It’s not really a moral dilemma –Joyce isn’t conflicted because of an internal moral quandary. She’s conflicted because she has been made to realise that this aspect of her already-problematic (but still steadfast) moral framework is absolutely incompatible with her much-needed social and emotional support network.
If both Ethan and Joyce are ok with this effort/experiment , why is anyone else’s opinion matter, it’s none of their business!
They can just keep their noses out of Joyce’s & Ethan’s business- Just as they demand others keep their noses out of their business.
Life is a continual learning experience, let them learn in their own way.
Why would you want it to work out? It’s been made abundantly clear that Ethan and Joyce are just using each other in a tragic show of mutual repression. I mean, they may actually like each other as, I dunno, good pals or something, but other than that…?
Because it’s exactly what each needs right now. It would be different if one of them was taking advantage of the other, but seems very unlikely considering the circumstances. Meanwhile you’ve got Amber and Sarah and Raidah’s pet goldfish trying to tear them apart.
The only way I can see this being good for them is that it will tear these faulty ideas from their minds and crush them in the most violent way possible. Crude. Painful. But it will make them better in the end so long as they don’t get hurt too bad along the way and have their fragile psyches smashed in just the right way so that they get the right lessons out and not the wrong damage. But it could far more easily go horribly wrong.
vsophi
So you think they should just keep on with the relationship up to a certain point? You at least concede that any kind of long-term relationship would fuck them both up, yes?
Also, I’m skeptical of that claim. Maybe what they need is safety, but their mindset going in is fundamentally flawed in a very harmful way. In fact, it seems that any benefit they’d derive from the experience would be so much smaller than the detriment as to be negligible.
Leorale
They do need safety, but they could get that from, y’know, not dating anyone for a few months, during which they could work on their issues and get stronger. Instead, they’re putting themselves in a position that only perpetuates/enables/worsens each other’s issues. They’ll have no incentive to heal, and every incentive to keep the status quo so they can keep each other.
Robbie C
I mean, Joyce and Ethan are never going to get married. That’s a given. (Besides, how else would she wind up with Danny, her ultimate ship. *Crossing fingers.*) In the short term, though, they get what they need and might learn a thing or two to boot.
Seriously, you must have had a friend in a long-distance relationship that you wish you could shake and say, “You’re wasting you’re time! It’s never going to work out for you both.” Or maybe a friend you wish you could tell that her boyfriend just isn’t right for her.
They’re just teenagers. And as far as I’m concerned, as long as the relationship isn’t toxic (e.g. an abusive one), then I’m rooting for them.
Leorale
Conversion therapy *is* toxic.
vsophi
This. It’s been pretty much established at this point that Ethan and Joyce are going for a full “lifestyle” change.
Robbie C
Not if he requested it.
It’s not like he thinks being gay is wrong. And it’s not like he’s hiding it, either. He just doesn’t want to be defined by one characteristic of himself, and I can sympathize with that.
Leorale
Nopes, it’s toxic even if he requests it.
People can totally request things that are bad for them.
vsophi
He might not think it’s wrong, but he sure thinks being straight is preferable.
Logician
Reread what he says when angsting about it. He doesn’t want help working out how he’s going to deal with it, and finding out what kind of person he is. He wants help pretending it isn’t real, even to himself.
DarkVeghetta
There’s also this tiny chance that they do fall for each other, for reals. Funny thing is you can still be straight and fall for a guy under very unlikely circumstances (quite rare, but it can happen as sexuality isn’t 100% genes or 100% upbringing – it’s a tad more complicated and funny then that), or fall for a girl if you’re a gay guy. Marriage? Hell no. Satisfying relationship that eventually ends at some point due
to various reasons? Not impossible.
Even if above isn’t likely, having each other understand could still be very good for them – even if it will most likely crash and burn in a glorious way sooner or later. But hopefully the trauma thereof will force them to learn some valuable lessons.
Really, either option is likely to lead to character growth – so I’m ok with it.
^ The entire reason your argument doesn’t work right there.
motorfirebox
What? Whoah, who brought up conversion therapy?
Regalli
Ethan wants to be in this relationship because it would be much easier if he were straight, and likes the idea that Joyce can, essentially, “cure” him. And likes the idea of calling it temptation because that makes it seem “easier and more manageable”. When he was talking to Joyce, he said about being gay that he wanted to lock it up and ignore it forever, and Joyce wants him to learn to resist “seemingly overwhelming temptations”.
So yes. Conversion therapy is basically what they’re trying to attempt.
Viredae
This, conversion therapy is toxic… But calling this conversion therapy is a mite pushing it.
Conversion therapy would be trying to force a square peg in a round hole, they’re not at that stage yet, it’s still at a stage of “I wonder if this square peg can fit in this round hole?”.
Basically, this hasn’t even come close to the escalation of conversion therapy yet.
vsophi
^ It’s working under the same harmful premise, though.
Leorale
True, it’s a bit early for me to be throwing around that term. I do think that’s where this is heading, though, and I think it’s going there quickly unless somebody puts a stop to it. Guess we’ll have to see!
Viredae
Oh it is heading there alright, that’s just storytelling 101.
motorfirebox
What Joyce and Ethan are discussing is not conversion therapy. Conversion therapy is when you take an LGBT person and try to make them straight. What Joyce and Ethan are discussing is refusing to indulge in a particular desire. There is a huge, huge, huge difference between those.
Li
This argument is predicated on the notion that Ethan doesn’t want to be straight, which I would say is inaccurate.
If all Ethan and Joyce wanted to do was repress their sexual desires, they wouldn’t be dating.
Mandy
Using a long distance relationship as an example of a terrible choice is a funny thing to do on the site of a webcomic artist who married his long distance girlfriend.
This whole conversation is evidence of what Sarah says in the second-to-last panel. People in mainstream American society are NOT tolerant of anyone who deviates from the norm, whether that’s as an asexual, a gay person who voluntarily represses or changes, or a flying jellyfish with pancakes shooting out its face.
No one is tolerant. Everyone wants you to conform to their accepted lifestyle. It’s something I learned in the church, it’s something I learned in the LGBT community.
Sorry about the harsh things you’ve learned. They’re not really applicable here, though. Sarahis saying that most people think what Ethan and Joyce are doing is harmful, not that people aren’t tolerant of nonconformity.
Ethan struggles with his sexual orientation being the most prominent thing about him and with how hurt he is by the Amber situation. Joyce wants to have sex, but she has been brought up to believe that that’s wrong, so she faces an internal conflict. This isn’t about nonconformity at all; neither is choosing to do what they’re doing because it’s what they want. They’re just trying to avoid difficult problems.
As for your difficulties with the church and the LGBT community and nonconformity, I’m deeply sorry. In my neck of the woods, people aren’t like that; they’re very accepting, in fact. So please try not to make generalizations like “No one is tolerant.” That’s as dramatic as it is inaccurate.
motorfirebox
“Sarahis saying that most people think what Ethan and Joyce are doing is harmful, not that people aren’t tolerant of nonconformity.”
In many cases–and I think this is one of them–that’s simply an expression of intolerance. I mean, heck, one of the religious right’s go-to arguments against gay marriage is that it’s harmful–to kids, to traditional marriage, etcetera.
Li
It’s not intolerance.
The end.
AsimovSideburns
It’s not that we don’t tolerate those people–I won’t tolerate people who DON’T respect them.
It’s that we get upset when somebody is so far in denial that they’re hurting themselves.
If you’re gay/lesbian, or asexual, or ANYTHING, and you deny that part of you, refuse to accept it, that’s harmful.
vsophi
“a gay person who voluntarily represses”
The only reason I can think of for somebody to voluntarily repress is because of religion. Ethan is not religious (or at least, not devoutly), and he isn’t interested in changing himself to please God. He wants to ignore his sexuality.
As far as I can tell, neither of them are trying to refuse their sexual desires because they’re being oppressed for them, so this doesn’t seem to be an issue of homophobia.
If Willis comes in and says that it’s homophobia, okay then the following is null, but -assuming that it’s not-…
I honestly see no issue with refusing to indulge sexual desires. Not only are we perfectly supportive of refusing to indulge other everyday desires, like eating meat or eating greens or being loud or even more violent fare, but on an anecdotal level, well, it seems to be working hella fine for me, compared to how much pointless drama my sexually active friends always seem to be going through — at the very least, I’ve never had to pretend to convert to a religion to impress someone, or stopped talking to someone completely because of hurt feelings.
Anecdotal, sure, but I fail to see how a choice that is not forced upon oneself and is done voluntarily can be claimed to be “inherently toxic”. Maybe I’m actually naturally asexual instead of just choosing to be, is how I get away with it, I dunno.
George
I think that Ethan’s motivation here cultural, not religious. It sounds like he’s afraid being openly gay would dominate his new circle of friends’ perception of him.
I suppose you could argue that the reason it would potentially be a big deal to his friends would be religion, but the underlying rationale probably matters to Ethan less than the effect on his relationship with them. It’s not *his* religious beliefs that are the issue here.
George
Whoops, I misread your second paragraph. We’re actually a lot more in agreement than I thought at first regarding Ethan’s lack of direct religious motivation.
Li
We don’t know what Ethan’s coming out experience was, other than that it was rough. We do know that he made a conscious decision to get himself another straight girl like Amber but this time just keep lying forever.
And by the way, it’s a huge stretch to claim that Ethan’s reasons are “cultural, not religious”. His reason is that being gay is seen as abnormal, and that is because of religion, nothing else. Specifically it’s because Judeo-Christianity is so deeply embedded in our society that we can hardly even see the distinction sometimes.
George
Since when have we needed religion to declare a minority group “abnormal”?
Chug
I’m with you. I’m asexual, and I’ve found even those from supposedly ‘tolerant’ groups are convinced I’m deluding myself. If Ethan thinks this will make him happy, who are we, or anyone else, to tell him that it’s not a way in which he’s *allowed* to be happy? You can say ‘I really don’t think this’ll make you happy’, but the comments here aren’t saying that, they amount to ‘If you’re happy doing something we disapprove of, you’re not really happy. It’s not allowed.” Whatever happened to ‘*I* am the master of my fate; *I* am the captain of my soul.”
Li
Sure. But you know, pattern recognition + the hover text on the strips where Joyce and Ethan got together? Those tell a different story.
Ethan isn’t asexual. He’s a gay man with a substantial sex drive, and we have all the reason in the world to think what they are doing is noooooot going to turn out well.
Nomes
I wouldn’t say that no one is tolerant, but your point is certainly valid. If your way-of-life doesn’t follow the norm – whatever that norm may be – then your choices are deemed unusual, weird, or even harmful. People are entitled to make their own choices, whether or not those choices seem “right” to anyone else. Especially when those choices don’t actually affect anyone else.
DarkVeghetta
“No one is tolerant. Everyone wants you to conform to their accepted lifestyle.” – it’s also perfectly normal, even wise, for a human being.
That sed, there are boundaries that come into play here. Thankfully, in this society only close friends get to have a say in such matters, so it’s much more manageable then the whole town having a say in it, the way it was handled just a few decades ago.
As far as I’m concerned it’s fine for the character’s friends to have a word with them, but not the whole damn world.
I suppose my point was that the quote is needlessly cynical. You’d want your friends to CARE, right? (If not, that’s a whole other can of bad worms that I won’t go into right now) Not so much so that they stop you
from doing shit, but enough to pinch in when they feel you need them to. In-comic I doubt anyone else will even know this is a thing, so a non issue there.
Marcos Dantas
“Because it’s exactly what each needs right now.”
That is what they want, but it is not what they need.
DarkVeghetta
These things have a habit of sorting themselves out, especially since it’s most likely not a sustainable [b]want[/b].
Exactly. This relationship is inevitably going to end badly, since it’s based on “I want to no longer be the thing I am and want to make it go away” and “I want to date someone who I know nothing will ever happen with (and save him from Teh Gay)”, and we know people will react with “WTF?!” when they see it. It’s as healthy as the plague.
motorfirebox
That might be true. I don’t think it’s necessarily true, though. To argue that the relationship is doomed because they’re not attracted to each other is to essentially call any relationship not based on sex doomed.
Li
But it IS based on sex. Specifically the repressing thereof. And also based on lies, e.g. the lie that being gay is wrong and that you can or should change your identity in order to be happy.
And relationships based on lies, especially ones we are telling ourselves, do not have a great track record.
DarkVeghetta
Which I’d be inclined to agree with. Doomed without sex that is, save for asexualls, which they are clearly not.
Even so, a little bit of happiness now and some trauma later will likely be good for them in the long run. Have at it kids, he’s a flamethrower. Go nuts.
Technically… she could provide butt-sex inside the dorm if they used a sheet of plywood with a glory hole, and stuffed her mouth with a sock. She’d still be “virginic” and he’d still be hetero… with his eyes closed.
I mean, if you’re going to pretend you’re both doing each other a service, then at least provide the services!
309 thoughts on “Lose”
Jen Aside
ouch
Resne
Dat gravitas.
Kilo
I thought gravitas came from the bat. Or possibly the Bat, it’s hard to tell in an allcaps comic and assuming the Dark Knight is involved amuses me.
otusasio451
Ah, I love the smell of moral dilemma in the morning.
Plasma Mongoose
But does it smell as good as napalm?
Yotomoe
Nothing smells as good as napalm…from a distance.
Leorale
Hey, does this rag smell like chloroform to you?
Boom
Why yes it does, why do you a-
Wonder Wig
Napalm is what I use when my lips feel napped.
Mr. Random
I hate it when my lips fall asleep. Makes my face look like a squinting robot.
Cooledd
squinting robot or a duck face?
6Qubed
What if ducks are squinting robots…?
insomniac
That’s nabalm.
filias
and the bacon?
Neospector
Is still delicious, so life on Earth can continue.
Witch [Soul] of Heart
Still gross. Get it away from me.
cookie1995
It smells like Jelly Babies
Plasma Mongoose
The 4th Doctor would be all over that then. 😀
Dibullba
And yet it tastes like snozberries
molochmachine
It’s not really a moral dilemma –Joyce isn’t conflicted because of an internal moral quandary. She’s conflicted because she has been made to realise that this aspect of her already-problematic (but still steadfast) moral framework is absolutely incompatible with her much-needed social and emotional support network.
Ivan
Thank you for sharing your completed your thesis for your MSW – but I didn’t think using a comic strip instead of live beings was allowed!
molochmachine
Ah well, not everyone is into subtextual reading I guess 🙂
Nee Hou
If both Ethan and Joyce are ok with this effort/experiment , why is anyone else’s opinion matter, it’s none of their business!
They can just keep their noses out of Joyce’s & Ethan’s business- Just as they demand others keep their noses out of their business.
Life is a continual learning experience, let them learn in their own way.
ASmellyOgre
Truth hurts.
Count Dracula
Military scientists were working on a secret project to weaponize truth. It was deemed inhumane and the project was cancelled.
SUGauthor
The quest to weaponize jokes however, lives on
Gordon Blvd
we found that out last week with the flu shot LoLz
Robbie C
I can’t be the only one to want this relationship between Joyce and Ethan to work out, can I?
Sarah’s just a big meanie.
licoricepencil
Appropriate gravatar is appropriate.
vsophi
Why would you want it to work out? It’s been made abundantly clear that Ethan and Joyce are just using each other in a tragic show of mutual repression. I mean, they may actually like each other as, I dunno, good pals or something, but other than that…?
Robbie C
Because it’s exactly what each needs right now. It would be different if one of them was taking advantage of the other, but seems very unlikely considering the circumstances. Meanwhile you’ve got Amber and Sarah and Raidah’s pet goldfish trying to tear them apart.
ASmellyOgre
The only way I can see this being good for them is that it will tear these faulty ideas from their minds and crush them in the most violent way possible. Crude. Painful. But it will make them better in the end so long as they don’t get hurt too bad along the way and have their fragile psyches smashed in just the right way so that they get the right lessons out and not the wrong damage. But it could far more easily go horribly wrong.
vsophi
So you think they should just keep on with the relationship up to a certain point? You at least concede that any kind of long-term relationship would fuck them both up, yes?
Also, I’m skeptical of that claim. Maybe what they need is safety, but their mindset going in is fundamentally flawed in a very harmful way. In fact, it seems that any benefit they’d derive from the experience would be so much smaller than the detriment as to be negligible.
Leorale
They do need safety, but they could get that from, y’know, not dating anyone for a few months, during which they could work on their issues and get stronger. Instead, they’re putting themselves in a position that only perpetuates/enables/worsens each other’s issues. They’ll have no incentive to heal, and every incentive to keep the status quo so they can keep each other.
Robbie C
I mean, Joyce and Ethan are never going to get married. That’s a given. (Besides, how else would she wind up with Danny, her ultimate ship. *Crossing fingers.*) In the short term, though, they get what they need and might learn a thing or two to boot.
Seriously, you must have had a friend in a long-distance relationship that you wish you could shake and say, “You’re wasting you’re time! It’s never going to work out for you both.” Or maybe a friend you wish you could tell that her boyfriend just isn’t right for her.
They’re just teenagers. And as far as I’m concerned, as long as the relationship isn’t toxic (e.g. an abusive one), then I’m rooting for them.
Leorale
Conversion therapy *is* toxic.
vsophi
This. It’s been pretty much established at this point that Ethan and Joyce are going for a full “lifestyle” change.
Robbie C
Not if he requested it.
It’s not like he thinks being gay is wrong. And it’s not like he’s hiding it, either. He just doesn’t want to be defined by one characteristic of himself, and I can sympathize with that.
Leorale
Nopes, it’s toxic even if he requests it.
People can totally request things that are bad for them.
vsophi
He might not think it’s wrong, but he sure thinks being straight is preferable.
Logician
Reread what he says when angsting about it. He doesn’t want help working out how he’s going to deal with it, and finding out what kind of person he is. He wants help pretending it isn’t real, even to himself.
DarkVeghetta
There’s also this tiny chance that they do fall for each other, for reals. Funny thing is you can still be straight and fall for a guy under very unlikely circumstances (quite rare, but it can happen as sexuality isn’t 100% genes or 100% upbringing – it’s a tad more complicated and funny then that), or fall for a girl if you’re a gay guy. Marriage? Hell no. Satisfying relationship that eventually ends at some point due
to various reasons? Not impossible.
Even if above isn’t likely, having each other understand could still be very good for them – even if it will most likely crash and burn in a glorious way sooner or later. But hopefully the trauma thereof will force them to learn some valuable lessons.
Really, either option is likely to lead to character growth – so I’m ok with it.
ASmellyOgre
^ The entire reason your argument doesn’t work right there.
motorfirebox
What? Whoah, who brought up conversion therapy?
Regalli
Ethan wants to be in this relationship because it would be much easier if he were straight, and likes the idea that Joyce can, essentially, “cure” him. And likes the idea of calling it temptation because that makes it seem “easier and more manageable”. When he was talking to Joyce, he said about being gay that he wanted to lock it up and ignore it forever, and Joyce wants him to learn to resist “seemingly overwhelming temptations”.
So yes. Conversion therapy is basically what they’re trying to attempt.
Viredae
This, conversion therapy is toxic… But calling this conversion therapy is a mite pushing it.
Conversion therapy would be trying to force a square peg in a round hole, they’re not at that stage yet, it’s still at a stage of “I wonder if this square peg can fit in this round hole?”.
Basically, this hasn’t even come close to the escalation of conversion therapy yet.
vsophi
^ It’s working under the same harmful premise, though.
Leorale
True, it’s a bit early for me to be throwing around that term. I do think that’s where this is heading, though, and I think it’s going there quickly unless somebody puts a stop to it. Guess we’ll have to see!
Viredae
Oh it is heading there alright, that’s just storytelling 101.
motorfirebox
What Joyce and Ethan are discussing is not conversion therapy. Conversion therapy is when you take an LGBT person and try to make them straight. What Joyce and Ethan are discussing is refusing to indulge in a particular desire. There is a huge, huge, huge difference between those.
Li
This argument is predicated on the notion that Ethan doesn’t want to be straight, which I would say is inaccurate.
If all Ethan and Joyce wanted to do was repress their sexual desires, they wouldn’t be dating.
Mandy
Using a long distance relationship as an example of a terrible choice is a funny thing to do on the site of a webcomic artist who married his long distance girlfriend.
Just saying.
Petre Pan
This whole conversation is evidence of what Sarah says in the second-to-last panel. People in mainstream American society are NOT tolerant of anyone who deviates from the norm, whether that’s as an asexual, a gay person who voluntarily represses or changes, or a flying jellyfish with pancakes shooting out its face.
No one is tolerant. Everyone wants you to conform to their accepted lifestyle. It’s something I learned in the church, it’s something I learned in the LGBT community.
The end.
Flair
Sorry about the harsh things you’ve learned. They’re not really applicable here, though. Sarahis saying that most people think what Ethan and Joyce are doing is harmful, not that people aren’t tolerant of nonconformity.
Ethan struggles with his sexual orientation being the most prominent thing about him and with how hurt he is by the Amber situation. Joyce wants to have sex, but she has been brought up to believe that that’s wrong, so she faces an internal conflict. This isn’t about nonconformity at all; neither is choosing to do what they’re doing because it’s what they want. They’re just trying to avoid difficult problems.
As for your difficulties with the church and the LGBT community and nonconformity, I’m deeply sorry. In my neck of the woods, people aren’t like that; they’re very accepting, in fact. So please try not to make generalizations like “No one is tolerant.” That’s as dramatic as it is inaccurate.
motorfirebox
“Sarahis saying that most people think what Ethan and Joyce are doing is harmful, not that people aren’t tolerant of nonconformity.”
In many cases–and I think this is one of them–that’s simply an expression of intolerance. I mean, heck, one of the religious right’s go-to arguments against gay marriage is that it’s harmful–to kids, to traditional marriage, etcetera.
Li
It’s not intolerance.
The end.
AsimovSideburns
It’s not that we don’t tolerate those people–I won’t tolerate people who DON’T respect them.
It’s that we get upset when somebody is so far in denial that they’re hurting themselves.
If you’re gay/lesbian, or asexual, or ANYTHING, and you deny that part of you, refuse to accept it, that’s harmful.
vsophi
“a gay person who voluntarily represses”
The only reason I can think of for somebody to voluntarily repress is because of religion. Ethan is not religious (or at least, not devoutly), and he isn’t interested in changing himself to please God. He wants to ignore his sexuality.
KKoro
As far as I can tell, neither of them are trying to refuse their sexual desires because they’re being oppressed for them, so this doesn’t seem to be an issue of homophobia.
If Willis comes in and says that it’s homophobia, okay then the following is null, but -assuming that it’s not-…
I honestly see no issue with refusing to indulge sexual desires. Not only are we perfectly supportive of refusing to indulge other everyday desires, like eating meat or eating greens or being loud or even more violent fare, but on an anecdotal level, well, it seems to be working hella fine for me, compared to how much pointless drama my sexually active friends always seem to be going through — at the very least, I’ve never had to pretend to convert to a religion to impress someone, or stopped talking to someone completely because of hurt feelings.
Anecdotal, sure, but I fail to see how a choice that is not forced upon oneself and is done voluntarily can be claimed to be “inherently toxic”. Maybe I’m actually naturally asexual instead of just choosing to be, is how I get away with it, I dunno.
George
I think that Ethan’s motivation here cultural, not religious. It sounds like he’s afraid being openly gay would dominate his new circle of friends’ perception of him.
I suppose you could argue that the reason it would potentially be a big deal to his friends would be religion, but the underlying rationale probably matters to Ethan less than the effect on his relationship with them. It’s not *his* religious beliefs that are the issue here.
George
Whoops, I misread your second paragraph. We’re actually a lot more in agreement than I thought at first regarding Ethan’s lack of direct religious motivation.
Li
We don’t know what Ethan’s coming out experience was, other than that it was rough. We do know that he made a conscious decision to get himself another straight girl like Amber but this time just keep lying forever.
And by the way, it’s a huge stretch to claim that Ethan’s reasons are “cultural, not religious”. His reason is that being gay is seen as abnormal, and that is because of religion, nothing else. Specifically it’s because Judeo-Christianity is so deeply embedded in our society that we can hardly even see the distinction sometimes.
George
Since when have we needed religion to declare a minority group “abnormal”?
Chug
I’m with you. I’m asexual, and I’ve found even those from supposedly ‘tolerant’ groups are convinced I’m deluding myself. If Ethan thinks this will make him happy, who are we, or anyone else, to tell him that it’s not a way in which he’s *allowed* to be happy? You can say ‘I really don’t think this’ll make you happy’, but the comments here aren’t saying that, they amount to ‘If you’re happy doing something we disapprove of, you’re not really happy. It’s not allowed.” Whatever happened to ‘*I* am the master of my fate; *I* am the captain of my soul.”
Li
Sure. But you know, pattern recognition + the hover text on the strips where Joyce and Ethan got together? Those tell a different story.
Ethan isn’t asexual. He’s a gay man with a substantial sex drive, and we have all the reason in the world to think what they are doing is noooooot going to turn out well.
Nomes
I wouldn’t say that no one is tolerant, but your point is certainly valid. If your way-of-life doesn’t follow the norm – whatever that norm may be – then your choices are deemed unusual, weird, or even harmful. People are entitled to make their own choices, whether or not those choices seem “right” to anyone else. Especially when those choices don’t actually affect anyone else.
DarkVeghetta
“No one is tolerant. Everyone wants you to conform to their accepted lifestyle.” – it’s also perfectly normal, even wise, for a human being.
That sed, there are boundaries that come into play here. Thankfully, in this society only close friends get to have a say in such matters, so it’s much more manageable then the whole town having a say in it, the way it was handled just a few decades ago.
As far as I’m concerned it’s fine for the character’s friends to have a word with them, but not the whole damn world.
I suppose my point was that the quote is needlessly cynical. You’d want your friends to CARE, right? (If not, that’s a whole other can of bad worms that I won’t go into right now) Not so much so that they stop you
from doing shit, but enough to pinch in when they feel you need them to. In-comic I doubt anyone else will even know this is a thing, so a non issue there.
Marcos Dantas
“Because it’s exactly what each needs right now.”
That is what they want, but it is not what they need.
DarkVeghetta
These things have a habit of sorting themselves out, especially since it’s most likely not a sustainable [b]want[/b].
Charles RB
Exactly. This relationship is inevitably going to end badly, since it’s based on “I want to no longer be the thing I am and want to make it go away” and “I want to date someone who I know nothing will ever happen with (and save him from Teh Gay)”, and we know people will react with “WTF?!” when they see it. It’s as healthy as the plague.
motorfirebox
That might be true. I don’t think it’s necessarily true, though. To argue that the relationship is doomed because they’re not attracted to each other is to essentially call any relationship not based on sex doomed.
Li
But it IS based on sex. Specifically the repressing thereof. And also based on lies, e.g. the lie that being gay is wrong and that you can or should change your identity in order to be happy.
And relationships based on lies, especially ones we are telling ourselves, do not have a great track record.
DarkVeghetta
Which I’d be inclined to agree with. Doomed without sex that is, save for asexualls, which they are clearly not.
Even so, a little bit of happiness now and some trauma later will likely be good for them in the long run. Have at it kids, he’s a flamethrower. Go nuts.
Ivan
Technically… she could provide butt-sex inside the dorm if they used a sheet of plywood with a glory hole, and stuffed her mouth with a sock. She’d still be “virginic” and he’d still be hetero… with his eyes closed.
I mean, if you’re going to pretend you’re both doing each other a service, then at least provide the services!
DarkVeghetta
I agree with buttsecks. ALWAYS. NO EXCEPTIONS!