pfft, y’all think this is going to go the way of Raidah getting in Daisy’s face about it, but Daisy is so inherently thirsty (look how she reacted to seeing Raidah) that it is instead going to comically devolve into Daisy flirting, Raidah either rebuking or leading her on to use her. and it’ll be fun to watch either way. ~<3
MyBlueBox
As much as Raidah is a bit of a scumbag I don’t think she’s mean queer enough to queerbait or gay enough to want to flirt back. Daisy’s definitely gonna do some flirting though.
Is it though?
I mean, if it had been two women PoC making out instead of two white women, I’m sure Daisy would still have put it on the cover. She’s equal opportunity when it comes to lesbian thirst.
At no point did Raidah complain about any specifics of the girls in question, just that they were being focused on instead of the protest.
Admittedly, considering https://www.dumbingofage.com/2025/comic/book-15/04-the-only-exception/reek/ she might be a little more annoyed about the specific pair of girls who got on the front page, but that’s not what she’s specifically complaining about right now.
deliverything
Oops… Somehow missed her specifying “white girls” in panel 4. It’s not yet clear how much she cares about that aspect, though.
hatman
I personally think it’s a descriptive intensifier and not a key part of the complaint. Future comics may show otherwise.
Temporaryobsessor
If Joyce were of the right race it may have been halfway relevant. Dorothy is Jewish right?
thejeff
Dorothy is partly Jewish. Enough for the worst antisemites to care, but not really anyone else. “white girl” isn’t really wrong.
So was Mike’s death. Does that mean people not only aren’t allowed to be upset about it, but aren’t allowed to agree with people in-universe saying Blaine was wrong to kill Mike?
Ike
I care more about whether it was right for Willis to kill Mike than for Blaine to do it tbh.
ZerglingOne
His story, not ours. We’re just here to experience it all.
Raidah is definitely not the kind of person who would remember to use alt text herself lol, she’d be over on Blacksky trying to suck up to prominent bloggers and journalists.
Pretty sure — of all people — Raidah (and/or the fundy) would still be on le twittre.
nadamás
Considerably how many racist live there i seriously doubt she give it the time of day.
not someone else
Yeah nah, Raidah is neither right-wing nor remotely in a demographic that would be safe on Twitter. Her obnoxiousness is a combination of ableism and bog-standard ambition.
She’s basically Dorothy without any of the stuff Dorothy has holding her back (both good and bad traits) and plus being affected by racism.
Shiro
Plenty of people who’d be the first to tell you they care deeply about social issues don’t care that it’s a nazi bar now, because they’re so addicted to the quote dunk culture over there they can justify staying to themselves. Now, I don’t have a good enough read on Raidah to tell whether she’d be one of them, but they definitely exist
TheOthin
Raidah clearly isn’t one for overlooking bigotry. She does care a lot about making connections, but Twitter’s utility in that regard has waned. The social media I’d bed on her putting the most time into is LinkedIn.
Shiro
No no. They’re staying over there because they’re so dependent on internet arguments, sometimes with the bigots, that they’re not moving. The presence of bigots is a feature, not a bug, for them
Again, not saying necessarily that Raidah would be one of them, I haven’t thought about her character that much. But it’s possible!
hatman
Now I’m imagining Raidah posting pro-AI posts with short one sentence paragraphs. It is a far more horrid fate than she could ever deserve.
She’s Raidah and thus always wrong regardless of whether Sarah tries to break up her relationship or tells Dorothy she’s been unreasonably idealistic.
Qube
she may not be factually wrong or even morally wrong, but she is an unlikable asshole who’s not even fun to hate
which for a fictional character is far more damning. like it’s a short list of characters in this comic that I have X-Pac Heat for and two of ’em are dead already.
and it is entirely possible to be right for the wrong reasons; not for nothing, but if the two blonde white girls in question were two people that she did not personally look down on nor previously antagonize, she wouldn’t give two shits about who’s on the front page of some college newsrag unless it was her
Decidedly Orthogonal
Brilliantly stated.
perpetual summer
Yeah I don’t know about that one. She does in fact say “What the entire fuck is this?” when she sees the newspaper (reasonable reaction IMO) before recognizing Joyce & Dorothy. Sounds kinda like she gives at least one shit
Qube
I mean it it mattered so much to her she would’ve been at the protest herself
but clearly she wasn’t, because otherwise the smell of teargas wouldn’t have been noteworthy enough to mention before going “bluh ur white”
…in fact right around the time the protest was going on, she was throwing a tantrum over Sarah hooking up with Tony. yeah she’s real concerned about this protest, just ALL tore up over it, you can tell
Needfuldoer
Tragic: the worst person you know just made a good point
Yeah I don’t like Raidah but this is a valid complaint.
It might work as clickbait to get people who otherwise wouldn’t read about the protest to read about the protest but I think Daisy’s just horny. And it says nothing about the protest itself.
Haz
Unfortunately, clickbait is absolutely necessary in today’s attention economy. It is however important, yet lacking for respectable media outlets to balance it with informative content. Is Daisy’s surrender to sapphic romance not that different than other editors’ acquiescence to avarice? I’m glad she has an ethical compass in Raidah (despite that I cringe it had to be her).
S.R.
Surely this wasn’t the only attention-grabbing photo taken there. Also, caving entirely to the most obvious clickbait (if this even is that) is really shitty journalistic behavior.
Also it seems like she did this because horny, not even because clickbait.
Yeah, I think Raidah’s a bottomless pit of a human being, but she does have a point on this one. And I don’t think Daisy has a coherent counterpoint
Bluesnake463
Her only counterpoint is that she is horny and bad at starting relationships. Which is a very bad rebuttal. So, ya, Raidah is objectively correct to be angry about this. Now we will have to see if she makes it Joice and Dorothy’s problem or not. Because that would be fucked up to be angry at them when they are also against being on the front page of this newspaper. But I can see her trying to take the piss out of Joice for an easy target to take her frustration out on.
I never said this wasn’t valid but are we just ignoring the context for this complaint? From the story presented Raidah never once spoke of or showed interest in the protest until after it was mentioned in passing by Joyce and Dorothy and that her complaint is motivated by her rivalry with them?
I can appreciate the muslim woman being upset that two white woman stole the media’s attention of an important protest involving and about her culture, but that’s not the story being told here. I also understand that is why this story really upsets a lot of people too.
Gotthammer
Raidah has barely been a character, and until Jocelyn was on her way to the protest nobody acknowledged it or the reason for it at all.
I’d put money down the only reason this comic exists is as part of the ham fisted shoving in of extra strips to make up for that very fact.
Shakes
It rankled me that Daisy seemed to originally get away with her flanderized thirsting knocking a protest and its message off the front page so hamfisted insertion as it may be I’m glad someone in-universe is calling it out.
Gotthammer
Oh yes I’m glad it’s being called out but like… Willis should’ve thought about that during the first draft, not needed it pointed out after you know?
nadamás
People learn by making mistake.
Gotthammer
Co-opting a very real protest about a very real genocide for a romcom moment is a bit more than an oopsie
nadamás
I didn’t say it was “Just an oopsie”. They took the criticism of it, and they set out to act on them to improve the story.
Astariel
Real genocide? Phew, maybe you can clear something up for me. Which continent is Bulmeria on?
Pull your head out of your ass. You know damn well what fucking genocide they’re talking about, and you know damn well this Bulmeria thing draws from it.
Shiro
To be fair to Raidah, we don’t know that because she’s a tertiary character at best. It’s entirely possible she was extremely invested and we’re going to find that out now
It’s also possible that she wasn’t personally invested until she saw the story being badly mishandled by the student paper, which like. Also kinda fair given the givens
Sirksome
I also find it interesting and probably a flaw in the writing that we’ve known about the protest for days and the most prominent muslim character never mentioned it once until after it was over. Maybe that’s an intentional characterization of Raidah or a bit of a whoopsy?
yeah that’s to do with the fact that Willis said himself he noticed a lack of Muslim characters in his strip who actually play serious narrative roles and thus has recently set out to amend that
And I’ll say, by the looks of this strip alone he’s already doing the issue justice so far, can’t wait to see where else this goes!
nadamás
She didn’t show interest because the protest wasn’t a relevant part of the story yetw it is and we see that Raidah cares about it. We can learn new information about characters. She can have a grudge towards Dorothy and Joyce AND also care about tge tge movement genuinely.
Sirksome
I honestly don’t know how to feel on this one anymore. This is clearly a hotter issue than I intended to spark with my first comment. I’ll just bow out for the day that seems like the smart move.
It’s like that one scene with Randy Marsh in the later seasons of south park…”Did everyone enjoy the Halloween special?” “No randy only you did.” “Oh, well that was my target audience anyway.”
Yeah, I’m guessing Daisy only has that job because no one else wants to do it. So she’s able to put content *she* wants to see in the paper.
OTOH, I’m sure the university is happy with the front page being about two white girls making out, instead of actually about the protest — and possibly even about the lengths the university went to to get it shut down.
My own university has pretty much that issue; corporate sponsors and investments that tie to Palestinian genocide. Students and some faculty have not been quiet about it, and the Pres is like; “Hey, look over there, is that Bigfoot?”
But it was the most important thing happening in this universe because Joyce and Dorothy, by virtue of being the main characters are the most important people in the universe. A bunch of other fictional people we will never see only matter as far it effects the characters we do see.
475 thoughts on “Editor”
NGPZ
I. ?? Called. ?? It. ??
HueSatLight
She’s right, and this isn’t something that can be dismissed as social climbing. And there are so many media outlets that lack a functional ombudsman.
RassilonTDavros
Apologies for the accidental report!
DJTsurugi
pfft, y’all think this is going to go the way of Raidah getting in Daisy’s face about it, but Daisy is so inherently thirsty (look how she reacted to seeing Raidah) that it is instead going to comically devolve into Daisy flirting, Raidah either rebuking or leading her on to use her. and it’ll be fun to watch either way. ~<3
MyBlueBox
As much as Raidah is a bit of a scumbag I don’t think she’s mean queer enough to queerbait or gay enough to want to flirt back. Daisy’s definitely gonna do some flirting though.
Lysbeth
I think she won’t notice, to be real.
YBAlex
Today I learned the “universal term” for what is called “défenseur des droits” in France!
Serendipity
This is an excellent complaint that I wish would go somewhere.
not someone else
Agree!
Rose by Any other Name
Is it though?
I mean, if it had been two women PoC making out instead of two white women, I’m sure Daisy would still have put it on the cover. She’s equal opportunity when it comes to lesbian thirst.
HueSatLight
1. Is she?
2. Moot because the complaint is that the photo is barely relevant, at best.
deliverything
At no point did Raidah complain about any specifics of the girls in question, just that they were being focused on instead of the protest.
Admittedly, considering https://www.dumbingofage.com/2025/comic/book-15/04-the-only-exception/reek/ she might be a little more annoyed about the specific pair of girls who got on the front page, but that’s not what she’s specifically complaining about right now.
deliverything
Oops… Somehow missed her specifying “white girls” in panel 4. It’s not yet clear how much she cares about that aspect, though.
hatman
I personally think it’s a descriptive intensifier and not a key part of the complaint. Future comics may show otherwise.
Temporaryobsessor
If Joyce were of the right race it may have been halfway relevant. Dorothy is Jewish right?
thejeff
Dorothy is partly Jewish. Enough for the worst antisemites to care, but not really anyone else. “white girl” isn’t really wrong.
noisy
This seems relevant: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2025/comic/book-15/04-the-only-exception/reek/
butting
Daisy wishes that things would go somewhere, too.
Steve C.
I think those upset may have to just accept that this was a necessary development to further the overall plot.
Daibhid C
So was Mike’s death. Does that mean people not only aren’t allowed to be upset about it, but aren’t allowed to agree with people in-universe saying Blaine was wrong to kill Mike?
Ike
I care more about whether it was right for Willis to kill Mike than for Blaine to do it tbh.
ZerglingOne
His story, not ours. We’re just here to experience it all.
Sirksome
Raidah really has nothing going on huh?
shadowcell
bluesky was down so she couldn’t yell at people for forgetting to use alt text
not someone else
Raidah is definitely not the kind of person who would remember to use alt text herself lol, she’d be over on Blacksky trying to suck up to prominent bloggers and journalists.
Decidedly Orthogonal
Pretty sure — of all people — Raidah (and/or the fundy) would still be on le twittre.
nadamás
Considerably how many racist live there i seriously doubt she give it the time of day.
not someone else
Yeah nah, Raidah is neither right-wing nor remotely in a demographic that would be safe on Twitter. Her obnoxiousness is a combination of ableism and bog-standard ambition.
She’s basically Dorothy without any of the stuff Dorothy has holding her back (both good and bad traits) and plus being affected by racism.
Shiro
Plenty of people who’d be the first to tell you they care deeply about social issues don’t care that it’s a nazi bar now, because they’re so addicted to the quote dunk culture over there they can justify staying to themselves. Now, I don’t have a good enough read on Raidah to tell whether she’d be one of them, but they definitely exist
TheOthin
Raidah clearly isn’t one for overlooking bigotry. She does care a lot about making connections, but Twitter’s utility in that regard has waned. The social media I’d bed on her putting the most time into is LinkedIn.
Shiro
No no. They’re staying over there because they’re so dependent on internet arguments, sometimes with the bigots, that they’re not moving. The presence of bigots is a feature, not a bug, for them
Again, not saying necessarily that Raidah would be one of them, I haven’t thought about her character that much. But it’s possible!
hatman
Now I’m imagining Raidah posting pro-AI posts with short one sentence paragraphs. It is a far more horrid fate than she could ever deserve.
Delavan
Shots fired, dayum.
Thag Simmons
I feel like complaining about how an issue you care about was covered is a relatively reasonable thing to be doing
Dot
Yeah like what’s actually wrong with this lol
C.T Phipps
She’s Raidah and thus always wrong regardless of whether Sarah tries to break up her relationship or tells Dorothy she’s been unreasonably idealistic.
Qube
she may not be factually wrong or even morally wrong, but she is an unlikable asshole who’s not even fun to hate
which for a fictional character is far more damning. like it’s a short list of characters in this comic that I have X-Pac Heat for and two of ’em are dead already.
and it is entirely possible to be right for the wrong reasons; not for nothing, but if the two blonde white girls in question were two people that she did not personally look down on nor previously antagonize, she wouldn’t give two shits about who’s on the front page of some college newsrag unless it was her
Decidedly Orthogonal
Brilliantly stated.
perpetual summer
Yeah I don’t know about that one. She does in fact say “What the entire fuck is this?” when she sees the newspaper (reasonable reaction IMO) before recognizing Joyce & Dorothy. Sounds kinda like she gives at least one shit
Qube
I mean it it mattered so much to her she would’ve been at the protest herself
but clearly she wasn’t, because otherwise the smell of teargas wouldn’t have been noteworthy enough to mention before going “bluh ur white”
…in fact right around the time the protest was going on, she was throwing a tantrum over Sarah hooking up with Tony. yeah she’s real concerned about this protest, just ALL tore up over it, you can tell
Needfuldoer
Tragic: the worst person you know just made a good point
nadamás
Especially when the person directly responsible for it’s easily accessible abd technically a peer.
Dawn
Yeah I don’t like Raidah but this is a valid complaint.
It might work as clickbait to get people who otherwise wouldn’t read about the protest to read about the protest but I think Daisy’s just horny. And it says nothing about the protest itself.
Haz
Unfortunately, clickbait is absolutely necessary in today’s attention economy. It is however important, yet lacking for respectable media outlets to balance it with informative content. Is Daisy’s surrender to sapphic romance not that different than other editors’ acquiescence to avarice? I’m glad she has an ethical compass in Raidah (despite that I cringe it had to be her).
S.R.
Surely this wasn’t the only attention-grabbing photo taken there. Also, caving entirely to the most obvious clickbait (if this even is that) is really shitty journalistic behavior.
Also it seems like she did this because horny, not even because clickbait.
Shiro
Yeah, I think Raidah’s a bottomless pit of a human being, but she does have a point on this one. And I don’t think Daisy has a coherent counterpoint
Bluesnake463
Her only counterpoint is that she is horny and bad at starting relationships. Which is a very bad rebuttal. So, ya, Raidah is objectively correct to be angry about this. Now we will have to see if she makes it Joice and Dorothy’s problem or not. Because that would be fucked up to be angry at them when they are also against being on the front page of this newspaper. But I can see her trying to take the piss out of Joice for an easy target to take her frustration out on.
Sirksome
I never said this wasn’t valid but are we just ignoring the context for this complaint? From the story presented Raidah never once spoke of or showed interest in the protest until after it was mentioned in passing by Joyce and Dorothy and that her complaint is motivated by her rivalry with them?
I can appreciate the muslim woman being upset that two white woman stole the media’s attention of an important protest involving and about her culture, but that’s not the story being told here. I also understand that is why this story really upsets a lot of people too.
Gotthammer
Raidah has barely been a character, and until Jocelyn was on her way to the protest nobody acknowledged it or the reason for it at all.
I’d put money down the only reason this comic exists is as part of the ham fisted shoving in of extra strips to make up for that very fact.
Shakes
It rankled me that Daisy seemed to originally get away with her flanderized thirsting knocking a protest and its message off the front page so hamfisted insertion as it may be I’m glad someone in-universe is calling it out.
Gotthammer
Oh yes I’m glad it’s being called out but like… Willis should’ve thought about that during the first draft, not needed it pointed out after you know?
nadamás
People learn by making mistake.
Gotthammer
Co-opting a very real protest about a very real genocide for a romcom moment is a bit more than an oopsie
nadamás
I didn’t say it was “Just an oopsie”. They took the criticism of it, and they set out to act on them to improve the story.
Astariel
Real genocide? Phew, maybe you can clear something up for me. Which continent is Bulmeria on?
Taffy
Pull your head out of your ass. You know damn well what fucking genocide they’re talking about, and you know damn well this Bulmeria thing draws from it.
Shiro
To be fair to Raidah, we don’t know that because she’s a tertiary character at best. It’s entirely possible she was extremely invested and we’re going to find that out now
It’s also possible that she wasn’t personally invested until she saw the story being badly mishandled by the student paper, which like. Also kinda fair given the givens
Sirksome
I also find it interesting and probably a flaw in the writing that we’ve known about the protest for days and the most prominent muslim character never mentioned it once until after it was over. Maybe that’s an intentional characterization of Raidah or a bit of a whoopsy?
NGPZ
yeah that’s to do with the fact that Willis said himself he noticed a lack of Muslim characters in his strip who actually play serious narrative roles and thus has recently set out to amend that
And I’ll say, by the looks of this strip alone he’s already doing the issue justice so far, can’t wait to see where else this goes!
nadamás
She didn’t show interest because the protest wasn’t a relevant part of the story yetw it is and we see that Raidah cares about it. We can learn new information about characters. She can have a grudge towards Dorothy and Joyce AND also care about tge tge movement genuinely.
Sirksome
I honestly don’t know how to feel on this one anymore. This is clearly a hotter issue than I intended to spark with my first comment. I’ll just bow out for the day that seems like the smart move.
Kyulen
Yeah I don’t Raidah is doing anything wrong in this case.
Newlland(Henryvolt)
For fuck sakes Daisy.
It’s like that one scene with Randy Marsh in the later seasons of south park…”Did everyone enjoy the Halloween special?” “No randy only you did.” “Oh, well that was my target audience anyway.”
Michelle J Caboose
Yeah, I’m guessing Daisy only has that job because no one else wants to do it. So she’s able to put content *she* wants to see in the paper.
OTOH, I’m sure the university is happy with the front page being about two white girls making out, instead of actually about the protest — and possibly even about the lengths the university went to to get it shut down.
Vulcanodon
My own university has pretty much that issue; corporate sponsors and investments that tie to Palestinian genocide. Students and some faculty have not been quiet about it, and the Pres is like; “Hey, look over there, is that Bigfoot?”
Taigan
We were all readers that day.
TheOthin
Some of us had the awareness to realize that that was not even close to being the most important thing happening at that time.
Astariel
But it was the most important thing happening in this universe because Joyce and Dorothy, by virtue of being the main characters are the most important people in the universe. A bunch of other fictional people we will never see only matter as far it effects the characters we do see.
Sirksome
Don’t trust readers. Yes that likely includes everyone reading this comic!
Fuzzy
Jokes on you I can’t read
mindbleach
It is a picture of the protest, with the reason for the protest in the headline. It even depicts the police response to the protest.
HueSatLight
It is a picture of something that happened in the same location as the protest, with the police response cropped out.
mindbleach
Tear-gas yuri bubbles beg to differ.