Yeah, big difference between being scrappy and being The Scrappy.
(I did not click that link because I need to get to bed before the sun rises)
ESM
Scrappy: A character who’s meant to be endearing but is just annoying
Mary isn’t a scrappy because we’re supposed to hate her. Becky isn’t a scrappy either, because a sizable chunk of the audience really likes her. Becky is more of a Vriska, in that she’s a divisive character some people really love and some people really hate
(And some people really hate just because she’s gay, but those people aren’t worth considering)
The Scrappies for me are Mary, Amber’s dad and step mom, Joyce’s mom, Ethan’s mom, Becky’s dad, Danny’s parents, Malaya in her worst days, Sal and Walky’s mom, the bigot’s at Joyce’s old church, Rachel when she give a cynical speech and Walkyverse Danny.
abysswatcher1993
Oh, and the rapist and the guy that tried to murder Marcie.
Freemage
Nah, most of those aren’t Scrappies. Remember, a key part of the Scrappy is that they are meant to be liked (or at least accepted) by the audience, but they ain’t, because they’re so damned annoying. Becky actually was viewed as “the Scrappy” by a lot of folks at various points, though the criticisms seem to have died down a bit lately.
Malaya might be a Scrappy; Rachel and Danny both at least approach that, though they have their admirers and supporters, too. The parents you name, Ryan the rapist, the douchebag who attacked Marcie–they’re all Hate Sinks.
Freemage
I think some folks have Roze as the Scrappy, though reluctantly–she has the ‘right’ views, but her manner and tactics are so abrasive that she rubs even the bleeding-heart hippies here (myself included) the wrong way.
thejeff
Yeah, villains can be Scrappies, but they have to be disliked as villains – you can hate them as people, but if most don’t enjoy them as antagonists, they can hit Scrappy status. As villains generally need to be overused.
Maybe Roz and Malaya? I’m not sure how much we’re actually supposed to like them. Their role is mostly as foils to the main characters. Even if they’re ‘right’, they’re not supposed to be liked.
Becky was seen by some that way – though she always had a stalwart contingent of defenders who really liked her. Carla makes a similar split. I think they’re more just polarizing than actual Scrappies. And honestly I think the Scrappy view of both is a misreading of the characters. They both are hard characters to get across I suspect since their surface presentation (goofy Becky and asshole Carla) is mostly a facade that covers all their real emotions.
Mostly though, it’s a good thing there aren’t any real Scrappies. The whole point of a Scrappy is that it’s a failure of a character. It’s a character who doesn’t get accepted as the author intended. In extreme case one that drives the audience away.
anonamousethatscurriesinthedarkness
Hand in Hand to driving the audience away is the author haveing a hissy fit and doing bad things to reader beloved characters because THEY liked this failure of a character too much and didn’t step back and look at it from the readers perspective.
Some would call that colon vision or some variant thereof.
ischemgeek
Roz is totally a Scrappy for me.
Becky used to be but is less so lately.
I would say Rachel also falls under the category for me.
ischemgeek
Admittedly I think Roz is intended to be grating right now.
Kitsune
A scrappy is a character you are supposed to like but don’t hate. If Roz’s hypocrisy was deliberate, she’d be a scrappy.
A lot of people having trouble with this, so quick reminder: Becky has not told Roz she plans to sabotage Robin’s campaign. She hasn’t told anyone that. Becky is pretending to campaign for real, and she’s actually doing a half-decent job of it by telling her friends, “Don’t worry, I control the message.”
Kind of like how so-called moderate Republicans told themselves Trump could be brought to heel.
I’m not speaking to Roz’s and Becky’s extremely stupid behavior here, but Roz is right to call Becky out over what seems like a very bad plan, and aggressively.
(Also Becky does not know politics and Roz does and Becky’s “I’m scrappy” is a sign of deep hubris.)
She didn’t. That’s the point. Becky has only stated to herself, “Haha, it’s no risk, Robin will never win.” She has never openly told anybody if that’s her plan.
She is not planning on Robin winning. We know that much. The rest is conjecture—but as long as she needs to keep pretending to actually campaign for Robin, Roz is going to be fully justified in calling her out for playing with fire.
Bicycle Bill
Nobody who was anybody thought Trump was going to win either.
GoblinScribe
This exactly. I do think it’s worth remembering that Robin is explicitly a bit of a Trump allegory/parody. Hell, didn’t Clinton’s campaign literally try to promote Trump early on, figuring he’d be an easy opponent to beat/that he’d “never actually win so who cares”?
I’m not saying Robin’s a mirror, but Willis could easily be going for a moral about the danger in taking Robin’s loss for granted and trying to profit from it.
daredaemon
Well 538 thought there was a very real possibility of it happening.
We just told ourselves they were wrong, and listened to Andrew Yang because he reassured us.
Oh and I said this earlier, but I’m getting really tired of Roz’s big role being “the privileged loudmouth leftist ally who talks over minorities”. We all know that that particular trope is very rarely performed by a woman of color in Indiana.
And you might wanna check the comic immediately after, where she clarifies that the “sabotage” is her controlling Robin’s message. 😛
Tan
So when you say “Becky has not told Roz she plans to sabotage Robin’s campaign” what you mean is “Becky has in fact told Roz she is actively sabotaging Robin’s campaign, but because I personally feel there is some chance Becky’s form of sabotage could backfire, that does not count as sabotage at all and therefore it is absolutely fair game for Roz to view Becky as a sellout fundie Republican shill and act accordingly despite direct plain words to the contrary”? Have I read you correctly?
GoblinScribe
You’re being a jerk.
Roz has been pretty clear that her concerns aren’t just with Becky’s background, but her lack of political experience, which could potentially lead to helping Robin more than she hurts. Roz is telling Becky, “Even if you mean well, Robin is better at this than you.”
Which Robin is.
Anyways, you aren’t actually engaging with what I’m saying, so I’ll leave you be. The “This is you hurr durr” line of argument isn’t really my scene. If you actually care to understand me, read my post more carefully, or read what I said to Sam below.
Tan
The first sentence of your opening post is a falsehood, on which you built the rest of your argument. You responded to correction with flippancy. I am merely attempting to emphasize the absurdity of your position based on a falsehood.
In an admittedly jerkish way, but hey, you didn’t say the specific words “Simon Says I’m sabotaging Robin’s campaign red rover red rover no takebacks”, so that’s allowed, right?
thejeff
Wait. Your argument is that Becky is trying to sabotage Robin’s already losing campaign but because she’s new to politics she could accidentally do something brilliant and save it?
And we’re expected to take this as a serious threat? Or take Roz seriously for believing it?
thejeff
I mean, it could work out, but if it does it’ll be because of “wacky Robin hijinks” not anything that makes sense.
In any kind of political reality, campaigning for a couple weeks as a radical leftist after a term (and months of campaigning) as a reactionary Republican doesn’t win elections, it just sinks you further. This isn’t even Trump’s laughable attempts at outreach to Hispanics, this is Trump handing his entire campaign over to an Immigrant rights group in the middle of October 2016.
Diagram for me how slamming a Republican’s platform to the left in as backwards a state as Indiana isn’t sabotage.
I’m not a fan of how Becky is acting here. Smug and shitty is never a good look. Period, end of sentence, don’t “Well, what about…?” me on this. But if Roz is the badass political operative/saboteur she clearly thinks of herself as, she should be able to see what Becky is doing without having it spelled out.
Robin is capable of great damage, yes. She is also insanely impulsive and easily manipulated. This could blow up in Becky’s face, but until now she had the high ground.
GoblinScribe
I think Becky’s “I control the messaging” is obfuscating it for Roz, and bear in mind, she’s running against a *Democrat* in Indiana. There’s really no telling who’s going to win in this race—a sort of ex-Republican who’s reaching to her opponent’s left and getting tons of media buzz, or a guy with “D” next to his name.
The only thing we know for sure is that Robin’s campaign was basically dead in the water. Now it’s a stick of dynamite in the water: Sure, Becky might destroy it even more, but Roz is upset that Becky’s taking the chance at all.
Roz is explicitly saying, “I know you think you’re good at this, but Robin is way better at politics than you think. She will use you. Clueless as she seems, Robin is better at politics than you.” That’s why Becky’s cockiness is a concern to Roz and I.
Roz is totally being a jerk, though. I said that in my OP.
GoblinScribe
I do wanna be clear here: Roz has basically two interpretations of what Becky is doing.
1. Becky is being sincere when she says “I control Robin’s messaging.” Becky actually believes she can make Robin a good congresswoman. Roz, who has dealt with her sister’s toxic control for years, thinks Becky is being cocky as fuck.
2. Becky is trying to “sabotage Robin’s campaign” even more than it already has been. This is a dumb idea. Robin was already in bad straits—there’s a reason she wants to bring Becky on. “Your tweets are the only thing people like about me.” There are dumber ways to give a campaign some adrenaline.
Oh, and the actual reason (which Roz doesn’t know) is that Becky is just praying that Robin’s loss is guaranteed so Becky can get herself things she needs. Becky doesn’t actually have any direct interest in sabotage—that’s not her motivation, it’s her excuse for doing this. No judgment, I’m just saying, it feels like people are really skewing around the facts of this here.
thejeff
Becky must have some motivation, because she’s been sabotaging Robin all along. She’s been using Robin’s hacked Twitter to spread a leftist message ever since Robin left Leslie’s.
Now she’s just getting paid for it. Getting paid hasn’t really changed what she’s doing.
Actually, she DID tell Roz. To her face. That she didn’t plan to unsabotage anything and was if anything, doing perpendicular sabotage. Roz refused to believe her based on her upbringing.
I just responded to this, but to expand—if Becky was openly saying, “I don’t plan for Robin to win,” why would she be making such a big deal about how she controls Robin’s messaging?
The answer is that she didn’t actually tell Roz she was trying to sabotage Robin’s campaign… at least, not fully. If you check out the comics in question, you’ll notice that immediately after, she clarifies her statement. Becky is using “sabotage” to mean “derail Robin’s issues and make her presentable”.
Because she’s trying to pretend she’s earnestly campaigning, remember? That’s also why she’s giving everyone in the dorm tweets supporting their pet issues.
The danger is that if she actually convinces everyone that she controls Robin’s messaging, she might accidentally succeed.
GoblinScribe
Succeed in getting people to vote for Robin, that is.
I think this scene is setting up Roz as the heel—too aggressive, too quick to leap to blows, too sensitive about her economic privilege—as a part of the “Pride comes before a fall” parable for Becky. Becky might successfully embarrass Roz here (and yeah, nothing there about the white girl who doesn’t know politics condescending to the brown girl who’s explicitly an expert on politics). The fall comes later.
Becky is not qualified to run a stealth sabotage race. Roz is right to warn her. Becky is playing with fire.
Zero
Roz is explicitly an expert according to herself.
ninja_jesus
Yeah, growing up with a politician for a sister and looking up politics on Google gives her just the minimum leg up on Becky, who’s never had either of those things in her life really.
GoblinScribe
… guys, who do you think Roz is?
Roz has spoken to Dorothy about how politics is an environment she was raised in. Roz is a staunch activist who willingly exposes herself to horrible online harassment for her beliefs (y’know, that thing that happens when women of color are both leftist and sexually open). She volunteers for Planned Parenthood in Indiana. A couple states over, she’d be at risk of getting carbombed for that.
Roz has a lot of flaws, but y’all seem to think she’s, like, an armchair activist all of a sudden. Roz puts in the time. She walks the walk.
ninja_jesus
Roz has not nearly put as much time as you think. I just did a cursory glance at the archive, and the conclusion I’ve reached is: She’s just a kid, man. She doles out unearned knowledge and is obtuse at times; the only real thing she’s done is put her body out on the internet as a protest. She’s just a kid and is as inexperienced as Becky is.
The idea that Roz is an experienced protester and advocate is a narrative that Roz herself has put out there. Whether or not she walks the walk really remains to be seen.
RacingTurtle
ninja_jesus, Roz really does do feminist activism like volunteering for Planned Parenthood in Indiana. Whatever else you may think of her, that is definitely walking the walk. We just don’t see her do it very often because none of the storylines have followed her there.
ninja_jesus
@RacingTurtle: Okay, I’ll admit that the Planned Parenthood volunteering is one thing she’s done as an activist. That and the sex tape protest are the only things she’s shown to have done, but a lot of her interactions with people are of her talking down to others and pushing her viewpoints over those with more experience. Until the story shows more of her efforts as an activist, I’m still of the opinion that she’s just a kid, with little experience and with more privilege than others; “legacy admission” seems to have hit a bullseye.
Sam
I do not see that as clarification, I see that as an entirely different statement. I see her stating she is sabotaging her and that she is in control of her message as two different aspects. At first I’m pretty sure Becky was trying to calm Roz down by going ‘I don’t plan to undo your work’ and ‘look, I can control her messaging alright, if you want something, just ask’ to try to prove to Roz that she’s willing to meet her halfway.
And now she’s just like ‘fuck it, you’re not listening to me at all so who gives a damn what you think, fuck off’. Also, I highly doubt Becky *can* succeed. She is literally the only person on staff with no experience and no true desire to help her win. Even if she could convince one floor, that’s like, how many people really? 30? Probably not enough to catch up with Robin’s opponent.
ninja_jesus
I believe Becky is also the only person on staff at all, if I remember correctly. Everyone else left.
thejeff
I think Robin still has Aide.
Admittedly, Aide is a lamp.
GoblinScribe
We’re kinda assuming that Robin is being totally honest about her plans for Becky. Roz is saying here that Robin is way better at manipulating people than we think. Roz would know.
Becky’s probably not just a campaign manager. She’s almost definitely a tool Robin plans to use. Robin’s not a criminal mastermind, but Roz is saying, “Hey, I grew up with this woman, and she’s better at this than you assume.”
Roz’s alarm isn’t unwarranted. It seems to be built on her own experiences with Robin.
thejeff
Maybe it’s just that I have a lot of trouble reading Robin that way. Robin’s good at manipulating people in the sense that she just rolls right over them and imposes her gaslit distortion of reality on them. She’s shown no signs of being subtle at all. Roz may not actually be the best judge of Robin, precisely because she grew up in the middle of that tornado.
Out of everyone who’s interacted with Robin, Becky’s come out of it best. When they met at Leslie’s and Leslie finally threw her out, she apologized to Becky for using her to try to appeal to Robin’s humanity and Becky said something like “Is that what we were doing? I was hacking her phone.”
GoblinScribe
Anyways, Sam, you have a valid read, but my reading is that the “sabotage” was, at best, a throwaway line that Becky did not immediately clarify for Roz’s benefit.
And is Becky listening to Roz? She’s mocking and dismissing everything Roz says. Neither of them are listening to each other. That’s… kind of the point here. Becky is being obtuse and Roz is bringing her baggage dealing with her sister.
See, now I’m wondering about the DeSantoses finances all over again. I got the impression from Shortpacked that they didn’t have much money and I was under the impression the same was true in this verse (mostly because Roz saying things like them being excessively numerous and her having to bankrupt herself at the holidays), at least before Robin got elected. Roz isn’t paid by Planned Parenthood, though if you take Willis’ tumblr as canon, she’s a sex columnist at the school newspaper and apparently their writers DO get paid, so. I dunno where I’m going with this.
And with that, I’m out. Mostly because I need to go to bed early and wake up early, and partly because jesus god, this conversation is turning the comment section into a clusterfuck.
Roz can’t have been the sex columnist for the paper for long, though; Daisy mentioned hiring her as a result of her video with Joe.
It’s also possible for rich families to not give their kids big allowances, in a “that’ll teach them the value of a penny” sort of way, and still make sure they get into good colleges. Then again, according to Dorothy, at least, this isn’t that great a college, so how great is being a legacy there anyway?
Well, if being in financial straights is defined by not getting all of your children into Havard, most of the world is. If you have a number of children, you don’t need to be in financial straights to decide to give all of the an in-state education. Or you have to play favorites and I don’t really expect the DeSantos to do that.
Eve
“Or you have to play favorites and I don’t really expect the DeSantos to do that.” Didn’t they kick out Robin in both this verse and dumbiverse? That seems exactly like a family that would play favorites.
Sunny
It’s “straits”, not “straights”. A strait is a narrow waterway where you have few or no options for maneuvering. The word is often used as a metaphor for being in any situation where you can’t afford flexibility, e.g. because your income is just enough to cover the essentials of life.
Maybe it’s the fact Robin at least had someone to sign loans and Becky didn’t? Legacy being just as true of an “insult” as Becky being a fundie shut in? Pointing out a small privilege and also hinting at a motivation for Becky? No clue. Not really liking Becky’s turn around, even if it’s on brand and a little deserved. This could have been her chance to bond over mutual fears or at least see she’s not alon. Becky needs her happy mask though.
Eh, Roz doesn’t really seem like the type to bond from what I’ve seen. I mean, have we seen her act non-confrontationally towards ANYONE thus far?
Heck, given what happened between her and Joe (uploading a sex tape without the other person’s consent is a shitty thing to do, and IIRC, Joe had no idea she was going to upload it even though he knew he was being filmed), it’s even possible that she’s the type of person who just uses others as convenient for them, though I don’t know that there’s enough corroborating evidence elsewhere in the story to really say for certain.
287 thoughts on “Scrappy”
Ana Chronistic
Dotty: “Roz, just walk away”
Becky: “OH I HAVE NEVER WANTED TO *NOT* BACK DOWN SO HARD AS RIGHT HECKIN’ NOW”
Ana Chronistic
Becky sure is brave to admit to being The Scrappy
Batz
Ha!
NICE!
geno
Isn’t Mary the scrappy? She definitely seems like the scrappy
motorfirebox
Naw, Mary’s the hatesink.
Schpoonman
Yeah, big difference between being scrappy and being The Scrappy.
(I did not click that link because I need to get to bed before the sun rises)
ESM
Scrappy: A character who’s meant to be endearing but is just annoying
Mary isn’t a scrappy because we’re supposed to hate her. Becky isn’t a scrappy either, because a sizable chunk of the audience really likes her. Becky is more of a Vriska, in that she’s a divisive character some people really love and some people really hate
(And some people really hate just because she’s gay, but those people aren’t worth considering)
Deadjolras
So Becky would be a Base Breaker?
Hoboturtle
Hahaha, I kind of want Base Breaker to be called “The Vriska” from now on.
abysswatcher1993
The Scrappies for me are Mary, Amber’s dad and step mom, Joyce’s mom, Ethan’s mom, Becky’s dad, Danny’s parents, Malaya in her worst days, Sal and Walky’s mom, the bigot’s at Joyce’s old church, Rachel when she give a cynical speech and Walkyverse Danny.
abysswatcher1993
Oh, and the rapist and the guy that tried to murder Marcie.
Freemage
Nah, most of those aren’t Scrappies. Remember, a key part of the Scrappy is that they are meant to be liked (or at least accepted) by the audience, but they ain’t, because they’re so damned annoying. Becky actually was viewed as “the Scrappy” by a lot of folks at various points, though the criticisms seem to have died down a bit lately.
Malaya might be a Scrappy; Rachel and Danny both at least approach that, though they have their admirers and supporters, too. The parents you name, Ryan the rapist, the douchebag who attacked Marcie–they’re all Hate Sinks.
Freemage
I think some folks have Roze as the Scrappy, though reluctantly–she has the ‘right’ views, but her manner and tactics are so abrasive that she rubs even the bleeding-heart hippies here (myself included) the wrong way.
thejeff
Yeah, villains can be Scrappies, but they have to be disliked as villains – you can hate them as people, but if most don’t enjoy them as antagonists, they can hit Scrappy status. As villains generally need to be overused.
Maybe Roz and Malaya? I’m not sure how much we’re actually supposed to like them. Their role is mostly as foils to the main characters. Even if they’re ‘right’, they’re not supposed to be liked.
Becky was seen by some that way – though she always had a stalwart contingent of defenders who really liked her. Carla makes a similar split. I think they’re more just polarizing than actual Scrappies. And honestly I think the Scrappy view of both is a misreading of the characters. They both are hard characters to get across I suspect since their surface presentation (goofy Becky and asshole Carla) is mostly a facade that covers all their real emotions.
Mostly though, it’s a good thing there aren’t any real Scrappies. The whole point of a Scrappy is that it’s a failure of a character. It’s a character who doesn’t get accepted as the author intended. In extreme case one that drives the audience away.
anonamousethatscurriesinthedarkness
Hand in Hand to driving the audience away is the author haveing a hissy fit and doing bad things to reader beloved characters because THEY liked this failure of a character too much and didn’t step back and look at it from the readers perspective.
Some would call that colon vision or some variant thereof.
ischemgeek
Roz is totally a Scrappy for me.
Becky used to be but is less so lately.
I would say Rachel also falls under the category for me.
ischemgeek
Admittedly I think Roz is intended to be grating right now.
Kitsune
A scrappy is a character you are supposed to like but don’t hate. If Roz’s hypocrisy was deliberate, she’d be a scrappy.
Kitsune
I meant to say “Wasn’t” not “Was”
Doctor_Who
Dorothy, at this point just tell them no holds, nothing below the belt, and ring the bell.
Bagge
Dorothy: “AND NO BITI….”
Roz and Becky, both with their teeth firmly lodged in the other’s leg: “Wffff?”
Dorothy: “…never mind.”
William Leonard Reese Jr.
*laughs* Man Becky just went right for the jugular against Roz’s pride huh? I’m proud of her.
Bagge
Yup. Poor Roz REALLY didn’t see that one coming.
GoblinScribe
A lot of people having trouble with this, so quick reminder: Becky has not told Roz she plans to sabotage Robin’s campaign. She hasn’t told anyone that. Becky is pretending to campaign for real, and she’s actually doing a half-decent job of it by telling her friends, “Don’t worry, I control the message.”
Kind of like how so-called moderate Republicans told themselves Trump could be brought to heel.
I’m not speaking to Roz’s and Becky’s extremely stupid behavior here, but Roz is right to call Becky out over what seems like a very bad plan, and aggressively.
(Also Becky does not know politics and Roz does and Becky’s “I’m scrappy” is a sign of deep hubris.)
laladoria
Can you please reference where Becky said she was going to sabotage it?
GoblinScribe
She didn’t. That’s the point. Becky has only stated to herself, “Haha, it’s no risk, Robin will never win.” She has never openly told anybody if that’s her plan.
She is not planning on Robin winning. We know that much. The rest is conjecture—but as long as she needs to keep pretending to actually campaign for Robin, Roz is going to be fully justified in calling her out for playing with fire.
Bicycle Bill
Nobody who was anybody thought Trump was going to win either.
GoblinScribe
This exactly. I do think it’s worth remembering that Robin is explicitly a bit of a Trump allegory/parody. Hell, didn’t Clinton’s campaign literally try to promote Trump early on, figuring he’d be an easy opponent to beat/that he’d “never actually win so who cares”?
I’m not saying Robin’s a mirror, but Willis could easily be going for a moral about the danger in taking Robin’s loss for granted and trying to profit from it.
daredaemon
Well 538 thought there was a very real possibility of it happening.
We just told ourselves they were wrong, and listened to Andrew Yang because he reassured us.
At least that’s what I did.
Pablo360
“…and I don’t want to succeed…”
Pablo360
aw dangit, one missing = broke the HTML. Here’s the raw link: http://www.dumbingofage.com/2019/comic/book-9-comic/04-vote-for-robin/plunge/
jmsr7
Lol, actually the general consensus is that panel 2 was Trump’s attitude. Remember he viewed his run for president as primarily a marketing stunt.
Pablo360
What consensus? That’s a fringe theory. He’s run before.
GoblinScribe
Oh and I said this earlier, but I’m getting really tired of Roz’s big role being “the privileged loudmouth leftist ally who talks over minorities”. We all know that that particular trope is very rarely performed by a woman of color in Indiana.
Tan
You might wanna check the last panel of http://www.dumbingofage.com/2019/comic/book-9-comic/04-vote-for-robin/wrangled/ again.
GoblinScribe
And you might wanna check the comic immediately after, where she clarifies that the “sabotage” is her controlling Robin’s message. 😛
Tan
So when you say “Becky has not told Roz she plans to sabotage Robin’s campaign” what you mean is “Becky has in fact told Roz she is actively sabotaging Robin’s campaign, but because I personally feel there is some chance Becky’s form of sabotage could backfire, that does not count as sabotage at all and therefore it is absolutely fair game for Roz to view Becky as a sellout fundie Republican shill and act accordingly despite direct plain words to the contrary”? Have I read you correctly?
GoblinScribe
You’re being a jerk.
Roz has been pretty clear that her concerns aren’t just with Becky’s background, but her lack of political experience, which could potentially lead to helping Robin more than she hurts. Roz is telling Becky, “Even if you mean well, Robin is better at this than you.”
Which Robin is.
Anyways, you aren’t actually engaging with what I’m saying, so I’ll leave you be. The “This is you hurr durr” line of argument isn’t really my scene. If you actually care to understand me, read my post more carefully, or read what I said to Sam below.
Tan
The first sentence of your opening post is a falsehood, on which you built the rest of your argument. You responded to correction with flippancy. I am merely attempting to emphasize the absurdity of your position based on a falsehood.
In an admittedly jerkish way, but hey, you didn’t say the specific words “Simon Says I’m sabotaging Robin’s campaign red rover red rover no takebacks”, so that’s allowed, right?
thejeff
Wait. Your argument is that Becky is trying to sabotage Robin’s already losing campaign but because she’s new to politics she could accidentally do something brilliant and save it?
And we’re expected to take this as a serious threat? Or take Roz seriously for believing it?
thejeff
I mean, it could work out, but if it does it’ll be because of “wacky Robin hijinks” not anything that makes sense.
In any kind of political reality, campaigning for a couple weeks as a radical leftist after a term (and months of campaigning) as a reactionary Republican doesn’t win elections, it just sinks you further. This isn’t even Trump’s laughable attempts at outreach to Hispanics, this is Trump handing his entire campaign over to an Immigrant rights group in the middle of October 2016.
Schpoonman
Diagram for me how slamming a Republican’s platform to the left in as backwards a state as Indiana isn’t sabotage.
I’m not a fan of how Becky is acting here. Smug and shitty is never a good look. Period, end of sentence, don’t “Well, what about…?” me on this. But if Roz is the badass political operative/saboteur she clearly thinks of herself as, she should be able to see what Becky is doing without having it spelled out.
Robin is capable of great damage, yes. She is also insanely impulsive and easily manipulated. This could blow up in Becky’s face, but until now she had the high ground.
GoblinScribe
I think Becky’s “I control the messaging” is obfuscating it for Roz, and bear in mind, she’s running against a *Democrat* in Indiana. There’s really no telling who’s going to win in this race—a sort of ex-Republican who’s reaching to her opponent’s left and getting tons of media buzz, or a guy with “D” next to his name.
The only thing we know for sure is that Robin’s campaign was basically dead in the water. Now it’s a stick of dynamite in the water: Sure, Becky might destroy it even more, but Roz is upset that Becky’s taking the chance at all.
Roz is explicitly saying, “I know you think you’re good at this, but Robin is way better at politics than you think. She will use you. Clueless as she seems, Robin is better at politics than you.” That’s why Becky’s cockiness is a concern to Roz and I.
Roz is totally being a jerk, though. I said that in my OP.
GoblinScribe
I do wanna be clear here: Roz has basically two interpretations of what Becky is doing.
1. Becky is being sincere when she says “I control Robin’s messaging.” Becky actually believes she can make Robin a good congresswoman. Roz, who has dealt with her sister’s toxic control for years, thinks Becky is being cocky as fuck.
2. Becky is trying to “sabotage Robin’s campaign” even more than it already has been. This is a dumb idea. Robin was already in bad straits—there’s a reason she wants to bring Becky on. “Your tweets are the only thing people like about me.” There are dumber ways to give a campaign some adrenaline.
Oh, and the actual reason (which Roz doesn’t know) is that Becky is just praying that Robin’s loss is guaranteed so Becky can get herself things she needs. Becky doesn’t actually have any direct interest in sabotage—that’s not her motivation, it’s her excuse for doing this. No judgment, I’m just saying, it feels like people are really skewing around the facts of this here.
thejeff
Becky must have some motivation, because she’s been sabotaging Robin all along. She’s been using Robin’s hacked Twitter to spread a leftist message ever since Robin left Leslie’s.
Now she’s just getting paid for it. Getting paid hasn’t really changed what she’s doing.
Sam
Actually, she DID tell Roz. To her face. That she didn’t plan to unsabotage anything and was if anything, doing perpendicular sabotage. Roz refused to believe her based on her upbringing.
GoblinScribe
I just responded to this, but to expand—if Becky was openly saying, “I don’t plan for Robin to win,” why would she be making such a big deal about how she controls Robin’s messaging?
The answer is that she didn’t actually tell Roz she was trying to sabotage Robin’s campaign… at least, not fully. If you check out the comics in question, you’ll notice that immediately after, she clarifies her statement. Becky is using “sabotage” to mean “derail Robin’s issues and make her presentable”.
Because she’s trying to pretend she’s earnestly campaigning, remember? That’s also why she’s giving everyone in the dorm tweets supporting their pet issues.
The danger is that if she actually convinces everyone that she controls Robin’s messaging, she might accidentally succeed.
GoblinScribe
Succeed in getting people to vote for Robin, that is.
I think this scene is setting up Roz as the heel—too aggressive, too quick to leap to blows, too sensitive about her economic privilege—as a part of the “Pride comes before a fall” parable for Becky. Becky might successfully embarrass Roz here (and yeah, nothing there about the white girl who doesn’t know politics condescending to the brown girl who’s explicitly an expert on politics). The fall comes later.
Becky is not qualified to run a stealth sabotage race. Roz is right to warn her. Becky is playing with fire.
Zero
Roz is explicitly an expert according to herself.
ninja_jesus
Yeah, growing up with a politician for a sister and looking up politics on Google gives her just the minimum leg up on Becky, who’s never had either of those things in her life really.
GoblinScribe
… guys, who do you think Roz is?
Roz has spoken to Dorothy about how politics is an environment she was raised in. Roz is a staunch activist who willingly exposes herself to horrible online harassment for her beliefs (y’know, that thing that happens when women of color are both leftist and sexually open). She volunteers for Planned Parenthood in Indiana. A couple states over, she’d be at risk of getting carbombed for that.
Roz has a lot of flaws, but y’all seem to think she’s, like, an armchair activist all of a sudden. Roz puts in the time. She walks the walk.
ninja_jesus
Roz has not nearly put as much time as you think. I just did a cursory glance at the archive, and the conclusion I’ve reached is: She’s just a kid, man. She doles out unearned knowledge and is obtuse at times; the only real thing she’s done is put her body out on the internet as a protest. She’s just a kid and is as inexperienced as Becky is.
The idea that Roz is an experienced protester and advocate is a narrative that Roz herself has put out there. Whether or not she walks the walk really remains to be seen.
RacingTurtle
ninja_jesus, Roz really does do feminist activism like volunteering for Planned Parenthood in Indiana. Whatever else you may think of her, that is definitely walking the walk. We just don’t see her do it very often because none of the storylines have followed her there.
ninja_jesus
@RacingTurtle: Okay, I’ll admit that the Planned Parenthood volunteering is one thing she’s done as an activist. That and the sex tape protest are the only things she’s shown to have done, but a lot of her interactions with people are of her talking down to others and pushing her viewpoints over those with more experience. Until the story shows more of her efforts as an activist, I’m still of the opinion that she’s just a kid, with little experience and with more privilege than others; “legacy admission” seems to have hit a bullseye.
Sam
I do not see that as clarification, I see that as an entirely different statement. I see her stating she is sabotaging her and that she is in control of her message as two different aspects. At first I’m pretty sure Becky was trying to calm Roz down by going ‘I don’t plan to undo your work’ and ‘look, I can control her messaging alright, if you want something, just ask’ to try to prove to Roz that she’s willing to meet her halfway.
And now she’s just like ‘fuck it, you’re not listening to me at all so who gives a damn what you think, fuck off’. Also, I highly doubt Becky *can* succeed. She is literally the only person on staff with no experience and no true desire to help her win. Even if she could convince one floor, that’s like, how many people really? 30? Probably not enough to catch up with Robin’s opponent.
ninja_jesus
I believe Becky is also the only person on staff at all, if I remember correctly. Everyone else left.
thejeff
I think Robin still has Aide.
Admittedly, Aide is a lamp.
GoblinScribe
We’re kinda assuming that Robin is being totally honest about her plans for Becky. Roz is saying here that Robin is way better at manipulating people than we think. Roz would know.
Becky’s probably not just a campaign manager. She’s almost definitely a tool Robin plans to use. Robin’s not a criminal mastermind, but Roz is saying, “Hey, I grew up with this woman, and she’s better at this than you assume.”
Roz’s alarm isn’t unwarranted. It seems to be built on her own experiences with Robin.
thejeff
Maybe it’s just that I have a lot of trouble reading Robin that way. Robin’s good at manipulating people in the sense that she just rolls right over them and imposes her gaslit distortion of reality on them. She’s shown no signs of being subtle at all. Roz may not actually be the best judge of Robin, precisely because she grew up in the middle of that tornado.
Out of everyone who’s interacted with Robin, Becky’s come out of it best. When they met at Leslie’s and Leslie finally threw her out, she apologized to Becky for using her to try to appeal to Robin’s humanity and Becky said something like “Is that what we were doing? I was hacking her phone.”
GoblinScribe
Anyways, Sam, you have a valid read, but my reading is that the “sabotage” was, at best, a throwaway line that Becky did not immediately clarify for Roz’s benefit.
And is Becky listening to Roz? She’s mocking and dismissing everything Roz says. Neither of them are listening to each other. That’s… kind of the point here. Becky is being obtuse and Roz is bringing her baggage dealing with her sister.
Tan
I wish to build a shrine to that burn.
Sunny
I know. “Sick” hardly begins to cover it. That was like the black death of burns.
BBCC
See, now I’m wondering about the DeSantoses finances all over again. I got the impression from Shortpacked that they didn’t have much money and I was under the impression the same was true in this verse (mostly because Roz saying things like them being excessively numerous and her having to bankrupt herself at the holidays), at least before Robin got elected. Roz isn’t paid by Planned Parenthood, though if you take Willis’ tumblr as canon, she’s a sex columnist at the school newspaper and apparently their writers DO get paid, so. I dunno where I’m going with this.
And with that, I’m out. Mostly because I need to go to bed early and wake up early, and partly because jesus god, this conversation is turning the comment section into a clusterfuck.
geno
These are different universe. In Shortpacked they may have experienced financial hardships while they were wealthy over here
BBCC
That’s why I said assumed, past tense.
Eve
But is there any evidence of them being wealthy in this universe?
Rabid Rabbit
Roz can’t have been the sex columnist for the paper for long, though; Daisy mentioned hiring her as a result of her video with Joe.
It’s also possible for rich families to not give their kids big allowances, in a “that’ll teach them the value of a penny” sort of way, and still make sure they get into good colleges. Then again, according to Dorothy, at least, this isn’t that great a college, so how great is being a legacy there anyway?
CJ
Well, if being in financial straights is defined by not getting all of your children into Havard, most of the world is. If you have a number of children, you don’t need to be in financial straights to decide to give all of the an in-state education. Or you have to play favorites and I don’t really expect the DeSantos to do that.
Eve
“Or you have to play favorites and I don’t really expect the DeSantos to do that.” Didn’t they kick out Robin in both this verse and dumbiverse? That seems exactly like a family that would play favorites.
Sunny
It’s “straits”, not “straights”. A strait is a narrow waterway where you have few or no options for maneuvering. The word is often used as a metaphor for being in any situation where you can’t afford flexibility, e.g. because your income is just enough to cover the essentials of life.
thejeff
The sex video was early in this semester – the first week, I think.
Given that she’s a freshman she’s been working that job about as long as could reasonably be expected.
Seregiel
Maybe it’s the fact Robin at least had someone to sign loans and Becky didn’t? Legacy being just as true of an “insult” as Becky being a fundie shut in? Pointing out a small privilege and also hinting at a motivation for Becky? No clue. Not really liking Becky’s turn around, even if it’s on brand and a little deserved. This could have been her chance to bond over mutual fears or at least see she’s not alon. Becky needs her happy mask though.
Woden
Eh, Roz doesn’t really seem like the type to bond from what I’ve seen. I mean, have we seen her act non-confrontationally towards ANYONE thus far?
Heck, given what happened between her and Joe (uploading a sex tape without the other person’s consent is a shitty thing to do, and IIRC, Joe had no idea she was going to upload it even though he knew he was being filmed), it’s even possible that she’s the type of person who just uses others as convenient for them, though I don’t know that there’s enough corroborating evidence elsewhere in the story to really say for certain.