Discussion (119) ¬
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Kevin Buist @kevinbuist.com ⋅ 12h
Ferric Fang @fangferric.bsky.social ⋅ 2d
Paul Lê @paulle.bsky.social ⋅ 1d
Rolling Stone @rollingstone.com ⋅ 1d
Blue sky nice guy @rajandelman.bsky.social ⋅ 11d
Maggie Westrum @maggiewestrum.bsky.social ⋅ 2d
David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 2d
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Just take up a safer hobby
like archery
or skeet shooting
or demolition
I was going to say pick-up sticks but you can prick yourself or lose an eye.
I’d add tiddlywinks but then I remembered the great brawl of 1995…I think it’s still banned in my middle school
Lawn Darts
Real ones, not those imposters with blunt plastic tips or beanbags.
I had friends that played some kind of game where they shot marbles at fairly closeb range with BBs. Always struck me as dangerous cause you could never tell what the BB would do after hitting the marble. These are the same friends that would toss lit firecrackers at each others feet. I thought they were crazy. On the other hand, I jumped off roofs. If I did that today I’d break every bone in my body.
had an ex who tried drinking gasoline on a dare
health problems later in life? NAWWWWW… 9_9
Ana did say demolition, anyway…
Eh, Skeet shooting and Archery are both far and away safer than Roller Derby. Both of them used ranged weapons and when practiced properly, you won’t hurt anybody.
Roller derby is full of dangers regardless of level of skill.
Ruth vs. Sal is the battle this campus, or maybe even this reality, could never contain
which of course means that it’s going to happen and Ruth finds her outlet leading to the three ladies forming their own team to battle for Marcie’s affection
I think I saw too many 80s team movies
Yeah, careful Sal. Last girl to antagonize Ruth ended up falling in love with her. It’s only a matter of time before Mary succumbs.
Heh. You said antagonize.
…is that what kids are calling it these days?
It’s nice that Ruth is here to supervise. And that Amber and Sal are making such an effort to get along. I also find Sal’s comment to be hilarious.
. . . I honestly never even considered that all of these snarkers could play off of eachother so well.
It’s a world made of snark, and I think that’s beautiful.
It’s a snark world after all.
It’s a snark eat snark world
It’s a world of snark and a world of bile,
And all that we say is spiteful and vile.
Once it’s said, we abhor; yet we still pile on more,
It’s a snark world after all.
it’s Snarknado Week on the Blowjob Cat Channel
Why is Ruth watching? Is it because this resemble hockey, sorta?
It’s a sport where the team she supports has a chance of winning.
Hey, it’s barely mid-late October. The Leafs haven’t been eliminated…yet.
What’ll happen first: the Leafs winning a Stanley Cup or DoA getting to the end of freshman year?
My money’s on the end of freshman year
Hate to tell Ruth, but the Quebec Nordiques will win the Stanley Cup before the Leafs.
(I am aware of what I said.)
Yea, Colorado has a slightly better chance of winning than Toronto, sure.
It’s a public parking lot. Maybe she just saw them at it and stayed to see what’s going on?
Billie is still next to her, so their relationship hasn’t run into Billie’s lies yet.
shes here for the slipshine
Elbows are clearly not hands.
Mine are.
I can’t tell if you’re joking, but I used to know a guy whose hands were legitimately attached at the elbow. He had to wear a helmet during recess, in case a stray ball or kid got launched in his direction, because he couldn’t flinch very well.
I have approximately 50 hands.
That’s pretty handsy.
Those girls gotta be careful. Too much elbowing, and they may wind up touching weenuses.
Yeah, amber, you’re practicing skating now. Elbowing comes later.
And yeah, sure, no elbowing, just like hockey has no fighting.
The fun part here is neither Ruth nor Sal are exactly wrong.
Won’t they end up on the same team though (so they won’t normally be playing against each other). Much of the derby i have seen involves one city against another.
I guess drawing parking lots is a pain in the asphalt after a while.
*switches the hacked P.A. to the channel for the hockey arena organ player*
sooo, do roller derby teams have cheerleaders for when Ruth decides to join too?
It’s a pretty independent sport, so any derby team could probably decide to have cheerleaders
Now I REALLY want to see a cheerleader troupe on skates
Sure, but the blades would get pretty chewed up by the wood and concrete floors.
So…Amber is saying sorry to Sal? Not the context I wanted but I’ll take it!
What about it? They’re like the same age and Ruth is no longer her RA.
Ruth and Billie? Ruth is a recovering alcoholic, and trying to get out of a depression. Billie is a practicing alcoholic. Ruth shouldn’t keep her company right now, she’s not stable herself. She needs distance to everything that contains alcohol until she has gained a bit of stability. It literally is a matter of life and death for her, since every relapse can be the one after which you never try to stop drinking again and alcoholism is deadly. I’m not sure sal knows about Ruth’s drinking problem though.
Also, sal knows that they both are codependent. Billie effectively told her. As soon as codependency comes into play, relationships get extremely unhealthy. sal recognised codependency so she probably knows that.
She also knows that Billie is an alcoholic. Free life lesson for you: if you ever discover that you partner is an alcoholic, run. Run as fast as you can. Living in close relationship with an alcoholic will make your life hell. Always. And the longer you stay, the more difficult it gets to escape from that. There are cases where partners saw no other way out than suicide.
So yeah, Sal is right about this. The relationship is extremely unhealthy.
Also, y’know, all the violence these two got into.
That said, considering her own relationship with Marcie, it’d be awful rich for Sal to have a go at Ruth for codependency.
True. I’m actually guessing that this is why she knows so much about it. It probably was part of her own therapy sessions.
Which definitely went super well, yeah. Wouldn’t shock me if that is part of why she’s rejected therapy entirely (as well as pretty strong implications her therapists were unhelpful at best and shitty to her at worst).
Actually, codependent people usually turn hostile towards everyone who criticises their relationship. So if they have tried to get a bit of distance between her and marcie, that might be enough to turn sal against them.
Although we also don’t know where therapy took place. If it were in Tennessee (and at least some of it probably was) then they were already forced to get distance.
Goddamn, I really just want to know what happened in Sal’s therapy sessions.
Yeah, the therapy she got was undoubtedly more “make Sal the way her mother wants her to be” than “help Sal deal with her situation on her own terms”…
There is scientific evidence that the danger you describe, the sharp cliff of relapse, is literally caused , created and maintained by total abstinence.
Despite Ideology advocating total abstinence for all person s is as effective a strategy as total abstinence is to horny teenagers as sex education. Meaning its 100% until its not at all, and consequences will be far more severe. ( with teenagers grwater likelihood of stds and pregnancy ).
What has proven effective is a strategy of radical reduced usage with no guilt and shame, plus a regime of Antiopiates to prevent a post alcohol high. This helps retrain the brain that alcohol isn’t a trigger for getting high, and prevents the severe crssh and burn from a mere sip of alcohol. It remove s the power of temptation and shame cycle.
There is a lot of evidence d based science behind this in human s and with mice. The AA approach of total abstinence is effective less than 7%.
It can also cause the dry drunk effect. Long term alcohol use also causes gaba deficiency which weaning off can help mediate.
It’s probably not a bad idea for a recovering alcoholic to try for a period of sobriety before retraining the brain, but it is definitely true that it’s proven very ineffective as a long term solution.
Also – it is possible to support someone recovering from alcoholism after you find out they’re an alcoholic. Alcoholic doesn’t automatically translate into a soul sucking pit of toxicity. Yes, it’s important to get out when you recognize a situation is toxic or turning toxic, but it’s hardly impossible to stay with someone who is an alcoholic and have it not turn toxic (especially if they’re trying to recover – that said, yes Billie isn’t trying to recover, but Ruth knows that and thus far is handling it okay).
It is possible if said person wants help. Billie doesn’t. If they don’t want help, they either are a soul sucking pit of toxicity or they will soon become one. Period.
An addict that doesn’t want to stop consuming will rather give up his parents, friends, job, partner and kids than his drug. There’s a reason that addicts tend to end up alone. Eventually the people around them say “I can’t do this anymore, me or the drug”. And they choose the drug.
I’m speaking more generally than about Billie and Ruth. I suspect you’re right that Billie will have to eventually decide to get help if she and Ruth are going to last, though for now both Billie and Ruth are remaining functional (which doesn’t mean Billie doesn’t need help, but it’s better than not).
Disciprine come from within
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLPUnTw4-1Q
Controlled drinking doesn’t work. An alcoholic has lost control over his drinking patterns. That literally is one of the characteristics of an alcoholic.
Trying to reduce the alcohol input is done by more or less every alcoholic at some point. Success rate is near zero. They can’t even follow simple rules like “don’t drink in my presence”. You can’t return to a normal, healthy drinking pattern. Addiction means you want more. Always and always more. And the addiction will win.
There is a difference between an alcoholic trying without professional help and one working with a professional along with meds that reduce if not eliminate whatever high they get from it. I’m not going to say Adam’s suggested regime works because I’ve not read the studies he mentions, but there is a difference. And it’s important to note it’s been proven completely cutting drinking out doesn’t work either (a method with a 93% failure rate can hardly be said to work, even if it is the highest rate around – again, I’m not familiar with addictions studies so I can’t comment on that).
Actually, it currently is the method with the best prospect of working. There currently is no reliable way to undo addiction. It effectively is a subconscious connection between alcohol and feeling good the brain has learnt. To cure addiction, you have to undo that. We don’t know how to do that. There are rare cases where it worked. To my knowledge, it’s currently not known why it worked. As long as you have that connection, consuming will always lead to the overwhelming wish to drink more.
My grandparents were not good people. The abuse they put in their children makes everything in this comic look pale. As a result, I have a bunch of addicted aunts and uncles. And I once had a relationship with a dry alcoholic. So I read a lot about it. Once I’ve read the thread of a guy who practiced controlled drinking for years. He knew a lot of studies and arguments and could discuss for hours. Explain why this is the best way to death with addiction. And it all sounded really convincing. And two posts further down he told us that he got really drunk the last evening. He had turned verbally aggressive against his children and beaten up his wife in front of said children. It was Christmas. Yeah. The wonders of controlled drinking. You’ll get beaten up less often if you stay.
I mean, he found all kinds of reasons and excuses for this. All except this one: he’s an alcoholic who drunkenly abuses his family and instead of being horrified, he tries to rationalise it.
“Actually, it currently is the method with the best prospect of working.”
[citation needed]
…actually I’d love some citations from Adam Black too. it’s not as easy as it used to be to find good information from a quick google.
fwiw, the wikipedia article is on the side of abstinence, but I don’t have the energy to dig into the studies and see whether they were for counselling+medication or counselling alone.
it does mention medications, but in a separate section, with no mention of long-term anything (besides a warning about the dangers of benzos).
Also, while I definitely believe Alanari about the person whose arguments they read, the same thing can happen to someone abstaining from alcohol. People go off the wagon, get really drunk and abuse the people around them all the time. That doesn’t necessarily mean abstinence isn’t the best choice.
I wouldn’t call Billy practicing, she pretty much has it down, she could probably go professional by now if she wanted to.
Ruth is still Sal’s RA. So criticizing her relationship with Billie is something not wise given the power imbalance.
If someone could point me to reliable studies about what works against addiction? The only people I know who reliably stopped drinking or smoking avoid alcohol and tobacco at all times. Everyone I know who tries the approach of controlled usage has phases of intensive usage. But this is anecdotal evidence and some of you here (and Cerberus, too) always insist that there are more effective ways to stop addictive behavior.
Though I’m sure you need to change gene expression to change the receptiveness to the drug – just like you need to change gene expression to end PTSD – no one is really sure how that works. There are some experience-based concepts for PTSD where the change is brain activity and hormone levels and stuff are shown for relatively small populations, but why these methods convince your body to regulate hormon production differently is still unclear.
I think the incredible power is that Ruth now knows that Sal was working with Amazi Girl, which would be of interest to the police. Ruth has blackmail power.
Pretty sure low blows are also not allowed in roller derby.
Through dangers untold and hardships unnumbered I have fought my way here to the parking lot beyond the dorms to take back the femurs you have stolen, for my will is as strong as yours and my campus as great. You have no power over me!
[Ruth vanishes in a puff of David Bowie]
Damn, I can never remember that line.
I was about to ask when Sal got some freckles, but then realized, oh, my monitor is dirty.
Cleaned now.
Nothing like that has ever happened to me. As far as you know.
One one hand we have former vigilantes trying to focus their rage on sports, and on the other we have a codependent relationship that broke many rules. Morality is confusing when no one is actively doing something evil.
Now I’m wondering what Sal wanted to say in the last panel.
hello pot, meet kettle
No elbowing in Derby? Sure. Just like there’s no traveling in basketball or holding in American football.
Or fighting in hockey.
After all that is against the rules.
I’m pretty sure that most sports’ rule-books are just to make the administrators feel better about themselves and let them fool themselves that they’re not enabling anarchy!
I know right? I can practically hear one saying “Look, we SAID it’s against the rules, what else do you want us to do? Hands are tied!”
You want us to tie ELBOWS as well? That’s just crazy
“Our weenuses are tied!”
(Yes, I love the word ‘weenus’. So help me, I will die on this hill.)
A friend of mine once went to a fight where a hockey game broke out.
That seems like a natural progression.
In fact, as far as I can tell, Ice Hockey was first invented in Iceland as described in Njal’s Saga
“Skarphedinn takes a spring into the air, and leaps over the stream between the icebanks, and does not check his course, but rushes still onwards with a slide. The sheet of ice was very slippery, and so he went as fast as a bird flies. Thrain was just about to put his helm on his head; and now Skarphedinn bore down on them, and hews at Thrain with his axe, “the ogress of war,” and smote him on the head, and clove him down to the teeth, so that his jaw-teeth fell out on the ice. This feat was done with such a quick sleight that no one could get a blow at him; he glided away from them at once at full speed. Tjorvi, indeed, threw his shield before him on the ice, but he leapt over it, and still kept his feet, and slid quite to the end of the sheet of ice.”
No forward passes in Rugby.
Everyone should play football – no it’s not called soccer you heathens – which is clearly the cleanest sport of all!
*dives for the dressing room*
Two characters in a snark-off… with Billie silent in the background. That’s just bizzar.
Billie is too smart to get involved in a snark-off between Ruth and Amazigirl.
Oh god, can Billie please call Sal AG in front of Amber? Please?
Billie has winner.
A snark-off has a winner?
You’re doing it wrong.
Of course it does if it’s a good one!
The audience.
Point.
Billie has the audience.
“now THATS how you do movie night!”
Lucy better take notes
holy shit that’s a burn of a thousand suns
Where’s Carla? Shouldn’t she be practicing too? I want more Carla
Carla’s not on the team.
But… she came to enlist
If you actually read the strip, she only came to be next to Sal in her jacket.
I think that Ruth may be worrying a bit too much here. Yes, Sal and Amber have extensive opportunities to be rough with each other but they also have fewer opportunities to think of reasons to be rough with each other except: “Get out of my way, girl!”
Kettle, meet pot
I don’t understand. What power does Ruth have over Sal? Or was it supposed to be sarcastic?
Ruth is Sal’s RA. As demonstrated by Ruth and Billie’s early interactions, it is fairly easy for an unethical RA to make one of their dorm resident’s life very unpleasant if they so choose.
Blackmail power. She knows about Sal & Amazi-girl.
Being non confrontational is swell, but you know, at a point you just can’t keep avoiding to address issues just because you can’t jab them. I mean, this is a mean parking lot and it deserves a rough treatment at least.
At least I’m not the only one who thinks derby is one of the dumbest possible options for a sport for someone trying to deal with violent anger issues.
NOOOOOooooo! We were supposed to get Leslie putting Joe in his place! This wasn’t the deal, Willis! THIS WASN’T THE DEAL!
This is a New Deal… partly starring the Great Depressed. How fitting.
Damn you Willis
“I am altering the deal. Pray I don’t alter it any further.”
Damn! Why don’t we have a thumbs up button?
Itd be better for leslie to sort her personal/teaching life out first
Oh boy, time for another round of Guess That Car!
I think Marcie’s in front of either a Pontiac G6 or a Dodge Intrepid.
I would guess Intrepid.
Also, a nod for drawing these cars. They look sorta generic, but all the proportions are all real-seeming and don’t distract from the foreground action. Plus it’s not.like they’re gonna be used much.
ruth: still a better matchmaker than joyce
“…an’ yet somehow ah still sort of managed.”
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2013/comic/book-4/01-the-only-dope-for-me-is-you/phrasing/
Ruth: Are you suggesting that your relationship with Amber is similar to ours?
Sal: Wha? No, that’s-
Amber: Well, I mean, Walky and I were together for a while, and you do look a little like him, especially if I don’t wear glasses…
Sal: I hate you all.