Sudden thought: wouldn’t it be interesting if the actual word bongo was replaced with something else so we know whether people are self-censoring or not?
thejeff
Maybe he could replace percussion instrument with percussion instrument.
Heavensrun
But then how do you know if they’re self-censoring, or self-censoring their self-censor?
Rowen Morland
Wait. Have people not been typing bongo on purpose all this time?
thejeff
Well, people have been typing bongo on purpose too. Some have even been censoring their bongoes//
Felgraf
A word that rhymes with “witch” and can also mean “female canine” is autocensored/corrected to bongo. =D
(In the interest of Full Disclosure: the main pieces of pop music running through my mind these days have been Mick Jagger’s “Hard Woman”, Streisand and Summer’s “Enough Is Enough”, and The Monkees’ “Auntie Grizelda”. But these are NOT on the hacked Muzak tonight, as a service to YOU.)
There’s a history there. People were using a particular word to describe Roz, I believe when she had a go at Joyce. DW didn’t particularly like that (I feel like some of the comments were rather unpleasant), so he introduced a filter for that word. And now it’s just sort of part of the culture of the comment section.
There are or were a few others. Mostly not actual curse words, just things that got annoyingly overused.
I think “For me it was Tuesday” is still censored.
Sadly, “SJW” isn’t, cause I liked that one.
thejeff
Apparently not.
Jason
What was the censor for SJW?
thejeff
“glistening phallus”, IIRC.
barefootbiker
Is “For me it was Tuesday” the censored version? Or has it, too, been de-censitized?
Aw, don’t lump Malaya in with that! She’s got a (very) prickly exterior, but is still a decent person. Mary’s a hypocrite who’s convinced SHE’S the Best Possible Person Ever and only those who live up to HER standards are even remotely worth dealing with. Given that the only things that have changed from the Walkyverse are ages and aliens, there’s a little something from Mary’s high school years that I just can’t WAIT to come out here. If only to see her try to justify it.
Wait, how is Malaya a decent person? Carla is a decent person with a prickly exterior, Malaya shines a light in someones eyes and says they’re the jerk.
She’s absolutely a jerk, but “being abrasive and unpleasant to interact with” still leaves Malaya MILES above Mary’s grab bag of aggressive, bigotry-fueled cruelty and willingness to push someone towards suicide.
Malaya isn’t nice, friendly, polite, gracious, or pleasant, but “basic decency” is something she has on Mary.
Jason
I feel like what “basic decency” means to us is something that could be heavily discussed. I mean, to me, being actively malicious to vulnerable people isn’t a “lack of basic decency”- it’s being an asshole. It’s basic decency- to me- to be polite because that helps ensure other people’s days are a little less shitty. It’s basic decency to NOT be actively antagonistic to people just because. That’s my concept of it- which Malaya fails.
But it sounds like the term means something different to you. Which, to be clear, I’m not criticising! That’s the nature of language- there’s a lot of nuance, and what we mean by the same words often doesn’t align perfectly.
TemperaryObsessor
You mean isn’t just a lack of basic decency, but also actively being an asshole. Basic decency is one of those phrases that does mean different things to different people. I think it means either getting a D or a C in the decent human behavior lab, and everyone has slightly different grading scales.
And yea Malaya may not be Mary levels of evil but do I think she sort of lacks basic decency as well.
…Malaya is convinced that no one actually likes or cares about anything, so she hates everyone in the world for being a bunch of posers. How is that decent?
Huehuetotl
So she’s an angsty 18 year old. That makes her myopic, not evil.
TemperaryObsessor
Until she stands on some ones foot they tell her to get off and she gets into this debate where she claims they only pretend they want her to stop standing on there foot because they are a bunch of posers instead of getting off there foot.
Les Moore
Their their – have some commas: , , ,
N0083rp00F
Their what? Please tell us
[I do the same thing when not paying attention to auto-correct]
The fact that people see any kind of moral equivalency between Mary and Malaya – and Mike, for that matter – somewhat disturbs me. Y’all realize that the worst Malaya has done is be kind of inconsiderate and rude to other people, whereas Mary & Mike have LITERALLY tried to destroy people’s lives. So why are they lumped together? It’s probably because their names all start with the letter M, right?
They could be referring to Mike’s Ethan/Danny plot – which technically so far is just an attempt.
Jason
Shagging someone’s crush doesn’t deserve to be in the same category as actively and purposefully worsening someone’s depression. Or implying that she wanted to have a hand in CARLA DYING. A crush getting with someone else is a long way from “life ruining”.
thejeff
Purposefully doing it to “turn the other into a jealous whimpering mess” goes a little beyond “a crush getting with someone else.
It’s still a step below Mary’s blackmail, if only because Danny isn’t suffering from suicidal depression.
Jason
Sure, Mike isn’t going to win any saint awards with his behaviour, but the phrasing was that Mike and Mary have actively tried to ruin people’s lives. Mike sure as hell isn’t trying to do right by either Danny or Ethan, but trying to hurt someone isn’t the same as trying to ruin their lives. Those are extremely strong words.
Unusually Angry Hippie
I think mike actually considers what he does to be for peoples own good, or at least, tries to rig things to make sure that could be used as a fairly true argument in his defense after the fact. I bet nothing gets his rocks off like making someone miserable only to be thanked for it after the fact.
Ok, y’all are getting hung up on the wrong thing. Mike and Mary don’t have moral equivalency, fine. I think Mike’s less terrible too.
The point I’m trying to make is about people saying *Malaya* and Mary are both equally bad when one of them’s surly and misanthropic and the other one is literally trying to ruin other people out of bigotry.
Joyfulldreams
Mike – An asshole. (Self-aware.)
Malaya – As asshole. (Arguably? Not self-aware.)
Mary – Literally evil
I suppose it’s kind of up to the individual whether you think the mike brand of assholery is better or worse than the Malaya brand. Personally, I think they’re pretty much equal, but in different ways. It balances out.
Joyfulldreams
And now I’m thinking about Mike and Malaya as like a yin/yang pair of assholery. The idea of the two of them trying to asshole at each other and the kind of bizarre infinite mobius double reach-around that would occur has me extremely amused.
Unusually Angry Hippie
I ship it?
N0083rp00F
A submarine of the Victoria Class?
Belches diesel. Needs lots of work. Elicits highly emotional responses from those all around. Still manages to get things done.
thejeff
I’d say Mike’s worse. Just because he’s more active. Self-aware, as you say, and sneakier and always plotting.
Malaya’s a jerk and I wouldn’t hang out with her, but if our paths crossed I wouldn’t be worrying about whether every interaction was some new way to torment me.
See, I guess this is the difference. I feel like I would enjoy hanging out with Malaya. She seems essentially harmless to me, in a bark-is-worse-than-her-bite kind of way. But then, I do tend to have a soft spot for pessimistic, sarcastic ladies who speak their minds.
Sam
Morally, Mary is definitely the worst. I still hate Malaya the most though because her way of being abrasive needlessly really just infuriates me so on an emotional level.
Mike told Amber that she’s destined to become like her father.
In my book that’s far worse than his current shenanigans.
Unusually Angry Hippie
Could you find that panel and link it for me? If it’s the one I’m thinking of, he never told her she was destined for anything(Mike definitely doesn’t do ‘destiny’), he merely made a true(if hurtful) observation about her interactions.
Panel three has the “doomed to follow your parents’ pattern” line. It’s not completely overt, but the implication is definitely there, IMO.
cbwroses
That’s just Mike rolling her own logic. He doesn’t state that he agrees with anything she says, only saying that IF she’s right, then X would be the result.
If she turned around and stopped comparing her relationships to her parents, I don’t get the impression he’d try to convince her that she was right the first time.
Shen Hibiki
I see him as basically saying “Either you’re like your dad, or realize your logic to make no sense, and be your own self”.
I hear him sayng those lines in a sarcastic tone, almost like someone “agreeing” with someone else’s horoscope xD
This isn’t the scenario here, but it reminds me of a time in high school where two people I really disliked started dating. My closest friends and I were thrilled about it because them dating each other meant that they weren’t making the people we actually liked miserable.
You sat next to someone unpleasant? Not sure what “that” is pointing to. At first I thought you meant two people started dating, but that isn’t something that happened to you, so I dunno.
266 thoughts on “Recognize”
FLUFFYWOLF
At last, Malaya’s bongoiness finds a useful outlet.
FLUFFYWOLF
…I feel like I should’ve seen that censoring coming somehow
Techhead
Hindsight’s a bongo, isn’t it?
Hana
Sudden thought: wouldn’t it be interesting if the actual word bongo was replaced with something else so we know whether people are self-censoring or not?
thejeff
Maybe he could replace percussion instrument with percussion instrument.
Heavensrun
But then how do you know if they’re self-censoring, or self-censoring their self-censor?
Rowen Morland
Wait. Have people not been typing bongo on purpose all this time?
thejeff
Well, people have been typing bongo on purpose too. Some have even been censoring their bongoes//
Felgraf
A word that rhymes with “witch” and can also mean “female canine” is autocensored/corrected to bongo. =D
Adam Black
I read that as “boingoness” —which is an awesome way to beat the censor
Stephen Bierce
…”Get a new MasterCard at Bongovia National Bank”…
Stephen Bierce
(In the interest of Full Disclosure: the main pieces of pop music running through my mind these days have been Mick Jagger’s “Hard Woman”, Streisand and Summer’s “Enough Is Enough”, and The Monkees’ “Auntie Grizelda”. But these are NOT on the hacked Muzak tonight, as a service to YOU.)
Stu
bongo bongo bongo I don’t wanna see the citch no more?
geno
Wow I always thought people were doing that themselves. Doesn’t seem like any other curse words get censored
Deanatay
nope, just the one!
Jason
There’s a history there. People were using a particular word to describe Roz, I believe when she had a go at Joyce. DW didn’t particularly like that (I feel like some of the comments were rather unpleasant), so he introduced a filter for that word. And now it’s just sort of part of the culture of the comment section.
N0083rp00F
So we are making yogurt now?
To quote MPFC: Silly Bunt. =P
thejeff
There are or were a few others. Mostly not actual curse words, just things that got annoyingly overused.
I think “For me it was Tuesday” is still censored.
Sadly, “SJW” isn’t, cause I liked that one.
thejeff
Apparently not.
Jason
What was the censor for SJW?
thejeff
“glistening phallus”, IIRC.
barefootbiker
Is “For me it was Tuesday” the censored version? Or has it, too, been de-censitized?
JepMZ
Yay for bongoerity
shadowcell
once again we see that evil can be battled only by some other evil
MM
I’m just going to assume everyone else in that class is also terrible so I don’t have to feel sorry for whoever’s stuck sitting near them.
Sionyx
Aw, don’t lump Malaya in with that! She’s got a (very) prickly exterior, but is still a decent person. Mary’s a hypocrite who’s convinced SHE’S the Best Possible Person Ever and only those who live up to HER standards are even remotely worth dealing with. Given that the only things that have changed from the Walkyverse are ages and aliens, there’s a little something from Mary’s high school years that I just can’t WAIT to come out here. If only to see her try to justify it.
Some1
Wait, how is Malaya a decent person? Carla is a decent person with a prickly exterior, Malaya shines a light in someones eyes and says they’re the jerk.
Dana
Put anyone next to Mary and they look decent.
Fart Captor
She’s absolutely a jerk, but “being abrasive and unpleasant to interact with” still leaves Malaya MILES above Mary’s grab bag of aggressive, bigotry-fueled cruelty and willingness to push someone towards suicide.
Malaya isn’t nice, friendly, polite, gracious, or pleasant, but “basic decency” is something she has on Mary.
Jason
I feel like what “basic decency” means to us is something that could be heavily discussed. I mean, to me, being actively malicious to vulnerable people isn’t a “lack of basic decency”- it’s being an asshole. It’s basic decency- to me- to be polite because that helps ensure other people’s days are a little less shitty. It’s basic decency to NOT be actively antagonistic to people just because. That’s my concept of it- which Malaya fails.
But it sounds like the term means something different to you. Which, to be clear, I’m not criticising! That’s the nature of language- there’s a lot of nuance, and what we mean by the same words often doesn’t align perfectly.
TemperaryObsessor
You mean isn’t just a lack of basic decency, but also actively being an asshole. Basic decency is one of those phrases that does mean different things to different people. I think it means either getting a D or a C in the decent human behavior lab, and everyone has slightly different grading scales.
And yea Malaya may not be Mary levels of evil but do I think she sort of lacks basic decency as well.
Fart Captor
I would generally think of that more as “politeness” than decency. And by basic decency, I mean something even more rudimentary.
Like, Malaya might be an asshole, but she’s not a monster or a bigot like Mary is. She’s just very unpleasant.
Hari
Very true. But that doesn’t make me not want to put them in a boxing ring and take bets on who will kick whose ass. hahaha
das-g
how indecent =(
EvilMidnightLurker
…Malaya is convinced that no one actually likes or cares about anything, so she hates everyone in the world for being a bunch of posers. How is that decent?
Huehuetotl
So she’s an angsty 18 year old. That makes her myopic, not evil.
TemperaryObsessor
Until she stands on some ones foot they tell her to get off and she gets into this debate where she claims they only pretend they want her to stop standing on there foot because they are a bunch of posers instead of getting off there foot.
Les Moore
Their their – have some commas: , , ,
N0083rp00F
Their what? Please tell us
[I do the same thing when not paying attention to auto-correct]
das-g
Commas, I think. There, they’re their commas.
N0083rp00F
… … .. . Well done. ⇬
Historyman68
The fact that people see any kind of moral equivalency between Mary and Malaya – and Mike, for that matter – somewhat disturbs me. Y’all realize that the worst Malaya has done is be kind of inconsiderate and rude to other people, whereas Mary & Mike have LITERALLY tried to destroy people’s lives. So why are they lumped together? It’s probably because their names all start with the letter M, right?
geno
Wait Mike tried to destroy someones life? Are we reading different comics?
Clif
They could be referring to Mike’s Ethan/Danny plot – which technically so far is just an attempt.
Jason
Shagging someone’s crush doesn’t deserve to be in the same category as actively and purposefully worsening someone’s depression. Or implying that she wanted to have a hand in CARLA DYING. A crush getting with someone else is a long way from “life ruining”.
thejeff
Purposefully doing it to “turn the other into a jealous whimpering mess” goes a little beyond “a crush getting with someone else.
It’s still a step below Mary’s blackmail, if only because Danny isn’t suffering from suicidal depression.
Jason
Sure, Mike isn’t going to win any saint awards with his behaviour, but the phrasing was that Mike and Mary have actively tried to ruin people’s lives. Mike sure as hell isn’t trying to do right by either Danny or Ethan, but trying to hurt someone isn’t the same as trying to ruin their lives. Those are extremely strong words.
Unusually Angry Hippie
I think mike actually considers what he does to be for peoples own good, or at least, tries to rig things to make sure that could be used as a fairly true argument in his defense after the fact. I bet nothing gets his rocks off like making someone miserable only to be thanked for it after the fact.
Historyman68
Ok, y’all are getting hung up on the wrong thing. Mike and Mary don’t have moral equivalency, fine. I think Mike’s less terrible too.
The point I’m trying to make is about people saying *Malaya* and Mary are both equally bad when one of them’s surly and misanthropic and the other one is literally trying to ruin other people out of bigotry.
Joyfulldreams
Mike – An asshole. (Self-aware.)
Malaya – As asshole. (Arguably? Not self-aware.)
Mary – Literally evil
I suppose it’s kind of up to the individual whether you think the mike brand of assholery is better or worse than the Malaya brand. Personally, I think they’re pretty much equal, but in different ways. It balances out.
Joyfulldreams
And now I’m thinking about Mike and Malaya as like a yin/yang pair of assholery. The idea of the two of them trying to asshole at each other and the kind of bizarre infinite mobius double reach-around that would occur has me extremely amused.
Unusually Angry Hippie
I ship it?
N0083rp00F
A submarine of the Victoria Class?
Belches diesel. Needs lots of work. Elicits highly emotional responses from those all around. Still manages to get things done.
thejeff
I’d say Mike’s worse. Just because he’s more active. Self-aware, as you say, and sneakier and always plotting.
Malaya’s a jerk and I wouldn’t hang out with her, but if our paths crossed I wouldn’t be worrying about whether every interaction was some new way to torment me.
Historyman68
See, I guess this is the difference. I feel like I would enjoy hanging out with Malaya. She seems essentially harmless to me, in a bark-is-worse-than-her-bite kind of way. But then, I do tend to have a soft spot for pessimistic, sarcastic ladies who speak their minds.
Sam
Morally, Mary is definitely the worst. I still hate Malaya the most though because her way of being abrasive needlessly really just infuriates me so on an emotional level.
Amazi-Stool
Mike told Amber that she’s destined to become like her father.
In my book that’s far worse than his current shenanigans.
Unusually Angry Hippie
Could you find that panel and link it for me? If it’s the one I’m thinking of, he never told her she was destined for anything(Mike definitely doesn’t do ‘destiny’), he merely made a true(if hurtful) observation about her interactions.
LynziGraye
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2013/comic/book-3/04-just-hangin-out-with-my-family/ensnared/
Panel three has the “doomed to follow your parents’ pattern” line. It’s not completely overt, but the implication is definitely there, IMO.
cbwroses
That’s just Mike rolling her own logic. He doesn’t state that he agrees with anything she says, only saying that IF she’s right, then X would be the result.
If she turned around and stopped comparing her relationships to her parents, I don’t get the impression he’d try to convince her that she was right the first time.
Shen Hibiki
I see him as basically saying “Either you’re like your dad, or realize your logic to make no sense, and be your own self”.
I hear him sayng those lines in a sarcastic tone, almost like someone “agreeing” with someone else’s horoscope xD
Adj
Mmm, Mary’s anger is so delicious.
Plasma Mongoose
and high in salt too.
QueerCat
I can’t wait for Malaya and Carlas alliance against Mary to finally set off in the plot. I want to see Mary destroyed.
Doctor_Who
Ruth might get in on that action too.
phlebas
If Mary doesn’t beat them to it and destroy herself.
Hana
Yeah, actually, this is pretty great. It’s like an explosion where only people I hate are in the blast radius.
Yumi
This isn’t the scenario here, but it reminds me of a time in high school where two people I really disliked started dating. My closest friends and I were thrilled about it because them dating each other meant that they weren’t making the people we actually liked miserable.
notYash
Just came here to say that that recently happened to me in college lol
Clif
You sat next to someone unpleasant? Not sure what “that” is pointing to. At first I thought you meant two people started dating, but that isn’t something that happened to you, so I dunno.
Cattleprod
I didn’t know how much I needed Malaya going after Mary.
Laladoria
Completely savage.
I bet Mary is even going to start to miss Billie soon. At least Billie didn’t make fun of her not-Pokemon.
Adam Black