my first thought was “Ah, probably an ED. Touchy subject, best be extra gentle”. Sometimes people are dealin’ with stuff, and it’s not our job to tell ’em not to, or to even bring it up if they haven’t done so first. Doubly so if we don’t know ’em very well.
Quick mockup of Shade of Blue’s dream character, Gigi Walkerton, the forgotten walkerton triplet who seduces jacob in a backless one piece swimsuit and has a pixie cut. https://imgur.com/a/nVJdoXC
It’d be nice if people weren’t obsessed with “the last word”, like it matters who says something last. I’ve had “let me have the last word” weaponised at me so many times, it just started rhyming with “don’t verbally acknowledge I said something to/at you”.
I mean…considering you said, “Billie, we’re breaking up, g’bye” out loud with your mouth and then proceeded to barricade your door, after laying the groundwork with a third party so that Billie would actually believe you this time…YEAH, Ruth, I’d say that was pretty stupid assumption.
I’m interested to see where she’s going with this. Ruth is dysfunctional but I didn’t think she was so out of touch with her own prior motivations that she’d honestly pull a “how dare you believe the words I said to you out loud, with my mouth, and the actions I specifically took to make you not come back” after trying to break things off with Billie multiple times…then again, I think we only learned that she had tried this multiple times FROM Billie, so. Maybe she’s more of an unreliable narrator than I thought.
We say ruth decide that she should break up with jennifer several times… It’s like, this one stuck, because it was casual, because it was premeditated, because she barricaded her room, and jennifer was still going to try to get back together the next day before raidah intervened. Frankly, raidah is ableist in ways that make it seem unsafe to be around her, and her motives might have been selfish… But i still think it was right of raidah to pull Jennifer away from this situation. (Sarah has been nice to Joyce, dina, and others, but has been consistently mean to Jennifer, and it feels good to know that Jennifer doesn’t have to see Sarah every day anymore, even though I like sarah)
Pretty sure Raidah is stealing anyone who is a friend of Sarah or Joyce as some sort of petty “revenge” plan against sarah and joyce. Radiah isnt going to help jennifer long term. And when the revenge trap is sprung and jennifer realizes shes just bait, she will be crushed and might just run back to Ruth. And they will go right back to beating the crap out of each other because neither one of them has learned anything yet.
These two are stuck in groundhog day. And we’re stuck with them.
I’m actually really starting to dislike Ruth now. This whole thing was her fault to begin with. She chose one of the worst ways possible to dump someone and is now blaming her ex for what…respecting the breakup?
Respecting my boundries and moving on when I asked you to move on? Deciding to heed my breakup and then getting mad you didn’t try to wrestle your way back into my life by force when I showed in no uncertain terms that I wanted you out of my life. How dare you not fight tooth and nail for a relationship I’ve proven is as flimsy as a paper mache wine glass.
Yeah, Ruth’s method of breaking up was not good, but I was still prepared to enjoy her presence in the comic. But this interaction makes it so much worse.
After the awful shit Jennifer has been saying to her recently to goad a responce from her, I can’t exactly blame her for starting this. It’s definitely unhealthy and she Should take the high ground but like, I can understand that it can be hard to do that when you try to be courteous and someone just fully rejects that at every turn.
It’s hard to justify that for me. Her courtesy only comes in after the complete lack of it she used to break up. Jennifer has a right to be bitter after the way Ruth completely shut her out, and afterward chose to act like was for Jen’s benefit. Except it wasn’t Ruth immediately folded on any pretense of altruism or empathy for Jennifer. This was all just pure selfishness because she was insecure in her relationship and decided to test Jennifer. A test Jennifer finally failed.
The only sympathy I have for Ruth is she’s clearly still struggling with her depression. That’s why she so easily talked herself into the breakup. I hope she turns a corner and starts trusting her own happiness instead of doing whatever this is.
Or maybe Ruth was conflicted herself and was doing it because she thought Jennifer would be better off without her, but now she’s in a low place and can’t handle it as well as she thought she could.
Okay, I sympathized with Ruth until right now. Fuck her with this attitude. You don’t get to push someone away and then act like the victim when they take the hint.
Now I want to see Ruth and Jennifer in adjoining rooms, each screwing their new man as loud and hard as possible to one-up each other in the “I”m over you” category.
“It’s not that I’m not enjoying this sudden burst of affection, only I’m roight chafed, innit.”
“Quiet, you. They’re up to seven already and we’ve barely hit six.”
“Jolly good then, carry on.”
I think for Ruth its love. She probably doesn’t intend to try to have another relationship with Billie or try to betray or abandon Math TA dude (its late and the name is forgotten), but I think Ruth has a hard time letting go of people, even those she has tried to sever ties with. Perhaps because she lost her parents so young and unexpectedly.
God if there was one I’d really hope it goes through the whole thing with them arguing the whole time and the background slowly transitioning to the bedroom with them slightly less dressed each panel.
Dang ruth, would you rather have died together then?
i’d have thought she’d stop antagonizing her for this reason unless her reasoning is “oh i’m not suicidal anymore ,we can have a proper healthy relationship now”
I predict the two having sex and causing problems
source? me and my ex did this exact thing 2 years ago at 20 (although the breakup circumstances were less dumb and less violent)
For all that I think that these two desperately need to not interact with one another for at least ten years, and physically keeping their distance from one another would be helpful (and given the mutual propensity for violence when either of them is angry, doubly a good idea), Jennifer isn’t here about Ruth. Becky explicitly went and brought her over to talk to Joyce on the grounds that she thought Joyce needed Jennifer’s help.
I’m gonna believe this is going somewhere. Like this isn’t all she’s gonna say… And the next words will make me go like “Ohhhh!” Instead of “Um… Oh.” Because the reason Ruth broke up with Jennifer wasn’t a bad one. The whole “I tried to get you to kill yourself with me” thing sounds like a horrible thing to grapple with after getting your more rational thoughts back. Bad wording but hope I got what I meant across.
Has she even told jennifer the reason why they broke up or her thought process…? Has dorothy told jennifer…? If it came out of the blue and jennifer *still* doesn’t know, that contextualizes things
Ngl, I’ve had it up to here with this relationship. This is so ridiculously toxic I can’t even stand it. She broke up with her, made it explicitly clear she was not wanting to be chased and is now mad and fighting her ex for not chasing her because it means she’s not trying hard enough?
Like for gods sakes just stop talking to each other please.
You may want to say that type of shit in the privacy of a therapy session, or a conversation with a consenting, caring, level-headed, non-incel friend.
But this is a trash thing to say in public, please don’t (and flagged)
How are you supposed to understand women when they are all different unique different individuals. I mean, it’s not like men where they are all basically Walky, Danny, oe Joe, with the occasional Mike thrown in.
She loves Jennifer. And in her eyes Jennifer has been acting like their relationship is no big deal. She hasn’t seen Jennifer’s concern for her, because she was pretty much out of it at the time. That’s gotta hurt. And meanwhile, love has been demanding that she break up with Jennifer. That’s gotta hurt worse.
I’m not saying this exchange is healthy but it’s understandable.
A couple strips earlier, she said “I’ll just pick the lock to her room later, sneak into bed, and tomorrow things will be fine. This happens literally all the time.” That fits her pattern of downplaying and deflecting problems instead of confronting them, which became a point of contention when Ruth pulled out of her downward spiral.
I think that’s the context behind today’s panel 4. It’s very “apparently I wasn’t worth fighting for, just being taken for granted”, as I read it.
yeah this whole time that interaction has been in my head, i feel like some people might have forgotten it. It was like, an absurdly shitty escalation from jennifer that I can understand why it rattled ruth.
I sorta assume that shes been spending the past day or so just thinking about the relationship, and is now spitefully saying something pretty mean just to try to prove her wrong.
Yeah, this is explicitly what Jennifer wanted from her, only Ruth stewed on it before answering. It’s not uncalled for, just, way after the fact.
(When I say it isn’t uncalled for, I am mostly saying it’s not a total non-sequitor. I definitely don’t think it’s a rational way to approach a relationship, being so hot and cold and then getting angry when it isn’t followed through on, but yeah, feelings are not always rational, especially in an already heavily mercurial relationship.)
Yeah you’re right tbh. She basically just said what Jennifer WANTED to hear. It doesn’t make much sense, but it’s what she wanted. I don’t really want these two together, personally. But yeah they’re both the problem. Jennifer for escalating, Ruth for… Unsure. This sentence? I’m of the belief that her reason for breaking up is completely understandable.
To me Ruth is the reason Jennifer is angry. She initiated all of this with the breakup. Jennifer did escalate things as a reaction to that and Ruth trying to justify her methods by using Jennifer’s happiness as proof.
It’s not an “I’m glad you’re happy.”
It’s an “I’m glad you’re happy because of what I decided was best for you.”
Even if the reality is true and the breakup was good for them (which I now believe) it’s still not okay what Ruth did. Saying after the fact that she did expect Jennifer to come back makes a bad decision worse.
This is worse than I imagined. Ruth is so used to violence with Jennifer that now she’s the one stopping her saying some pretty crazy things. At least Ruth has finally stopped asking Jennifer for forgiveness every time she sees her. Let’s hope this closes the door for good and she will try to be happy, with Janos or with anyone else.
Honestly I have a lot more sympathy for Ruth than most people in the comments here. I know what it’s like to be in a really dark place and get this distorted thought stuck in your head that your friends don’t REALLY care about you, that all your relationships are insubstantial and everyone around you is just looking for an excuse to leave you. And so you just start pushing, start lashing out at people you care about, to try and drive off the flakes. And what you really want is for them to push back, to reject your rejection, and prove that they care enough about you to fight to keep you in their life. So, yeah, I get it, I really do, and I also get feeling angry in the aftermath at someone for “proving that they didn’t really care.”
….. but, at some point, you need to realize that all of that was depression distorting your view of the world, that no one can really be expected to psychically intuit your secret desires while you’re trying to hurt them, and that if someone takes you seriously and walks away, that it’s on you to explain yourself and try and fix things.
Of course, I don’t think Ruth understands ANY of what I just said, so I expect this relationship to continue to be a massive trainwreck of seething resentment for a long time to come.
Yeah, thats textbook codependency.
A person doesnt love themselves so they cant love others. They feel no self worth, so they try to get others to validated their worth for them.
Jennifer didnt love herself, so she couldnt really love Ruth. All Jennifer could do was sacrifice herself to Ruth and die with Ruth.
Ruth didnt love herself, so she couldnt really love Jennifer. All she could do was sacrufice her wants and push Jenn away to try and “save” her, but she also wanted Jenn to validate her sacrifice.
Neither one of these two loved themselves, so they couldnt love anyone else. And all they could do was sacrifice themselves to try to win love from the other. But since neither could love, they are trapoed in this catch 22, groundhog day.
The only way out of this trap is if each starts getting some self worth so they can love themselves. Only then can they really love anyone else.
Ok, so, i just binged the entire comic, which means i didnt read any comments that might have explained this, but, is David Willis OK?
The casual violence in this strip is shocking. Ruth and Jennifer have committed battery on each other multiple times. Amber was a vigilante. Ambers dad worked for the mob and murdered Beckys dad. Beckys dad committed kidnapping twice. Amber stabbed gash-face 60 times? (Psst. Thats not self defense) Both Joyce and Becky were hit as children. Dina said she was physically bullied as a child.
And the mental health of a lot of characters is unhealthy. Suicidal characters include Ruth, jennifer, and Amber (and sarahs freshman roommate). They all claim to be going to therapy now, but none of them seem to have improved much. Maybe ruth improves, but she constantly regresses. Ruth and amber have both stated that their therapy isnt working. Jennifer seems to be getting better, and yet shes hanging out with Asher (who helped ambers dad kidnap everyone) and Raidah (who is lying and conniving to “steal” all of Sarah and Joyces friends away from them out of revenge for sarahs freshman roommate and joyce “stealing” jacob, who wasnt a good fit for her anyway)
Joe is into one night stands like his dad? Maybe? Part of me wonders if at some point Joe confides to Joyce that it was all an act and he only had sex with like 3 women total. Roz has a healthy relationship to sex but is portrayed as bit of a busybody, throwing her privilege around and berating Joyce for growing.
So many adults are messed up. control freaks include ambers dad, ruths grandad, beckys dad, joyces mom, joyces missionary embezzling brother, sal’s mom. Ambers stepmom. Ethans mother, and also possibly father.
Messed up adults include ambers mom, joes dad, sal’s dad, representative desanto, genddr studies teacher with with a name based on a pun on the word lesbian, the biology teacher who is a sociopath, two math teacher assistants fired for having sex with students. Jennifers parents were rich assholes.
There isnt a single healthy adult character in the strip. Joyce’s dad seems to have started down that path, but he has a lot of deprogramming to do. Leslie is a good teacher and was helpijg becky but eats like a 5 year old and is has such low self esteem that she cant date.
The only adults who MIGHT be healthy are dorothys parents, but we never got to hear them say much more than “helllo”. Dina’s parents are supportive, but pretty clearly autistic like Dina. Their autism was the punchline of one comic. I cant remember the specifics but i think dina and her parents were all inthe elevator with sarah, and the last panel was dina and parents standing in silence.
Joyce is autistic. Has cult deprogramming to do. Has a seriously warped relationship to corporal punishment. Is in massive denial about sex.
Becky seems unstobbably positive. And yet i keep seeing glimpses that maybe its a facade, like take away joyce and she would shatter. I cant tell if shes just so friggen happy, of if she is in complete denial of soooooo much unacknowledged grief about her parents.
Students who do the best they can do in a lousy situation are demonized. Sarah had a suicidal roommate and tried to get her help and Raidiah and all.her friends hate her for it. Carla reported Ruth and Billie for suicidal preparations and they still throw the stink eye at Carla.
Ethan needs therapy badly. His parents harrassed him for coming out as gay, something he never recovered from. And then he saw his best friend die, which turned him into goth ethan. And no one is noticing? Amber is, but she has zero skills. And he thinks Danny “stabbed him in the back”? I missed where that came from?
The students who DO try to look out for others are all shown as busy bodies. Dorothy helps everyone she can, but she apparently has no “charisma” according to Jennifer. Jennifer is head cheer leader, alpha bongo, problem solver who helps people, but is incapable of helping herself, is mixed up with bad boy asher, and cant see Radiah’s manipulations. Sarah helps, but shes presented as a misanthrope who helps others simply to reduce the distracting drama in her life.
Which brings us back to these two suicidal codependent knuckleheads. Jeebus. Both of these two have SERIOUS personal issues that are their own personal responsibility to deal with. Ruth has dead parents, got moved around, was taken in by her asshole grandfather, all of which she needs therapy for, on top of which, she may have some sort of neurological issue requiring medication for the rest of her life. NONE OF WHICH IS JENNIFERS FAULT. Jennifer has useless, clueless, asshole parents, crashed while drunk driving and killed her friend, all of which she needs therapy for. NONE OF WHICH IS RUTHS FAULT. And yet these two idiots always blame the other for their problems. Jennifer thinks wanting to die for Ruth is sort of weapon to abuse Ruth with? And Ruth thinks “i will sever l relationships to save everyone but me” is a different kind of weapon to abuse Jennifer with? You two need to stop blaming the other for your problems. You are both messed up, totally by yourselves, and its unfortunately something you have to deal with yourselves. With therapy maybe, but without blaming others for your lousy choices.
Every time therapy comes up, its from a character that says it doesnt work, its useless, its a waste, or its someone to fake being normal to. And then there’s Boomer who is replacement Mike who is a Psych? Major? Whose introduction includes him accurately assessing ambers psychological problems, and amber calling him a weirdo for it.
So, are any of these characters ever going to get to the point of whst might be considered ‘healthy”? There has been a lot of development with Joyce going from fundie cult member to someone who accepts people for who they are, but who has years of cult programming to un-program, has possible ptsd from multuple separate incidents.( Getting roofied, two separate kidnappings, seeing beckys dad murdered before her eyes, mike dying. ) and is currently facing an existential crisis due to her loss of faith.
i cant think of any character who is what i would call a healthy, emotionally stable, mature person?, does David willis know what that llooks like?
Like is this Ruth/Jennifer thing always going to be a never ending train wreck? Will ruth ever stop cutting off Jennifer to “save” them from her? Will Jennifer ever stop sacrificing herself to “save” ruth? Will they ever stop being 2 codependents with self esteem issues?
The commentary here on the content of the strip strikes me as fair game. The comments on the author’s mental/emotional health and maturity as extrapolated from what they choose to write about seems uhhhhhhh extremely misguided, not to mention unnecessarily rude. Jackass behavior towards a real, non-fictional person, in fact. (Do you do this with all the fiction you read or watch? If so, I would recommend not doing that. If it’s just something you’re doing here, in reaction to this one comic strip…I would also suggest not doing that.)
I had one sentence asking if he was ok. The entire rest of the comment was about so many characters being unhealthy. And the reason i asked specificay was because the “read this before posting” says Joyce is autobiographical. And i was wondering how much.
Ruth/jennifer are seriously messed up. Even after getting what the comic portrays as professional help on a significant level, Ruth is barely any better. And this specific comic today, ruth berating jennifer for not fighting to stay in a toxc relationship is …. toxic. This is showing Ruth exactly the same as when she was firet introduced. She is gaslighting jennifer. Guilt tripping her. If ruth is seeing a therapist, her therapist SUCKS.
but then none of the characters are getting much better, as the laundry list mentined in my previous post. And some are getting worse. Joyce went from militant religious to militant atheist. Dorothy is hiding her acceotance to yale? Ethan is suicidal.
None of the characters are remotely healthy even after years and years of comics.
I was drawn to joyce trying and growing but shes got a loooong way to go and so many around her are suffering.
Yeah, it’s been like five minutes. If anything, Joyce’s “development” (if we really need to call it that) has been wicked fast by our mortal standards. If I changed so much so quickly at her age, I’d have people badgering me about my drug problem, demanding to confiscate my stash, taking my laptop to check for weird cult emails, making sure I wasn’t being groomed by some 37-year-old guy named Kyle, the whole nine yards.
But I’m sure Other People had it all figured out by the end of their first semester of college.🙄
“Is he ok?” Wasnt snide. I just binged the entire dumbing of age comics. I havent read the comment sections. I dont know what has been discussed when stuff like Ruth+suicide happened. I DO know that the “read before commenting” said Joyce is autobigraphical, the religious fundie deprogramming was basically what he went through.
Did anything come up in the comments when suicide came up? When therapy always sucks came up? Some times when a story is about suicide, there is a psa at the end with a phone number to a suicide hotline, etc. Was anything like that mentioned? Maybe just a “dont worry, this part isnt autobiographical”?
Maybe because i read a decade of comics in one swoop, the suicidal stuff, and the depressiin stuff, and the codependent stuff, comes across a lot stronger than if i read it one comic a day.
But seeing a LOT of very dark behavior, knowing that SOME of this is autobiographical, and asking Is everything Ok? wasnt me being snide.
Good grief. Its not concern trolling. Im not trying to derail anything. I just binged read like 10 years of comics in maybe 2 weeks. Because i do really like them. But getting all the suicide, depressions, murder, kidnapping, split personalities, the abusive parents, assault, attempted rapes, and reading many many many times from many different characters that therapy doesnt work, the whole thing lands as pretty friggen dark. This all happens in one semester and a some of these kids would have ptsd, having nightmares of being thrown into a pile of bodies in a basement, and so on. I read it in like two weeks, so its pretty grim all at once.
It wasnt concern trolling. Just concern. and i couldnt read through ten years of comments, so i was asking if like it ever cam up. And if didnt, then fine. Maybe spread out over ten years, it would have landed as meh.
“I didn’t like this aspect of the work I voluntarily read, so I’m going to actually voice out loud, in the comments section of the work, which is maintained and moderated by the author, that I think that this work is the work of someone who’s all fucked up in the head, because only fucked-up people write about fucked-up stuff.”
Same idea, so many fewer words.
It’s not actually your business whether or not Willis is “okay,” by the way. They don’t owe you a damn thing about the state of their physical, emotional, or mental health. That’s what makes it inappropriate to invoke it in the context of discussing *your* reaction to the creative work they’ve produced, and what makes it concern trolling to double down and insist that no, really, you’re just WORRIED about anybody who could write ten years worth of material that covered (gasp) a lot of challenging themes and some upsetting content. You’ve enumerated at length and with great specificity how much and what exactly about the comic bothers you, and I appreciate that you’re prepared to argue from examples; like, no faulting your level of engagement with the text and all, but also? That is 100% a you concern. It is fully on you to explore and process your feelings about this material without projecting *your* sense of upset or dissatisfaction onto the mental state of the author.
DIdnt read any of this but I think he’s fine. A lot of this needlesss complication is just good storytelling. If everyone worked through their issues and acted rationally from day 1 it wouldn’t be a hilarious and edge of your seat style adventure. It would not be very fascinating if some guy was just. Fine. Just doing okay.
I disagree with that last bit, if only on a contextual level. I’d love to have a character in something really grimdark or pessimistic, for example, who’s just doin’ okay. Just a very level, balanced person in a completely wretched world, and nobody’s sure how to approach or think about that character.
Not an extremely weird and skewed framing at all, that first part. Very normal thing to say. Definitely doesn’t flavor the rest of the comment in a way that resembles “video games cause violence”, wherein media being negative in some way is inherently an indicator of a real human’s mental state and/or influence on their real-life behavior.
If you want something less “casually violent” (lmao), with less iffy interpersonal conflict you could try Teletubbies.
I ask if any character is getting better in this comic world of abusive, cult like, gaslighting, physical abuse, emotional repression, and rampant denialism, and you tell me if i dont like it maybe i should “watch teletubbies” instead?
Ask about Bruno. Get a chorus about how we dont talk about Bruno.
I may have been just a wee bit sarcasm-adjacent, yes.
Although from a certain perspective, he did get the best song in the movie, and he deserved that after all the bullshit he had to put up with, so he got at least one thing he deserved, just in a good way and not a “vindictive to this fictional character” way.
He didn’t really get to sing the best song in the movie, though… but I do appreciate that if you took a sampling of people and said, “Name a character in Encanto,” Bruno would be the leading character-name response. (motherfucker barely in the poster, but this is a movie about HIM, yknow?)
Except that one bit about “healthy, emotionally stable, mature” people. I know you know what a teenager is (and isn’t). You’ve definitely met some. You’ve been one, and if you haven’t, you should wait until afterward to comment on people’s mental health. Especially real people.
Maybe i am in a weird situation where i know some “healthy, emotionally stable, mature” adults in my personal life and expect everyone knows at least one person like that.
Some of the growth Joyce has gone through is truly amazing, deep, rich, insightful, powerful, and human.
But the adult world in this comic seems to be populated by a lot of …. i dunno what it would be called… cardboard characters created by a goth high school kid? A mix between “parents just dont understand” and “adults suck” or something.
Joyces character and development is so multidimensional. The adults in this world are astonishingly flat.
Yes, all of them. All of them can be messy. The main cast is so dysfunctional, it would be jarring for their parents to be completely tidy. It’s unreasonable to expect everything to be nice and clean and “healthy” (whatever that means) all the time.
And yes, the adults in this world often suck, just like they do in reality, but there’s plenty of nuance there that you seem to be ignoring to make some kind of point. Amber’s mom, for one example, is a little less than perfectly helpful with her daughter sometimes, but she does try and she’s also had to put up with Blaine’s abuse for years on end so it’s understandable if she’s just ever so slightly fried on occasion. I won’t be giving other examples, but let’s not be silly here.
“The main cast is so dysfunctional, it would be jarring for their parents to be completely tidy”
Ok. I get maybe i am criticizing something that people hold dear and they may feel the need to attack anything short of glowing 5 star reviews. If thats not what youre doing, then i think i was pretty clear i would have been happy with ONE healthy adult being shown here and there. Not rewite it so all the parents of the main cast are healthy adults, but maybe give Dorothys parents some face time and we find out they are happily married, support Dorothy, and love her, and maybe worry shes just a tiny bit too hard on herself.
” It’s unreasonable to expect everything to be nice ”
Again, i am giving DoA a 4 out of 5 star review. If you cant allow that, ok, i’ll adjust. But I am in no way expexting EVERYTHING to be nice.
a healthy, happily married couple who doesnt beat or gaslight or kidnap their children would, in my humble opinion, be nice to get some face time and dialogue.
Still a good comic. Just channels some subtle “parents dont understand” silliness the way it is now.
Consider Hank – who’s had his problems, but is definitely on a growth path.
But mostly, we don’t see the healthy parents because we see parents when there’s drama between them and their kids. And we also see a largely flat view of them because we’re seeing them through their kid’s eyes.
“If you can’t allow that” Be more secure in your own opinions. I don’t have any need or desire to “allow” your weird numerical review (on a website that’s not even mine), that’s not my decision to make for you. Take responsibility for your own thoughts and don’t be so defensive when somebody disagrees, you’re not under fucking attack. And not that it’s got anything to do with the price of tea in China, but this comic isn’t someing I “hold dear”, it’s a series of pictures I’m interested in discussing sometimes.
I will say though, using Dorothy’s parents as a specific example is funny to me, because in their few appearances, we’re more or less told they’re exactly what you want. Maybe they could be slightly more verbose about it, but they’re completely fine and are shown to be supportive of their weird daughter. Hell, Mike’s parents’ only flaw seems to be that they’re a little too nice. Dina’s parents are like Dorothy’s but quieter, and haven’t we been told in-comic, by Dina, that they’ve fought for her to get her autism diagnosed in the past? Do they just not count because they’re quiet? The good parents aren’t the focus because they’re not causing problems like the shitty ones are, but they do show up for the big crises when they’re really needed, and we’re explicitly shown them supporting and comforting their kids. It’s like you’re ignoring that because you want it to be untrue or something. If you misremembered, that’s fine, but it’s not everyone else’s job to remind you before you post a novel about it.
While Amber’s mom is often over her head, she has my eternal respect for surviving and eventually getting herself and her daughter as far from Blaine as she could. Joe is worried, but currently, she and Joe’s dad are happy together. Mike’s parents were absurdly normal (like out of a Norman Rockwell painting). We’ve never met them, but Willis has mentioned that Mary’s parents are fine and not to blame for how Mary is turning out.
This was brief and a super long time ago, but Sierra’s dad also seemed to really have his act together. (He tried to deescalate Blaine when Blaine was shouting in the hall. It was brave, and the right thing for him to do.) Sierra seems to be doing just fine, along with Mandy and Grace and Other Rachel and Jacob and Riley and all the other characters that we don’t see too often. (It’s kinda become a running gag in the commentary: while we like seeing more of our favorite characters, we know that wishing to see more of them is like wishing the characters to live in Interesting Times, they’re far safer offscreen!) So, people doing OK definitely exist in this world. It’s just, this comic focuses on the hot messes, who generate oodles of drama for the viewers.
In other words, we see a lot more of the characters with big exciting problems, because big exciting problems tend to be interesting to write and read about.
The whole comic is basically a character-driven soap opera set in college. It’s rarely a low-stakes slice-of-life story like “Joyce & Walky!”, nor is it a morality play where the whole point is picking up who is the goodguy/badguy (you didn’t make this mistake, but we often do, here in comments-land, so I like to mention it).
If you’ll like an ensemble portrait piece / character-driven soap opera, sweet! And either way, glad you 4-outta-5 mostly-enjoyed your comics binge. Welcome!
I feel that it’s a little condescending to suggest that dysfunctional parents are coming from a “goth kid” perspective– that’s some people’s lived experiences, not any form of immaturity. Some people don’tget to grow up around healthy, supportive adults who understand what they’re going through (abuse). It’s not a bad thing to portray that.
I like 80% agree with what you have to say though 😛
But why is it shocking? Because it would be shocking to happen across a group so dysfunctional on real life? This cast is curated, not a random sample.
I mean if there were emotionally healthy level headed adult figures guiding these characters there would be way less drama, and its a drama webcomic, hence this particular group of characters within the broader world portrayed in the narrative has only messy or actively malicious older adults and parents. Except for Dina’s parents who aren’t especially present in the comic but who have been very much supportive of Dina her whole life while being emotionally stable leveled headed people. Also Sierra’s parents… Although they… Also aren’t super present. I also assume some of the emergency response team people who were there for becky were level headed adults, and there was that one black male police officer, and a few other characters i might not be thinking of off the top of my head…?
That’s all honestly a fair reaction to this comic. I think one of the main things is that a lot of healthy behaviors aren’t as often shown off screen with the expectation that you’d see healthy behaviors in real life and that they’re not as novel or dramatic as unhealthy behaviors—this webcomic is meant to entertain and it uses drama to do that.
As someone who’s been to therapy i can tell you that a lot of therapists are useless for PTSD or specialize in specific types of clients. Booster didn’t really take offense to being called a weirdo, and it feels different coming from someone else who’s a self described weirdo, so that wouldn’t have been hurtful. Also, booster was really disrespecting everyone’s boundaries and potentially endangering people by throwing peoples issues around out in the open. Their character is ribbing at psych majors overall, and frankly, a lot of therapists have that kind of attitude. (I’m not a psych person but I’m generally pretty decent at reading people and that itself can be overwhelming for people, if I share what I’ve analysed.)
Sarah presents herself as a bongoy misanthrope who only wants less drama as a defense mechanism She hides her positive emotions and jokingly criticized Joyce for being able to tell when she’s happy.
Leslie is honestly just a realistic character for me. She’s been through a lot, she’s accomplished a lot in spite of that, and her current issues are the type to take years to address. And she’s like, mid to late 20s? She’s fine.
One thing you haven’t figured out is that the “help” people get for being suicidal is often bad enough to drive people to suicide! People experience abuse as psych patients! Families can be abusive even under the guise of helping! Ruth having a pretty good/okay experience in the psych hospital was a twist and leading up to that would have been suspense It feels like you don’t have the real world knowledge to understand: Ruth’s home isn’t safe. if ruth and jennifer could have asked for help without that being a huge fucking risk, they probably just would have!
Joyce fundie cult stuff is realistic… Also: Jennifer didn’t kill her friend?? She crashed the car with Alice in it, who then criticized her for it later… So… There??
I will admit they show some positive growth, like Joyce getting glasses. She resisted, friends held her hand, she got glasses, and is demonstrably better for it.
But i dunno if i buy the “therapy sucks” that every character reports back. Dorothy said something a long time ago that tberapy is good everyone could benefit, but we never saw a before/after of what changed for dorothy. And then dorothy said sonething about how her therapist said to reinterpret traumatic incidents as great experience, so dorothy put being kidnapped on her resume? Feel like she misunderstood or her therapist is terrible.
And i know not all therapists are perfect. A lot of them are clueless. But some can really help. Therapy in this comic comes across as one big gaslighting grift. No one in this comic is helped by it, but a bunch are doing it? Oh, forgot, Sal saw multiple therapists after robbing convenience store, and said they were worthless. Just feel like statistically, at least one person woukd have gotten a good therapist by now.
This comic doesnt match my experience at all.
Leslie is fine for her history. Shes got some stuff to get over though. Woulda been cool if she was shown to be late thirties and happily married to a woman she loves and loves her. Could still have her terrible past, but gotten to the other side.
Joyces fundie cult is mos def realistic. It woulda been nice if her closeted… transgender? brother (sister?) could maybe guide joyca a bit? Or at least give joyce the understanding of escaping a cult that she could use.
I mean, isnt that ultimately the biggest lesson? Dont keep it bottled up. Talk with people who understand you.
Ruths home isnt safe. Yes. But in this comic right here, Ruth is blaming and guilt tripping Jennifer. Ruth MUST have said some bs like this to one of her therapists, blaming Jennifer, and therapist 101 would be telling Ruth she needs to stop blaming others for her decisions. Yes, grandpa is a fascist. Yes that seriously harms ruth. But ruth was TERRIBLE for Jennifer and jennifer was TERRIBLE for ruth, and ruth guilting Jennifer for setting a healthy boundary is something even a terrible therapist should have caught.
Jennifer didnt kill her friend. Ah. Misremembered that.
I cant remember. Is Jocelyn in the closet? Joyce has no clue about it. But i dont know if thats because Jocelyn is out, but parents kept her hidden from Joyce? Or because Jocelyn is still in the closet?
Booster was wearing make up on first day and Joyce immediately called them out on it. So i assume Jocelyn wasnt presenting as female? Else Joyce would have immediately pointed it out?
Jocelyn is very definitely closeted. Their parents wouldn’t be at all okay with it.
Even Hank, after the growth he’s already shown, will likely struggle.
Oh on the topics of transgender kids and their parents, Carla’s rich parents were awesome and supportive and changed her life. They won some kind of landmark high-profile progressive court case on Carla’s behalf (lawyered by Jacob’s big brother). Their rad support is a huge part of Carla’s self-confidence. She credits her parents for being there for her (starting with making a custom Ultra-Car toy, which really mattered to her and made her feel understood from a young age, and onwards).
Jennifer once challenged Carla’s blind spot: some people just don’t have safe/supportive homes. (Was your home supportive and safe? Mine too — very lucky us!) It can be hard for us to imagine just how special that can be, and what happens when a person didn’t have one of those, and the many years of work it can take to mitigate the damage caused there.
To contrast, Willis has indeed shared that Joyce’s mom is based on Willis’s mom. Willis realized that their mom would always choose her fundamentalist cult over her kids, and this tragedy comes through in the writing, very intentionally.
But yeah, Willis is doing pretty well, as far as we know! They love their wife and twin kiddos. Also transformers and mac n cheese. They made boundaries years ago with their extremely difficult mom, which was sad but necessary and healthy. They make tons of comics! Good times.
I’ve known to many people who experienced therapy as a gaslighting grift to find the portrayal unrealistic? Sometimes it’s like, “my mental health has improved now that I’m finally put of therapy and no longer taking medication!” Because the therapists were gaslighting them and forcing them to relieve trauma over and over again, and because the medication wasn’t helping them with any issue that they actually had and was slowly poisoning them (high dosages of the wrong medications can do that)
I’ve had good experience with therapy, although the down to earth kind of therapist who doesn’t just tell you what you want to hear and who doesn’t gaslight you isn’t always easy to find. Maybe you’re on the lucky side when it comes to your experiences with therapists?
To put it simply, the comic ‘Everyone Does Things Sensibly Of Age’ is quite a bit shorter and less dramatic. Also, your dismissal of people with autism as somehow unhealthy/’messed up’ is… Yikes.
“Dina’s parents are supportive, but pretty clearly autistic like Dina. Their autism was the punchline of one comic. ”
Seems pretty dismissive. It comes across as “But they’re autistic so it doesn’t count.” Like you’re disqualifying them from your personal concept of “healthy”.
And “Lol they have autism” isn’t the punchline if that strip, that’s a fucking ridiculous read, the punchline is that Sarah’s family is louder/more obnoxious than she likes and Dina’s parents are refreshingly quiet by comparison.
Wow, thanks for the summary =) its a pretty good refresher.
he thinks Danny “stabbed him in the back”? I missed where that came from?
I think that refers to that time at the clinic when Danny hinted that he thought everyone would be better off with Mike dead. Or possibly said not quite that but something easily misinterpretable as that.
Their autism was the punchline of one comic.
Willis is all but confirmed autistic themself, and Joyce (as they point out in the “read before posting” section above the strip) is largely autobiographical. So, its maybe just phrasing on your part but i dont think he would want to imply that Dina’s parents are “not healthy grown-ups” for that reason.
Anyway, i second maybe not speculating aloud about the authors mental health, and perhaps taking a breather after bingeing on such an intense comic. I think for me, for many of us probably, messed up characters are relatable or merely interesting, for reasons we may not jecessarily always be able or willing to dissect (although plenty of excruciating dissection does happen around here)
Also, welcome to the section if you do choose to stick around!
And feel free to post strings of swears to see which ones are creatively censored =P its a time honoured tradition. We all did it. In fact its basically compulsory.
“Danny hinted that he thought everyone would be better off with Mike dead”
Aahh. I do remember that. I guess that makes sense.
I have problems with Mike. He is an asshole but is cast as doing his asshole thing for the right reasons. Like he got Ambers teacher fired when they were kids because she thought amber was cheating? Ok. Fine. I guess. Children have no power over bad teachers and it was a wish fullfillment fantasy. Fine.
But he was cruel at times. Hiding behind “im doing whats best for this other person”. Having been on the recieving end of that, FUCK THAT. And he was a hypocrite. He was alsways pushing people to do things they were uncomfortable with because “make them better”, but unless I am totally misreading this, he was in love with Ethan and too chicken shit himself to say it, other than to ask ethan “wanna make out” and pretend it was only because he was bored.
Yes, Mike showed courage leading two kidnapping dads away from the party, but he was still an asshole to pretty much everyone and a hypocrite.
That doesnt mean he deserves to die, but Ethan has gone full Goth over Mike’s death and is idolizing Mike up to be something Mike never was.
Danny may have gone too far the other way, but as best as I can tell, what danny said was no worse than anything Mike ever said the differnce is Mike would be intentionally cruel, it seemed that Danny was reacting in the moment to Ethans idolization.
Stories also need characters that develop. Todays comic, we see Ruth reset to square one. As if she hadnt spent all that time with doctors and therapists and whoever else is trying to help her professionally.
I think Sal mentions she had to see a therapist after robbing tbe convenience store, and that it didnt do anything for her. I dont recall if she said how long she went.
I doubt that they treated a young black girl with a Karen mom and “behavioral concerns,” in a respectful way. It would surprise me if her perspectives were validated or if they tried to understand. It would surprise me if she wasn’t gaslit or traumatized. Especially as a child, she had very little autonomy.
Also – therapists have specialties. Not every therapist is going to be able to ping that Sal’s parents are toxic and their parenting is the problem. (And if they did, you can bet her mom would have found a new provider ASAP.)
The thing about therapy is that it only works if the patient and the therapist share the same idea about what recovery looks like AND if the patient can trust the therapist.
Sal either was going to court mandated therapy OR parentally mandated therapy. I doubt there was a lot of trust there.
“How many characters in TV sitcoms are good, healthy people?”
Uh. I think a more fair question would be how many sitcoms do you know where half the main characters need serious therapy, while half the main characters also state that therapy doesnt work.
In the course of a couple months these characters go through murder of classmate, kidnapping of much of cast, campus shooting and a different kidnapping, suicide attempt, murder of two different fathers, two attempted sexual assaults, a case of “self defemse” that results in 60 stab wounds of the assailant, dozens of cases of battery. A guy who works for the mob. A convenience store roldup/hostage revealed via flashback.
In a couple of months.
And in that same time we have more “mundane” trauma like joyce losing her religion and having an existential crisis. Multiple parents ostracizing their kids. Parents divorcing. Multiple people coming out as gay. One questioning if theyre trans. Two people in authority fired for sex with students. A sex tape. A “sex list” that goes public. A homophobe politician who comes out as gay. Homophobe parents hating their gay children. Racist parents hating their black children. An embezzling missionary.
In a couple of months.
I dont know a lot of current sitcoms but none seem like a fit for the level of violence and trauma that happens here in a couple months. This feels more like “Game of Thrones, the College Years”
While not usually presented as violent and/or traumatic, in my own experience and recollection, many sitcoms are week after week of personal and professional crises, setbacks, “zany schemes” going horribly wrong, etc.
Reminds me of how I write characters. Insomuch that’s all my characters are assholes, dipshits, losers, weirdos and failures because I find that so much more interesting. Characters who have their shit together bore me unless them being normal is meant to have them as a foil to the rest of the cast.
I don’t align with this writing philosophy; characters who have it more together can handle far more interesting situations without breaking down right away and I like being there to see it. Not a criticism though.
That’s moreso assuming that their reaction to a situation is “breaking down”. Most of my characters don’t “break down” so much as they have noontraditional/healthy ways of interacting with a situation.
Like Ed Edd n Eddy. The Eds are all varying amounts of those things I mentioned, but they rarely breakdown. They persevere despite the fact that they constantly lose and also are usually the bad guys.
Personally (personally, mind) i have no issue with your comment beyond the issuea i’ve already mentioned, or the frustration you’re expressing. And i disagree with those who say there would be no story worth telling if some of the characters weren’t as messed up as they are. There are plenty such stories but yeah, this isn’t one of those. I happen to like this comic but it’s fine and cool that you aren’t. Peace✌️
First, it seems like a lot of your analysis has been impacted by the idea that the things that happen that aren’t good or that you don’t like are somehow… the point? Or, like, the message of the comic? Or maybe you just missed a lot of things in your reading, idk. In a previous comment, you say, “I have problems with Mike. He is an asshole but is cast as doing his asshole thing for the right reasons.” This isn’t my experience of Mike, and I feel it ignores the comics attempt to challenge that narrative. To me, that felt fairly explicit, but if you didn’t see it, fair enough. Even before that, though, there were a lot of us who didn’t like Mike, but understood that the existence of a comic character was not an endorsement of his behavior.
You also say in a reply that you “had one sentence asking if he was ok.” Your comment is framed around the question “is David Willis OK?” And again near the end of your first comment, you say, “i cant think of any character who is what i would call a healthy, emotionally stable, mature person?, does David willis know what that llooks like?” Yeah, that definitely makes your comment come off as weird and rude to Willis.
Taking Dina’s parents out of the running for healthy adults with the sentence “Dina’s parents are supportive, but pretty clearly autistic like Dina” is where I disagree that you “never dismissed anyone with autism.” You describe their autism as “the punchline of one comic,” presumably this one: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2013/comic/book-3/04-just-hangin-out-with-my-family/adopt/ –that’s fair enough, I guess, if that’s how you view it, though I disagree that it’s meant to be any kind of “haha, autism” thing.
A lot of choices made by characters that you agree with are criticized by other characters. Okay, but that doesn’t mean that Willis is saying these choices are BAD. People are going to react differently to others choices, and a lot of choices around complex situations are– unsurprisingly– complex. I agree with Carla’s choice regarding getting help with Ruth’s situation. That doesn’t mean other characters shouldn’t have feelings about it. Like, in real life, I’ve intervened with suicidal individuals in various capacity a number of times. In one of those cases, the person was a sort-of friend before and now no longer talks to me. And you know what? Fair enough. I don’t think I did anything wrong. I would probably respond the same way now. And the other person would still be allowed to have their own feelings about it. What I cared about was them being safe and alive, didn’t have the best options available to me to get them there, but did what I could.
I can understand wanting a more positive portrayal of therapy, but that’s also a case where the timeline of the comic is going to have a big impact. Most therapy takes time, you know? There are some modalities I’m aware of that seem to go faster for some issues and individuals, but those may not be available to the characters, who are going to mostly be relying on the on-campus counselling resources. These resources are often not the most helpful, for a number of reasons. Not to put down everyone who works at one; one of the issues is that the counselors are often stretched too thin. Another, in my experience anyway, is that you can’t really “try out” different therapists. If you don’t vibe with the therapist who gets assigned to you, you can try to deal with it, get referred out, or maybe get back on the waitlist. There’s also (again, in my experience) a decent amount of turnover among non-senior staff there, so maybe you do get a therapist you work well with, but then, before you’re through treatment, they move their practice elsewhere.
As for “stories need characters that develop”– well, I think a number of the characters DO develop, though I can see again how the pace of the comic can make the rate at which this happens frustrating. You also talk about characters who are getting worse, which is development. It may not be the type of development you want in the media you consume, which is, again, fair enough. I kind of love it, but to each their own. I also like when characters sometimes regress because it feels true to life. Recovery’s not linear, you know? I recently had a panic attack after not having had one for maybe two year. It sucked! It sucked for so many reasons. But that doesn’t mean the time in between was nothing.
Finally, and this is really more just a note, but Booster used they/them pronouns. Easy enough to miss if you’re reading fast and not looking through the comments, but yeah.
” I disagree that it’s meant to be any kind of “haha, autism” thing.”
It kinda landed that way for me. Dina was presented as a child and everyone related to her as a child at the beginning. Whe. Becky said she wanted to kiss Dina, the characters all squicked saying shes too young. Then Dina asserted her adulthood and kissed becky. It felt like Dina was presented a bit differently after that.
But i wasnt dismissing Dina’s parents for being autistic. To me it was kinda like the comic dismissed dina and her parents for a while there. And yeah her parents are great. When dina called them and said she was dating becky, they sent her $200 to take becky on a date. maybe i am forgetting other scenes, but i dont remember seeing them other than the elevator scene where they didnt do anything, and the phone call.
I was just hoping for a tad more face time from good adults here and there. The “parents just dont understand” trope is a thing, and its a fine trope.
“I can understand wanting a more positive portrayal of therapy, but that’s also a case where the timeline of the comic is going to have a big impact”
I think Sal says she had to see a therapist after robbing the convenience store. Dont remember if it ever says for how long. But i do seem to rememeber her appraisal was negative. Obviously court mandated therapy, or maybe it was parent mandated, is going to land different than someone going lf their own volition.
The only character i know of who said therapy is good was dorothy saying it to someone, but we dont see dorothy actually change as a result.
“Booster used they/them pronouns.”
I thought i used they/them. If i didnt it was not intentional.
Okay, real quick, just gonna check in with this: You know that none of these people are real, and that their behavior, growth, etc, are all fake, yeah? Because you’re extremely invested in the way they’re portrayed to a degree that makes me pretty worried.
Maybe the punchline others saw as it being more about Sarah’s family and her appreciation of silence didn’t land for you. But as for the completely other issue you then bring up… yeah, Dina’s infantilization early on isn’t great. It is something that has been discussed in the comments, and, as you mentioned addressed directly in the comic and then somewhat changed.
What you said when talking about how there aren’t healthy adults in the strip is, “The only adults who MIGHT be healthy are dorothys parents, but we never got to hear them say much more than “helllo”. Dina’s parents are supportive, but pretty clearly autistic like Dina.” Yes, that reads like dismissing them for being autistic. If your issue is that they, like Dorothy’s parents, don’t show up much, you could follow your “but” up with something about that like you did for Dorothy’s parents.
I think there can be lots of interesting media that focuses on good people and mostly has parents who do right by their children. There’s also value in media where that’s not the case, and as for what gets more screen time in a drama comic… yeah, what we get makes sense to me. And, like, my parents are pretty good people. I’m luckier in that regard than many of my friends were, and part of the impact in my early away-from-home-for-the-first-time college years was that discussions about parents between my friends and me would focus more heavily on stuff about my friends parents. “My parents sent me this picture of my dog and told me to keep an eye out for a care package in the next week” just takes less time to talk about than “My mom is threatening to withhold tuition if I don’t visit my dad when he’s in town, but that would mean missing this class that I’m already struggling with and also last time we talked, he hit me,” you know?
Sal did talk about having to go to therapy after the convenience stores, and she did have a negative view of it, but then you immediately hit on some reasons why that might have been, so. Dorothy does have a positive view of therapy, like you said. As for her not really changing as a result, Dorothy, in my opinion, started off as someone who was “pretty okay” (I don’t really like her as a character, but that’s something different), so how therapy “should” change her is more up to debate. It did seem like she mostly started therapy to help cope with immediate trauma, and it did that well. There was just then more trauma to cope with, and so things are ongoing. Beyond that, shifts to things like long held mindsets are back in the “takes more time” category, and getting to them is probably pushed back by the different, immediate traumas.
I appreciate that you didn’t intentionally misgender Booster, but “if” you did? You can literally look back at your comment where you used “him” (exclusively) for them.
What i was trying to say about Dinas parents wasnt thst i dismissed them, but that they seemed to be the butt of the joke in the elevator, which landed as treating them dismissively.
There are parents that are great, but they dont get face time and with Dinas parents they also seemed to get treated as a punchline.
“You can literally look back at your comment where you used “him” (exclusively) for them.”
I looked before i replied and didnt see anything. I only see half a dozen occurrences of the name Booster. Maybe my phone isnt searching properly? I sometimes get the comment section truncated? Its kinda weird. Happens a lot. Old phone maybe cant keep up? I generally go by the rule to call people by what they want ro be called. So. Yeah. I dont know what i said? But i can do a preemptive apology? Before i know what i said? I guess?
“Mike. He is an asshole but is cast as doing his asshole thing for the right reasons.” This isn’t my experience of Mike”
His first exposure, hes mainly a jerk
But then we have a flashback where Amber says the teacher marked questions wrong that were correct. Ambers afraid to confront the teacher. Mike does it. Teacher says she cant prove it but thinks amber cheated. Mike says “because shes a girl”. Mike then gets some kind of relationship with a football player, sets the teacher up for having a relatiomship with the football player, and gets teacher fired.
Mike wasnt going to birthday party until ambers dad runs imto him and is a jerk talking about amber. Then he goes. Once there he digs through receipts to get dirt on ambers dad and gets him to be nice to her.
He kisss ethan, saying he’s just bored, but it gets ethan to admit and accept being gay. And then ethan starts having gay flings. Prior to that he was dating joyce to try and not be gay.
I dont know if the intention of all these incidents was to make mike a good antihero, or not. But thats how it landed for me. He’s an asshole for all the right reasons. The sympathetic antihero.
When you write a story about young adults, having wise and reliable authority figures who can handle the problems robs the story of drama. Imagine if Harry Potter could get help from a teacher instead of dealing with the crisis himself at the end of every book. “Amber goes to therapy and gets better” is not as interesting as “Amber deals with her violent tendencies by becoming a vigilante”. Likewise with a lot of the violence and toxic relationships. Emotionally stable and happy characters mean less drama. In fiction the purpose is to engage and entertain the readers, not to reflect real life. I know Willis says it is semi-autobiographical but I’m sure some elements are highly dramatized or made up entirely. Taking it as a reflection of someone’s mental state is a stretch.
I’d also point out while we have noted over the year how different aspects of Willis show up in different characters, JOYCE is the one referred to as autobiographical in the section BowlerHatGuy is referring to, yet many of the issues used to support the idea that they were actually wondering if Willis is okay were things other characters experienced.
“Imagine if Harry Potter could get help from a teacher instead of dealing with the crisis himself”
Yes. This can be difficult to balance though sometimes. There are scenes in harry potter where im rolling my eyes because harry spends a huge part of one story trying to talk to dumbledore and dumbledore is a total idiot for the entire year. At tbe end of the story, dumbledore says “i didnt talk with you because i thought it would protect you”. No. The author needed to keep dumbledore away from harry so the story could last the school year. But in the middle of the story, it hits a point where youre screaming at dumbledore to quit being a shit.
There was a school shooting. A kidnapping. Another kidnapping. Three murders. 2 attempted suicides. Assault and a 60x stabbing. In a couple months. School might actually shut down. While a swarm of therapists descend on the entire campus.
But nope. No therapists. No counsolers. Half a dozen characters say therapy doesnt work. And at some point im screaming at dumbledote.
What the fuck is wrong with these commenters? Jennifer slammed Ruth into a wall simply for trying to be amicable, accused her of being a liar, and ranted twice now where she vilifies the shit out of Ruth, yet the one time Ruth stops playing nice you all start foaming at the mouth for her hanging.
You people are so goddamn obsessed with these fictional people and the need to treat them like they’re real that you hold literally EVERY SENTENCE under some kind of scrutiny. Nobody is allowed to be flawed or say something mean without thirty people being up in arms about it for one day, before doing the exact same thing to the character they were defending the next.
Go watch fucking Bluey or something if all this is too damn complex.
I’m not foaming. As you said, Ruth has (IMO) been in the right before, which is why I’m shaking my head now at this mistake. She’s playing into the narrative that Jennifer has been trying to set.
Feel you. Especially since my french autocorrect (when i forget to switch from texting or whatev) keeps thinking i must be meaning “a bref”. Things are rough out here.
Last time Billie was in this hall, didn’t she bash Ruth into a wall and go on an unhinged rant about Ruth’s alleged dishonesty? If nothing else, it’s probably smart to keep tabs on the violent ex, boundaries or none.
They’re both each other’s violent exes. I don’t care if Ruth escalated, two things can be true at the same time without both having to be mentioned regardless of which one we’re talking about.
I wasn’t really being contrary, just kinda saying it’s a good idea for these two to keep an eye on each other, in a one-sided way. I don’t always like adding the full picture to my comments, especially when my thought isn’t all that long.
There relationship was severe codependency. Both felt worthless by themselves. Both felt some worth due to the other person. Both then turned their relationship into a “i shall sacrifice myself for you” codeoendency nonsense. Look at the sacrifice i make for you!
And ruth seems to reverting to literally square one here. Where she has no value unless Jennifer sacrifices herself and pushes through Ruths barricade.
Billie should just walk away it would actuall be the most loving thing she could do for ruth because if she reinforces this codependency nonsense, shes just enabling some really dark, unhealthy stuff.
While very bad, I do feel like Jennifer keeps explicitly asking for these kinds of remarks and then rewarding them (“you’re finally being honest” or something similar).
I hate this so much but I’ve seen plenty of relationships that imploded and were messy for lengthy periods of time afterwards in exactly this manner. Very realistic.
Yeah I am calling BS on that one Ruth. Just because she didn’t throw a fit the LAST time doesn’t suddenly mean she didn’t try to work for it. The allegedly dozens of breakup attempts before that one also count.
For those who might see this and need it, please know that there are many people who see the stance of that opening quote, well-intentioned though it may be, as shit.
Developing self-love and self-compassion are worthy goals. You deserve it for yourself. If you are not there, you can still love others. You can still be compassionate toward others. Your efforts of love and compassion are not worthless because of your struggles with yourself.
I get that people are mad that Ruth’s doing a low blow, but after all the shitty vitriol Billie– I mean “jEnNiFuR” threw at her it would extremely satisfying if she finally got a chance to snap back.
I dont understand how it is harmful. It seems to perfectly explain Ruth and Jennifer. Neither one loves themselves and they both keep throwing themsleves into this suicide pact hoping to get someone to love them because they cant do it themselves. And they both have to work on themselves before they have a chance of working their relationship out. Even if “working it out” is a healthy amicable breakup instead of whatever this (motions up) is.
But right now, what ruth is doing to jennifer isnt love.
If you actually want to ask about how the quote you shared is harmful, you could try asking about it in today’s comments; I’m too tired to get into now, and most won’t be looking back here.
1) It’s not even a real Dalai Lama quote. Best I can tell, the real Dalai Lama believes the opposite — that you can’t love yourself until you first love others.
2) It’s a fucking hateful ideology. It is absolutely ridiculously untrue that you can’t love somebody else if you don’t love yourself. That’s just something shitheads made up to tell the depressed that they’ll never be worthy of human interaction. It’s trite, untrue, and terrible. Get that garbage away from my website.
3) Billie and Ruth cared for each other plenty without first having a high regard for themselves. The shitty maxim doesn’t even apply well to them.
“It is absolutely ridiculously untrue that you can’t love somebody else if you don’t love yourself. That’s just something shitheads made up to tell the depressed that they’ll never be worthy of human interaction.”
Everyone is worthy of love. Whoever said otherwise is truly a manipulative, gaslighting shithead. The quote was a clunky way of trying to convey a complex topic about codependency. But i definitely was not saying anyone is unworthy of love.
“Billie and Ruth cared for each other plenty without first having a high regard for themselves.”
Yes. But thats two different things. They each cared for the other. Buf for the most part, neither one had enough high regard for themselves, enough self worth, to let the other person’s love in. Thats the definition of codependent.
Everyone deserves love. Everyone is worthy of love. But a codependent is someone who doesnt feel worthy of love, someone who feels like they dont deserve to be loved. So they cant love themselves and they cant let anyone else’s love in. Codependents try to “earn” the others love through various sacrifices. But because they feel unworthy, they cant feel the other persons love, the sacrifice feels like it was for nothing, and then the sacrificer resents the other person. Guilt tripping, gas lighting, and other manipulations follow this resentment.
Ruth’s sacrifice is breaking up with Jennifer to “save” Jennifer, but then Ruth wants Jennifer to acknowledge this sacrifice. Jennifer’s sacrifice was trying to “save” Ruth to the point of being willing to die with her, but then Jennifer wants Ruth to acknowledge this sacrifice. And then when acknowldgement is not satisfied, physical violence breaks out. These two are the classic codependent archetype.
If these two are ever going to be in a healthy relationship, they both need to feel worthy of love once in a while. Then they can love themselves and let other peoples love in. Right now it seems like they both have a ways to go.
Hi! That’s not remotely close to what the shitty quote you shared, aka what people are responding to, said! Nor is it really a response to what Willis said!
Well, i know nothing in the original quote said anything about not being worthy of love. And that seemed far more important to deal with.
I wont use the quote again. I apologize for those it upset. It wasnt my intent to upset. It definitely wasnt my intent to suggest anyone is unworthy of love.
For me it captures the issue around codependency, but if its landing as saying anyone isnt worthy of love, i will be more careful.
“You are the only one who somehow got to that version of things????”
I mean, besides the comments saying the quote is “bad” or “harmful” or whatever, one of the few comments that said WHY it was hateful was “tell the depressed that they’ll never be worthy of human interaction”.
Which wasnt what i was trying to say. I dont think the quote is trying to say it either. But i have a positive history with this quote. It has helped me in the past. I’ve dealt with low self esteem and i’ve been in relationships with people with low self esteem. And this quote or variations of it has helped me. But if others are using it to attack people, then i applogize, it wasnt my intent. I didnt realize some use it to cause harm.
Which, again, is different than the things you are saying. I did suggest you bring it to TODAY’S DISCUSSION if you actually wanted to understand why people thought it was harmful (because you waited until past midnight to engage with the responses to your post, though you were around), but since I’ve already made the mistake of coming back here so much, okay:
Your words were “If you don’t love yourself, you cannot love others. You will not be able to love others. If you have no compassion for yourself then you are not able to of developing compassion for others.”
The issue with this is not that it’s saying that you are unworthy of receiving love, but that you are incapable of giving love. That you cannot be compassionate toward others. This idea can contribute to the suffering of those who are already dealing with mental health issues. In fact, many people who struggle to love themselves or be compassionate toward themselves love and show great care for others! What I had said initially in response to your post, before it was deleted, was that those who are struggling with themselves should not believe that their efforts of love and compassion are worthless.
Again, if you are interested in having a conversation around this, you could try bringing it to the current comment section. If it’s more important to you to have the last word or whatever, that’s fine (well, by me, anyway) and you can just respond to this however you want.
Have you deeply examined any if these sacharine ideas. They arent true.
“But a codependent is someone who doesnt feel worthy of love”
That isnt what makes a relationship codependant. and it really misses the point of that to make a personal attack.
“someone who feels like they dont deserve to be loved. So they cant love themselves and they cant let anyone else’s love in. Codependents try to “earn” the others love through various sacrifices.”
All the rest is basic Evangelical Christianity posing as psychology. No Doubt that was where it comes from. There is some psychology in there buried, but its been cut up and reassmebled by Evangelical authors , probably in the Prosperity Gospel tradition.
” ……Thats the definition of codependent.”
NO its not the defintion of codependant. That is just someone opinion pushing a wider agenda , probably to convert.
“Everyone is worthy of love” Are they though? Maybe as Babies. To get there you have to infantilize adults.
This is def religion posing as psychology. Look at your word choices, “worthy” “sacrificice” . This is Christianity in some flavor, probably influenced from the trite USA “self esteem movement” of the 80s and 90s.
You managed to use the word codependancy an actual codependent couple while totally ignoring and sidelining their actual shared addiction.
“Evangelical Christianity” … “Evangelical authors , probably in the Prosperity Gospel tradition.” … “pushing a wider agenda , probably to convert”
Look, i am sorry for whatever these evangelical christians did to try to convert you. Truly. But I’m atheist. I see different people get real value from all kinds of different religions and thats great. And i see agnostics and atheists who are real humanists. Im not trying to convert you. Whatever religion you have (or dont have) is fine by me.
““Everyone is worthy of love” Are they though? Maybe as Babies. To get there you have to infantilize adults.”
Well, i suppose it depends on what you mean by love. I know “love” to some people means “blind love”. Like the nitwits who say “if you dont love america, leave it”. Thats not love.
Pretty sure love is a lot more complicated and nuanced than that. And in that nuanced definition, yes, i do think everyone is worthy of love.
I think Becky kind touched on this at one point saying she thought her dad was in heaven, or at least that she didnt believe in eternal damnation of hell, that her dad didnt deserve that. Becky loved her dad that way. And at the same time she easily admitted hes a total asshole and was fine not having that asshole in her life.
one difference tween me and becky is i think everyone is worthy of love without me beliving in god.
Honestly, there are probably some things you disagree with the Dalai Lama about, and that’s okay.
I had more on this, but then I realized I didn’t know if your feeling bad was coming more from “I feel bad I disagree with the Dalai Lama” or from “I feel bad the Dalai Lama disagrees with me,” if that makes sense. But either way, I get the response of feeling bad about t, and I think that either way, you’re okay.
Whats fasicinating is this is both a Genre of fake Buddhist and fake Buddha quotes, but also a THEME.
There is a deep fake literature in precisely this theme , which has a history of being abused. There is a Fake ( or highly currupted ) Zen quote “Compassion isnt for other people, its for self”
Despite being very obviously Anti-buddhism, its accepted often harmlessly, because its taken to be a Koan meant to unfix traditional ideas. or Zen often uses SELF in a big sense for beingness not personality.
But it does also endorse dark triad narcissism , and has a long history of abuse.
But its probably a coincidence and just newly invented American New age therapy claptrap nonsense.
“There is a deep fake literature in precisely this theme , which has a history of being abused. There is a Fake ( or highly currupted )”
I dont know how to break this to you, but any text can be abused. Even whatever source you are referencing. There are shitty psychologists and shitty priests and shitty doctors and shitty monks.
Ruth and Billie both are super fuckin nostalgic for times that really shouldn’t be idealized. I agree with Becky: terrible couple really. They were there for each other when they were both spiraling into alcohol, Ruth into deepest hurt depression, Billie into lack of being aggrandized and also probably real depression too. Codependency ensued. A grand tapestry of travesties and being garbage was finally settled off camera, and the audience never forgave it.
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“IF IT WAS SO EASY, THEN WHY AM I STILL HERE”
wait no
No, I left because i was disgusted at how pathetic your attempt to get rid of me was! you didnt even put a single state line between us! Its like you werent even trying!
I’d say I’m glad Willis doesn’t do Friday cliff-hangers. But they’ve absokutely slammed us before, and I don’t want to tempt them into pulling out this pin and then cutting away while the grenade is rolling on the ground.
“And now for something completely the same!”
–Willis, hopefully
What we didn’t see is the four times Ruth launched into this when she heard footsteps, before getting the right person.
if only we hadnt already done both of this month’s bonus strips
I’m not seeing the winky face. Why am I not seeing the winky face?
Sierra: Well gee Ruth, I didn’t know you felt that way. I’ll try harder in the future.
“Unhindered her, Dan Backslide!”
I would pay to read those strips…especially if AT LEAST ONE of those tries was Carla. (Could accidentally get the same person more than once for added awkwardness… “All I want to say is…” “—nope sorry, just me again, carry on…”
Damn. Didn’t know American thanksgiving came with fireworks
Nah, that’s Black Friday. 😛
literally every american holiday is a cause for fireworks except the ones where it’s too cold
Its true. I grew up where fire works are illegal. Every New Year’s, Fourth of July, and and sometimes even holidays like Memorial Day are still sounded like a war zone. You cannot keep Americans away from gunpowder and shiny lights. (Its why the Canadian border has those giant fly-zapper put in front of all the gun stores. You didn’t think they were really relying on mounted police to keep us out did you?).
We had fireworks going off often enough that I just started pulling up a “what holiday is today” site to see what we were celebrating. It’s gotten some pretty random stuff.
In my area, the question is: was that fireworks or gunfire?
Not a clear distinction in many places. Assholes around the world like “happy fire” where you fire live ammunition into the air in celebration of something or other. And yes, people do sometimes get killed by this.
I promise if I die like this I will find a way to personally haunt the asshole who did it to me.
In my area, gunfire or just deer hunting season.
Yeah, right before the gridiron scrums.
We don’t have scrums. We have dog piles.
“You could’ve at least tried to kick the door down or break in through the window, geez“
Can we not start this again? You two are terrible. That’s not very complicated.
Life is a journey.
Time is a circle.
The door is ajar.
And its this, or we start the Joyce/Joe romance, where we watch Joe lose his mind from lack of intercourse in the longest character backslide since Jaime Lannister.
I don’t actually think Joe is that horny. He hasn’t had a hook up since coming back off break and he seems to be holding up okay. Plus haven’t you heard? Joyce is on hussy pills and has chosen to be free of her former self identified baggage.
They are both such awful people, I’m happy if we just assume they continue to be dramatic trash off screwn forever
At least she’s finally owning up to being angry and not burying it under 2 feet of cement. Doesn’t mean it’s not a really bullshit thing to say, but some of the stuff we feel is indeed bullshit.
Heaven Or Hell.
DUEL 3
LET’S ROCK.
Don’t you want a rematch?
“Run that back”-Ruth probably
Either Ruth is about to get whiff punished hard or she caught Billie walking back with a low. Question is if Billie’s gonna BURST.
Now I want them to do a DoA variant of the metaphor duel in Hell from Sandman.
Hang on. Are they both mad that the other one decided to end the relationship?
I realize this is a super low level of dysfunction for these 2, but still.
Yes.
Close. They are both mad that the other one let them decide to end the relationship.
This cannot end well.
Yeah, they might kiss.
I’m as over these two as Becky
I wish I could say the same.
BTW is it just me or does Jennifer’s butt look big in that last frame?
I mean….I’m looking respectfully.
well maybe not her butt, but like, the tied up shirt looks like it’s part of the wall or something? I dunno ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
technically
this is character development, besides Jennifer is a bit obese at least from the description of other characters
I actually think Jennifer’s posterior has been consistently large. She’s a big girl.
“Obese” has meaning and connotations. She’s a little on the round side, but only in all the extra-fun places and only compared to the toothpicks she’s surrounded by. Boney-ass white chicks all over the place.
Definitely obese is too strong a word for Billie.
By the way, people might be especially sensitive about all their body shapes today, please remember to be extra gentle on this topic. ♡
Why especially today, if you don’t mind my asking?
Thanksgiving can be extremely triggering for people with EDs
Ah, my issue was that I had no idea it was thanksgiving.
Thanks.
This is extremely true. We had a potluck with some friends last night, nothing super fancy really, and one person just… didn’t eat. We were told ahead of time that they might not, and asked not to Make A Thing about it, and my first thought was “Ah, probably an ED. Touchy subject, best be extra gentle”. Sometimes people are dealin’ with stuff, and it’s not our job to tell ’em not to, or to even bring it up if they haven’t done so first. Doubly so if we don’t know ’em very well.
I don’t like the term obese… She’s chubby and it’s pretty.
…. you locked and barricaded your door and then knocked off the door knob.
But only because she trusted Billie to get into her room anyway.
She didn’t know Mike would die and become Jennifer.
Huh? I missed those strips. So Mike is now a ghost possessing people?
No, he died and then physically transformed into Jennifer. Ever watch Doctor Who? It’s like that, except way funnier.
I think I prefer the symbiont idea from “Deep Space 9.”
That’s Star…Trek, right? I don’t know that show, so I’m not familiar with the “symbiont” thing.
Quick mockup of Shade of Blue’s dream character, Gigi Walkerton, the forgotten walkerton triplet who seduces jacob in a backless one piece swimsuit and has a pixie cut.
https://imgur.com/a/nVJdoXC
Say what you will about the Walkerton parents, they passed down some hella genes
It’s almost as if there was some alien genetic tampering.
Yeah…. almost 😏🛸
Yessssasssss
Oooh very cute
I might join the patreon to vote for her on the next poll 😙
YES! Hahahaha!
Thanks Yotomoe, this made my week. Gigi livessss!
That’s just “What if Walky was trans?”. Still good though.
Ah well that’s not at all what’s i was going for. Guess I’ll have to figure out ways to distance her design from Walky more.
Love it!
Ruth what are you doing
C’mon, Ruth. Just…. No.
jfc both of you leave it
If only we lived in a world where everyone could have the last word…
I know it sucks that the quest got vaulted but it’s still available at the exotic kiosk, and honestly it’s not really a top-tier exotic anymore.
WOW. whether I wanted it or not, I understood this reference!
It’d be nice if people weren’t obsessed with “the last word”, like it matters who says something last. I’ve had “let me have the last word” weaponised at me so many times, it just started rhyming with “don’t verbally acknowledge I said something to/at you”.
“I also hated letting you have the last word.”
For fucks sakes get over it!
(This was not supposed to be a reply to you Dean. And this was directed at Ruth)
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
“Huh.”
(etc :p )
I mean…considering you said, “Billie, we’re breaking up, g’bye” out loud with your mouth and then proceeded to barricade your door, after laying the groundwork with a third party so that Billie would actually believe you this time…YEAH, Ruth, I’d say that was pretty stupid assumption.
I’m interested to see where she’s going with this. Ruth is dysfunctional but I didn’t think she was so out of touch with her own prior motivations that she’d honestly pull a “how dare you believe the words I said to you out loud, with my mouth, and the actions I specifically took to make you not come back” after trying to break things off with Billie multiple times…then again, I think we only learned that she had tried this multiple times FROM Billie, so. Maybe she’s more of an unreliable narrator than I thought.
Out loud, with her mouth, in front of many witnesses no less!
We say ruth decide that she should break up with jennifer several times… It’s like, this one stuck, because it was casual, because it was premeditated, because she barricaded her room, and jennifer was still going to try to get back together the next day before raidah intervened. Frankly, raidah is ableist in ways that make it seem unsafe to be around her, and her motives might have been selfish… But i still think it was right of raidah to pull Jennifer away from this situation. (Sarah has been nice to Joyce, dina, and others, but has been consistently mean to Jennifer, and it feels good to know that Jennifer doesn’t have to see Sarah every day anymore, even though I like sarah)
Pretty sure Raidah is stealing anyone who is a friend of Sarah or Joyce as some sort of petty “revenge” plan against sarah and joyce. Radiah isnt going to help jennifer long term. And when the revenge trap is sprung and jennifer realizes shes just bait, she will be crushed and might just run back to Ruth. And they will go right back to beating the crap out of each other because neither one of them has learned anything yet.
These two are stuck in groundhog day. And we’re stuck with them.
Black Friday’s starting well
Jenny’s gonna walk laps ’round ya, Ruth, watch out
I’m actually really starting to dislike Ruth now. This whole thing was her fault to begin with. She chose one of the worst ways possible to dump someone and is now blaming her ex for what…respecting the breakup?
How dare you listen to me when I say we’re finished
Respecting my boundries and moving on when I asked you to move on? Deciding to heed my breakup and then getting mad you didn’t try to wrestle your way back into my life by force when I showed in no uncertain terms that I wanted you out of my life. How dare you not fight tooth and nail for a relationship I’ve proven is as flimsy as a paper mache wine glass.
Yeah, Ruth’s method of breaking up was not good, but I was still prepared to enjoy her presence in the comic. But this interaction makes it so much worse.
After the awful shit Jennifer has been saying to her recently to goad a responce from her, I can’t exactly blame her for starting this. It’s definitely unhealthy and she Should take the high ground but like, I can understand that it can be hard to do that when you try to be courteous and someone just fully rejects that at every turn.
It’s hard to justify that for me. Her courtesy only comes in after the complete lack of it she used to break up. Jennifer has a right to be bitter after the way Ruth completely shut her out, and afterward chose to act like was for Jen’s benefit. Except it wasn’t Ruth immediately folded on any pretense of altruism or empathy for Jennifer. This was all just pure selfishness because she was insecure in her relationship and decided to test Jennifer. A test Jennifer finally failed.
The only sympathy I have for Ruth is she’s clearly still struggling with her depression. That’s why she so easily talked herself into the breakup. I hope she turns a corner and starts trusting her own happiness instead of doing whatever this is.
Or maybe Ruth was conflicted herself and was doing it because she thought Jennifer would be better off without her, but now she’s in a low place and can’t handle it as well as she thought she could.
Oh my god their relationship is just an absolute nightmare. Whatever Ruth has been playing at since Halloween, it’s just awful.
Run, Jennifer. Run away. The mob boss’ grandson is the healthier option here.
“Healthy Decisions” is *not* the name of this comic.
It can be, if you squint extra extra hard.
This relationship is such a clusterfuck, it’s like one of those cartoon snowballs rolling downhill.
Nobodies winning here.
To quote ‘It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’:
This is not ‘Will they or won’t they’. This is ‘I know they won’t and I don’t want them to’.
Nobody’s winning here?
The readers are winning here.
Okay, the readers with a weakness for twisted relationships are winning here.
Okay, I am winning here.
I mean, it doesn’t even begin to make up for losing Mike, but still…
That’s not how relationships work Ruth you toxic piece of shit. God I hate every interaction these two have.
Where is the tolerance?
I am so sick and tired of them having this breakup discussion over and over and over.
But I’m simping so goddamn hard for Jennifer right now y’all. I can’t deny it.
That is a pretty good look for her. Respect.
https://imgur.com/a/wB7pfXX
Fuck it.
Ruth is just super thirsty for Jennifer. It all makes sense now! It’s gotta sting when your ex got hotter after the break up.
Ain’t that always the way.
Goddamn she is
Okay, I sympathized with Ruth until right now. Fuck her with this attitude. You don’t get to push someone away and then act like the victim when they take the hint.
Especially since she (claims she) broke up with Jennifer multiple times before it stuck.
Whatever happened to “No means no”.
Explicitly negotiated at the start of the relationship. “Don’t leave me, even if I’m stupid and try to make you.”
It’s a messed up relationship dynamic, but it was their deal.
You’ve got to look at in context, not just an abstract moment.
Asher is in for the hatefuck of his life and he didn’t even do anything
“I’m having a bad day, kindly fuck me within an inch of my life”
“Or as people used to say, hello?”
“Also i will need you to wear this Leafs jersey, don’t ask”
“Where the hell did you get th–”
“I SAID,” *jumps at his face crotch-first* DON’T ASK”
Now I want to see Ruth and Jennifer in adjoining rooms, each screwing their new man as loud and hard as possible to one-up each other in the “I”m over you” category.
“It’s not that I’m not enjoying this sudden burst of affection, only I’m roight chafed, innit.”
“Quiet, you. They’re up to seven already and we’ve barely hit six.”
“Jolly good then, carry on.”
Ruth both of you are in relationships now what is this
I think for Ruth its love. She probably doesn’t intend to try to have another relationship with Billie or try to betray or abandon Math TA dude (its late and the name is forgotten), but I think Ruth has a hard time letting go of people, even those she has tried to sever ties with. Perhaps because she lost her parents so young and unexpectedly.
Codependent obsession is probably a better word than love
That’s two words.
Cue hate sex montage
God if there was one I’d really hope it goes through the whole thing with them arguing the whole time and the background slowly transitioning to the bedroom with them slightly less dressed each panel.
👀That’s an excellent description for the ideal scenario with these two goobers. +3 Tokens of Approval.
Ruth e Jennifer must be a good title for a soap opera, right. A perfect mexican telenovela.
I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving!
If your country did not celebrate Thanksgiving yesterday – I hope it was a good day regardless.
What about Canadians? Where do they fit into your scheme?
I hope you had a good Thanksgiving back in October!
and that you have a good Thanksging next October. And that you find someone to box with on Boxing Day.
It was Brazil game on World Cup. So, it’s kind of holiday, because they close everthing here dureing the match.
Is that really today? It’s a two for one deal — World Cup Brazil Game AND Black Friday!!!! 🤩🤩🤩
*plays “Detroit Rock City” by KISS on hacked muzak*
God dammit, Ruth. Why am I the one who’s drunk but you’re the one acting like an asshole?
Dang ruth, would you rather have died together then?
i’d have thought she’d stop antagonizing her for this reason unless her reasoning is “oh i’m not suicidal anymore ,we can have a proper healthy relationship now”
Ruth trying to make Jennifer hate her again?
a transition between groups of characters talking, just by walking down the corridor. Nice ! I like it
I predict the two having sex and causing problems
source? me and my ex did this exact thing 2 years ago at 20 (although the breakup circumstances were less dumb and less violent)
Damn. Ruth just threw down the gauntlet. Can we expect an angry, curse ridden shouting match? Or maybe full on Mortal Kombat?
Bedroom sparring.
Is that what they’re calling it these days?
That’s what some dragon ball z comedy shows on YouTube are calling it.
I want to say it was dbz abridged, but I’m not sure.
Goddamn, Ruth is hot when she’s pissy. Or wearing green. Or leaning out of a doorway.
Shut up.
You’re not wrong.
I’m righter than everyone.
Ruth, YOU broke up with HER. You don’t get to be the one who ends the relationship and also the hurt party.
I’ve been there. It happens. You just don’t get to be justified.
Billie needs a restraining order tbh.
Jennifer. I will never remember before I post, I swear.
For all that I think that these two desperately need to not interact with one another for at least ten years, and physically keeping their distance from one another would be helpful (and given the mutual propensity for violence when either of them is angry, doubly a good idea), Jennifer isn’t here about Ruth. Becky explicitly went and brought her over to talk to Joyce on the grounds that she thought Joyce needed Jennifer’s help.
Oh yeah not like Jennifer needs to be served papers. She should get a restraining order against Ruth so Ruth has to stop talking to her.
I’m gonna believe this is going somewhere. Like this isn’t all she’s gonna say… And the next words will make me go like “Ohhhh!” Instead of “Um… Oh.” Because the reason Ruth broke up with Jennifer wasn’t a bad one. The whole “I tried to get you to kill yourself with me” thing sounds like a horrible thing to grapple with after getting your more rational thoughts back. Bad wording but hope I got what I meant across.
Has she even told jennifer the reason why they broke up or her thought process…? Has dorothy told jennifer…? If it came out of the blue and jennifer *still* doesn’t know, that contextualizes things
I don’t think so. I hope this convo leads up to her revealing the reason.
Ngl, I’ve had it up to here with this relationship. This is so ridiculously toxic I can’t even stand it. She broke up with her, made it explicitly clear she was not wanting to be chased and is now mad and fighting her ex for not chasing her because it means she’s not trying hard enough?
Like for gods sakes just stop talking to each other please.
…
That’s it. I don’t understand girls, period.
You’re probably fine. It’s these two idiots who have the problem.
hi there’s like 4 billion of us and we’re all different people and also these two are fictional and mentally ill
so start with that
You may want to say that type of shit in the privacy of a therapy session, or a conversation with a consenting, caring, level-headed, non-incel friend.
But this is a trash thing to say in public, please don’t (and flagged)
Take care of yourself <3
What’s not to understand? 🤨
No really, do tell.
How are you supposed to understand women when they are all different unique different individuals. I mean, it’s not like men where they are all basically Walky, Danny, oe Joe, with the occasional Mike thrown in.
I mean, if we’re ignoring all the guys who don’t adhere to those loose archetypes, yeah. I can’t tell if you’re being serious.
I don’t understand most humans in general. Probably due to me being autistic in a world built for and run by neurotypicals.
I didn’t mean for that to be taken seriously, so I apologize. Out of context, that sounds pretty bad.
Damn it Ruth.
I love you, but you effing broke the handle and placed a large desk on the other side.
Jennifer is not Amazi-girl to hang from windows. Geez.
She loves Jennifer. And in her eyes Jennifer has been acting like their relationship is no big deal. She hasn’t seen Jennifer’s concern for her, because she was pretty much out of it at the time. That’s gotta hurt. And meanwhile, love has been demanding that she break up with Jennifer. That’s gotta hurt worse.
I’m not saying this exchange is healthy but it’s understandable.
We saw Ruth barricade the door, but we didn’t see Jennifer try to breach it. She just looked at the broken doorknob and moved on.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2022/comic/book-12/05-this-was-halloween/murder-2/
A couple strips earlier, she said “I’ll just pick the lock to her room later, sneak into bed, and tomorrow things will be fine. This happens literally all the time.” That fits her pattern of downplaying and deflecting problems instead of confronting them, which became a point of contention when Ruth pulled out of her downward spiral.
I think that’s the context behind today’s panel 4. It’s very “apparently I wasn’t worth fighting for, just being taken for granted”, as I read it.
Walk away, Billifer. Just keep walking. Do not engage.
Ruth [glad you’re happy]
Jennifer: Fuck you no you’re not fuck you
Ruth: ok yeah I’m actually kinda mad now that you mention it
y’all: fuck you ruth
Make it make sense.
In my case it’s more of a request/wish.
yeah this whole time that interaction has been in my head, i feel like some people might have forgotten it. It was like, an absurdly shitty escalation from jennifer that I can understand why it rattled ruth.
I sorta assume that shes been spending the past day or so just thinking about the relationship, and is now spitefully saying something pretty mean just to try to prove her wrong.
I’m just “Fuck their toxic ass relationship all together, keep those two as far apart as possible”
Getting really tired of hearing “toxic” get thrown around like a buzzword.
Let the storyline play out in its entirety before you judge the relationship. Please.
We’ve been watching their relationship for nearly 10 years now. How much more do we need?
Yeah, this is explicitly what Jennifer wanted from her, only Ruth stewed on it before answering. It’s not uncalled for, just, way after the fact.
(When I say it isn’t uncalled for, I am mostly saying it’s not a total non-sequitor. I definitely don’t think it’s a rational way to approach a relationship, being so hot and cold and then getting angry when it isn’t followed through on, but yeah, feelings are not always rational, especially in an already heavily mercurial relationship.)
Yeah you’re right tbh. She basically just said what Jennifer WANTED to hear. It doesn’t make much sense, but it’s what she wanted. I don’t really want these two together, personally. But yeah they’re both the problem. Jennifer for escalating, Ruth for… Unsure. This sentence? I’m of the belief that her reason for breaking up is completely understandable.
Look at the comic and tell me this is not kinda toxic.
This is not kinda toxic. It’s entirely toxic. It needs a biohazard sign. It should be encased in concrete and fired towards the sun.
I already agreed with Jennifer in the last exchange too. I’m not changing my mind. I’m reiterating my opinion.
To me Ruth is the reason Jennifer is angry. She initiated all of this with the breakup. Jennifer did escalate things as a reaction to that and Ruth trying to justify her methods by using Jennifer’s happiness as proof.
It’s not an “I’m glad you’re happy.”
It’s an “I’m glad you’re happy because of what I decided was best for you.”
Even if the reality is true and the breakup was good for them (which I now believe) it’s still not okay what Ruth did. Saying after the fact that she did expect Jennifer to come back makes a bad decision worse.
SO, HEY WILLIS! WHAT HAVE SAL AND DANNY BEEN UP TO SINCE WE LAST SAW THEM? LET’S SEE MORE OF THOSE GUYS!
I don’t understand. Why would you want to break Sal and Danny up?
This is worse than I imagined. Ruth is so used to violence with Jennifer that now she’s the one stopping her saying some pretty crazy things. At least Ruth has finally stopped asking Jennifer for forgiveness every time she sees her. Let’s hope this closes the door for good and she will try to be happy, with Janos or with anyone else.
*Nom nom* this popcorn is delish *nom*
This feud can only be resolved through trial by combat.
They’re still going at it though 🤔
“How dare you respect my clearly established wishes.”
We get it Ruth, you’re a toxic bongo who needs to be the victim even when you’re the one hurting others.
MAKE OUT
THIS CAN BE SO EASY
Oh look, it’s Ruth. Hi Ruth. Also, fuck alllllllll the way off, Ruth.
Honestly I have a lot more sympathy for Ruth than most people in the comments here. I know what it’s like to be in a really dark place and get this distorted thought stuck in your head that your friends don’t REALLY care about you, that all your relationships are insubstantial and everyone around you is just looking for an excuse to leave you. And so you just start pushing, start lashing out at people you care about, to try and drive off the flakes. And what you really want is for them to push back, to reject your rejection, and prove that they care enough about you to fight to keep you in their life. So, yeah, I get it, I really do, and I also get feeling angry in the aftermath at someone for “proving that they didn’t really care.”
….. but, at some point, you need to realize that all of that was depression distorting your view of the world, that no one can really be expected to psychically intuit your secret desires while you’re trying to hurt them, and that if someone takes you seriously and walks away, that it’s on you to explain yourself and try and fix things.
Of course, I don’t think Ruth understands ANY of what I just said, so I expect this relationship to continue to be a massive trainwreck of seething resentment for a long time to come.
…hm. this is something I’m going to think about for a while.
Huh. Food for thought.
Yeah, thats textbook codependency.
A person doesnt love themselves so they cant love others. They feel no self worth, so they try to get others to validated their worth for them.
Jennifer didnt love herself, so she couldnt really love Ruth. All Jennifer could do was sacrifice herself to Ruth and die with Ruth.
Ruth didnt love herself, so she couldnt really love Jennifer. All she could do was sacrufice her wants and push Jenn away to try and “save” her, but she also wanted Jenn to validate her sacrifice.
Neither one of these two loved themselves, so they couldnt love anyone else. And all they could do was sacrifice themselves to try to win love from the other. But since neither could love, they are trapoed in this catch 22, groundhog day.
The only way out of this trap is if each starts getting some self worth so they can love themselves. Only then can they really love anyone else.
Yeah, well. That’s what you get, Ruth.
The author just tossing grenades now.
Ok, so, i just binged the entire comic, which means i didnt read any comments that might have explained this, but, is David Willis OK?
The casual violence in this strip is shocking. Ruth and Jennifer have committed battery on each other multiple times. Amber was a vigilante. Ambers dad worked for the mob and murdered Beckys dad. Beckys dad committed kidnapping twice. Amber stabbed gash-face 60 times? (Psst. Thats not self defense) Both Joyce and Becky were hit as children. Dina said she was physically bullied as a child.
And the mental health of a lot of characters is unhealthy. Suicidal characters include Ruth, jennifer, and Amber (and sarahs freshman roommate). They all claim to be going to therapy now, but none of them seem to have improved much. Maybe ruth improves, but she constantly regresses. Ruth and amber have both stated that their therapy isnt working. Jennifer seems to be getting better, and yet shes hanging out with Asher (who helped ambers dad kidnap everyone) and Raidah (who is lying and conniving to “steal” all of Sarah and Joyces friends away from them out of revenge for sarahs freshman roommate and joyce “stealing” jacob, who wasnt a good fit for her anyway)
Joe is into one night stands like his dad? Maybe? Part of me wonders if at some point Joe confides to Joyce that it was all an act and he only had sex with like 3 women total. Roz has a healthy relationship to sex but is portrayed as bit of a busybody, throwing her privilege around and berating Joyce for growing.
So many adults are messed up. control freaks include ambers dad, ruths grandad, beckys dad, joyces mom, joyces missionary embezzling brother, sal’s mom. Ambers stepmom. Ethans mother, and also possibly father.
Messed up adults include ambers mom, joes dad, sal’s dad, representative desanto, genddr studies teacher with with a name based on a pun on the word lesbian, the biology teacher who is a sociopath, two math teacher assistants fired for having sex with students. Jennifers parents were rich assholes.
There isnt a single healthy adult character in the strip. Joyce’s dad seems to have started down that path, but he has a lot of deprogramming to do. Leslie is a good teacher and was helpijg becky but eats like a 5 year old and is has such low self esteem that she cant date.
The only adults who MIGHT be healthy are dorothys parents, but we never got to hear them say much more than “helllo”. Dina’s parents are supportive, but pretty clearly autistic like Dina. Their autism was the punchline of one comic. I cant remember the specifics but i think dina and her parents were all inthe elevator with sarah, and the last panel was dina and parents standing in silence.
Joyce is autistic. Has cult deprogramming to do. Has a seriously warped relationship to corporal punishment. Is in massive denial about sex.
Becky seems unstobbably positive. And yet i keep seeing glimpses that maybe its a facade, like take away joyce and she would shatter. I cant tell if shes just so friggen happy, of if she is in complete denial of soooooo much unacknowledged grief about her parents.
Students who do the best they can do in a lousy situation are demonized. Sarah had a suicidal roommate and tried to get her help and Raidiah and all.her friends hate her for it. Carla reported Ruth and Billie for suicidal preparations and they still throw the stink eye at Carla.
Ethan needs therapy badly. His parents harrassed him for coming out as gay, something he never recovered from. And then he saw his best friend die, which turned him into goth ethan. And no one is noticing? Amber is, but she has zero skills. And he thinks Danny “stabbed him in the back”? I missed where that came from?
The students who DO try to look out for others are all shown as busy bodies. Dorothy helps everyone she can, but she apparently has no “charisma” according to Jennifer. Jennifer is head cheer leader, alpha bongo, problem solver who helps people, but is incapable of helping herself, is mixed up with bad boy asher, and cant see Radiah’s manipulations. Sarah helps, but shes presented as a misanthrope who helps others simply to reduce the distracting drama in her life.
Which brings us back to these two suicidal codependent knuckleheads. Jeebus. Both of these two have SERIOUS personal issues that are their own personal responsibility to deal with. Ruth has dead parents, got moved around, was taken in by her asshole grandfather, all of which she needs therapy for, on top of which, she may have some sort of neurological issue requiring medication for the rest of her life. NONE OF WHICH IS JENNIFERS FAULT. Jennifer has useless, clueless, asshole parents, crashed while drunk driving and killed her friend, all of which she needs therapy for. NONE OF WHICH IS RUTHS FAULT. And yet these two idiots always blame the other for their problems. Jennifer thinks wanting to die for Ruth is sort of weapon to abuse Ruth with? And Ruth thinks “i will sever l relationships to save everyone but me” is a different kind of weapon to abuse Jennifer with? You two need to stop blaming the other for your problems. You are both messed up, totally by yourselves, and its unfortunately something you have to deal with yourselves. With therapy maybe, but without blaming others for your lousy choices.
Every time therapy comes up, its from a character that says it doesnt work, its useless, its a waste, or its someone to fake being normal to. And then there’s Boomer who is replacement Mike who is a Psych? Major? Whose introduction includes him accurately assessing ambers psychological problems, and amber calling him a weirdo for it.
So, are any of these characters ever going to get to the point of whst might be considered ‘healthy”? There has been a lot of development with Joyce going from fundie cult member to someone who accepts people for who they are, but who has years of cult programming to un-program, has possible ptsd from multuple separate incidents.( Getting roofied, two separate kidnappings, seeing beckys dad murdered before her eyes, mike dying. ) and is currently facing an existential crisis due to her loss of faith.
i cant think of any character who is what i would call a healthy, emotionally stable, mature person?, does David willis know what that llooks like?
Like is this Ruth/Jennifer thing always going to be a never ending train wreck? Will ruth ever stop cutting off Jennifer to “save” them from her? Will Jennifer ever stop sacrificing herself to “save” ruth? Will they ever stop being 2 codependents with self esteem issues?
The commentary here on the content of the strip strikes me as fair game. The comments on the author’s mental/emotional health and maturity as extrapolated from what they choose to write about seems uhhhhhhh extremely misguided, not to mention unnecessarily rude. Jackass behavior towards a real, non-fictional person, in fact. (Do you do this with all the fiction you read or watch? If so, I would recommend not doing that. If it’s just something you’re doing here, in reaction to this one comic strip…I would also suggest not doing that.)
I had one sentence asking if he was ok. The entire rest of the comment was about so many characters being unhealthy. And the reason i asked specificay was because the “read this before posting” says Joyce is autobiographical. And i was wondering how much.
Ruth/jennifer are seriously messed up. Even after getting what the comic portrays as professional help on a significant level, Ruth is barely any better. And this specific comic today, ruth berating jennifer for not fighting to stay in a toxc relationship is …. toxic. This is showing Ruth exactly the same as when she was firet introduced. She is gaslighting jennifer. Guilt tripping her. If ruth is seeing a therapist, her therapist SUCKS.
but then none of the characters are getting much better, as the laundry list mentined in my previous post. And some are getting worse. Joyce went from militant religious to militant atheist. Dorothy is hiding her acceotance to yale? Ethan is suicidal.
None of the characters are remotely healthy even after years and years of comics.
I was drawn to joyce trying and growing but shes got a loooong way to go and so many around her are suffering.
Remember that years of comics translates to a few months for the characters. They haven’t been in college very long.
Yeah, it’s been like five minutes. If anything, Joyce’s “development” (if we really need to call it that) has been wicked fast by our mortal standards. If I changed so much so quickly at her age, I’d have people badgering me about my drug problem, demanding to confiscate my stash, taking my laptop to check for weird cult emails, making sure I wasn’t being groomed by some 37-year-old guy named Kyle, the whole nine yards.
But I’m sure Other People had it all figured out by the end of their first semester of college.🙄
Even after getting what the comic portrays as professional help on a significant level, Ruth is barely any better.
That’s to be expected. Mental illness is not easily fixed with a few months of therapy and meds, no matter how good the therapy and meds are.
The part about Joyce being partly autobiographical makes the snide comment about the author’s mental health more inappropriate, not less, my dude.
“Is he ok?” Wasnt snide. I just binged the entire dumbing of age comics. I havent read the comment sections. I dont know what has been discussed when stuff like Ruth+suicide happened. I DO know that the “read before commenting” said Joyce is autobigraphical, the religious fundie deprogramming was basically what he went through.
Did anything come up in the comments when suicide came up? When therapy always sucks came up? Some times when a story is about suicide, there is a psa at the end with a phone number to a suicide hotline, etc. Was anything like that mentioned? Maybe just a “dont worry, this part isnt autobiographical”?
Maybe because i read a decade of comics in one swoop, the suicidal stuff, and the depressiin stuff, and the codependent stuff, comes across a lot stronger than if i read it one comic a day.
But seeing a LOT of very dark behavior, knowing that SOME of this is autobiographical, and asking Is everything Ok? wasnt me being snide.
Sure is concern trolling, though!
Good grief. Its not concern trolling. Im not trying to derail anything. I just binged read like 10 years of comics in maybe 2 weeks. Because i do really like them. But getting all the suicide, depressions, murder, kidnapping, split personalities, the abusive parents, assault, attempted rapes, and reading many many many times from many different characters that therapy doesnt work, the whole thing lands as pretty friggen dark. This all happens in one semester and a some of these kids would have ptsd, having nightmares of being thrown into a pile of bodies in a basement, and so on. I read it in like two weeks, so its pretty grim all at once.
It wasnt concern trolling. Just concern. and i couldnt read through ten years of comments, so i was asking if like it ever cam up. And if didnt, then fine. Maybe spread out over ten years, it would have landed as meh.
“I didn’t like this aspect of the work I voluntarily read, so I’m going to actually voice out loud, in the comments section of the work, which is maintained and moderated by the author, that I think that this work is the work of someone who’s all fucked up in the head, because only fucked-up people write about fucked-up stuff.”
Same idea, so many fewer words.
It’s not actually your business whether or not Willis is “okay,” by the way. They don’t owe you a damn thing about the state of their physical, emotional, or mental health. That’s what makes it inappropriate to invoke it in the context of discussing *your* reaction to the creative work they’ve produced, and what makes it concern trolling to double down and insist that no, really, you’re just WORRIED about anybody who could write ten years worth of material that covered (gasp) a lot of challenging themes and some upsetting content. You’ve enumerated at length and with great specificity how much and what exactly about the comic bothers you, and I appreciate that you’re prepared to argue from examples; like, no faulting your level of engagement with the text and all, but also? That is 100% a you concern. It is fully on you to explore and process your feelings about this material without projecting *your* sense of upset or dissatisfaction onto the mental state of the author.
DIdnt read any of this but I think he’s fine. A lot of this needlesss complication is just good storytelling. If everyone worked through their issues and acted rationally from day 1 it wouldn’t be a hilarious and edge of your seat style adventure. It would not be very fascinating if some guy was just. Fine. Just doing okay.
I disagree with that last bit, if only on a contextual level. I’d love to have a character in something really grimdark or pessimistic, for example, who’s just doin’ okay. Just a very level, balanced person in a completely wretched world, and nobody’s sure how to approach or think about that character.
Not an extremely weird and skewed framing at all, that first part. Very normal thing to say. Definitely doesn’t flavor the rest of the comment in a way that resembles “video games cause violence”, wherein media being negative in some way is inherently an indicator of a real human’s mental state and/or influence on their real-life behavior.
If you want something less “casually violent” (lmao), with less iffy interpersonal conflict you could try Teletubbies.
I ask if any character is getting better in this comic world of abusive, cult like, gaslighting, physical abuse, emotional repression, and rampant denialism, and you tell me if i dont like it maybe i should “watch teletubbies” instead?
Ask about Bruno. Get a chorus about how we dont talk about Bruno.
Bruno got what he deserved.
Bruno was gaslit and blamed for things he had no control over and then ostracized by his family for it. So, no. Bruno did t deserve it.
Didn’t you hear the song? He killed people’s goldfish and caused hurricanes and stuff.
Please tell me you’re being sarcastic…?
I may have been just a wee bit sarcasm-adjacent, yes.
Although from a certain perspective, he did get the best song in the movie, and he deserved that after all the bullshit he had to put up with, so he got at least one thing he deserved, just in a good way and not a “vindictive to this fictional character” way.
He didn’t really get to sing the best song in the movie, though… but I do appreciate that if you took a sampling of people and said, “Name a character in Encanto,” Bruno would be the leading character-name response. (motherfucker barely in the poster, but this is a movie about HIM, yknow?)
TL;DR
Except that one bit about “healthy, emotionally stable, mature” people. I know you know what a teenager is (and isn’t). You’ve definitely met some. You’ve been one, and if you haven’t, you should wait until afterward to comment on people’s mental health. Especially real people.
Except all the adults in the comic are messed up as well.
Grown-ups can be messy, too. This is not shocking or novel.
All of them? Seems a little shocking.
Maybe i am in a weird situation where i know some “healthy, emotionally stable, mature” adults in my personal life and expect everyone knows at least one person like that.
Some of the growth Joyce has gone through is truly amazing, deep, rich, insightful, powerful, and human.
But the adult world in this comic seems to be populated by a lot of …. i dunno what it would be called… cardboard characters created by a goth high school kid? A mix between “parents just dont understand” and “adults suck” or something.
Joyces character and development is so multidimensional. The adults in this world are astonishingly flat.
Yes, all of them. All of them can be messy. The main cast is so dysfunctional, it would be jarring for their parents to be completely tidy. It’s unreasonable to expect everything to be nice and clean and “healthy” (whatever that means) all the time.
And yes, the adults in this world often suck, just like they do in reality, but there’s plenty of nuance there that you seem to be ignoring to make some kind of point. Amber’s mom, for one example, is a little less than perfectly helpful with her daughter sometimes, but she does try and she’s also had to put up with Blaine’s abuse for years on end so it’s understandable if she’s just ever so slightly fried on occasion. I won’t be giving other examples, but let’s not be silly here.
“The main cast is so dysfunctional, it would be jarring for their parents to be completely tidy”
Ok. I get maybe i am criticizing something that people hold dear and they may feel the need to attack anything short of glowing 5 star reviews. If thats not what youre doing, then i think i was pretty clear i would have been happy with ONE healthy adult being shown here and there. Not rewite it so all the parents of the main cast are healthy adults, but maybe give Dorothys parents some face time and we find out they are happily married, support Dorothy, and love her, and maybe worry shes just a tiny bit too hard on herself.
” It’s unreasonable to expect everything to be nice ”
Again, i am giving DoA a 4 out of 5 star review. If you cant allow that, ok, i’ll adjust. But I am in no way expexting EVERYTHING to be nice.
a healthy, happily married couple who doesnt beat or gaslight or kidnap their children would, in my humble opinion, be nice to get some face time and dialogue.
Still a good comic. Just channels some subtle “parents dont understand” silliness the way it is now.
Consider Hank – who’s had his problems, but is definitely on a growth path.
But mostly, we don’t see the healthy parents because we see parents when there’s drama between them and their kids. And we also see a largely flat view of them because we’re seeing them through their kid’s eyes.
Dina’s parents are a healthy, happily married couple who don’t beat or gaslight or kidnap their children.
“If you can’t allow that” Be more secure in your own opinions. I don’t have any need or desire to “allow” your weird numerical review (on a website that’s not even mine), that’s not my decision to make for you. Take responsibility for your own thoughts and don’t be so defensive when somebody disagrees, you’re not under fucking attack. And not that it’s got anything to do with the price of tea in China, but this comic isn’t someing I “hold dear”, it’s a series of pictures I’m interested in discussing sometimes.
I will say though, using Dorothy’s parents as a specific example is funny to me, because in their few appearances, we’re more or less told they’re exactly what you want. Maybe they could be slightly more verbose about it, but they’re completely fine and are shown to be supportive of their weird daughter. Hell, Mike’s parents’ only flaw seems to be that they’re a little too nice. Dina’s parents are like Dorothy’s but quieter, and haven’t we been told in-comic, by Dina, that they’ve fought for her to get her autism diagnosed in the past? Do they just not count because they’re quiet? The good parents aren’t the focus because they’re not causing problems like the shitty ones are, but they do show up for the big crises when they’re really needed, and we’re explicitly shown them supporting and comforting their kids. It’s like you’re ignoring that because you want it to be untrue or something. If you misremembered, that’s fine, but it’s not everyone else’s job to remind you before you post a novel about it.
While Amber’s mom is often over her head, she has my eternal respect for surviving and eventually getting herself and her daughter as far from Blaine as she could. Joe is worried, but currently, she and Joe’s dad are happy together. Mike’s parents were absurdly normal (like out of a Norman Rockwell painting). We’ve never met them, but Willis has mentioned that Mary’s parents are fine and not to blame for how Mary is turning out.
This was brief and a super long time ago, but Sierra’s dad also seemed to really have his act together. (He tried to deescalate Blaine when Blaine was shouting in the hall. It was brave, and the right thing for him to do.) Sierra seems to be doing just fine, along with Mandy and Grace and Other Rachel and Jacob and Riley and all the other characters that we don’t see too often. (It’s kinda become a running gag in the commentary: while we like seeing more of our favorite characters, we know that wishing to see more of them is like wishing the characters to live in Interesting Times, they’re far safer offscreen!) So, people doing OK definitely exist in this world. It’s just, this comic focuses on the hot messes, who generate oodles of drama for the viewers.
In other words, we see a lot more of the characters with big exciting problems, because big exciting problems tend to be interesting to write and read about.
The whole comic is basically a character-driven soap opera set in college. It’s rarely a low-stakes slice-of-life story like “Joyce & Walky!”, nor is it a morality play where the whole point is picking up who is the goodguy/badguy (you didn’t make this mistake, but we often do, here in comments-land, so I like to mention it).
If you’ll like an ensemble portrait piece / character-driven soap opera, sweet! And either way, glad you 4-outta-5 mostly-enjoyed your comics binge. Welcome!
I mostly agree with this comment!
I feel that it’s a little condescending to suggest that dysfunctional parents are coming from a “goth kid” perspective– that’s some people’s lived experiences, not any form of immaturity. Some people don’tget to grow up around healthy, supportive adults who understand what they’re going through (abuse). It’s not a bad thing to portray that.
I like 80% agree with what you have to say though 😛
But why is it shocking? Because it would be shocking to happen across a group so dysfunctional on real life? This cast is curated, not a random sample.
I mean if there were emotionally healthy level headed adult figures guiding these characters there would be way less drama, and its a drama webcomic, hence this particular group of characters within the broader world portrayed in the narrative has only messy or actively malicious older adults and parents. Except for Dina’s parents who aren’t especially present in the comic but who have been very much supportive of Dina her whole life while being emotionally stable leveled headed people. Also Sierra’s parents… Although they… Also aren’t super present. I also assume some of the emergency response team people who were there for becky were level headed adults, and there was that one black male police officer, and a few other characters i might not be thinking of off the top of my head…?
That’s all honestly a fair reaction to this comic. I think one of the main things is that a lot of healthy behaviors aren’t as often shown off screen with the expectation that you’d see healthy behaviors in real life and that they’re not as novel or dramatic as unhealthy behaviors—this webcomic is meant to entertain and it uses drama to do that.
As someone who’s been to therapy i can tell you that a lot of therapists are useless for PTSD or specialize in specific types of clients. Booster didn’t really take offense to being called a weirdo, and it feels different coming from someone else who’s a self described weirdo, so that wouldn’t have been hurtful. Also, booster was really disrespecting everyone’s boundaries and potentially endangering people by throwing peoples issues around out in the open. Their character is ribbing at psych majors overall, and frankly, a lot of therapists have that kind of attitude. (I’m not a psych person but I’m generally pretty decent at reading people and that itself can be overwhelming for people, if I share what I’ve analysed.)
Sarah presents herself as a bongoy misanthrope who only wants less drama as a defense mechanism She hides her positive emotions and jokingly criticized Joyce for being able to tell when she’s happy.
Leslie is honestly just a realistic character for me. She’s been through a lot, she’s accomplished a lot in spite of that, and her current issues are the type to take years to address. And she’s like, mid to late 20s? She’s fine.
One thing you haven’t figured out is that the “help” people get for being suicidal is often bad enough to drive people to suicide! People experience abuse as psych patients! Families can be abusive even under the guise of helping! Ruth having a pretty good/okay experience in the psych hospital was a twist and leading up to that would have been suspense It feels like you don’t have the real world knowledge to understand: Ruth’s home isn’t safe. if ruth and jennifer could have asked for help without that being a huge fucking risk, they probably just would have!
Joyce fundie cult stuff is realistic… Also: Jennifer didn’t kill her friend?? She crashed the car with Alice in it, who then criticized her for it later… So… There??
I will admit they show some positive growth, like Joyce getting glasses. She resisted, friends held her hand, she got glasses, and is demonstrably better for it.
But i dunno if i buy the “therapy sucks” that every character reports back. Dorothy said something a long time ago that tberapy is good everyone could benefit, but we never saw a before/after of what changed for dorothy. And then dorothy said sonething about how her therapist said to reinterpret traumatic incidents as great experience, so dorothy put being kidnapped on her resume? Feel like she misunderstood or her therapist is terrible.
And i know not all therapists are perfect. A lot of them are clueless. But some can really help. Therapy in this comic comes across as one big gaslighting grift. No one in this comic is helped by it, but a bunch are doing it? Oh, forgot, Sal saw multiple therapists after robbing convenience store, and said they were worthless. Just feel like statistically, at least one person woukd have gotten a good therapist by now.
This comic doesnt match my experience at all.
Leslie is fine for her history. Shes got some stuff to get over though. Woulda been cool if she was shown to be late thirties and happily married to a woman she loves and loves her. Could still have her terrible past, but gotten to the other side.
Joyces fundie cult is mos def realistic. It woulda been nice if her closeted… transgender? brother (sister?) could maybe guide joyca a bit? Or at least give joyce the understanding of escaping a cult that she could use.
I mean, isnt that ultimately the biggest lesson? Dont keep it bottled up. Talk with people who understand you.
Ruths home isnt safe. Yes. But in this comic right here, Ruth is blaming and guilt tripping Jennifer. Ruth MUST have said some bs like this to one of her therapists, blaming Jennifer, and therapist 101 would be telling Ruth she needs to stop blaming others for her decisions. Yes, grandpa is a fascist. Yes that seriously harms ruth. But ruth was TERRIBLE for Jennifer and jennifer was TERRIBLE for ruth, and ruth guilting Jennifer for setting a healthy boundary is something even a terrible therapist should have caught.
Jennifer didnt kill her friend. Ah. Misremembered that.
Jocelyne is indeed transgender, so unbeknownst to Joyce she is, in fact, her aister!
*sister. Autocorrect being lazy today
I cant remember. Is Jocelyn in the closet? Joyce has no clue about it. But i dont know if thats because Jocelyn is out, but parents kept her hidden from Joyce? Or because Jocelyn is still in the closet?
Booster was wearing make up on first day and Joyce immediately called them out on it. So i assume Jocelyn wasnt presenting as female? Else Joyce would have immediately pointed it out?
Jocelyn is very definitely closeted. Their parents wouldn’t be at all okay with it.
Even Hank, after the growth he’s already shown, will likely struggle.
Oh on the topics of transgender kids and their parents, Carla’s rich parents were awesome and supportive and changed her life. They won some kind of landmark high-profile progressive court case on Carla’s behalf (lawyered by Jacob’s big brother). Their rad support is a huge part of Carla’s self-confidence. She credits her parents for being there for her (starting with making a custom Ultra-Car toy, which really mattered to her and made her feel understood from a young age, and onwards).
Jennifer once challenged Carla’s blind spot: some people just don’t have safe/supportive homes. (Was your home supportive and safe? Mine too — very lucky us!) It can be hard for us to imagine just how special that can be, and what happens when a person didn’t have one of those, and the many years of work it can take to mitigate the damage caused there.
To contrast, Willis has indeed shared that Joyce’s mom is based on Willis’s mom. Willis realized that their mom would always choose her fundamentalist cult over her kids, and this tragedy comes through in the writing, very intentionally.
But yeah, Willis is doing pretty well, as far as we know! They love their wife and twin kiddos. Also transformers and mac n cheese. They made boundaries years ago with their extremely difficult mom, which was sad but necessary and healthy. They make tons of comics! Good times.
I’ve known to many people who experienced therapy as a gaslighting grift to find the portrayal unrealistic? Sometimes it’s like, “my mental health has improved now that I’m finally put of therapy and no longer taking medication!” Because the therapists were gaslighting them and forcing them to relieve trauma over and over again, and because the medication wasn’t helping them with any issue that they actually had and was slowly poisoning them (high dosages of the wrong medications can do that)
I’ve had good experience with therapy, although the down to earth kind of therapist who doesn’t just tell you what you want to hear and who doesn’t gaslight you isn’t always easy to find. Maybe you’re on the lucky side when it comes to your experiences with therapists?
“one big gaslighting grift” is not unrealistic…? It’s Freud’s legacy you know.
Freud is the worst
To put it simply, the comic ‘Everyone Does Things Sensibly Of Age’ is quite a bit shorter and less dramatic. Also, your dismissal of people with autism as somehow unhealthy/’messed up’ is… Yikes.
I never dismissed anyone with autism.
“Dina’s parents are supportive, but pretty clearly autistic like Dina. Their autism was the punchline of one comic. ”
Seems pretty dismissive. It comes across as “But they’re autistic so it doesn’t count.” Like you’re disqualifying them from your personal concept of “healthy”.
And “Lol they have autism” isn’t the punchline if that strip, that’s a fucking ridiculous read, the punchline is that Sarah’s family is louder/more obnoxious than she likes and Dina’s parents are refreshingly quiet by comparison.
Wow, thanks for the summary =) its a pretty good refresher.
he thinks Danny “stabbed him in the back”? I missed where that came from?
I think that refers to that time at the clinic when Danny hinted that he thought everyone would be better off with Mike dead. Or possibly said not quite that but something easily misinterpretable as that.
Their autism was the punchline of one comic.
Willis is all but confirmed autistic themself, and Joyce (as they point out in the “read before posting” section above the strip) is largely autobiographical. So, its maybe just phrasing on your part but i dont think he would want to imply that Dina’s parents are “not healthy grown-ups” for that reason.
Anyway, i second maybe not speculating aloud about the authors mental health, and perhaps taking a breather after bingeing on such an intense comic. I think for me, for many of us probably, messed up characters are relatable or merely interesting, for reasons we may not jecessarily always be able or willing to dissect (although plenty of excruciating dissection does happen around here)
Also, welcome to the section if you do choose to stick around!
And feel free to post strings of swears to see which ones are creatively censored =P its a time honoured tradition. We all did it. In fact its basically compulsory.
…ok that bitof silliness could go very wrong. Dont post any and all swears. Sorry just being a silly person out here =D
“Danny hinted that he thought everyone would be better off with Mike dead”
Aahh. I do remember that. I guess that makes sense.
I have problems with Mike. He is an asshole but is cast as doing his asshole thing for the right reasons. Like he got Ambers teacher fired when they were kids because she thought amber was cheating? Ok. Fine. I guess. Children have no power over bad teachers and it was a wish fullfillment fantasy. Fine.
But he was cruel at times. Hiding behind “im doing whats best for this other person”. Having been on the recieving end of that, FUCK THAT. And he was a hypocrite. He was alsways pushing people to do things they were uncomfortable with because “make them better”, but unless I am totally misreading this, he was in love with Ethan and too chicken shit himself to say it, other than to ask ethan “wanna make out” and pretend it was only because he was bored.
Yes, Mike showed courage leading two kidnapping dads away from the party, but he was still an asshole to pretty much everyone and a hypocrite.
That doesnt mean he deserves to die, but Ethan has gone full Goth over Mike’s death and is idolizing Mike up to be something Mike never was.
Danny may have gone too far the other way, but as best as I can tell, what danny said was no worse than anything Mike ever said the differnce is Mike would be intentionally cruel, it seemed that Danny was reacting in the moment to Ethans idolization.
Yeah, Ethan and Mike had something special. Doesnt make Mike a good guy, but feelings are messy and grief is weird.
Stories need conflict to be interesting. You cannot sustain a story on fluff alone.
Stories also need characters that develop. Todays comic, we see Ruth reset to square one. As if she hadnt spent all that time with doctors and therapists and whoever else is trying to help her professionally.
RUTH NEEDS TO GROW. .SO DOES JENNIFER.
Again, “all that time” amounts to “only a few months”.
Therapy takes a long time, and it’s a lot of “two steps forward, one step back”.
Yeah, even good therapy takes time. Lots of problems take years to be created, so it just makes sense that unraveling them might not be very quick.
I think Sal mentions she had to see a therapist after robbing tbe convenience store, and that it didnt do anything for her. I dont recall if she said how long she went.
I doubt that they treated a young black girl with a Karen mom and “behavioral concerns,” in a respectful way. It would surprise me if her perspectives were validated or if they tried to understand. It would surprise me if she wasn’t gaslit or traumatized. Especially as a child, she had very little autonomy.
Also – therapists have specialties. Not every therapist is going to be able to ping that Sal’s parents are toxic and their parenting is the problem. (And if they did, you can bet her mom would have found a new provider ASAP.)
The thing about therapy is that it only works if the patient and the therapist share the same idea about what recovery looks like AND if the patient can trust the therapist.
Sal either was going to court mandated therapy OR parentally mandated therapy. I doubt there was a lot of trust there.
this is the funniest comment in the world
How many characters in TV sitcoms are good, healthy people?
“How many characters in TV sitcoms are good, healthy people?”
Uh. I think a more fair question would be how many sitcoms do you know where half the main characters need serious therapy, while half the main characters also state that therapy doesnt work.
In the course of a couple months these characters go through murder of classmate, kidnapping of much of cast, campus shooting and a different kidnapping, suicide attempt, murder of two different fathers, two attempted sexual assaults, a case of “self defemse” that results in 60 stab wounds of the assailant, dozens of cases of battery. A guy who works for the mob. A convenience store roldup/hostage revealed via flashback.
In a couple of months.
And in that same time we have more “mundane” trauma like joyce losing her religion and having an existential crisis. Multiple parents ostracizing their kids. Parents divorcing. Multiple people coming out as gay. One questioning if theyre trans. Two people in authority fired for sex with students. A sex tape. A “sex list” that goes public. A homophobe politician who comes out as gay. Homophobe parents hating their gay children. Racist parents hating their black children. An embezzling missionary.
In a couple of months.
I dont know a lot of current sitcoms but none seem like a fit for the level of violence and trauma that happens here in a couple months. This feels more like “Game of Thrones, the College Years”
While not usually presented as violent and/or traumatic, in my own experience and recollection, many sitcoms are week after week of personal and professional crises, setbacks, “zany schemes” going horribly wrong, etc.
Reminds me of how I write characters. Insomuch that’s all my characters are assholes, dipshits, losers, weirdos and failures because I find that so much more interesting. Characters who have their shit together bore me unless them being normal is meant to have them as a foil to the rest of the cast.
I don’t align with this writing philosophy; characters who have it more together can handle far more interesting situations without breaking down right away and I like being there to see it. Not a criticism though.
That’s moreso assuming that their reaction to a situation is “breaking down”. Most of my characters don’t “break down” so much as they have noontraditional/healthy ways of interacting with a situation.
Like Ed Edd n Eddy. The Eds are all varying amounts of those things I mentioned, but they rarely breakdown. They persevere despite the fact that they constantly lose and also are usually the bad guys.
Personally (personally, mind) i have no issue with your comment beyond the issuea i’ve already mentioned, or the frustration you’re expressing. And i disagree with those who say there would be no story worth telling if some of the characters weren’t as messed up as they are. There are plenty such stories but yeah, this isn’t one of those. I happen to like this comic but it’s fine and cool that you aren’t. Peace✌️
Okay, I guess I’ll take a crack at this…
First, it seems like a lot of your analysis has been impacted by the idea that the things that happen that aren’t good or that you don’t like are somehow… the point? Or, like, the message of the comic? Or maybe you just missed a lot of things in your reading, idk. In a previous comment, you say, “I have problems with Mike. He is an asshole but is cast as doing his asshole thing for the right reasons.” This isn’t my experience of Mike, and I feel it ignores the comics attempt to challenge that narrative. To me, that felt fairly explicit, but if you didn’t see it, fair enough. Even before that, though, there were a lot of us who didn’t like Mike, but understood that the existence of a comic character was not an endorsement of his behavior.
You also say in a reply that you “had one sentence asking if he was ok.” Your comment is framed around the question “is David Willis OK?” And again near the end of your first comment, you say, “i cant think of any character who is what i would call a healthy, emotionally stable, mature person?, does David willis know what that llooks like?” Yeah, that definitely makes your comment come off as weird and rude to Willis.
Taking Dina’s parents out of the running for healthy adults with the sentence “Dina’s parents are supportive, but pretty clearly autistic like Dina” is where I disagree that you “never dismissed anyone with autism.” You describe their autism as “the punchline of one comic,” presumably this one: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2013/comic/book-3/04-just-hangin-out-with-my-family/adopt/ –that’s fair enough, I guess, if that’s how you view it, though I disagree that it’s meant to be any kind of “haha, autism” thing.
A lot of choices made by characters that you agree with are criticized by other characters. Okay, but that doesn’t mean that Willis is saying these choices are BAD. People are going to react differently to others choices, and a lot of choices around complex situations are– unsurprisingly– complex. I agree with Carla’s choice regarding getting help with Ruth’s situation. That doesn’t mean other characters shouldn’t have feelings about it. Like, in real life, I’ve intervened with suicidal individuals in various capacity a number of times. In one of those cases, the person was a sort-of friend before and now no longer talks to me. And you know what? Fair enough. I don’t think I did anything wrong. I would probably respond the same way now. And the other person would still be allowed to have their own feelings about it. What I cared about was them being safe and alive, didn’t have the best options available to me to get them there, but did what I could.
I can understand wanting a more positive portrayal of therapy, but that’s also a case where the timeline of the comic is going to have a big impact. Most therapy takes time, you know? There are some modalities I’m aware of that seem to go faster for some issues and individuals, but those may not be available to the characters, who are going to mostly be relying on the on-campus counselling resources. These resources are often not the most helpful, for a number of reasons. Not to put down everyone who works at one; one of the issues is that the counselors are often stretched too thin. Another, in my experience anyway, is that you can’t really “try out” different therapists. If you don’t vibe with the therapist who gets assigned to you, you can try to deal with it, get referred out, or maybe get back on the waitlist. There’s also (again, in my experience) a decent amount of turnover among non-senior staff there, so maybe you do get a therapist you work well with, but then, before you’re through treatment, they move their practice elsewhere.
As for “stories need characters that develop”– well, I think a number of the characters DO develop, though I can see again how the pace of the comic can make the rate at which this happens frustrating. You also talk about characters who are getting worse, which is development. It may not be the type of development you want in the media you consume, which is, again, fair enough. I kind of love it, but to each their own. I also like when characters sometimes regress because it feels true to life. Recovery’s not linear, you know? I recently had a panic attack after not having had one for maybe two year. It sucked! It sucked for so many reasons. But that doesn’t mean the time in between was nothing.
Finally, and this is really more just a note, but Booster used they/them pronouns. Easy enough to miss if you’re reading fast and not looking through the comments, but yeah.
” I disagree that it’s meant to be any kind of “haha, autism” thing.”
It kinda landed that way for me. Dina was presented as a child and everyone related to her as a child at the beginning. Whe. Becky said she wanted to kiss Dina, the characters all squicked saying shes too young. Then Dina asserted her adulthood and kissed becky. It felt like Dina was presented a bit differently after that.
But i wasnt dismissing Dina’s parents for being autistic. To me it was kinda like the comic dismissed dina and her parents for a while there. And yeah her parents are great. When dina called them and said she was dating becky, they sent her $200 to take becky on a date. maybe i am forgetting other scenes, but i dont remember seeing them other than the elevator scene where they didnt do anything, and the phone call.
I was just hoping for a tad more face time from good adults here and there. The “parents just dont understand” trope is a thing, and its a fine trope.
“I can understand wanting a more positive portrayal of therapy, but that’s also a case where the timeline of the comic is going to have a big impact”
I think Sal says she had to see a therapist after robbing the convenience store. Dont remember if it ever says for how long. But i do seem to rememeber her appraisal was negative. Obviously court mandated therapy, or maybe it was parent mandated, is going to land different than someone going lf their own volition.
The only character i know of who said therapy is good was dorothy saying it to someone, but we dont see dorothy actually change as a result.
“Booster used they/them pronouns.”
I thought i used they/them. If i didnt it was not intentional.
Okay, real quick, just gonna check in with this: You know that none of these people are real, and that their behavior, growth, etc, are all fake, yeah? Because you’re extremely invested in the way they’re portrayed to a degree that makes me pretty worried.
Maybe the punchline others saw as it being more about Sarah’s family and her appreciation of silence didn’t land for you. But as for the completely other issue you then bring up… yeah, Dina’s infantilization early on isn’t great. It is something that has been discussed in the comments, and, as you mentioned addressed directly in the comic and then somewhat changed.
What you said when talking about how there aren’t healthy adults in the strip is, “The only adults who MIGHT be healthy are dorothys parents, but we never got to hear them say much more than “helllo”. Dina’s parents are supportive, but pretty clearly autistic like Dina.” Yes, that reads like dismissing them for being autistic. If your issue is that they, like Dorothy’s parents, don’t show up much, you could follow your “but” up with something about that like you did for Dorothy’s parents.
I think there can be lots of interesting media that focuses on good people and mostly has parents who do right by their children. There’s also value in media where that’s not the case, and as for what gets more screen time in a drama comic… yeah, what we get makes sense to me. And, like, my parents are pretty good people. I’m luckier in that regard than many of my friends were, and part of the impact in my early away-from-home-for-the-first-time college years was that discussions about parents between my friends and me would focus more heavily on stuff about my friends parents. “My parents sent me this picture of my dog and told me to keep an eye out for a care package in the next week” just takes less time to talk about than “My mom is threatening to withhold tuition if I don’t visit my dad when he’s in town, but that would mean missing this class that I’m already struggling with and also last time we talked, he hit me,” you know?
Sal did talk about having to go to therapy after the convenience stores, and she did have a negative view of it, but then you immediately hit on some reasons why that might have been, so. Dorothy does have a positive view of therapy, like you said. As for her not really changing as a result, Dorothy, in my opinion, started off as someone who was “pretty okay” (I don’t really like her as a character, but that’s something different), so how therapy “should” change her is more up to debate. It did seem like she mostly started therapy to help cope with immediate trauma, and it did that well. There was just then more trauma to cope with, and so things are ongoing. Beyond that, shifts to things like long held mindsets are back in the “takes more time” category, and getting to them is probably pushed back by the different, immediate traumas.
I appreciate that you didn’t intentionally misgender Booster, but “if” you did? You can literally look back at your comment where you used “him” (exclusively) for them.
What i was trying to say about Dinas parents wasnt thst i dismissed them, but that they seemed to be the butt of the joke in the elevator, which landed as treating them dismissively.
There are parents that are great, but they dont get face time and with Dinas parents they also seemed to get treated as a punchline.
“You can literally look back at your comment where you used “him” (exclusively) for them.”
I looked before i replied and didnt see anything. I only see half a dozen occurrences of the name Booster. Maybe my phone isnt searching properly? I sometimes get the comment section truncated? Its kinda weird. Happens a lot. Old phone maybe cant keep up? I generally go by the rule to call people by what they want ro be called. So. Yeah. I dont know what i said? But i can do a preemptive apology? Before i know what i said? I guess?
It didn’t show up on your search because you had their name as “Boomer” in your original comment.
Ah. There it is. Wasnt my intention.
Apologies
“Mike. He is an asshole but is cast as doing his asshole thing for the right reasons.” This isn’t my experience of Mike”
His first exposure, hes mainly a jerk
But then we have a flashback where Amber says the teacher marked questions wrong that were correct. Ambers afraid to confront the teacher. Mike does it. Teacher says she cant prove it but thinks amber cheated. Mike says “because shes a girl”. Mike then gets some kind of relationship with a football player, sets the teacher up for having a relatiomship with the football player, and gets teacher fired.
Mike wasnt going to birthday party until ambers dad runs imto him and is a jerk talking about amber. Then he goes. Once there he digs through receipts to get dirt on ambers dad and gets him to be nice to her.
He kisss ethan, saying he’s just bored, but it gets ethan to admit and accept being gay. And then ethan starts having gay flings. Prior to that he was dating joyce to try and not be gay.
I dont know if the intention of all these incidents was to make mike a good antihero, or not. But thats how it landed for me. He’s an asshole for all the right reasons. The sympathetic antihero.
When you write a story about young adults, having wise and reliable authority figures who can handle the problems robs the story of drama. Imagine if Harry Potter could get help from a teacher instead of dealing with the crisis himself at the end of every book. “Amber goes to therapy and gets better” is not as interesting as “Amber deals with her violent tendencies by becoming a vigilante”. Likewise with a lot of the violence and toxic relationships. Emotionally stable and happy characters mean less drama. In fiction the purpose is to engage and entertain the readers, not to reflect real life. I know Willis says it is semi-autobiographical but I’m sure some elements are highly dramatized or made up entirely. Taking it as a reflection of someone’s mental state is a stretch.
I’d also point out while we have noted over the year how different aspects of Willis show up in different characters, JOYCE is the one referred to as autobiographical in the section BowlerHatGuy is referring to, yet many of the issues used to support the idea that they were actually wondering if Willis is okay were things other characters experienced.
“Imagine if Harry Potter could get help from a teacher instead of dealing with the crisis himself”
Yes. This can be difficult to balance though sometimes. There are scenes in harry potter where im rolling my eyes because harry spends a huge part of one story trying to talk to dumbledore and dumbledore is a total idiot for the entire year. At tbe end of the story, dumbledore says “i didnt talk with you because i thought it would protect you”. No. The author needed to keep dumbledore away from harry so the story could last the school year. But in the middle of the story, it hits a point where youre screaming at dumbledore to quit being a shit.
There was a school shooting. A kidnapping. Another kidnapping. Three murders. 2 attempted suicides. Assault and a 60x stabbing. In a couple months. School might actually shut down. While a swarm of therapists descend on the entire campus.
But nope. No therapists. No counsolers. Half a dozen characters say therapy doesnt work. And at some point im screaming at dumbledote.
I
Have you been to university? Barely anyone has good mental health or a well-rounded sense of self. Most people aren’t even 20 yet.
What the fuck is wrong with these commenters? Jennifer slammed Ruth into a wall simply for trying to be amicable, accused her of being a liar, and ranted twice now where she vilifies the shit out of Ruth, yet the one time Ruth stops playing nice you all start foaming at the mouth for her hanging.
You people are so goddamn obsessed with these fictional people and the need to treat them like they’re real that you hold literally EVERY SENTENCE under some kind of scrutiny. Nobody is allowed to be flawed or say something mean without thirty people being up in arms about it for one day, before doing the exact same thing to the character they were defending the next.
Go watch fucking Bluey or something if all this is too damn complex.
I’m not foaming. As you said, Ruth has (IMO) been in the right before, which is why I’m shaking my head now at this mistake. She’s playing into the narrative that Jennifer has been trying to set.
Maybe it’s not so simple as one of the two is right and the other wrong. Maybe they’re both messed up and conflicted.
Very impressed with your tireless advocacy for nuance in comments.
Now that I’m home from my agonizingly frustrating job and not at an emotional boiling point, I can now talk like a normal person. Sorry about before.
I’ve got too many unfunny quips for this, so here’s just a few.
Ma’am, this is a Wendy’s.
The foam isn’t coming out of my mouth.😏
The only “hanging” we’re after is in Jason’s pants.
Whaddaya mean, “You people”?
Is it really necessary to say “Go watch a kids’ show”?
What the fuck is wrong with us? What the fuck is wrong with you?
Et cetera
In all fairness these are good quips.
But yeah I was at a boiling point when I wrote that comment and I apologize for it.
I’m just really tired of the attitudes I see here.
‘S all good. Shit gets intense around here, sometimes.
That’s understandable. Glad you’re feeling better now. It does get a little frustrating sometimes.
I don’t appreciate you shamelessly linking tvtropes
If “a href” wasn’t so annoying to do in the middle of sentences, I’d do it fucking constantly.
Feel you. Especially since my french autocorrect (when i forget to switch from texting or whatev) keeps thinking i must be meaning “a bref”. Things are rough out here.
ROUND TWO!
.
.
.
.
FIGHT!
Could we, for once…. NOT??
Pretty please?
Ruth is really consistent about not respecting Jennifer’s boundaries and being entitled to her time and attention, huh?
Last time Billie was in this hall, didn’t she bash Ruth into a wall and go on an unhinged rant about Ruth’s alleged dishonesty? If nothing else, it’s probably smart to keep tabs on the violent ex, boundaries or none.
I mean ruth escalated but okay. Ruth is Jennifer’s violent ex…
They’re both each other’s violent exes. I don’t care if Ruth escalated, two things can be true at the same time without both having to be mentioned regardless of which one we’re talking about.
If that’s the case why did you need to be contrary to what I was saying…? (I actually agree with the point you just made, though.)
I wasn’t really being contrary, just kinda saying it’s a good idea for these two to keep an eye on each other, in a one-sided way. I don’t always like adding the full picture to my comments, especially when my thought isn’t all that long.
Fair enough. Have a good day/night.
Ruth is guilt tripping Jennifer here.
There relationship was severe codependency. Both felt worthless by themselves. Both felt some worth due to the other person. Both then turned their relationship into a “i shall sacrifice myself for you” codeoendency nonsense. Look at the sacrifice i make for you!
And ruth seems to reverting to literally square one here. Where she has no value unless Jennifer sacrifices herself and pushes through Ruths barricade.
Billie should just walk away it would actuall be the most loving thing she could do for ruth because if she reinforces this codependency nonsense, shes just enabling some really dark, unhealthy stuff.
While very bad, I do feel like Jennifer keeps explicitly asking for these kinds of remarks and then rewarding them (“you’re finally being honest” or something similar).
I hate this so much but I’ve seen plenty of relationships that imploded and were messy for lengthy periods of time afterwards in exactly this manner. Very realistic.
Just stop talking to each other guys!
Or actually talk to each other instead of shouting insults.
Yeah I am calling BS on that one Ruth. Just because she didn’t throw a fit the LAST time doesn’t suddenly mean she didn’t try to work for it. The allegedly dozens of breakup attempts before that one also count.
For those who might see this and need it, please know that there are many people who see the stance of that opening quote, well-intentioned though it may be, as shit.
Developing self-love and self-compassion are worthy goals. You deserve it for yourself. If you are not there, you can still love others. You can still be compassionate toward others. Your efforts of love and compassion are not worthless because of your struggles with yourself.
I get that people are mad that Ruth’s doing a low blow, but after all the shitty vitriol Billie– I mean “jEnNiFuR” threw at her it would extremely satisfying if she finally got a chance to snap back.
Just a terrible pair.
please no fake dalai lama quotes that promote shitty messages, thank you
Yes, they are especially terrible with morning coffee, can confirm. 😑
Also, obligatory reminder that the flag system exists and works.
Wait what
You can see the first part of the comment that was deleted on Willis’ Twitter, if you so desire.
Thanks for that, Willis. It’s good to know you’re also one of the ones who recognizes the harm of that mindset.
I dont understand how it is harmful. It seems to perfectly explain Ruth and Jennifer. Neither one loves themselves and they both keep throwing themsleves into this suicide pact hoping to get someone to love them because they cant do it themselves. And they both have to work on themselves before they have a chance of working their relationship out. Even if “working it out” is a healthy amicable breakup instead of whatever this (motions up) is.
But right now, what ruth is doing to jennifer isnt love.
If you actually want to ask about how the quote you shared is harmful, you could try asking about it in today’s comments; I’m too tired to get into now, and most won’t be looking back here.
1) It’s not even a real Dalai Lama quote. Best I can tell, the real Dalai Lama believes the opposite — that you can’t love yourself until you first love others.
2) It’s a fucking hateful ideology. It is absolutely ridiculously untrue that you can’t love somebody else if you don’t love yourself. That’s just something shitheads made up to tell the depressed that they’ll never be worthy of human interaction. It’s trite, untrue, and terrible. Get that garbage away from my website.
3) Billie and Ruth cared for each other plenty without first having a high regard for themselves. The shitty maxim doesn’t even apply well to them.
“It is absolutely ridiculously untrue that you can’t love somebody else if you don’t love yourself. That’s just something shitheads made up to tell the depressed that they’ll never be worthy of human interaction.”
Everyone is worthy of love. Whoever said otherwise is truly a manipulative, gaslighting shithead. The quote was a clunky way of trying to convey a complex topic about codependency. But i definitely was not saying anyone is unworthy of love.
“Billie and Ruth cared for each other plenty without first having a high regard for themselves.”
Yes. But thats two different things. They each cared for the other. Buf for the most part, neither one had enough high regard for themselves, enough self worth, to let the other person’s love in. Thats the definition of codependent.
Everyone deserves love. Everyone is worthy of love. But a codependent is someone who doesnt feel worthy of love, someone who feels like they dont deserve to be loved. So they cant love themselves and they cant let anyone else’s love in. Codependents try to “earn” the others love through various sacrifices. But because they feel unworthy, they cant feel the other persons love, the sacrifice feels like it was for nothing, and then the sacrificer resents the other person. Guilt tripping, gas lighting, and other manipulations follow this resentment.
Ruth’s sacrifice is breaking up with Jennifer to “save” Jennifer, but then Ruth wants Jennifer to acknowledge this sacrifice. Jennifer’s sacrifice was trying to “save” Ruth to the point of being willing to die with her, but then Jennifer wants Ruth to acknowledge this sacrifice. And then when acknowldgement is not satisfied, physical violence breaks out. These two are the classic codependent archetype.
If these two are ever going to be in a healthy relationship, they both need to feel worthy of love once in a while. Then they can love themselves and let other peoples love in. Right now it seems like they both have a ways to go.
Hi! That’s not remotely close to what the shitty quote you shared, aka what people are responding to, said! Nor is it really a response to what Willis said!
Well, i know nothing in the original quote said anything about not being worthy of love. And that seemed far more important to deal with.
I wont use the quote again. I apologize for those it upset. It wasnt my intent to upset. It definitely wasnt my intent to suggest anyone is unworthy of love.
For me it captures the issue around codependency, but if its landing as saying anyone isnt worthy of love, i will be more careful.
“Well, i know nothing in the original quote said anything about not being worthy of love. And that seemed far more important to deal with.”
Yeah, and that’s why literally no one else was talking about that???? You are the only one who somehow got to that version of things????
“You are the only one who somehow got to that version of things????”
I mean, besides the comments saying the quote is “bad” or “harmful” or whatever, one of the few comments that said WHY it was hateful was “tell the depressed that they’ll never be worthy of human interaction”.
Which wasnt what i was trying to say. I dont think the quote is trying to say it either. But i have a positive history with this quote. It has helped me in the past. I’ve dealt with low self esteem and i’ve been in relationships with people with low self esteem. And this quote or variations of it has helped me. But if others are using it to attack people, then i applogize, it wasnt my intent. I didnt realize some use it to cause harm.
Which, again, is different than the things you are saying. I did suggest you bring it to TODAY’S DISCUSSION if you actually wanted to understand why people thought it was harmful (because you waited until past midnight to engage with the responses to your post, though you were around), but since I’ve already made the mistake of coming back here so much, okay:
Your words were “If you don’t love yourself, you cannot love others. You will not be able to love others. If you have no compassion for yourself then you are not able to of developing compassion for others.”
The issue with this is not that it’s saying that you are unworthy of receiving love, but that you are incapable of giving love. That you cannot be compassionate toward others. This idea can contribute to the suffering of those who are already dealing with mental health issues. In fact, many people who struggle to love themselves or be compassionate toward themselves love and show great care for others! What I had said initially in response to your post, before it was deleted, was that those who are struggling with themselves should not believe that their efforts of love and compassion are worthless.
Again, if you are interested in having a conversation around this, you could try bringing it to the current comment section. If it’s more important to you to have the last word or whatever, that’s fine (well, by me, anyway) and you can just respond to this however you want.
Have you deeply examined any if these sacharine ideas. They arent true.
“But a codependent is someone who doesnt feel worthy of love”
That isnt what makes a relationship codependant. and it really misses the point of that to make a personal attack.
“someone who feels like they dont deserve to be loved. So they cant love themselves and they cant let anyone else’s love in. Codependents try to “earn” the others love through various sacrifices.”
All the rest is basic Evangelical Christianity posing as psychology. No Doubt that was where it comes from. There is some psychology in there buried, but its been cut up and reassmebled by Evangelical authors , probably in the Prosperity Gospel tradition.
” ……Thats the definition of codependent.”
NO its not the defintion of codependant. That is just someone opinion pushing a wider agenda , probably to convert.
“Everyone is worthy of love” Are they though? Maybe as Babies. To get there you have to infantilize adults.
This is def religion posing as psychology. Look at your word choices, “worthy” “sacrificice” . This is Christianity in some flavor, probably influenced from the trite USA “self esteem movement” of the 80s and 90s.
You managed to use the word codependancy an actual codependent couple while totally ignoring and sidelining their actual shared addiction.
“Evangelical Christianity” … “Evangelical authors , probably in the Prosperity Gospel tradition.” … “pushing a wider agenda , probably to convert”
Look, i am sorry for whatever these evangelical christians did to try to convert you. Truly. But I’m atheist. I see different people get real value from all kinds of different religions and thats great. And i see agnostics and atheists who are real humanists. Im not trying to convert you. Whatever religion you have (or dont have) is fine by me.
““Everyone is worthy of love” Are they though? Maybe as Babies. To get there you have to infantilize adults.”
Well, i suppose it depends on what you mean by love. I know “love” to some people means “blind love”. Like the nitwits who say “if you dont love america, leave it”. Thats not love.
Pretty sure love is a lot more complicated and nuanced than that. And in that nuanced definition, yes, i do think everyone is worthy of love.
I think Becky kind touched on this at one point saying she thought her dad was in heaven, or at least that she didnt believe in eternal damnation of hell, that her dad didnt deserve that. Becky loved her dad that way. And at the same time she easily admitted hes a total asshole and was fine not having that asshole in her life.
one difference tween me and becky is i think everyone is worthy of love without me beliving in god.
Ty ty
Thank you so much for deleting that. I didn’t know it was a fake quote so I was like, “huh, i disagree with the dali lama.” Which made me feel bad.
Seriously it is such a relief to not have to disagree with the dali lama. T_T
Honestly, there are probably some things you disagree with the Dalai Lama about, and that’s okay.
I had more on this, but then I realized I didn’t know if your feeling bad was coming more from “I feel bad I disagree with the Dalai Lama” or from “I feel bad the Dalai Lama disagrees with me,” if that makes sense. But either way, I get the response of feeling bad about t, and I think that either way, you’re okay.
Whats fasicinating is this is both a Genre of fake Buddhist and fake Buddha quotes, but also a THEME.
There is a deep fake literature in precisely this theme , which has a history of being abused. There is a Fake ( or highly currupted ) Zen quote “Compassion isnt for other people, its for self”
Despite being very obviously Anti-buddhism, its accepted often harmlessly, because its taken to be a Koan meant to unfix traditional ideas. or Zen often uses SELF in a big sense for beingness not personality.
But it does also endorse dark triad narcissism , and has a long history of abuse.
But its probably a coincidence and just newly invented American New age therapy claptrap nonsense.
“There is a deep fake literature in precisely this theme , which has a history of being abused. There is a Fake ( or highly currupted )”
I dont know how to break this to you, but any text can be abused. Even whatever source you are referencing. There are shitty psychologists and shitty priests and shitty doctors and shitty monks.
*sees a ruth and billie comic*
*200+ comments*
Oh brother…
Ruth and Billie both are super fuckin nostalgic for times that really shouldn’t be idealized. I agree with Becky: terrible couple really. They were there for each other when they were both spiraling into alcohol, Ruth into deepest hurt depression, Billie into lack of being aggrandized and also probably real depression too. Codependency ensued. A grand tapestry of travesties and being garbage was finally settled off camera, and the audience never forgave it.
Bruno was gaslit and blamed for things he had no control over and then ostracized by his family for it. So, no. Bruno did t deserve it.