I’ll defend Mike’s actions in that he does them for reasons, even if those reasons are horrible and he tries to be as hurtful as possible, but what the fuck is he accomplishing here? There’s nothing but him rubbing salt in Dorothy’s and Walky’s wounds.
Okay, sometimes he does them for reasons. I still don’t know what the hell he was thinking when he told Amber she was destined to become her father. A lot of his other awful terrible things are (academically) for others’ benefits. They’re just, you know, never that practically.
Nono
Best thing I can think of is to evoke an emotion. Somebody getting depressed? Induce anger. Because they can do something about that anger. At the very least, it gives them a target they can focus on.
I still don’t like Mike, though.
wrog
I don’t think you’re *supposed* to like Mike
Nono
And yet some people do.
Paradox
I think that some of it is people clinging to Walkyverse Mike and his actually purposeful mind games that were meant to make people feel like crap about stupid stuff they’ve been deluding themselves into being okay with.
I like him because I enjoy a decent antagonist and he does a good job being something for the cast to be on their toes about.
timemonkey
By making her aware of how she was behaving so she could stop the behaviour? It’s not in any way the way such a thing should have been handled. He was also poking a hole in her logic.
Yeah, no. She was not acting like Blaine. She was occasionally having outbursts of rage and snapping at people, but that is not the same thing.
That’s beyond “not how that should be done” and well into “a fucking horrible thing to say to someone even if you DO mean well”
timemonkey
Well of course it was a horrible thing to say, nobody has ever said it was the right approach or a job well done.
And she absolutely did end up in the abusive zone as she went on. She recognised it, was horrified by it, and hopefully can pull herself in a better direction but her relationship with Danny was very quickly failing into a very empty place.
BBCC
‘As time went on’ is not the same thing as Mike being right at the time.
cbwroses
Mike did not say Amber was destined to be like Blaine.
SHE had said she was worried that her relationships would be like her parents, but that the guys she dated were never like Blaine.
What Mike then said was IF her relationship was destined to follow the pattern of her parents’ relationship, and IF they guys were never like Blaine, then she didn’t have to worry about it because she was the Blaine figure.
That’s two conditional statements that followed her own premise of her relationships being like her parents’ relationship.
He didn’t say her relationships had to be like that and he didn’t say the guys she dated would always take her mom’s role in such a relationship, thereby putting her in Blaine’s role.
He was showing her the end result of her own logical premise, but at no point did he say that her premise was correct or unchanging if correct.
Was it the best way to go about allaying her fears? Hell no. But it was distinctly different than telling her she was destined to be like her father.
BBCC
Saying she’s the Blaine figure is pretty damn similar to saying she’s destined to be like Blaine. Also – Amber never said she was destined to be like her mom, but she was afraid she would be. MIKE made up the logic that if she was destined to be like her parents. He made up his own premise as well as offered the false idea that the only alternative to dating abusive jerks was to date pushovers.
cbwroses
No. She said she was worried she would be like her mom, but the guys she dated were never like that. She was the one who said she keeps picking decent guys/”pushovers” and Mike just went along with the idea that she chooses them; not that she SHOULD choose them. He was establishing a pattern of her past dates, not suggesting a modus of operandi for future ones.
He said she shouldn’t worry about that because IF her relationships were like theirs and IF the guys she dated were never like Blaine, then by default of her relationship being like her parents’ and the guys not being like dad, the guys must then be like mom. Leaving her to be like dad.
That leaves two options: quit worrying about it because your relationship isn’t destined to follow theirs, or quit worrying about it because it your relationship does follow theirs, but not in the dynamic you’re worried about. Either way, quit worrying about it.
BBCC
Amber said she was afraid of being abused like her mother was, she never expressed a belief she was destined to be like her parents. If I’m afraid of the possibility someone else burning down my home, that doesn’t mean I believe it’s destined to happen. That is what MIKE said.
Also, Amber never used the word ‘pushover’ to describe Danny. She said he was king, honest, loyal and nothing like her dad. MIKE, again, is the one who said he was a pushover and MIKE is the one who said the only alternative to an abusive jerk was a pushover.
Again, Mike is the one who made the premise Amber was destined to be like her parents and that she was the one dating pushovers (not people like Amber described) then she would end up like Blaine. Both premises are bs.
cbwroses
I know Amber never called them pushovers. That’s why I put them in quotation marks.
And Mike didn’t suggest she continue dating what he called pushovers to avoid her parents’ fate.
Again, he was pointing out the pattern of her past relationships, not suggesting what she should do for her future ones.
But I’m repeating myself now and want to avoid my bad habit over overexplaining stuff, especially when neither side will come to a consensus.
BBCC
Mike’s entire statement was based on the idea that if Amber’s always dating pushovers (which, again, he positions as the only alternative to abusive tools) then she’s not doomed to be like her mom, she’s doomed to be like her dad. Which is, again, a position HE is forwarding. That wasn’t what Amber said. Amber said she was afraid she’d be abused like her mom was. He said if she was destined to follow her parents pattern (again, HE is asserting that) then she’s destined to be like her dad based on her dating choices (again, using qualities he is asserting as part of an idea he is stating – that her only options are jerks who will abuse her and pushovers. Neither is a thing Amber said).
Someone
Playing devil’s advocate — Mike is trying to make Walky and Dorothy realize that they are both being extremely dumb about something they both want, and in so doing, are only hurting themselves now over something that might hurt later.
Pablo360
Nope. He’s being an asshole in the hopes that he will receive lhysical retaliation, which is his major turn-on.
His entire life is Becky’s storyline with Dina’s hat, except replace the hat with masochistic pleasure and the schenanigans with inflicting pain on others.
Knuf Wons
I’m so hyped for semi-daily Mike/Dorothy interactions! I don’t think they’ve gotten enough.
Myth
I’m pretty sure we should just treat Mike as a walking plot device rather than a person. Sometimes you just need a total asshole to say something terrible to some other character for plot/character development reasons, and no one else in the ‘verse is quite enough of an asshole to do it, and that is how you get characters like Mike.
Mike nets us a lot of useful insight on other characters via what he says/does and how they react to it. I like Mike for that reason. But I don’t like him as a character. He has always seemed less multi-faceted than Willis’ other characters. Again, that is why I think he is a walking plot device.
JessWitt
Yeah, Mike really needs to be better fleshed out.
Which is why I like to imagine the possibility of him developing feelings for his mark, Ethan. It would certainly make him more human.
Needfuldoer
Mike can give the other characters the verbal dope slap they need, but we can only scream into the comments. He just does it in the most dickish way possible.
GoblinScribe
I think the point here is that Dorothy might not be making the right decision, and deep down, she knows this.
But Mike is just a comic relief jackass. Maybe he’s just being a jackass today.
Reltzik
I don’t really think he does these things for reasons beyond his own satisfaction.
I think he’s just a troll trying to provoke negative emotional responses. Having “reasons” is just a routine part of his M.O. to make his target feel even worse.
JetstreamGW
I feel no need to defend Mike’s actions. He’s an asshole. That’s why he’s the best. Because he’s funny.
This universe’ Mike is an anomaly. He’s still the biggest asshole in the world, but somehow he’ll actually help people, usually by making them confront what they don’t want to
He may often THINK he has a point, but he’s just a smug-ass teenager who thinks he’s figured everything out. His methods are awful and his points are bad.
Leorale
Yeah, I kinda don’t understand the Mike tolerance, when, it seems,more people get sick of other jerk characters.
I hope it’s that people find him so cartoonish that they don’t consider him a real person, but more of a walking plot device. Mike is terrible.
Or make things worse by telling an abuse victim that she’ll become her father, perpetuating a harmful stereotype and attempting to needle her about her WORSE FEAR
Eat my entire ass. Amber’s anger problems do not justify that shit.
Irredentist
Amber does a lot of things that aren’t justified. I’m not saying she’s a bad person. And I’m not saying that abuse victims in real life should be treated that way. But everything Mike said was true.
BBCC
Bull. Mike’s logic was completely irrelevant to what Amber said.
Irredentist
It wasn’t logic, it was a prediction. “You’ll end up like your dad.” And he was right. Even Amber thinks so. “I got saddled with your petty rage.” Now she can finally do something about it.
BBCC
Amber knew that before Mike said anything. Again, best case scenario, he made no impact and at worst he made a bad situation worse. Also, he absolutely did offer his own logic on the situation – faulty logic, sure, but ‘If you’re destined to be like your parents and if you’re never the one dating jerks because you’re dating pushovers, which are you’ is definitely him trying for a logical take. Again, it’s BS logic because ‘if you’re destined to be like your parents’ and ‘the only alternative to jerks is pushovers’ are both faulty premises, but that’s what Mike said.
Irredentist
It wasn’t Mike’s logic. Amber was the one worried she’d end up like her parents.
BBCC
No, she was not. She said she was worried about ending up in an abusive relationship. Nowhere did she say she was destined to do so. MIKE is the one who brought that up.
Irredentist
She said she was worried about falling for a jerk LIKE HER MOM DID
And the fact that Amber believes that her anger makes her a Blaine waiting to happen is exactly why it’s fucking harmful for Mike to say shit like that. Anger issues can be managed! Tons of people have them and don’t abuse anyone! Amber’s fatalistic view that she’s doomed to become her father is why she puts on a mask and beats up criminals instead of actually finding a healthy outlet! If she’s doomed to become her abuser, there’s no point seeking mundane ways to deal with her issues, because if those had any chance of working, she wouldn’t be doomed.
BBCC
Yes, like her mother did. That doesn’t mean she feels she’s destined to end up like them, it means she’s afraid of the possibility of being abused. MIKE is the one who presented it as an inevitability, and in the present tense, as FC said.
Unusually Angry Hippie
Amber should be in prison or a psychiatric institution if this comic were even remotely realistic. Her issues go FAR beyond ‘anger problems’ and into the territory of criminal vigilantism and assault that serves no actual purpose besides giving her someone to vent her rage onto while convincing herself it’s alright because her victims are petty criminals.
CJ
In prison?
What exactly for? She violently interfered in some guy trying to rape a girl. Twice, I think.
She cut up a known rapist coming after her and her friend with the knife he brought to the scene.
She went after a guy stealing handbags as he was in the act of stealing a handbag.
These are all legal acts (though someone with less reason to hate abusers might have manger with keeping the rapist within the knife more intact but he was the one who brought the knife and upped the ante all by himself).
Going to pick a fight with Sal’s and company was not, put getting in a senseless fight with someone is not a prison-worthy offence as long as all you end up with are some bruises.
So, what exactly did she do that should be penalized by jail time?
He was pointing out the flaw in her own logic. If she’s so afraid of becoming like her mother than she ends up becoming the one seeking out partners she can walk all over and treat however she wants then she ends up in just as much an unwanted place as the thing she’s trying to avoid.
BBCC
Except she never said anything about picking pushovers. She said she didn’t want to date anybody like her dad and end up like her mom. Mike said if she was doomed to repeat their behaviour and never dated jerks (to avoid ending up like Mom) she’d become just like her dad. Which presupposes she IS doomed to repeat her parent’s pattern AND that the only alternative to dating jerks is to date pushovers, both of which are absolute hogwash. The right thing to do is point out ‘Amber, you’re not doomed to repeat your parent’s pattern.’ not whatever the fuck Mike was doing.
Irredentist
And yet she DID repeat her parents pattern, at least partially.
BBCC
That had nothing to do with Mike except maybe that Mike made her feel worse and more insecure about those things and less likely to seek help. Mike was the exact opposite of helpful and whatever he thought he was doing, he certainly was not pointing out the flaw in her logic, he was pointing out the flaw in the logic he made up.
Irredentist
Amber doesn’t really seem like the type to seek help on her own. Mike or no Mike.
BBCC
That doesn’t really have anything to do with whether Mike was helpful. At best, he made no impact and at worst, actively made a bad mental health situation worse.
Yeah, and we can all thank Blaine for that. He’s the one who treated like she was broken, and burden because of her social anxiety, and said she was weak for not being able to protect her friend from a knife-wielding robber, and then insisted she take self-defense classes instead of getting therapy afterwards.
Mike’s not fucking helping. Walky, on the other hand, has actually been helping her. You know, by listening to her and being appropriately supportive in a way that can actually reach her, instead of being a fucking trash monster and needling her at every opportunity.
When? When did she hit Danny? She’s shouted at him and said mean things a couple times, in bursts of anger, then she dumped him.
Calling that “repeating her parents’ pattern” is utter bullshit. Other characters who weren’t ever abused have done the same kind of things, and nobody bats an eye.
This idea that someone who has been abused is “repeating the cycle” if they ever lose their temper or act like a jerk no matter how however briefly it lasts, or however much other stress they were under, or how quickly they reign it in and apologize, is damaging to real people. They shouldn’t have to be superhumanly calm, collected, and gentle at all times just to avoid being compared to their abusers.
Go ahead and criticize Amber’s behavior all you want – plenty of it has been shitty, unhealthy, or both – but knock that “cycle of abuse” bullshit the fuck off.
Irredentist
Amber literally beats up criminals to run away from her problems. AND she’s an asshole to her boyfriend.
If she was like Blaine she wouldn’t be beating up criminals.
She’d still be going after Sal and her friends. That’s literally the only time she’s come AT ALL close to being like him.
Blaine woudn’t have risked her life to save Becky. Or helped Joyce clean the white boards to apologize for blowing up at her. Or apologize to Danny, EVER.
Losing her temper and getting a bit mean IS NOT THE SAME THING AS VIOLENTLY ABUSING YOUR OWN FAMILY.
Irredentist
Ok fine she’s not as bad as Blaine, hell she’s a hero in many ways. Are you happy now?
Her fear regarding her mother was “That I’ll be like my mom and end up ensnared by some jerk”. How the fuck does “being afraid of ending up stuck in an abusive relationship” cause HER to become abusive?
Avoiding angry, domineering men and seeking more gentle, even submissive men is not “looking for someone she can walk all over”, and sure as hell isn’t causing her to become abusive.
She has a problem with bursts of extreme anger that she actually does a decent job of reigning in (not counting the unhealthy venting via masked vigilantism). She also has PTSD, anxiety issues, and some kind of dissociative disorder that are all teaming up to make that harder to manage.
Her taste in boyfriends is not and was never the problem.
Unusually Angry Hippie
His qualifier ‘IF you really ARE doomed to follow in your parents footsteps’ is the important part. The tone and phrasing implies that he doesn’t really believe that’s true, and neither should she. Mike should know, his parents are sweet enough to give you diabetes through skin contact and he’s MIKE.
cbwroses
People keep forgetting/ignoring that “IF” part. I don’t know why.
She’s the one worrying about following in the footsteps of that relationship. He just pointed out how that would work if everything else she said was correct. Not that she was actually correct in saying it.
Because that “IF” part is bullshit. He’s using the past tense, because it’s not a prediction.
He’s using the Socratic method to walk her through his own train of thought to the intended conclusion. Suggesting he’s not making a clear statement about what Amber IS, CURRENTLY, because of that “IF” is like suggesting that I don’t have a specific answer in mind if I were to ask “If I had 3 apples, but I gave 2 of them away, how many apples do I have…?” I know exactly how many apples I fucking have when I start talking. Only in this case, leading you to think that I have 1 apple is not going to be more cruel than simply saying it outright, because nobody will fucking argue that I may actually have 5 apples now.
cbwroses
I respectfully disagree. But can see your point.
BBCC
Except that is not what Amber said and its a bullshit premise in the first place. MIKE brought that premise up. ‘I am scared I will get into an abusive relationship like my mom’ is not the same as ‘I think I’m destined to be like my parents’. MIKE brought that up and it is 100% utter garbage, which is exactly what he should have told Amber if he was remotely interested in helping.
cbwroses
No. You’re forgetting that Amber also said that Ethan and then Danny were not like Blaine and that she actually said it right before she said she feared being in an abusive relationship like her mother.
So she was not only worried about being like her mom, but that her significant others would be like her dad. She is therefore worrying and comparing her relationships to her parents.
Mike didn’t pull that out of thin air. She brought it up and he just flipped it around with the caveat that IF the guys were never like Blaine, but following the pattern of her parents was a LEGITIMATE worry, then Blaine role falls to her.
As long as her taste in men remains constant and she also doesn’t believe her relationship has to follow theirs, then the idea of her being like Blaine in the relationship holds no water. But comparing her relationships to her parents did in fact come from her in that she compared the guys to Blaine and herself to her mom.
*Apologies if I’m repeating myself within the same comment. I tend to overexplain myself, even when I know it won’t change anyone’s opinion. And I feel like I’m reaching that point, so I’ll just agree to disagree from here.*
209 thoughts on “Swept away”
Ana Chronistic
fighting over who has to take custody, sounds legit
Side One
‘Getting’ Mike. Does that mean that one has WON the custody battle, or LOST it?
Reltzik
Alternating days means mutually assured annihilation.
TrueVCU
Mike cannot be returned*
*without a virgin sacrifice
butts
Mike can only be returned to your mom for a nickel.
Bickendan
She overpaid.
Cipher
The Malaya icon makes your comment even better
Jack Spade
JOYCE!
Schpoonman
Fuck off, Mike.
JetstreamGW
But Mike is the best 😀
Schpoonman
I’ll defend Mike’s actions in that he does them for reasons, even if those reasons are horrible and he tries to be as hurtful as possible, but what the fuck is he accomplishing here? There’s nothing but him rubbing salt in Dorothy’s and Walky’s wounds.
Schpoonman
Okay, sometimes he does them for reasons. I still don’t know what the hell he was thinking when he told Amber she was destined to become her father. A lot of his other awful terrible things are (academically) for others’ benefits. They’re just, you know, never that practically.
Nono
Best thing I can think of is to evoke an emotion. Somebody getting depressed? Induce anger. Because they can do something about that anger. At the very least, it gives them a target they can focus on.
I still don’t like Mike, though.
wrog
I don’t think you’re *supposed* to like Mike
Nono
And yet some people do.
Paradox
I think that some of it is people clinging to Walkyverse Mike and his actually purposeful mind games that were meant to make people feel like crap about stupid stuff they’ve been deluding themselves into being okay with.
I like him because I enjoy a decent antagonist and he does a good job being something for the cast to be on their toes about.
timemonkey
By making her aware of how she was behaving so she could stop the behaviour? It’s not in any way the way such a thing should have been handled. He was also poking a hole in her logic.
Fart Captor
Yeah, no. She was not acting like Blaine. She was occasionally having outbursts of rage and snapping at people, but that is not the same thing.
That’s beyond “not how that should be done” and well into “a fucking horrible thing to say to someone even if you DO mean well”
timemonkey
Well of course it was a horrible thing to say, nobody has ever said it was the right approach or a job well done.
And she absolutely did end up in the abusive zone as she went on. She recognised it, was horrified by it, and hopefully can pull herself in a better direction but her relationship with Danny was very quickly failing into a very empty place.
BBCC
‘As time went on’ is not the same thing as Mike being right at the time.
cbwroses
Mike did not say Amber was destined to be like Blaine.
SHE had said she was worried that her relationships would be like her parents, but that the guys she dated were never like Blaine.
What Mike then said was IF her relationship was destined to follow the pattern of her parents’ relationship, and IF they guys were never like Blaine, then she didn’t have to worry about it because she was the Blaine figure.
That’s two conditional statements that followed her own premise of her relationships being like her parents’ relationship.
He didn’t say her relationships had to be like that and he didn’t say the guys she dated would always take her mom’s role in such a relationship, thereby putting her in Blaine’s role.
He was showing her the end result of her own logical premise, but at no point did he say that her premise was correct or unchanging if correct.
Was it the best way to go about allaying her fears? Hell no. But it was distinctly different than telling her she was destined to be like her father.
BBCC
Saying she’s the Blaine figure is pretty damn similar to saying she’s destined to be like Blaine. Also – Amber never said she was destined to be like her mom, but she was afraid she would be. MIKE made up the logic that if she was destined to be like her parents. He made up his own premise as well as offered the false idea that the only alternative to dating abusive jerks was to date pushovers.
cbwroses
No. She said she was worried she would be like her mom, but the guys she dated were never like that. She was the one who said she keeps picking decent guys/”pushovers” and Mike just went along with the idea that she chooses them; not that she SHOULD choose them. He was establishing a pattern of her past dates, not suggesting a modus of operandi for future ones.
He said she shouldn’t worry about that because IF her relationships were like theirs and IF the guys she dated were never like Blaine, then by default of her relationship being like her parents’ and the guys not being like dad, the guys must then be like mom. Leaving her to be like dad.
That leaves two options: quit worrying about it because your relationship isn’t destined to follow theirs, or quit worrying about it because it your relationship does follow theirs, but not in the dynamic you’re worried about. Either way, quit worrying about it.
BBCC
Amber said she was afraid of being abused like her mother was, she never expressed a belief she was destined to be like her parents. If I’m afraid of the possibility someone else burning down my home, that doesn’t mean I believe it’s destined to happen. That is what MIKE said.
Also, Amber never used the word ‘pushover’ to describe Danny. She said he was king, honest, loyal and nothing like her dad. MIKE, again, is the one who said he was a pushover and MIKE is the one who said the only alternative to an abusive jerk was a pushover.
Again, Mike is the one who made the premise Amber was destined to be like her parents and that she was the one dating pushovers (not people like Amber described) then she would end up like Blaine. Both premises are bs.
cbwroses
I know Amber never called them pushovers. That’s why I put them in quotation marks.
And Mike didn’t suggest she continue dating what he called pushovers to avoid her parents’ fate.
Again, he was pointing out the pattern of her past relationships, not suggesting what she should do for her future ones.
But I’m repeating myself now and want to avoid my bad habit over overexplaining stuff, especially when neither side will come to a consensus.
BBCC
Mike’s entire statement was based on the idea that if Amber’s always dating pushovers (which, again, he positions as the only alternative to abusive tools) then she’s not doomed to be like her mom, she’s doomed to be like her dad. Which is, again, a position HE is forwarding. That wasn’t what Amber said. Amber said she was afraid she’d be abused like her mom was. He said if she was destined to follow her parents pattern (again, HE is asserting that) then she’s destined to be like her dad based on her dating choices (again, using qualities he is asserting as part of an idea he is stating – that her only options are jerks who will abuse her and pushovers. Neither is a thing Amber said).
Someone
Playing devil’s advocate — Mike is trying to make Walky and Dorothy realize that they are both being extremely dumb about something they both want, and in so doing, are only hurting themselves now over something that might hurt later.
Pablo360
Nope. He’s being an asshole in the hopes that he will receive lhysical retaliation, which is his major turn-on.
His entire life is Becky’s storyline with Dina’s hat, except replace the hat with masochistic pleasure and the schenanigans with inflicting pain on others.
Knuf Wons
I’m so hyped for semi-daily Mike/Dorothy interactions! I don’t think they’ve gotten enough.
Myth
I’m pretty sure we should just treat Mike as a walking plot device rather than a person. Sometimes you just need a total asshole to say something terrible to some other character for plot/character development reasons, and no one else in the ‘verse is quite enough of an asshole to do it, and that is how you get characters like Mike.
Mike nets us a lot of useful insight on other characters via what he says/does and how they react to it. I like Mike for that reason. But I don’t like him as a character. He has always seemed less multi-faceted than Willis’ other characters. Again, that is why I think he is a walking plot device.
JessWitt
Yeah, Mike really needs to be better fleshed out.
Which is why I like to imagine the possibility of him developing feelings for his mark, Ethan. It would certainly make him more human.
Needfuldoer
Mike can give the other characters the verbal dope slap they need, but we can only scream into the comments. He just does it in the most dickish way possible.
GoblinScribe
I think the point here is that Dorothy might not be making the right decision, and deep down, she knows this.
But Mike is just a comic relief jackass. Maybe he’s just being a jackass today.
Reltzik
I don’t really think he does these things for reasons beyond his own satisfaction.
I think he’s just a troll trying to provoke negative emotional responses. Having “reasons” is just a routine part of his M.O. to make his target feel even worse.
JetstreamGW
I feel no need to defend Mike’s actions. He’s an asshole. That’s why he’s the best. Because he’s funny.
Side One
Mike is Best at being Worst.
That takes TALENT!
AutobotDen
Agreed.
AnvilPro
This universe’ Mike is an anomaly. He’s still the biggest asshole in the world, but somehow he’ll actually help people, usually by making them confront what they don’t want to
Doctor_Who
In a universe featuring Blaine, Sir, Toedad, and Ryan, he’s far from the biggest asshole.
He’s just the one who’s working at it, instead of it coming naturally.
Inahc
no, in this universe he usually just makes things worse.
timemonkey
That’s because his methods are awful. He often has a point but he makes it in such a way that it almost never actually gets across.
Fart Captor
He may often THINK he has a point, but he’s just a smug-ass teenager who thinks he’s figured everything out. His methods are awful and his points are bad.
Leorale
Yeah, I kinda don’t understand the Mike tolerance, when, it seems,more people get sick of other jerk characters.
I hope it’s that people find him so cartoonish that they don’t consider him a real person, but more of a walking plot device. Mike is terrible.
Fart Captor
Or make things worse by telling an abuse victim that she’ll become her father, perpetuating a harmful stereotype and attempting to needle her about her WORSE FEAR
Irredentist
Amber isn’t an innocent victim anymore. She’s all grown up and made victims of her own. She has to face that.
Fart Captor
Eat my entire ass. Amber’s anger problems do not justify that shit.
Irredentist
Amber does a lot of things that aren’t justified. I’m not saying she’s a bad person. And I’m not saying that abuse victims in real life should be treated that way. But everything Mike said was true.
BBCC
Bull. Mike’s logic was completely irrelevant to what Amber said.
Irredentist
It wasn’t logic, it was a prediction. “You’ll end up like your dad.” And he was right. Even Amber thinks so. “I got saddled with your petty rage.” Now she can finally do something about it.
BBCC
Amber knew that before Mike said anything. Again, best case scenario, he made no impact and at worst he made a bad situation worse. Also, he absolutely did offer his own logic on the situation – faulty logic, sure, but ‘If you’re destined to be like your parents and if you’re never the one dating jerks because you’re dating pushovers, which are you’ is definitely him trying for a logical take. Again, it’s BS logic because ‘if you’re destined to be like your parents’ and ‘the only alternative to jerks is pushovers’ are both faulty premises, but that’s what Mike said.
Irredentist
It wasn’t Mike’s logic. Amber was the one worried she’d end up like her parents.
BBCC
No, she was not. She said she was worried about ending up in an abusive relationship. Nowhere did she say she was destined to do so. MIKE is the one who brought that up.
Irredentist
She said she was worried about falling for a jerk LIKE HER MOM DID
Fart Captor
That is not what Mike said. He used the present tense. He was saying she already was like her dad.
And the fact that Amber believes that her anger makes her a Blaine waiting to happen is exactly why it’s fucking harmful for Mike to say shit like that. Anger issues can be managed! Tons of people have them and don’t abuse anyone! Amber’s fatalistic view that she’s doomed to become her father is why she puts on a mask and beats up criminals instead of actually finding a healthy outlet! If she’s doomed to become her abuser, there’s no point seeking mundane ways to deal with her issues, because if those had any chance of working, she wouldn’t be doomed.
BBCC
Yes, like her mother did. That doesn’t mean she feels she’s destined to end up like them, it means she’s afraid of the possibility of being abused. MIKE is the one who presented it as an inevitability, and in the present tense, as FC said.
Unusually Angry Hippie
Amber should be in prison or a psychiatric institution if this comic were even remotely realistic. Her issues go FAR beyond ‘anger problems’ and into the territory of criminal vigilantism and assault that serves no actual purpose besides giving her someone to vent her rage onto while convincing herself it’s alright because her victims are petty criminals.
CJ
In prison?
What exactly for? She violently interfered in some guy trying to rape a girl. Twice, I think.
She cut up a known rapist coming after her and her friend with the knife he brought to the scene.
She went after a guy stealing handbags as he was in the act of stealing a handbag.
These are all legal acts (though someone with less reason to hate abusers might have manger with keeping the rapist within the knife more intact but he was the one who brought the knife and upped the ante all by himself).
Going to pick a fight with Sal’s and company was not, put getting in a senseless fight with someone is not a prison-worthy offence as long as all you end up with are some bruises.
So, what exactly did she do that should be penalized by jail time?
timemonkey
He was pointing out the flaw in her own logic. If she’s so afraid of becoming like her mother than she ends up becoming the one seeking out partners she can walk all over and treat however she wants then she ends up in just as much an unwanted place as the thing she’s trying to avoid.
BBCC
Except she never said anything about picking pushovers. She said she didn’t want to date anybody like her dad and end up like her mom. Mike said if she was doomed to repeat their behaviour and never dated jerks (to avoid ending up like Mom) she’d become just like her dad. Which presupposes she IS doomed to repeat her parent’s pattern AND that the only alternative to dating jerks is to date pushovers, both of which are absolute hogwash. The right thing to do is point out ‘Amber, you’re not doomed to repeat your parent’s pattern.’ not whatever the fuck Mike was doing.
Irredentist
And yet she DID repeat her parents pattern, at least partially.
BBCC
That had nothing to do with Mike except maybe that Mike made her feel worse and more insecure about those things and less likely to seek help. Mike was the exact opposite of helpful and whatever he thought he was doing, he certainly was not pointing out the flaw in her logic, he was pointing out the flaw in the logic he made up.
Irredentist
Amber doesn’t really seem like the type to seek help on her own. Mike or no Mike.
BBCC
That doesn’t really have anything to do with whether Mike was helpful. At best, he made no impact and at worst, actively made a bad mental health situation worse.
Fart Captor
Yeah, and we can all thank Blaine for that. He’s the one who treated like she was broken, and burden because of her social anxiety, and said she was weak for not being able to protect her friend from a knife-wielding robber, and then insisted she take self-defense classes instead of getting therapy afterwards.
Mike’s not fucking helping. Walky, on the other hand, has actually been helping her. You know, by listening to her and being appropriately supportive in a way that can actually reach her, instead of being a fucking trash monster and needling her at every opportunity.
Fart Captor
When? When did she hit Danny? She’s shouted at him and said mean things a couple times, in bursts of anger, then she dumped him.
Calling that “repeating her parents’ pattern” is utter bullshit. Other characters who weren’t ever abused have done the same kind of things, and nobody bats an eye.
This idea that someone who has been abused is “repeating the cycle” if they ever lose their temper or act like a jerk no matter how however briefly it lasts, or however much other stress they were under, or how quickly they reign it in and apologize, is damaging to real people. They shouldn’t have to be superhumanly calm, collected, and gentle at all times just to avoid being compared to their abusers.
Go ahead and criticize Amber’s behavior all you want – plenty of it has been shitty, unhealthy, or both – but knock that “cycle of abuse” bullshit the fuck off.
Irredentist
Amber literally beats up criminals to run away from her problems. AND she’s an asshole to her boyfriend.
Fart Captor
If she was like Blaine she wouldn’t be beating up criminals.
She’d still be going after Sal and her friends. That’s literally the only time she’s come AT ALL close to being like him.
Blaine woudn’t have risked her life to save Becky. Or helped Joyce clean the white boards to apologize for blowing up at her. Or apologize to Danny, EVER.
Losing her temper and getting a bit mean IS NOT THE SAME THING AS VIOLENTLY ABUSING YOUR OWN FAMILY.
Irredentist
Ok fine she’s not as bad as Blaine, hell she’s a hero in many ways. Are you happy now?
Fart Captor
I’d be happier if you dropped the comparison to Blaine entirely, but yes.
Fart Captor
No, he told her she already WAS like her father.
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2013/comic/book-3/04-just-hangin-out-with-my-family/ensnared/
Her fear regarding her mother was “That I’ll be like my mom and end up ensnared by some jerk”. How the fuck does “being afraid of ending up stuck in an abusive relationship” cause HER to become abusive?
Avoiding angry, domineering men and seeking more gentle, even submissive men is not “looking for someone she can walk all over”, and sure as hell isn’t causing her to become abusive.
She has a problem with bursts of extreme anger that she actually does a decent job of reigning in (not counting the unhealthy venting via masked vigilantism). She also has PTSD, anxiety issues, and some kind of dissociative disorder that are all teaming up to make that harder to manage.
Her taste in boyfriends is not and was never the problem.
Unusually Angry Hippie
His qualifier ‘IF you really ARE doomed to follow in your parents footsteps’ is the important part. The tone and phrasing implies that he doesn’t really believe that’s true, and neither should she. Mike should know, his parents are sweet enough to give you diabetes through skin contact and he’s MIKE.
cbwroses
People keep forgetting/ignoring that “IF” part. I don’t know why.
She’s the one worrying about following in the footsteps of that relationship. He just pointed out how that would work if everything else she said was correct. Not that she was actually correct in saying it.
Fart Captor
Because that “IF” part is bullshit. He’s using the past tense, because it’s not a prediction.
He’s using the Socratic method to walk her through his own train of thought to the intended conclusion. Suggesting he’s not making a clear statement about what Amber IS, CURRENTLY, because of that “IF” is like suggesting that I don’t have a specific answer in mind if I were to ask “If I had 3 apples, but I gave 2 of them away, how many apples do I have…?” I know exactly how many apples I fucking have when I start talking. Only in this case, leading you to think that I have 1 apple is not going to be more cruel than simply saying it outright, because nobody will fucking argue that I may actually have 5 apples now.
cbwroses
I respectfully disagree. But can see your point.
BBCC
Except that is not what Amber said and its a bullshit premise in the first place. MIKE brought that premise up. ‘I am scared I will get into an abusive relationship like my mom’ is not the same as ‘I think I’m destined to be like my parents’. MIKE brought that up and it is 100% utter garbage, which is exactly what he should have told Amber if he was remotely interested in helping.
cbwroses
No. You’re forgetting that Amber also said that Ethan and then Danny were not like Blaine and that she actually said it right before she said she feared being in an abusive relationship like her mother.
So she was not only worried about being like her mom, but that her significant others would be like her dad. She is therefore worrying and comparing her relationships to her parents.
Mike didn’t pull that out of thin air. She brought it up and he just flipped it around with the caveat that IF the guys were never like Blaine, but following the pattern of her parents was a LEGITIMATE worry, then Blaine role falls to her.
As long as her taste in men remains constant and she also doesn’t believe her relationship has to follow theirs, then the idea of her being like Blaine in the relationship holds no water. But comparing her relationships to her parents did in fact come from her in that she compared the guys to Blaine and herself to her mom.
*Apologies if I’m repeating myself within the same comment. I tend to overexplain myself, even when I know it won’t change anyone’s opinion. And I feel like I’m reaching that point, so I’ll just agree to disagree from here.*