but the idea that you “sometimes have to hit rock bottom first” first is UTTER BULLSHIT and really, really detrimental to people who want to get well before destroying their lives. so.
I always thought of rock bottom as the personal low that knocks you to your senses. It doesn’t have to be complete destruction of your life. It is just a moment that makes you realize you have to turn it around. Though I don’t think it is necessary to decide to make changes, I do think that it is variable and many people need that sinking aha! moment.
Okay, I know the comment chain is long and full of arguments. I’ve looked over the points made, and this is what I took away from it.
There are two types of “rock bottom”:
Type A is the nadir at which you’ve got nothing left to lose, because you’ve lost everything but your wits and faculties, and because you are even in danger of losing control over these. This means you’ve lost all your material possessions, all social status, and all ability to determine your future for yourself (without risking your life, your sanity, or your freedom). No one we’ve seen in Dumbing of Age has reached this point, so far as I know.
Type B is the point at which you’ve got nothing left that you care about losing – which is different, because no two people care about exactly the same things (and, more importantly, because there’s a difference between what each person doesn’t value at all). It’s a loss of control over your life to a more limited extent, and isn’t as bad as Type A, because reaching this point generally just means you’re replacing a deeply-flawed outlook on some facet of life with something more practical – in this scenario, you’ve achieved a moment of clarity, facilitated by a moment of complete desperation caused by your own hand. Some may disagree that this is really “rock bottom”, but that would seem to be a semantic argument that disregards the idea that a common phrase can (or, ought) be used as a metaphor.
Regardless, with Ruth, we’re looking at a Type B scenario. Billie just recently realized she’s reached a Type B rock bottom herself, and wants to help Ruth pick herself back up (and though she might be looking for a little bit of reciprocation, here, that’s not as selfish as she could be).
There are words and terms that have precise meanings in specific contexts, and establishing definitions can be important there. But sometimes, a phrase or term is so vague and subjective that arguing the definition is at least pointless and at worst, vain.
People, IT DOESN’T MATTER WHAT “ROCK BOTTOM” ACTUALLY IS. Stop arguing about that. The -point- is that, as this very argument -demonstrates, it’s a subjective term that means something a little different for everyone, so the thing to do isn’t to argue that your definition is the best one, the thing to do is to consider that other people have other definitions in the first place before you use the term to refer to people that aren’t -you-, BECAUSE they probably have different definitions.
You’re absolutely right about the Platonic reification of “THE Definition”. But despite that SOME use can come from discussing the ideas associated with a term like rock bottom, IF people listen to each other and are interested in learning and considering others views, rather than beat each other down with their own particular idea. That’s one way for useful definitions to emerge, effectively talking about what we want to use the term for, even if people don’t realize that’s what their doing. Admittedly that results in a whole lot of heat and smoke and less light, but I try to stay chill about it. As I said to start, you are right, but I doubt that you’ll ever get most people to understand your point–it’s not that I think people are dumb, but humans — westerners? — seem to be dyed in the wool Platonists.
Speaking of someone who has hit “a rock bottom” It’s not destroying your life. it’s a moment of such shittitude that it’s basically knocking your dumb ass out of your own body and you see what crap you are and what you need to fix it.
In this case, Billie needs Ruth , and frankly Ruth needs Billy.
Taking the metaphor, the thing about ‘rock bottom’ isn’t how low it is, it’s that it REALLY hurts when you hit it. But it’s not even necessarily the bottom. I recently saw a good line about someone who hit rock bottom and started digging. On the other hand, I think you can realize that rock bottom is going to REALLY hurt while you’re still on the way down and act before you hit–I’m hoping.
Having hit what I consider to be my rock bottom this past spring, I respectfully disagree. It’s not necessarily that rock bottom is “everything’s as bad as it could possibly ever be,” but that it’s “everything’s as bad as I can let it get before being forced to recognize that something needs to change and I can’t change it alone.” And of course that point varies if it’s ever reached at all, but I do think that in many cases that realization is necessary for recovery. It’s not meant to discourage people who are trying to get help before destroying their lives, but many people simply can’t or won’t do that without the wake-up call that is rock bottom. For me, I knew for a while that I probably SHOULD be getting help, but it took feeling like my life was falling apart around me to acknowledge that I NEEDED help to prevent me from destroying it for good.
As Cassidy tells us in the pages of Preacher, there is no ground floor in Hell. I think there’s only the limits you set for yourself, and maybe it feels like rock bottom because you cannot imagine lowering yourself further.
Like so many arguments on the Internet, it’s just a question of defining terms.
yeah, I hear that. the thing is, it can always get worse. some folks’ “rock bottom” looks WAY HIGHER than someone else’s, but the point is, it doesn’t have to be REALLY REALLY AWFUL to start getting help. best wishes to all in recovery in the comment section.
The Hunger Games did that, and it’s a pretty good series. Well, at least the first book is. The others I’ve heard mixed opinions about and haven’t read.
It’s used to evoke a sense of witnessing the action, though that’s probably why the Hunger Games works better as a movie than it does a book.
Hunger Games works better as a movie because the book is WAY too much telling and not showing–Katniss spontaneously recalls various bits of exposition rather than even just talking with someone about them. Also, that Donald Sutherland literally wrote himself a larger part by explaining how you can’t “act” a tyrant, because tyranny is most effectively shown through how it affects other people. [citation: extras on Hunger Games DVD/BD]
I’ve read another book [the title of which I’ve long forgotten but it was some sci-fi thing about crossing dimensions in the 2-D/3-D/4-D/etc. sense] in first-person present tense, and I honestly think it and Hunger Games would have been vastly improved by NOT writing them in present tense. It’s stupid and should only exist in scripts, Dick and Jane books, and Choose Your Own Adventure books.
Bright Lights, Big City was written in second person present tense. Basically someone telling you what you, the main character, are currently doing. Had to read it for highschool. Seriously weird read, never have found another example.
Present tense is pretty standard for the second-person perspective, but the second-person perspective is very unusual. First-person or third-person present tense is also fairly common in thrillers, in my experience.
The reason hardly any stories are written in present tense is that we’re weirded out by it. The reason we are weirded out by it is that hardly any stories are written in present tense. It’s a closed cause-and-effect loop. If more stories were written in present tense, we would be less weirded out by it.
There are stories where the point of view of the narrator is explicitly set after the events, and those stories should be told in past tense. But for other stories, there’s really no reason apart from force of habit. If the narrator can move our field of “vision” anywhere in space and even inside people’s minds, then not being able to witness events as they unfold seems like a completely arbitrary restriction.
If nothing else it would be a way of avoiding writing in past past tense, as in when a character is reminiscing about events that had happened previously in a story and you need to distinguish between those events and thing that are ‘currently’ happening. Because when you find yourself putting the word “had” twice in every sentence long enough, you find yourself breaking into fleeting moments of present tense (couched as a straight dictation of the character’s thoughts/experiences at the time) just to give yourself a damn break. Or rather you’ll have done that because you had that experience that had made you want a damn break. Dammit.
I don’t know much about 50 shades of Grey, but I do know that it doesn’t have vampires that have almost none of the features, strengths, or weaknesses of vampires.
Most “published fanfics” end up changing the names of the characters and/or making them humans for the sake of making them “original characters.” Cassandra Clare did it with City of Bones/her Harry Potter fic, fandom threw a fit, E.L. James did it with 50 Shades/her Twilight fic, fandom threw a fit. The problem is that fans have “gone pro” in various forms for pretty much as long as people have been fans of stuff. http://fanlore.org/wiki/Fans_Turned_Pro
Yotomoe, you are playing with fire my friend. Saying nothing is as bad as twilight will be taken as a challenge by someone. And if anything is worse than twilight, I don’t want to know about it. Sooner or later we’ll create something so shitty that it bends the fabric of space and time. And then the old ones will awake and Cthulhu eats our faces.
I read the first several books in the “Left Behind” series. Then partway through, by untreated mechanisms, I became an atheist. I couldn’t finish it after that. I maintain, however, that the storytelling is compelling if you can ignore the parts where main characters representing of their sinful ways and turn to Jesus. Kind of like the Jefferson Bible, in that respect. (The Jefferson Bible has to have its own Wikipedia page, for those who don’t know about it.)
Noble words. But there’s a flaw in your reasoning: humanity being what it is, someone will write something worse than twilight. It’s bound to happen, and it’s not worth biting one’s tongue in the vain hope that one might thus stop it from coming to be.
So like, how many of the people who complain about how unlike vampires Edward is read Carmilla and Dracula? Because frankly, the stock vampire ain’t that much more like them than Eddy. FFS they can walk around in the sun, they just don’t like it. Mind that Eddy still wants to eat people, he just gets by on aminal.
I fucking hate Twilight, but I hate silly nerd memes just as much. And frankly, Twilight’s old hat, since the people who grew up with it… seem to have mostly outgrown it.
Keep in mind, I also complain about Alucard in Hellsing Ultimate and the fact that HE can just go in the sun and shit. I just hate sun dwelling Vampires.
Seriously, Eddy not hating walking in the sun is closer to Dracula than the stock vampire.
Dracula: Walks in sun, hates doing so.
Stock Vampire: Burnt to a crisp by the sun
Eddy: Walks in sun, is fine with it.
Romance is like a gaudy couch you get from a yard sale, but you don’t get rid of it cuz you have a lot of memories, even though it’s smelly and has little to none of the features you initially liked about it.
WITH EVERY SOUL I HAVE EVER OBLITERATED (VIA THE FURY OF DESTRUCTIVE LESBIANRY [THAT IS NOT TO SAY THAT LESBIANITUDINALNESS IS INHERENTLY DESTRUCTIVE]), YES
Actually, uh, no–they probably can’t. Pinning your recovery to someone else (I’ll get sober for her because I love her) is as close to a guaranteed failure as you can manage. Human beings all fail at SOMETHING now and then. If Billie gets sober for Ruth, the first time Ruth fails at anything (and, no, it needn’t be sobriety, Billie’s alcoholic inner voice will start telling her it’s okay to drink again (“she betrayed you, man, fuck her–have a couple 40s”).
Yeah, okay, no, you’re both right. No saving will be occurring here. *sigh* I just *really* want it to. This will instead be a mutually assured destruction of unprecedented proportions. But at least they can have each other. Fuck.
It’s not just because of Charon; Pluto also hasn’t cleared its orbit, defined by the fraction of mass in Pluto’s orbit being lower than some arbitrary fraction of the total mass of the system. Even discounting Charon, Pluto still has too many asteroids in its orbit to be a planet. Occasionally, Pluto’s orbit includes Neptune.
–Hey, after that, can we please go back to calling it Ur-anus instead of Urine-us? It’s really no better and I’m kind of put out we changed the 300-year-old name of a planet named after a 3000+ year-old-god because some idiots couldn’t stop snickering.
Seriously, most of us got over it in the first five minutes after the teacher told us to grow up and move on. Changing it is just pandering to these idiots.
It’s so ingrained into our culture that “Uranus” is funny that I never stopped to realize that I had no solid idea what the “Anus” was until like…high school.
I just call them whatever I feel like. They’re balls or rock and gas floating in space, that’s it. If I want to call Jupiter bongo Tits it doesn’t make a difference, so if you call it Ur-anus instead of Ur-inus what’s the difference?
Well, in the end of “what dreams may come”, (spoilers ahoy) his character decides the only way to save his wife’s soul from hell is to join her there. That’s kind of relevant, particularly since the wife killed herself.
But yeah, strips being published now were drawn months ago, this is just unfortunate timing, not Willis being an insensitive jerk.
Ya see Jay, it’s one of the central conceetes and running jokes here in the comment sectionn that Willis has a buffer of strips drawn months and months in advance. Now we all know that’s not really so; that it’s proposterous and that Willis throws something together off the top of his head at the last possible minute like every other comic artist. And in fact you can easily go through the past strips and find many cases where the comments on one strip have influenced the next days strip. But in spite of this we all go along with the mutually understood gag to preserve the artistic integrity of the experience.
Now when you made your otherwise perceptive comment pointing out how Willis was exploiting the Robin Williams suicide, you proved you weren’t one of the cool kids. And so now each of us gets to mock you in our own special way.
I think the actual concept of depression, which to the original poster probably didn’t exist until it affected a celebrity. Trying to work out the logic of these posts can be tricky.
To be fair, in the time period he lived, alcohol was actually much safer to drink than plain water, since it acts as a disinfectant and kills all those pesky bacteria.
I really hope these two get help and someone see how toxic this relationship is for the both of them at this moment in time. This is a real scary situation
Just for once, Willis, if this turns into a desparate, temporary romance, don’t make a porno for Slipshine. This is the one time, even a fictional, rondesvous should be ‘private’
ill-advised alcoholic suicidal bisexuals angrily having emotionally-scarring same-sex encounters more out of spite than out of desire is totes my fetish.
A cruel angel’s thesis
Will someday fly high from the window
If memories are betrayed by
The overflowing, burning pathos.
Young girl, shine like a legend,
Holding the sky in your arms.
Yeah I’m really curious why they exercised such restraint when Amber’s arc literally involves her triggering a berserk state created by trauma and her father’s conditioning, to beat the everloving shit out of her father.
See, I’m torn between squeeing because I ship them and worrying because this is one of the most codependent and dysfunctional situations possible and it will probably not end well.
Literally? Because that’s actually a serious problem and it kind of bothers me when people say they’re pulling their hair out when they just mean they’re frustrated or anxious. Not that I blame you, because most people simply aren’t aware that compulsively pulling your hair out is an actual thing. And if you are actually pulling your hair out… get some help for that, seriously.
Kernator could be actually pulling her hair out non-compulsively as a side effect of extreme stress. It’s possible. Not all hair-pulling is compulsive.
From my experience this was a good strategy on Billie’s part. Ruth still cares, just not about herself. This provides a lever to keep her from killing herself, until someone can get her to someone that can give her medication and therapy that can reverse the situation.
From mine, it’s a terrible strategy. It’s a moving show of dedication and all, but nobody should try to keep up a 24/7 sole support thing forever, especially with all Billie’s intersecting problems and zero training or tools, and possibly against the wishes of the ill person. Even real live professionals who deal with suicidal people all day have to go home and replenish themselves and carefully prevent burn out so they can keep helping effectively.
From someone with Depression – this is a bad idea. Getting Ruth to go in for professional help would have been better.
Depression + someone losing their own self worth trying to keep up with them = Bad ending because that someone probably doesn’t know to get help for themselves.
I could be wrong, but when I wasn’t on meds and I was around someone else not on meds trying to “help” it made one or the other of us worse. Mostly, because you feel worthless and think trying to help isn’t good for the other person – who in turn feels worthless because you didn’t help them. Vicious Cycle.
I hope this made some kind of sense – I’m half asleep…
The Houston Museum of Natural Science showed Sharknado as part of its August Shark-Awareness Movie Bonanza Extravaganza (that isn’t what it was called, but that’s what it basically was).
Follow me now and you will not regret,
Leaving the life you led before we met,
Look into my eyes, you will see who I am,
My name is Ruthless, girl, please take my hand…
I would stick it on my laptop, and people at school would be like “lol you read webcomics don’t you” and I would say “um… yes” and then find an excuse to run the eff away because I am terrible and anxious in social situations.
Interestingly, one of the reasons the Hindenburg was a tragedy waiting to happen was that the metallic paint they used was made of the same ingredients that make thermite.
Billie’s going to learn something about people with deep, untreated depression. They’re really, really hard to live with. This particular mental illness is downright insidious in that it triggers tremendous loneliness but also tends to make the person aggressive, contrary, and they generally tend to drive friends and family away from them. After awhile, if it continues to be untreated, the depressed person may find it difficult or nearly impossible to socialize, because they ‘can’t relate’ to other people, which may develop into a full-blown anxiety disorder, causing the person to avoid human contact, and yet desperately crave it, driving them further into the fugue of depression.
TL;DR – Depression is freaking poisonous, and someone as unstable as Billie is not going to be a help. Ruth needs a doctor and therapy.
Indeed. But oftentimes a patient with depression will refuse those until something really bad or jarring jolts them into reality. So until those things become an option, Billie will have to do. The most important thing to do with a patient dealing with depression is to never -I repeat, NEVER- leave them to fend for themselves, or give them the impression that they’re alone. That feeling of isolation (which, like you mentioned, is self-generated and hard to drill through for an outsider) is usually what gives the final push to a depressive individual.
While the specific manifestation I mentioned is full of ‘mays’, and ‘coulds’, it’s familiar enough to me, as it is my manifestation. Ruth’s behavior is familiar, because it looks like mine, and I suspect where she’s headed because I’ve been there, and am still digging out of the trench. It’s not ‘typical’ of depression, because depression is very individual. However, there are patterns that can usually be discerned.
You know, I kinda have to say I can’t see this as a romantic relationship. One of deep concern yes, but the actual romance of it I just can’t really see.
And yes, usually two dysfunctional people in a relationship usually doesn’t work. But if you’re dysfunctional in just the right ways, sometimes it does. Let’s see what happens.
I kind of think that Billie is doing this in an attempt to make up for her poor high school attitude and her manipulation of Alice. Let’s not forget that Billie just had a confrontation with someone who she still thought was her best friend; so now, hearing Ruth talking like she’s going to walk out on her as well is affecting her greatly. :\ Billie’s desperate to hold on to the people closest to her, having finally realized just how horrible a person she’s been, and she’s determined to set things straight. I admire her for that.
I hope that what she’s doing works. Billie’s showing a surprising amount of commitment to someone she’s only known for about a month, someone she actually loathed at first.
I hope Ruth accepts her help, because she absolutely needs it. It surely isn’t a healthy relationship to have, but if it keeps Ruth away from the bottle, then perhaps it’s worth it.
I just want to pick them up and put them somewhere substantially less painful than college and give them therapy and nice puppies. Actually. That’s how I feel about most of the people in this comic. And in college.
btw, I noticed people saying it before, but I really hope danny doesn’t have too difficult a time coming to terms with his sexuality
it’s kind of depressing that walky and dorothy get to be happy together, while ethan, billie, and ruth are all miserable
Ehh, even as a couple, Walky and Dorothy aren’t that happy. We just had a comic with Walky wanting to keep emotional distance from Dorothy, and personally he’s got a whole bunch of issues with his sister and his parents’ racism/favoritism. Dorothy, on the other hand, is constantly having her ambitions questioned, and seems to be struggling between having a casual relationship and working hard towards her goal of becoming president.
Danny is currently struggling with problems regarding Amber and her vigilante antics while now questioning his sexuality, as well as figuring out what the hell he wants to do with his life; for a long time, he was raised by his parents to become an accessory to a more successful girlfriend, but I’m sure he’s aware that just isn’t going to cut it anymore.
So really, pretty much everyone’s miserable, in varying degrees.
walky and dorothy have their problems, sure, but they’ve definitely had a better time of it than the lgbq+ chars (including danny)
even danny and amber had their moments, though I guess you could say the same for billie and ruth…
idk, I just want some happy queer people in this comic at some point ; – ;
Not to burst your bubble, but given that Leslie’s currently jonesing for someone she looks like she wouldn’t actually get along with (Heck, at least Billie and Ruth enjoy each other’s company when they’re not being POISON), she’s just not letting it mess with her day to day life.
Yes, but in this one Robin’s a pretty cold manipulator, even if she’s terrible at it on the personal level, and Leslie hates her politics. You can have a relationship that way, but it’s not generally conducive to getting along fine. They still may, but they’re not necessarily going to.
I adore Leslie and wouldn’t be sad if she and Robin got together again, mind.
When I march (or ride my cargo bike with the 300 pound payload capacity) in your Army of Unkillable Badasses and we take over the world I humbly request a position in the the DoT of the New Order, so that infrastructure mistakes like high-speed surface streets that double as highways might be removed from residential neighborhoods and Dutch-quality bicycle infrastructure be made world-wide.
Naw, Willis is going to double-cross us all and make the entire world in DoA’s image. So everyone’s needs are provided for, but There Are No Therapists and everyone is required to take minute-by-minute diaries of their lives.
Ethan/Joyce is only dysfunctional because Joyce is trying to force herself into thinking she’s in love and Ethan is trying to force himself into thinking he could be straight. Outside of the forced self-deceptions, it’s functionally a perfectly fine setup for both of them. Ruth/Billie is all kinds of bad for both of them.
I don’t know, there’s a lot of deception (and self-deception) in there, BUUUUUUUUUT they’re both so brash and straightforward that I think they really could call each other on the other’s shit, yknow? AAAGH GOD THIS IS LIKE MY NUMBER ONE SHIP JUST LM HAVE IT PLLLLEEEEEASE
Is Ethan trying to convince himself he could be straight or is he using Joyce as a beard? I think he’s trying to convince himself that he’s not “using” her opportunistically.
Ethan desperately wants to be straight, but he’s the only person he’s really fooling. Well, maybe Danny, but that’s only to last until Danny comes to terms with his bisexuality. Once that gets worked out, oh boy, there’s going be DRAAAAHMAAH.
You’re right, although Joyce is going along with him because of her own reasons: he’s good looking but sexually non-threatening & and she’ll score a zillion Church points if she can convert him, in both ways. But it suddenly occurs that IF Ethan and Danny happens, Joyce might go all medieval on Danny.
I think I kinda need a break from this comic on account of knowing too many suicidal people (including sometimes myself), but I’m not sure I have the willpower to stay away from it.
It has been so awkward reading the last week of strips because both Ruth and Billie have hit home for me so many times. I have seen (and lived out) both of these aspects of depression too many times to count.
Let me just say that I’m really, REALLY glad right now that this comic runs seven days a week, because I don’t think I’d be too happy with a weekend break right here. (Like, “HULK SMASH” not too happy.)
You know what I think this might actually be good for both of them at least for right now. Billie needs friendship and someone to need her Ruth needs to be able to vent and apparently needs someone to motivate her to not drink and ease her depression. It isn’t healthy Ling term but it might actually help them make steps in the right direction it already has. It got Ruth to stop drinking. It has helped Billy realize she has some serious character flaws as well. It won’t save either of them long term but it might work as a temporary stopgap until they can both get more longterm help. And I don’t think being alone is good for either of them. And I can’t say Ruth has any right to be offended by Billy’s declaration she did it first. Doesn’t make it right but she did open the door to this.
This…is really, really unhealthy. People can’t be “fixed” or “healed” because you want them to be. I can understand where Billie’s coming from, believe me, but she’s gonna destroy herself in the process. And I’m not so sure she realizes that.
True. So true but I so hope they can help eachother. This really feels like what they both need for a while to get through a crisis so they can get long term hang help
I think it would do more harm than good if Billie was successful at healling them both. It provides an example that could hurt people in Billies situation. That the reason they and their loved one are destroying one another is because they dont love them enough or that they aren’t there for them enough. I cant express how much this bothers me. I get that the shippers like the pairing but there is no healthy relationship here. I guess this is assuring drama for quite a long time. This is on par with Ethan and Joyce’s relationship in my eyes.
I was reading the Dresden files, and I think this quote summarizes the whole damn story arc.
“Growing up is all about getting hurt. And then getting over it. You hurt. You recover. You move on. Odds are pretty good you’re just going to get hurt again. But each time, you learn something.
Each time you come out of it a little stronger, and at some point you realize that there are more flavors of pain than coffee. There’s the little empty pain of leaving something behind ‒ graduating, taking the next step forward, walking out of something familiar and safe into the unknown. There’s the big, whirling pain of life upending all of your plans and expectations. There’s the sharp little pains of failure, and the more obscure aches of successes that didn’t give you what you thought they would. There are the vicious, stabbing pains of hopes being torn up. The sweet little pains of finding others, giving them your love, and taking joy in their life as they grow and learn. There’s the steady pain of empathy that you shrug off so you can stand beside a wounded friend and help them bear their burdens.
And if you are very, very lucky, there are a few blazing hot little pains you feel when you realize that you are standing in a moment of utter perfection, an instant of triumph, or happiness, or mirth which at the same time cannot possibly last ‒ and yet will remain with you for life.
Everyone is down on pain, because they forget something important about it: Pain is for the living. Only the dead don’t feel it.”
In response to the Robin Williams claim, go back and read the past month or so of the comics with Ruth in them. I wasn’t surprised by what Ruth had said, it just helped me get an idea of how far she is with all of the things.
Willis sorry to disappoint you but I am already trying this romance at home. Like… if Ruth was trans and Billy was the one being more fally aparty, lol. And more drugs.
Well, congrats Willis. This is the most endearingly horrific thing I’ve seen you do in this strip. I don’t think I’ve ever been so elated to see something while wanting to scream NOOOOOO! at the sight of it. I’m not sure how to feel about that.
Ruth physically (and verbally, and psychologically) harassed Billie for like a week, but the kissing was the first (only?) instance of sexual harassment.
I admire Billie’s determination, but I’m wondering why she hasn’t raised therapy and/or AA yet, even in the sense of ‘I will knock you unconscious and drag you there’ which would be in keeping with the tone of this conversation.
Ruth probably thinks Billie’s a little out of her mind now. With some luck, tomorrow’s strip will be Ruth trying to help Billie through her panic. Alternatively, she might just push Billie away more forcefully. Or Willis may surprise me, as he is want to do.
I expect Ruth to literally push Billie away for the time being, but I have not once ever successfully predicted the next strip. (Maybe I have – I vaguely recall boasting about my accomplishment once. But not more than once, anyway.)
The “problem” with having Ruth push Billie away for the time being is that it would be retreading what happened the last time they met. It could work, in part because the focus is now much more heavily on Ruth’s state of mind (and Willis could be going for shutting down Ruth-Billie shipping hard by emphasizing that Ruth doesn’t want Billie around several times in quick succession), but it’s not what I expect to happen, because that’s not the best way to keep readers on the edges of their seats. (Could work very well to milk RuthxBillie shipper tears, though.)
It’s from this very strip. I usually make a new gravatar for every strip I comment on, from the strip that I’m commenting on. I just converted panel 3 Ruth to 2-tone black and white.
Speaking as someone who made and kept that promise, Billie is in for way more than she can imagine. I was married for 14 years to a woman with a substance abuse problem. I loved her more than life itself and stayed with her until she died. But there’s no way I would recommend anyone else do anything but run away as fast as their feet will move. Being in a relationship with an addict is not for the faint of heart.
I think there’s something wrong with everyone who thinks this page is sweet. Billy’s showing some nice sentiments, but this page is pretty frelling scary. This whole thing feels less like a declaration of love and more like a suicide pact.
It is in fact terrifying. I want to hope that it’s not the latter, and there are signs that Billie is trying to improve- which is good- but then she got slammed down and accepted it, which is horrible. One could say that her life stands upon a knife’s edge.
“For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.”, Romans 1:26-27, ESV
I don’t think that the parent was serious in his or her interpretation. The verse in question is correctly quoted (and most translations give the same basic message: http://www.preceptaustin.org/romans_126-27.htm.) A true literalist doesn’t have much wiggle room here.
Of course, that *could* be because biblical literalism is effectively a bankrupt and internally inconsistent theological position. But that couldn’t possibly be, now could it?
If by “parent” you mean me, I quoted the passage as an example of the Bible saying something about female homosexuality. Personally though, I’m a lesbian atheist.
Yes, I realize that you were simply providing an example of a New Testament text text speaking to lesbianism. I was simply observing that your interpretation is correct, insofar as mainstream modern Biblical scholarship goes.
As to your religious affiliation or sexuality, that has nothing to do with the question of interpretation. Most of the best modern bibcrit is written by non-Christians: Christians tend to get all tied up in “what does this text means for me and why should I think so?” and lose touch with “what does this text mean, and why do we think so?”
If you have never heard of codependency go look it up. You’ll find a picture from this strip. Holey shit, this is so toxic. Do not want. Love does not fix this it only breaks people. They really need healthy boundaries.
In a very corporate world, yes. Where you can somehow just contract out problem solving to other people (like therapists or going to the mall and shopping instead of dealing with your problems), then this would be toxic. But in real life, toxic relationships are the quasi-predictable outcomes of people working with the friends and family they’ve got to make it through their problems, because “healthy boundaries” can’t be seen or set without a lot of experience.
tl;dr: Give the kids a break, they’re young and the phrase “healthy boundaries” doesn’t mean anything to people who haven’t experienced healthy and unhealthy lives yet.
Just about every University that I know of offers therapy to its students. Often for no extra cost. I understand and agree with the characters needing a real life example to be capable of establishing healthy boundaries. This is toxic, “corporate world” or not. As far as any of the other potential and canon pairings that are present in this strip, this one appears to be the most likely to harm both participants. There is a grayscale to toxicity level in real life relationships not just on or off.
There’s a simile about relationships becoming abusive over time being like a frog being boiled. If you put the frog in when the water is boiling it’ll jump out right away, but if you slowly turn up the heat it’ll stay in much longer.
Is Billy aware that she’s speaking like a terrible soap opera character or is Dave just having fun at her expense? This is, of course, making the assumption that they don’t both die in a drunken car wreck after committing some unspeakable act, thus making lines like her final panel tragic forshadowing rather than tragic freshman melodrama.
P.S. (for Mr. Willis) Please don’t tragically kill Ruth or Billy. At least give them a few years to live.
I don’t want to wait for our lives to be over,
I want to know right now, what will it be?
I don’t want to wait for our lives to be over,
Will it be yes or will it be…sorry?
Personally, I’m loving the Alice:Billie::Billie:Ruth analogy. The difference is that Alice explicitly says she decided not to let Billie drag her down, whereas Billie has just said that she intends to let Ruth drag her down.
Dysfunctional as hell? HOOOOOLYYYYYYYYYYY SHIT, yes.
Ultimately catastrophic? Almost certainly.
But this could potentially be useful if it convinces at least one of them (and more likely, both) to get professional health.
Getting up close and personally invested in problematic people is how great artists are made. This kind of relationship can’t be faked, and these two…if they come out of undergrad with some ambition ans self-awareness…could be excellent artists or writers or musicians. Too bad we won’t know, but the fanfic potential is definitely there for some postscript about their diaries, their poetry, and hell, even what they tell their grandkids about life the universe and everything.
Loading ...
Here we go.
Well, if one needs to hit rock bottom before recovery… I think rock bottom has been achieved.
so I know that you were making a joke
and that this is a jokey website
but the idea that you “sometimes have to hit rock bottom first” first is UTTER BULLSHIT and really, really detrimental to people who want to get well before destroying their lives. so.
I always thought of rock bottom as the personal low that knocks you to your senses. It doesn’t have to be complete destruction of your life. It is just a moment that makes you realize you have to turn it around. Though I don’t think it is necessary to decide to make changes, I do think that it is variable and many people need that sinking aha! moment.
That’s called “a moment of clarity”, it’s not rock bottom.
Okay, I know the comment chain is long and full of arguments. I’ve looked over the points made, and this is what I took away from it.
There are two types of “rock bottom”:
Type A is the nadir at which you’ve got nothing left to lose, because you’ve lost everything but your wits and faculties, and because you are even in danger of losing control over these. This means you’ve lost all your material possessions, all social status, and all ability to determine your future for yourself (without risking your life, your sanity, or your freedom). No one we’ve seen in Dumbing of Age has reached this point, so far as I know.
Type B is the point at which you’ve got nothing left that you care about losing – which is different, because no two people care about exactly the same things (and, more importantly, because there’s a difference between what each person doesn’t value at all). It’s a loss of control over your life to a more limited extent, and isn’t as bad as Type A, because reaching this point generally just means you’re replacing a deeply-flawed outlook on some facet of life with something more practical – in this scenario, you’ve achieved a moment of clarity, facilitated by a moment of complete desperation caused by your own hand. Some may disagree that this is really “rock bottom”, but that would seem to be a semantic argument that disregards the idea that a common phrase can (or, ought) be used as a metaphor.
Regardless, with Ruth, we’re looking at a Type B scenario. Billie just recently realized she’s reached a Type B rock bottom herself, and wants to help Ruth pick herself back up (and though she might be looking for a little bit of reciprocation, here, that’s not as selfish as she could be).
Arguments like this irritate the crap out of me.
There are words and terms that have precise meanings in specific contexts, and establishing definitions can be important there. But sometimes, a phrase or term is so vague and subjective that arguing the definition is at least pointless and at worst, vain.
People, IT DOESN’T MATTER WHAT “ROCK BOTTOM” ACTUALLY IS. Stop arguing about that. The -point- is that, as this very argument -demonstrates, it’s a subjective term that means something a little different for everyone, so the thing to do isn’t to argue that your definition is the best one, the thing to do is to consider that other people have other definitions in the first place before you use the term to refer to people that aren’t -you-, BECAUSE they probably have different definitions.
Thank you for beating me to writing this and thus saving me the trouble of doing it. *Relief*
You’re absolutely right about the Platonic reification of “THE Definition”. But despite that SOME use can come from discussing the ideas associated with a term like rock bottom, IF people listen to each other and are interested in learning and considering others views, rather than beat each other down with their own particular idea. That’s one way for useful definitions to emerge, effectively talking about what we want to use the term for, even if people don’t realize that’s what their doing. Admittedly that results in a whole lot of heat and smoke and less light, but I try to stay chill about it. As I said to start, you are right, but I doubt that you’ll ever get most people to understand your point–it’s not that I think people are dumb, but humans — westerners? — seem to be dyed in the wool Platonists.
when you reach ‘I do not want to live like this any longer, it’s too painful, and I’ll attempt to find my way out’?
Speaking of someone who has hit “a rock bottom” It’s not destroying your life. it’s a moment of such shittitude that it’s basically knocking your dumb ass out of your own body and you see what crap you are and what you need to fix it.
In this case, Billie needs Ruth , and frankly Ruth needs Billy.
To “hit rock bottom” means to hit the lowest point possible. It has nothing to do with epiphanies about realising how to get back up again.
By definition, if you get back up from a given point, it WAS the lowest point for that scenario.
Taking the metaphor, the thing about ‘rock bottom’ isn’t how low it is, it’s that it REALLY hurts when you hit it. But it’s not even necessarily the bottom. I recently saw a good line about someone who hit rock bottom and started digging. On the other hand, I think you can realize that rock bottom is going to REALLY hurt while you’re still on the way down and act before you hit–I’m hoping.
Clearly, hitting rock bottom is the new jumping the shark.
Rock sharks!
Rocking the shark’s bottom!
@Fogel: Rock Lobsters?
Having hit what I consider to be my rock bottom this past spring, I respectfully disagree. It’s not necessarily that rock bottom is “everything’s as bad as it could possibly ever be,” but that it’s “everything’s as bad as I can let it get before being forced to recognize that something needs to change and I can’t change it alone.” And of course that point varies if it’s ever reached at all, but I do think that in many cases that realization is necessary for recovery. It’s not meant to discourage people who are trying to get help before destroying their lives, but many people simply can’t or won’t do that without the wake-up call that is rock bottom. For me, I knew for a while that I probably SHOULD be getting help, but it took feeling like my life was falling apart around me to acknowledge that I NEEDED help to prevent me from destroying it for good.
AND found the courage/desperation to seek that help and to accept it if you find it — and my best wishes to you on the path.
good job, friend – there’s more light on the path you’re on than there was before you took this step.
The fact with “rock bottom” is that some continue to dig, some just find an equilibrium on this slight rope, some come to an epiphany.
From the last some manage to improve, at least temporarily.
Each case is quite unique. Meh, humans…
As Cassidy tells us in the pages of Preacher, there is no ground floor in Hell. I think there’s only the limits you set for yourself, and maybe it feels like rock bottom because you cannot imagine lowering yourself further.
Like so many arguments on the Internet, it’s just a question of defining terms.
No “just” about it! 🙂
yeah, I hear that. the thing is, it can always get worse. some folks’ “rock bottom” looks WAY HIGHER than someone else’s, but the point is, it doesn’t have to be REALLY REALLY AWFUL to start getting help. best wishes to all in recovery in the comment section.
Take me down to the paradise city, where the grass is green and the girls are… pretty messed up.
OH WON’T YOU PLEASE TAKE ME HOOOOOME!
I KNOW WHO I WANT TO TAKE ME HOM–wait, wrong song.
HOME, HOME ON THE RANGE- no, wait, that isn’t right…
I wish I was… HO-OMEWARD Bou–wait
AAAAAAARRREEEE YOU GONNA TAKE ME HOME TONI– gosh dangit!
Voulez vous …
COUNTRY ROOOADS, TAKE ME HO- nope, still not the right one
HOME IS WHERE THE HEA- Shit, that’s not even a song.
MAMA, I’M COMING HOM- ah, hell.
Home, home on the — Okay, I KNOW that isn’t it.
Rats still, not a dina! Also, sorry for mispelling my email address. Hard to post on phone.
Home-dor?
I see what you did there…and it’s awesome.
Well played.
Thank you for making my evening
I’M COMING HOME, COMIN- wait, shit.
Still a less messed up relationship than Twilight.
Although Billie DID watch Ruth sleep, huh
Yeah, but she had the good sense to just snap a picture so she could enjoy it at her leisure. Edward apparently needed a live show every night.
So its about the same huh
Just with out the sparkels
Trust me, Skye and Ward from Agents of Shield are a far less messed up relationship than Twilight.
Everything’s better compared to Twighlight.
Have I got a little series to tell you about called “50 Shades of Grey”.
No, that IS Twilight. It’s just what happens when Twilight starts working for Slipshine.
nearly ruined my work computer reading your comment, warn me before I take a sip next time???? JEEZ, COURTESY, PEOPLE
/jkjkjk
DO NOT insult slipshine. 50 Shades is not porn; it is what happens when people who are embarassed about porn try to imagine porn.
You could say the same about Twilight itself.
I’ll give it that, at least Twilight wasn’t written in fucking PRESENT TENSE.
Fun Fact: 50 Shades of Grey started as a Twilight fanfic.
I… wha… who does that?!
The Hunger Games did that, and it’s a pretty good series. Well, at least the first book is. The others I’ve heard mixed opinions about and haven’t read.
It’s used to evoke a sense of witnessing the action, though that’s probably why the Hunger Games works better as a movie than it does a book.
Hunger Games works better as a movie because the book is WAY too much telling and not showing–Katniss spontaneously recalls various bits of exposition rather than even just talking with someone about them. Also, that Donald Sutherland literally wrote himself a larger part by explaining how you can’t “act” a tyrant, because tyranny is most effectively shown through how it affects other people. [citation: extras on Hunger Games DVD/BD]
I’ve read another book [the title of which I’ve long forgotten but it was some sci-fi thing about crossing dimensions in the 2-D/3-D/4-D/etc. sense] in first-person present tense, and I honestly think it and Hunger Games would have been vastly improved by NOT writing them in present tense. It’s stupid and should only exist in scripts, Dick and Jane books, and Choose Your Own Adventure books.
Bright Lights, Big City was written in second person present tense. Basically someone telling you what you, the main character, are currently doing. Had to read it for highschool. Seriously weird read, never have found another example.
Present tense is pretty standard for the second-person perspective, but the second-person perspective is very unusual. First-person or third-person present tense is also fairly common in thrillers, in my experience.
Halting State and Rule 34 by Charles Stross, too. It actually works pretty well there.
Why would anyone write a book in present tense?
I want to write a book in the Future tense.
I want to have written a best-selling book in the past tense.
I want a book written in future plusquamperfectum, because I want perfect future.
Why wouldn’t they?
The reason hardly any stories are written in present tense is that we’re weirded out by it. The reason we are weirded out by it is that hardly any stories are written in present tense. It’s a closed cause-and-effect loop. If more stories were written in present tense, we would be less weirded out by it.
There are stories where the point of view of the narrator is explicitly set after the events, and those stories should be told in past tense. But for other stories, there’s really no reason apart from force of habit. If the narrator can move our field of “vision” anywhere in space and even inside people’s minds, then not being able to witness events as they unfold seems like a completely arbitrary restriction.
One thing I like about fanfic writing is that a lot of authors do use present tense. 😀
If nothing else it would be a way of avoiding writing in past past tense, as in when a character is reminiscing about events that had happened previously in a story and you need to distinguish between those events and thing that are ‘currently’ happening. Because when you find yourself putting the word “had” twice in every sentence long enough, you find yourself breaking into fleeting moments of present tense (couched as a straight dictation of the character’s thoughts/experiences at the time) just to give yourself a damn break. Or rather you’ll have done that because you had that experience that had made you want a damn break. Dammit.
I don’t know much about 50 shades of Grey, but I do know that it doesn’t have vampires that have almost none of the features, strengths, or weaknesses of vampires.
Always remember Yotomoe, it can always get worse. Always.
when it comes to fancanon, we all pay the price
They could also not have the … name?
Most “published fanfics” end up changing the names of the characters and/or making them humans for the sake of making them “original characters.” Cassandra Clare did it with City of Bones/her Harry Potter fic, fandom threw a fit, E.L. James did it with 50 Shades/her Twilight fic, fandom threw a fit. The problem is that fans have “gone pro” in various forms for pretty much as long as people have been fans of stuff. http://fanlore.org/wiki/Fans_Turned_Pro
Much like Dungeons and Dragons was written by Tolkien fans, though I’ll admit that nobody is very apologetic about that.
Happened in ancient Greece when a bard after Homer did it with the Iliad.
Yotomoe, you are playing with fire my friend. Saying nothing is as bad as twilight will be taken as a challenge by someone. And if anything is worse than twilight, I don’t want to know about it. Sooner or later we’ll create something so shitty that it bends the fabric of space and time. And then the old ones will awake and Cthulhu eats our faces.
Have you ever heard of a book (maybe a series?) known as Left Behind?
I read the first several books in the “Left Behind” series. Then partway through, by untreated mechanisms, I became an atheist. I couldn’t finish it after that. I maintain, however, that the storytelling is compelling if you can ignore the parts where main characters representing of their sinful ways and turn to Jesus. Kind of like the Jefferson Bible, in that respect. (The Jefferson Bible has to have its own Wikipedia page, for those who don’t know about it.)
Noble words. But there’s a flaw in your reasoning: humanity being what it is, someone will write something worse than twilight. It’s bound to happen, and it’s not worth biting one’s tongue in the vain hope that one might thus stop it from coming to be.
How does “The Eye of Argon” stock up?
I don’t know how Edward is a vampire. He has none of the characteristics of a vampire, and all the characteristics of a fairy.
And yet everyone calls him a vampire. It’s gotten to the point where actual vampiric monsters are now called “zombies who drink blood.”
By whom, where?
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1336006/
So like, how many of the people who complain about how unlike vampires Edward is read Carmilla and Dracula? Because frankly, the stock vampire ain’t that much more like them than Eddy. FFS they can walk around in the sun, they just don’t like it. Mind that Eddy still wants to eat people, he just gets by on aminal.
I fucking hate Twilight, but I hate silly nerd memes just as much. And frankly, Twilight’s old hat, since the people who grew up with it… seem to have mostly outgrown it.
Keep in mind, I also complain about Alucard in Hellsing Ultimate and the fact that HE can just go in the sun and shit. I just hate sun dwelling Vampires.
…Again, so can Bram Stoker’s Dracula, and Bram Stoker’s Carmilla. I’m glad you have some consistency, but seriously.
Seriously, Eddy not hating walking in the sun is closer to Dracula than the stock vampire.
Dracula: Walks in sun, hates doing so.
Stock Vampire: Burnt to a crisp by the sun
Eddy: Walks in sun, is fine with it.
Well I couldn’t even start this relationship since I’m not a redheaded bi/homosexual girl who likes hockey
I’m really not sure any of those parts are really relevant to the matter at hand.
They’ll come up eventually, I’m sure of it.
That whole sequence of answers were very Dina, your pic fit so well
Come on, you girls are doing great!
True romance.
Nothing says romantic like a permanent fixture.
Romance is like a gaudy couch you get from a yard sale, but you don’t get rid of it cuz you have a lot of memories, even though it’s smelly and has little to none of the features you initially liked about it.
Nothing says romance like “I’m never going to leave you, ever, whether you like it or not.”
And the restraining order goes to…
Dat sarcasm.
And now I’m imagining Ruth & Billie as Rust & Marty.
How about George and Martha? The Albee ones, not the Washingtons.
I saw a movie with that title once. This may be a more accurate comment than it was intended to be, based off that.
Warning: following relationship advice from webcomics can be hazardous to your health.
Interpreting everything you see as advice can have the same effect…
Come one, taking romantic advice from Homestuck is a really great idea!
Well, at least they have things in common.
Both being socially and emotionally deadened?
Alcoholics who still think it can deaden them enough inside to be able to ignore their respective problems?
They share that with everyone in this strip. It’s a prereq to being at IU.
Glasses? Sports? Really terrible codependent relationship choices?
Rooms on the same floor? Hair? Two biological parents? Rough bilateral symmetry?
There have so very much in common. What’s important here? Inquiring minds want to know.
DRAMA TORNADO!
Def Con 5! Code Red! May Day, May Day!
…the drama finger of God.
I HATE THIS AND LOVE THIS
That’s the proper way to appreciate anything.
Odi et amo. quare id faciam, fortasse requiris?
nescio, sed fieri sentio et excrucior.
Never has Catullus felt more appropriate. Really I kind of feel like it sums up their relationship/lack thereof.
WITH EVERY SOUL I HAVE EVER OBLITERATED (VIA THE FURY OF DESTRUCTIVE LESBIANRY [THAT IS NOT TO SAY THAT LESBIANITUDINALNESS IS INHERENTLY DESTRUCTIVE]), YES
BILLIE: “If need be, I will hollow you out and live inside you!”
RUTH: “…How would that even work.”
“And I thought these things smelled bad…on the outside…”
BILLIE: “I will graft my DNA onto yours! We will coexist on a molecular level!”
RUTH: “…This is actually really freaking me out now.”
BILLIE: “We will cosign each other’s student loans! Then our destinies will be forever entwined!”
RUTH: “NOW THAT’S GOING TOO FAR!”
WE WILL BE AS ONE
one of us… one of us…
‘Til all are one.
part of the ship… part of the crew…
Ok, now that reminds me of a VN a friend showed me once.
“Sweetie pumpkin? Do you wanna join the Columbia Record Club?”
I said “Woah, hold on now, baby! I’m just not ready for that kinda commitment!”
Reminds me of one of the Crossed: Family Values issues where that exact thing happens. (huge trigger warning for that series, btw)
….erm.
Wow.
I will agree with the hovertext. And the previous one.
😀
Yes. Everything is better outdoors.
surprisingly this is the most beautiful scene i’ve seen in a while
I totally agree
just because we *can* ship it doesn’t mean we *should*
I will ship everything and like it.
-Captain of the SS. Faz/Dina.
You monster.
Not Amber/Blaine? Weaksause!
*goes to hide in sarcasm cave*
THE SARCASM CAVE CANNOT PROTECT YOU NOW. RUN.
THE HATE SHALL CONSUME ALL
It can get worse.
Joyce/that guy from the party
shipping blackens the soul, yotomoe. i’ve always feared that you would become that which–
oh, wait
shit
Oh my god I’m so in love with them right now. Yes! Do it! Save each other! You can!
Omg no! Stop trying to save each other all alone! You can’t! Get skilled help! This is so unhealthy I can’t even. ::implodes::
Actually, uh, no–they probably can’t. Pinning your recovery to someone else (I’ll get sober for her because I love her) is as close to a guaranteed failure as you can manage. Human beings all fail at SOMETHING now and then. If Billie gets sober for Ruth, the first time Ruth fails at anything (and, no, it needn’t be sobriety, Billie’s alcoholic inner voice will start telling her it’s okay to drink again (“she betrayed you, man, fuck her–have a couple 40s”).
Yeah, okay, no, you’re both right. No saving will be occurring here. *sigh* I just *really* want it to. This will instead be a mutually assured destruction of unprecedented proportions. But at least they can have each other. Fuck.
And so Ruth Begrudgingly took Billie to her home planet, Canada.
Oh so Canada’s a planet now, but Pluto isn’t? Astronomy’s a fickle mistress.
Yep they changed it because Pluto’s satellite (Charon?) is so close to the size of Pluto. And Canada is just that weird.
It’s not just because of Charon; Pluto also hasn’t cleared its orbit, defined by the fraction of mass in Pluto’s orbit being lower than some arbitrary fraction of the total mass of the system. Even discounting Charon, Pluto still has too many asteroids in its orbit to be a planet. Occasionally, Pluto’s orbit includes Neptune.
So, if Neptune hasn’t cleared its orbit of a Plutonic amount of mass, how come Neptune still gets to be called a planet? HUH?
It isn’t amount, it’s proportion. Neptune is *much, much* larger than Pluto.
You didn’t hear that they are considering reinstating it? 😀 😀
Are they? AWESOME! 😀
–Hey, after that, can we please go back to calling it Ur-anus instead of Urine-us? It’s really no better and I’m kind of put out we changed the 300-year-old name of a planet named after a 3000+ year-old-god because some idiots couldn’t stop snickering.
Seriously, most of us got over it in the first five minutes after the teacher told us to grow up and move on. Changing it is just pandering to these idiots.
/planetary rant
I say it “Oo-ranos”, which is – as I understand it – how you’re supposed to pronounce the name of the actual Greek god.
It’s so ingrained into our culture that “Uranus” is funny that I never stopped to realize that I had no solid idea what the “Anus” was until like…high school.
I just call them whatever I feel like. They’re balls or rock and gas floating in space, that’s it. If I want to call Jupiter bongo Tits it doesn’t make a difference, so if you call it Ur-anus instead of Ur-inus what’s the difference?
i’m not crying you’re crying
Well yes, I am!!!! (TT-TT)
Respectfully, it seems a little early to thrown in a Robin Williams reference in a web comic referencing addiction.
ha ha ha ha ha
ha ha ha ha ha ha
ha ha ha ha
ha ha ha ha ha
ha ha ha ha ha
someone else tell him i can’t do it i can’t
Why are all these other responses so serious. You need to be telling this guy that Willis thrives on your misery or something.
Too soon? Of course it’s too soon!
Robin Williams was still alive when this was written!
Also what even is the Robin Williams reference
Well, in the end of “what dreams may come”, (spoilers ahoy) his character decides the only way to save his wife’s soul from hell is to join her there. That’s kind of relevant, particularly since the wife killed herself.
But yeah, strips being published now were drawn months ago, this is just unfortunate timing, not Willis being an insensitive jerk.
“Sorry,” said Robin Williams, “I’ve retroactively copyrighted all suicide references forever.” Or at least, in my head, that’s a joke he’d appreciate.
And the theory it was an addiction relapse that pushed Williams over the edge has been pretty thoroughly discredited, FWIW.
Ooooo. Oooooo. Ooooooo!
Can I explain?
Ya see Jay, it’s one of the central conceetes and running jokes here in the comment sectionn that Willis has a buffer of strips drawn months and months in advance. Now we all know that’s not really so; that it’s proposterous and that Willis throws something together off the top of his head at the last possible minute like every other comic artist. And in fact you can easily go through the past strips and find many cases where the comments on one strip have influenced the next days strip. But in spite of this we all go along with the mutually understood gag to preserve the artistic integrity of the experience.
Now when you made your otherwise perceptive comment pointing out how Willis was exploiting the Robin Williams suicide, you proved you weren’t one of the cool kids. And so now each of us gets to mock you in our own special way.
(Did I splain it good Willis? 😉
Actually Willis uploads the strips and then edits them later. And he really does do them months in advance.
I heard he uploads the strips first and then draws them after. And while he does have a time machine, he mostly uses it to go watch Elvis’s shows.
Shhhhhh!
Willis is almost into 2015 on his buffer. He could be predicting the future?!
Dude, the strips are written way in advance. Willis made this strip wayyyy before that happened.
Willis has a buffer that’s about 5 months long. These strips were written last -spring-. Any commentary on Robin Williams is in your own mind.
Wait, what’s the reference?
I think the actual concept of depression, which to the original poster probably didn’t exist until it affected a celebrity. Trying to work out the logic of these posts can be tricky.
*Facepalm*
(By ‘original poster’ I meant Jay, not Willis, I just realized that might be unclear.)
I’m hoping it’s just me, but does anyone else see a ‘Thelma and Louise’ ending for these two in the future??
Nobody dies. Word of God 🙂
Sorry I wasn’t clear. I was thinking about their lives after the comic ends (so to speak)
re: alt text – A little too late. Things can get better from there tho!
BILLIE NO
STOP THIS UNHEATHLY TRAIN NOW AND GET RUTH AND YOURSELF SOME HELP.
JFC SOMEONE GET THESE KIDS SOME THERAPY
JFC WWJD
HE WOULD TOTES GET THESE KIDS SOME THERAPY
I dunno, he’s more famous for boozing up a party (turning water into wine) than getting people therapy…
To be fair, in the time period he lived, alcohol was actually much safer to drink than plain water, since it acts as a disinfectant and kills all those pesky bacteria.
http://stream1.gifsoup.com/view5/2616332/spongebob-eating-hands-o.gif
Achievement Unlocked: Down with the shipness
did you just
s/he totally did
I really hope these two get help and someone see how toxic this relationship is for the both of them at this moment in time. This is a real scary situation
Maybe Billie’s RA could steer her toward Al-Anon.
Oh, wait….
Or maybe a program that doesn’t promote goofball pseudoscientific ideas rooted in Scientology?
Just for once, Willis, if this turns into a desparate, temporary romance, don’t make a porno for Slipshine. This is the one time, even a fictional, rondesvous should be ‘private’
But ill-advised alcoholic suicidal lesbians angrily having emotionally-scarring sex more out of spite than out of desire is my fetish!
Is it me or is the Sarah gravitar a little perfect for that comment?
They aren’t lesbians they are bisexuals having a same-sex encounter, now get it right! 😉
ill-advised alcoholic suicidal bisexuals angrily having emotionally-scarring same-sex encounters more out of spite than out of desire is totes my fetish.
Did I get it right? 😀
bingo!
Normally abbreviated to IAASBAHESSSEMOoSTOoD in the sex industry.
I dub thee minority opinion.
I second that dubbing.
I third that dubbing, though I hold it as well.
I prefer the sub.
So, if Billie’s Chief, does that make Ruth McCloud?
I’m inclined to say 86
[MAXWELL SMART, YES]
99, I love you…
And Dina is totally Hymie.
Then who’s Larrabee?
A cruel angel’s thesis
Will someday fly high from the window
If memories are betrayed by
The overflowing, burning pathos.
Young girl, shine like a legend,
Holding the sky in your arms.
What’s with all the Eva fans following this comic, like seriously every other day there’s some reference.
Not complaining mind you. *wanders off to write bad Eva fanfic*
That statement is so redundant, or just plain illogical. It postulates the existence of good Neon Genesis Evangelion fanfic.
something can be bad without there being a good counterpart. For example, Twilight. Just Twilight.
Twilight can also be a time of day that many people enjoy.
Yeah I’m really curious why they exercised such restraint when Amber’s arc literally involves her triggering a berserk state created by trauma and her father’s conditioning, to beat the everloving shit out of her father.
I must have different subtitles on mine, cos that’s only about half familiar.
YOUNG GIRL, GET OUT OF MY MIND
MY LOVE FOR YOU IS WAY OUT OF LINE
See, I’m torn between squeeing because I ship them and worrying because this is one of the most codependent and dysfunctional situations possible and it will probably not end well.
Yes, but the flames will be glorious.
My shipwreck burns on both ends
It will not bring delight
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends
It makes a lovely light
— Edna St. Mincemeat Souffle
Is that how you pronounce her name? I wondered.
Also +1 Internet.
I am pulling my hair out over these two.
Literally? Because that’s actually a serious problem and it kind of bothers me when people say they’re pulling their hair out when they just mean they’re frustrated or anxious. Not that I blame you, because most people simply aren’t aware that compulsively pulling your hair out is an actual thing. And if you are actually pulling your hair out… get some help for that, seriously.
We don’t call her the bald Kernanator for nothin.
Why go to that expense when waxing at home is so much cheaper?
Kernator could be actually pulling her hair out non-compulsively as a side effect of extreme stress. It’s possible. Not all hair-pulling is compulsive.
Oh dear. Get ready for a bumpy ride!
Wonderful performances. Bravo.
From my experience this was a good strategy on Billie’s part. Ruth still cares, just not about herself. This provides a lever to keep her from killing herself, until someone can get her to someone that can give her medication and therapy that can reverse the situation.
From mine, it’s a terrible strategy. It’s a moving show of dedication and all, but nobody should try to keep up a 24/7 sole support thing forever, especially with all Billie’s intersecting problems and zero training or tools, and possibly against the wishes of the ill person. Even real live professionals who deal with suicidal people all day have to go home and replenish themselves and carefully prevent burn out so they can keep helping effectively.
OK it worked for me, the person died from an unrelated disease and did not commit suicide. And only one of us was alcoholic… Not Me.
I’m glad your person didn’t complete suicide, and I’m sorry your person died.
From someone with Depression – this is a bad idea. Getting Ruth to go in for professional help would have been better.
Depression + someone losing their own self worth trying to keep up with them = Bad ending because that someone probably doesn’t know to get help for themselves.
I could be wrong, but when I wasn’t on meds and I was around someone else not on meds trying to “help” it made one or the other of us worse. Mostly, because you feel worthless and think trying to help isn’t good for the other person – who in turn feels worthless because you didn’t help them. Vicious Cycle.
I hope this made some kind of sense – I’m half asleep…
Doing one does not negate the possibility of the other, you know.
I said I could be wrong. I don’t know everything.
Drama Hurricane meets Drama Tornado. Millions will die.
We may even be closing in on Drama Sharknado if this keeps up.
The Houston Museum of Natural Science showed Sharknado as part of its August Shark-Awareness Movie Bonanza Extravaganza (that isn’t what it was called, but that’s what it basically was).
I love the museums here.
Follow me now and you will not regret,
Leaving the life you led before we met,
Look into my eyes, you will see who I am,
My name is Ruthless, girl, please take my hand…
Idk, in the song Lucifer’s pretty actively trying to tempt the subject, Ruth doesn’t really seem to want to drag Billie down with her.
On a completely unrelated note, when are mid-terms coming? I can’t wait to see what happens when Joyce writes an essay for gender studies (hee-hee)!
It’s only been like 24 days since the beginning, so I’d imagine there’s still a pretty long way to go.
YIKES!
OH BALLS IT HAPPENED! IT’S HIT THE FAN LADIES AND GENTLE MAN GET READY FOR A MASSIVE FUSTER CLUCK
OBEY the the alt text. (What an awesome piece of swag that sticker would be…)
I would stick it on my laptop, and people at school would be like “lol you read webcomics don’t you” and I would say “um… yes” and then find an excuse to run the eff away because I am terrible and anxious in social situations.
Yeah, this aint ending well…
…but I’ll ship it every moment on the way down.
The ship is an airship, with a fualty engine. It’ll crash, but the ride’ll be awesome
So it’s the Hindenburg.
That would explain so much.
Interestingly, one of the reasons the Hindenburg was a tragedy waiting to happen was that the metallic paint they used was made of the same ingredients that make thermite.
The Hindenburg’s engine was fine.
YOUR engine is fine. >:(
😉
😐
Billie’s going to learn something about people with deep, untreated depression. They’re really, really hard to live with. This particular mental illness is downright insidious in that it triggers tremendous loneliness but also tends to make the person aggressive, contrary, and they generally tend to drive friends and family away from them. After awhile, if it continues to be untreated, the depressed person may find it difficult or nearly impossible to socialize, because they ‘can’t relate’ to other people, which may develop into a full-blown anxiety disorder, causing the person to avoid human contact, and yet desperately crave it, driving them further into the fugue of depression.
TL;DR – Depression is freaking poisonous, and someone as unstable as Billie is not going to be a help. Ruth needs a doctor and therapy.
Indeed. But oftentimes a patient with depression will refuse those until something really bad or jarring jolts them into reality. So until those things become an option, Billie will have to do. The most important thing to do with a patient dealing with depression is to never -I repeat, NEVER- leave them to fend for themselves, or give them the impression that they’re alone. That feeling of isolation (which, like you mentioned, is self-generated and hard to drill through for an outsider) is usually what gives the final push to a depressive individual.
That sounds too specific to be an accurate description of how deep and untreated depression always manifests.
Agreed. :\
While the specific manifestation I mentioned is full of ‘mays’, and ‘coulds’, it’s familiar enough to me, as it is my manifestation. Ruth’s behavior is familiar, because it looks like mine, and I suspect where she’s headed because I’ve been there, and am still digging out of the trench. It’s not ‘typical’ of depression, because depression is very individual. However, there are patterns that can usually be discerned.
Uwa codependent girlfriends. ;_;
(Yeahh we’re rolling in the classy commentary today.)
I’m pretty sure that love stories are NOT meant to give off the ending to the “Old Yella” vibe.
Wow you edited that Tedd icon fast. (Not related to what you just said, but it’s nice!)
Thanks, the EGS artstyle easily lends itself to pallette change. ^_^
You know, I kinda have to say I can’t see this as a romantic relationship. One of deep concern yes, but the actual romance of it I just can’t really see.
“I’m going to ruin my life you can’t stop me !”
“We’ll see about that !”
Ah yes, relationship stability vi mutually-assured destruction. I would say this can’t end well, but I really, really want it to.
er, via*
We’re all a bit biased on that point.
I am drowning
There is no sign of land
You are coming down with me
Hand in unlovable hand
And I hope you die.
I hope we both die.
But I will walk down to the end with you
If you will come all the way down with me
This actually a song or something?
A song by the mountain goats.
Who wrote a whole bunch of beautiful songs about an alcoholic doomed couple.
P.s. John Darnielle always said there was an escape hatch for the alpha couple, I hope there is one for these people too.
“This time you taste like vomit!”
Maybe toothpaste? One can only hope.
God damn it, Willis.
This is like Laverne and Shirley meet Thelma and Louise
Well, damn. I did not see that coming.
Oh wait, yes I did.
And yes, usually two dysfunctional people in a relationship usually doesn’t work. But if you’re dysfunctional in just the right ways, sometimes it does. Let’s see what happens.
Yes this is think they are just broken enough to help eachother. I don’t think it can work long term though
My spouse and I are going on 13 years, so yes it can.
That sounds as plausible as eating soup from two broken plates.
This is the most beautiful disaster of a relationship that ever was. God, do I ship it.
Poor Billie. Poor Ruth.
I kind of think that Billie is doing this in an attempt to make up for her poor high school attitude and her manipulation of Alice. Let’s not forget that Billie just had a confrontation with someone who she still thought was her best friend; so now, hearing Ruth talking like she’s going to walk out on her as well is affecting her greatly. :\ Billie’s desperate to hold on to the people closest to her, having finally realized just how horrible a person she’s been, and she’s determined to set things straight. I admire her for that.
I hope that what she’s doing works. Billie’s showing a surprising amount of commitment to someone she’s only known for about a month, someone she actually loathed at first.
I hope Ruth accepts her help, because she absolutely needs it. It surely isn’t a healthy relationship to have, but if it keeps Ruth away from the bottle, then perhaps it’s worth it.
I just want to pick them up and put them somewhere substantially less painful than college and give them therapy and nice puppies. Actually. That’s how I feel about most of the people in this comic. And in college.
They need some kitten therapy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2XJx3mpDU8
Billie, go see the school counselor. You too, Ruth, but in a different session.
btw, I noticed people saying it before, but I really hope danny doesn’t have too difficult a time coming to terms with his sexuality
it’s kind of depressing that walky and dorothy get to be happy together, while ethan, billie, and ruth are all miserable
Dorothy and Walky’s happiness was recently kind of smudged though.
It will be Challenged more when it turns out that Dorothy has been banging Daisy to get her articles accepted.
Ehh, even as a couple, Walky and Dorothy aren’t that happy. We just had a comic with Walky wanting to keep emotional distance from Dorothy, and personally he’s got a whole bunch of issues with his sister and his parents’ racism/favoritism. Dorothy, on the other hand, is constantly having her ambitions questioned, and seems to be struggling between having a casual relationship and working hard towards her goal of becoming president.
Danny is currently struggling with problems regarding Amber and her vigilante antics while now questioning his sexuality, as well as figuring out what the hell he wants to do with his life; for a long time, he was raised by his parents to become an accessory to a more successful girlfriend, but I’m sure he’s aware that just isn’t going to cut it anymore.
So really, pretty much everyone’s miserable, in varying degrees.
So… like in real life, then?
…
TELL ME I’M WRONG.
Yer wrong.
Mike is doing fine.
If this were real life, Mike would be doing your mom. For $10.00. (real life inflation).
Mike doesn’t ‘do’ inflation. His nickels account for inflation for him. So he’d do your mom for a nickel worth $10.00.
walky and dorothy have their problems, sure, but they’ve definitely had a better time of it than the lgbq+ chars (including danny)
even danny and amber had their moments, though I guess you could say the same for billie and ruth…
idk, I just want some happy queer people in this comic at some point ; – ;
Maybe we could see some more of prof. Leslie Bean. She seems successful, comfy in her skin, and generally awesome in every way.
I didn’t realize how much I needed more leslie until I read this comment
thanks a lot, leorale /sniffs
for reaaaallllllll leslie bean is my hero
Not to burst your bubble, but given that Leslie’s currently jonesing for someone she looks like she wouldn’t actually get along with (Heck, at least Billie and Ruth enjoy each other’s company when they’re not being POISON), she’s just not letting it mess with her day to day life.
*Given that she’s jonesing for someone she wouldn’t get along with, I’m not sure that’s all that better, so much as not as far along.
they got along fine in the other universe…?
I mean, eventually, after some hardships, but…
Yes, but in this one Robin’s a pretty cold manipulator, even if she’s terrible at it on the personal level, and Leslie hates her politics. You can have a relationship that way, but it’s not generally conducive to getting along fine. They still may, but they’re not necessarily going to.
I adore Leslie and wouldn’t be sad if she and Robin got together again, mind.
Honestly, at this point in the comic, I’ll just take happy people, period. Misery seems to chase these kids all over the place.
Comes with the territory dude. Or more specifically the age group and location.
Also with being in a Willis universe.
Joe? Except when he’s frustrated over Danny…
Pour up (drank), head shot (drank)
Sit down (drank), stand up (drank)
Pass out (drank), wake up (drank)
Faded (drank), faded (drank)
Fight! Fight! Fight! Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!
Dammit Caboose!
(Yes, I know what it was “actually” from)
This is WAY more intense than my freshman year ever was.
You must have done it wrong. Go back and screw it up right this time.
Mr. Willis,
When I march (or ride my cargo bike with the 300 pound payload capacity) in your Army of Unkillable Badasses and we take over the world I humbly request a position in the the DoT of the New Order, so that infrastructure mistakes like high-speed surface streets that double as highways might be removed from residential neighborhoods and Dutch-quality bicycle infrastructure be made world-wide.
Humbly yours,
Naw, Willis is going to double-cross us all and make the entire world in DoA’s image. So everyone’s needs are provided for, but There Are No Therapists and everyone is required to take minute-by-minute diaries of their lives.
So, pretty much like I’m currently living except fewer mortgage worries? Sweet!
Lord knows it’d be much more difficult for me, though.
This relationship is so fucked up. I love it.
Aw, is that a hug I see? Willis listened to my request. 🙂
More dysfunctional than Joyce and Ethan, y/n?
The answer is ‘cows.’
The question is irrelevant. The answer is always “cows.”
I thought the answer was “Dinosaurs. RAWR!”
Yes.
Ethan/Joyce is only dysfunctional because Joyce is trying to force herself into thinking she’s in love and Ethan is trying to force himself into thinking he could be straight. Outside of the forced self-deceptions, it’s functionally a perfectly fine setup for both of them. Ruth/Billie is all kinds of bad for both of them.
I don’t know, there’s a lot of deception (and self-deception) in there, BUUUUUUUUUT they’re both so brash and straightforward that I think they really could call each other on the other’s shit, yknow? AAAGH GOD THIS IS LIKE MY NUMBER ONE SHIP JUST LM HAVE IT PLLLLEEEEEASE
I can’t let you have it, I’m captaining it. Well, I guess we can share.
Is Ethan trying to convince himself he could be straight or is he using Joyce as a beard? I think he’s trying to convince himself that he’s not “using” her opportunistically.
Ethan desperately wants to be straight, but he’s the only person he’s really fooling. Well, maybe Danny, but that’s only to last until Danny comes to terms with his bisexuality. Once that gets worked out, oh boy, there’s going be DRAAAAHMAAH.
And perhaps Slipshine.
You’re right, although Joyce is going along with him because of her own reasons: he’s good looking but sexually non-threatening & and she’ll score a zillion Church points if she can convert him, in both ways. But it suddenly occurs that IF Ethan and Danny happens, Joyce might go all medieval on Danny.
I think I kinda need a break from this comic on account of knowing too many suicidal people (including sometimes myself), but I’m not sure I have the willpower to stay away from it.
It has been so awkward reading the last week of strips because both Ruth and Billie have hit home for me so many times. I have seen (and lived out) both of these aspects of depression too many times to count.
“Ruth, you’re my Charles Bukowski! WE MUST BECOME WINOS TOGETHER!”
Billie, you can be my Kerouac.
Let me just say that I’m really, REALLY glad right now that this comic runs seven days a week, because I don’t think I’d be too happy with a weekend break right here. (Like, “HULK SMASH” not too happy.)
It’s a good thing cliffhangers by cutting out aren’t super common, then!
(…I’m not aware enough to figure out if this should be sarcastic or not, so take it as whatever XD)
Oddly enough, I coulda handled that better than NO UPDATE UNTIL [patreon update/regular update].
The weekend strips will be Dina walking around with a magnifying glass, looking for the whiteboard dingdong bandit.
Full-blown Sherlock Holmes cosplay, you mean.
With raptor-skin cap.
“Dina walking around with a magnifying glass, looking for the whiteboard dingdong bandit.”
DO WANT
This is just so toxic, but I so want them to start making out right now. And other things.
god I knowwwwww
You know what I think this might actually be good for both of them at least for right now. Billie needs friendship and someone to need her Ruth needs to be able to vent and apparently needs someone to motivate her to not drink and ease her depression. It isn’t healthy Ling term but it might actually help them make steps in the right direction it already has. It got Ruth to stop drinking. It has helped Billy realize she has some serious character flaws as well. It won’t save either of them long term but it might work as a temporary stopgap until they can both get more longterm help. And I don’t think being alone is good for either of them. And I can’t say Ruth has any right to be offended by Billy’s declaration she did it first. Doesn’t make it right but she did open the door to this.
Ah, love is such a beautiful thing.
as dark as ruth is here (shockingly), billie is just as earnest and as real as she has ever been. IMPRESSED WITH YR WRITING, WILLIS, JEEZ LOUISE
that is ummmm
JEEZ LOU-WILLIS
This…is really, really unhealthy. People can’t be “fixed” or “healed” because you want them to be. I can understand where Billie’s coming from, believe me, but she’s gonna destroy herself in the process. And I’m not so sure she realizes that.
True. So true but I so hope they can help eachother. This really feels like what they both need for a while to get through a crisis so they can get long term hang help
I think it would do more harm than good if Billie was successful at healling them both. It provides an example that could hurt people in Billies situation. That the reason they and their loved one are destroying one another is because they dont love them enough or that they aren’t there for them enough. I cant express how much this bothers me. I get that the shippers like the pairing but there is no healthy relationship here. I guess this is assuring drama for quite a long time. This is on par with Ethan and Joyce’s relationship in my eyes.
Bad bad bad bad bad bad idea. Bit damn that’s such a killer last panel.
I hope they try, I really do. Who knows, maybe these 2 negatives can make a positive.
Especially if they find AA eventually. Maybe just maybe Billie may keep that ‘one day’ at bay. Damn, they do need each other, Willis.
If these two do a Thelma and Louise I may have to go read Dilbert or something.
I was reading the Dresden files, and I think this quote summarizes the whole damn story arc.
“Growing up is all about getting hurt. And then getting over it. You hurt. You recover. You move on. Odds are pretty good you’re just going to get hurt again. But each time, you learn something.
Each time you come out of it a little stronger, and at some point you realize that there are more flavors of pain than coffee. There’s the little empty pain of leaving something behind ‒ graduating, taking the next step forward, walking out of something familiar and safe into the unknown. There’s the big, whirling pain of life upending all of your plans and expectations. There’s the sharp little pains of failure, and the more obscure aches of successes that didn’t give you what you thought they would. There are the vicious, stabbing pains of hopes being torn up. The sweet little pains of finding others, giving them your love, and taking joy in their life as they grow and learn. There’s the steady pain of empathy that you shrug off so you can stand beside a wounded friend and help them bear their burdens.
And if you are very, very lucky, there are a few blazing hot little pains you feel when you realize that you are standing in a moment of utter perfection, an instant of triumph, or happiness, or mirth which at the same time cannot possibly last ‒ and yet will remain with you for life.
Everyone is down on pain, because they forget something important about it: Pain is for the living. Only the dead don’t feel it.”
This is the most unhealthy romance I’ve seen since the early days of Amber/Mike
Billie really DOES destroy everything she touches, even depressed suicide plans.
In response to the Robin Williams claim, go back and read the past month or so of the comics with Ruth in them. I wasn’t surprised by what Ruth had said, it just helped me get an idea of how far she is with all of the things.
To hell in a hand basket!!
Willis sorry to disappoint you but I am already trying this romance at home. Like… if Ruth was trans and Billy was the one being more fally aparty, lol. And more drugs.
My life.
Get yourself and your SO to a therapist/psychologist, NOW.
And do the drugs in moderation, pls, I don’t want to see any of my fellow commenters die.
Well, congrats Willis. This is the most endearingly horrific thing I’ve seen you do in this strip. I don’t think I’ve ever been so elated to see something while wanting to scream NOOOOOO! at the sight of it. I’m not sure how to feel about that.
Pleased at good craft?
This is some 50 Shades of Grey level messed up right here.
Nah. At least here, they are CONSENSUALLY in a dysfunctional relationship.
I must have missed the strip where Ruth agreed to this.
I think it was the one where she broke into Billie’s room.
and the other part where she sexually harassed her for like a week and then kissed her
Ruth physically (and verbally, and psychologically) harassed Billie for like a week, but the kissing was the first (only?) instance of sexual harassment.
but… she was doing it because she was sexually attracted to Billie, so doesn’t that count?
That was before she broke up with her.
I admire Billie’s determination, but I’m wondering why she hasn’t raised therapy and/or AA yet, even in the sense of ‘I will knock you unconscious and drag you there’ which would be in keeping with the tone of this conversation.
Ruth probably thinks Billie’s a little out of her mind now. With some luck, tomorrow’s strip will be Ruth trying to help Billie through her panic. Alternatively, she might just push Billie away more forcefully. Or Willis may surprise me, as he is want to do.
‘wont’ to do.
I expect Ruth to literally push Billie away for the time being, but I have not once ever successfully predicted the next strip. (Maybe I have – I vaguely recall boasting about my accomplishment once. But not more than once, anyway.)
The “problem” with having Ruth push Billie away for the time being is that it would be retreading what happened the last time they met. It could work, in part because the focus is now much more heavily on Ruth’s state of mind (and Willis could be going for shutting down Ruth-Billie shipping hard by emphasizing that Ruth doesn’t want Billie around several times in quick succession), but it’s not what I expect to happen, because that’s not the best way to keep readers on the edges of their seats. (Could work very well to milk RuthxBillie shipper tears, though.)
Also, I love your gravatar. Where’s it from?
It’s from this very strip. I usually make a new gravatar for every strip I comment on, from the strip that I’m commenting on. I just converted panel 3 Ruth to 2-tone black and white.
2-shade, I guess. I mean black-and-white that’s actually black and white, rather than including grays.
Relationship difficulty: Deity level
WARNING: Relationships of this difficulty mode should only be attempted by experts!
Billie: Whatever. *Clicks OK*
LOL
Or that Insanity level of difficulty from DOOM. It has the same disclaimer “Are you sure you want to play this? It isn’t even remotely fair.”
I believe you mean Nightmare difficulty. Where the demons respawn, move faster and do more damage.
Also, do the two players share bottles ? er.. I mean hit points ?
My Deity level comment was a reference to the highest difficulty in the Civilisation game series, actually. Never was one for difficult FPSs. 😛
Rule #1: never fall in love with / marry anyone crazier than you are.
But there’s always someone in the relationship who’s crazier than the other person.
You’re discounting the possibility that they could be exactly the same level of crazy. 🙂
But does that happen in real life or only in fairy tales?
(The other ideal is qualitatively complimentary crazinesses.)
Which is why Rule #2 is: In any relationship make certain that you are crazier than your partner. (‘re Rock Lobster 🙂 )
Oh yeah. This is not going to end well.
This is so dark and tragic, a small part of me is beginning to wish one of them would yell “You are TEARING ME APAAHT!” just to inject some levity. 🙁
There isn’t enough Tommy Wiseau in the world for that.
Speaking as someone who made and kept that promise, Billie is in for way more than she can imagine. I was married for 14 years to a woman with a substance abuse problem. I loved her more than life itself and stayed with her until she died. But there’s no way I would recommend anyone else do anything but run away as fast as their feet will move. Being in a relationship with an addict is not for the faint of heart.
Hi Ho Hi Ho
It’s off to Hell we go…
I think there’s something wrong with everyone who thinks this page is sweet. Billy’s showing some nice sentiments, but this page is pretty frelling scary. This whole thing feels less like a declaration of love and more like a suicide pact.
It is in fact terrifying. I want to hope that it’s not the latter, and there are signs that Billie is trying to improve- which is good- but then she got slammed down and accepted it, which is horrible. One could say that her life stands upon a knife’s edge.
It’s certainly touching, but maybe that’s indicative that we’re all touched.
Just like Romeo and Juliet…
I do not know whether to like this turn of events or not. I dooooon’t knooow
This could almost barely make up for Valentine’s Day.
A little. Possibly.
By the “Good Book” girls loving girls go to hell anyway, so it’s all good.
Not necessarily. It says men lying with men is an abomination, and “spilling seed” pisses off god, but it says nothing about women…
“For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.”, Romans 1:26-27, ESV
here’s an alternate interpretation of that
I don’t think that the parent was serious in his or her interpretation. The verse in question is correctly quoted (and most translations give the same basic message: http://www.preceptaustin.org/romans_126-27.htm.) A true literalist doesn’t have much wiggle room here.
Of course, that *could* be because biblical literalism is effectively a bankrupt and internally inconsistent theological position. But that couldn’t possibly be, now could it?
If by “parent” you mean me, I quoted the passage as an example of the Bible saying something about female homosexuality. Personally though, I’m a lesbian atheist.
Yes, I realize that you were simply providing an example of a New Testament text text speaking to lesbianism. I was simply observing that your interpretation is correct, insofar as mainstream modern Biblical scholarship goes.
As to your religious affiliation or sexuality, that has nothing to do with the question of interpretation. Most of the best modern bibcrit is written by non-Christians: Christians tend to get all tied up in “what does this text means for me and why should I think so?” and lose touch with “what does this text mean, and why do we think so?”
If you have never heard of codependency go look it up. You’ll find a picture from this strip. Holey shit, this is so toxic. Do not want. Love does not fix this it only breaks people. They really need healthy boundaries.
In a very corporate world, yes. Where you can somehow just contract out problem solving to other people (like therapists or going to the mall and shopping instead of dealing with your problems), then this would be toxic. But in real life, toxic relationships are the quasi-predictable outcomes of people working with the friends and family they’ve got to make it through their problems, because “healthy boundaries” can’t be seen or set without a lot of experience.
tl;dr: Give the kids a break, they’re young and the phrase “healthy boundaries” doesn’t mean anything to people who haven’t experienced healthy and unhealthy lives yet.
Just about every University that I know of offers therapy to its students. Often for no extra cost. I understand and agree with the characters needing a real life example to be capable of establishing healthy boundaries. This is toxic, “corporate world” or not. As far as any of the other potential and canon pairings that are present in this strip, this one appears to be the most likely to harm both participants. There is a grayscale to toxicity level in real life relationships not just on or off.
There’s a simile about relationships becoming abusive over time being like a frog being boiled. If you put the frog in when the water is boiling it’ll jump out right away, but if you slowly turn up the heat it’ll stay in much longer.
Is Billy aware that she’s speaking like a terrible soap opera character or is Dave just having fun at her expense? This is, of course, making the assumption that they don’t both die in a drunken car wreck after committing some unspeakable act, thus making lines like her final panel tragic forshadowing rather than tragic freshman melodrama.
P.S. (for Mr. Willis) Please don’t tragically kill Ruth or Billy. At least give them a few years to live.
I don’t want to wait for our lives to be over,
I want to know right now, what will it be?
I don’t want to wait for our lives to be over,
Will it be yes or will it be…sorry?
10x better in Walky’s voice. Thanks.
Sigh, I’ve misspelled “foreshadowing” yet again. I hate it when I can’t edit, but can only laugh at myself. Haha.
Cue the Shire theme from Lord of the Rings!
Amber puts her hand on them, “And my axe!”
I only found DoA about a month ago, and binging through 2+ years of the comic in a couple of days was great.
Seen one per day, this strip is agonizing in its pace – I want to see more all at once!
Kudos to Mr. Willis and I hope he keeps this up for a long time. Good work, and also aaargh!
this ends with billie and ruth driving over a cliff into the grand canyon in a 1966 Ford Thunderbird convertible, right?
I can see it.
i see Willis is already taking steps to make the Beandel test a thing
MY FEELS
Personally, I’m loving the Alice:Billie::Billie:Ruth analogy. The difference is that Alice explicitly says she decided not to let Billie drag her down, whereas Billie has just said that she intends to let Ruth drag her down.
“You always have all the answers, Ruth! Well, what’s your answer to THAT?”
“My R.A. is a – DRUNKIE!”
DoA attacks youth’s greatest problem – drunkenness!
Dysfunctional as hell? HOOOOOLYYYYYYYYYYY SHIT, yes.
Ultimately catastrophic? Almost certainly.
But this could potentially be useful if it convinces at least one of them (and more likely, both) to get professional health.
Getting up close and personally invested in problematic people is how great artists are made. This kind of relationship can’t be faked, and these two…if they come out of undergrad with some ambition ans self-awareness…could be excellent artists or writers or musicians. Too bad we won’t know, but the fanfic potential is definitely there for some postscript about their diaries, their poetry, and hell, even what they tell their grandkids about life the universe and everything.
Depressingly Romantic. Still, they might as well be miserable together.
Head cheerleader. Problem solver.
THE FEELS!!!
Misery loves company.
And then she flings them both off the top of Hogwarts?
This relationship doesn’t actually make either of us better people, but at least there’s sex! Hot, wet, sex. That’s better than actual growth, right?
Hamen to the alt-text XD
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMOGaugKpzs
All of your problems can be resolved through lesbian sex.
Guys I think Ruth is bluffing
Are you joking or serious? I can’t tell with text.
Then again, there are some happy interpretations of this situation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SuWAGT9ZkYE
…or, at least, beautiful performances of songs about this situation.