Have you SEEN our statesmen here in the US? At this point that’s about as dire an insult as you can get.
vlademir1
Hate to break it to ya, but we have exceptionally few statesmen here in the US. We, meanwhile, unfortunately have a plethora of pandering demagogues, dogmatic obstructionists and naive idealists.
Needfuldoer
And unfortunately, Category 1 will beat Category 3 down mercilessly until they become Category 2, because titles and whose team you’re on matter more than ideas. It’s just easier for the Third Estate to understand that way.
thejeff
Well, in many cases there’s not actually a lot of difference between the “naive idealist” and the “dogmatic obstructionist” other than power and opportunity. If you’re an idealist and you’re not in a position to push your ideals through, all you can do is obstruct things that don’t live up to them.
David T. Shaw
Wow…
It’s depressing because it’s true.
.
In an attempt to bring some humour to
references to politicians etc, here is a
vintage Bloom County. https://www.gocomics.com/bloomcounty/2010/09/02
weirderthanweird
I first read “demagogues” as “demagorgons” which still made a lot of sense.
Jack Sprat
Demagorgon/Beholder 2018.
Better the evil you know than the evil you don’t.
David T. Shaw
The big difference is that people don’t get upset when a demagorgon is killed by some well-meaning idealist (or even demented conspiracy theorist).
Which is okay, because that particular cure is much worse than the disease for the demagogues.
A statesman is a dead politician. We desperately need more statesmen in this country. – quote attributed to Groucho Marx
David T. Shaw
Because I tend to be a pedagogue, I am giving a correction.
Which is a silly thing to do for quotes, because it sometimes seems that every famous quote is either wrong or misattributed.
.
According to the internet (and when is it ever wrong?), a statesman (yes, he is a dead politician) by the name of Arlen Specter said it.
But I can’t find a source. Sigh. Even if he was the first person to use those exact words, he is not the first with the core idea.
.
However, Truman (the President, not the fictional character played by Jim Carrey) said the following, as recorded in the April 12, 1958 edition of The New York World Telegram & Sun: “I’m proud that I’m a politician. A politician is a man who understands government, and it takes a politician to run a government. A statesman is a politician who’s been dead ten or fifteen years.”
.
However, Thomas Brackett Reed, a Congressman from Maine who served as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1889 to 1891 and again from 1895 to 1899 wrote in a letter: “A statesman is a successful politician who is dead.”
So it seems that in every case, a ‘future statesman’ created the thought, not Groucho.
Because Groucho couldn’t have said everything… 8)
This is the story of a Mike
Who was an asshole and stole Willis’s bike
And while he looked so mad to spite a dad
I kinda liked him better when he smiles
We all tend to find a time we think he’s being literal, and sift it from the jokes, stunts, and ploys.
Like, the current one is people who think he is doing all of this to make Danny sad, for… reasons, I guess, but given that’s the sort of thing he says as a maybe-joke sometimes, it’s kinda hard to parse. I certainly don’t expect him to carry out all of the shit he says he’ll do.
Well, Mike in SP! doesn’t like his parents. If that carried over, I see the key as “Well, I can’t stop you, but I can keep you pointed at a target that will benefit me”.
I’m going to guess that we’ll never know. This arc isn’t about revealing Mike’s hidden depths as an anti-hero, or revealing why he’s a villain. It’s backstory that will preserve the status quo of Mike as an unrepentant asshole.
Does he do it to make people grow in his own direct way, because he’s learned that’s the safest/most effective way? Does he just like sowing chaos and people are weakest where they most need to grow? That’s for Willis to know(?) and for us to obsess over.
Nope. Chaotic Neutral (or more accurately, Cynical or Fatalistic), Masquerading as Neutral Evil.
He casts shitty situations to others as if he was the master manipulator creating them, when in fact he’s just being existentialist, swimming with the currents in the sewer of life.
Analyzing Mike’s alignment is futile. Mike is whatever you don’t want him to be.
Departure_Dave
Given that he’s quoting from the New Testament to justify his antipathy, I’d say he looks Lawful Evil, if he has to be framed in those terms.
David Doty
I’m not sure quoting the bible makes you inherently lawful any more than it makes you inherently good. I’m sure Mike doesn’t consider Blaine any kind of lawful authority over his parents, in a secular or spiritual sense.
It looks like maybe also a pinch of protecting himself from being hurt by trying not to care about anyone else (or at least convincing HIMSELF of that)
Remember. Literally a few pages ago Mike confronted a teacher due to the bad grade given to Amber, I don’t know how he can spin that to mean he doesn’t care, but it’ll be a stretch. Pretty sure this is 100% a bluff. Even if Mike does or doesn’t believes it himself.
For now, I’m reading it as a bluff here, but over the years it hardened into his actual personality. Although at least now we see that there’s a good Mike buried in there that could someday be redeemed.
AFTER his shittiness costs him Ethan, of course. If stories have taught me anything, it’s that suffering is literally the only path to redemption.
Which would also be a warning about playing the asshole lest it become your entire persona. And it’s understandable thanks to Blaine why he would see it as attractive. If you don’t care, you can’t get hurt. If you hate the friends you love the most and treat them like garbage, then someone abusive can’t use your love for them and vulnerability against you.
But it makes you into the type of person who doesn’t deserve those friends.
And it makes me wonder if he can dig himself out of this bad path. I suspect he’s going to have to lose Ethan and Amber for it to happen, though.
Freemage
“We are what we pretend to be.” — Vonnegut
3-I
110% agreed, this is totally my read on the character.
I can’t tell if Mike’s more of a sociopath than Blaine, or just trying to convince Blaine that he is.
David Doty
Fairly certain that Rachel wasn’t intended to be Truth in that strip, or at least not the entire truth. She’s speaking to Ruth, who I certainly don’t think is irredeemable. I think it’s probably closer to the truth to say redemption doesn’t erase the bad things you’ve done, and you still have to live with them and their consequences.
David Doty
Or, of course closer to the truth to say you’re going to have to face it you’re addicted to love. Maybe typing it all out will get it out of my head.
I was already to scream ‘Damn you Ellis’ when you raise the possibility that it was a bluff.
.
As someone else posted, I’m getting emotional whiplash reading this arc.
I hope some knowledge of what Mike was, or is, or why is revealed by the end. I’m not asking for a lot, just a little nugget that I can trust is real.
.
Yeah. After re-reading the last sentence, good luck to me on that….
I have to wonder how much of that was Mike bluffing and how much of it was him actually believing that. Does Mike hate his parents? Hell he might have offered the key hoping Blaine would do something, though that doesn’t seem his style. Every one of these flashback segments raises more questions even as it answers old ones. I guess my next question is, what are Mike’s parents like?
Assuming they’re like they were in Shortpacked!, they’re super friendly, super enthusiastic, and super TMI.
And honestly? I’m pretty sure Mike is just a huge dickhead to everyone. I don’t think there’s anything deeper to it. Maybe he’s being that dickhead to teach people something, but honestly I doubt it.
Possible, but what would be the point in exploring that from Willis’ point of view? He said early on that Mike was difficult to fit into DoA as much as he did in Shortpacked because he was something of a cartoon character.
Like, I don’t really get what the payoff would be if it’s just “yeah, he’s bad to the core.” That’d be one wet fart of a climax.
well.
huh.
I wonder how truthful he’s being. like, this could be his way of protecting amber by being really convincingly not-caring about her? but maybe I just want to believe that?
also I wonder if even *blaine* is disturbed by this. seems like it.
..is that “none are righteous” thing a quote from somewhere?
356 thoughts on “Righteous”
Ana Chronistic
so Present-Mike is upset b/c after HOT SEXENGS he’s thinking about Blaine, whoops
Ana Chronistic
gotta admire his commitment to spite tho
Doctor_Who
Could be worse. Could be during.
Ana Chronistic
*during* could make him last longer, tho? Or make him harder, idk how it works
Spite boner
Inahc
HOT.
DICKINGS.
🙂
shadowcell
FROM A CUP
Questionor
HORSE BUTTHOLES
Delicious Taffy
I USED TO WONDER WHAT FRIENDSHIP COULD BE
Omahdon
COWBOY HAwait no this has gone into a dark and terrible place o:
ShinyNeen
SCORCHED EARTH
… Seriously, Mike, givin’ me whiplash! It still counts if it’s across a five-year time gap!
Clif
Whiplash? Step three of Mike’s masterplan to create Amazigirl is now complete.
Jabberwocky
this is
the story of a mike
who flipped me off and called me a
uh
well it wasn’t very nice
Stu
Bike? Psych? Trike?
Doctor_Who
He called you statesmanlike? That doesn’t seem too bad.
Tarnish
Have you SEEN our statesmen here in the US? At this point that’s about as dire an insult as you can get.
vlademir1
Hate to break it to ya, but we have exceptionally few statesmen here in the US. We, meanwhile, unfortunately have a plethora of pandering demagogues, dogmatic obstructionists and naive idealists.
Needfuldoer
And unfortunately, Category 1 will beat Category 3 down mercilessly until they become Category 2, because titles and whose team you’re on matter more than ideas. It’s just easier for the Third Estate to understand that way.
thejeff
Well, in many cases there’s not actually a lot of difference between the “naive idealist” and the “dogmatic obstructionist” other than power and opportunity. If you’re an idealist and you’re not in a position to push your ideals through, all you can do is obstruct things that don’t live up to them.
David T. Shaw
Wow…
It’s depressing because it’s true.
.
In an attempt to bring some humour to
references to politicians etc, here is a
vintage Bloom County.
https://www.gocomics.com/bloomcounty/2010/09/02
weirderthanweird
I first read “demagogues” as “demagorgons” which still made a lot of sense.
Jack Sprat
Demagorgon/Beholder 2018.
Better the evil you know than the evil you don’t.
David T. Shaw
The big difference is that people don’t get upset when a demagorgon is killed by some well-meaning idealist (or even demented conspiracy theorist).
Which is okay, because that particular cure is much worse than the disease for the demagogues.
Jon Rich
Nice one.
Opus the Poet
A statesman is a dead politician. We desperately need more statesmen in this country. – quote attributed to Groucho Marx
David T. Shaw
Because I tend to be a pedagogue, I am giving a correction.
Which is a silly thing to do for quotes, because it sometimes seems that every famous quote is either wrong or misattributed.
.
According to the internet (and when is it ever wrong?), a statesman (yes, he is a dead politician) by the name of Arlen Specter said it.
But I can’t find a source. Sigh. Even if he was the first person to use those exact words, he is not the first with the core idea.
.
However, Truman (the President, not the fictional character played by Jim Carrey) said the following, as recorded in the April 12, 1958 edition of The New York World Telegram & Sun:
“I’m proud that I’m a politician. A politician is a man who understands government, and it takes a politician to run a government. A statesman is a politician who’s been dead ten or fifteen years.”
.
However, Thomas Brackett Reed, a Congressman from Maine who served as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1889 to 1891 and again from 1895 to 1899 wrote in a letter:
“A statesman is a successful politician who is dead.”
So it seems that in every case, a ‘future statesman’ created the thought, not Groucho.
Because Groucho couldn’t have said everything… 8)
Ana Chronistic
This is the story of a Mike
Who was an asshole and stole Willis’s bike
And while he looked so mad to spite a dad
I kinda liked him better when he smiles
Chronos
This is the story of why Mike doesn’t smile.
Someguy
This was kinda badass
ego
PSA: do not play poker with mike.
Stu
Genuinely unsure if this is a bluff or not, just as I was genuinely unsure if he was being genuine with Ethan.
Sambo
Same here… hoping it’s a bluff
DailyBrad
This is the Mike experience.
We all tend to find a time we think he’s being literal, and sift it from the jokes, stunts, and ploys.
Like, the current one is people who think he is doing all of this to make Danny sad, for… reasons, I guess, but given that’s the sort of thing he says as a maybe-joke sometimes, it’s kinda hard to parse. I certainly don’t expect him to carry out all of the shit he says he’ll do.
Viktoria
Well, Mike in SP! doesn’t like his parents. If that carried over, I see the key as “Well, I can’t stop you, but I can keep you pointed at a target that will benefit me”.
Sporky
To be honest, I feel foolish for thinking I ever knew anything about Mike to begin with.
Bladeglory
I’m going to guess that we’ll never know. This arc isn’t about revealing Mike’s hidden depths as an anti-hero, or revealing why he’s a villain. It’s backstory that will preserve the status quo of Mike as an unrepentant asshole.
Does he do it to make people grow in his own direct way, because he’s learned that’s the safest/most effective way? Does he just like sowing chaos and people are weakest where they most need to grow? That’s for Willis to know(?) and for us to obsess over.
skittylover3
Why not all of the above?
Zaxares
Mike is Chaotic Evil. Confirmed. 😉
Shawn L.
Nope. Chaotic Neutral (or more accurately, Cynical or Fatalistic), Masquerading as Neutral Evil.
He casts shitty situations to others as if he was the master manipulator creating them, when in fact he’s just being existentialist, swimming with the currents in the sewer of life.
Clif
Analyzing Mike’s alignment is futile. Mike is whatever you don’t want him to be.
Departure_Dave
Given that he’s quoting from the New Testament to justify his antipathy, I’d say he looks Lawful Evil, if he has to be framed in those terms.
David Doty
I’m not sure quoting the bible makes you inherently lawful any more than it makes you inherently good. I’m sure Mike doesn’t consider Blaine any kind of lawful authority over his parents, in a secular or spiritual sense.
Michelle J. Caboose
It looks like maybe also a pinch of protecting himself from being hurt by trying not to care about anyone else (or at least convincing HIMSELF of that)
Kevin Zheng
Remember. Literally a few pages ago Mike confronted a teacher due to the bad grade given to Amber, I don’t know how he can spin that to mean he doesn’t care, but it’ll be a stretch. Pretty sure this is 100% a bluff. Even if Mike does or doesn’t believes it himself.
David Doty
For now, I’m reading it as a bluff here, but over the years it hardened into his actual personality. Although at least now we see that there’s a good Mike buried in there that could someday be redeemed.
AFTER his shittiness costs him Ethan, of course. If stories have taught me anything, it’s that suffering is literally the only path to redemption.
Cerberus
Yeah, it feels like that.
Which would also be a warning about playing the asshole lest it become your entire persona. And it’s understandable thanks to Blaine why he would see it as attractive. If you don’t care, you can’t get hurt. If you hate the friends you love the most and treat them like garbage, then someone abusive can’t use your love for them and vulnerability against you.
But it makes you into the type of person who doesn’t deserve those friends.
And it makes me wonder if he can dig himself out of this bad path. I suspect he’s going to have to lose Ethan and Amber for it to happen, though.
Freemage
“We are what we pretend to be.” — Vonnegut
3-I
110% agreed, this is totally my read on the character.
HeatherJean
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2017/comic/book-7/03-the-thing-i-was-before/redemption/
I can’t tell if Mike’s more of a sociopath than Blaine, or just trying to convince Blaine that he is.
David Doty
Fairly certain that Rachel wasn’t intended to be Truth in that strip, or at least not the entire truth. She’s speaking to Ruth, who I certainly don’t think is irredeemable. I think it’s probably closer to the truth to say redemption doesn’t erase the bad things you’ve done, and you still have to live with them and their consequences.
David Doty
Or, of course closer to the truth to say you’re going to have to face it you’re addicted to love. Maybe typing it all out will get it out of my head.
David T. Shaw
I was already to scream ‘Damn you Ellis’ when you raise the possibility that it was a bluff.
.
As someone else posted, I’m getting emotional whiplash reading this arc.
I hope some knowledge of what Mike was, or is, or why is revealed by the end. I’m not asking for a lot, just a little nugget that I can trust is real.
.
Yeah. After re-reading the last sentence, good luck to me on that….
Passchendaele
um
holy shit
Ivy
Haha nice
butts
…huh
this sure is a mike roller coaster
Platypus King
Cue the Red Hot Chili Peppers and the obligatory joke about Ethan being ‘tall enough to ride’.
vivid grim
mike’s dicksmasher
Kyrik Michalowski
I have to wonder how much of that was Mike bluffing and how much of it was him actually believing that. Does Mike hate his parents? Hell he might have offered the key hoping Blaine would do something, though that doesn’t seem his style. Every one of these flashback segments raises more questions even as it answers old ones. I guess my next question is, what are Mike’s parents like?
JetstreamGW
Assuming they’re like they were in Shortpacked!, they’re super friendly, super enthusiastic, and super TMI.
And honestly? I’m pretty sure Mike is just a huge dickhead to everyone. I don’t think there’s anything deeper to it. Maybe he’s being that dickhead to teach people something, but honestly I doubt it.
BBCC
They were at Freshman Family Weekend too. Seem about the same as ever.
DailyBrad
Possible, but what would be the point in exploring that from Willis’ point of view? He said early on that Mike was difficult to fit into DoA as much as he did in Shortpacked because he was something of a cartoon character.
Like, I don’t really get what the payoff would be if it’s just “yeah, he’s bad to the core.” That’d be one wet fart of a climax.
Ivy
My theory is that he thinks of life as like playing a video game, and he’s doing an evil playthrough
Jon Rich
That’s actually a really good way to put it.
DailyBrad
I think that even if he’s not bluffing, he might know Blaine’s not going to do take him up on it, if that is really a key for his house.
tim gueguen
We’ve seen Mike’s mom, who seems to be super nice to the point of freaking people out. Sara pulls out a baseball bat to keep her away.
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2013/comic/book-3/04-just-hangin-out-with-my-family/guard/
Frost Magi
“MA’AM, I HAVE A BAT” I love it lmao
newllend(henryvolt)
Mike is an enigma.
sultryglebe
And sometimes also an enema.
Platypus King
And also sometimes an enemy!
Roborat
Wait, he is Batman’s enemy?
Mollyscribbles
Strictly speaking, we don’t know what the key was for.
Possibly Blaine’s mom’s house.
Doctor Bees
…for a nickel
Inahc
well.
huh.
I wonder how truthful he’s being. like, this could be his way of protecting amber by being really convincingly not-caring about her? but maybe I just want to believe that?
also I wonder if even *blaine* is disturbed by this. seems like it.
..is that “none are righteous” thing a quote from somewhere?