Please, change your avatar. I think this comment is about social bubbles of cult and hate, but with that avatar (and its expression) it looks like what you are saying is something very different.
Joyce: “Boy, I wish my bubble had been poked sooner. Such a firm, resilient bubble, it required a lot of work to penetrate! What? Why are you all laughing at my big bubble?”
I think it’s one of the most fascinating things that Joyce’s big huge revelation of her lack of faith doesn’t bother Carol in the slightest because she’s just “acting out.”
That’s because it was never about faith to begin with. It was just a tribal marker for her.
She’s already decided what their opinions are, and she’s not taking any input from them on the matter.
So long as she remains closed off in her own little, ahem… bubble, at least she won’t be very antagonistic about it all.
Honestly, that seems nuts to me. TikTok is a skinnerbox style nightmare to begin with, but now that they’ve been pulled out these people want to go right back into a nearly identical one. Then off all the knock-offs they could select, they choose another one run by China – the nation that uses its tax income to support slave labor camps and build nukes to point at their cities? At least with American companies like Youtube you know your taxes are being put to good use – keeping people locked up in private prisons for the benefit of wealthy lobbying groups and building nukes to point at, I guess Greenland now for some insane reason? You may say that makes little difference, but I say here there is at always hope a vote will turn things around – and Greenland is already a frozen hellscape, so how much worse can it really get?
pretty much all commercial social media is a skinnerbox trap,
besides the fact is that banning TikTok here wouldn’t reduce China’s business tax income by even a SMIDGE, on account that they produce over 80% of the worlds consumer electronics
it was never about China, the app was banned because it was one of the biggest platforms with a majorly left-leaning userbase, and as usual China is neo-mercantilists’ go-to for anti-socialist red-baiting (9-9)
Is that even actually happening? I swear, I’ve seen the phrase “tiktok banned” in my Google suggested searches ever since TikTok got popular, and it hasn’t gone anywhere. Not that anything of value would be lost.
LOL at hoping a vote will turn things around; as if votes will be allowed again in the future. Trump did promise people would never need to vote again if he was re-elected…
From what I’ve heard from Americans who started using Rednote because of the Tiktok ban, a lot of them are learning, by actually talking with Chinese people on that app, that most of the things they were told about China and Chinese people by the US government and media were lies. So while I think Tiktok ban was stupid, at least there’s one good thing that’s come about as a result of it.
It’s entirely possible it won’t stay dead. Depends on how the new admin wants to handle it.
I do find it funny in a frustrating sort of way that Biden’s team didn’t try to stall this though. It’s a policy that’s going to piss a lot of people off that their political enemies proposed, but the Dems decided they just had to get it under the wire so they could take credit for shutting it down and give the Republicans the option to swoop in and fix the problem they caused.
It does! Estrogen can increase overall body fat percentage as well as changing the distribution towards a more hourglass silhouette (hips, thighs, boobs and butt) while higher testosterone increases the likelihood of an apple body shape (storing more fat in the waist and belly). I not a doctor and endocrine systems are stupid complicated and I don’t know how much role other hormones and other factors have to play, and I know that with hormones it is often more about levels relative to each other rather than absolute amounts in the body, but…yeah, I think she was talking about butts.
I feel the context is more like Jocelyne coming to atheism but also to figure herself out after getting poked when she thought she was still a he. So at the time everyone involved thought it was gay. Now the former partners still are gay but she’s not.
Joyce has decided that clearly all religion is silly and interpretations of Christianity because she knows all of their beliefs as they are presumably identical to the one type she knows.
As someone who was raised nondenominational Christian and left the religion when I was a teenager, it is VERY hard to put that toothpaste back in the tube.
I respect people who find comfort/community in their faith, so long as they don’t push their beliefs on others or use those beliefs to justify harm. But I can’t see myself aligning with any religious or spiritual tradition (even ones that were different from the one I grew up with) because I do not believe things for which there is no tangible proof, which is a prerequisite to every religious tradition of which I am personally aware.
I mean they might disagree on some details, but if you find issue with the core premise then it doesn’t matter how many denominations and what their views are because your issue is with the core premise they all have.
“woo” as in, to seek someone’s love with false promises.
fitting, given woo-meisters within pseudo-science and religious authoritarianism seek people’s admiration, falsely promising them miraculous and easily understandable knowledge
The most bizarre thing about having been an atheist as long as I have is this idea that something happened to make me wanna be atheist. Like I had some negative experience with Christianity or organized religion or grew up in a conservative environment and naw.
I just sorta realized one day I don’t believe in this stuff. Like how I don’t believe in Santa or Super Mario. So in a funny way I find it hard to relate to a lot of other atheists and agnostics. Sometimes I even wish I DID believe in an afterlife cuz at least it would give me comfort that I, and everyone I love, aren’t heading towards a cold empty cessation of consciousness.
I’m a lifelong agnostic. Religion was never a factor in my upbringing beyond basic cultural background radiation stuff, so yeah, I’m kinda there with you.
Same. I realised in primary school (been to Catholic schools all my life. That’s not a big deal in Britain though) that I didn’t believe any of the god stuff.
Honestly I don’t think I ever really believed in it. I went to sunday school and read the bible but it never once felt real to me, it was always just a bunch of dubious stories. The only thing that changed is that when I was about 17, my parents stopped making me go.
That is not to say I don’t get religion. I just think the goddess is a mercurial bongo, and she most certainly ain’t YHWH
My family wasn’t very religious when I was growing up and we only went to church on major holidays like Easter and Christmas, so while I believed in a god for a few years as a kid, I rarely prayed to it and was very apathetic about it. When I learned at the age of 14 that atheism was a thing, it made perfect sense to me and I stopped believing in any gods. Other atheists became atheists because of negative experiences with the religions they were raised in, but for me it was just realizing that there were others who didn’t believe in gods and saw how silly it all was.
man, I really don’t get the last panel. The bubble metaphor is extremely straight forward, there’s no need for Dorothy to try to clarify what “bubble” stands for; it’s not a literal bubble! It’s a metaphor to say that both Joyce and her sister were raised in a cult-like environment where their social interactions and education were purposefully kept stunted to make sure they acquiesce to the fucked-up rules of their church.
The metaphorical bubble burst when both of them got exposed to people outside their church, particularly queer people and realized they were lied to.
But Jocelyn’s last sentence makes it sound like her bubble is her chest, something physical that people can literally poke. So she left the church and came out as trans because…gay people literally poked her boobs? Like in a sexual way? What the hell does this mean?
Each event that Joyce went through was more bitter than the other, her decision was understandable, but in part it is sad that they killed her faith in that way.
I confess that even with those tragedies, Joyce’s faith would be preserved but with a more flexible approach, but surprisingly it would be Becky who would show that.
Firstly, it’s a bit weird to talk about a fictional character like that, but secondly, why exactly would it have been good for ”Joyce’s faith to have been preserved”?
She was raised to pretend she heard the voice of god, and to believe insane things about the natural world. Why would keeping her superstitious world view have been something good?
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Gotta pop ’em all!!!
POKING ON!!!
Please, change your avatar. I think this comment is about social bubbles of cult and hate, but with that avatar (and its expression) it looks like what you are saying is something very different.
bonk bonk
Social bubbles and buttsex. It can be both.
If you think it’s only about one, reread the comic.
Reminder that “buttsex” is an anagram of “subtext”.
It’s both. Innuendo at its finest.
Pop bubbles, crack eggs, etc 8D;
dos huevos, ammi right? XD
Joyce: “Boy, I wish my bubble had been poked sooner. Such a firm, resilient bubble, it required a lot of work to penetrate! What? Why are you all laughing at my big bubble?”
Cue Scandalised Joyce Face in three…two…one…
Or, possibly three years our time in the future, when someone explains a bubble butt to her and she flashes back on this conversation.
As she looks slyly at Joe.
Ass Joycy glances coyly at Dotty.
God, Jocelyne is reminding me so much of my sister (this is a high compliment)
Jocelyne: “Gonna get some enormous jugs like my little sister.”
She should ask Carla how she got hers.
…
What? They’re wonderful little shoes!
Shit, that’s good.
Thank you. That entendre just fell into my lap.
Oh pretty sure she didn’t mean those.
Becoming best friends with an Athiest certainly didn’t hurt though
I think it’s one of the most fascinating things that Joyce’s big huge revelation of her lack of faith doesn’t bother Carol in the slightest because she’s just “acting out.”
That’s because it was never about faith to begin with. It was just a tribal marker for her.
I figured it was more it doesn’t matter what her kids say since she’s already decided their opinions.
She’s already decided what their opinions are, and she’s not taking any input from them on the matter.
So long as she remains closed off in her own little, ahem… bubble, at least she won’t be very antagonistic about it all.
It’s about obedience and falling in line, as far as Carol really cares.
I am very glad jocelyne and Dorothy went there because if they hadn’t, I was going to.
Hehe. Bubble.
Jocelyne’s absolutely shameless joy in herself is infectious. Thank you so much for writing this.
Ah, confirmation that Jocelyn is one of them a-theist types too.
She’s a theist?
The opposite, actually.
Joss knows what’s up.
r.i.p. joyce’s budding tiktok career, press f to pay respects
US TikTok users are all going to RedNote now, thus the equivalent of Re-Animator serum ;)
Honestly, that seems nuts to me. TikTok is a skinnerbox style nightmare to begin with, but now that they’ve been pulled out these people want to go right back into a nearly identical one. Then off all the knock-offs they could select, they choose another one run by China – the nation that uses its tax income to support slave labor camps and build nukes to point at their cities? At least with American companies like Youtube you know your taxes are being put to good use – keeping people locked up in private prisons for the benefit of wealthy lobbying groups and building nukes to point at, I guess Greenland now for some insane reason? You may say that makes little difference, but I say here there is at always hope a vote will turn things around – and Greenland is already a frozen hellscape, so how much worse can it really get?
Part of the issue is all the people who would buy TikTok are ones who would run it into the ground.
LOL, Poe’s Law aside,
pretty much all commercial social media is a skinnerbox trap,
besides the fact is that banning TikTok here wouldn’t reduce China’s business tax income by even a SMIDGE, on account that they produce over 80% of the worlds consumer electronics
it was never about China, the app was banned because it was one of the biggest platforms with a majorly left-leaning userbase, and as usual China is neo-mercantilists’ go-to for anti-socialist red-baiting (9-9)
They’re moving to another Chinese app specifically to spite the TikTok ban.
Is that even actually happening? I swear, I’ve seen the phrase “tiktok banned” in my Google suggested searches ever since TikTok got popular, and it hasn’t gone anywhere. Not that anything of value would be lost.
A few of my American friends got a message when they tried to use the app a few hours ago which confirmed that it has, indeed, been banned.
The message also praises Trump’s presumed future efforts to unban it, so maybe not a permanent situation, who the hell even knows anymore.
It’s current down in the states, so something is happening at least. Whether it goes down long term, who knows at this point.
LOL at hoping a vote will turn things around; as if votes will be allowed again in the future. Trump did promise people would never need to vote again if he was re-elected…
I don’t think avoiding putting all your personal data and tracking into a Chinese – owned app is about boycotting their labour practices.
It’s about not having your every move and thought in a foreign governments database.
Same reason China doesn’t use Google or Facebook.
Which is, I am just saying, hilarious.
From what I’ve heard from Americans who started using Rednote because of the Tiktok ban, a lot of them are learning, by actually talking with Chinese people on that app, that most of the things they were told about China and Chinese people by the US government and media were lies. So while I think Tiktok ban was stupid, at least there’s one good thing that’s come about as a result of it.
once again, bigoted buffoons’ attempts at information control backfires XD
Ya can fool some people sometimes,
but ya can’t fool all the people all the time!
It’s entirely possible it won’t stay dead. Depends on how the new admin wants to handle it.
I do find it funny in a frustrating sort of way that Biden’s team didn’t try to stall this though. It’s a policy that’s going to piss a lot of people off that their political enemies proposed, but the Dems decided they just had to get it under the wire so they could take credit for shutting it down and give the Republicans the option to swoop in and fix the problem they caused.
It took me longer to figure out what she meant more than I care to admit.
If she was an android then I’d send her to Faye… well I’d send her to Bubbles.
Reference missed.
Faye (human) and Bubbles (droid) are a couple in Questionable Content. They are really cute together, and good for each other.
I did not realise I had Danny, this has to change.
Oh here I thought bubble meant butt, because…bubble-butt. And was like ‘estradiol doesn’t help you with that?’.
It doesn’t? I’m admittedly cis and ignorant, but I’d think it would sorta make you curvier all over.
It does, and honestly I still assume the meaning here is “butt.”
It absolutely does mean butt, and estradiol absolutely does help over time, y’all are just second-guessing yourselves lol
Well, like… one person was? That’s what makes sense here.
It does! Estrogen can increase overall body fat percentage as well as changing the distribution towards a more hourglass silhouette (hips, thighs, boobs and butt) while higher testosterone increases the likelihood of an apple body shape (storing more fat in the waist and belly). I not a doctor and endocrine systems are stupid complicated and I don’t know how much role other hormones and other factors have to play, and I know that with hormones it is often more about levels relative to each other rather than absolute amounts in the body, but…yeah, I think she was talking about butts.
I don’t get it
She is talking about butts.
Look at that smile on Dorothy ☺️ wait did Jocelyne assume Joyce—
This is the one bubble that won’t burst! …wait does that mean Jocelyne is a—
Wait, did Joyrcelyne assume that Joyce and Dorothy were dating? (I mean, it might be a QPR? not sure.)
Dorothy retains the ability to understand.
Try two: Dorothy retains the ability to understand what isn’t being said.
Dorothy would’ve understood your first comment
Jocelyn’s cute as hell, so I mean, I doubt she had much trouble finding help with that one.
Come on, you’re blurring the line between gay and transgender. I thought you didn’t want that
I am assuming you are being sarcastic or joking, if that is the case Iwould recommend putting on a tone indicator because it is kind of hard to tell.
I feel the context is more like Jocelyne coming to atheism but also to figure herself out after getting poked when she thought she was still a he. So at the time everyone involved thought it was gay. Now the former partners still are gay but she’s not.
So a couple things here:
– Trans people can be gay.
– You don’t have to be a guy to poke someone’s bubble.
Conclusion: Jocelyne could absolutely have had her bubble poked by gay people without doing whatever you’re complaining about.
u can be two (or more) things 😛
Joyce has decided that clearly all religion is silly and interpretations of Christianity because she knows all of their beliefs as they are presumably identical to the one type she knows.
As someone who was raised nondenominational Christian and left the religion when I was a teenager, it is VERY hard to put that toothpaste back in the tube.
I respect people who find comfort/community in their faith, so long as they don’t push their beliefs on others or use those beliefs to justify harm. But I can’t see myself aligning with any religious or spiritual tradition (even ones that were different from the one I grew up with) because I do not believe things for which there is no tangible proof, which is a prerequisite to every religious tradition of which I am personally aware.
I thought that except there’s quite a few religions that don’t have supernatural elements at all.
See pantheism for example.
“I am spiritually aware and communing with the universe around me.”
If you’re calling yourself “spiritually aware” then you’re making a supernatural claim. It’s woo nonsense.
I mean they might disagree on some details, but if you find issue with the core premise then it doesn’t matter how many denominations and what their views are because your issue is with the core premise they all have.
All religion IS silly. Sure, some of them are more harmful than others, but the silly supernatural woo nonsense factor is there for all of them.
What the fuck is “woo nonsense”? I get the “nonsense”, but what’s the “woo” attachment?
Religion is like a rollercoaster and you’re expected to say “woo” occasionally.
I bet roller coasters are more fun than church, when you’re stoned.
Depends which church. If you go to Our Lady of the Screaming Tracks there’s a rollercoaster inside the church. Two for one kinda deal.
“woo” as in, to seek someone’s love with false promises.
fitting, given woo-meisters within pseudo-science and religious authoritarianism seek people’s admiration, falsely promising them miraculous and easily understandable knowledge
I feel like Jocelyne is the horniest character here.
Just because Joyce isn’t acting as much – yet – doesn’t mean she’s less horny than her older sister.
But yeah Jocelyne is … I really want to say pegging the meter, but that’s backwards. Somebody figure the joke out for me, I know it’s there somewhere.
Well, from what she says, she’s pretty new to this. Didn’t really feel one way or the other until starting the medication.
As an eighth level wizard with a level in artificer, I feel like Joyce could have been a little more inclusive with panel 3.
Our cleric can hush up, though; his god *is* rather silly.
The most bizarre thing about having been an atheist as long as I have is this idea that something happened to make me wanna be atheist. Like I had some negative experience with Christianity or organized religion or grew up in a conservative environment and naw.
I just sorta realized one day I don’t believe in this stuff. Like how I don’t believe in Santa or Super Mario. So in a funny way I find it hard to relate to a lot of other atheists and agnostics. Sometimes I even wish I DID believe in an afterlife cuz at least it would give me comfort that I, and everyone I love, aren’t heading towards a cold empty cessation of consciousness.
I’m a lifelong agnostic. Religion was never a factor in my upbringing beyond basic cultural background radiation stuff, so yeah, I’m kinda there with you.
Same. I realised in primary school (been to Catholic schools all my life. That’s not a big deal in Britain though) that I didn’t believe any of the god stuff.
Honestly I don’t think I ever really believed in it. I went to sunday school and read the bible but it never once felt real to me, it was always just a bunch of dubious stories. The only thing that changed is that when I was about 17, my parents stopped making me go.
That is not to say I don’t get religion. I just think the goddess is a mercurial bongo, and she most certainly ain’t YHWH
My family wasn’t very religious when I was growing up and we only went to church on major holidays like Easter and Christmas, so while I believed in a god for a few years as a kid, I rarely prayed to it and was very apathetic about it. When I learned at the age of 14 that atheism was a thing, it made perfect sense to me and I stopped believing in any gods. Other atheists became atheists because of negative experiences with the religions they were raised in, but for me it was just realizing that there were others who didn’t believe in gods and saw how silly it all was.
Oh my god, fine, I’ll talk to my doctor about HRT.
Yay!
The marketing really should emphasize butt enhancement more.
I celebrate Jocelynn’s theoretical existence.
man, I really don’t get the last panel. The bubble metaphor is extremely straight forward, there’s no need for Dorothy to try to clarify what “bubble” stands for; it’s not a literal bubble! It’s a metaphor to say that both Joyce and her sister were raised in a cult-like environment where their social interactions and education were purposefully kept stunted to make sure they acquiesce to the fucked-up rules of their church.
The metaphorical bubble burst when both of them got exposed to people outside their church, particularly queer people and realized they were lied to.
But Jocelyn’s last sentence makes it sound like her bubble is her chest, something physical that people can literally poke. So she left the church and came out as trans because…gay people literally poked her boobs? Like in a sexual way? What the hell does this mean?
The bubble that both Jocelyne and Dorothy are making innuendos about in the final panel is Jocelyne’s butt. Which has been poked by gay people.
ANAL SEX.
ANNUAL SEX.
Yeesh. Imagine only getting to have sex once a year for some reason, and then it’s not even good.
😛 Imagine not having sex for 30. I’m pretty concerned it won’t be very good!
From “Zorro: The Gay Blade”:
Florinda : [regarding Esteban] Do you know he only makes love to me 12 times a year?
Don Diego : Well, once a month is not so bad.
Florinda : No, he makes love to me 12 times in one night and then, zip, nothing!
Don Diego : Tell me, on that one night, does he eat anything special? Oysters? Raw eggs?
Florinda : Garlic. A lot of garlic.
I’m also sure that the attempted murder of your friends and the literal death of one of them helped a bit in the whole becoming atheist thing.
Each event that Joyce went through was more bitter than the other, her decision was understandable, but in part it is sad that they killed her faith in that way.
I confess that even with those tragedies, Joyce’s faith would be preserved but with a more flexible approach, but surprisingly it would be Becky who would show that.
… what?
Firstly, it’s a bit weird to talk about a fictional character like that, but secondly, why exactly would it have been good for ”Joyce’s faith to have been preserved”?
She was raised to pretend she heard the voice of god, and to believe insane things about the natural world. Why would keeping her superstitious world view have been something good?
1) Joyce was raised in a cult.
2) Becky is not doing that great. At all.
I adore Dorothy’s smile in panel two. Goddamn, she’s in love.
Also:
“If there’s heart room, there’s butt room.”
I was told this was a Swedish saying buuuuuut I’m thinking it’s applicable here. Somehow. We’ll figure it out..
Dorothy’s smile always captivates
I’ve never seen that phrase double entendre’d before but I support it lmao
The big sister dorothy never knew she needed
I think she got bubbles disease
*cues up “Together We Ride Dat Booty” mashup on youtube*
(I’unno why, the Fire Emblem just makes it catchier imo)
Bubbly personality masking bossy control freak!
In case it’s not clear, Jocelyn’s bubble is her butt!