In her head, Dina knows that the T. Rex lived in a time of no buildings, was not actually big enough to stomp them if they had existed, and probably would have had no inclination to do so even if it was capable of doing so.
In her heart, she knows this is exactly what nature intended.
True, I think Dina learned about chirpy dinosaurs in the wintertime, so this flashback might’ve been before the great HOMPKening. But surely she knew about feathers.
I wouldn’t recommend trusting the claims of somebody who writes a comic strip that is specifically titled “B.C.” but then makes the characters evangelical Christians.
A T. rex could probably do some serious damage to most pre-modern buildings, they were quite powerful animals, even though they couldn’t literally crush a building underfoot
Yeah, those little mammals just coming on the scene loved log cabins. Unfortunately, T. rexes could crush them without even noticing, and the little mammals would holler, “Gosh darn it! Heck!” because real cussing hadn’t evolved yet.
Eventually there were some mutant teenage boy little mammals and they would hollor “Gosh darn it all to heck!” And as a result they attracted more girls because they were cooler. And thus cussing slowly evolved over the millennium.
That’s debated.
Another hypothesis is that the development of cussing was driven by its effectiveness in parental care. mammals are famously altricial (it’s in the name) and so the development of behavioural traits allowing parents (or other adults in social species) to cost-effectively discipline their young would allow them to increase brood size and/or improve survival rates. Nothing like heavy language to impress upon your young that if they don’t fucking behave, you swear to god, you will leave their sorry ass right here in the middle of the giant fern forest and let them find their own goddamn way back to the burrow and please don’t come whining if they get lost and the anurognathids make fun of them, you ungrateful little shit.
While mammal parents are indeed altricky, such advanced and nuanced language did not and could not spring full blown off the tip of that organ manipulated by the genioglossus, the hyoglossus, the styloglossus, and the palatoglossus; rather such language required time to evolve and was readopted by exasperated parents in whatever state of advancement cussing had reached at that time.
I have made my case and submit the present debate to due review by our peers (fellow internet randos) to evaluate our respective claims on the basis of the usual criteria, viz,
1. Ockham’s various hair removal implements
2. Confirmation biases
3. Cool-soundingness of science-y jargon
4. Personal sympathies.
As soon as we finish backbreeding chickens into pet dinosaurs we’ll get right onto domesticated giant praying mantises that can be trained as guard mantises to bite the heads off intruders.
Wow, I’m surprised that Becky wants both of her parents to see Dina and accept that she’s dating. Her mother I could understand wanting to share Dina with her but why toedad?
Becky’s actually talked about it a few times in the past—she doesn’t believe in the existence of hell, and believes her father would at least be able to remain in contact with her mother in the afterlife.
Although her mother was obviously significantly less awful than her dad, I get the impression that she still has a pretty complicated relationship to her memories of her as well. It’s probably something she was already used to thinking about by the time her dad died, and it’s probably less black and white than ‘Dad bad Mom Good’ for her
My assumption is that Becky’s statement is a bit backwards… She wanted to give Dina an idea of what her parents were like rather than the other way around.
I read it as an unattainable wish for an accepting, non-awful, non-dead version of her parents, who would be happy to meet Dina. Because, that’s what it would take to get to share Dina with them.
She knows that they’re dead, and that this is not going to happen, of course. So she’s kinda trying to scratch that itch by stepping into a weird fundie hellscape again, but this time she’s confident, and can talk back, and the hellscape is all recontextualized by her happy relationship with Dina. That’s as close as Becky can get to her unattainable wish.
It’s sad that Becky’s wish is unattainable, but very happy that she’s having a blast with Dina, and feeling empowered about it.
My money’s down to it being an error, since while a hovertext near the beginning of this chapter joked about switching the “Jennifer” tag back to “Billie” for the duration of the chapter, both that strip and the ones following remain tagged “Jennifer”, and the current tags seem to treat “Billie” and “Jennifer” as separate individuals.
I was taught that Noah did take some dinosaurs on the Ark, but only the smol ones and babies.
Then they were all hunted to extinction shortly after the Flood in accordance with the new “Thou Shalt Eat Meat Henceforth” command. Also something something relict populations something something dragon inspirations something something Loch Ness something something cryptids.
Something something the flood shook up a lot of sediment and all the fossils were created then and the denser the bones the lower down in the ensuing deposed strata they sunk.
It makes perfect sense if you think about it very quickly and then stop thinking about it!
Dina would probably lay into Becky if she did pronounce the hyphen. T. rex is the scientifically-correct name, as the nomenclature-standard abbreviation of the full binomial name Tyrannosaurus rex.
Huh, did Willis a corrected strip? There’s no hyphen now.
@Wellerman: its a joke =) typographical symbols are of course not pronounced, therefore there’s no way Dina would know to school Becky about it. Cyntalan could have written something bland like “Becky’s bubble has a hyphen instead of a period for “T. Rex” what’s up with that” but instead they made it funny like =)
If there was any strip correction, it was fairly immediate and before I even refreshed the page to show “latest comic”; I assumed Cyntalan was under the (mistaken, but apparently more common than you might expect) impression that “T-rex” is the proper scientific name instead of T. rex/Tyrannosaurus rex.
Ooooooh. I read Cyntalan’s comment exactly backwards then. That is, i failed to parse the word “not” in their comment. My bad for increasing the amount of confusion in the universe, and tgank you for reversing the damage and now all is well with the world once more. Phew
Being vulnerable in public is a sign of weakness that people might exploit! Best to swiftly cover them up with a joke. There’s a reason they call it a gag! heyyooo
*scoff* Excuse me, the character’s name is actually Dijira, dumb American! It was only that cheap Americanization import with Rebecca Burr that bastardized the name to Dinazilla!
This reminds me of my favorite memory from high school. We had just had student council elections and the school was still covered in election posters, now useless. My teacher, known for being a bit of a maverick, decided we should all run through the school and tear down the posters. It was the most fun I’ve ever had at that school, and because it was the teacher’s idea none of us got in any trouble.
HELL YEAH!! House
I mean, what did she expect when holding a mirror up to the people she hates the most
Carla LOVES THAT SHIT
Nah. Too fakey.
A T-Rex RAMPAGE!!!!
HELL YEAH!!!!! ??? ??? ✌️?
*plays “Godzilla Bio Wars Theme” on hacked muzak*
–followed by The Brothers Johnson “Stomp”*
Followed by Barn… Aught!
This post was found near Clif’s body that appeared to have been stomped on repeatedly by a large animal. Police have ruled his death a coincidence.
In her head, Dina knows that the T. Rex lived in a time of no buildings, was not actually big enough to stomp them if they had existed, and probably would have had no inclination to do so even if it was capable of doing so.
In her heart, she knows this is exactly what nature intended.
She’s the common popular idea of a T-Rex! You can tell by the size and the RARRing. It’s scientifically inaccurate / very spooky!
We don’t know for a fact that dinosaurs didn’t go RARR.
They couldn’t always be HOMPKing.
More often than HOMPK, they could GROWL and HISS!
This is a flashback though; did she know about HOMPK at this time?
True, I think Dina learned about chirpy dinosaurs in the wintertime, so this flashback might’ve been before the great HOMPKening. But surely she knew about feathers.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2021/comic/book-11/04-hompk/fowl/
Dina has always known about HOMPK! She was merely waiting for the proper time to educate the rest of us.
This,
And when she learned it, has nothing to do with the well established scientific fact that we know in our hearts that large dinosaurs also went RARR!
Actually, according to Johnny Hart (creator of the comic strip B.C., dinosaurs say “GRONK!”
Who are we to argue with eyewitness accounts?
I wouldn’t recommend trusting the claims of somebody who writes a comic strip that is specifically titled “B.C.” but then makes the characters evangelical Christians.
Not to mention the upright posture.
The one you just mentioned?
Dina carries the spirits of dinosaurs with her at all times.
A T. rex could probably do some serious damage to most pre-modern buildings, they were quite powerful animals, even though they couldn’t literally crush a building underfoot
Buildings were smaller back then on account of the Earth being younger.
What about a log cabin?
They were also smaller in the time of dinosaurs.
Yeah, those little mammals just coming on the scene loved log cabins. Unfortunately, T. rexes could crush them without even noticing, and the little mammals would holler, “Gosh darn it! Heck!” because real cussing hadn’t evolved yet.
Eventually there were some mutant teenage boy little mammals and they would hollor “Gosh darn it all to heck!” And as a result they attracted more girls because they were cooler. And thus cussing slowly evolved over the millennium.
:))
That’s debated.
Another hypothesis is that the development of cussing was driven by its effectiveness in parental care. mammals are famously altricial (it’s in the name) and so the development of behavioural traits allowing parents (or other adults in social species) to cost-effectively discipline their young would allow them to increase brood size and/or improve survival rates. Nothing like heavy language to impress upon your young that if they don’t fucking behave, you swear to god, you will leave their sorry ass right here in the middle of the giant fern forest and let them find their own goddamn way back to the burrow and please don’t come whining if they get lost and the anurognathids make fun of them, you ungrateful little shit.
While mammal parents are indeed altricky, such advanced and nuanced language did not and could not spring full blown off the tip of that organ manipulated by the genioglossus, the hyoglossus, the styloglossus, and the palatoglossus; rather such language required time to evolve and was readopted by exasperated parents in whatever state of advancement cussing had reached at that time.
I have made my case and submit the present debate to due review by our peers (fellow internet randos) to evaluate our respective claims on the basis of the usual criteria, viz,
1. Ockham’s various hair removal implements
2. Confirmation biases
3. Cool-soundingness of science-y jargon
4. Personal sympathies.
OK, who else here also thinks Dina would absolutely LOVE the Emmy Award winning show Primal? ??
It depends. How accurate were their dinosaurs?
They are not accurate, but they are amazing, intelligent and have feelings.
hey just like that big, pet praying mantis i dreamt about last night!
*sigh* why no intelligent, domesticated praying mantises reality
why
As soon as we finish backbreeding chickens into pet dinosaurs we’ll get right onto domesticated giant praying mantises that can be trained as guard mantises to bite the heads off intruders.
If historically inaccurate dinosaurs and large mutant Praying Mantis are what you want, check out Primeval.
Nothing to say that a T-rex wouldn’t get some enrichment out of crushing things!
We need some art of Dinah and Vanessa of Something Positive, happily destroying cardboard cityscapes together.
Wow, I’m surprised that Becky wants both of her parents to see Dina and accept that she’s dating. Her mother I could understand wanting to share Dina with her but why toedad?
To rub it in his face.
… or, you know, to part of a larger fantasy in which she has a healthy relationship with a non-wacko father.
Non-wacko and alive father. You know so she’s not-an-orphan?
Has = present tense = still alive. … or a ghost, or watching from heaven, but in those cases Becky wouldn’t need a Hell House as a substitute.
Hovertext is presumably from Becky’s POV, given that it answers this exact question.
I wonder, does she believe her dad is in hell or heaven? Personally I’d put money down on hell if I believed in it.
Becky’s actually talked about it a few times in the past—she doesn’t believe in the existence of hell, and believes her father would at least be able to remain in contact with her mother in the afterlife.
That’s a pleasant way to look at things. If that is how she’s taking it, then good for her.
To taunt him with it.
Look, dad, at the fine young pussy I’m getting. See you next Thanksgiving. Enjoy your AstroGlide.
As a giant toe, perhaps he would naturally approve of quality stomping.
In her heart, she really really really wishes things could have been different, even tho she knows it wasn’t likely to happen.
Given the context I think “accept that she’s dating Dina” is optional at best
I think that’s the whole point re: Toedead. He encountered Dina a couple times and was… less than accepting.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-5/04-walking-with-dina/evilutionist/
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-6/01-to-those-whod-ground-me/deceptress/
(They were in a grand total of 20 strips together, but he was unconscious for half of those because hammer.)
Although her mother was obviously significantly less awful than her dad, I get the impression that she still has a pretty complicated relationship to her memories of her as well. It’s probably something she was already used to thinking about by the time her dad died, and it’s probably less black and white than ‘Dad bad Mom Good’ for her
My assumption is that Becky’s statement is a bit backwards… She wanted to give Dina an idea of what her parents were like rather than the other way around.
I read it as an unattainable wish for an accepting, non-awful, non-dead version of her parents, who would be happy to meet Dina. Because, that’s what it would take to get to share Dina with them.
She knows that they’re dead, and that this is not going to happen, of course. So she’s kinda trying to scratch that itch by stepping into a weird fundie hellscape again, but this time she’s confident, and can talk back, and the hellscape is all recontextualized by her happy relationship with Dina. That’s as close as Becky can get to her unattainable wish.
It’s sad that Becky’s wish is unattainable, but very happy that she’s having a blast with Dina, and feeling empowered about it.
I like Becky’s ability to focus on what’s important.
Becky’s no fool, she had to know what was coming and she went through it just to prove a point… and also to let Dina destroy some of it.
Ahhhh, the motive becomes clear!
In theaters next week. DinaSaurus Destroys Fundieville!
You are all gonna LOVE the DOA game I’m working on, i can just tell.
This is the third comic to have “bille” rather than “jennifer”.
Meaningful, or mistake?
I mean, since all of the “billie” tags were switched to “jennifer”, back when.
This was before she was Jennifer.
And after!
My money’s down to it being an error, since while a hovertext near the beginning of this chapter joked about switching the “Jennifer” tag back to “Billie” for the duration of the chapter, both that strip and the ones following remain tagged “Jennifer”, and the current tags seem to treat “Billie” and “Jennifer” as separate individuals.
UNLESS…this is clearly evidence that “Jennifer” is truly Mike in disguise, as Willis confirmed so long ago!
that usually means they are .
“Usually”…???
Close. I prefer the triple feature.
Coming this Halloween:
The Orphaning
When DinaSaurus Ruled the Earth
Ruthless in Indiana.
Which was supposed to be a reply to AeromechanicalAce above.
I’m suddenly reminded of a Jurassic Park fic I read a while back that was set at the Creation Museum.
Hahahahaha
Cut to Becky and Dina stomping on a cardboard cutout of Noah.
“Leave ME off the ark, will you?”
I was taught that Noah did take some dinosaurs on the Ark, but only the smol ones and babies.
Then they were all hunted to extinction shortly after the Flood in accordance with the new “Thou Shalt Eat Meat Henceforth” command. Also something something relict populations something something dragon inspirations something something Loch Ness something something cryptids.
Something something the flood shook up a lot of sediment and all the fossils were created then and the denser the bones the lower down in the ensuing deposed strata they sunk.
It makes perfect sense if you think about it very quickly and then stop thinking about it!
Well what else would you do with a snugglable dinosaur?
Becky continuing to be the kind of petty I aspire towards XD
Panel 4 is more than a little bit heartbreaking.
Dina x Vanessa (from Something Positive) crossover strip when?
I was thinking of Vanessa too!
Came here just to say if the arc continues into October, I want it renamed to “This Is Halloween” please.
It won’t, it’s due to end in a couple weeks. Sorray
How has Dina not laid into Becky for not pronouncing the hyphen yet?
Dina would probably lay into Becky if she did pronounce the hyphen. T. rex is the scientifically-correct name, as the nomenclature-standard abbreviation of the full binomial name Tyrannosaurus rex.
OK I am honestly confused. Human, how do you pronounce a hyphen?
“ə haɪfən”
😛
HA!
θæŋk ju
Huh, did Willis a corrected strip? There’s no hyphen now.
@Wellerman: its a joke =) typographical symbols are of course not pronounced, therefore there’s no way Dina would know to school Becky about it. Cyntalan could have written something bland like “Becky’s bubble has a hyphen instead of a period for “T. Rex” what’s up with that” but instead they made it funny like =)
If there was any strip correction, it was fairly immediate and before I even refreshed the page to show “latest comic”; I assumed Cyntalan was under the (mistaken, but apparently more common than you might expect) impression that “T-rex” is the proper scientific name instead of T. rex/Tyrannosaurus rex.
Ooooooh. I read Cyntalan’s comment exactly backwards then. That is, i failed to parse the word “not” in their comment. My bad for increasing the amount of confusion in the universe, and tgank you for reversing the damage and now all is well with the world once more. Phew
There was a whole bonus strip about this a few books ago.
A huge two-seconds pause?
Stop making me cry, fourth panel Becky
Why can’t you be more like fifth-panel Becky, fourth-panel Becky
You mean “bury the feels with a joke” Becky?
Being vulnerable in public is a sign of weakness that people might exploit! Best to swiftly cover them up with a joke. There’s a reason they call it a gag! heyyooo
To be fair it might be also “Busting all this Fundie stuff with my Atheistic Lesbian Dino Girlfriend is cathartic to me.”
That went straight to the heart.
It’s Dinazilla! Well due to international copyright laws it’s not but let’s pretend like it is!
*scoff* Excuse me, the character’s name is actually Dijira, dumb American! It was only that cheap Americanization import with Rebecca Burr that bastardized the name to Dinazilla!
*gets angry while munching on Pierogis* Disrespectful! How dare you call me an American! *munch munch*
Oooh pierogis with a dash of mordant irony, bet that tasted fine ^^
Oh I learnt a new word, mordant!
Oh no, it’s a pretty old word I think
Becky feels like Mary is one of her family because she has the same beliefs of her parents? Mary is like an annoying cousin… what a disgrace!
the eye window reminds me a lot of the original Chex Quest for some reason
“How are things going? Since, you know, the orphaning.” Would be a book title that asks questions at least.
We need Dina-in-costume to meet Kaiju Vanessa from Something Positive.
Dina: “fi na lly !!”
You know Becky, checks out. Plus she got to mess around with Mary. Best choice!
That hell house is gonna have to be taken down eventually, might as well let Dina have some fun doing it.
This reminds me of my favorite memory from high school. We had just had student council elections and the school was still covered in election posters, now useless. My teacher, known for being a bit of a maverick, decided we should all run through the school and tear down the posters. It was the most fun I’ve ever had at that school, and because it was the teacher’s idea none of us got in any trouble.
Becky’s smile in the final panel gives me the impression that she is going to receive a great deal of satisfaction from Dina destroying things.