517

Bubblebrained
Posted on October 23, 2019 by David M Willis

517 thoughts on “Bubblebrained”

  1. Ana Chronistic

    “No you WON’T see, WHAT did I just say”

    1. Diner Kinetic

      She doesn’t know he plans to steal her glasses

      1. Doctor_Who

        Are they even wearing glasses, or did they start dating after meeting at the pince nez store?

        1. Delicious Taffy

          Yes.

        2. mrnoidea

          I just realized that face in Delicious Taffy’s profile pic makes for a great dream-sequence Anti-Joyce.

        3. Delicious Taffy

          That’s Joyce’s Nobody, staring right at Raidah while she smooches her soon-to-be-ex man.

        4. Arawn

          She liked that he was kinda square… and he liked her round …. lenses…

        5. Adept

          See now I’m fascinated to know whether Joyce actually has a “MEGA-ASS” as Raidah so delicately puts it.

          My straight boy mind wants details.

        6. Karma

          She said MAGA-ass, as in trump supporter

        7. Adept

          ROFL, so she did. Read that too fast.

  2. Doctor_Who

    Raidah: Oh, we’ll see all right. Soon everyone will see. Ha. Ahaha. MUAHAHA-

    (Smash cut to Raidah waiting tables at Galasso’s)

    Raidah: Wait, I forget why this was part of the plan.

    Sydney: I know, right? I’m sure there was a logical reason my evil scheme involved working here, but I can’t remember.

    Blaine: More breadsticks, table six!

    Ross: Order up!

    1. Cholma

      I LOL’d. 🙂

    2. Screwball

      Well evil vengeance schemes don’t pay for themselves. Or at least not for a while…

    3. He Who Abides

      Galasso: FOOOOOOOOOOOLS!

    4. Clif

      Why is there no laughing heart button?

  3. BBCC

    This’ll be fuuuuuun.

  4. Chaucer59

    No, Jacob, she isn’t.

    1. King Daniel

      We’ll see.

      1. StClair

        I think we’ll see that she isn’t.

        1. Schpoonman

          She’s maintained harassing Sarah probably since Dana left. We definitely won’t.

        2. Clif

          Sarah only narced on a friend. Joyce has negatively impacted her planned professional future and her current romantic one. You haven’t seen harassment.

        3. TemperaryObsessor

          Sarah told the person who she had the most reason to believe would focus on Dana, because she couldn’t shoulder it alone and trying to would have a huge impact on her future and Dana’s other friends including Raidah didn’t make it clear they were interested in helping her.

        4. TemperaryObsessor

          Sorry typo focus on helping Danah.

  5. Danielle

    that anger will eventually pass

    1. JetstreamGW

      Will it? So far that hasn’t really been demonstrated. Raidah’s kinda grudgey.

      1. Lyssie

        “Kinda”.

        1. AbelUndercity

          The Irish are looking at Raidah and saying: “Damn, she’s seriously grudgey.”

    2. thejeff

      “Eventually.”

      Maybe a few years after Raidah graduates. Given the pace of this comic, that’ll be centuries from now.

    3. DudeMyDadOwnsADealership

      Her self-destructive control issues that make Mrs. Walkerton’s look trivial by comparison (almost always involving condemning someone else for whatever didn’t work out with her life,) however, will pass over her dead body…..Funny how sometimes a promising future isn’t worth sacrificing a self-validating preconception that you were in the right from the very beginning for some people………

  6. ValdVin

    The “her” is pretty evident anyway, isn’t it? When Raidah called Sarah “Human Sandpaper” Jacob didn’t disagree.

    1. BigDogLittleCat

      I felt his lack of reaction was more not wanting to acknowledge the bongoy side. Ditto when he didn’t say anything when Raidah made fun of Joyce’s eating neuroses.

      1. DailyBrad

        Yeah, like, I think Jacob liked Sarah when she’d open up to him, usually when talking about Joyce, but he was stymied by her putting up walls, which was why he eventually stopped talking to her, since yeah, Sarah’s not exactly eager to let people in. Think of everything Joyce has had to do to get Sarah to be frank with her.

      2. ValdVin

        Good callback on the eating habits thing, but I don’t know how surprised Raidah should be that Jacob reads “her” to be Joyce. There was also the trip to church.

        (And did Raidah know about the Toebreaker Incident?)

  7. Kyrik Michalowski

    I feel bad for Jacob here, but I still think dumping Raidah will be ultimately good for him. Shame things won’t work out with Joyce but now he can find someone who is good for him. Now I just have to ask, should I feel bad for Raidah?

    1. Danielle

      *shakes 8 ball*

      1. Thursday Violist

        It says “No”

        1. Proxiehunter

          Mine just started laughing.

        2. He Who Abides

          Mine said “Not Now, I’m Tired”.

    2. BigDogLittleCat

      No. She’s not a nice person.
      Jacob was dating her because she checked the boxes on a list. Did he actually enjoy her company? Did he *like* her, or did she just fit the criteria he thought were important?
      I think the real reason he broke up with her is not that he crossed a line with Joyce, but Joyce made him realize that Raidah was not the kind of person he wants to date.
      As messed up as Joyce is, she is good hearted and cheerful, which Raidah is not.
      If she were what he wanted, he wouldn’t have found Joyce so attractive. So yeah, not sorry for the unpleasant person.

      1. AntJ

        Raidah, like Anna, has said or done something mean or spiteful nearly every time she’s made an appearance. She never listed her reasons for liking Jacob, and Jacob’s reason was “she’ll impress Harrison”, so I find no reason to cheer for them as a couple. She flirted with him by talking about his brother. Seriously, who does that? Certainly not your soulmate.

        1. Seregiel

          Maybe its because Raidah is younger, but I find her less awful despite her tendency to hate train because she never negged Jacob. Fueled his insecurities, but those could still be taken as supporting his plans as opposed to… you have a big nose or she doesn’t get dates because of her eyebrows.

      2. thejeff

        I’m not sure it was quite that bad. He did seem to like her, though we didn’t see that much of them together. He always seemed happy to see her, didn’t complain about her, seemed to be open with her, sought her out.
        It’s certainly not true in all cases that finding someone else attractive means you’re not happy with who you’re with. That’s not necessarily how we’re wired.
        He did seem to make some kind of connection with Joyce he didn’t with Raidah as he acknowledged. OTOH, he acknowledged that after his brother praised him for dating Joyce rather than someone like Raidah, so there’s that.

        None of which is to defend Raidah herself. I agree she’s more than unpleasant, but I think she mostly kept that under wraps around Jacob or was subtle enough that he didn’t pick up on it.

      3. Oberon

        These are good questions. Jacob seems to phrase a lot of his self worth in terms of pleasing/living up to his brother. Raidah could have been more the girl Jacob thought his brother would approve of and less the girl Jacob was attracted to.

    3. Huehuetotl

      I read Raidah’s last comment as a response to “you won’t”. I’m not sure either. He shouldn’t, but he might change his mind.

    4. Jamie

      I don’t think you’re under any obligation to feel bad for her.

      What has happened to her so far, in this particular story arc, was probably not her fault and definitely not shown to be her fault. And what has happened to her has been bad.

      That said, her entire history in this comic has been pretty terrible. If she’d been faceless arm candy to disappear into the background, I’d feel a little obligated to feel bad for her on principle. But she has a personality and has gotten some smidges of development… about as much as Ash has, perhaps.

      I think that Willis has plans in store for her, but it’s hard to guess where she’ll end up in the long run. But right now?

      I feel sorry for her, because I understand how she feels. I don’t feel bad for her, after that reaction.

      1. Ana Chronistic

        Here’s the Dr. Nerdlove trick to dating: Every relationship ends, until one doesn’t. Raicob has run its course, and in the grand scheme of things, it’s better to end when one or both know it won’t work than to drag it out past its natural expiration date.

        Feel bad? Eh, EVENTUALLY it’ll be better for both, whether or not you care about them.

    5. James

      Maybe a little. Being dumped sucks, and even if Raidah’s a demonstrably kind of terrible person who didn’t really respect Jacob, that’s not why he’s breaking up here.

      So this specifically may warrant a 2-3 out of 10 on the sympathy scale.

      In GENERAL, beyond this specifica relationship, no, Raidah has earned exactly zero sympathy.

    6. Geeky Warrior

      I’m still hoping that Harrison will have a talk with Jacob
      “Bro do you like her?”
      “Yeah but.”
      “That’s it, stop right there, give her a chance after things settle if you still like her”

      1. Ana Chronistic

        I imagine Jacob might cop out and say Joyce had to be somewhere, so it’s just the guys* hereafter

        *I’m assuming we’re treating Joyce’s declaration of Jaime being Jacob’s nephew (not niece or nibling) as fact, since that’s literally the only indication I see otherwise

      2. Oberon

        Harrison will probably never find out what happened.

        Of course, if Harrison asks a few key questions then Jacob will be right back in the position of having to lie to his brother or confess the truth, so perhaps Harrison will find out if Jacob decides that he’s had enough of lying to the older brother he clearly idolizes. But if he keeps on lying then that will probably just build more resentment towards Joyce.

        1. Diane

          I think Harrison already knows and is waiting/hoping his brother says something. And when Jacob doesn’t, Harrison makes sure his brother knows he’s disappointed in him, the worst thing for Jacob at this point in his life.

        2. Michelle J. Caboose

          I did feel like it seemed like Harrison kept giving them chances to talk. It could have been so they could sync their stories enough to keep the sitcom going, but I felt it was more to give them a chance to be honest with each other and come clean to him.

  8. Tacos

    No she’s not. She ain’t better than that.

  9. Stephen Bierce

    –The man says I’m “overdue”
    “Sing along
    Send some money
    Join the Chosen Few”
    Hey! Mister, I’m not in a hurry
    And I don’t wanna be like YOU!
    All I want from tomorrow
    Is to get it better than TODAY!

    1. StClair

      Step by step, rung by rung
      Higher and higher

  10. BigDogLittleCat

    So much for Raidah’s claim of not being jealous and shrugging him off as not worth her time if there were another girl.

    1. timemonkey

      Raidah tells herself a lot of little lies to make herself feel better.

    2. Wraithy2773

      It’s almost like Raidah’s a human being who, like many human beings, is not able to react perfectly and smoothly to bad news, especially bad news that is kinda hard-wired into much of the human psyche to be on the level of “I should kill this person to establish my dominance” evolutionary instincts.

      1. CJ

        What kind of bullshit idea of evolution do you promote here?
        Only humans kill for dominance, the rest of nature manages to settle such problems without killing their own kind. It’s a social thing – and reeks of toxic masculinity.

        1. Lexicon

          Ants conduct warfare on a massive scale every day. Primates fight each other too. Plenty of species fight themselves.

        2. CJ

          Ok, ants are about the only species other than humans that engage in war.
          Primates fight often, and usually one side yields and accepts the dominance and so they live. They also have lots of sex to keep social structure without fighting.
          Saying humans fight to the death because of their biology is plain wrong. It’s a social idea. Evolution has nothing to do with it. Where evolution is concerned, all species who are able to survive in a certain environment will do so, and when the environment changes, all those that have enough flexibility to still survive under the new circumstances will endure.
          The term ‚survival of the fittest‘ is one of the most misunderstood terms that ever made the rounds.

        3. tyersome

          I’m sorry, but I don’t think you understand this subject quite as well as you think …

          Chimpanzees also exhibit warlike behavior where groups of males will go out and kill their “neighbors”.

          If you search online you will find other examples of behavior where other animals kill conspecifics — humans can be terrible, but we are by no means unique.

          (Also, there are thousands of different species of ants in 21 different subfamilies, so even if only ants were involved in war that would still be many different species!)

        4. King Daniel

          For just one mammalian example, I believe deer killing/fatally wounding other deer (sometimes, even mutually!) with their antlers during the course of a fight is by no means uncommon.

        5. King Daniel

          Oh, and let’s not forget dolphins’ tendency to murderrape babies and females of their own species.

        6. Kamino Neko

          Deer have been known, in at least 2 cases, to wander around for days with rivals decapitated heads still locked in their antlers.

        7. Kamino Neko

          Lions have infanticide as a significant reproductive strategy!

        8. CJ

          Yeah, infanticide is very common for all kinds of animals.
          So could be just stop citing nature as a reason for why humans do what they do? It doesn’t prove shit.

        9. CJ

          BTW: all cited animal behavior related to dominance behavior was about males, which makes the argument that evolution would drive Raidah, a female, to that even more ludicrous.

        10. Council

          Also the prospective combatants here are very much cis women

          As far as ideological rhetoric goes this was a huge stretch

        11. Lingo

          You need to learn about meerkats. Not to mention all the other mammals that will kill young of their own species if they’re not related (eg bears, lions).

    3. Eve

      I mean she also thinks of herself as a full grown adult despite being one year older than the freshmen she called a child. She has plenty of wrong ideas about herself.

      1. SillyGoose

        I feel her reaction here is quite aligned. She’s not making a scene or anything, just ascertaining where that came form when they had plans together until 5 seconds ago.

        But also yeah, what Wraithy said. We all say a lot of things that are not necessarily 100% true but reflect what we wish were. When I say “I won’t be angry if X happens” it can mean I won’t, but sometimes it means “I don’t want to be angry in that scenario and recognize it’s not worth getting riled up over”.

        1. thejeff

          And sometimes it’s just bullshit because you don’t want your boyfriend to think you’re going to be a jealous percussion instrument like those girls he was just complaining about.

          Then on the first hint of trouble you go into “tear down my rival” mode rather than talking to your boyfriend about it.

        2. SillyGoose

          …that too, sometimes, yes.

      2. Lingo

        Sarah acts the same way in that respect.

  11. Synnerman

    And Regina George, I mean Raidah, calls out her Mean Girls Squad.

    1. JessWitt

      Joyce never knew the horror of girl cliques since she was homeschooled so this is going to be new to her.

      1. not someone else

        If Indiana evangelical society is anything like Southern evangelical society, I wouldn’t be so sure; that sort of thing winds up being replicated in churches just fine, including by adult women.

        1. Norah

          It wouldn’t surprise me. I could almost imagine Joyce’s mom engaging in some of that.

        2. JessWitt

          Oof yeah. Church ladies be judgin’.

  12. Mra

    maga-assed?

    1. Yumi

      With the comic lettering it’s hard to tell, but that’s “MAGA-ass.”
      If that helps.

    2. Hina

      I think it’s from Trump’s slogan “Make America Great Again”

      1. DailyBrad

        Yeah, it’s from her (incorrect, at least at this point) assumption about Joyce’s political leanings.

        1. Wraithy2773

          ………I dunno, I can’t exactly fault Raidah too much about that assumption. We’re talking about someone that, until coming to college and getting exposed to new viewpoints, was pretty much in the dyed in the wool hardcore Christian Evangelist camp.

          Also, she’s angry. That she’s not throwing punches is a positive sign.

        2. Jamie

          She’s not loyal to that tribe, though. She’s demonstrably not loyal to that tribe, and has never shown the slightest inclination of having any such loyalty. She’s been indoctrinated by them, yes, and brainlessly parrots their dogma, yes. But she has never sided with them on any actual point of contention. Never. Seriously, the most malicious thing she’s actually done is punch Joe.

          … the window had it coming.

          I mean, I agree that it’s a reasonable conclusion from Raidah’s perspective, but as omniscient readers, we should thoroughly know better.

        3. not someone else

          Not to get too real life in here, but “brainlessly parrots their dogma” isn’t really not a reason people vote Republican, regardless of their actual presence or lack of ethics.

        4. Dr. T

          The thing is that, for all of her faults, Joyce is earnest in her Christianity. It isn’t for show or to deem herself superior to anyone else.

          I think the best contrast point for Joyce is Mary, who IS likely to be very MAGA (her tendencies towards Japanese art style notwithstanding).

          – Mary is very holier than thou without actually being particularly so. Remember, while Joyce has shown an embarrassed interest in online smut, the mere threat from Carla to hack her internet search history was enough to make Mary run away and stop harassing her at one point.

          – Mary is openly bigoted. Yes, her primary focus has been towards the LGBTQ+ community, but that is something Joyce was unwilling to embrace once she got to know anyone in that community.

          – Mary is even willing to discriminate against someone for not being the right type of Christian as she deemed Robin a RINO for the crime of being a Catholic. This was long before any of the messes with Gashface or Leslie came out.

          Wait a minute. Mary would be very MAGA. She rooms with Roz, a Catholic Latina woman whom she despises in just about every way. If this webcomic did not try to be too set in a certain time, I would expect a few strips where Roz has to deal with ICE officials who were investigating an anonymous tip that she was an illegal immigrant.

        5. bhtooefr

          TBF, her tendencies towards Japanese art styles fit. There’s a reason why “anime avatar” means fascist half the time. (That reason is 4chan.)

          (The other half of the time it’s Actual Communists, and I’m not sure why that is.)

        6. Songbird

          It can’t be that they just like anime? Enjoying something doesn’t always have to be an indication of political leanings. I like anime, used to have anime-styled avatars as a kid. You going to accuse me of being an ultra-conservative fascist, too? I’d be insulted, but this seems to be a pretty common assumption for some reason, so as it is, it’s just kind of annoying.

        7. Clif

          I think you’ll find that ICE does very little investigation of the siblings of congress-critters.

        8. Dr. T

          I think you’ll find that ICE isn’t really that great at doing their homework. They have deported actual American citizens under Trump because they deny them due process to prove who they are. They totally could arrest and try to deport someone like Roz without realizing her sister is in a position of power.

        9. SillyGoose

          I remember her telling DeSanto “You have the letterswe like next to your name so I would have voted for you”. So she would have voted fasc– I mean MAGA not too long ago; but she probably now recognizes that maybe mindlessly imitating her parents’ voting behaviour won’t do.

        10. Oberon

          I agree, it’s a fairly safe assumption for Raidah to make.

          I don’t recall seeing Joyce make any political statements, but even with the doubts she has been recently feeling about her religion/religious oppression her inclination is probably going to be to vote for the party which wants to lock down her reproductive rights. Because abortion = sin+murder has been a part of her culture for her entire life, and one women’s studies class probably isn’t going to change that.

        11. woobie

          ehh, the religious are more likely to be NeverTrumpers.

        12. thejeff

          Really?
          Everything I’ve seen has white Evangelicals as his core base – voting something like 80% for him in 2016 and still supporting him at similar levels.

        13. woobie

          I overstated, but most are aware he is a godless heathen using them for votes.

    3. King Daniel

      “MAGA-assed”. Joyce is from a white conservative family, while Raidah’s family is Muslim. Do the math on that.

      1. Jago

        tbh I’m not from America and I had to think a moment to realize wtf MAGA is supposed to mean.

    4. Nymphie

      I have no memory of that Raidah would have known of Joyce’s political standpoint (which was pretty republican at least until Becky blasted the closet) so I think she just did the conclusion of that she must be a Trumpster since she’s a christian white girl that does seem a tad sheltered from reality.

      So yeah, maga as in “make america great again”

      1. Nymphie

        Ah shoot there i go for being slow on the phone xD

    5. Charles Phipps

      I assume that the Browns are Trump supporters like many evangelicals and there’s actually a (noncanon?) story about them thinking Obama was the antichrist.

      1. Oberon

        I do recall a Chinese Christian being interviewed about not voting for McCain because of the whole biblical Cain killing Able fable, but I don’t recall any serious (as in, outside of right wing propaganda outlets just inventing stuff as per usual, not actual churches professing this to be the case) Obama is the antichrist beliefs floating around.

  13. Piotr W

    “We’ll see”.

    Raidah: starting to plan Joyce’s demise.

    1. Thursday Violist

      More likely, she plans on hooking him up with Joyce just to prove him wrong out of spite.

      1. DailyBrad

        I really don’t see that as likely.

      2. SuperZero

        “You’re better than that.”
        “We’ll see.”

    2. Cyrus

      New prediction! Raidah’s new vendetta against Joyce will end up pushing Jacob back towards Joyce since he’ll feel both protective of her and guilty/partially responsible for the harassment.

      Anyway, endgame will still be Joeyce, Jacob ends up with Malaya, Sarah and Raidah hate-fuck and Danny elopes with Mike.

      1. ktbear

        Ummm, re-end game. Can definately see it, no…just, no! God, I hope so! and, I would have thought it’d be Danny and Ethan but I guess Danny and Mike is a definate possibility.

        1. thejeff

          God no for Danny and Mike. Danny’s getting better about standing up for himself, but he’s not heading anywhere he could have a vaguely healthy relationship with Mike.

        2. Clif

          No one ever said that Amber had a healthy relationship with Mike. Willis is pretty good at twisted relationships you root for. See Ruth/Billie. That said, Danny/Mike seems particularly unlikely.

        3. Seregiel

          Least healthy and angriest pairing: Sarah and Mike.

        4. SillyGoose

          That could be healthy, if they’re both in for the cathartic angry sex and not much else. As long as everyone agrees on the terms of the relationship or lack thereof.

        5. thejeff

          Let’s say I think Danny would have a much less healthy relationship with Mike than SP! Amber. And I don’t think Mike would be interested, because of that.

          Barring big changes in either or both of them, Danny would be a patsy for him, while he loved Amber because she challenged him.

        6. JBento

          Also, Mike promised Ethan he wouldn’t mess with Danny. There’s no fun in doing stuff by BREAKING the rules, that’s too easy.

        7. Clif

          Point.

    3. Netty

      Now watch her team up with Amber and Becky’s Dad.

  14. Foxhack

    Oh. Yay. “Maga-ass.”

    1. JetstreamGW

      That snide remark won’t be dated in a couple years! 😀

      1. Madock345

        I feel like that’s going to be remembered for a very long time 🙁

      2. Norah

        Oh please, let it be dated after, say, November 2020

        1. King Daniel

          Even if he loses the election (and in order for that to be so, people need to get out and vote), I don’t think it’s something that will fade easily from the public consciousness, for years to come at least.

        2. Muttski

          Dated after 2020? Not likely considering the sideshow acts that are the Democrat hopefuls.

          The only one worth taking serious gets called a Russian “Actor” by the loser of the last election?

          Hilarious. They really do eat their own.

        3. ValdVin

          “Actor”?

          Cite where Clinton said that, please. “Useful fool” to the Russians is not an “actor”.

          Also, Gabbard’s got a huge spike in bot Twitter amplifiers who usually are pimping conservatives. https://twitter.com/cbouzy/status/1185332311983869952?

        4. g127

          Well: she is supported by Russian troll accounts and cheers on Assad policies.

          I think there are several great people in the race; Gabbard is not one of them.

        5. huttj509

          If you’re referring to the New York Times story saying Clinton said the Russians were “grooming” Gabbard as a spoiler candidate, she didn’ty, she said the Republicans were, and the NYT misquoted her.

          https://www.rawstory.com/2019/10/new-york-times-changes-story-admitting-they-misquoted-clinton-saying-russians-were-grooming-tulsi-gabbard/#.Xa-gAKKls4E.twitter

        6. ValdVin

          The NYT misquoted something to stir the pot about Hillary Clinton?

          This is my shocked face.

        7. Thursday Violist

          And then the NYT stealth-edited their story, effectively gaslighting all the other people who quoted them.

      3. 3oranges

        Although I don’t think it was ever abbreviated, Reagan had the slogan “Let’s make America great again” back in 1980. So long as there are people scared of others gaining some equality, I don’t think the sentiment is going anywhere.

        1. Dr. T

          Another slogan Trump has used, even evoking it in his inaugural speech, was “America First”. It is a recycled slogan from the KKK from several generations ago. I think MAGA will simply get recycled and repurposed for decades to come.

        2. woobie

          That is NOT what it fucking meant in 1980 (when Trump was a Democrat and Warren a Republican).
          Iranian hostage crisis? High inflation? Relinquishing the Panama Canal? Carter was a smart man, but he was lacking in the hey hey let’s go leadership and things were not going well. Having someone in charge who appears confident goes a long way toward making anything great.

        3. thejeff

          It kind of was. Reagan was subtler about it, but he was definitely dog whistling to the old segregationists. The vision of the past when America was Great was still tied to “when people like you were in charge and they knew their place.”

  15. Delicious Taffy

    Wow, Raidah. You’re just gonna go ahead and basically call Joyce a Neo-Nazi, huh? And she’s also stupid, apparently, so that’s great.

    I’m incredibly shocked that Raidah would behave in such a petty manner. Shocked, I tell you. Man, breakups suck.

    1. Charles Phipps

      Raidah being mean is as unsurprising as water being wet.

      1. Fomalhaut88

        …or Joyce and Sarah being mean.

        Y’all have pretty aggressive protagonist-centered myopia.

        1. begbert2

          Sarah yes duh, but if you think that the typical Joyce action can be fairly characterized as “mean”, then you have a pretty weird myopia yourself.

    2. Chris Phoenix

      Well, to be fair, Becky called Joyce’s siblings the Hitler Youth IIRC.

    3. Shane Wegner

      “Joyce is weak and stupid and will never defeat me! Also she is the first reason I think of as to why I was defeated!”

      1. Kim

        😀 This is a great call!

    4. Fomalhaut88

      …she’s not wrong, though. Joyce’s attitudes are shifting, but she is still very xenophobic and fundamentally afraid of change.

      Plus, her family literally are Trump supporters.

      1. Seregiel

        Calling out the xenophobia claim- yes it means fear of the unfamiliar, but in the context of America and Trump supporters it means more specifically – fear of foreigners. This is a hugely important distinction when we are discussing this with a Muslim woman and African American man on screen. Particularly since… we don’t know if Raidah is actually foreign. That is a key problem with MAGA people, is they presume you’re from another country when you could be 4th gen based on this fear and you need to go back to “where you belong.” Dreamers would also be a key problem with this. They grew up here and are fundamentally American, but they are reduced to their birth nation and assigned that otherness. It’s irrational to that degree and it is very tightly tied in with racism because of it.

        We have never seen Joyce look side eyes at people from other countries/races. It is different than racism, but as we don’t know where ALL the cast originated from (you can be a biracial kid from 2 countries born in a third, you can be an American who spent your whole life in France, etc), but because this is a comic and we project how we think people speak onto these characters, we’re going to have to tie it into racism at least a little bit. Only confirmed not American I believe is Ruth. Could be wrong.

        That said: Joyce is afraid of change in her own life, but that isn’t the same as DISLIKING people based on their origin and differing beliefs. The only person she’s been uncomfortable with was Raidah, and she was happy to get advice from her at the mall until the Sarah thing went down. Joyce dated Ethan and was interested in Joe from the start (Jewish), was happy to have a sister in Sarah (African American), is working on her relationship with Sal (biracial but is apropos Walky black), Billie is her closest Christian friend (biracial), had a crush on Walky as a child (generic beige is his own claim), Dina hits a nerve because of EVOLUTION not where her parents are from, didn’t blink twice at Asma’s hijab, had zero problems with Roz (latina) or Sierra (unsure if confirmed African American or black from other country) on the context of race etc and has never mentioned immigrant stances. She also likes trying new experiences (non christian college, athiest friend, went to a frat party). As soon as she understood otherness of orientation it wasn’t a blip in her mind. Joyce wants to meet her brother’s wife whom he met while in India (maybe indian? maybe another white minister?). She has some seriously westernized stances but she loves people. She faced down her parents to have them love her neighbors. Her biggest problem with other countries is the food and Jesus… and soon it’s just going to be the food. That was about her comfort and believe in the Truth, not about whether you should hate/fear other people for being “wrong.” Xenophobia is an active fear of PEOPLE and she has always worked to smash that into the dust despite initial dumb reactions.

        1. Seregiel

          Jbento pointed out a possibly islamophobic interaction so this might actually be a little bit more murky.

        2. Delicious Taffy

          Even that incident isn’t necessarily islamophobic, though. Joyce already had a panic attack just from a visit to a church that’s just a different branch of her own religion. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say she recoiled because a different religion’s service would be too much of a change, too quickly.

          Raidah doesn’t have to be that charitable, but the readers don’t have to take her accusations at face value, or read them as a truthful statement about Joyce. Raidah barely knows Joyce, so she’s not exactly the authority on Joyce’s entire character.

        3. Seregiel

          Totally agreed. Just pointing out why I could have had a blind moment.

        4. Foxhack

          Maybe a bit late, but THANK YOU.

          Joyce is definitely sheltered but she’s been shown to GROW as a person and understands that the believes she was raised on are not perfect.

  16. Dark

    This comic proving that Raidah is a terrible judge of character in literally every way.

    “MAGA ass”… MYass…

    Punk ass bongo, just because Joyce is white and Christian.

    1. FLUFFYWOLF

      Meanwhile, she hangs with someone who very conspicuously said Dinah was… well. Y’all remember.

      Great job Raidah

      1. GoblinScribe

        She called that person out as soon as it happened. And all she knows about Joyce is “white Christian, pretty conservative mindset, Indiana, Islamophobic.” I mean, remember when Joyce recoiled at the mention of Islam? In front of Raidah? It’s a fair assumption.

        I don’t like Raidah, but y’all are being ridiculous.

        1. SuperZero

          “Didn’t want to attend service at a Mosque” and “recoiled at the mention of Islam” aren’t quite the same thing.

          If anything she seemed like she was trying not to be insulting.

        2. JBento

          I think GS is referring to the fact that Joyce pretty much teleported back a few feet:

          http://www.dumbingofage.com/2017/comic/book-8/01-face-the-strange/guzzle/

        3. thejeff

          Though it’s not clear how much that was the mention of Islam and how much that was the girlfriend of the boy she was flirting with showing up. The blushing ties it to the latter, imo.

        4. JBento

          It is? Like, “girlfriend shows up” is panel 3. Note the difference in distance from panel 4 to 5, which is “mention of mosque”.

        5. Seregiel

          Man, if that’s the intent I totally made the wrong distinctions in an above comment. I took that as – jumped back because flirting and further alienated because she couldn’t even handle a different church. I didn’t think distance increased, just we zoomed out and the background went away so it was just them and the tension. Less Muslim problem, more overloaded and I JUST NEED GRAPE JUICE WHY IS THIS SO HARD?!

        6. Seregiel

          Also, never panicked around Asma’s hijab so that’s probably why I didn’t pick up the islamophobia reading from that panel.

        7. JBento

          She’d JUST handled a different church – she and Jacob are from different denominations and they’d gone to a service at his church.

        8. SuperZero

          She didn’t really handle it very well.

        9. Seregiel

          She had a panic attack in the church and was still talking about finding grape juice… and then she had a germophobic moment with the wine.

        10. SuperZero

          It wasn’t just “mention of Islam,” though.
          There are several aspects of what she said that could have alarmed Joyce, although I wouldn’t blame Raidah just for that assumption.

        11. Maddieface

          I think Raidah can believe Joyce is a Trumpist. I think Raidah can believe Jacob is interested in Joyce. I think Raidah trying to hold both those beliefs simultaneously is batshit. Give Jacob enough credit to not be trying to hook up with a Neo-nazi, Raidah.

        12. Andy

          It’s not like she’s in a great place to be thinking unemotionally at the moment. Breakups suck major ass, especially being on the receiving end of an unexpected one. I think the “Yeah, we’ll see” is more worrying, since Raidah has shown herself willing to hold grudges over perceived slights and engage in mild harassment as revenge.

        13. Fomalhaut88

          Jacob has a history of being flighty, and disrespects other religions as “just flawed versions of the one true (my) religion”.

          Come on, people.

        14. TemperaryObsessor

          To be fair I think that’s the default position of anyone with a religion including atheism.

        15. Roborat

          Atheism isn’t a religion.

        16. Seregiel

          Did he hold that religions other than his are flawed or people are flawed and thus religions are imperfectly trying to capture the same destination? Truly asking because I don’t remember and those are pretty different. He wasn’t interested in religion at all until recently in an academic capacity so I’m not sure he’s as invested in the True Religion train.

        17. JBento

          It’s the first – he says other religions are worshipping HIS god but in a different way.

        18. SuperZero

          “I believe this to be true” inherently includes “I believe people who believe this is not true to be incorrect.”
          That’s gonna be true with all beliefs, though of course sometimes you’re just… objectively correct. My “belief” is a fact and you’re just flat-out wrong.

          “I think people who believe something I don’t are mostly correct,” is pretty benign.

        19. Seregiel

          Different is not saying it’s flawed, but the possessiveness of God definitely slants it that way. Thank you for finding that for me!

        20. thejeff

          I still think that’s one of the best approaches you can find from anyone who’s truly religious. (At least for monotheistic religions. Might not be true for all others.)
          If you actually believe your God to be the One True God who created all and rules over all, you can’t really also be going “Yeah, this other religion also has their One True God who created everything. They’re right too.”

          Conflating the gods is about the only alternative to “Their God is just fake.”

          In fact, it’s essentially dogma for all three religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam worship the same God of Abraham. They just differ in what His message is.

        21. Andy

          And Raidah has a history of harassing Sarah and trying to turn Sarah’s friends against her.

    2. Dark

      Huh. There’s an auto-censor on bongo, but not on Ass.

      Weird.

      1. Yumi

        Is it? I mean, it’s obviously not weird when you’ve been around the comment section and are used to it, but I still don’t think I’d find it weird or surprising.

        1. Dark

          Eh. I’m generally reading the comic on…

          Well, apparently referring to the platform gets comments auto-banned (or at least that’s been the past experience I’ve had), but it’s the server chat that starts with a D.

      2. Nymphie

        Because the b-word has been aggresively overused before and in particular is a gendered insult.

        1. Dark

          It… Definitely isn’t.

          100%, not anymore. Just like dude and bro. bongo refers to anything and everything.

          It’s not even an insult anymore.

        2. Deadjolras

          Yes, yes, it is.

        3. Yumi

          It has more complexity now, but it definitely is still an insult and gendered.

        4. Badgermole

          Can’t speak for every woman but being called a bongo still feels pretty stinging to me in a way other insults don’t.

        5. Nymphie

          Just because you use those words however you want and to whoever you want doesnt mean they are suddenly gender neutral. Bro is a gendered word regardless if you use it towards a woman. Sis is a gendered word regardless of if you would use it towards a man.

          And you cant exactly claim that the word for female dogs that have birthed pups isnt even an insult anymore, when you just used it /specifically as an insult/.

        6. Dark

          No. I used “punk ass bicth” as an insult.

          It’s in the same vein as weasel. On it’s own, not an insult.

          But “weasel titted cock gobbler” is most definitely an insult.

          Compound insults. They’re great.

        7. King Daniel

          …calling a human being a “weasel” on its own is already very insulting, what are you even on about?

        8. Dark

          Anyone who is insulted by being referred to as the best member of the Mustela genus is not a person who is worth my time.

        9. SuperZero

          Whereas “weasel titted cock gobbler” is merely gibberish.
          I’m not sure this person knows what an insult is.

        10. King Daniel

          Unless you’re being deliberately obtuse (which I’m starting to suspect by this point, if I hadn’t already), you should know as well as I that when someone refers to another person as a “weasel”, they are not praising them.

          “weasel, n. a person who is regarded as treacherous or sneaky.”

        11. JBento

          Please don’t switch letters around to bypass the filter. Willis keeps a comments section that is somehow both extremely curated and extremely permissive, respect the few boundaries he has put in.

      3. pjeseb

        A few years ago, there was a Roz vs. Joyce flamewar in the comments section. Thousands of comments from both sides calling one or the other a bongo. A few days later, the auto-censor was installed, to much hilarity, and it’s stayed that way ever since. Most people who have been reading the comments for long enough have gotten used to it; a few such as myself have even started actually using “bongo” when we comment. As in we will type b/o/n/g/o.

        1. FLUFFYWOLF

          It’s just part of the landscape now I guess

        2. Miri

          I found the comic after that but still find myself typing b/o/n/g/o here. But wouldn’t use the other b word as an insult.

          Calling Mary empty inside, annoying and hard to resist beating? This makes sense. Insulting female dogs? Not so much.

        3. pjeseb

          I feel like most swear words get separated from their actual, technical/original meaning in the minds of people who use them. Most people nowadays who call someone a “bastard” do not mean “you were born out of wedlock.” Many atheists use “goddamn” and “hell” as swear words. It’s just something they say to add emphasis.

        4. DSL

          I have fun with the people who use the word “fu cking” as emphasis (in other words, they use it as if it’s a comma) on everything by pretending to read the resulting comment literally.
          Example: An otherwise erudite (just ask him) friend of mine referred to “fu cking meetings” at work. I (with elaborately feigned innocence) responded: “They have special meetings for that now? Where I worked, people just ducked into in the supply closet.”

        5. thejeff

          If you just use fuck (in its various forms) for emphasis, you’re wasting its versatility. It can replace nearly any part of speech.

          “Fuck it. The fucking fucker’s fucking fucked.”

        6. Seregiel

          Yessss. Via youtube the History of the F word: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvPbxZmZxZ8

        7. Savail

          When I do that, people erroneously assume I’m mad.

        8. thejeff

          They get separated from their actual meaning, but still care a lot of the connotations.
          Bongo in particular isn’t just used for emphasis, but links the target to the negative gendered traits it’s tied to.

        9. thejeff

          Or just as “percussion instruments” 🙂

      4. Sporky

        One’s a gendered slur, one’s not. Pretty simple stuff.

    3. Badgermole

      Joyce is white and evangelical Christian and visibly flinched that one time Raidah invited her to her mosque. It’s 2019 and POC in America are well within their rights to make assumptions about people’s political leanings based on this much.

      1. FLUFFYWOLF

        Concur’d. I was gonna be mad but then I was all “…wait, that’s actually not unreasonable.”

      2. ivy

        Thanks for this.

      3. Cyrus

        I thought that was more about her suddenly being confronted with Jacob’s girlfriend and becoming aware of how flirty and inappropriately close she was to him and teleporting away through the power of sheer awkwardness.

        1. thejeff

          A bit of both, I think. And since she did teleport further away when Raidah suggested the mosque visit and because Raidah was only just starting to wonder about the flirting between her and Jacob, it makes sense for Raidah to focus on that part.

      4. brute

        i wanted to Like the comment but i can’t so

        i concur with badgermole

      5. Dark

        What? A young woman who’s been homeschooled and surrounded by the same views her entire life and is clearly uncomfortable just going to a service by a different sect of her own religion was extremely uncomfortable at the idea of going to a Muslim service?

        Say it ain’t so!

        Raidah’s literal only “evidence” is Joyce reacting in exactly the way she expected Joyce to react.

        She’s assumed and the result is the same as it always is when people assume shit: she looks an ass.

        I don’t give a shit if you’re black, white, brown, or something in between: Don’t assume. You’ll be wrong.

        1. Wraithy2773

          …yes, she’s made an assumption about Joyce’s political leanings based on what parts of Joyce’s background she knows.

          Evangelical Christians are still backing Trump at the 70+% range. And home-schooled-in-a-small-and-very-white-town definitely screams “Super-Evangelical”.

          It’s an assumption by a pissed off woman, sure, but it’s a fairly reasonable one all-told.

        2. King Daniel

          Not to mention that by Joyce’s own admission, she would formerly have voted Republican in the last election had she been old enough to vote then. And this in 2019…

        3. 3oranges

          “How horrible of Raidah to make an assumption like that! In fact, Joyce hasn’t been one the MAGA-types that vote to against her minority’s rights for literally a few weeks.”

        4. not someone else

          Let’s be real here; Joyce has been for gay and lesbian rights for a whole few weeks. We haven’t seen shit that says she isn’t Islamophobic and possibly passively racist.

        5. King Daniel

          Joyce also still has no idea about her sister or trans issues in general so far as we’re aware (beyond being highly likely to have been raised in the sort of environment that clamors in favor of the so-called “bathroom bills” and whatnot, with all the misinformation and vitriol that entails), so there’s that to consider as well.

        6. g127

          Truth: but how long has Raidah known her? Shorter than that, right?

        7. King Daniel

          Joyce and Raidah’s first encounter was here. Joyce was still very homophobic then (she hadn’t even begun her “date Ethan into being straight” scheme at that point).

        8. Dark

          Her admission was based on “you have the letter we like next to your name”.

          That to me reads as Joyce not understanding politics much more than voting the same way as her parents.

        9. 3oranges

          Maybe it’s just me, but I think a Muslim woman might have very good reason to not really care precisely why someone decided to support the letter that keeps attacking her. Sometimes being able to be non-judgemental is a privilege.

        10. SuperZero

          Raidah didn’t hear that. And if she had, she would know that the context involved Joyce learning about what that meant and resisting it, openly challenging an elected Republican on her Republican behavior.

        11. 3oranges

          No, Raidah didn’t here that, but she has still talked to Joyce (in a conversation that we only got to hear excerpts from). And apparently she came to the conclusion that Joyce would support the Republicans, which is being faulted as unfair, yet is only a short time from being accurate.

          But let me be more explicit in what I’m saying. People tell you not to assume someone is being racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, etc. until you have very firm evidence of it. And the people telling you that are almost always white, male, straight, cis, etc. You know why? Because people who are non-white, female or non-binary, non-straight, trans, etc. usually shouldn’t assume nobody is biased against them until all the evidence is in; it’s wrong too often and it’s dangerous for them.

          There are lots of things not to like about Raidah. I don’t think her not being 100% willing to reserve judgement about someone who, as it turns out, truly was planning to vote for those who want to stomp on her rights until just a short while ago is really one of them.

        12. SuperZero

          Republicans are bad, but “Magat” is quite a few steps past that.

          I also think there’s a big difference between not assuming somebody is safe and assuming they are dangerous.

          And you’re giving her credit for being mostly right, but Raidah didn’t know that.
          She does know that Joyce went into battle, unarmed and unprepared, to defend a lesbian from a violent gunman, and she knows that Joyce became visibly distressed when invited to a Mosque (while already visibly distressed) and then, uh… politely declined. And then interacted with her several times after that and only mentioned her religion to point out that she might not be interested in talking about the Picture Bible.
          Oh, and she brought up trans people apparently just to see if Joyce would react; she didn’t. (Quite possibly it went over her head, but Joyce came off better than Raidah did on that one.)

          Y’know, I thought Raidah was being rude but then I looked through their past strips together and my position has evolved. She has reason to dislike Joyce, but if anything she should be the last person to make that particular assumption.

        13. JBento

          “Republicans are bad, but “Magat” is quite a few steps past that.”

          No, they are not. They’re exactly the same step. You know how I know? Because Republicans, for all their “oh, this is very concerning, I need to think about this”, end up voting for Trump and his policies every goddamn time.

          Because, and guess what, Trump’s policies are the Republicans’ policies. MAGAts are saying the quiet part out loud now, but the quiet part WAS ALREADY THERE.

        14. not someone else

          If she voted the same way her parents did and supported the same politicians her parents did, that would make her a Trump-voting Republican. Sans the fact she wasn’t old enough to vote, not sans openly supporting Trump.

        15. SuperZero

          I’m not about to defend somebody who would have voted Republican–that’s extraordinarily immoral at the best of times–but it’s a far cry from Trump Republican.

        16. King Daniel

          Robin herself has served in this comic as a parody of Trump/Trumpism, among other things. Remember her “Make [Indiana Congressional] District Nine Great Again” slogan, or her tiny hands?

        17. King Daniel

          Or how about the comic where she was tweeting angrily at and about the parents of a dead soldier who “will just not shut up about how [she’s] got no tact”?

        18. SuperZero

          And Joyce’s interaction with Robin was to call her out for how evil she is.

          Plus she’s still quite mild compared to the real thing.
          Things got much worse in reality in a way that plays very weird with a comic set in the perpetual present.

        19. JBento

          No, it is not. It’s the exact same words, except non-MAGAs just mutter it under their breath, but they all vote the same way.

        20. SuperZero

          It’s some of the same stuff, but there’s a difference in degree.

          Plenty of them left the party over him.
          Which looks more like “Evil, but with some standards” than actual penitence (Joyce is much better here–and Raidah should know it, she has the evidence), so… again, not defending them.

        21. SillyGoose

          It’s not a real difference though, is it.

          If you think your preference for ((whatever your excuse is, let’s say your conviction that trickle-down economics work because that’s hilarious))
          is more important than the actual lives of ((Black/transgender/female/poor/Hispanic/with a preexisting life-threatening condition/Muslim/non-native English speaking/etc.)) people,
          then you are actively choosing to kill people to defend that choice.

          …now probably Joyce is not aware of that because she hasn’t been thinking about it, or not much, so far. She’s still a child, politically speaking.

          But if we’re discussing real life, let’s not pretend. Voting Trump choosing to kill minorities. If you do it because you like something the Republicans defend, whatever that is, is had better be worth it. If it’s not an extremely important reason, then it’s a flimsy pretense.

        22. SuperZero

          Oh yeah, of course.

          But Joyce saying her family was Republican growing up does not equal redcap. A lot of those people did stop. They weren’t good people, but they still felt he was too much.
          And I can much more easily believe that a pre-Trump Joyce didn’t really know what “Republican” implies than a post-Trump one.

        23. King Daniel

          We also know that Joyce’s family was one of those demonstrating in favor of Chick-Fil-A’s homophobic policies, as stated in another previous strip. I’d say Joyce’s family being Trump Republican is…very likely.

        24. Badgermole

          I’d rather be wrong than assume benevolence in someone whose demographic identity makes them more likely to be right wing ideologues. If I’m wrong and they’re decent people, they’d be more understanding than personally offended.

          Also, Dark? In this political climate, telling POC to not think a certain way about white people makes you sound like a clueless jerk.

        25. SuperZero

          I think there’s a difference between not assuming benevolence and assuming malevolence.

          Especially when the evidence she has doesn’t support it at all.
          While Raidah has personal reasons to be biased against Joyce, we know she tends to be unfair. Based on what she actually knows of Joyce I’d think she should probably be less judgy of her than we are.

      6. ktbear

        I don’t recall Raidah going to church with her boyfriend either tho. If anything, I feel Raidah suspected Joyces reaction even before she made the offer.

      7. Charles Phipps

        I imagine the Browns are Trump supporters as Willis did a comic about it.

        Mind you, Robin may replace Trump in this universe.

        1. King Daniel

          Trump definitely exists as president in this ‘verse. Joe made a crack to Dorothy about how his “Do List” was just as “presidential” as anything she’d ever done, with Walky calling him out for it immediately afterward and Willis confirming it was meant to be a Trump allusion.

      8. Sporky

        I 100% don’t fault Raidah for saying this either.

        Just for everything else about her.

      9. Seregiel

        So I’m on kinda both sides of this as above has shown. Not about in character reactions but about our reactions to the characters. Joyce’s reactions to Raidah totally make Raidah to be okay in making those assumptions even if they are wrong. That distance was weird but she was also going after Jacob. Joyce’s reactions being seen by the commentariot as a whole make it hard for me to understand why WE would read Joyce in such a fashion when we’ve seen her in other interactions. She’s never had a problem with Asma’s hijab for example. I read that interaction to be less about the Mosque and more about a) jacob flirting and b)already did all the change for the day and being further isolated when faced with anymore change/ still not having grape juice. Totally understand in this climate why there would be another reading of that and it is also partially validated by the fact Joyce does the feinting goat with anything not in her wheel house.

        As a person protecting yourself – you do not have to give benefit of the doubt when it comes to risk. At all. Ever. Don’t feel that pressure. That whole don’t judge others is BS and is SUPER helpful. It doesn’t have to all be bad. Judgement allows us to minimize PERCEIVED risk (and that’s all we got). But, labeling another as having an unconfirmed fault TO OTHER PEOPLE- yes, be careful. Gossip is horrible. Make sure you are right because wrong presumptions can also be harmful. You don’t have to give people a chance, but you do have to not do active harm (exceptions for self preservation, etc). Gets murky when commenting about fictional people because characters don’t get hurt, but people still can because of incorrect labeling and that whole what words mean vs how they are used thing.

        Already addressed the possible racist/xenophobia labels above and how I feel those are unfair with all the characters she interacts with on screen, but she might still have some internalized assumptions and systemic racist slants despite her love of people.

      10. Regalli

        Agreed. Raidah also hasn’t been present to watch Joyce’s significant progress. We as the readers know she’s breaking away from church teachings and adapts extremely quickly to new data (in-timescale, I mean. She’s been at college for eight weeks and considering atheism.) Raidah doesn’t, and the one real indication she does have is ‘Joyce is probably Islamophobic.’ (And I don’t think she’s wrong in that assessment, considering how few interactions Joyce has had with Muslim characters thusfar and how prevalent it is in this country.)

        And while yes, Joyce has a pretty diverse friendgroup, there are plenty of Trump supporters who make exceptions for individuals they know who are X marginalized group while supporting policies that hurt them. Raidah has no way of knowing from her limited interactions how much Joyce has changed.

        (I still don’t like Raidah for the classism and ‘I reject the most blatant slurs but still infantilize you’ ableism, not to mention her total unwillingness to recognize Sarah was in a bad place because Dana was in a bad place and Sarah could not hold and subsequent harassment, but her dislike of Joyce is pretty rational all things considered. Add in her hatred of Sarah and Joyce continuing to associate with her – not like Joyce would have an option not to – and yeah, I can see her assuming malevolence here.)

        1. Seregiel

          Oh yeah, totally Raidah has that against her but this isn’t that. I want Raidah and Joyce to be disliked for THEMSELVES. 😀

        2. Regalli

          I am totally in favor of acknowledging our antagonists’ good points (when they have them) and our protagonists’ flaws! Everyone in this comic has made at least one terrible choice that will horribly impact someone else at SOME point, and that’s something I like about it!

          (The exception is like Sierra, who I can maybe find making a really bad choice if I look REALLY hard but is right on the line between supporting and minor character and is therefore not in the spotlight enough to really fuck up. Everyone more major than her? I probably have at least one example.)

    4. AeromechanicalAce

      To be fair, This is also Indiana. Lot of MAGAts around there. Plus they gave us pence.

    5. Hazel

      The assumption that a seemingly conservative, homeschooled white christian girl would be “maga-assd” isn’t super off base. Hell, a few months Joyce may have swung that way politically.

      Though I do agree that Raidah isn’t the best judge of character. Or rather, she lets her disagreement of a person colour her view of them.

      1. FLUFFYWOLF

        And, like… much as we dislike Raidah, it’s not like she’s been there to read every strip of this comic and understand Joyce’s character arc.

        Questionable character judgment aside, there’s a lot of stuff about Joyce that she’d have no way of knowing.

        1. Norah

          And she’s just been dumped. I know she’s not very nice, but most people who’ve just been dumped wouldn’t be feeling especially kindly towards someone who the think might be responsible for the breakup.

        2. SuperZero

          She knows Joyce beat up a supervillain because he was doing the kind of stuff Raidah is now accusing her of. That’s a pretty big detail

      2. BBCC

        Joyce DID swing that way by her own admission, until she changed her mind about gay people.

        1. SuperZero

          And Raidah only knows about one of those two things.

          It’s the second one.

        2. BBCC

          She also knows Joyce’s family is super Christian (enough that she freaked out at Jacob’s different denomination), flinched away at the mention of going to her mosque and that her brother worked as a missionary (who have done plenty of fucked up things all over South Asia, which I’m pretty sure is where Raidah’s family descends from). She’s got reason to think it’s pretty likely she was Trumpian (and she was right until a couple weeks ago in universe).

        3. SuperZero

          Joyce was already flinching away from Raidah just because she was hanging on her boyfriend. She then suggested that if Joyce was questioning her religion (a topic that Joyce was already extremely uncomfortable about) she was welcome to come to a service for a different religion entirely.

          Being extremely uncomfortable with all of that isn’t hugely damning, although I’d agree it’s fair for Raidah to be extra wary–if Joyce hadn’t continued interacting with her on other occasions without any sign of discomfort, anyway.

        4. BBCC

          They weren’t talking about Raidah’s religion in those interactions, so I’d say any wariness springing from that incident stands. Especially because while it was awkward, Joyce only jumps back five feet once she gets the invite. Heck, even at the time, there were a few of us who noted, while we know that’s not what made Joyce jump, it could very easily have looked that way.

        5. SuperZero

          They did mention her religion once.
          Dorothy tried to defuse the two of them by asking what they were talking about before Raidah arrived. Joyce said “The Picture Bible?” and then suggested Raidah wouldn’t be interested in that conversation–though the way she put it, that Raidah wouldn’t have anything to say, maybe wasn’t ideal.

          Raidah said she knew more about Joyce’s religion than Joyce knew about hers (almost certainly true).
          Of the two, Joyce was nicer.

          Interacting with her without talking about her religion almost seems a point in her favor here, though.

        6. BBCC

          Joyce was trying to be nice, but assuming Raidah wouldn’t have much to say when she’s in frigging Indiana (where most people are at least nominally Christian) doesn’t really look better either. Not being rude about it would be a point, but Joyce really didn’t make herself look good there. We know what Joyce meant because as readers we get to see more of these characters, but I don’t think Islamophobe is an unreasonable guess.

        7. thejeff

          Joyce wasn’t trying to be nice. She’s not as good at being mean as Raidah, but they were both in full feud over Jacob mode at that point.

    6. Fomalhaut88

      …and Joyce’s family are Trump supporters, and Joyce was openly bigoted for 90% of the time anyone’s known her, etc.

  17. auroki

    Gonna laugh if Raidah and Blaine’s legion of evil plans to go after joyce both work against each other and this ends in Looney Tunes level hijinks that trickster god on earth Bug Bunny can’t even explain.

    1. Chris Phoenix

      Gonna cry (and then should CALLED IT!) if Raidah and Blaine team up.

      1. SuperZero

        I don’t see why they would. There’s more than one flavor of jerk.

        How could Blaine recruit both her and Ross? That’s a pretty big conflict.

        1. EnerPrime

          Ross and Raidah don’t have to ever actually meet for Blaine to recruit and/or manipulate them to achieve his goals.

        2. SuperZero

          I’m not really sure what’s in it for her. She can be malicious and hold grudges, but that seems like a lot of effort dedicated to evil.

          Maybe a little manipulation, but actually recruiting her to join Team Bad Dad? I guess it’s possible, but I don’t see how it would work. She’s smarter than Ross.

  18. Shane Wegner

    LIVE FOR REVENGE. Or don’t, you won’t care about any of this in a few years.

  19. FLUFFYWOLF

    My best guess is she’s going to try and dox Joyce.

    The fact that she immediately jumped to assuming Joyce voted trump (admittedly, not an unreasonable assumption at the beginning of this school year) gives me the feeling Raidah will not see anything as being off-limits when it comes to utterly destroying her.

    1. Jamie

      I honestly can’t imagine how you’d dox Joyce.

      …

      Idea. Plant drugs in Joyce/Sarah’s room.

      … right, I’m done thinking about this for the week.

    2. not someone else

      …How do you dox someone IRL? Like, she could just ask someone “hey which dorm room is Joyce Brown in”, even get her phone number, but then where does she put the information that Joyce would be anonymous?

      1. James

        I mean, reasonably, just putting someone’s info on 8Chan or something and saying “go to town” would probably result in a whole lot of unpleasantness, but I don’t know if that’s really doxing per se.

        1. Regalli

          Remember that, very recently, Ryan’s buddies were going after his victims who had come forward after the stabbing and AG was redirecting them elsewhere to beat them up.

          If Raidah went that route, she’d be completely evil, and I’d like to think she’s not THAT COMPLETELY EVIL, but yeah she could actually dox Joyce to the known threats on campus. (And I’m not ruling out the possibility Ryan described the bongo who glassed him to his toadies before the stabbing and they’re looking for her in particular.)

  20. Deadjolras

    I see Jacob also uses Dorothy’s “you’re a better person than this” tactic.

    1. AntJ

      and it seems it will work on Raidah as well as it worked on Walky and Joyce

      1. Deadjolras

        He’s such a Dorothy.

        1. Norah

          He is. No wonder Joyce is attracted to him.

        2. Miri

          I wonder if they smell similar…

  21. HeinousActsZX

    I’ve known Joyces IRL who definitely went full MAGA so I don’t think Raidah’s completely off-track here, at least from what she knows about Joyce herself.

    1. AeromechanicalAce

      Plus, i’m willing to take a large bet that Carol is a big Trump fan. So if Joyce had just swallowed her parent’s ideology like she was on track to before college…

      1. King Daniel

        Willis has actually drawn Carol waving a Trump sign and wearing the red cap (and this was before Election Day had even arrived), so…yeah.

        1. abysswatcher1993

          Joyce was scared of her mom being a trump supporter.

        2. King Daniel

          As mentioned in Willis’ own aside for that little comic, it’s not actually set in DoA continuity due to the whole “DoA’s-sliding-timescale/that-strip-having-set-dates” thing, so I mainly linked it to point out that yes, Carol is in all likelihood an actual “MAGA-ass”.

        3. Kamino Neko

          Yeah…when it was posted, about 3 years ago, the election was coming when Joyce was already at school and found out about Becky. And the ‘last election, where she would have voted R, if she’d have been able to vote’ was Obama’s second term.

          NOW the election was when she was 15, and the ‘last election’ was Trump’s first.

        4. Kamino Neko

          Sorry, the election she would have voted R wasn’t a presidential election…so it was DURING Obama’s second term, not for it.

        5. SuperZero

          Yeah, he really fucked with a sliding timescale comic that mentions politics.
          Suddenly basically everything Joyce and/or Dorothy have said on the subject is way different from what it was when it was written.

          I’m kind of surprised that the comic didn’t just avoid him entirely. Honestly, any real-world-ish fiction in a world that includes him should be different for him being in it.

        6. Agemegos

          That might end up like The West Wing avoiding mention of the War on Terror and the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. Sometimes, in fact pretty often, politics is obtrusive, and there is only a limited range of characters you can portray as ignoring it.

        7. SuperZero

          I didn’t say characters should ignore it–that’s actually the issue, they can’t possibly but that immediately places the story at a certain time and in a very different setting from where it started.

          But if he’s just… not a thing in the setting. So stories not about him can still exist.

        8. King Daniel

          When the entire premise of Dumbing of Age is that it more or less takes place in “our” universe – and one of the female protagonists aims to become President (another even pejoratively referring to her as “Little Miss Hillary Clinton Junior”, in a comic published before November 2016) while a major supporting character is a Republican congresswoman to boot – he becomes an all-but-impossible subject to avoid.

    2. ivy

      The IRL Joyce I knew in middle to high school is unrepentantly MAGA, anti- BLM, etc. She’s a blonde blue-eyed pretty white Christian who gives to charities and is perky and likes Disney movies and she’s also everything else! It’s amazing when you talk to someone you thought you knew, who in other ways seems so good, and hear this toxic waste spew out of their mouths.

      1. Jamie

        Same, on all points, though I unfriended that person on FB during the Occupy movement, so I never had to listen to any MAGA-era crap.

      2. abysswatcher1993

        All the MAGA jerks I have met are Mexican American dudes obsessed with weapons and 4chan. I no longer meet them, and I had to work with one for a project and my patience was at fading.

        1. JBento

          Mexican American dudes? The… the ones that Trump said were criminals in general and rapists in particular?

        2. Seregiel

          ^Agrees with Jbento…. what?

        3. abysswatcher1993

          Believe me. There are Latin Americans that just because they were born in the United States they believe they have more rights than undocumented immigrants.

        4. Seregiel

          I mean… they DO have more rights in this country. Being born here gives you citizenship which gives you them. Different than human rights…

        5. BBCC

          Internalized racism’s a hell of a drug.

        6. JBento

          *gasp* They’re drugdealers, too?

        7. StClair

          real bad hombres

  22. King Daniel

    A brief reminder here that the second-most-recent time Joyce and Raidah crossed paths, Joyce started backpedaling quickly just as soon as Raidah mentioned “mosque”; yeah, there was the “Joyce embarrassed about proximity to Jacob” factor as well, but considering the political climate – and Joyce’s own white fundamentalist background – it wouldn’t necessarily be a major leap of logic for Raidah to assume Joyce is a MAGA-type.

    1. Deadjolras

      Also, there’s the second panel in this strip: http://www.dumbingofage.com/2016/comic/book-7/01-glower-vacuum/wouldve/

      (For those that don’t remember, Robin is a Republican).

      1. Deadjolras

        Sorry, I meant third panel. I can’t count.

  23. Axel

    Raidah: has never been better than that

    1. Agemegos

      Indeed, but Jacob wants to colour complying with his wishes as the Good thing to do.

      1. Clif

        Which is completely different from the fact that complying with my wishes is the good thing to do.

  24. Sofiya

    I dislike Raidah a lot but I think it’s gross that Jacob had the audacity to say “you’re better than that” to her like he was scolding her. I don’t think he gets to have the moral high ground here.

    1. Sofiya

      Whoops, I meant the “I’ll let that slide” part.

    2. Jamie

      I mean, if you’re going to make that statement, don’t use a metaphor where someone who jumps off a cliff is automatically ceding the high ground to literally anyone else around.

      1. Sofiya

        Sorry, I’m confused by your comment. Can you explain?

    3. Happilychaotic

      Agreed.

  25. Madock345

    If there were doubts about Raidah and Jacob not actually being that close before, this relatively cold and dispassionate breakup should be proof enough.

    1. SuperZero

      Also Jacob thinking she’s good and her pledging not to be.

      Not very many people openly declare themselves to be not-good, and he didn’t even know she wasn’t.

      1. Madock345

        Hmm. I read the “We’ll see” as a response to him saying she won’t see Joyce with him

        1. SuperZero

          I suspect you’re right and also that it’s intentionally ambiguous.

  26. Wraithy2773

    Can I just say, while everyone is bashing Raidah for being mildly pissed off and making reasonable-if-in-this-case-maybe-inaccurate assumptions about Joyce’s potential political leanings, that I love her bit in Panel 2?

    Just the whole “I didn’t say who ‘her’ was” rhetorical trap is a good one. No, Jacob isn’t being 100% a dick, he realized he stepped over the line, and he wants to break things with Raidah gently, but even he acknowledges in that panel that his claim is a load of crap.

    And just in general? Guys, Raidah’s angry because she’s being broken up with. She’s making some harsh comments about the woman that she’s correctly identified as being the impetus to said break up, sure, but she’s being a lot calmer than most would be here.

    Yeah, this might go real bad eventually, Raidah does have a vindictive streak in her, but this comic isn’t her being an asshole, it’s her being pissed off and not handling it like Jesus “Call Me Moses” Mohammad the 3rd, give her a bit of a break.

    1. Hazel

      What she does call Joyce isn’t exactly super cruel either. Wrong about being maga, probably right about her used to be choir girl, and bubblebrained is a pretty mild insult. No swears or slurs, honestly pretty mild for someone mid breakup!

      1. Jamie

        That only means she’s smart and eloquent. I don’t trot out swears or slurs when I’m incandescent with rage, either, because there are just so many deeper ways to shiv someone when you want them to hurt.

        I only swear at people when I’m trying to be nice despite the anger.

      2. SuperZero

        “Maga” is a pretty damn serious accusation.

        Any one thing she’d have to be guilty of for it to be true would be beyond the pale to say without evidence, and it includes them all.

        1. thejeff

          “A serious accusation?”
          It’s not like MAGA hats aren’t everywhere. It’s not like it’s the slogan of the president. Pick a random fundie and the odds are damn good they’re Trump supporters. It’s not some fringe group. MAGA is mainstream America.

          Which is fucking terrifying.

        2. SuperZero

          Yes, I do think it’s pretty serious that openly treasonous white supremacist terrorists are everywhere.

        3. Fomalhaut88

          …really? Calling the documented bigot a bigot is an unconscionable accusation?

          So, she can just act cute a few times like Joyce did and the audience will forgive her, right? After all, Joyce has done much worse and apparently she’s the heroin love interest, so…

        4. SuperZero

          Joyce has done bad things, and she’s working to be better.

          Raidah doesn’t know most of either of those things, but she’s seen the results of Joyce becoming better.
          Also, while all redcaps are bigots not all bigots are redcaps. She’s accusing Joyce of a lot more than just that, and taking it for granted that she’s guilty of all of it–despite that contradicting the evidence she has. Including, for example, her relationship with Jacob (which definitely includes reasons for Raidah to dislike her, but absolutely not related to this).

    2. Fox

      Yeah, it is her being an asshole because she’s blaming Joyce instead of being mad at Jacob, Joyce is not responsible for this break up, Jacob is. Raidah is a horrible person a lot of the time to people who she doesn’t like or condescending to people she thinks are differently abled mentally like Dina. She’s a jerk, there’s no reason to assume she is not being one now.

      1. Fomalhaut88

        …Joyce literally and documentedly plotted to break them up, and roped Jacobs family into her plot to boot.

        WTF.

        > Raidah is a horrible person a lot of the time to people who she doesn’t like

        So, like Joyce, Sarah, Billie, Ruth, malaya, Carla, amber, etc.?

        1. 3-I

          Look. The line being crossed here is being mean to Dina.

          Dina has done nothing wrong, and being cruel to her is unacceptable.

          Everybody else, sure, there might be reasons, and those reasons might conceivably even hold water, but if a character in this comic is mean to Dina, that is a super bad sign.

        2. SuperZero

          Maybe if you said Mike.

        3. Fox

          A plot she abandoned and Jacob agreed to lie even when Joyce offered repeatedly to tell the truth and get out of his life forever, which HE refused. Jacob is breaking up with Raidah because of His feelings and actions, not because of Joyce and blaming Joyce instead of Jacob for the breakup is stupid.
          Not liking someone isn’t an acceptable reason to be a bongo to them, full stop. Also, she talked to Dinah like she was stupid because she assumed she is differently abled mentally and she hangs out with someone who thinks it’s okay to call people “retarded”. Joyce fucked up and is trying to be better, but Raidah is just an asshole.

    3. Norah

      Yes, even nice people are not feeling very kindly towards someone they think is responsible for their being dumped.

    4. Norah

      I also think “her” might be referring to Sarah, not Joyce. Raidah may suspect that Sarah put Joyce up to going after Jacob.

      1. JBento

        Doesn’t work with the follow-up – whatever Raidah may think of Sarah (and it’s not flattering), I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t refer to her as a “bubblebrained MAGA-ass choir girl”.

    5. Seregiel

      I’m not even mad at that assumption. Probably more annoyed with the hate in the comments towards either lady, honestly and them buying into same assumptions when we’ve seen the character arcs. I do not like Raidah but she is in my top I like to dislike her pile. She’s real, she has her strengths (it’s not with people) and I’m delightfully looking forward to the “we’ll see” and her impending evilness. She’s a smart, driven lady who’s a bit of an alpha bongo and is her way or the highway. I can respect those traits even if I don’t respect how she uses them.

  27. Fox

    Raidah is such a judgmental jerk-wad. It’s understandable that she’s mad, but why be mad at Joyce and not Jacob? Jacob is breaking up with her, he cheated on her, he fell for someone else. Joyce did shitty things, but she didn’t cause this. I’ve seen this situation irl, almost always the ex girlfriend and the new woman go after each other or the ex blames the new woman for the boyfriend leaving her? What is that? It’s not a thing I’ve ever seen a man do and as an intersex man, it’s not something I can understand. This is a serious question, why does this happen? Can a woman or feminine leaning person please explain this to me?

    1. Woomy

      As someone who’s been broken up with for someone else, I was mad at both of them on an emotional, not intellectual level. Yeah, I knew it wasn’t the girl’s fault, but that didn’t stop me from imagining them both laughing together over what a fool I was to ever think the guy in question would choose me.

      1. Fox

        I guess that makes sense, maybe it’s just a difference in the way men and women generally process certain emotions. I’ve been broken up with for someone else, as have several other men I know and their reactions and mine were to either blame the person ending it or blame ourselves for not doing enough to make things work.

    2. Nymphie

      I think, as a woman thats been the recieving end of this shit, twice from the same man, that it has a lot to do with how close it is. Its easier to blame the “other woman” because since you most likely still have feelings for your now ex (or as in my first instance, planning on giving it another shot), you dont really want to blame him. Its too much cognitive dissonance. Its much more convenient to see the outsider as the villain.

      Why it doesnt occur, or at least not as often with men, im not sure, but i have a theory. Its statistically more common that men dont break up a relationship until he has found someone else to join a new relationship, while women tend to break up a relationship to be single for a time (of course, not always, but its more common) so for those cases, they’re not really “another man” for the man to blame, while there very often is another woman the ex can project all the hurt and blame on.

      1. Fox

        The cognitive dissonance makes sense, as I said above myself and the men I’ve known who went through this either blamed the person breaking up with us or ourselves. Maybe it’s just a difference in the way men and women generally process certain emotions and situations.

    3. BigDogLittleCat

      You’ve never heard of a man beating on another man for going with “his woman”?
      That said, when a woman breaks up with a man and he takes it out on her, there’s usually possessiveness involved (see, women murdered by ex- or estranged male partner).

      But the answer to your question is biology. Logic tells us that the person to be angry with is the partner, but animal brain says be angry at and fight the competition.

      1. Fox

        Beating someone up is wrong, but is a different behavior than blame, it’s about ego. It’s more possessive and gross than blaming the other man, which is more an act of emotional projection, I don’t associate with the kind of man who would beat someone up for any reason other than self defense and that behavior is apples to oranges with what I’m talking about.

        See, that makes no sense to me still and isn’t a behavior I see in men generally, maybe it’s just a difference between most men and women.

    4. Seregiel

      Going to go a different route and just look at the character’s knowledge of each other: Joyce actively did a flirt challenge with Raidah at lunch with her friends and Jacob around. If this was just Jacob changing his mind apropos he got close to someone else and emotionally bonded, I’d be mad at him and myself for not feeling good enough. The fact she KNEW Joyce was instigating the trouble and didn’t respect their relationship… yeah, Joyce can have a slice of the anger.

      1. Fox

        But she’s not blaming Joyce and Jacob, she’s placing ALL the blame on Joyce, that not the Sam as sharing the anger.

        1. Seregiel

          The Joyce not Jacob is that she knows Jacob was at least manipulated. He wasn’t out searching for it. I was more pointing to your where other woman blame comes in. I’d still blame Jacob thought. People can… not.

        2. Fox

          I suppose, but she doesn’t really know that she’s assuming it. I’d blame him too and as a reader I do.

  28. Romanticide

    I think Jacob break up with Raidah as best as he could. And I do wish he is right with Raidah being better than that, but I can only hope.

  29. MatthewTheLucky

    Raidah hate-ships it.

  30. Woomy

    Big oof for Raidah and Joyce

  31. Bagge

    *Dorothy pops up from a trashcan*

    YOU ARE BETTER THAN THIIIIIIIIS!

  32. Bagge

    Good thing Raidah doesn’t do jellousy!

    1. King Daniel

      Jellousy sounds delicious. What flavors do you have available?

      1. Needfuldoer

        Wrath, with little chunks of spite suspended in it.

        1. Delicious Taffy

          Why do people insist on ruining good wrath by putting stuff in it? If you want both, have a side dish.

  33. JessWitt

    Yeah, this was for the best. For Jacob, that is.

  34. Amy

    Ugh. Raidah can go sit and spin. This is *not* Joyce’s fault. This breakup is on Jacob. Joyce did not make him do anything. He went along with her lies, he kissed her, and he decided to break up with Raidah. I’m personally not pleased with any of the three right now. Joyce shouldn’t have lied like that, Jacob should have told the truth(or at least *not kissed Joyce* before telling her they weren’t going to be an item), and Raidah is being ridiculous here. She needs to put the blame where it belongs– on her ex-boyfriend.

    1. Woomy

      Joyce definitely had plans to break them up though and, while it was Jacob’s choice to fall for that, what Joyce did was shitty towards Raidah and she has a right to be mad about that

      1. Fox

        But Raidah doesn’t actually know that about Joyce’s plans, only we readers know that.

        1. King Daniel

          Raidah may not have known the specifics of Joyce’s plan, but she very definitely knew Joyce had been gunning for Jacob for a while now.

        2. Fox

          True, but she still has no reason to blame Joyce for the breakup.

        3. Miri

          Also Joyce had shelved those plans…

        4. Fox

          Also, true. I’d forgotten about that.

        5. thejeff

          How does that work? From Raidah’s point of view, Joyce was trying to seduce Jacob away from her and then she succeeded. How does that translate into “no reason to blame”? Sure, blame Jacob for letting it work, but Joyce was the one trying.

          And Raidah has no idea that Joyce had shelved those plans. Nor is it really clear how thorough that shelving was, given recent events.

        6. TemperaryObsessor

          Because from the perspective of someone who has never been broken up with or cheated on and barely dated.
          Barring some extreme special circumstances, it does not matter which specific person your partner fell for, either they were committed or they weren’t. The other person made you no promises and while what they did was shitty if they did it on purpose, if it worked chances are someone else would have eventually done the same.

        7. Woomy

          So I can go around trying to seduce everyone else’s partners, and if I succeed no one can get mad at me because I’m not the one cheating?

        8. TemperaryObsessor

          You make a good point. But I guess I see it as either it does not work and they get mad at you as a couple or you are an accessory in which case no one has to like you but getting mad at you is mostly a distraction from the real problem.

        9. Fox

          I’ve done lots of dating and been cheated on and I agree that the person going after someone in a relationship is being shitty, but the bigger fault goes to the person who broke their commitment because the other person made no promises, but the committed partner did and then broke them, which is a bigger breach than just being a bad person to a stranger.

        10. thejeff

          I can accept any of that. Plenty of blame to go around and different people will split it up differently.
          It was just “no reason to blame Joyce” that was off for me.

        11. Fox

          The Jeff, I think the point was there is no reason to blame Joyce specifically for Jacob breaking up with Raidah because that was solely his decision, she bares some blame in the larger scheme, but not in this specific moment.

        12. Clif

          Does no one date without an implied promise of exclusivity anymore?

    2. Fox

      Agreed Amy, I feel the same way. Raidah could also stand to be less petty and judgey.

      1. frogger44

        She was JUST broken up and has accurately assumed that Joyce was the cause of it. Why should she stand to be less petty and judgey?

        1. Fox

          Because it’s not just now that she’s petty and judgey, it’s a pattern of behavior, not a one off. She’s tormented Sarah over a grudge for at least a year and she automatically assumed Dina was differently abled mentally and treated her like she was stupid for hanging out with Sarah. She tried to literally drag Joyce away from Sarah without asking her what she wanted, she’s petty and judgey MOST of the time, not just during the break up.

      2. Fomalhaut88

        So, 10% as Petty and judgey as Joyce and Sarah, instead of only 20%?

        1. Fox

          See, this isn’t a valid argument. Decency or being awful are not limited resources, more than one person can be awful or decent at a time. It’s not a competition either, one person being awful doesn’t change the awfulness of someone else’s actions.

          Also, Sarah and Joyce are trying to be better people, Raidah is not. She’s run a year long smear campaign against Sarah to isolate her because she didn’t believe Sarah and then didn’t like what Sarah did when she had no support. Sarah being unpleasant in no way makes this an okay thing to do, and it may be a big part of WHY Sarah is unpleasant. Also, she talked to Dina like she was stupid and assumed she was mentally differently abled, which was her excuse for talking down to her. Raidah is a petty, judgmental, asshole, the actions of other characters has no bearing on this fact and does not change it.

        2. Regalli

          Just as a heads up, ‘mentally differently abled’ is awkward as hell and given a lot of us see Dina as autistic specifically, we tend to either prefer ‘disabled’ outright (it’s technically classed as a developmental disability) or ‘on the spectrum/autistic’ and not considering it a disability. Depends on the autistic, I’m the former. Disabled isn’t a slur, it’s a fact of reality, and trying to tiptoe around it usually just ends up giving ableist douchebags another term to twist into an insult. (See also why I specifically call Raidah out for calling Dina ‘special’ or the like. I didn’t get called the r-word to my memory but I did get that one.)

        3. Fox

          I’m autistic myself, the reason I said it the way I did is because Raidah treats Dina like she is of low IQ or intellectually disabled, with an added level of dehumanization and infantalization and I wasn’t sure of a way to describe that without using a word I don’t like. Essentially, Raidah treats Dina like she thinks she’s “slow”. It was about how Raidah treats Dina, not how we as the readers see her. I have no problem with the word disabled, but Raidah was treating her as mentally incompetent more than disabled and that was the problem I was trying to point out.

  35. abysswatcher1993

    Raidah is going to try to get revenge against Joyce? I mean, Joyce did try to sabotage her relationship, but part of me know Raidah is someone that holds grudges and gives disproportional punishments. She convinced everyone around Sarah that she snitched on her friend and made Sarah and outcast. Knowing this, Raidah could try to use misinformation tactics to make Joyce look like a hipocrite Christian/boyfriend stealing whore to the whole campus, adding to the rumors that would make Carol try to take Joyce away from college.

    Blaine and Toedad who? This is a smart antagonist with the intelligence and charisma of Roz, the self righteousness of Mary and a better portfolio than dear Dorothy.

  36. Tab

    MAGA? Aren’t we like November 2010?
    We only got 1 Transformers movie, The XBox Kinect is revolutionizing gaming forever, and people were being taught how to Dougie.

    Unless she is referring to term Nigerians scammers use for future suckers.

    1. Deadjolras

      It’s always present-time in the comic. So, right now, this strip is taking place in 2019. If you come back next year to read this, then this strip will be taking place in 2020. If it had been published last year, then it would’ve taken place in 2018.

      1. Dave

        Yeah Willis said specifically at one point, the comic uses a sliding time scale so it doesn’t become a period piece by accident. Good decision, I feel. I had to adopt the same policy on my own webcomic when I realized I’d made that very blunder by canonizing a date on some paperwork in-panel.

        1. abysswatcher1993

          Isnt the same with the simpsons, futurama (plus 1000 years) and questionable content.

      2. Thursday Violist

        If I time-travel then I can make this comic happen during the Roman Empire

        1. King Daniel

          “Stupor Aevitem”?

    2. Needfuldoer

      DoA time still uses 2010’s calendar to line up its days of the week, but it’s still a floating timeline.

    3. cesium133

      “Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.” — Douglas Adams

  37. Dave

    Didn’t Raidah organize a whole smear campaign against Sarah? She has some experience in fucking over those who cross her if I recall.

    1. abysswatcher1993

      Step aside Blaine and Toedad. Heres’s a new antagonist in town.

  38. CMasta

    Raidah you got a great legal future ahead of you. Don’t fuck it up on these two.

    And don’t join up with Toedad and Blaine.

    1. abysswatcher1993

      Didnt they die on their way to their home planet?

    2. Miri

      They’re Toedad, they’re Toedad and the Blaine Blaine Blaine Blaine…

      1. Cyrus

        Neither one’s a genius, and both are insane…

        1. Harvey Janus

          They’re bigoted and pale, they both should be in jail.

        2. Harvey Janus

          Forgot to put this at the end of my comment and wish there was an edit button:

          Kinda wish there was a term for prison that rhymed with White.

        3. Miri

          “Inside” is the closest I can come up with and that’s reasonably ambiguous and also not a true rhyme ?

    3. 3-I

      We’re just gonna bring together all the villains of the comic. Toedad, Blaine, Joyce’s mom… AND SIDNEY YUS!

  39. Sirksome

    I don’t think a President Trump realijty was a concept when Joyce was first introduced in this comic and now she’s being called “MAGA-ass” Has she even voted in one election yet.? Hell has Raidah? Because of the whole fluid time thing they were both probably just starting high school under Obama.

    1. Charles Phipps

      That’s Robin’s slogan in-universe.

      But yes, there’s also sliding timescales ala Comic Books.

      1. Sirksome

        Is that really her slogan? I honestly kinda forgot cause it’s been awhile since we’ve seen her. I guess that would make more sense in context of the comic, but does Robin a failing congresswoman have that kind of influence? Although I guess Trump didn’t actually come up with MAGA so maybe it doesn’t matter so much.

        1. Madock345

          From what we’ve seen of Robin so far, I think she’s not doing well in the polls, but gets an inordinant ammount of press attention, probably both of those because of the crazy antics she gets up to.

        2. King Daniel

          Robin’s slogan is MDNGA, not the other one – also, Joe at least has already made a Trump joke, off the top of my head.

  40. King Daniel

    No, Robin’s slogan is “Make District Nine Great Again”, or MDNGA.

    1. King Daniel

      ….that was meant to be a reply to Charles Phipps above me.

  41. BenRG

    I suspect that it will take very little time for Jacob to realise just what a lucky escape he has just had with Raidah. I think that he’s going to realise just how little he actually knew her and her real personality at all!

    1. Fomalhaut88

      …or raidahs the one making the lucky escape from the patriarchal, philandering, habitually dishonest, patronizing asswipe?

      1. BenRG

        … Nah.

      2. Jago

        Raidah wasn’t dating Amber’s dad tho?

  42. Josh Spicer

    Also, pretty sure Joyce is neither a MAGA-ass or a choir girl at this point.

    1. Kamino Neko

      But, less than a month ago, she was.

      1. Delicious Taffy

        And now, less than a month later, she’s not. If the change doesn’t matter, she may as well have stayed a bigot.

        1. Kamino Neko

          That’s rather a non sequitur, there.

          The closest anybody comes to saying Joyce hasn’t changed is the people claiming that Joyce as she is now means that Raidah is being unreasonable for taking her earlier interactions with Joyce and basing her opinion of her on them.

  43. Keulen

    I’m pretty sure Raidah is not better than that.

    1. Fox

      Yep, same here.

    2. Bagge

      What are you talking about?

      She clearly said she will just move on.

      http://www.dumbingofage.com/2017/comic/book-7/02-everything-youve-ever-wanted/storied/

      1. Andy

        People have a wonderful capacity for self-delusion and not truly understanding the emotional weight of things until they go through them. It’s why you see people 100% convinced that if abc happened, they’d do xyz unlike that guy over there that did zyx.

        In this case, I think Raidah had decided that she’d be fine and not give a shit about being cheated on without realizing how hard that actually hits a person. Now it’s happened and she’s having trouble falling into the mindset she said she’d have. We can tell she’s not just saying “fuck you” and moving on because she tried to hurt Jacob with the “I WILL be sorry” line.

        It’s interesting, too, that she’s not really putting blame on Jacob. She says it’s Joyce’s fault and discard’s Jacob’s statement that he made the decision himself. I have a feeling that Raidah’s grudge will be almost entirely against Joyce instead of including Jacob, despite the fact that it took 2 to tango.

        1. Bagge

          Back at… the pizza-date, I think, there was a long discussion around the claim that Raidah regarded Jacob as a possession to be manipulated rather than his own agent.

          I think that claim will turn out to be right.

        2. thejeff

          I liked that line from Raidah. That was about the high point in my opinion of her.
          Given her immediate reaction to the perception of a threat from Joyce, I’ve converted to the idea that it was bullshit all along. Not that she’s now having trouble with the reality, but that she was actually lying. She wanted to present herself as not jealous, like those other girls Jacob was complaining about, but that doesn’t mean she meant it.

        3. Bagge

          Yeah, I think that’s spot on the money.

  44. DaveM

    Jacobs motivation seems a little skeevy to my eye. He announced he “had to break up with Raidah”, and when Joyce pointed out he’d done nothing to betray Raidah, he kissed her (thus betraying Raidah after the fact). His whole motive seems to be that “My brother who I adore is OK with me having a girlfriend like Joyce, so I don’t have to keep Raidah as my girlfriend to please him.” Currently out of the three of them, Raidah seems to have the moral high ground at the moment, and that’s just weird!

    1. Madock345

      I think it’s more that Jacob realized how dissatisfied he was with the kind of relationship he had with Raidah. Like, even look at how they break up, it’s pretty cold.

      He’s been hurt by Joyce, so he doesn’t want her right now. But he’s realized he wants the kind of relationship she offers, and he’s probably going to try to find it somewhere else before he comes back to Joyce, if I were placing bets.

      1. thejeff

        I’ve seen some apparently pretty cold breakups – where both parties were holding it together for form’s sake and had the emotional reactions afterwards more privately.

        It’s certainly possible that’s right, but not necessarily.

  45. Eve

    I mean. I don’t know what to expect. She got cheated on and dumped, of course she’s unhappy. Though I always dislike when people who are cheated on blame the person they were cheated with rather than the asshole that cheated on them. I understand it’s easier, if you’re dating someone you like them and it’s easy to not want to blame them and rather put the blame on someone you don’t care about but Jacob is the one who agreed to be in a relationship and then cheated.

    Raidah has been known to be a huge asshole but the tactics she uses are mostly only workable on someone who doesn’t usually have friends around to defend them like Sarah. Joyce and Jacob are both fairly social people who probably won’t be alone and available for Raidah to go up to and harass in public, so I don’t think too much will come of this from her.

    1. Fox

      Same thoughts, I agree with you 100%.

  46. Acebender

    Uh oh. Are we gonna see her teaming up with asshole dad gang?

    1. LauraS

      Given that her first insult to Joyce is “MAGA-ass” I doubt she’d touch Toedad wit her a ten foot pole. I believe the relevant TV Trope is Even Evil Has Standards.

      1. MatthewTheLucky

        Also, if Toedad works with a Muslim woman of color he’ll shrivel up.

  47. BenRG

    FWIW, Raidah is right to say that it is Joyce’s ‘fault’ in that Joyce’s actions created a scenario where Jacob basically had to realise that he was in a relationship with Raidah because he thought Harrison would approve of her, nothing else. That isn’t right for him and it as sure as hell isn’t fair on her.

    I’m sort of looking forward to Raidah confronting Joyce and then ending up totally confused when Joyce keeps on insisting that she and Jacob aren’t together and that he’d already rejected her. Joyce having a rebound with, maybe, Danny would only make said confusion worse!

  48. Ohmsford

    But it isn’t her fault, she was given those beans!

    1. thejeff

      “No, of course, what really matters is the blame
      Somebody to blame
      Fine, if that’s the thing you enjoy, placing the blame
      If that’s the aim, give me the blame
      Just give me the boy”

      1. JBento

        Somebody (somebody) ooh somebody (somebody)
        Can anybody find meeeeeeeee
        somebody to blame?

  49. Vulcanodon

    Raidah moves to confront Joyce, but ends up saving her from Blaine and Toedad. The two of them go have ice cream to dish on Jacob.

  50. Ucchan

    Pfft, you don’t know Raidah at all, do you Jacob?

  51. JBento

    DUN DUN DUUUNNNNNN!!!!!

  52. Guest42

    Raidah, meet Joe.

    It’s like no one knows how to diffuse a villain here.

    1. StClair

      Vaporizing people is not an option.
      In this comic.

  53. Juanoku

    And then there was a school shooting provoqued by a toe… Tl;dr dads suck in the dumbiverse

  54. SonicBlueRanger

    “MAGA ass” Dayum that’s unfair. We’ve seen no proof that Joyce would be pro-Trump.

    1. Wizard

      Yeah, I merely disliked Raidah before, but this makes her sound like a hopeless bongo. Just because I want nothing to do with the proggy line, that doesn’t mean I kneel to the Orange Messiah.

    2. Fomalhaut88

      …other than her being visibly islamophobic, fundamentally terrified of those different to her, strongly misogynistic, homophobic up until her best friend came out, fundamentalist evangelic who explicitly stated she would have voted for the Republican because Republicans are “correct”, and her family are Trump supporters?

      1. CJ

        Joyce would have voted for trump when she started college.
        What she would do now is a different thing.

        1. Delicious Taffy

          What she would do now doesn’t seem to matter to a lot of people.

        2. Kamino Neko

          The fact that Joyce has changed is exactly the crux of why Raidah isn’t unreasonable in her belief. She has accurately pegged the Joyce who existed in September, and since she’s a character in the comic, not a reader of it, has no good reason to believe she’s changed.

          That Raidah is an entire percussion section unto herself doesn’t change that fact.

        3. King Daniel

          This.

        4. Andy

          I require explanation of what is meant by “Raidah is an entire percussion section unto herself” because I have never heard that used to describe a human being. Please.

        5. King Daniel

          It’s a reference to the bongo filter – a “bongo” is a type of percussion instrument.

        6. Andy

          Well that’s rather less fun than I was hoping.

        7. thejeff

          It’s a play on the bongo filter, which has led some people here to use percussion instrument instead of either bongo or the word that it replaces.

    3. Norah

      It’s not that farfetched to assume that a white homeschooled fundamentalist Christian might be a Trump supporter. A good portion of white fundamentalist Christians support him.

      1. 3oranges

        Much more often than not. But that doesn’t prove Joyce is one of them, and I don’t think there is enough evidence for her to be properly convicted of it. Which I assume must be what is happening here, a formal legal trial, based on the responses.

        I mean, otherwise people are seeing a Muslim make an assumption about a white Evangelical that is very likely to be true, for no more than a single-word insult during a break-up, and declaring her unfair and hopeless because of it. And irony can’t be that dead, right?

        1. JBento

          Irony’s not dead, but it has rusted away. As Beyonce said, “if you liked it then you should have put a zinc on it”.

  55. hof1991

    If Raidah knew what took place in the previous hours, she would know that Joyce set this all in motion. Careless, inept Joyce, who has now lost her only chance with Jacob. Jacob is well rid of Raidah, but he does deserve and will find someone better for him than Joyce, or at least Joyce at this stage. He is really the most adult of all the cast. Identify and admit mistakes, move on from sunk costs. Raidah is moving into Sidney Yuss territory, which is not a good place to live.

    1. Fomalhaut88

      He’s patriarchal and patronizing on both a personal and societal level, he has a history of philandering and blaming the “crazy jealous exes” for it, and he has no difficulty lying about serious topics even to his own family.

      Come on. The dude is a pretty bright example of toxic masculinity.

      1. JBento

        Also, “I lied but that was partly your fault.” blameshifting. Also, the pre-“not you” kiss. Jacob’s performance in this shitshow is terrible in a multiplicity of ways.

        1. thejeff

          He’s not doing well, but Fomalhaut88’s characterization is over the top, imo.

        2. Jago

          Um. Didn’t Joyce actually start the whole lie-thing? And he continued it? So she IS partially to blame.

        3. JBento

          She is partly to blame for the shitshow, but not for Jacob lieing.

      2. Cyrus

        His “history of philandering” is a total assumption on your part, and he did not call any of his previous girlfriends crazy.

    2. Reaver

      The “Most adult” of the cast, he LIED to his brother, got an opportunity to amend the lie,and denied it, and then cheated on his girlfriend, kissed another girl just to make a point, told her they wouldn’t work out because she didn’t match his list, then dumped his girlfriend, and talked to her condescendingly.

      Jacob is not the most “adult” of them all, he’s a stupid teenager like the rest of them.

      1. Blazing Ace

        I feel like y’all are reading way too far into the “list” comment

        1. Reaver

          I really don’t think that negates the rest of the things Jacob’s done.

  56. Rabisch

    Oh no. Joyce now has a personal enemy, who is also very intelligent and vengeful. Her life, already very complicated, will become a real hell.

  57. Beekeeper

    Why do we not like Raidah again? I know Sarah doesn’t like her, but she hasn’t been more callous or mean spirited than Carla or Malaya

    1. 3-I

      ‘Cus she was mean to Dina.

      1. Regalli

        Mean in a specifically ableist way (infantilizing passive-aggression is not actually a more flattering look than her friend that used the r-slur.) Her comments to Joyce about teachers’ salaries were pretty bad, too. And we’re introduced to her after a year of ostracizing and harassing Sarah because Sarah was pretty much out of options dealing with her freshman year roommate. (I still consider the possibility that Dana’s dad was not a safe person, but we have no conclusive info either way and Sarah didn’t have any real avenues for support. Because Raidah denied there being any problem if Dana could hide how well she was functioning to orhers.)

        1. Regalli

          Basically, this is the one plotline Raidah’s had involvement in where she’s actually and definitely in the right.

        2. thejeff

          She’s been in the right and she’s still not coming off well – particularly in the earlier interaction where she met up with Jacob and Joyce at lunch and spent her time with somewhat subtle classist attacks on Joyce intended to make Jacob not think of her as a suitable partner.
          In the right, but with nasty tactics, as opposed to Joyce being in the wrong, but using nicer tactics.

        3. Kamino Neko

          She’s giving off the same vindictive aura she has concerning Sarah, so she’s hardly clean, either, but she is, as it stands, the least wrong of the three. But, to use her words, we’ll see if that stands. (Probably not.)

        4. Sam

          Literally this. There is also the fact she tried to tell Dina not to be friends with Sarah (so trying to isolate someone still over a year later), she brought up an event Sarah apologised for and that they had agreed to drop to try to make Jacob like Sarah less (it didn’t work, but weaponising the event against her after agreeing to drop it was not cool), and she hid her jealousy from Jacob despite knowing he has had issues with jealous partners before (this just really bothers me personally because it shows she didn’t really trust him to make her preferred decision).

          Sarah doesn’t just ‘dislike’ Raidah, Raidah went on a goddamn year long harassment campaign against her for making a decision she didn’t like after disbelieving Sarah that there was still a problem and has made it hard for Sarah to be open and vulnerable with people.

        5. Fox

          Exactly!

        6. 3-I

          This is absolutely the truth. Sarah has reason to dislike Raidah and her manipulative, abusive bullcrap.

          Still, even though people apparently have issues holding Raidah accountable for being awful to Sarah, NOBODY should have a problem with holding her accountable for being awful to Dina.

          In this comic, mean-to-Dina is the moral line that no one should cross. It’s the one thing I think everyone can agree on.

    2. Zellgato

      Mainly because she talks down and insults everyone she talks to with backwards meaning words. Typically spoken in a way she assumes no one dumber than her will understand (but everyone but joyce gets).
      Additionally treats and speaks to anyone ~not on her level~ as if they’re unable to understand human speech.

      She just uses far more psassive agressive “i’m better than you” speaking patterns. Also during her first meeting with the cast, she basically went “rawr don’t touch my boyfriend”
      Likely because she knew he was just “following the list” and not legit interested as we’ve seen. But it still is not a great introduction when they insult half the cast passive agressively–though Joyce didn’t understand and took it as a compliment. but everyone else got it

      Carla-Mean but equally fair about being mean.
      malaya- snark but also fairly equally snarky.
      that religious judgy but faker girl- she’s openly conteptious and insutling
      Raidah- pretty simliar to the above, but ore passive agressive about it because lawyer characters always have to talk like that

    3. SillyGoose

      Also, in Rachel’s words “yeah but we can multitask” and dislike Raidah AND Malaya at the same time.

      Not Carla though, she’s a national treasure. She acts obnoxious in a very over-the-top way, but her behaviour is nowhere in the same territory as Malaya’s and Raidah’s, which are meant to demean and hurt.

    4. thejeff

      Carla tries to be an asshole, but we’ve also seen lots of good in her. We’ve seen her helping when she didn’t have to, we’ve seen her look after others and check in on them. All covered up with a facade of “I don’t care”, but still there.

      So we have that to contrast with her callous or mean side.

      We don’t have anything like that with Raidah. We might be getting something with Malaya in her current arc, but she’s still not well liked around here.

    5. Jago

      She is a bully, for one.

    6. Eve

      Because she deliberately sought Sarah out to harass her multiple times, tried to drive her friends away and assumed Dina was mentally challenged and then talked down to her for it.

      If she just had bad history with Sarah and didn’t get along times they were forced to interact she’d be a lot more tolerable but she goes out of her way to fuck with someone who is just trying to avoid her.

  58. Zellgato

    Wow Jacob didn’t do things well there.

  59. Diane

    Next comic: Raidah bongoing she just lost her easy ticket into a well known lawyer office because she didn’t even get a chance to be introduced before being dumped by said lawyer’s brother.

    Unless we follow Jacob but…eh…can we follow neither? Go back to snarky Drew and Danny instead maybe? Ew…this comic made me want to go back to focusing on Drew, that’s pretty bad.

    1. King Daniel

      Raidah’s family literally owns a law firm. She already has that “easy ticket”.

      1. Diane

        But is it known? Or is it a “well I’m desperate to have someone represent me guess I’ll go here”? She strikes me a someone always looking for more connections.

        1. King Daniel

          If I recall, way back when Raidah was suspicious of Sarah’s motives when she apologized for punching Raidah in the face, and specifically asked whether it was out of genuine remorse…or out of fear of Raidah’s dad suing her into oblivion for battery.

        2. Diane

          Not so much of suing into oblivion. Just suing in general. Any legal matters brought against you basically destroys any chance of being in the legal field. Happened to a friend of mine, she was going to school for law, some form of needing to go to court happened, never asked for details, not my business, but basically couldn’t purse being a lawyer anymore.

    2. Eve

      God knows no one could have liked Jacob because he’s nice and handsome? Clearly someone whose family already owns a law firm and has multiple friends whose families own law firms needs to secretly base her dating life on meeting some random lawyer.

      There are plenty of reasons to dislike Raidah, she openly seeks out someone she knows she doesn’t like just to harass them and because they’re friendless and she can get away with it, she assumes Dina is mentally challenged just from talking to her for like, a second and then talks down to her because of it, she thinks of herself as an adult which ok is less outright bad and more just like of eye rolly.

      But the whole ‘she’s using jacob as social climbing’ thing just seems totally made up.

  60. DarkoNeko

    Y’know, if someone tells me that I’m “better than that” I’d go “oh ? Watch me.”

  61. TemperaryObsessor

    You won’t.
    Could mean you won’t be sorry or you won’t see me with her.
    And since Raidah doesn’t know what we know she might be more inclined to believe he’s saying you won’t be sorry.
    We’ll see.
    Can mean we’ll see if I’m better than that, we’ll see if I really won’t see her with you, or we’ll see if I if I don’t feel bad when I see her with you.

    1. Schpoonman

      Guessing “You won’t see us together,” and “We’ll see if I’m better than that.”

  62. Van Jealous

    …Meanwhile….over at Kiwi Blitz…..
    https://www.kiwiblitz.com/

  63. Seregiel

    So… going to close my eyes now to all the hate on either lady, and just say… I AM LOOKING FORWARD TO THIS CLASH. I do not like Raidah, but I like to not like her. She has some horrible personality flaws, but she’s also shown to be loyal and tries to fight for what she wants or what she thinks is right. She’s driven, she’s academic, she has some power, and is also a petulant, malicious and tenacious when she should be better spending that energy improving herself instead of getting “just” desserts. She’s the Maleficent of the “mean” characters and I want to see what she does. The other antagonists make me cringe because of the danger involved or nastiness for seemingly no reason but because. She’s just going to be NASTY, she has a REASON (even if bad) and it will be FUN TO WATCH.

    1. Dana

      Well said.

    2. JBento

      Additionally, unlike most other antagonists, Raidah appears to actually be GOOD AT THINGS.

      1. Jago

        Like bullying!

        1. JBento

          Look, the bar’s really low, ok?

      2. Seregiel

        I know. So. Thrilled.

  64. Dana

    To the extent that there’s any disagreement here whether Raidah is a bongo it’s nice to see that she owns the popular opinion.

  65. goggleman64

    Is it just me, or is Jacob being kind of a dingus here? First he kisses Joyce – a girl he knows is almost literally head-over-heels for him – while knowing full well that he’s going to pull the rug out from under her in the next breath. And now he’s tossing around sanctimonious lines like “I’ll let that slide” to his ex who he /just/ cheated on?

    1. Blazing Ace

      Maybe I’m weird, but if you cheat on someone but then immediately break up with them without them finding out I don’t really see the issue

      1. JBento

        If part of your criteria for making something ok is “the harmed party never found out about it”, that something is not ok.

        1. Blazing Ace

          How was Raidah harmed if she was immediately broken up with?

  66. CJ

    I know it’s not really explainable, but why would fundy Christians ever vote for someone who is an open philanderer?

    1. abysswatcher1993

      Why would Christians create the Inquisition?

      1. CJ

        Oh, that’s easy: Because they have to save your souls from eternal damnation. It’s totally crazy but consistent.

    2. 3oranges

      Because everyone is a sinner and falls short in God’s eyes, completely worthless except for his love, but only turning away from him is unpardonable. So it is only fair to overlook such individual failings so long as they stay committed to the greater service of his cause.

      Yes, I know. Properly there shouldn’t be forgiveness for people who don’t feel remorse and would rather reoffend than atone, and everyone knows that when it’s not someone on their team. But if you want the theological excuse, I think it’s this.

      1. SillyGoose

        Also it’s the woman’s fault if she gets cheated on. Had she been a better wife, this wouldn’t have happened!

    3. thejeff

      Because he hates the right people and that’s more important.

    4. Uly

      Starts with an r, rhymes with space-ism.

      1. thejeff

        To be fair, it also includes sexism, Islamophobia and homo and trans phobias.

        There’s plenty of bigotry to go ’round.

    5. Kamino Neko

      Because he’s not the n-word.

    6. Charles Phipps

      There was actually an attempted revolt by Evangelical leadership against Trump support by the Baptist Union. The ministers pointed out that Trump was not only a misogynist, racist, adulterer, and abusive but also many many other sins that he bragged about.

      They didn’t get far because the base loved him BECAUSE of his racism and cruelty. The hypocrisy caused at least one to form his own breakaway church.

  67. Jhon

    First step, Raidah:
    Know your enemy.

    ( or read sun tzu hes good too )

  68. Resulli

    I don’t think Jacob is being entirely fair to anyone. It was his choice to not just dash the lie to his brother aside the moment it popped up. What he’s doing now sounds like an escape strategy so he doesn’t have to deal with it. He’s still gonna have to see these people around so things aren’t going to be resolved at all and make things incredibly awkward, especially with his brother who he worships and now has a self-imposed reason to be ashamed of himself with.

    1. Sam

      Could be but it could also just be the most fitting solution in his mind: he breaks up with Raidah, because he knows he has not been fair to her and she doesn’t deserve him treating her like this; he doesn’t get together with Joyce, because she still crossed a line for him and he doesn’t want to build a relationship on lies; his brother won’t have his image of Joyce tarnished; he is alone and eventually has to lie and say he broke up with Joyce despite never truly getting together with her. None of them are winning anything here but it is as fair as it can be to everyone except his brother who he should have and still should, tell the truth because his disapproval cannot be worse than this trainwreck series of events.

  69. Ray

    The fact that Raidah automatically ASSumes Joyce is a Trump supporter because she’s white and uber-religious also speaks volumes about Raidah…

    1. King Daniel

      Joyce was that kind of person until just a couple of weeks ago, in-universe.

      1. Kamino Neko

        But she’s not, now, and therefor any negative impressions formed from when she was are nothing but the purest of bigotry.

        1. Blazing Ace

          Oh please, white people can’t experience bigotry based on race

        2. Madock345

          /s please

        3. Blazing Ace

          I’m not being sarcastic. White people cannot experience racism

        4. Delicious Taffy

          You’re wrong, but keep believing that. It’s super helpful and makes you look really cool.

        5. Deadjolras

          Reverse racism isn’t real. You can be prejudiced against white people, but not racist. Racism is not prejudice on its own; it is always backed by the system in some way. There is no power not authority working against white people based solely on their skin colour.

          If a POC says “I hate white people”, sure, it may hurt the feelings of some white people out there. They can even say “how can you hate me when you don’t know me?”. It’s a prejudiced statement but not a racist one, because of the difference in privilege/power.

        6. Faros

          @Deadjolras, because for some reason I can’t reply to you directly:

          If we were talking about systemic racism, I’d agree with you. But at the individual level, your argument is absolutely ridiculous. An individual POC can absolutely be racist against whites.

          And before anyone jumps in, no, I’m not white. I’m just sick of this argument being used. It’s always used to excuse or lessen the impact of hateful comments being thrown at white folks.

        7. Jago

          Reverse racism is still just racism, because racism isn’t an exclusive word. It means prejudice or discrimination against other people because of their (different) race or ethnicity. Not prejudice or discrimination coming from white people.

        8. Blazing Ace

          Punching up is always ok. White people cannot experience racism, end of.

        9. Jago

          Sure.

        10. Charles Phipps

          It depends on who you define as white, where, and what. White people are a privileged minority in the Americas but Jews like Bernie Sanders can be considered white and definitely experience racism. Also, many Hispanic people identify as White.

          Because “white” is a nonexistent classification by idiots.

        11. SuperZero

          White people are not a minority in the US?

        12. Jago

          I mean, if you don’t call being called names because of where you’re from (as in, country) racism, then yes.

        13. Resulli

          If anyone thinks whites can’t experience racism doesn’t know what it’s like to be a cashier. I have been yelled and cursed at, called a racist myself, had things thrown at me, given attitude, because I am following company policy and federal law when I refuse certain tobacco sales. I tell people why I have refused their sale (most often because their license is invalid in some way, such as being expired), and because I’m white and they’re not I get treated like garbage. In their eyes I am not refusing them for reasons outlined from within my job description or training, I’m refusing them because I’m white and they’re not. It doesn’t matter how calmly I try to explain my situation, their immediate assumption is that because they aren’t getting their way I’m being discriminatory. I have legitimately heard the words “you’re just saying this cuz I’m black” or “this little white boy trying to tell me I can’t get what I want”. This is blatant racism because I’m not allowed to have legitimate reasons for doing my job. Neither my opinion or my position matter because I’m white and expected to give people with other skin colors what they want without arguing. So good job, you’ve wrapped racism around and turned it against people who don’t deserve it because you feel oppressed by people who wouldn’t even look at your skin color if you didn’t point it out every time something doesn’t go your way.

        14. Blazing Ace

          Cool story, not racism

    2. 3oranges

      That she’s perceptive enough to realize exactly what someone was like in the recent past, but not quite perceptive enough to update that impression in real time?

    3. thejeff

      That it’s a damn good assumption says volumes about the white and uber-religious (particularly the fundies.)

  70. Jago

    “You’re better than this.”
    Not really, no.

    1. SuperZero

      We’ll see.

      1. Jago

        We kinda already have.
        The question is, CAN she be better than this.

  71. Steelbright

    Oh Jacob. Really believing that everyone is better than this… including himself

  72. PB

    Oy. Raidah kept her cool better than I anticipated, but still went below the belt at the end. Nobody wins today, huh?

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