483

Object
Posted on August 16, 2017 by David M Willis

483 thoughts on “Object”

  1. Ana Chronistic

    “ARGH WHAT ARE THESE FEELS”

    1. Ana Chronistic

      “mama, just punched a man/put my fist against his head/now he’s in a/hospital bed”

      1. Queen Anthai

        oh my god ana

      2. Haven

        slow clap.

      3. SgtWadeyWilson

        *Frantic, uncontrollable clapping.*

      4. foamy

        You and Willis are both monsters

      5. jpic89

        (Continuing as though it’s a group version by the entire cast)

        Mama. School had just begun! But now I’ve gone and ruined my GPA!

        Mamaaaaaa! Ooohoohooh. Didn’t mean to end up Bi. If I’m not straight again this time tomorrow, carry oooon, carry on. Because gender doesn’t matter.

        Too late. Their time has come. Gonna kick them in the spine. Bodies breaking all the time.

        Goodbye everybody, got somewhere to go. Gotta sneak away and spend some time with Ruth.

        Mamaaaaaa. oohoohooh. I just wanna die! Really just wish I’d never been born at all!

        I see a giant silhouette of a man. What a douche! what a douche! Can I just be straight? Fuck no! Rifle blasts and fighting, Toedad’s really frightening me!

        Galasso owns you. (Galasso owns you)
        Galasso owns you. (Galasso owns you)
        Galasso owns your very soul. This job really blow-ow-ow-ows.

        I’m just a gay boy, nobody loves me.
        He’s just a gay boy from a Jewish family.
        Spare him a life with homosexuality.

        Easy A, whatcha say? Will you let me go?
        Immoral, no! I will not let you go! (let me go!)
        Immoral, no! I will not let you go! (Just a blow?)
        Immoral, no! I will not let you go! (Who will know?)
        Will not let you go! (Come on let’s go!)
        Never never let you goo-oh…oh…oh, no no no no no no no!
        Oh, queen and country!
        Come and fuck me!
        You really gonna say no?

        Beezlebub has the devil put aside for thee! And thee! and theeeeee!!!!

        So you think you can rate us and no one will mind?
        So you think you can get away with it by being ki-i-ind!
        Oh baby. Not that easy baby.
        You better get out. Better get right out of here.

        Nothing really matters. It’s not that hard to see.
        Nothing really matters. You’re all a bunch of losers…to meeee.

        Fucked your mother for a nick-elllll!

        *gong*

        1. Oz

          Please do some sort of musical character wrap up for Sluggy Freelance! That was epic.

        2. Screwball

          Daniel here, & all I can say is that was beautifully EPIC!!! I heartily applaud your song rewriting skills!Even Screwball was impressed!!

          …When I finally got him to understand it…

        3. Screwball

          OK, that link should have gone here…
          media2.giphy.com/media/b9aScKLxdv0Y0/giphy.gif

        4. Koms

          Amazing

        5. jpic89

          Perfect gravatar is perfect, lol

        6. Jason Johnson

          That was the best thing in a while. Made my week

        7. Deanatay

          Bohemian Dumb-sody

          DOA Rhapsody

        8. Roborat

          Wow. . . . That. Was. Genius.

        9. jpic89

          Awwww, thanks guys. I’m glad you guys liked it, I don’t usually get many people who appreciate my song parodies (yes, I have written several others, lol). It means a lot. ^_^

    2. Durandal_1707

      Having a name that starts with “J” in this comic means you’re going to end up re-evaluating all your life choices before too long.

      1. A5PECT

        Yeah, just look at Jamber.

        1. Pablo360

          And Jalky.

        2. FLUFFYWOLF

          And Janny.

        3. Delicious Taffy

          And Juth

        4. MatthewTheLucky

          Not Jarah.

        5. Dean

          Or Jalasso. Jalasso is living his perfect life.

        6. Ana Chronistic

          What does Jyan think, I wonder

        7. SgtWadeyWilson

          Dare we ponder the fate of… Jaz?

        8. Goblin Scribe

          Don’t forget Jorothy! “Jort” to her friends.

        9. Needfuldoer

          Jillie’s been meandering since it finally sank in that her social status from high school doesn’t automatically carry over to college.

          Jacob seems to be doing okay so far… That probably means we’ll see a storyline where he binge-watches New Yankee Workshop, drops his courses, and spends all his time building antique-style furniture.

        10. pumacatrun2

          Well I mean technically Billie’s first name is indeed Jennifer..

        11. David

          @Needfuldoer: You just triggered the weirdest image for me with “Jacob […] drops his courses”: I thought of a strip club for lutes. Yeah, drop your courses, baby. This isn’t a time for fretting.

        12. davidbreslin101

          Jeckie an’ Jinah’ll be alright, won’t they?

        13. King Daniel

          It’s Jina, not Jinah.

        14. SgtWadeyWilson

          Yeah, Jecky and Jina. No ie either.

        15. NelC

          “Jina”? How do you pronounce that?

      2. Deathjavu

        They don’t call it “Look Back On Your Wise and Judicious Decisions…Of Age”

      3. Dana

        I have trouble giving Joss or Jaine that much credit.

    3. jeffepp

      I told you all yesterday: The Feels.

    4. HeySo

      Willis comes in with the raw, honest, impactful intensity..
      …and then totally throws it out the window with that alt-text. 😛

  2. Cheesy1

    *gong*

  3. AnvilPro

    Bohemian Rhapsody is pretty good, I guess.

    1. Maveric1984

      The hover text jokes yesterday and today kinda ruin the mood of the comic.

      They’re good jokes, but maybe digest the comic before going to see the hover text joke.

      1. Paradox

        I like to think of them as Shakespearean intermissions. If we go too long with just drama and dark places then it becomes too taxing, so Willis, in his wisdom, offers a place of rejuvenation in each strip.

        Or he could just like jokes. I dunno.

  4. MatthewTheLucky

    Good god, that man had a family!

    1. lejwocky

      It’s a figure of speech, Morty. They’re bureaucrats. I don’t respect them.

    2. CianM1301

      BAH GAWD

  5. Foxhack

    Oh noooooooooooooooo. 🙁

    1. Gojira

      Yes!!!

  6. Puckish Rogue

    Huh I finally, almost but not quite, got a prediction about the strip right…sort of

  7. Sunny D

    Okay I actually managed to forget yesterday’s strip during the day so this really caught me off guard

    Hoo boy

  8. Miguel

    Ohhhh

  9. factorsofx

    *reads title text*
    *piano riff plays in head*

    1. UniqueSnowflake2

      Scaramucci, Scaramucci, will you do . . . Uh, never mind.

      1. Mr. Bulbmin

        The Fandango?

        1. 3oranges

          The man-mango.

      2. Beef

        oh, he must’ve got fired in the middle of your sentence

        1. StClair

          Note: Moochie died on the way back to his home planet.

      3. Doc Harleen

        I am really hoping the Scaramucci/fandango jokes will stop soon. OMG. It wasn’t funny the first time I heard it. And I love Queen.

  10. WarDragon

    Damn. Despite what I said yesterday, I do get Joyce’s perspective on it as well. I’m going to bet that Joe wasn’t the only one starting to tear up a bit.

  11. Citizen Ant

    Aaaand shit just got REAL!

  12. Optimal Optimus

    Yesterday, I was wondering what Joyce was going to say.

    I have to admit this is pretty powerful stuff.

    1. StClair

      Same, on both counts.

  13. Kay

    Joyce….

  14. Kris

    Oh man….that’s a lot of pressure Joe.

    1. SomeUnregPunk

      Want to bet he’s going to try to use “mindless” sex to reset himself…. and fail.

      1. Geno

        I will definitely take that action UnregPunk. Joe may be an idiot, but he’s a good guy when it counts. Not saying he’s suddenly gonna become like Danny or something, but I don’t see him dropping the ball here when when Joyce is involved.

  15. butting

    There’s a lot of Joyces in my life, and a lot of Joes.

    Willis, you’ve nailed it. Thank you.

  16. AeromechanicalAce

    Much like Roz’ “that was you” rant to Joyce, this will probably be a turning point for Joe.

    Here’s hoping it sticks

    1. Pablo360

      I don’t really think Roz’ rant was the turning point so much as it was a rant that happened to take place chronologically close to the turning point.

      1. Fart Captor

        Joyce still admitted to Roz she needed to hear when she came to Joyce’s party. It was harsh and it sucked, but it forced her to recognize the harm she herself had been part of.

        Even if she couldn’t really have known any better thanks to the way she was deliberately insulated as she grew up, it was still something she needed to see in order to completely break free of it.

        1. thejeff

          I’m still not sold on it. I think Joyce’s admission at the party can really support as much as is read into it – “sometimes maybe I need someone to be mean” isn’t quite “I never would have realized without you screaming at me”.
          Even if she meant it, she’s coming from a place of being guilty about it – that she feels she needed to be shamed and humiliated doesn’t mean she actually did.

      2. pjeseb

        Yeah, what you said.

        Although I’m pretty sure a bigger turning point for Joyce was Becky coming out to her.

        1. Pablo360

          And subsequently ripping into her for needing to look into the Bible to justify not being homophobic.

    2. begbert2

      Next strip: a silhouette of Joe having hung himself.

      Seriously, how do you come back from this? Deleting the list (assuming it’s still around) wouldn’t do it. The irreversible damage is already done.

      1. Eldritch Gentleman

        You learn and move forward.

        1. Socks

          Okay, but pretend you’re an incredibly emotionally stunted teenager.

        2. Pablo360

          Drugs. Lots and lots of drugs.

        3. Delicious Taffy

          The only reason I can think of to do that, is using the mindset to commit epic trolling upon some unsuspecting adult, who’s currently behaving in the same manner.

          And even that’s a last resort, only to be used in a thread of minimal consequence.

      2. Delicious Taffy

        “People have to commit suicide if they can’t magically undo something they did.”

        I feel like that’s probably not true.

        1. Pablo360

          If it were, everyone would be dead by age twenty-three.

        2. Delicious Taffy

          You’re shooting about 20 years too high. That’s some dangerous optimism, right there.

  17. Cephalo the Pod

    B-b-book 7 title?

    1. Thor

      Dumbing of Age Book 7: “I Cut His Face. He Ran Away.”

      1. Pablo360

        Remember when this comic was all light-hearted comedy with no harsh lessons?

        I don’t.

      2. Orion Fury

        I don’t think that’ll test well in focus groups…

        1. Pablo360

          I think we’re the focus groups.

        2. Orion Fury

          Well we’ll like anything in the end, you’re looking to bring in new people, right? More money, etc, etc.

  18. Mr D

    Well, the comment section is gonna be fun tomorrow morning.

  19. Romanticide

    Considering Joyce just admited this to Joe… damn….. O.o

    1. Needfuldoer

      Joe had no idea about ‘Ryan’ until now, did he?

      Maybe this will finally start changing his mindset from “Og list make ladies mad at Og” to “oh my god I’m actually hurting people”. Contrast today’s strip against his interaction with Rachel in the science building. When it’s coming from someone he’s merely attracted to physically, he can brush it off and move on to the next hot stranger. Here, Joyce is cutting deep because he already knows and cares about her (if only a little bit); she’s not just an easily replaceable background character.

      1. erejnion

        “I’m actually hurting people” isn’t something that can stick, because it’s mostly not true. But what will probably stick is him trying to help Joyce out of guilt over this.

      2. maybe dumb.

        Ok, so maybe i’m being dumb, but from my understanding, Joe’s list was a rating list of people, not a detailed description of their likes/dislikes and class schedule.

        “8/10 blonde” is asinine but relatively harmless while “8/10 blonde who lives in room 203 and likes to jog late at night and likes puppies” is obviously sexual assault bait, but I don’t remember it being like that.

        I’m not really seeing how this kind of thing encourage people like Ryan unless they used it to try to track down the people that Joe considered high-rated to rape/hurt them?

        I get that Joe’s list is an insensitive and stupid thing, but it seems to be a given that it’s enabling sexual assault and I haven’t seen that yet. Maybe I missed a strip where it’s more detailed?

        1. thejeff

          It’s not clear to me that it would actually be a practical help to a rapist. The descriptions were generally clear enough that people could pick themselves and others they knew out from the list and once you’d identified them could potentially suggest ways to approach them – but they were generally pretty superficial and likely what you’d easily have picked up if you could identify them.

          But that’s not what Joyce is saying, or what Needfuldoer said or really what anyone’s been saying today, though it’s definitely come up before.

  20. William Leonard Reese Jr.

    *is easting a bucket of popcorn as his eyes take in the strip enraptured*

    . . . .If I ever doubted Willis before, I take it back, this is really really REALLY good emotions here with the art showing it all. The relationship between these two as well as how everything has effected them and *hums in delight* I just can’t wait for tomorrows strip!

    1. William Leonard Reese Jr.

      *eating*

      1. SgtWadeyWilson

        Don’t want to be mistaken for an Easter? It was just a hare’s breadth from normal, so I didn’t notice until I saw the correction. Isn’t that bunny-*Ahem.* funny?

        1. William Leonard Reese Jr.

          *snickers at the punny humor* Ah to fix my mistake only for it to draw attention to the mistake in the first place, the irony. But yes. *grins toothily* Very funny.

  21. Moose

    Okay, he’s going to need a lot more doughnuts.

    1. Jamie

      No, at this point, he needs to bake a cake.

      …which probably means angel cake with no frosting or anything, doesn’t it?

      1. Needfuldoer

        There’s frosting, but instead of covering the cake it’s scooped onto the other side of the plate.

        1. ValdVin

          And the sprinkles (blue ones picked out, please), in a tiny wax paper cup, next to that.

        2. Orion Fury

          It’s a deconstructed angel cake, much like what some people is going on in Joe’s mind.

        3. Godfather

          What some people “think”, right?

        4. Orion Fury

          Yeah, that. Wireless keyboard, sometimes doesn’t transmit key presses at times.

  22. Nono

    Y’know, it didn’t even hit me that Joyce thinks of Joe as a friend.

    Wonder how along ago that happened before she went home for the weekend.

    1. William Leonard Reese Jr.

      Wasn’t it revealed that he was the one she was texting during that weekend? Thought that that kinda cemented their status as friends if not the best of them. Confidants at least.

      1. Rachel

        she was texting Joe, yes. despite their arguments during gender studies and that mess of a date, she trusts him a lot, and he’s helped her sort out her feelings about her home life.

        this leak must’ve hit her really hard.

      2. Nono

        It did, but they were presumably friends by then. And while they’ve interacted loosely before, I’m wondering when they got to ‘texting each other about problems’ status.

        1. thejeff

          It was right before that actually. In gender studies. After the marriage exercise.

    2. Benwhoski

      I’m kind of wondering how much of Joe’s reaction is to realizing Joyce really does think of him as a friend, combined with the knowledge of the impact his behavior can and has had on her.

  23. Carms

    I need a hug :<

    1. boop

      *offers hug, and warm blanket, and hot cocoa*

    2. Emanuele

      I need someone, probably Joe, to hug Joyce…

      1. Carms

        yeah I would totally take an in-story hug absotively.
        *preferably* Joe, even just for dimensional reasons- he is a big guy and that would be a big, enveloping hug

    3. Orion Fury

      We all need hugs here.

  24. Darkoneko

    Open your eyes.

    1. Orion Fury

      I think Joe’s are now. The true challenge will be if he can accept that the damage caused by not caring still occurs, and will change for the better.

  25. The Mad Academic

    I need to remind myself to not read this comic while I’m suffering from an episode of severe depression.

    I wish I could hug Joyce…. Hell I wish she’d hug me too.

    1. Dana

      Hugs if you want them from a random Internet dude whose heart goes out to a fellow depression sufferer.

    2. LR

      Hoping you can remember that being depressed is like having s%$t colored glasses welded to your head. Don’t believe every color you see. Hoping also you find some medication that works or some other effective way to fight the depression. Take care of yourself even if it’s really hard to do.

  26. BBCC

    Making funny hover text doesn’t actually help the gaping hole where my heart was, Willis.

    1. Thor

      My usual defense against Da Feelz is to deploy snark and dark humor, but with emotional tension super high here at the moment and not being known enough here for my motives to be understood, any wisecrack I might make, no matter how blatant it might seem that I am kidding, would become the release valve for other people’s defense mechanisms, and coupled with Poe’s Law, the resulting firestorm would be daunting to say the least.

      That’s a damn long sentence just to say “Now is not a good time to joke around.”

  27. boop

    is it about fucking TIME he got told how he contributes to rape culture

    *offers hugs to Joyce*

    1. Queen Anthai

      ^This. Objectifying women, on its own, is just shallow. But it’s not harmless. Because it does reduce women to objects. Even if JOE doesn’t mean any harm and wouldn’t take it any further, that doesn’t mean OTHER men who DO mean harm won’t take it as tacit permission to dehumanize women further.

      And that’s how it starts. That’s what helps Ryan feel entitled to women. Because if objectification is seen as permissible, it’s a very small step up for harmful people to also justify full dehumanization.

      The road to that is paved with microaggressions. Joe doesn’t need to lay down any more stones.

      1. Passing through

        It somewhat bothers me how this comic portrays people who’re into casual sexual encounters. When it was the three lesbian floormates of Joyce who seemed to have an open relationship-/friends-with-benefits-type thing going, it was all about how ok that is & look at how uncomfortable that makes Joyce, hehe hoho.

        Whereas with Joe it’s all boo-hoo he’s objectifying wimmins (contributes to rape culture? Seriously?) I feel this kind if ignores the fact that people can be into casual sexual encounters, without being dicks about it.

        BTW people objectify people all the goddamn time, and every one of ya who was all offended about the list, has one themselves, only difference being that most people have it in their heads & don’t bother to write it down.

        (Just as a general note) This whole thing with Joe seems like an exaggerated extreme & loads of readers are being hypocrites about the objectification part. I get what the point of the arc is, but some people’s reaction to it are far too friggin’ much. Half the comment sections are filled with people jerking off to their own self-righteousness, it seems.

        1. Mishyana

          False equivalency. You can both be into casual sexual encounters AND not also be an awful garbage human who treats that individual like a vagina or a penis nailed to a board. Go back and think about your argument a little more, and then come back. You might also want to have a think on the irony of going on that little rant while accusing others of self righteousness.

        2. Passing through

          That was specifically my argument, that a person can be one without the other which, when going by the main characters, isn’t really portrayed very well, as all, for lack of better word, promiscuous main characters are, in one way or another, dicks about it. Except for Sarah, maybe, but funnily enough, she’s also the only one of em not “getting any”, so to speak.

          I mostly commented, as it fit into the rest of what I was saying, on a tendency I noticed over the last weeks, since I don’t comment often. If anything longer than one paragraph is a “rant”, well, that’s just a reflection on your concentration span, buddy.

        3. thejeff

          Roz?
          I’d say she and Joe are the only promiscuous main characters.
          I guess Billie aspired to be, before she got involved with Ruth, but as far as we know, she had no success.
          Maybe Grace/Mandy & Sierra, but from what little we know of it, that doesn’t seem casual or promiscuous to me.

        4. Passing through

          Well yeah, Joe, Roz, arguably Mike? Didn’t he hook up with some guy that one time just to rub it into Ethans face that he’s not getting laid.

        5. thejeff

          I don’t know: Do you want Mike to be promiscuous?
          If so, he isn’t.

          I’d say Roz is the least dicky of those you might call promiscuous. I’m not sure what if anything is problematic about it. (She’s got other things I dislike, but not really about that.)

        6. Wildcard

          The difference is, those women knew what was going on and were okay
          with it. Plus even “friends with benefits” involves that whole “friend” thing.

          Joe, as we saw with Joyce doesn’t let them know what there getting into at the beginning.

        7. boop

          i don’t get it when people say ‘everyone makes a list in their head’

          i dunno, maybe it’s because i’m asexual

          but i really don’t shuffle people around on a list based on how much i’d wanna bone ’em, or even how much i enjoy their aesthetic

          i do very, very occasionally go ‘omigosh this person is SO PRETTY i want to protect and cuddle them forever’ but i also go ‘wow that whole ‘evolved predisposition towards fawning over the Superficially Healthy people’ sure is a thing, huh’ and i go lie down until the vapors pass, and then i can go back to seeing them as actual people instead of Pretty Object

          is . . is that not how most people do things

        8. Michael Chandra

          I once had a top-5 of barmaids I’d like to boink from two bars I attended. Mentioned it to a friend of some once, she spread it around apparently because one of the barmaids asked me what position she was and appearing a bit offended she was only #2. But it was still a one-time thing and I only told like two people ever, and it was without massive ratings and so on.

          Also I’m pretty sure I phrased it ‘someone I’d like to sleep with’ and not ‘I wanna ride her like crazy, ya know’. Plus I never flirted with them when they were working, because that’d be plain rude and abusive.

          But yeah, sometimes people compare and make a list. But rating them with detailed justifications, not sure why people do that, nevermind spread it.

        9. Passing through

          Well, when I say “list”, I don’t mean that people specifically have a exact rating system for every person they find attractive. But one way or another the first thing people perceive & evaluate about a person is their physical appearance.

          Point is, some degree of objectification is always happening, because you don’t have the time to interact on a human level with every person you see during your day-to-day activities, so the visual impression is often times the only one you’re gonna have of a person.

          So (unless you’re asexual I assume) your brain is going to process many people purely on a “this person I just saw I find attractive for reason xyu” basis.

          It’s a thing, and during the Joe-centric arcs it just feels like people forget that some degree of objectification is a perfectly acceptable thing. I might be wrong in my perception of the comments, of course, but who knows.

        10. Hrovitnir

          OK, I hate this. Please don’t make statements about what “people” do. I sure do tend to have an idea of whether I find someone sexually attractive pretty quickly, but it is 100% not just about what they look like.

          This isn’t me being morally superior, you do you, but goddamnit not everyone is 100% looks based?! People’s bodies are part of it, but if I admit to my foibles, people who are too stereotypically attractive tend to be a turn-off (sorry. Not a dealbreaker, but makes me wary.)

          Some people are more attractive than others, but it’s not linear and I have few physical hard-and-fast dealbreakers. I have *many* personality/bigotry dealbreakers (that can come up real quick, trust me.) And my generalised sorting into “would sleep with/would befriend/unsure/noooo” is not a goddamn list.

          /not the point, but it annoys the shit out of me.

        11. Passing through

          On a basic level, human sexuality is shallow, and brains love to categorize stuff, so some sorting process still exists. Call it a list, call it smth else, the nature of it doesn’t change.

        12. Vulcanodon

          There is a big difference between having a thought, aligning it with the corresponding thought, about real people, on a website for all to see. I think all kinds of random stupid things but I also have the ability to keep those observations to my own damn self. They’re just noise, and don’t align with my values.

        13. Passing through

          Sure. The impression I got though was that many people had not only a problem with the existence of the list as a written-down public document, but with the fact that it exists at all, even as a, uh, construct in Joe’s conscious mind.
          Might, of course, just be a misunderstanding.

        14. thejeff

          Having thoughts of “Oh she’s hot” is one thing and is at least common.

          Joe’s complete obsession with it and with referencing it and making sure that everyone is sorted into their proper place and with informing others (either the woman in question) or friends and others of his rankings all takes it far beyond anything common. Even before we get to his sharing the actual document. Or even before we get to writing it down at all.

          Huge difference between that and just a casual thought about a stranger’s appearance.

        15. thejeff

          As for the “list in their heads”, speak for yourself. I’ll certainly look at people and think they’re attractive, but that’s a far cry from a rating system.

          I also find that, when it comes to people I know, my estimate of their physical attractiveness is closely tied to how much I like them.

        16. boop

          thinking someone might be a great partner for some casual sex is not the same as thinking people are only important insofar as they’d make a great partner for casual sex

          i have no problems with Joe getting all the sex. more power to him *thumbs up* but he makes a point of how shallow he is -for the lulz- because ‘haha, that Joe, reducing women to their hotness again’ is a great deflection from his vulnerability. but making ‘lol someone literally only cares about [any subset of humanity] for sex’ into a damn JOKE – it signals to everyone else ‘hey, it’s not really a big deal to see people as sex toys, everyone does it, see people even joke about it’. so people think it’s okay to not give a shit about [whatever subset they’re attracted to] except for the part where they personally manage to get off.

          Joe can think women are hot and i won’t give a shit. the part where he -very publicly- acts like a woman’s hotness is the only important thing about her? yeeeeah he’s normalizing dehumanization. don’t rate people, Joe.

        17. erejnion

          boop, making ‘lol someone literally only cares about [any subset of humanity] for sex’ into a damn JOKE – it signals to everyone else ‘hey, that someone is a JOKE himself, don’t pay him any heed’.

          Normalization would have been if it was played off as if it isn’t a joke at all. Joe always makes sure to be so over the top that nobody can take him seriously.

        18. thejeff

          Except he doesn’t. Or he doesn’t do so effectively, if that’s his aim.

          He didn’t when he was creeping on Rachel a few days back. Or when he was hitting on Sarah. Or Joyce early on for that matter.
          If it’s all a joke, we haven’t seen anyone take it that way.

        19. Vivid Grim

          no. you know what jokes do? they make us think things are less serious than they are. that’s why we use them in dark times.

          so much sexual, racist, etc harassment is brushed off and minimized because they come in the form of jokes, for fuck’s sake.

        20. erejnion

          Passing through, the whole thing with Joe is about Joe purposefully being an exaggerated extreme, graduating from that because he has too much self-awareness, and hooking up with somebody that actually matters to him.

          Joyce. I’m speaking about Joyce.

        21. Fart Captor

          He really isn’t exaggerated. I’ve known men like him, and many commenters have said they’ve had to deal with men like him and worse.

          Facebook groups where soldiers were sharing nude pics of female soldiers, entire YouTube channels and websites dedicated to shit like Joe’s do list and much much worse, it’s all around.

          Joe is only on the shallow end of that cesspool, finally seeing what he’s been soaking in

        22. Fart Captor

          @Passing through:

          That’s the thing, Joe wanting casual sex is fine. Open relationships are fine. Neither of those is the issue. The problem is with HOW HE TREATS WOMEN. Sexual harassment isn’t necessary to pursuing causal sex. That’s what he does. He IMMEDIATELY hits on women, gets in their personal space, and makes sexual comments without so much as an introduction.

          THAT is a symptom of the mentality that caused him to put so much emphasis on ratings and his list. He never gives women the chance to opt out of his unsolicited, unwelcome advances.

          THAT’S the fucking problem. If his only interest in MEETING women was the pursuit of sex, it would be kinda shallow, but not harmful to anyone else. But he isn’t going out and trying to meet women interested in casual sex, he treats EVERY interaction with a woman like it’s appropriate to hit on them.

        23. Vivid Grim

          don’t rate women, joe.

    2. strictly speaking

      So by analogy, does that mean that Forbes’ list of billionaires contributes to theft culture?

      1. boop

        yes

      2. Vulcanodon

        Tiny percentage of billionaires own most of the wealth, so, yes.

      3. Liliet

        Well, Forbes’ list is not made with an explicit subtitle of “wouldn’t it be cool if you got their money” and does not include the billionaires’ schedule and plan of the house with small ‘x’s where they keep their valuables. Also billionaires are not a class specially vulnerable to theft (that would actually be poor people who don’t have lots of bank accounts, real estate and expensive insurance for everything valuable in their house).

        1. boop

          it does indirectly tell everyone ‘remember, WINNERS are the ones with the most money, regardless of how they got that money! money = fame and power, you know you want it~’

          i hate american capitalism tho so i’m probably biased

      4. thejeff

        Nah, it contributes to corporate culture. It contributes to “greed is good” and anything that’s good for business is good.

        It doesn’t contribute to people knocking over liquor stores, but it might well contribute to white collar crime.

  28. Synnerman

    For some reason, I heard Joyce’s words in Kevin Conroy’s voice.

    1. Delicious Taffy

      To my everlasting shame, it took me a few minutes to remember who Kevin Conroy is. Forgetting the voice of the Green Lantern will forever haunt me.

      1. William Leonard Reese Jr.

        . . . . Was he Green Lantern too? I only really know him from the Batman Animated Series.

      2. Queen Anthai

        Did you do that on purpose

        1. Delicious Taffy

          You can’t prove anything.

      3. SgtWadeyWilson

        Well, the only two GL voices worth remembering were in Buffy, so it shouldn’t be too hard.

        1. SgtWadeyWilson

          Forgot the word “actors” after were…

        2. Delicious Taffy

          James Marsters and Alyson Hannigan?

        3. SgtWadeyWilson

          *Sigh.* I wish.

        4. Delicious Taffy

          I never really got into Buffy, so those two, David Boreanaz, and Sarah Michelle Gellar are the only ones I recognise from it. And honestly, I mostly recognise those four from other stuff.

          A quick search says some guy called Nathan Fillion played Hal Jordan in some cartoons. Was he in anything good? I don’t recognise most of his other stuff.

        5. SgtWadeyWilson

          *Glares.* Buffy, Firefly, Serenity, Dr. Horrible, Con Man… other things I can’t remember.

        6. Delicious Taffy

          Out of all of those, Buffy is the only one I’ve seen more than a gif of.

        7. Delicious Taffy

          Wait, he’s in Castle. I thought that was Jeremy Renner.

        8. SgtWadeyWilson

          Castle was… okay. I never really got into that one, honestly.

        9. Kamino Neko

          Dr Horrible is not part of ‘anything good’…it’s a waste of good talent (Joss, Nathan, NPH).

          Castle, on the other hand was brilliant, until the last couple seasons.

        10. SgtWadeyWilson

          @Kamino Neko, I respect your opinion on Dr. Horrible, but I’m little upset that Felicia Day didn’t make the list of good talent.

        11. Kamino Neko

          I don’t really have a base to judge her on. One episode of Buffy, 7 episodes of Adventure Time (so, maybe an hour’s worth featuring her) and Dr Horrible is all I’ve ever seen that she was in.

          Joss, Nathan, and NPH, OTOH, I have a good basis to work from.

        12. Adj

          I didn’t know Nathan Fillion was in Buffy. Neat!

        13. Roborat

          Holy crap, I love Buffy, and I never spotted him, even when I recently binged the series. I feel like an idiot.

        14. SgtWadeyWilson

          IIRC He’s that terrible Preacher villain that takes Xander’s eye. Kinda different from his usual…

        15. Kamino Neko

          That’s Caleb, and yes, he was played by Fillion.

        16. SgtWadeyWilson

          Yes… Caleb, that b- *Ahem.* Thanks!

  29. JohnnyO

    Joe: “So, we’re just friends?”

    1. Goblin Scribe

      I think he’d be surprised she considers him a friend at all, to be honest. They’re kinda enemies, and Joe has trouble accepting love and support, even though they’ve been communicating a lot of late. Consider his framing of the “I saved a donut for you” act.

      1. David

        What about his framing of the donut? Joe is working within his facade of shallowness. It gives him the chance to show less commitment than he finds himself saddled with. A poor person does not parade a tenner he came across but safeguards it.

        Reminds me of McMurphy in Kesey’s “One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest” who is gambling with the other patients and accused of “always winning things”. It’s his facade, his excuse for caring more than he’ll readily admit. Until he is forced to.

  30. Passchendaele

    There’s nothing I can say that would compare to Joyce’s speech. If this can’t force Joe to consider the stupidity of his actions and how they’re based on irrational logic, such to the point that actually showing emotions and openly caring for others is less damaging overall, nothing will. *applauds Joyce’s awesomeness*

    1. William Leonard Reese Jr.

      *also applauds* Infact I think Joyce’s speech is working, look at Joe’s face evolve and break into tears as he hears her and hears her hurt. It is making a major impact and I think it out of everything will BREAK him out of this faux-nihilistic mental and emotional block he has.

  31. JessWitt

    Exactly what Joe needs to hear. Puts his thoughts and beliefs into a bigger context.

  32. Oggser

    im going to sob tears of blood out of despair

    1. Delicious Taffy

      You missed the Black Parade by about 10 years, sport. If bloody tears have persisted this long, call your doctor immediately.

      1. SgtWadeyWilson

        Just be careful, phones and any other sharp objects should be kept away from faces to prevent further blood loss.

      2. Oggser

        yeah i called them like 4 years ago but apparently its too late for me

  33. nicostrat

    Willis, thanks for depicting rape culture clearly. I think this will be my favorite stip for a looooong time

  34. Emperor Norton II

    I…

    …

    …

    …

    …

    I have nothing to say. I have not the right to say anything to this.

  35. Lingo

    Dang. Well put.

  36. Delicious Taffy

    Well, she hasn’t struck him, yet. She hasn’t kissed him, either. This anime is too unpredictable for me.

    1. MatthewTheLucky

      At any moment the comedic sidekick will show up and derail the conversation.

      So I guess Sal’s gotten sick of Desperado.

  37. Reagan

    Dunno if anyone noticed, but the hand she’s clutching is the one she held the glass in when she cut him.

    1. Michael Chandra

      It’s also the wrist she hurt punching the Toe and has had the habit of holding when reminded of dangerous situations.

      1. butting

        More than that, both times she’s had to act violently. That’s hard to deal with, especially with her background of girls-are-pure-and-beautiful-flowers-that-must-be-protected, and that the way she’s dealing with it is to school Joe the way she just has… it’s a thing of beauty.

      2. thejeff

        The clutching habit predates Toedad and seems closely tied to flashbacks to Ryan rather than generic danger.

  38. Puckish Rogue

    This doesn’t diminish but only encourages my belief that Jo-Jo is still a distinct possibility…nay probability

    1. Thor

      But Joyce and Jocelyn are siblings! That’s kind of kinky, but not really in character.

      1. Puckish Rogue

        http://i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/facebook/000/312/563/05d.jpg

  39. Shiro

    This is well said. Well written. And the reason I can count my male friends on my fingers. The men I can truly say I trust, on one hand.

    This is #yesallwomen put more beautifully than I could hope to.

    1. Jason

      I’m training to become a counsellor, and on the course is a woman who has said that before she started, she couldn’t trust any men. Not one. Being on the course with three very different men who had all come there to help people and had a fair amount of self awareness and open mindedness (all essential for the training) had essentially opened her mind to the idea that men can be okay.
      We recently went to her birthday party, and other than our classmates there were only two men- one of whom was my husband. But the fact that the other man was there at all made me so happy, because it showed that despite what she had been through, she was starting to get to the point of refusing to let it stop her from making connections with men.

      Your comment about trust reminded me of her, so I thought I would share.

      For myself, as a transman, I STILL have initial concerns about socialising with men because of what I experienced pre-transition.

    2. Fox man

      As a man and sexual assault survivor, I understand the impulse to generalize to a whole group when you’ve been hurt and I also think it is neither healthy nor fair to punish the many for the actions of the one or few. Males and men are not all inherently a threat or unworthy of trust just as females and women are not. By the same token not all males or females and men or women are all inherently safe or trustworthy. Building trust takes time when you’ve been hurt and it’s okay to be wary, but this reads to me as going into the territory of hostility and hate towards male people and men. As someone who has had to learn trust and to feel safe after assault, I urge you to look for healing and peace for your hurts and I also urge you not to paint all males or men as “potential threats” because we are individuals, some good, some bad, and some in between no matter our sex or gender. Try to remember that the actions of one person or a few people doesn’t define everyone in that group. I can tell you from experience that females and women are just as capable of horrendous abuses as men and males, so are intersex people or poeple of other genders. All people no matter their sex or gender are capable of being good or bad, there’s no way to look at a person and know if they are good or bad because what is on the outside doesn’t define what’s on the inside. I hope you csan find peace.

      1. Li

        First: Not being trusted isn’t a punishment.

        Second: As a woman who has been abused by both men and women, someone saying “I can count the men I trust on one hand” is not painting anyone as anything.

        Shiro didn’t say “all men everywhere are scum”, she even invoked #YesAllWomen which you may recall was SPECIFICALLY an acknowlegement that Not All Men Are Bad — it would be more productive for you to respond to the actual things she said, instead of the Caricature of Feminists Scripted By MRAs that you’re currently talking to.

        1. Fox man

          First, I didn’t say not being trusted is a punishment, I’m saying being thought of as being untrustworthy because you’re a man is punishing all men for the actions of some men.
          Second, according to my research #YesAllWomen means all women experience misogyny and was a response to #NotAllMen. Also, I don’t talk to MRAs and while I don’t need to defend myself or my opinion to you, I would like to point out that you just judged me for being a man who disagrees with you by linking me to a hate group. Also, FYI I am a man who was born female because I am trans, so I a man have directly experienced misogyny for the 24 years of my life pre transition. I think maybe the way arguments are made needs to be looked at here because this was an unnecessarily hostile response to my having a different opinion.

        2. boop

          “I didn’t say not being trusted is a punishment, I’m saying being thought of as being untrustworthy because you’re a man is punishing all men for the actions of some men.”

          i’m not sure how it can be punishing all men if being thought of as untrustworthy isn’t a punishment

        3. Fox man

          You’re misunderstanding me, I’m saying it’s okay, to mistrust someone but not solely on the basis of them being a man because then you are implying all men are a dangerous just because they are men.

        4. Fart Captor

          No, we’re understanding you just fine.

          If you’ve been hurt, repeatedly, by members of any particular group, you’re inevitably going to learn to distrust members of that group. The vast majority of sexual assaults, sexual harassment, and acts of domestic abuse are perpetrated by men.

          All men ARE potentially dangerous. It’s unfortunate that the world is this way, but for many women its simply prudent to distrust any man they don’t know.

          That distrust isn’t about YOU.</b It's not an attack on you personally, or an accusation, and it's not even because they think ALL men are going to attack them if given the chance. It's because ALL men could.

          That’s not the fault of women who feel that way. It’s not the fault of those men who actually are safe. It’s the fault of men out there who have earned every last shred of that mistrust. If you really believe you’re a safe, trustworthy person, direct your anger at the people who are actually to blame for this state of affairs, not the survival mechanisms of people who they target.

        5. Fox Man

          I am a sexual assault survivor who was victimized by men and women, but I refuse to judge a stranger by the actions of the people who hurt me. As a female man, I have lived in both worlds and I see this as a problem with people, instead of a problem with men. Let me ask you some questions am I more dangerous post transition than pre? Are women less dangerous than men? I think equality means holding everyone to the same standard of behavior and that change comes from changing hearts and minds and not us vs. them behavior.

        6. Fart Captor

          Equality will be great if it’s ever actually achieved.

          Right now, toxic masculinity and rape culture are pervasive in the US. This alone provides a understandable reason to mistrust cis men.

          The impetus to “win hearts and minds” does not belong on the heads of people currently getting the short end of the stick.

        7. Fox man

          If everyone believed, the impetus to “win hearts and minds” does not belong on the heads of people currently getting the short end of the stick.” nothing would ever change because unless the people getting the short end of the stick speak up and stand up no one will know there’s a problem, isn’t that the point of activism? Look my whole point boils down to no one wants to fight for you when you tell them they are part of the problem. A relevant quote here is, “fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering.” Fearing men doesn’t get them on women’s sides, it makes them stop caring because if you will automatically be lumped in with the monsters, if you are guilty until proven innocent, then why try?

        8. Fart Captor

          As a straight, heterosexual cisgender white man, I can assure you that isn’t the case. I was won over by stories of anger and bitterness. I had too much privilege blocking my view to see much else.

          Not everyone can or should do what you’re suggesting. You should encourage them, not scold them. Privileged dudes like me who have already been won over are the ones who should be scolded for not doing more. I assure you we don’t need the kid gloves. We don’t have to invest as much of our emotional resources in basic survival and functioning from day to day.

        9. Li

          This really well-put, and as a white ablebofied cis person I second it — it was people showing me their anger and pain that really shocked me out of my previous intellectual understanding of oppressions I don’t face, and into listening.

          I’m a woman and I’m bi. I have some other Things going on. But I think we have a cultural tendency in the USA to debate social justice as if it were all abstract logic problems instead of stuff that hurts people.

          And that tendency definitely favors people who, yeah, don’t use up as many of their emotional resources just surviving. Lauding people’s politeness and their cool heads when talking about this stuff… dismisses correcting injustice as being less important than staying calm when your humanity is being questioned, which is also a requirement only for marginalized people.

          It makes these conversations only more difficult. For example, instead of getting to talk about rape culture, or even getting to talk about the fact that yes, people of all genders can be abusive, and people of all genders can be victims…

          …instead we have gotten thoroughly bogged down in this pointless semantic argument about whether or not Shiro’s offhanded, personal testimonial about her difficulties trusting the men in her life is actually tantamount to calling all men rapists, and how her offhanded personal comment made in this forum might hurt what Fox Man assumes is her political cause, because being mistrusted by an abuse survivor apparently makes men not want to try to be better people “because why even try”?

          (What a really dim view of men that is, by the way. How uncharitable and unkind. Personally, I think men as a whole are better than that.)

        10. Fox man

          Fart Captor, you made my point though. You were changed by hearing people’s stories, you didn’t wake up and suddenly know what people needed, they told you either directly or indirectly. Of course not everyone should speak out because it’s not always safe, my point was if NO ONE speaks out no one who isn’t directly affected knows there’s a problem. There’s a difference between pain and anger and blame. Someone saying I’m upset with the injustice I suffer from people you share a trait with is very different than I suffer because of you and it’s your fault. The first moves many people to change, the second leads to defensiveness. It’s like how what Joyce said to Joe reached him, but when he thought she was going to preach at him, he closed off and became defensive. People like to be told they can be part of a solution, not that they are the problem.

        11. Fox man

          Li it seems no matter what I say it’s going to be twisted into something bad so I’m done trying to have this conversation.
          TheJeff and Li, caring about how men feel doesn’t hurt women because I care equally about how women and anyone of any other gender feels, I would make the same arguments for people working off the premise of women being untrustworthy until proven otherwise, or gender queer people, or trans people, or gay people etc. All people matter and it takes all types of people to effect change and fearing and othering a large part of the population isn’t going to help anyone, but sure because I say men have a place in this fight, which is won by treating them like people instead of monsters I’m a bad guy. I was born female and now women I’ve never met are afraid of me walking down the street because I look male, I know this because they act afraid of me just walking their direction casually. I transitioned to be myself and am now treated as a threat just for existing in the same space as many women. I’m a little guy and very friendly. I don’t think the fact that our society teaches women to be afraid of men is a positive thing, I didn’t think it was when I was precieved as a woman and I don’t think it is now that people see me as the man I really am, and if that makes me bad in your book so be it.

        12. Fox man

          Farcaptor, why should privileged people be scored for not doing more if they were ignorant of the issues? Correct me if I’m wrong, but your argument reads to me like the privileged need to fight this fight for the underprivileged and the underprivileged shouldn’t fight for themselves, is that how you mean this?

        13. Li

          Meanwhile it is equally clear to everyone else in this conversation that you are determined to ignore what people are actually saying to you in favor of continuing to beat up that straw Evil Feminust Who Hates Men.

          Sorry this couldn’t have been a more productive conversation, but I promise you it was not for lack of trying on anyone else’s part.

        14. Fox man

          You aren’t talking to me Li, I’m being talked at and treated as an enemy of feminism because I believe in an alternate way of handling the dismantling of a corrupt and unfair system. You seem to have decided who I am and look at everything I say through that lense. It doesn’t seem to occur to you that I can have good and pure motivations and still disagree with what you’re saying. That’s sad to me because I really do care about these problems, but you’re seemingly determined to believe otherwise. Nothing we do happens in a vacuum, no one group is more important than another, we all live in this world and we all have to work together to change it for the better. Feminism has done very good things but, advocating for the underprivileged by vilifying the privileged wasn’t the point. If you want equality, you start by treating everyone as having equal value and equal worth to socitey and one group fearing the other doesn’t allow for that in the long run.

        15. Li

          Again, literally no one said “men are bad”. You are not listening to anyone, and you are being treated as someone who isn’t listening. It has absolutely nothing to do with your gender. It doesn’t even have anything to do with feminism.

          I genuinely don’t know why I’m still replying because this is clearly a waste of breath, but one last try I guess.

        16. Li

          You’re hearing hostility but I’m just tired.

          Again, it would be more productive for you to respond to the things Shiro has actually said, instead of the fictional version of her that I guess you got from somewhere else, despite this “generalizations are evil” and “have you considered that you not trusting men because you were traumatized is actually really rude and hurts men?” stuff being some of their favorite talking points.

          (Yes, YesAllWomen was “a response” to NotAllMen — specifically, the response was, “no, not all men harass women in XYZ fashion, but YesAllWomen have stories of times when some dude harassed them.” Hence, again, invoking it is specifically saying “we know not all men are bad”, and your entire comment was needlessly defensive.)

          (Much like your assertion that I “judged” you “for being a man who disagrees with me”….. about what, even? Pff, I was just pointing out that your response was not relevant to Shiro’s comment. We weren’t talking until just now. I have no idea what any of your political opinions even are, pithy comment about MRA talking points aside.)

        17. Fox Man

          I’m not saying, “have you considered that you not trusting men because you were traumatized is actually really rude and hurts men” I am saying not trusting men simply because they are men doesn’t make them want to be part of the solution to the problems in our society that lead to being traumatized. I am responding to what Shiro is saying, not just the words but the mentality these statements lead to. Just like men like Joe contribute to a larger problem ie rape culture, so do statements like some men objectifying women is why I trust so few men, which is what this boils down to and it contributes to hatred of men and bad treatment of men. You don’t effect change by making people who have a privilege you don’t out to be your enemy, that only turns into us vs. them. Blame doesn’t make people want to help you, it makes them stop caring or trying to do better. The fact that you felt the need to bring up MRAs at all in connection to me is a judgement, it implies I am like them or think like them. I’m saying you seem to be judging me for disagreeing with you that this type of statment isn’t problematic and unhealthy. You call it defensive, but I’ve not attacked anyone or called anyone names, I’ve pointed out how a statement reads to me. If my response isn’t relevant then so be it, but my thoughts, feelings, and opinions are just as valid as anyone else’s and like you have the right to interpret what I say, so to do I have the right to interpret what others say.

        18. Li

          OK, so you’re saying not trusting men because someone was traumatized will make men not want to fight for social justice.

          That’s gross, and still a really popular MRA talking point.

          Anyway, for the third time, Shiro saying “I personally trust only a few men” is not saying “all men are evil” or even “I hate men”, and you are still reacting with completely unnecessary defensiveness. The “mentality” you think her personal difficulty with trusting men “leads to” is still something that you are inventing wholecloth out of that defensiveness.

          If I’m “judging” you, it’s as someone who cannot be bothered to make sure you fully understand what another person is saying before jumping to conclusions.

          I’m not “disagreeing with you” that “this type of statement is problematic or unhealthy”, I’m pointing out that you are wrong about what “type of statement” Shiro was making, so your disagreement with it is irrelevant to this thread. Like, you keep insisting Shiro is “blaming” men but literally all she has done is said that she’s only met a few men she can trust. That’s it — that is what you are wildly overcorrecting for here, what you are NotAllMen-ing even though Shiro never said “all” men, never said anything more than that she only knows a few men that she feels she can trust.

          And if people have to “attack” and “name-call” in order to be defensive, I would love to hear what your justification is for calling me hostile, since I have at worst pointed out that you keep parroting a group you don’t want to be associated with.

        19. thejeff

          They brought up MRAs in connection to you because you’re making arguments straight out of the MRA playbook.
          You may not have got them from there, but we’ve heard them before.

        20. Li

          +1 this exactly.

        21. Fox man

          Oops, this posted above when i meant it to be here. Li it seems no matter what I say it’s going to be twisted into something bad so I’m done trying to have this conversation.
          TheJeff and Li, caring about how men feel doesn’t hurt women because I care equally about how women and anyone of any other gender feels, I would make the same arguments for people working off the premise of women being untrustworthy until proven otherwise, or gender queer people, or trans people, or gay people etc. All people matter and it takes all types of people to effect change and fearing and othering a large part of the population isn’t going to help anyone, but sure because I say men have a place in this fight, which is won by treating them like people instead of monsters I’m a bad guy. I was born female and now women I’ve never met are afraid of me walking down the street because I look male, I know this because they act afraid of me just walking their direction casually. I transitioned to be myself and am now treated as a threat just for existing in the same space as many women. I’m a little guy and very friendly. I don’t think the fact that our society teaches women to be afraid of men is a positive thing, I didn’t think it was when I was precieved as a woman and I don’t think it is now that people see me as the man I really am, and if that makes me bad in your book so be it.

  40. nightsbridge

    I used to like, throw up paragraphs of analysis? And now I’m just like . . . oof, so many feels . . .

  41. Danieleon

    Dude. Something just got broken inside Joe

    1. OhPun

      You say broken, I say fixed.

      1. StClair

        Sometimes things that have broken and healed wrong (say, after a divorce?) need to be broken again first.

  42. Shiro

    And for all the That Guys who have been refusing to understand why the list is such a big fucking deal: THIS is why.

  43. Pl0x

    I hope no commenter ever calls Joe harmless ever again!

    1. Delicious Taffy

      Hope is a dangerous thing.

      1. Pl0x

        I said it as sort of a disciplinary warning. I realize effectiveness would probably be limited to only today’s strip’s comments. Which is disappointing.

        1. Delicious Taffy

          It would have been nice to go at least one day without it. Maybe next time.

        2. Michael Chandra

          *looks at bottom of comments* Whelp. You tried.

  44. Rukduk

    Wow. This…this here is powerful. Joyce is being open, very open about her trauma to Joe as a way of both processing her trauma and as a way to try to open Joe’s eyes. And in panel 5 Joe looks about ready to cry. In panel 4 he’s clearly worried, and in panel 5 Joyce drops several facts on his head. And he realizes this in a way that leaves him overwhelmed. Because in this moment, Joyce is saying that she does care about Joe, she views him as a friend, she trusts him enough to tell him about what happened (which is incredibly brave of Joyce and very hard for her), and that he is hurting her with his actions. The actions that he takes as a way to “not hurt people” according to last strip. And at last, there’s nothing left for him to hide behind. He has to face the potential harm he causes, and it horrifies him. He’s about to cry because he feels guilty, because he doesn’t really view himself as human according to yesterday, because he never wanted to hurt anyone, and finally because he hurt someone who has admitted they do care about him and that he cares about on an emotional level. This moment is his last chance in comic. He has to make a choice between his “everybody treating everyone else as an object keeps people from being hurt” mythology and the tangible fact of emotional pain he has caused. And the consequence here isn’t getting yelled at or getting the cold shoulder. The consequence is losing his (potential) friendship with Joyce and probably losing the ability to look at himself in the mirror. Because for once in his life, he realizes the part he plays in the problem. And Joe doesn’t want to be part of the problem. He’s admitted that he doesn’t want to hurt people. So hopefully, hopefully, he makes the right choice.

    1. BP

      (slow clap) Thank you for putting it so well.

  45. spoopyfox

    GIRL TELL HIM

  46. fogel

    Now to see if Joe rejects the idea that his objectification & Ryan’s are of the same species and that his hurts Joyce maybe more because hes suppossed to be a decent guy & even a friend OR he has a horrified realization because Joyce isn’t letting him NOT know what it’s about.

  47. ObiKemnebi

    As painful as this comic is for me to read sometimes,

    Thank you Willis. Thank you for saying what needs to be said, and for showing things as they are without a minimalizing lens.

  48. Keulan

    That is a huge punch to the feels there.

  49. Miri

    Joe looks terrified by Joyce’s summary…

    ‘He treated me in the same way you did. I cut his face. He came at my friend. He’s in hospital now.’
    Crap – Joyce is warning me she’s going to kill me. Do I run? Does she want me to run so she can hunt me down? I screwed up bad didn’t I?

    But on a serious note – YES. Joe has never considered that his attitude, extended, gets into Druggy McRapey territory. It has never occurred to him that it makes him threatening. It has never occurred to him that people see his list and hear him talk, and it validates their objectification of women to the point where the idea of half the species having the right to consent becomes laughable… It has never occurred to him that the way he has treated women contributes to the world feeling and being less safe for them in a real and meaningful way. Even with Rachel yelling at him for painting a target on her – I think Danny felt that one, and Joe was left thinking ‘But you ARE an 11, anybody with eyes can tell that…’. But for somebody he knows and cares about to tell him outright that she was attacked and his attitude makes her less safe… That has to hit home, in a way that he can’t dismiss or easily minimise.

    ‘I’m not like that’ doesn’t hold up so well when somebody connects the dots for you and shows how your words and actions MAKE you like that. That not treating people like people doesn’t make everybody safer from emotional harm – it DEHUMANISES them and that makes them more vulnerable to very real physical and pschological damage.

    Also, all of the appropriate gestures of concern and support through gentle and respectful touching for Joyce 🙁

    1. Jason

      When in doubt about hugs, there’s usually some animal that is appropriate for the individual to snuggle. Joyce likes dogs, right? Doggy snuggles.

      I mean, I totally agree with the meat of your comment, I just didn’t have anything meaningful to add. So… doggy snuggles.

  50. EvilMidnightLurker

    Everyone else has said everything intelligent I could have said already.

    So.

    The eyebrow came back, the very next day. The eyebrow came back, oh we thought it was a goner, but the eyebrow came back, it just couldn’t stay away…

    1. foamy

      Took five panels though :p

  51. Peter Lewerin

    Genom min synd är jag skyldig
    till mer ont än jag förstår
    och har del i världens bortvändhet från dig.

    (Through my sin I am guilty of more evil than I understand, and am a part of the world being turned away from you.)

    Even though I have now lived longer as an atheist than a christian, some memes remain because there is a kind of truth to them. Some things you do, even though they don’t seem bad and you don’t mean any harm, actually can cause a lot of harm and make the world a worse place.

    I’m not writing this to tell anyone anything new: this is fairly common knowledge if we think about it. I’m writing this because I see this realization in Joe’s eyes in this strip.

    1. Delicious Taffy

      Dang, foreign languages make things sound so much better.

  52. MapleAmber

    ALL THE CRYING.
    Thanks, Willis.

  53. Cmd1095

    Hm, in regards to yesterday’s comment where I was talking about Joe’s insecurities and how him opening up was a moment where Joyce could set him on the right path or kick him back to the wrong one. I’d say this response by Joyce was a really positive one, though not in the manner I had meant before. It didn’t really address Joe’s emotional baggage, but we can tell by his face that her words reached him here.

    And I think this might end up being more effective than I’d hoped. Joe’s M.O. for avoiding his feelings of worthlessness and whatnot are predicated on the premise that when he acts like a shallow womanizing fuckboi, nobody can get truly hurt in a way he can’t just hand out donuts to fix.

    But here he is being confronted by someone he trusts enough to open up to like he just did, and being slapped in the face with a real case of how his behavior DOES hurt people, and how it hurts the people he values personally. And that’s big, because in the mind of someone who believes nobody truly cares for him and just wants to put on the shallow act to avoid hurting anyone or getting hurt, if he’s now hurting people, his behavior can’t continue anymore. If his method of not hurting people does in fact hurt them then there’s no point of doing things like that.

    And that’s going to cut deep. I doubt he’ll make a full 180 overnight, it’s hard to break old habits, and scary when its these kind of habits. But I think this could be something that sets him on the path to changing. And who knows maybe he’ll just find a different shallow facade to hide behind that’s less harmful (like my jokes/sarcasm/self-depreciating humor). But I don’t think he’s going to stay with this one, I don’t think he’ll be able to anymore.

    1. Delicious Taffy

      Not to discard the rest of this, because it’s definitely important, but “fuckboi” is not a term I expected here.

      1. Cmd1095

        oh is that slang out of date already? I don’t keep up with it very well

        1. Delicious Taffy

          I’m not sure, myself. Are we still mourning Harambe?

        2. Cmd1095

          I don’t think so, those memes seem to have died down

        3. KSClaw

          “fuckboi” has also been decided it’s not a very good term, because it’s another term for people who get raped in prison. So while it sounds funny, the origins behind it are not.

        4. KSClaw

          And because I can’t edit a comment, adding now, I got in doubt about it and double-checked and to quote Inigo Montoya “I do not think it means what you think it means.” Fuckboi did not have the negative relation to it I thought it did, but it’s still not really a nice word tbh. (But you can say that about a lot of words)

        5. Li

          Fuckboy is AAVE. I am super white, but what I have seen repeatedly from Black people trying to correct our usage of it is that it means “a guy who isn’t nearly as cool as he thinks he is”. Who “ain’t shit”, to put it another way.

          (It does not mean “male slut”, either. It honestly has nothing to do with sex at all. And despite confused MRAs trying to spread the prison rumor because they thought fuckboy was “anti male language” and hated how popular it was and wanted it to go away (see also: mansplaining), it definitely does not mean that, either.)

    2. Liliet

      Wait, you thought Joyce setting him on the right path would be by addressing Joe’s insecurities??? The entire lesson Joe needs to learn here is “it’s not always about you”… JFC. Talk about women being expected to fix men’s booboos by blowing on them gently.

      1. Cmd1095

        Not necessarily, what initially came to mind was Joyce showing Joe that he does matter to people and thus his actions have an impact on them whether or not he realizes it. His actions were based on the premise that he doesn’t matter to anyone. By showing that is false, acknowledging what he said but countering it, she would force him to reevaluate his attitude.

        And when it comes to insecurities like this, some degree of addressing the root issue is often needed, because if Joyce were to just tell him “no that’s wrong” and not address it we’d get nowhere, he’d continue being defensive like he just was. That’s not an ideal thing, but it’s how it typically goes.

        So my first thought was that Joyce’s counter would be on the “I don’t matter” part of his rant, but she instead tackled the part of the rant where he claims not to be doing anything that would hurt anyone. Which in terms of getting him to stop being such an asshole is probably effective, as I said. In terms of actually moving past the source of the asshole behaviors however, this would probably be less effective.

        So in short, there were two points Joyce could address to yield a positive result, she took the one that didn’t come to mind first for me, since I viewed that one as a symptom of the other.

        The lesson for Joe here isn’t “it’s not always about you,” to say that is to misunderstand where he’s coming from on this. In his mind he acts the way he does to avoid hurting anyone or being hurt himself. In his own head his actions are actually tinged with a bit of selflessness, because he puts on the act to make sure he doesn’t cause any harm. The lesson he needs to learn here is that the act he was putting on DOES cause harm, and that he was wrong about it being harmless. And that’s a key part, he was wrong. Nobody should argue that his behavior was good or acceptable, it was wrong, he was wrong, and it needs to change, but if you want to see that change happen you need to properly identify the root of the issue, otherwise it’ll be like beating your head against a brick wall.

        Now as for how this approach is going to affect Joe, I think it will have a beneficial effect, but I suspect Joe is going to switch from one set of shallow behaviors to another, hopefully less harmful set that is still quite shallow, because the core belief that nobody cares about him is still there. That hasn’t been addressed yet, and while it’s not Joyce’s job to do that, it would’ve been good for him if she had. That being said, it isn’t all about him, and if he at least stops harming others that’s still a positive outcome for the majority of people, just not a best case outcome for him personally.

  54. Stu

    For those thinking that Joyce was going to hit Joe – she did, but not in the way you believed she would. And for my part, I think it’s because she legitimately cares about him (whether it’s strictly platonic or a bit romantic I have no clue), and wants to make sure he doesn’t go down the same road.

    1. Nono

      With any luck, Joyce won’t need to hit anyone ever again.

    2. Owlmirror

      I think Joe might have preferred that Joyce had physically struck him, and said nothing.

      1. Jason

        Absolutely. This has had far more impact that a punch could. His face…

      2. Dan

        He most defiantly wishes she’d just punched him again.

  55. Pylgrim

    Every way the wind blows?

  56. Nakams

    “Some say that Joe’s grew three sizes that day.”

    1. Smiling Cat

      Joe’s what? 😛

      1. Heavensrun

        I’m gonna go with “heart”, because the entire point of the scene.

    2. Thor

      Joe’s what?

      There’s a part of Joe that grows three sizes on a regular basis, but I don’t think that’s what you are referring to.

      1. John Merklinghaus

        The pupil of his eye in dim light?

        1. Jason

          His eyes in general, here…

  57. Heavensrun

    ;_____________;

  58. AY

    Someone please remind me, did Joe know previously that Joyce was (one of) the girl/s Ryan had attacked? Or at least, do we know if he knows? I can’t recall.

    1. BigDogLittleCat

      I don’t think so- i don’t recall anything indicating he even knew about the attempt at the party.
      This is bringing home to Joe that there is a connection between his “shallow” joke and rape, and the real impact on women. He thought they were just offended. He’s now starting to understand that the rage against him is not simple vanity: it’s survival.

      Coming from Joyce, the one person who has ever understood that there’s more to him than Super Stud. she figured out that his family life is not happy and she trusted him enough to ask him for help. She is the one woman he’s ever been able to drop the act around, the one woman who’s considered him a friend. I think he is realizing how much she means to him, even as he’s seeing how terribly he has hurt her.

  59. Bagge

    Wow…

    From a pure layout perspective, this strip is really, REALLY good. We focus just on Joyce’s words (mouth) and trauma (hand), interspersed with a zoom in on Joe’s reaction – one of the VERY few times he is entirely without shield or mask. And in the last panel, those big blue eyes and a gentle reminder that the hottest part of a flame is blue. Joyce is in shadow, Joe is not. For all we know, her eyes might very well be the light source of the room. From a metaphorical perspective, they are.

    The words are true, and only more poignant from the occasional stutter. This is the heart of the matter, spoken by the heart of the story. This is what the stakes have always been. We (and Joe) have seen it. Rachel has flat out told us (and Joe), but this is where it hits home.

    This might be the best strip in the entire Dumbing of Age (and there is not even any Becky in it).

    1. ValdVin

      I zeroed in on Joe’s one word and the disappearing size of the letters as he said it. A seldom-used variance in the typography. Very effective.

    2. butting

      And she’s behind the panels, surrounding him, and there’s bars in the background of his panels.

      Just, damn. So good. And I normally only say that over at Wilde Life, my thrice-weekly as-good-as-Sandman jam.

    3. Chrissy

      It really is superb. I was wondering how Willis would manage to get this point across so effectively (and it had to be done in a single strip for impact), and I am just floored. Incredibly accurate, succinct, and poignant all at once.

      1. Jason

        Another point about the effectiveness is the way Joyce is speaking. Short sentences, very little detail, at least about the attacks. It’s incredibly “real”. It’s believable and a very natural reaction, it shows how hard it is for her to share what happened. It hits harder than eloquence could.

        1. StClair

          Yes, this.

    4. Fart Captor

      Yeah, both this strip and yesterday’s are just masterpieces. The dialog is brilliant, but feels completely natural and in-character, and so much more emotional detail is captured than it seems like should be possible

  60. Owlmirror

    Ow.

    It seems to me that this is actually kind of a good sign, in a big picture kind of way.

    Joyce is saying all this, not just because it’s true, but because she thinks she can get through to Joe; that her words will be taken to heart. She thinks that Joe is educable and redeemable.

    And, as a credit to her judgement, he probably is. It will probably hurt him a lot before it happens, but sometimes, growth is pain.

    And sometimes not growing is worse pain.

  61. Bunny

    Bravo.

  62. QueerBitch

    Joyce is being so brave to open up like this. Trauma can be hard to share especially after being raised in a Christian setting which kind of encourages the bottling of things that people don’t want to see. It can be difficult and I hope this works to get through to Joe

    Joe needs to realize that casual sex and not seeing the people you sleep with as human beings is disgusging and gross and can often go down a dangerous path to slowly start to disregard consent. I would never sleep with someone I don’t respect as a human being…and I’m a slut…so…yeah…Joe don’t be a bongoass.

    1. QueerBitch

      Seriously tho…you can be a HUGE slut and still respect people. I do it. I refuse to be friends with people who don’t see other humans as people and not objects. Me and all my friends manage. Dammit Joe.

      1. Shiro

        Good addition, I was gonna be like “but mutually respectful casual sex is great :c”

        For real, half my friendships have been strengthened considerably by casual sex and/or camming. With the right kind of friend, it’s awesome.

        1. Emperor Norton II

          Mutually respectful sex is the best sex!

        2. Shiro

          Agreed! 😀 It’s the only kind I’ll have.

        3. Emperor Norton II

          Not to mention mutual orgasms. I mean, not that they’re bad when they’re apart, but when they are at the same time, it’s just that little bit better, you know?

  63. BP

    Wow.

    Joyce … I’m proud of you. It’s never easy to talk about the worst things that have happened to you. That you can tell Joe is a huge sign of respect and growth.

    Joe … Listen to your friend. Let what she’s saying stick. It matters so much.

  64. neon5162

    now we can start a joeXjoyce a joece if it were for this universe due to joe having a complete change in persepective then stuff then they fall in love and get married lol

  65. newllend(henryvolt)

    Fist full of reality right there.

  66. Tenzhi

    Most, if not all, human interaction involves one person wanting something that another person has. (Indeed, such might broadly be applied to most interactions in the known universe.) Realising and accepting what one wants from other people – such that one could put them in a rated list – isn’t problematic. The problems arise when one person prioritizes their wants above others to the point that they’ll take what they want by force.

    We are, every one of us, objects of varying worth.

    1. Shiro

      This was such a good comments section. We were all having a good comments section.

      Then this happened.

      1. Tenzhi

        It’s still a perfectly fine comments section. Even with my very slight dissent. I think focusing on the wrong issues obfuscates the actual problem. I could argue further on the point, but I understand it’s a sensitive topic and I apologise if I upset anyone.

    2. Irredentist

      Well, yes, but that’s only one way to look at it. Being objects of varying worth doesn’t mean we aren’t also real people with real lives.

    3. Tarmaniel

      Seriously, putting this kind of crap in a publically accessible list is the problem. If you’re just bullshitting with your friends, it’s not a big deal to rate a woman on attractiveness any more than it is for a woman to brag about how rich the guy she’s currently dating is. But if a woman were to compile a publically available “dateability index” of all the men she’s ever met, ranked the men on said list almost entirely based on earning potential, and provided snide commentary on the low ranks where she mocks the poor guys for various perceived life failures that led to them being poor and “undateable,” there would be absolutely no dispute at all that this woman was a horrible person. A guy doing the same thing for physical attractiveness isn’t better.

      1. Fart Captor

        No, it’s also that he was always doing it. As you say, it’s not a big deal to do it once in a discussion with your friends, but when you get anywhere near thinking about every woman in those terms, that’s a problem even if you keep the ratings to yourself.

        Even without taking to the extremes Joe did, it’s symptomatic of / reinforcing a harmful mindset, where human beings end up being reduced to something less than people.

        Reducing human interaction to calculated transactions has basically the same result.

        1. thejeff

          Even doing so more casually with your friends, you’re still reinforcing the “looks are all that matters in women” thing. Or as Cerberus would put “how much of a boner she gives me”.
          It’s a matter of degree of course – a simple “I think X is hot” isn’t a big deal. Getting into more detailed comparisons, with or without numbers gets more problematic.
          It reinforces that toxic masculinity bullshit.

      2. Shiro

        I mean, I don’t know about you, but it’s an instant turnoff for me if someone around me starts reducing women down to fuckability numbers. Which is, I do believe, the point of this storyline

        1. Tenzhi

          Indeed. It’s disheartening when you catch women comparing men like cuts of meat and you’re not one of the cuts who gets a sentence describing what they’d do which ends in a number of mmms.

        2. Shiro

          That’s very true. But there is a massive difference between being rude to men on an individual level, and the wholesale dehumanization of women which is permitted on a societal level.

        3. Tarmaniel

          It is quite a bit more socially acceptable for a man to be really shallow than a woman and I’m not really sure why that is. An extreme gold digger is universally reviled and ostracized, Tucker Max is a bestseller. Sure, his books are bought by people that enjoy reading about train wrecks and who will pretty much universally acknowledge that he’s a terrible person, but he’s not getting shunned over it.

        4. Lovely Monsters

          Ugh, are we still pretending that women determine the attractiveness of men based on their income? Is that still a thing?

          As a woman who exists in reality, allow me to speak for many members of my gender here: women talk to other women about how much they want to have sex with dudes based on–wait for it–wanting to have sex with dudes. Because women, like men, enjoy having sex for its own sake, not just as a route to financial parasitism. It’s true! Some of us even have our own jobs and bank accounts and everything.

          And the first half of your statement–“If you’re just bullshitting with your friends, it’s not a big deal to rate a woman on attractiveness”–is also wrong and gross.

          I’m going to be charitable here and assume that by “with your friends” you mean men talking to other men in the absence of women. (It does not surprise me at all that the implied Everyman in your statement does not have female friends.)

          Even if that’s true, and you’re not actively reminding women you (putatively) care about that you’re comfortable assigning a numerical value to how much you would like to use their bodies, what you are doing is showing other beings of privilege that it is acceptable to assign a numerical value to other humans based on how much you want to use their bodies.

          The problem is not that the “you” in your sentence is being a “horrible person” (although he is!). The problem is that you are creating a world in which it’s okay to treat humans like little plastic figures, like toys.

          You’re also–and I will try to describe this so it’s clear that this is a bad thing, because there seems to be some doubt–assigning a numerical value to other humans based on how much you want to use their bodies.

          So no, the problem is not the publicly accessible list. The problem is the world created when you look at women and see things and not people and then encourage your male friends to do the same.

        5. Tarmaniel

          No, most women do not choose partners entirely based on money – this is simply the equivalent stereotype to the man that chooses partners entirely on looks, which is something most men don’t do either. The point is that just like it doesn’t make a woman a bad person if she comments on the wealth/status of the guy she’s dating or wants to date, it also doesn’t make a guy a bad person if he comments on how hot he thinks the woman he’s dating or trying to date is. You actually have to do something, like making a list, that suggests you don’t care about anything else before you hit awful territory.

        6. Lovely Monsters

          Tarmaniel: Neither the comic nor your earlier comment discusses “choosing partners” or “trying to date.” They discuss, specifically, how men talk about women they do not know well.

          Your argument is that “it’s not a big deal to rate a woman on attractiveness.” I disagree. If you rate one woman, you imply that all women have a rating and that it is acceptable to discuss that rating instead of thinking of women as individual beings with rich lives and strange thoughts. It’s not an okay thing to do, and doing it in a group just encourages other people to do it too.

          I have more than once been the friend to whom men have commented about women “I can’t do any better than a 6” and “She’s a 9, maybe a 10” about both strangers and their girlfriends, and when it happens, it makes me die inside, not because I’m not a 10 or Grade II* or whatever but because I offered a person my trust, my thoughts, and my laughter and got reminded that, in his view, people like me fail to qualify for adjectives or respect and can instead be discussed like cars or models of mobile phone.

          I call it awful because awful it feels.

        7. Lovely Monsters

          ^because awful IS HOW it feels.

        8. Jason

          My husband and I (I’m also male) have got “ogling” (for want of a more appropriate word) down to a fine art. The last conversation we had about a woman who caught both our eyes (wearing an outfit inspired by a sari, I think) went like this:
          “Whew- did you see her?”
          “Oh yeah- her threads!”
          “Well yeah, her clothes were amazing, but-”
          “The woman herself?”
          “She was lovely too.”
          Firstly: nothing that shouldn’t be overheard (although we aim to not be), and nothing that would upset or make a person feel dehumanised if they did overhear. Secondly: a focus on how she has CHOSEN to look the way she did. Had she been wearing plainer clothes we likely wouldn’t have commented at all- we admired the way she had chosen to present and express herself.
          Typically we comment on hair (we like unnatural colours) and less common clothing styles. Sometimes piercings. We look at the choices a person makes to express who they are, a small visual part of their personality. THAT is interesting. That is what we vocally admire.

          Not in any way trying to refute the contents of your comment! Just to say that there’s ways that men can admire women without being creepy fucknuckles about it. This is the sort of thing that two men say to each other about women when we’re alone. Completely doable. The only excuse other men have is not knowing any better.

        9. Vivid Grim

          good practice!

        10. Lorien Inksong

          Do you want a bandaid?

          Hurt feelings =/= maimings, honor killings, oppression, rape, death….
          you know, things men do to women because they’re women.

        11. nightsbridge

          We’re talking about women right now Harold.

        12. QueerBitch

          Maybe you aren’t desired since you refuse to see people as people and talk like this. Maybe women don’t want to waste their time with assholes

      3. TemperaryObsessor

        Its not as big of a deal to bullshit with friends is more the truth.
        Actually making a list gives it more of an air of legitimacy, and sharing it with more people increases the scale of harm but even just bullshitting with friends creates a small environment where looking at real women who did not sign up to be looked at that way and seeing a piece of meat feels acceptable.
        I do think there is a definite difference from only mentioning the tens and nines and listing every woman in your school because the latter makes it clear you think women have some sort of duty to be attractive.

    4. Abel Undercity

      “…And that’s what your holy men discuss, is it?” [asked Granny Weatherwax.]
      “Not usually. There is a very interesting debate raging at the moment on the nature of sin. for example.” [answered Mightily Oats.]
      “And what do they think? Against it, are they?”
      “It’s not as simple as that. It’s not a black and white issue. There are so many shades of gray.”
      “Nope.”
      “Pardon?”
      “There’s no grays, only white that’s got grubby. I’m surprised you don’t know that. And sin, young man, is when you treat people like things. Including yourself. That’s what sin is.”
      “It’s a lot more complicated than that–”
      “No. It ain’t. When people say things are a lot more complicated than that, they means they’re getting worried that they won’t like the truth. People as things, that’s where it starts.”
      “Oh, I’m sure there are worse crimes–”
      “But they starts with thinking about people as things…”
      –from Carpe Jugulum, by Terry Pratchett.

      1. Jason

        Thanks for that quote! Pratchett had a lot of wisdom tucked into his humour. I really do like that one, I might have to save it.

  67. Fart Captor

    Finally, Joe is confronted with the thing Joe had been stubbornly refusing to see, every time a woman told him to fuck off, snapped at him, or just asked him to leave them alone. Finally he stops struggling and truly listens.

    He might see his behavior as only doing slight, superficial harm, that doesn’t make it so to the person he’s treating that way, all the more so because he’s not just slipping up now and then, he is doing it all the time, to every woman he meets, as soon as he meets them, and that shit adds up. Especially when he’s not the only one out there acting that way.

    Joyce should never have had to share this with Joe in order for him to understand this. This hurts her to talk about. You could see it in her face yesterday, and here in how her voice falters throughout the entire story because she has to force out the words. She’s not telling him this because it’s a story she wants him to know, or because she needed to talk about it with someone. She’s telling him because it was the only way to make him understand, and she needed him to finally understand. I think that f he didn’t, she would have to simply avoid him going forward, and give up on the sincere, human Joe that helped her survive her trip home.

    I honestly don’t hate Joe. I get that his stubborn refusal to listen is part of an unhealthy coping mechanism taken much too far, and it hurts himself as well. I was completely blind to my own privilege as a teenager and there were plenty of things that took far, far too long for me to really listen to and understand, despite people who knew better trying to tell me. That sure as hell didn’t change in a day, but Jesus fucking Christ is he a jackass for fighting it all the way to this point.

    This is why you need to listen to the people around you. This is why when you don’t understand why someone is upset at you, you should try to understand that reason, not just write off their reaction as irrational. Because unless you’re born some kind of saint or a hermit, you should always be able to look back at yourself from a year or five in the past and think “good lord, what a jackass.” That’s how you know you’re less of a jackass now.

    From the way you can feel Joyce’s eyes burning a hole through Joe’s core, I’d say Joe’s having that first moment right now. Thank fucking god. You’ve got work to do, Joe. Good luck.

    1. Shiro

      Yep. I wish more men understood this, that when a guy engages in this kind of behavior, a significant number of the women around him silently and without comment acknowledge that he is not to be trusted.

      (Some, like Rachel and Joyce, are brave and strong enough to comment, but it’s iffy whether or not it works)

    2. Chris Phoenix

      “This is why you need to listen to the people around you. This is why when you don’t understand why someone is upset at you, you should try to understand that reason, not just write off their reaction as irrational.”

      I was in a class today: Courageous Conversations on Race with a focus on workplace. At one point, someone said “I apologize if I come across as an ‘angry black woman.’ But I’m black, I’m a woman, and I’m angry.” After the applause died down, one of the facilitators said, “Yes, anyone who’s paying attention will be angry. And for things to change, we have to make it OK for people to be angry in a professional context.”

      Yes, we need to be willing to listen.

      1. Pablo360

        I took a course on Race in Writing that ended up being a course on race history, oppression, and intersectionality explored through the research and memoirs of racial minorities. One of the things we discussed was the Angry Black Woman stereotype and how it was used to delegitimize anger. People don’t listen to someone’s anger if they think it’s just what that person does.

        The same applies for stereotypes about women being overly-emotional and hysterical (a word whose etymology has been dissected in these comment sections many times before). When we listen to people, we have to actively acknowledge and mentally counteract those stereotypes. We need to know that there is a part of us that wants to dismiss the feelings of women, and actively work against that part of us. That is what it means to listen.

        Of course, just based on this comment there’s a whole conversation to be had regarding Sal and certain stereotypes about black women, but that’s a conversation for another time.

  68. YBCZ

    The past four strips (THIS CONVERSATION HAS ONLY BEEN FOUR STRIPS LONG SO FAR) have been such a rollercoaster. The adorable, silly beginning, the display of real connection after, the dark turn in part three, and now the deep, deep cut.

    Amazing and emotional as Joyce’s speech is, Joe’s changing expressions really make this strip. The face he makes in panel five shows just how hard he’s taking this. Whether he believes it or not, Joyce is his friend, and she’s just had to hurt him and show him how much he has hurt her. From panel four to five, you can see him go straight from confused to just plain upset. He really didn’t understand how much he was hurting Joyce, and now he does, and it kills him.

  69. OnyxIdol

    I learn a lot from this comic and the comment section.

    1. some guy

      i know right

    2. StClair

      Same.
      And as someone with my level of privilege(d ignorance), I know I have a lot to learn.

      1. Scar Man!!!

        Same. The internet has taught me so much

  70. Bicycle Bill

    I’d just like a little bit of foreshadowing as to what will happen to him when he gets *OUT* of the hospital.  Coming after someone with a knife is still likely to be against some sort of law or another.

    1. some guy

      i just immeadiately thought of a darth vader thing happening

  71. WingedBeast

    I don’t know who I want to slow-clap for more, Joyce or David Willis?

    1. Cody Connelly

      Both. The answer is both.

  72. Irredentist

    Very compelling. Real life doesn’t work like this, unfortunately. Men don’t have these sudden moments of emotional understanding. Things just keep on being shitty. No one ever improves as much as they need to. Only force ever changes anything.

    1. Lovely Monsters

      Yes, and the armies of Mordor are too strong ever to be defeated. Put the palantir down, Denethor.

      Not all men (to turn the trope on its head) have sudden moments of emotional understanding. Some do–I’ve seen it happen–but sudden moments of emotional understanding are not the only way to personal improvement. There is also gradual (conscious and unconscious) improvement, which I have also witnessed.

      And no, no one ever improves as much as they need to. But that is not the fault of men, and force won’t change it.

      1. Jason

        Absolutely. I can’t agree with you more. I could climb onto the roof of my house waving bright flags and yelling “THIS!” but you won’t see it and it’ll just confuse my neighbours.
        People of all stripes have huge moments of understanding of how their behaviour or lives or identity etc were in some way a problem. I know I have. Sometimes people are determined to not grow, to cling to their identity as it’s built upon problematic foundations, but that’s not everyone either.
        Small, slow growth is such a common type of growth and it shouldn’t be underestimated. It may take a longer time but it absolutely works. I can see this in any older person who embraces my relationship with my husband, who at the age of these characters would have thought it perverse, weird, deviant. They have grown, changed, and most of them probably didn’t do it due to one flash realisation.
        And even those big moments of realisation don’t change everything. They are a start of a progress. And we should celebrate positive progress, and recognise it, and remember no matter how bleak things may sometimes look it IS there and it DOES happen.

    2. ICSM

      Disagreed. Am a man. Had sudden moments of emotional understanding.

      I could actually describe in long detail the many, many times this happened. My favorite epiphany was when a friend of mine, who is also a heterosexual male said in the msn chat of a manga scanlator, about 10 years ago, “well, I am pro gay rights.” The concept that a man could openly state that he supported gay people without being gay himself was mindblowing. What followed was the sudden realization that it was horrible that I needed to discover that that was possible at all. It led to the reevaluation of many values.

      Many other sudden realizations have happened since, some had happened before. I even caused some to happen myself. It is really fun to see it happen. Hell, seeing the face of people when it happens is half the reason I became a teacher.

      So yeah, people do have those.

      1. Vivid Grim

        i’m glad that happened for you! really, life is a series of epiphanies, realizing things they people may even have told you but that it took a certain spark to really understand.

    3. Pablo360

      I don’t really thing that’s entirely…

      …ingenuous? What’s the opposite of disingenuous?

      Men can have these kinds of epiphanies. Many don’t. But every good one has.

      1. Pablo360

        Reference: Despite my avatar, I am somewhat man-like in nature.

  73. BenRG

    I’m thinking that this might have been the first time that Joyce has gone this deeply into her feelings with anyone. It’s an important breakthrough for her and, I think, a very important one for Joe who likely didn’t know what had happened to Joyce and how it had affected her.

    I’m giving odds that Joe is going to end up hugging Joyce and then Willis is going to use Mike to break the tension by having him make some kind of inapprpropriate comment.

    1. thejeff

      If he’s going to hug her, he’d better be an awful lot better about consent for physical contact than he’s ever been before.

  74. Sylphiod

    I’m glad he didn’t get punched, I’d hate seeing all the comments defending unwarranted physical violence against men.
    But I must say man did she hit him hard with that.
    But I disagree with her philosophy on the harmless joke. I think almost every joke is okay even the ones I dislike or find offensive, a joke should never cost someone a job. Anyways I’ll save a full opinion for after seeing joe’s response. Maybe it will change my mind, but probably not.

    1. Chris Phoenix

      Labeling something as a “joke” does not make it a joke. Anything can be called a joke.

      There are probably people who think that if a white man physically pushed in front of someone less privileged in the lunch line, adding an ugly racial or sexual insult, that he could say “It was just a joke” and shouldn’t be fired on the spot.

      Anyone who thinks the action I just described is OK is being willfully ignorant. Personally, I would not want to work at a company where that wasn’t a first-time firing offense.

      1. Sylphiod

        See you had a good argument until you brought up privilege. That is an unneeded part of your argument. Because what you are implying is that if it was reversed it and towards a white man it would be okay.
        I wouldn’t want to work at a company where an off-handed comment was a first-time firing offence, a warning sure. Image being so triggered and hateful that someone saying something you dislike once was worth firing and ruining their life over. Now if it was repeated and directed harassment that’s different.
        After all Insults aren’t jokes, but offensive jokes aren’t insults.
        Let’s take your example and switch the white men with a black women saying something towards a white man. You must also think she should also get fired for her sexist or racist insult. It would be as you say in your words ignorant to claim otherwise. If you do think both examples should be fired then that’s okay. I think in either example at worst it should be a warning, and at best they talk and laugh it off. But then again I’m ignorant in your eyes, though to me you are quite ignorant as well. So I guess it evens out.

        1. butting

          Privilege is the very point of it, which you seem to have missed somehow?

          The white man pushing in front of others less privileged (and insulting them while he’s at it) is doing it, and likely getting away with it, because of privilege. A black woman trying the same thing would be treated differently. Although switching the examples around doesn’t really work as a counter to the argument — the unprivileged don’t get to wield the weapons of privilege against the privileged by definition.

          The “harmless” jokes against women (and against minorities, and against LGBTQA, and so on to the crack of doom) exist because those making them are protected against those “below” them by dint of having more privilege than them.

        2. Michael Chandra

          True, only an ignorant individual would pretend punching down is fine.

        3. Jago

          Is it, though? So far I’ve read a bit online about people talking about “punching down”. And I’ve learned that it very hard to pin down when someone is “punching down” or “up”.
          And I’ve also seen “punching up” used as an excuse to insult someone with perceived privilege, which is ultimately just that: an excuse to insult people.

        4. Fart Captor

          It’s very simple. If you’re a white person mocking people of color, a man mocking women, a straight person mocking gays, anyone with privilege mocking a group without that privilege for the very attribute which is why they don’t have it, then it’s punching down.

          Punching up isn’t necessary okay, but it’s always worse to punch down, like a large muscular person punching someone smaller and weaker. The weak getting angry and lashing out at the strong is both more understandable and more excusable

        5. PomperaFirpa

          Intersectionality is complicated, yes. People can have privilege through their color but be shit on due to being female, gay, trans, disabled, on the spectrum, and/or poor. It’s layered. It therefore leads to white people going “wait, I grew up super poor and had to work my ass off for everything I have, I have NO PRIVILEGE” when it’s not that at all– you just don’t have THAT LAYER of privilege.

          That’s why rich, cis, straight, neurotypical, able-bodied dudes are everyone’s punching bag: because they have ALL THE LAYERS of privilege and making fun of them evens that out just a tiny bit.

        6. 80-watt Hamster

          And that’s how you end up with an alt-right.

          Yes, I’m massively oversimplifying.

        7. Valerie

          “Don’t tell your oppressors to stop oppressing you, because they’ll just want to oppress you even more.”

        8. Deathjavu

          But the alt-right is as old as the actual Nazi right, a point in time when, evenoutside Germany millions of black people weren’t allowed to vote and gayness was either hidden or often murdered. Not to mention the obvious awfulness of Germany itself on both fronts.

          In other words, this explanation goes none of the way towards explaining the origins of the alt-right, because it supposes the current status under debate has existed for 75 years, when in reality it’s closer to 5-7 years.

        9. Fox man

          I think insulting anyone is wrong whether they have a privilege you don’t or not. Being nasty to people is bad, attack the system not the people in it because attacking the people doesn’t win you allies, it just makes you look like a jerk and therefore not worth listening to. That’s why many people don’t take ideas like privilege seriously, because it’s used as a weapon by some who think they are justified in attacking other people for benefiting from a system they didn’t create. To put it in perspective, that’s like attacking a person because the hoa they live under is abusing it’s power, the system is the problem not the people. People shouldn’t be punished for having something other people don’t because it isn’t their fault they were born into or given a type of privilege someone else wasn’t just like it isn’t a person’s fault they don’t have a type of privilege. There will always be someone who has more or less than you so it’s better IMO to make allies of your fellow people, especially those with more leverage, than enemies.

        10. Michael Chandra

          The difference is quite simple. Are your jokes targeting a group that gets that same thing and worse thrown at them all the time, without it being an actual joke? Or are your jokes targeting a group that, asides from this kind of mockery, doesn’t face much oppression from your kind?

        11. TemperaryObsessor

          Lets see person A is waiting in line for lunch. Person B pushes them out of the way because they can’t be bothered to wait in line. To add insult to relatively minor injury they actually insult them while doing that.
          If they just pushed them out of the way its possible that they have a ten minute left for lunch and they need food before returning to work.
          If they just insulted them its possible that they had a bad day and need to be reminded that its not acceptable behavior.
          But the fact that its both makes it clear its no slip up.

        12. Li

          “I think almost every joke is okay, even ones I find offensive”

          are you sure about that, because one mention of the word privilege sure did send you into a tail spin

  75. erinacea

    Bravo! @Willis

    Again, Joyce’s quiet determination is hitting Joe harder than a stranger yelling at him. He actually looks sorta distressed here. I hope this leaves an impact he can’t easily reason away.

  76. NozajDarkcaster

    Oh…
    I have been putting off commenting since I found this web comic a couple months ago, reading all of them in a day…

    This is probably one of my favourite strips so far, mores so than some of those with Dina.
    I wish I had more to say…

    1. Emperor Norton II

      Only say what you feel you need to say. That is always enough.

      We welcome you here, especially since you are clearly a person of impeccable taste (Dina is, after all, the best).

      1. NozajDarkcaster

        Well, you may be surprised to know I follow the same policy in real life…

        Many have assumed I was mute.

        1. Emperor Norton

          That’s OK, because I usually talk enough for at least three people.

  77. nlips

    I work in a restaurant.

    There is a common division of labor in restaurants. Very frequently, the pretty girls work in the front, as servers and hostesses. The kitchen tends to be predominantly men.

    It is frequently — not always, but frequently — a recipe for rampant sexism. Nothing overt that you could bring to HR, but real and present and everybody knows about it.

    I’ve been refusing to take part in it. And recently, one of the worst offenders quit, and we replaced him with a very spunky, outspoken female cook. I like her.

    The mood shift has been extraordinary, and the other day one of the waitresses confided something in me.

    She’s one of those incredibly pretty 20-something women. The kind that rate highly on Joe’s list.

    We park behind the restaurant, and come in through the back kitchen door. She said that every day when she comes to work, she puts her head down and almost runs through the kitchen. She doesn’t say hi, and she knows the cooks are LOOKING and wants to get through before they say anything and before they have much time to stare at her body.

    She said that with the sexist cook leaving, and me and the new woman in the kitchen, she’s suddenly realizing she doesn’t need to do this anymore. She can stop and say hi and chitchat a little on her way up to the front.

    Hearing her say this at once was very flattering for me — since I try hard not to be THAT kind of man — and also so heart-wrenching. Knowing that this has been her internal dialogue every day — every single day — she has worked, but she never said anything. She just hurried on through like she was worried she was late, and would maybe exchange a few words through the food window later on. But she never let on what was going on in her head.

    She is always all smiles and politeness and silly giggles because that’s what is expected of her. She doesn’t want to be mean and call people out because girls are supposed to be nice and sweet. She is getting a Master’s Degree (another thing I found out that she doesn’t share) in Nutrition. She’s incredibly intelligent. And she feels she needs to hide it all, keep her eyes down, and hope men aren’t staring at her ass as she walks away.

    It breaks my heart thinking that this is what she — and so many girls and women — put up with every day, and never say anything. They don’t want to be seen as bongoy or too emotional. They feel like they have no choice but to endure it.

    I’m not the most outspoken person. I tend not to confront others about their behavior, and maybe this is a moral failing on my part. But I DO try to be an example. I try to show people that not all men are crude, sexist assholes. I refuse to take part in that kind of shit, even when it seems to confuse my fellow men. And I can raise my sons not to be like that either — and my daughter how to deal with them.

    1. Vulcanodon

      Thank you for that story. My wife has worked in restaurants for large chunks of her life and all of it is right.

  78. Vukodlk

    Right now Joe is thinking, couldn’t you have just hit me again it’d have been less painful.

  79. Firewater513

    I met a girl. I thought she liked me.
    I thought that because she made the first move, came on to me and started flirting pretty hard.
    To make a very long story short, it ended with her helping her out of a jam. Helping her to the tune of her scamming me for no small amount of money and putting my physical safety in some minor danger. Then completely breaking contact with me out of no where. To the point where I thought something bad had happened to her, then finding out that no, she was fine, she just put my number on ignore and blocked me on facebook.

    This is not the first time someone has taken advantage of me, just the most recent. People have told me I’m gullible, too trusting, and even that “It’s my own fault and I should have known better.” So now I’m left with the options of not trusting anyone else and closing myself off from anyone else emotionally, or sticking to my guns and refusing to let bad experiences make me so jaded that I give up on any goodness in humanity.

    Joyce has an advantage here. Her situation is fictional. We, the readers, know exactly what happened and every angle of the story. We KNOW how bad the guy was from a first hand experience having read and lived the story alongside her, and so we can take her at her word for the events.
    But Joyce, you just compared ranking how attractive you find girls to attempted rape. That would be like me comparing my story to being stabbed and robbed of everything I own, doomed to destitute poverty if I don’t bleed out first.

    Part of me is an idealist. I have seen enough good in humanity that I refuse to give up hope in it. I have seen good outnumber the bad even if the bad is so much more visible to the eye. But part of me is a realist too, and knows that to some extent everyone looks out for number one, seeing every other person as either an adversity or a means to an ends, and that I am powerless to change that.

    1. Emperor Norton II

      “But Joyce, you just compared ranking how attractive you find girls to attempted rape.”

      No, she did not.

      What she did, was pointing out that the reason someone tried to rape her, was because he thought of her as an object. And that’s really at the core of it: To be able to rape someone, you have to stop thinking about them as humans. To be able to ignore consent, you have to think of them as things.

      As Granny Weatherwax said it in “Carpe Jugulum”:

      And sin, young man, is when you treat people as things. Including yourself. That’s what sin is.“

      “It’s a lot more complicated than that …”

      “No. It ain’t. When people say things are a lot more complicated than that, they means they’re getting worried that they won’t like the truth. People as things, that’s where it starts.”

      “Oh, I’m sure there are worse crimes …”

      “But they starts with thinking about people as things …

      Ryan’s attempt at raping Joyce started with him thinking of women as objects. That’s where it started.

      And Joe’s list is all about systematically thinking about women as objects.

      Can you not see that even if Joe himself truly respected consent (and his track record isn’t exactly spotless there), that spreading around lists like that between “like-minded” people, it will be one more step on the path of someone eventually thinking they are entitled to get sex and therefore are allowed to ignore consent? Can you not see how making and spreading lists like these contributes to rape?

      Because they do.

      1. Zaxares

        It’s a fine line here. On the one hand, Joe is perfectly entitled to his own judgments about how attractive he finds someone else. Everybody is. This isn’t something you can control, any more than people like certain foods and dislike others. There will be people in your life that you just don’t find appealing, and nobody has the right to tell you “Oh, you must be racist!” just because they don’t match your preferences.

        That said, it does NOT give you the right to be rude or obnoxious to someone you don’t find attractive. Nor does it give you the right to dismiss them as a non-person. In my last job, I’m reminded of a story told to me by a coworker who used to work at a massage parlour. There was an employee there who got fired because she found fat people physically unappealing and refused to work on them. That’s an example of what I mean.

        Yes, the kind of lists that Joe does can contribute to the problem, but if the lists are held private (or even just in your head), you can’t really beat someone over the head for thinking “bad thoughts”. Otherwise, once we start censoring how people think, it opens the door for some very, very dark social possibilities. The best we as a society can hope for is tolerance for people you don’t like, and treating them with, if not respect, then at least politeness and professionalism.

        1. Firewater513

          Heard something in a critical thinking class, and this is heavily paraphrased:
          “Bigotry is a reflex, discrimination is an action.”
          Think the teacher was using racism as the example, but the implication was all discrimination. He was trying to point out what you’ve said here, what happens in your head is not a crime. Bigotry can be something as small as a reflexive jump-to-conclusion of something truly inconsequential. It’s not ‘inborn’, you can work to rid yourself of it, but it IS reflexive and immediate. Taking action based on that bigotry is where you hit things like racism, sexism, etc.

          The only way to rid the world of ANY bigotry would be pure thought police, and even that wouldn’t get rid of it. Simply introduce punishment for it.

          Really just commenting for that thought there, but a follow up question based on Joe’s list. I’d need to backtrack a few weeks in the comics (and it’s 5:45am and I should be getting to sleep soon) but wasn’t Joe’s list private? I honestly forget if it was his own private ‘list’ that he decided to write out for some reason or if it was shared but just not ‘public’ so the female students wouldn’t find out.

        2. TemperaryObsessor

          It was not his own private list. It was “private” in that you needed the password which he would give unsolicited to pretty much anyone who wasn’t on it and stayed in his presence for ten seconds.

        3. Li

          Stop hearing “you shouldn’t objectify people” as “you aren’t allowed to think some people are more attractive than others”, and especially stop hearing “don’t rank women, Joe” as “we are going to beat you up for your thoughts”.

          No one is actually proposing any kind of thought police. People are saying that reducing other human beings to objects is crappy, and that it leads to treating them badly, which is demonstrably true — it is much easier to be awful to someone you’ve dehumanized.

          You “can’t really beat someone over the head for bad thoughts” — literally no one is suggesting anybody should be, so it’s immaterial that doing so would be wrong.

    2. ScarvesandCelery

      I’m sorry to hear that happened to you – no one deserves to be used in that way.

      But Joyce isn’t comparing Joe’s actions to Ryan’s – she’s pointing out the link between the two, which is a different thing. She’s pointing out the wrongness of Joe’s claim that refusing to treat people as people stops people getting hurt, because dehumanising actively leads to people being hurt. Joe’s beliefs in the hands of a guy like Ryan, lead to far worse actions than Joe thinks he would ever take. And lists like Joe’s actively contribute to a culture that make people like Ryan think it’s okay to commit rape. And it is important for Joe, and people like him in real life, like the girl who wrongly treated you as an object, to reflect on that.

    3. PomperaFirpa

      There is a layer of hurt to being sexually assaulted where it’s just a huge, agonizing shock to find out that someone thought that your thoughts and intentions and choices about your own body just… don’t exist. Your mind, your soul, your personhood are not in play and might as well not exist.

      That feeling, that sense that the inner person doesn’t matter, is what happens when you try to rate women based ONLY on what they look like. The personhood of the women doesn’t enter into it, it’s just their bodies.

      Those “objective” ratings lead to men making dating choices based on what other men would think– is this woman highly-rated enough to make me look like a bad-ass for dating her? It’s part of fat women knowing, every day, every moment, that they are nothing to so many people because they aren’t up to standard. It has absolutely nothing to do with us as people AND THAT’S WHY IT HURTS.

    4. Socks

      “But Joyce, you just compared ranking how attractive you find girls to attempted rape.”

      Well, no, a thing people in the comments haven’t seemed to touch on (that I’ve noticed) is that in large part, (how I read) what Joyce is saying is that the problem with things like Joe’s list isn’t even that it leads to rape. It’s that it’s a reminder that, to varying degrees, people with the capacity to harm you think it’s a funny joke to talk about how you aren’t a person. It doesn’t mean that THAT person will harm you, but then, there’s no real way of knowing the difference beforehand between a dude who just thinks it’s funny to joke about, and a dude who will then take that as an excuse to harm you. Until that happens, there’s absolutely NO way for us to tell between those two people- they behave identically. And it’s also a reminder that even if one guy won’t actually violate your consent, he very likely wouldn’t side with you if someone else did. He’d probably think it was funny and/or justified. And that just hurts in general!

      Like, if everyone you knew constantly made jokes about how much they want to get into your wallet, not knowing or possibly not caring about what happened to you. And, uh, also all these people are super hackers that can steal your money without you being able to do anything about it, to parallel the discrepancy in strength that makes men a threat to women (on average). Even if they’re not going to wipe your bank account, it still sucks to know they wouldn’t really take it seriously if someone did. It’s more like if you’d been stabbed and people kept miming stabbing you, even with nothing in their hands so it’s OBVIOUSLY just a joke and not a real threat.

  80. SomeDumbGuy

    Way to graduate an Object into a Subject, Joyce.

  81. Yet Another Laura H

    This should be required reading.

  82. ADLegend21

    a message that needs to be understood when it comes to rape culture.

    I just hope we don’t brush over Joe’s self-loathing and feelings of worthlessness. It’s not gonna go away after the first time he’s probably told his actions mattered was in his friend getting hurt. I hope he can understand that without those getting worse in his head.

  83. KSClaw

    I’m wondering if Joe is either going to hug her, or he’s gonna get so overwhelmed that he runs away.

    1. BenRG

      I don’t see any other outcome, for what it’s worth.

      I’ve said this before but I’ll say it again: I think that Joe and Joyce will date for a while, mostly because of tonight’s emotional intimacy but there will be no real romance to it and it will fade away into just ‘meeting a buddy for lunch’. I guess I just think that they’d do a lot better as friends than they would as romantic partners.

  84. Eldritch Gentleman

    Joyce dropping the nuke.

  85. Dracke

    well holly fuck

  86. Minder

    I hate so much that so often, it needs to be someone close to you before you can or will finally understand it matters.

    But that was my starting point. More than once. Hopefully it will be Joe’s starting point. And hopefully it won’t need to be either of ours again.

  87. Jess

    Good.

  88. Joe Covenant

    “You rate women 1-10, so you’re partially responsible for Ryan trying to rape me.”

    I can’t accept that.

    (Yes, I’ve read the comment. Yes I understand the argument, no I don’t agree with the correlation.)

    Video games to not lead to school shootings.
    Violent movies do not lead to serial killings.
    Superhero movies do not lead to floods of vigilantes.
    Immature “marks” lists do not lead to rape.

    The “seeing people as objects” is a whole other thing.
    But I can’t help but think that arguing about Joe’s list like that is taking extrapolation and causality to the Nth degree.
    No doubt YMMV.

    1. Michael Chandra

      When did she say he’s partially responsible to Ryan’s specific acts?

      Also, why are you comparing video-games and school shootings to objectifying women and objectifying women to the extreme? Next thing you’re gonna say that accepting White Supremacists doesn’t enforce their arrogance.

    2. Gizen

      You don’t agree with the correlation because you just made it up. That’s not the point being made, and that you’re jumping straight to that correlation only demonstrates that you DON’T understand the argument.

      It’s not “You rate women 1-10, so you’re partially responsible for Ryan trying to rape me.”

      It’s “You treat women like objects, and Ryan treats people like objects, and Ryan rapes women, so now I have to be afraid when I’m around you because I don’t know if you’ll rape me too.”

      It’s not that Joe’s list will make him a rapist, it’s that it makes him harder to distinguish from a rapist, which means not only being trapped in a constant state of fear, but also being less able to identify an actual threat, because shitty behaviour is supposed to be how we identify shitty people, and when that shitty behaviour is normalized and treated like it’s no big deal, it lets shitty people move around with impunity and more easily do whatever they want.

      1. Gizen

        Actually, gonna make an addendum to this, because it’s also worth pointing out.

        Video games don’t lead to school shootings because video games are not real.
        Movies do not lead to serial killings because movies are not real.
        Superheroes movies do not lead to floods of vigilantes because superheroes are not real.

        What separates an immature mark list from all those things? That list IS real life. When you kill someone in a video game, you’re not killing a real person, and anyone who isn’t already crazy can recognize that. When you objectify a real person by making a list like that, you are already objectifying a real person. You have already stepped past make-believe and into reality.

        As I mentioned above, bad behaviour is how we’re supposed to recognize bad people. If bad behaviour is not looked down upon, if it’s treated like it’s normal, like it’s acceptable, then it will spread.

        1. Lovely Monsters

          THANK YOU.

    3. Minder

      “You rate women 1-10, so you remind me constantly that there are men out there that view me as an object like a number instead of a person whose feelings matter.”

      1. Li

        +1

      2. Eldritch Gentleman

        There was a bunch of people who put numbers on people to dehumanize them. Three guesses who they were…

      3. Lovely Monsters

        I second Li’s +1

      4. Socks

        “It hurts me when you do that, in direct contrast to what you were just saying about how your behavior doesn’t hurt people and that’s very clearly the entire reason for my saying this gosh I hope no one watching this conversation would take this to mean that I think you made Ryan into a rapist”

    4. MK15

      Went to reply to this but you guys & gals got it.

    5. Vivid Grim

      your actions don’t occur in a vacuum.

    6. QueerBitch

      Actually as someone who has worked with more sexual assault victims then you I’d beg to differ. Rape doesn’t have clear lines drawn in our society for some reason despite how obvious things. “legitimate” rape is an actual argument and men like Joe often do end up raping people later down the road. In fact it happens quite a bit.

  89. Chris Borgars-Smith

    When you call someone on their shit, roll with +Cold.

    1. Beachfox

      Joyce cashing in all those Strings.
      Or is this gaining yet another String on Joe?
      *pulls out his rulebook and mutters to himself*

  90. joms tooperbumpus

    alright. best page of DoA. save and print, everyone. it’s been a good 400 years

  91. Leila

    I’m just glad that Joyce finally can talk about it out loud. Even if it’s to Joe to prove a point about his misogynist behavior, she just talked about it.

    She’s gonna be all right. Not now, but she will heal.

    1. Eldritch Gentleman

      The fact that she can talk to Joe who, from her perspective, is the person who stands closest to Ryan philosophy-wise, proves that she is made of stern mental stuff.

      1. egwenna

        Oh yeah. Joyce is strong, and she is good. Even after everything, she sees good in people, and she’s willing to reach out to Joe. Powerful stuff.

  92. Ryek Hvek

    The Great Faz would applaud and cry out “Author, Author,” but he’s tied up at the moment….

    1. Eldritch Gentleman

      Clap your feet like a seal.

  93. erejnion

    That shows utter lack of abstract thinking. One is able to think of somebody as a sexual object and as a human being at the same time, just in different contexts. And most people do exactly this. In comparison, the sexual predator failed exactly in having this same abstract thinking, disregarding any humanity in his victims.

    1. DinaWho

      Uh, Joe said last strip that he doesn’t think of anyone as a human being, so…

      1. erejnion

        That’s obviously false, though. We’ve seen him think of people as of human beings more than enough.

        So that’s just a facade he puts for the sake of his “love” life.

    2. Freezer

      That is true from a purely objective, rational standpoint.

      But context matters, and in this context that is utterly tone deaf shite.

      1. erejnion

        Glad I’m not actually talking to Joyce then 🙂 I wouldn’t trust myself to explain this concept to her well enough, so I’d just hope the actual professionals manage to do it eventually.

    3. QueerBitch

      I see people as sexual HUMANS not objects. Just because you are a bad person doesn’t mean that we are

      1. erejnion

        That’s just rhetoric on your side. Trying to redefine terms to make yourself look better is nice and all, but it doesn’t pertain to what I said.

        I find the mind and personality of a human way more sexually arousing than the figure, so I probably have more leeway to claim that I see people as sexual HUMANS than you. But if we’re to keep to the definitions of the words, I still see both the people and the sexual objects. I’m not asexual, damn it.

  94. Liliet

    oh man, GOOD JOB JOYCE <3

  95. Vulcanodon

    Wow.

    And there was a person named David Willis, and told stories, and laid down a fulcrum for everyone to lift up the world and make it better…

    1. Rukduk

      And some of the people tried, but that it was to hard and gave up.
      And some of the people saw and considered but did not because they believed someone else would do it.
      And some of the people ignored it.
      And some of the people even tried to lower the world with a lever of there own.
      But despite this there were those who used it and stayed true, despite hardships and ridicule.
      Because they believed in what was right, just, and compassionate.
      And eventually, through many years of perseverance against forces arayed against them, the succeeded.

  96. altalemur

    #relatable

  97. Ntrovert

    It seems to me that Joyce is using the injury to her wrist as a focal point to reinforce her feelings of accomplishment and self-worth. In both the situation with Ryan and with Toedad, she acted in a way that we – and certainly she – did not believe she was capable of. Both situations injured her, but they also made her stronger and showed her that she IS more capable than she believed.

    I think that her holding/rubbing her wrist before and while she is talking to Joe is an unconscious attempt to bolster her elf-confidence as she, once again, attempts something that she did not think herself capable of – being willing to expose her vulnerability to Joe in order to make him see the consequences of his action. By speaking to him directly, and calmly, and not screaming hate at him, she has reached him in a way that no one else has been able to, letting him see that his actions had consequences beyond his intentions.

    This is my favorite DoA yet. Well done, Mr. Willis, well done.

  98. Perry

    Two thoughts:
    1. “Everything *you* do matters” includes both Joe’s dehumanizing Joyce by including her on the list (having a list at all, in fact) but also his humanizing her by giving her and her alone a rating based on how he felt about her as a person. Those ideas are separated by two whole days, so it took me a minute to put them together. I think it’s a crucial connection for us to make, though.

    2. Isn’t Joyce slightly guilty of the same sin? Looking at boys first and foremost as a trophy for her to marry/cure of their Jewishness/cure of their gayness, as a theological/marital conquest rather than as a human being with agency and autonomy?

    It seems to me that in a deep way, Joyce and Joe are on the same journey. Joyce was disabused of her failure to treat people as people through Ryan’s lies and Becky’s truthfulness – both painful epiphanies for Joyce in different ways.

    Joyce isn’t better than Joe. She just has a head start. That gives me hope that he’ll soon catch up.

    1. Liliet

      From Joyce’s point of view, curing of Jewishness/gayness WAS caring about them as people, because her upbringing has taught her that all non-Christians and gay people go to hell.

      Sure, the “marry whoever” thing does have a tint of objectification in it, but it’s nowhere NEAR “upgrade her to a 10 with my dick”

      1. Eldritch Gentleman

        Quite. For Joe girls were just something to bring him pleasure, he was focused entirely on his own gain. Joyce on the other hand tried to help those people, how misguided her mentality on the subject was aside.

        1. erejnion

          He was focused entirely on not getting hurt by actual romance. Which is slightly different than “gain”. Surely he also believed (in past tense!) that this is a better choice for the girls too. Imposing your beliefs on others is the common thread here. Even if “trying to convince them your beliefs are a better idea than their beliefs” is a step away from that, I’d say it’s different enough for us to be able to condemn any imposing of beliefs.

    2. Cerberus

      Yup, and it’s something she’s had to wrestle with. That her church-inherited views and hang-ups about queer people had real impact on real people like her best friend or her former boyfriend.

    3. TemperaryObsessor

      Joe actively resists seeing other people as people. Joyce seeks potential relationships with people before she really knows them as people based on superficial things. Is what Joyce was doing an different than you know anyone actively seeking someone to fill a role in their life?

  99. Galuna

    Putting away that guy didnt magically cure Joyce of her trauma?

    No way.

    1. shammers

      It’s almost as if shit LINGERS!

  100. Freezer

    JOYCE used TRUTH! Critical hit!

    1. Liliet

      It’s not very effective… Wild Joe fainted!

      1. Eldritch Gentleman

        Joyce uses a Master Ring! Wild Joe was successfully married!

  101. David

    That’s what you get for messing with a Zero Minus.

  102. hof1991

    What a great strip. The text is superb, but the artwork and composition shine. I am always impressed with DYW’s ability to use the form to magnify the narrative. The shrinking size of the letters as Joe says her name is a small and exquisite example of just how good this is. Better than regular text and more impactful than a play or mvoie of the scene would be.

  103. HentMas

    anyway the wind blows….

  104. BabyBlue

    Jesus fucking crotch monkeys, this page is powerful as hell! Also, “Everything you do matters” would make for a very good title for one of the books.

  105. Tyramisu

    Much honor and glory to Joyce for the verbal headslap to Joe. But I need to ask a slightly off topic question.

    How badly did Amber beat Ryan? I understand she was trying to kill him, but did she beat him within an inch of his life? Shattered bones? Deep knife wounds? Slashes? All of the above?
    I know Joyce said he’ll be in hospital a long time, which to me means at least 6 months. Which is some serious healing time. So how badly did she cripple him?

    1. Regalli

      We don’t know Joyce’s definition of long time (and hospitals don’t really like a stay that long), so it’s harder to say, but we can figure out a few things. In the original strip Amber punches him hard enough her fist comes away bloody – that’s probably his face, given we only see one punch. Then there’s the stab wound. Walky calls it eviscerated and Amber said she tried to kill him, so it was probably a chest or maybe throat stab. Finally, it was classified as self-defense, so I suspect with no evidence beyond that that there wasn’t much more than what we saw. So I’m guessing more damage to his face and a serious chest wound, maybe an organ damaged.

  106. Vicky

    Wow. I don’t have words for how much I love this.

  107. shammers

    Daaaamn even I felt that punch in the face

  108. Cerberus

    Comic Reactions:

    Panel 1: It can’t be understated how big of a moment this is for Joyce. This is a very fresh trauma, one that causes a moment of severe body horror and panic attack to even speak of. A trauma she wasn’t even able to describe to her best friend directly because of how painful it is to recall.

    And here, she’s speaking of it. Relating it. And relating it to a possibly hostile audience. Like, Joe has just been angrily defending his actions of sexism to her and is in a pissy mood and it would have been easy (though morally reprehensible) for him to just blow this off as not related to him.

    But that’s the central piece. She does trust Joe. She’s seen his capabilities. She wanted him to know the full context of his actions, to understand how they’ve impacted her. She wants to speak truth and by doing so reclaim some sense of power over that whole worldview that sees women as hoarders of the sex who must be tricked into relinquishing it.

    And that mattered enough to relate her trauma.

    And that’s something I feel a lot of resonance with. It can be important to share those moments, to tell those truths in service to helping people understand. It can be a draining form of activism. But in a way it can be healing as well and often times those personal stories are what help people understand and get over themselves on an issue.

    Like, it’s easy to dismiss someone talking about the statistics of trans suicide for example, but a lot harder to dismiss someone’s personal narrative of attempting to take their life due to transphobic bullying and culture.

    That’s not to say we should be forced to bear our scars always. But that when freely given it can be important and for Joyce to make that decision here. It’s big. It’s powerful. And it matters.

  109. Cerberus

    Panel 2: And this is how the pieces fit, this is why so many have talked about Joe’s and Ryan’s actions as part of a spectrum of viewing women. Because yeah, the natural end point of viewing women as greedy hoarders of the sex who must be harangued into giving it up, of viewing women as less people and more hostile NPCs, the easier it becomes to justify the actions Ryan did.

    It’s why so much of PUA tactics just ends up being forms of sexual assault taking advantage of social customs that make it rude for a woman to blow up on a creeper violating boundaries. And it’s something Joe has been guilty of in the past, viewing all women as a buffet for his boner rather than people with inner lives that matter.

    And it’s part of that whole system. The patriarchal values that view women as less than human and as holders of the sex underscore so much in our society, in so many ways that women are mistreated. It’s what allows guys like the Google douche to assume that women are out of place in tech companies, it’s what allows sexual harassment and assault to be so common, it’s what allows white supremacists to view white women as their “reward” for committing racist violence.

    And it’s this moment that I think Joe is finally starting to get what Leslie has been trying to teach him. That he doesn’t just get to sidestep the system of sexism we are all drowning in. That his actions have direct relations to things and power structures in the real world.

    Panel 3: This panel breaks my heart. Not just because I know how hard it is to talk about this stuff. I know well that feeling of dissociating, just relating the facts of what happened while feeling the pressure of my rapist on my body.

    But also because of that quiver when she speaks of Dorothy. Because she cares deeply about Dorothy. One could even argue that they are in a form of queer-platonic relationship, with platonic bonds that go deep into the heart on both sides. Knowing that Dorothy was nearly hurt by her rapist hits super hard and if Joyce’s brain is anything like mine, I imagine she partially blames herself for her rapist coming back and nearly hurting Dorothy, which is why she notes it immediately after talking about the cut.

    So yeah, my heart breaks on this panel. Plus, it’s just heart-breakingly framed and artistically powerful. The camera cutting off her face except for her mouth and focusing tightly on the hands that mark that she’s experiencing body horror and flashbacks. It makes her seem almost trapped tightly in that experience, which is likely true in a way. She’s reliving it, it’s here, but it’s important to her that Joe understand this.

    1. Pablo360

      I’m still not entirely sold on the idea of “queer-platonic relationships” as something meaningfully different from any strong friendship, but then again I’m not exactly a seasoned expert on “having friends”.

      1. Li

        Well if you aren’t aro, it doesn’t really matter whether you see a meaningful difference there, you just have to trust other people when they say “it’s different from my friendships and I definitely need a word for that so I am using this one, which I like”.

        Like, it’s not being suggested as a general usage term. It’s specialized language for a group that needs it. If it doesn’t make sense to you, you don’t need to use it. But there’s also no need to tell other people you think their relationships are invalid, and that they’re not clever enough to know whether or not they’re “just friends” with their partner — which is indirectly what you’re doing, when you say you aren’t “sold” on the language, and I’m sure is not your intent 🙂

  110. Cerberus

    Panel 4: Yep. And that’s one of the worst parts of surviving sexual assault or rape. The painful knowledge that to many that horrific crime and all the PTSD from it is not taken seriously by society at large. That a person you talk to about what happened is just as likely to try and find a means to blame you or outright say to your face that they think you’re making it up (it’s happened to me and many friends over the years) as they are to show sympathy.

    And that violation makes it hard to feel safe in similar spaces which is often the point of public rapes, to discourage public participation of women in spaces certain awful men feel entitled to. To remind us that anyone at any time could do that to us and there is no system of justice we can reliably turn to.

    And shit like PUA crap and general objectification hammers that home. That we are not people, but objects holding a valuable resource and to be viewed solely in terms of said resource.

    And finally Joe gets that. Is internalizing that. Is realizing what he has participated in and helped prop up. The real reason all those women went “aggro” on him. I don’t see him rejecting this. I see him doing the right thing and changing, cause to do anything else would be abhorrent.

    Panel 5: This. All of this.

    And this is why “it’s only a joke” is never a real defense for awfulness, because all that says is that the brutal fear and oppression you daily face is seen as a joke and when something bad happens to you, it’ll be seen as a charming anecdote in the eyes of folks, maybe even your friends and family.

    It’s why marginalized people talk about how representation and the type of representation matter deeply. It’s why marginalized groups seem to “irrationally blow up” at what appears to the dominant group to be “minor things” relating to how we’re talked about.

    Because it being a joke is part of the oppression. Each time I was nearly killed for being trans, it was in the context of a world that laughs at comedic “justified” violence against trans women, that treats comic “jokes” about killing a trans woman who “tricked” someone as fun frivolity. It was part of the trauma of those events, knowing that if I had died, it would have been seen as a joke to many. That anyone I talk to about what happened is as likely to see it as meaningless fluff as they are to see it as the trauma it was.

    And every time someone makes a “killing the (slur for trans woman)” “joke” it reminds me of those moments and the fear and horror I had then. It brings me back and gives ammo to the side of my brain that likes to rip me a part. It’s been the same feeling as Joyce with regards to my rape and sexual assaults. The “jokes” afterwards are part of the trauma.

    And shit like this puts the full context to Joe’s ongoing harassment of Joyce. Of what he has been communicating unbeknownst to him. And it is sinking in. It needed to sink in. And Joyce and Joe will be better for it. Joyce because she was able to talk to someone about what happened. Joe because he’s been given an amazing gift to not be a shitlord.

  111. Cerberus

    Panel 6: I consider this the hammer blow against the weaponized apathy championed by certain cultures of privilege. The sort of “lol bigotry” brigade that treats rape “jokes” and holocaust “jokes” as “edgy”, that has normalized performative bigotry to the point that literal nazis feel comfortable marching the streets murdering and trying to murder people.

    That hides behind the cloak of “lol, only kidding” when called out. That acts like treating one’s actions as not serious or “trolling” somehow erases the violent impact their actions have on the world.

    Cause yeah, there is no “ironic” racism, just racism finding a nice mask to grin and wink through. And the end result of these toxic cultures are on the hands of everyone who deliberately fed it whether they excuse it to themselves as jokes or not.

    Everything we do matters. Every person we do it against is a real person. Real life doesn’t take a sabbatical so we can “vent” free of consequence.

    Also, it’s a lovely reminder to every asshole who’s ever made “jokes” about trigger warnings or people being triggered. That a trigger is a real thing. A real thing in which your whole body relives a tremendous horror you’ve suffered, where you can’t breathe, where you’re having a panic attack and feeling your abuser on your body.

    Joe’s actions have triggered Joyce in the past, have come in under the context of abuse she was suffering and reliving and minimizing it, making it into “jokes” so Joe could avoid the hard work of caring about people and being vulnerable around them.

    His actions have done harm. His attitudes have reinforced horrendous actions done to folks.

    And it’s an important reminder for him. His actions matter. Will always matter. There’s no secret cheat code to avoid dealing with reality and its contexts, to avoid having to tangle with emotions and personhood.

    And that can be scary. It can be scary to admit vulnerability in a culture that says that deserves pain and suffering and rape. But it’s necessary. And I think Joe will find it impossible to turn away this time.

    1. Rachel

      Amazing as usual. <3

    2. Li

      Seriously, always a pleasure to read these.

      I hope you’re doing well! Your absence was noted recently. /appropriate gesture of support!!

    3. Rukduk

      I have always tried to not be a part of and to struggle against the apathy culture, the “Shock humor”, and anything that promotes the current patriarchal system in the US. And it’s hard, because I jave benefited from and been raised in that system for so long. I have a strong sense of what’s called “white guilt”. But it seems to me that whenever someone says “white guilt” it’s in a negative way, as if it’s just a silly little thing you shouldn’t feel because you don’t hurt others, nor did you help build the system that oppresses others. I disagree with that statement. I think having guilt over one’s privileges in society is not only perfectly justifiable to feel, but something you should feel if you aren’t using that privilege of circumstance to help the oppressed or attempt to change the system. Because otherwise you’re normalizing or abetting the oppression. But sometimes it’s hard to recognize that for me. When I recognize a failing I do my best to correct it. But it’s still so hard. And it leaves me questioning myself all the time. I watched and enjoyed “Django” and “The Hateful Eight” and worried for weeks afterward that I might be racist for liking them. I’ve listened to and enjoyed songs that disrespect women and treat them as objects, and after the adrenaline from wanting to dance along to the music fades I hate myself for it. I do my damdest to be better than what our societal and cultural system says I should be. I say this not to sound like some sort of self-righteous martyr, but to point out that it is so difficult for men such as myself (currently 28) to not be part of the problem. It saturates the atmosphere. It feels numbing at times. Some days, you just want to give up because you feel “what good can I really, feasibly do?” And I had probably one of the best environments growing up to prepare me for resisting the underlying vileness in our society. I was raised by a compassionate pair of loving parents (until my father lost his job, his chance at running his own business, one of his brothers, the use of his left arm for ten months because of a biking accident, his insurance and savings because of said accident, and any control he had over his online poker addiction all in one year; then he eventually just couldn’t function with the family anymore and left because he was always either frustrated and angry or deeply depressed) in a comfy middle-class home and neighborhood. I got what I think was just the right amount of filtering to where I wasn’t exposed to things too young, but wasn’t overly sheltered either. We belonged to a liberal Catholic parish which was assigned some of the most compassionate and understanding priests I’ve ever met. I got a good education. I was born white and male. I have all the environmental and nurturing benefits someone needs to fight against the system for people I care about who are oppressed by said system. And I still feel that I come up short. Many young men don’t get those factors growing up, or are part of the oppressed. And they have a hard time understanding and countering the systemic cultural influences upon us as a result. Some men enjoy being a part of the dominant group and embrace the culture. And most are ignorant of the underlying cultural and systematic roots of our society’s problems and don’t know how to help. It’s why I wanted to be a teacher going into college ten years ago. So that maybe I could help other young men realize these things so they don’t end up as “edge-lords” like Mike or “dude-bros” like Joe. And so that I can help let the kids who are justifiably afraid of what our society will do to them, who are apart of groups that are oppressed, attacked, humiliated, killed, violated, and treated like second-class citizens because of gender, or orientation, or skin color, or religion, or ethnic group that there are people who want to and will help them. That there are some people in the dominant group that don’t think there should be a dominant group. Who don’t want people to have to live in fear. Who won’t hurt or take advantage of them just because they can. And I think, with your permission and Willis’ that I would like to use this story arc and your analyses of the comics to help my students in the upcoming school year realize this as a part of my lesson plan for one of the seminar classes I’ll be teaching. Because I think reading comics like these and reading analyses such as yours would help them speak honestly and openly about the subject matter. Is that ok with you Cerberus? Is that ok with you Willis? Because if either of you are uncomfortable with that idea I will scrap it. I have some other reading that could probably work for my students.

      1. OBBWG

        As an Old Bearded Balding White Guy who is twice your age and grew up in similar circumstances (except my father kept his job and lived a good life – *hugs* for your situation), let me share my unsolicited advice for what good you can do. (You probably know most of this already, so thank you for indulging this old fart.)

        1. You will never be able to help enough people. This is good. It keeps you humble and hungry to help more.

        2. Treat everyone you meet as at least your respected equal (until conclusively demonstrated otherwise) regardless of age, gender, race, religion or political affiliation. From your students to the bum on the street to the most privileged rich, white guy. No one will say anything to you about this, but people notice and it rubs off on them.

        3. Being human, you will have many more failures, make more mistakes and miss more opportunities than you will have victories. Don’t beat yourself up over your failures, mistakes or misses. Learn from them and do better next time.

        4. Do what you can when and where you can. For example, your work in your classroom is commendable.

        5. You will not learn about most of your victories. They happen out of your sight and often long after the fact.

        Keep up the good fight.

        1. Rukduk

          Thank you. When you type out that advice it feels uplifting. When I try telling myself similar things, it sounds depressing. I think I’m not very good on the inspiration front.

      2. Pablo360

        Wow, I don’t know if you just wrote the single greatest piece of literature in all of Internet comments because I can’t visually parse a block of text that large without any whitespace.

        1. Rukduk

          Your critique is biting, but true. I need to remember to press the “return” button on my iPod when I use it.

    4. Rukduk

      Also
      *hugs offered*
      You have my sympathy and support for all your ordeals, and I apologize if the comment posted above possibly came off as dismissive or belittling of your experiences, which now that I read back through it, it could very well be read as. I only share these things because as you said, it can be (and for me is) very healing and as a way of showing a sense of…Storge (for lack of a better term) that I feel towards you and the others here who comment regularly in a sense of community.

      1. Cerberus

        *hugs* You’re good and thanks.

    5. Bagge

      *applauds*

  112. Kaffeeteria

    Thank you for this. Thank you.

  113. Josh Spicer

    Feel it Joe. Feel it. Embrace that.

  114. Lulu

    Too deep. But then maybe we will see better Joe who will become a proper partner for Joyce in this universe.

  115. Some Guy

    This is the best possible response to Joe’s bullshit, delivered to him by the best possible vector, a person who he actually knows, who actually gives a shit, whose motives are unassailable. Rachel wasn’t able to get through to him, Danny wasn’t able to get through to him, not really, and a literal parade of women he had wronged were not able to get through to him. Hopefully this will finally get through to him. Judging from his expression, it looks like it might.

    This might actually be the best DoA strip so far.

    Still there are a few people who seem to be trying to not get it. But it’s far fewer than usual.

  116. Commander Clash

    Is it me or does it look like Joe us getting teary eyed in panel 3?

  117. Alex Boston

    I think Joe might have a “come to Jesus” moment, metaphorically speaking. Ironic since he just tried to dis Joyce’s beliefs in the last strip and she put him in his place without mentioning Jesus once.

    1. Drakkin the Alien

      now that you mention it…. she came to the IU “high on Jesus” and if i recall it right, she prayed just before get in to Ross party. Now she doesn’t mention Jesus as much. Scripture, yes, but Jesus… That name is fading in her lips. There is no power in uttering his name. She was never the “put the other cheek” kind of christian anyways… more like the “pray with a gun at hand” kind. The “i love Jesus, and Jesus loves me, so i will kill you if you hurt me, and he will forgive my sins, for sure…”

      1. Stella

        I dunno; it’s hard to know what you’d do in a violent situation before you’re in one. Ryan’s attack was probably the first time Joyce was faced with a “violent self-defense or pacifism?” dilemma irl. I would suspect that her home church isn’t a pacifist denomination, but it also seems like she hasn’t given the ethics of violence a ton of thought one way or the other until just recently.

        So, while you’re right that Joyce doesn’t seem to be a pacifist, she also doesn’t seem to be the type who uses her religion to justify anything she wants to do. She seems to be earnestly seeking the truth as best she can–whether it’s about LGBT people, who goes to heaven, or what have you. Unlike Mary, she seems far from sure of herself or her own beliefs at this point. Joyce has more questions than answers.

        I think Joyce isn’t mentioning Jesus or religion because she’s far less sure of either of those things as a reason for doing things. Instead, what she’s sure of is only her own experience and perspective, and she’s also sure that she values Joe as a friend and as a person. She’s sure that everyone’s actions make an impact. So that’s what she’s talking about now.

  118. Delicious Taffy

    One more incident and I will be in prison.

    1. Delicious Taffy

      Only tangentially related: Had a genuine flashback nd fury not 20 minutes ago. Guess I have actual real PTSD.

  119. WikiDreamer

    OMG! First Questionable Content questions privileges and now here, ON THE SAME DAY? You and Jacques are conspiring I just KNOW it.
    Also, on a serious note, to only be able to see yourself as a human when you’re listed as a -0 on a misogynistic “Do List”? Great googamooga! Gimme back my triangle smile Joyce. ;^;

    1. Fart Captor

      I don’t think that was about Joyce seeing herself as human. She was happy about it because it told her that Joe had seen her as human

      1. Li

        +10000

  120. quietlythundering

    Having gone through something similar to what Joyce went through, it took me years to grapple with the resulting trauma. I used to bury it inside me, and pretend that it never existed, that it never happened. But it did. I knew the person who did it; I trusted them. After it all came to light I blamed myself for everything that happened, but as an adult, I now know that I was taken advantage of. I’m in a much better place now; I have opened up to a few people that I trust about it. Hell, I’m talking about it with internet strangers at this very moment.
    Most of the time, it is pushed to the back of my mind, but as with Joyce, there are reminders everywhere. It can be something as simple as a hug (I find most physical contact uncomfortable now), or, it can even come as a “joke.” And it can come from everywhere, sometimes all at once.
    It would be false to say that Joe is on the same level as Ryan (in terms of hurting and objectifying women) but the attitude remains, if to a lesser degree. Those attitudes also encourage and foster people like Ryan, which is why they are so terrible at all.
    I don’t know if Joe will have a complete turnaround. Old habits die hard. I want to be optimistic, though. I hope that what Joyce has chosen to share with him helps him to realize that what he does has an impact on people. I hope that he walks away from this conversation as a better person.
    Also, thank you, Willis, for portraying this subject matter in a realistic and thoughtful manner.

    1. CoMa

      I believe the same – the conversation will have some impact on him in a positive sense (or maybe negative at first, and after reflection, positive).

      But what I actually wanted to say is: Sorry for everything you’ve been through and…and I wanted to offer internet hugs as a gesture of support, as they don’t need physical contact, but still carry the same emotion and thoughts as real-life hugs (if they are wanted)…

      1. quietlythundering

        Internet hugs are fine.
        Thank you for taking the time to be compassionate to me! 🙂

  121. Puckish Rogue

    Has Joyce opened up like this, or this much, to anyone else?

    1. egwenna

      I do not believe so. Certainly not so candidly.

      1. Puckish Rogue

        Interesting that its Joe she opens upto, I’m guessing its due her thing of doing whatever she can for others even at the cost to herself

  122. Vivid Grim

    “we all engage in objectification every day” sounds like massive projection and if you bring that up in response to discussion of rape culture it tells me everything i need to know about whether you’re something i want around me

    1. Vivid Grim

      *someone, ironic typo

    2. Vivid Grim

      [tw for sexual abuse, pedophilia]

      there a lot of factors that made me susceptible to the particular form of abuse i went through – i was lonely irl and outspoken on the internet, i was desperate for validation and attention, my cousin interacted with me sexually when i was 10…

      but i would say one of the two predominant factors that made me think it was okay, and for so long at that, was the culture we have of objectifying women*. because i saw all around me men focusing only on the appearance of women, of how how they were, how they and their body parts ranked in comparison to other women. it was clear to me that one of the best, most reliable ways to get the validation i needed was to offer myself up as a sexual object.

      (* the other was the rampant sexualization of teenage girls in mainstream culture + the obsession with “lolis” in internet anime communities. my friend group on a particular site, after learning about my age, referred to me affectionately as a “loli” and “jailbait”. to this day if someone jokes about lolis my pulse starts to race.)

      [end tw]

      i wish i could do a better job arguing my point, but i’m in a weird headspace today. anyway, to all the other survivors of sexual harassment and abuse in this comments section today: don’t let the rape culture apologists get you down. objectification is scummy and you didn’t, don’t, and never will deserve it.

  123. Puckish Rogue

    So I’m wondering if part of the reason Joyce has spent more time with Joe (as opposed to the other girls) is because of her upbringing in that Joes behaviour would be considered more “acceptable” in her church setting

    1. Valdrax

      One only has to look at their earlier interactions to know Joyce very much does not see his lustful behavior as appropriate. Taking the lead is fine, but being a shallow horndog is not and is a continued source of friction between them.

      It’s really I think only because they have a class together and gotten to know each other more *without* Joe’s usual attitude towards women (after their hilariously disastrous date) that she’s become a closer friend than other women have. Plus they have a bond from Joyce texting him about what to do with a family that’s less than perfect.

      Also, I don’t think a lot of what would be appropriate in her church’s setting has much of a grip on her anymore after visiting home with Becky and after the way people treated her after her attack.

      1. Puckish Rogue

        Well sure not the horndog specifically but more the viewpoint of “men are weak so its up to women to change them” kind of thing which I understand can be prevalent in churches

  124. Sam

    Dammmmn, Joyce. I dont even have any words right now.

  125. Sarah Seeley

    I have read this comic or years and never commented but I have to say I love this page. It says a lot of things that I think when going to a rural school and just in every day life. Thank you for creating this.

  126. maninblack

    Cryptic

  127. JohnInCA

    Eh… I get what Joyce is saying, and why she’s saying it, but she’s wrong.

    See, sexual assault (whether it goes as far as rape or not) isn’t *really* about sex. It’s about power. And power over an object, a thing? That’s not the thrill people that assault are looking for. If it was, then they could “assault” a blow-up doll and be just as happy.

    But they aren’t, because they *don’t* see women as objects. They see them as people with thoughts, emotions, and agency. And they take that agency away, they control the thoughts, they force the emotions. And *that* is what it’s about. Not the sex. But the power, the control.

    So I get what and why Joyce is saying/thinking that way. But she’s fundamentally misunderstanding the motivations behind sexual assault.

    1. SmokedToast

      To be fair, if you remove all of those things, you’re still dealing with an othering… you are reducing that person to what would be considered an object. You certainly don’t see them as a person, you don’t treat other people in your life like that in that situation. Its not that they don’t see the person having all those things, but taking those things do reduce them to an object, a conquest, or whatever term you want to apply. But that term still comes to stripping away all the things that makes someone a person.

    2. BBCC

      I fundamentally disagree. By disregarding someone else’s agency, you are treating them like an object. The fact people derive power from treating other people like objects doesn’t make them not dehumanizing and not treating people like objects. It’s still dehumanizing.

    3. Fart Captor

      No, she’s absolutely right. Seeing women as less than human is completely compatible with wanting to have power over them. That shit isn’t 100% rational or logical.

      And blow up dolls aren’t as good as the real thing. There’s a strong narrative in toxic masculinity which says that masturbation, and any kind of getting off other than sex with a woman is shameful and makes you weak, and less of a man.

      This, combined with a view that women are – if not literal objects – lesser beings, unable to ever be meaningfully equal to men, is what fuels it. They want power over women because they view women as a commodity. They want to dominate and control because they want to force women to act the part, and they get resentful when these “lesser creatures” would deny them.

      Reducing women to anything less than full human beings helps foster these kinds of attitudes in others. We are all influenced by the behavior of our peers this way.

    4. Murgatroyd

      I don’t think it’s a black-and-white situation. Some people who commit sexual assault are probably sadistic about it, some probably don’t care about anything but getting off, some are mixtures, and obviously serial assaulters can have different experiences each time.

      I got molested once and I can tell you that it felt a lot like what Joyce describes — being reduced to an object. Maybe the dude who touched me aimed to get a sense of power from acting like my inner life didn’t exist or matter. Maybe he just wasn’t able to finish while pleasuring himself, so he decided that molesting me would help with that. Either way, whether he recognized that I was human but chose to treat me as an object or just actually thought of me as an object, he did treat me as an object and that’s what sucked about that experience.

  128. DJFlare84

    I would say she’s wrong because she doesn’t realize the difference between that guy and Joe.

    This takes me all the way back to Jack Thompson and his ridiculous claim that video games can convince kids to murder people in real life.

    If that’s all it really takes, that doesn’t mean the video game is bad. It means the kid was unhinged and he was already going to do it.

    In this comparison, the video game is like Joe’s list, or general judging of people based on their looks. A harmless thing in and of itself. For it to be used as a weapon like that requires an already unstable mind.

    Joe’s a champ for taking it in stride, though.

    1. Fart Captor

      If Joyce wasn’t completely aware that there are differences between Joe and Ryan, she would not be bothering to tell him any of this. She’s showing him the ways that he IS like Ryan though, as well as the harm that his behavior does, and she is absolutely correct about it.

      There’s a whole spectrum of awfulness that stems from treating other people as less than full, equal human beings. Joe may be at the lower end of it, but it’s still the same one that Ryan is on. Joe may not be in danger of becoming more like Ryan, but he doesn’t need to. He was already doing harm right where he was.

      Joe’s a champ for finally listening, and finally considering that maybe causing women this kind of distress isn’t something he can just write off.

  129. Wind

    I’ve been trying to work up the energy/courage to talk about something here, and this strip seems like as good a lead-in as any. Sorry, this is going to be a long ramble.
    I’m new to Dumbing of Age (though I did read Shortpacked long ago) and have really been enjoying it. I think the characters are great, and its had a lot of emotion. Its made me cry (in a generally good way) more times than most media I can think of already (this started back in Shortpacked…Leslie’s wedding really got to me!)

    What keeps bugging me though, is that while the characters are very well written, I keep feeling like there’s a fair bit of time spent objectifying many of the female characters; that they are often shown very much from a “male gaze”. While its great to see gay and lesbian characters (and trans, lets not forget the totally awesome Carla!), it kind of feels the there are so many lesbian characters with so much focus more as a ‘turn on’ for male readers. Part of what causes this feeling is that the gay men don’t seem to get nearly as much focus or have comparable romantic storylines (Ethan’s romantic storylines in Shortpacked were practically just background compared to the three main relationships).

    I love this comic so much, but this really bugs me. I’ve been very reluctant to get friends to read it because of this.

    Is this nuts? Has anyone else felt like this?

    1. Halpful

      Hmm … Not really? They’re not Breasting Boobily about, there’s none of the standard awful anime tropes or fanservice, they’re just… People, who happen to be women and queer. It seems very respectful to me (although I’m not the greatest judge of such things)

      There was someone else who was wishing for more gay guys, and iirc he mentioned some comics that have lots of that. Wish I could remember when that was. Seriously, we should start a wiki it something to collect the awesome links that come up here.

      1. Fart Captor

        The only one I can remember is Monsterkind. I think that must have been some time in June or there about, but my memory is not super reliable.

      2. Wind

        Well, thanks for talking about it a bit. It was very halpful. :p

  130. Mortartarsaus

    Joe: “Okay, take it easy, Joyce– T-t-that’s dark,”
    Joyce: “Oh, it gets darker, Joe. Welcome to the darkest year of our adventures!”

  131. Wind

    OK, I tried changing the capitalization of a letter in my email so I didn’t get Mary…but who is that that I got instead? I don’t recognize her.

    1. Wind

      Ah ha! Alice, Billie’s ex, who has been in like 5 strips. And yes, I’m trying a different variant now. Too entertaining to see all the possible gravatars.

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