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David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 18h
David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 17h
NEANDERTHAL FINGERPRINT! NEANDERTHAL FINGERPRINT! NEANDERTHAL FINGERPRINT! NEANDERTHAL FINGERPRINT! NEANDERTHAL FINGERPRINT! NEANDERTHAL FINGERPRINT! NEANDERTHAL FINGERPRINT! NEANDERTHAL FINGERPRINT! NEANDERTHAL FINGERPRINT! NEANDERTHAL FINGERPRINT! 🤯
www.theguardian.com/science/2025...
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It’s-a me! Carlio!
Having been with someone who would just flat out ignore me, despite her usual over-the-top nature, I’m hurting for Carla here.
I hope this doesn’t hurt her. 🧸 Or Charlie.
wow, we’re closing on to 20 minutes shift lol
Just a minute let me do some math based on the time this comment is tagged with.
According to the time stamps 14 minutes off. But the new comic wasn’t loading for longer than that.
Yeah it’s ..quite a bit now. Used to be 3-5 mins after the hour.
A whole universe of gender and discovery, waiting for you!!!! ^^
*plays “Phendrana Drifts” from Metroid Prime on hacked muzak*
I think I see what you did there. Also, thanks for the video on logic the other day – it was great.
ahahahahahaha thx. yeah i know Black Dynamite is an exploitation film, but i still find parts of it rather funny
I’ve missed the context to this, but I wouldn’t call Black Dynamite an exploitation film, more of a parody of one. Like, it came out not that long ago, and it’s like that on purpose, as a joke.
I’ve moved across the entire rainbow. Life is weird and what matters is not the destination but the road!
A rainbow road, you say.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuX5_OWObA0
such a good OST
ok Charlie is absoltuely doing it on purpose now
well, it looked like her smartwatch? is giving her an otification
tho it would be an amusing troll like. “grab a snack at x time, ten minutes later, smooch carla”
Nah, Charlie just noticed she has boobs. This is the first time she’s really stopped to register them, and she’s pleasantly surprised.
Charlie interacts with the world at 5000ms ping time.
High bandwidth, low latency.
I think you’re right about the watch. It’s not shaded in the last panel, implying the screen lit up.
Booster told Carla to show their sister understanding and patience:
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2024/comic/book-14/02-its-the-love-i-havent-got/unsettling/
Charlie is very likely neurodivergent, wouldn’t be surprised if she has ADHD and/or autism
Or cognitive disengagement syndrome, which is another proposed attention disorder separate from ADHD (but often diagnosed as ADHD currently).
And apparently sometimes comorbid with ADHD, according to the wikipedia page. Thanks for mentioning the name, hadn’t read about this before
oooo interesting!
I might actually have this, if only because it seems to be a neurodivergent stripe that falls under both autism and ADHD?
(what a joy it is to have executive dysfunction :/)
Carla and Charlie could be married and we’d never know.
And Carla wouldn’t be sure either.
Hm.
Will Charlie be the type to just go with whatever a more forceful personality says, or will she need her personal alone time/space and Carla’s needling will just not mesh?
Its too late Carla, the seahorses have her now.
Leslie is still a good mom.
Maybe Charlie has a The Prestige situation going on where she has a secret third identical twin and they switch places in real life to keep the illusion going and that’s why she doesn’t acknowledge Carla. It’s a different Charlie.
I hope Becky tells Leslie about her mom. It’s a trauma she hasn’t looked at yet because of all the other traumas that followed. A stable and caring adult is what she needs to start that painful journey.
She really does need to unpack it sometime, and Leslie would be a great person to talk to about it. Plus, it’s always nice seeing more of their relationship (found family is wonderful)
As I noted a while back she hadn’t even discussed it with *Joyce*, which means she almost certainly hasn’t discussed it with anyone*.
* Certainly not her “spiritual leaders” of the time, though I’d have though that sort of thing was their JOB.
They would have the same reaction that Carol had to Mike dying.
Nobody discussed it with Joyce. She thought Bonnie died of cancer up until Ruth ended up in the hospital. Not only did this keep Joyce sheltered from the realities of the world, but it also meant she didn’t have the full context she could’ve needed to help support Becky.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/superglue/
https://www.dumbingofage.com/indebted/
(Also, fuck cancer.)
Not just that she didn’t have the context, but that Becky couldn’t even open up to her about it.
Confirmation that Americans will use any weights and measures to avoid the metric system when Dina stated her weight in atrociraptors.
If this comment area had an upvote this comment would get my upvote.
As a teacher, I love my students, but I’m not a therapist, so my listening hopefully only gets them to open up to more helpful people down the line. I know that Leslie’s gone above-and-beyond (including housing), but Becky might benefit from more professional help than just amateur kindness and generosity.
I would also not be surprised if Becky has had negative experiences with therapists in the past.
I would be surprised if Becky had experiences with therapists in the past.
Toedead would be more likely to lay hands and pray, throw hands, or bring her to the pastor.
Charlie about to tell Carla something interesting about humpback whales. Because whales identify themselves in whalesong, and she thinks its cute how Carla always introduces herself.
Carla who?
It’s interesting that the fluid identity stuff is something that seems (or is interpreted by Leslie) as being hard for Becky to accept or cope with. She pretty easily coped with Ruth going from dating a woman to dating a man, pointing out that Ruth was bi and also Ruth’s happiness was important. I get that Becky was basically raised up to be little more than a housewife married to a man, but we don’t really get the sense that Becky herself REALLY jived with that and is pretty happy and content to be a lesbian.
Is this supposed to be lead up for someone else’s fluid sexuality experience? Perhaps someone like Joyce, who’s sexuality being fluid (but not fluid enough to return Becky’s affections) would be something that’d be hard for Becky to accept?
Wow, if story will go there… wow, awesome!…
My guess is Dorothy!
Would be rather fitting if it happened to coincide with the imminent distribution of fluid at a particular party…
I’m now putting 50/50 odds on this happening.
Raising a 60%, this is foreshadowing, not tinfoil hatting
I don’t think Joyce being lowkey Dorothysexual impacts anyone’s identifiers.
Impacts Dorothy’s, who reciprocates and had previously described herself as straight but openminded to change.
I don’t think it’ll impact Becky’s identifiers but it will undoubtedly make her feel some type of way. It’s easier to cope with Joyce not returning her feelings by saying “well, Joyce is straight!!”. It’s harder if it becomes “well, Joyce is actually into girls sometimes. Not me though. Dorothy, yes. But not me.”. Not because I think she wants to date Joyce anymore, but because Becky’s got self-worth and self-esteem issues she hides behind jokes. She internalized Dina being grey-ace as meaning Becky wasn’t desirable enough. She would definitely internalize this.
This is the it of it, Becky has deep insecurities, she will probably react to any version of Joyce having feelings for girls(but especially Dorothy) to any other Joyce related situation more dramatically just because she feels rejected
Their close relationship growing up just further complicates the matter, because that can subconsciously flag someone as “family, platonic love only”. I wonder if Becky bring an only child, while Joyce has three siblings, affected their perspectives.
Ooooooohhhhh, I hadn’t thought of that but yea that would absolutely create a difference between them on how they view each other
Idk, I think Leslie’s comment about, “Even if you shif you can still keep using the words you like.” is more indicative of Becky’s GENDER shifting rather than her sexuality. She is VERY assertive in her label of being a lesbian and has shown zero interest in or attraction to men. So pushing down any ~weird gender feelings~ for the sake of holding onto her identity of “lesbian” could definitely fit!
Oh my God thank you for reading this as an intentionally written story with foreshadowing and arcs. It makes for so much more meaningful stuff to talk about
Happy to contribute to a more interesting comment section!
That’s a real cute Ms Marvel
First, I feel like everything about the class has been affirming of Becky’s identity so far, but the idea that sexual orientation has drift may be undermining for someone who has spent most of her life dealing with people telling her she can just choose to not like girls and has only recently been able to assert that she was in fact born this way.
And Leslie is trying to gently remind her that labels are how we want society to see us and don’t always or ever capture all edge cases. If Becky should meet someone that reveals she might like 1/1000 guys, or enby’s, or transmen does that make her stop being a lesbian?
Only if she wants it to. But easier said than done.
Or it’s because she doesn’t want to start fantasizing about putting Joyce through gay conversion therapy.
Being bi isn’t more fluid than any other identity.
Joyce being Joyce doesn’t mean it’s any harder for anyone else to follow.
The sexuality itself isn’t the fluid part, the fluid is the identity itself. For instance, if someone grows up thinking they are straight, because that’s all they think there can be, only to realize as they get older that they find the same gender attractive. Maybe they’ll adopt the label bi-curious, then bi. Then, as they dabble, they realize they’re gay and feel nothing for the opposite gender. That’s the fluid part.
That unnecessary lecture applies to everything equally as much as it does to bisexuality
Becky’s acceptance of Ruth is no more difficult than it is to accept anyone else doing or being anything else
Saying Becky understands fluid identity because she accepts Ruth’s bisexuality does not follow loigcally unless you think bisexuality is somehow more fluid than other identities
Joyce had difficulty understanding the fluidity of Ruth dating a man after dating a woman. THAT is where I’m basing the comparison, because in story Joyce had difficulty understanding that. Please don’t make assumptions on what you think I believe when you do not know me. Sorry I offended you somehow but please back off, thanks.
This may apply in some cases, but there are also plenty of people who experience a shift in who they are actually attracted to at different points in their life.
… Becky will throw all these things on this drinking party, won’t she?
Of course she will.
It’s been simmering under the surface so long that I would welcome this, even if it’s a complete disaster.
She wouldn’t fret over the synopsis, she is the synopsis(?)
Still not…
I genuinely forgot about the rest of the strip as soon as Carla appeared. Carla time!
But…she’s in the first panel.
And?
They said what they said.
Is my exposure limited in some way? I don’t understand the portrayal of Charlie. Like, by what’s been shown, she’s not … functional, without substantial assistance.
It does seem that way to me too. Like, we thought Dina was awkward, but this is a whole ‘nother level. But she is apparently getting by at school on her own, so…fair guess that Willis has plans to reveal more.
Oh no, she didn’t respond within 10 seconds. Big whoop.
She also seems to be look at her smartwatch probably a notification on it, so its possible she has that queued up first.
It’s a reminder: “class is over. Leave the room.”
Seriously: I have an alarm set on my watch to go home at 5, because I’ve been known to keep working until 7 or 8 or my wife calls to find out what’s going on.
Working through quitting time when you’re actively engaged with a solo task is plainly relatable to nearly everyone. Sitting in a classroom chair with your hands folded after the instructor finished speaking and the room completely empties around you is pretty different!
There have also been times when she didn’t remember someone was trying to talk to her.
There have been times in my life when I have been just that spacey. It’s amazing what you can do with the right accommodations, such as class recordings and an assigned notetaker.
I mean, she seems to have a really big problem with responding to any outside stimuli whatsoever, even from people she enjoys spending time with. Being zoned out (or zoned in) to that degree everywhere you go is dangerous, like imagine that scary driving autopilot feeling that happens sometimes when you drive while tired but when you’re doing or going anywhere.
Like, the notifications on her watch probably help her keep to a schedule and stuff, but they won’t help her say, cross a road safely if there’s someone running the light, or hear tornado sirens, or notice smoke. Considering that she doesn’t seem to notice people trying to get her attention at all, verbally or visually, I would worry it would even impact her ability to notice a fire alarm—even the special flashing ones for Deaf people.
Basically, if it is as severe as it has been represented so far, I think she might need a service animal. It won’t solve the social issues that come from this, but I think it would help avoid the bigger dangers of zoning in and out like she appears to do. (I would also like to just see more Charlie in general because we are only seeing like one side of this).
I’m on board. Pls add a no-nonsense Labrador to the cast, it gets to stare down everyone about to do something dumb. The ultimate judgment will be when it takes Charlie and leaves the room.
She doesn’t remember where she’s going, what’s she supposed to be doing, who she was talking to.
There are people in the world who are this dysfunctional and don’t have consistent assistance available. Including people in their first year of college. The parents might have tried to connect Charlie with the disability resource center of the school, but in my experience that mostly means more time on tests and more lenience for attendance. They were likely counting on Booster to check in with her regularly, and might have been using the relatively walkable and safe environment of a college dorm to see if Charlie can live independently.
Omg, has Becky’s obnoxious overemphasis of her identity been foreshadowing all along? Is she going to have a shift?
Nah I think that’s just normal “Im free to tell the truth after 18 years of being terrified of it”. Pretty common beyond just becky
is Charlie being shy?
“Oh! Sorry, Carla; I was thinking about pocket lint. Did you know there are 17 species of dust mites that prefer it to any other environment?”
[Not disparaging Charlie. I think she’d be someone I’d enjoy talking with, if I could ever get her attention.]
Carla and Charlie (Charla? Carlie?) are adorable.
Becky is putting on her Becky Face too much and not confronting her issues enough.
These two met this semester and they’re already this cute. Imagine how sapphic and cute Dorothy and Joyce, who met last semester, would be in foursome with their men watching.
I like your style
Oh, let’s see, between:
– Amber deciding she’ll get drunk and let herself make mistakes
– Dorothy (who’s still depressed btw), getting drunk after getting Walky back
but also wanting Joyce– Joyce declaring she will get drunk again and probably throwing herself at Joe
but also very clearly about to discover something about herself too.– Becky’s clown persona masking a pressure cooker of issues (there’s gender in there too??), getting drunk, and letting them all out – drunk. Also witnessing other people’s drama.
Also watching whatever Joyce and Dorothy have going, even if nothing happens she’s so jealous
This will be a disaster, like many a college party. I need to watch it unfold. I hope they invite Booster.
(Kiddo needs to make mistakes as part of this telenovela, not a witness.)The drama is going to be delicious
Add: Jennifer, in denial about her identity (personal and sexual); Asher, her ex(?) she was ordered to win back; Ethan, Asher’s emo hottie hookup.
Inject the drama into my veins!
Oh, for sure there’s gender in there. Growing up evangelical and being constantly told there’s only One Right Way To Be A Woman really leaves an impact. Even if she unpacks it all and decides she is still a woman, she needs to unpack it.
It’s gonna be the biggest party disaster since Halloween.
Well now I just need to keep voting Carla and Charlie to see more of this. I love this.
I thought Carla and Charlie were quote unquote dating already? Why is Carla still acting this desperate?
Because she’s still not being directly acknowledged this very second, which means there is still a Carla Crisis in effect.
The first panel seems pretty normal, the last panel is because Charlie isn’t reacting and it triggers Carla’s insecurities.
Carla is used to immediate attention.
whether she wanted it or not
Also Carla still doesn’t seem to be sure about the whole dating thing. Like, last time we saw them they were holding hands and still she wondered if she likes her.
Pretty normal to still act desperate in the early days of dating, where nothing is concrete yet and you’re still insecure. Especially if you’re 18/19
Carla’s 20 but that’s still pretty normal.
I still think Charlie is hard of hearing and either she and her family haven’t figured it out yet, or they have but forgot to let Carla know.
Huh. And she reads lips so it helps when she’s looking at someone but if she’s not… HM. That’s an interesting theory, I’d like to see more.
Right now she registers as an ADHD/Autistic combo, but who needs way more support than she’s getting.
Booster “forgot” to tell Carla. Given that Booster really doesn’t like Carla, that makes sense.
I don’t think they’d want to give their sister a hard time like that
I like this theory, but it doesn’t super track with her first appearances where she’s staring off into space & just has a very belated reaction to things going on around her… So it’s not just that. But being hard of hearing could very well play into auditory processing issues she might have due to ADHD/autism (I read her similarly to Dante)!
I agree, even if she is HOH I’d guess she also has ADHD based on her other behavior (like forgetting why she was in Carla’s section of campus last time we saw her). But the level of not-acknowledging-people that she has going on sometimes makes me think there’s more than just inattentive ADHD or autism at work.
Yes, that’s been my impression from the beginning, too. She seems much more “with it” and engaged when her conversation partner is looking straight at her and vice versa.
Wouldn’t be the first time hearing trouble or auditory processing time lag presents itself as inattention.
I could’ve sworn we’ve had instances of her not noticing people in front of her speaking to her either though. Or just not noticing Carla’s Carlaness even when it’s in front of her face and peripheries lol
Becky is putting Leslie in a very bad spot here. Like, Leslie could get in a LOT of trouble if people find out she knew about this. Becky is spiraling out of control lately.
Anyways, I can’t tell if Becky is messed up because she made a sort-of suicide joke, because she’s having gender vibes, or because she’s feeling weird about the idea about identities and orientations being fluid in this Joyce-and-Dorothy-getting-really-close day and age.
Like Becky is having a gender identity crisis? I always thought she liked being a woman.
Maybe she always thought that, too.
Maybe Becky is subconsciously or consciously trying to ‘accidentally’ sabotage the keg party, because she fears Joyce will drift even further away from her if it happens.
I think the point of the keg party is to try to bring herself closer to Joyce. Like, Dorothy got to have Joyce’s first drunk night, but she’s going to get to have Joyce’s first keg party. T That being said, I think it’s going to backfire. The Chaos Scenario (Dorothy kisses Joyce in front of at least Becky and probably Walky or Joe) is looking like a stronger and stronger possibility. I’ve said that before, but never have I been more sure.
Carla. Touch her, you chowderhead. Put your hands on her shoulders. Kiss her hair. Nibble her ear. You have to get between her and her thoughts.
Or just poke her if you’re shy! Tapping on the shoulder would suffice.
Carla is doing what Booster said and being patient! You shouldn’t generally youch someone unless you’ve previously cleared that it’s okay to do so, especially if they don’t seem to notice you.
Charlie said they were dating.
Let’s not with the stigmatization of touch thing. It’s actually fine.
She knows they’re dating. I’m talking about the fact that Charlie clearly has a processing disability. Like, Booster clearly didn’t just mean the romantic thing when they said to be patient. Booster was saying, “don’t rush her”.
I’m also not here to stigmatize touch. I’m saying that you wouldn’t sneak up on somebody and pat them on the shoulder without prior rapport around that, and from what we can tell, that’s the equivalent here. Again, I am looking at the time that Booster told Carla to be patient, and it tells me that people probably usually try to rush Charlie a lot or force her to “catch up”. You know, like, through unexpected physical contact. Please make the effort to read me in good faith.
You’re right, I wouldn’t “sneak up on” somebody and pat their shoulder. At most, I’d walk directly up to them, in their line of vision, and tap them on the shoulder. With like, one finger. And then say something like “Hey, you ready to go?”. If you want good faith (which I wasn’t aware I wasn’t giving (news to me)), it’s polite to give the same and not assume people are just ambushing others as the first form of contact.
She specifically said “especially if they don’t seem to have noticed you” in the first message you replied to. Claiming that assumption isn’t good faith is just ignoring the context of the comment in the first place.
And for what it’s worth, I really don’t like it when people touch me to get my attention. At best, if I can see the person already then it’s just unnecessary and kind of rude? If I’ve already noticed you then a wave or a “Hey” already signals the intent to get my attention far better. At worst, if I didn’t notice the person first it can either be seriously triggering or momentarily frightening depending on where the person touches.
I wish people would ask before doing it more often! That’s not “stigmatization of touch”, that’s just common courtesy!
I’ll take your word for it and believe that’s your own personal standard.
For the record, I’ve known maybe 3-4 people who have unexpected touch, from an unseen source, as an extremely strong trigger. Each of them has a unique context for the trigger, too. It’s really fairly common, and lots of different kinds of trauma, physical and emotional, can cause it.
Carla is allergic to walnuts, so the relationship isn’t gonna work out.
From what we’ve seen, she hasn’t reacted to Juglans much at all.
Am I the only one thinking that what Leslie is trying to gently assure Becky about is the about Becky’s gender, not sexuality? As in, if your identity moves away from Woman you can still call yourself a lesbian? (For example, there are very butch lesbians who transition but have spent their whole lives in lesbian subculture and it’s a part of their identity so they find a way to keep that). Not saying Becky will, but that’s how I read it
I don’t think Leslie is trying to reassure Becky about anything in particular tbh. She just sees that one of her students is struggling against applying the concept of a fluid identity to herself and wants her to know that identity and labels aren’t the same and you can keep labels that work for you even as identity shifts.
I fail to understand why Carla is into a person who seems to live in a different galaxy.
Because even people who “seem to live in a different galaxy” deserve love too.
Yeah, no. This is just cheese, no bread or anything.
Cheese is a gift from the gods and you will respect it!
Because even though Carla demands and thrives on attention, she apparently gets super hot for people who don’t give it to her.
Same reason she was down bad for Malaya a few months(/a million years) ago.
^^^ The parallel to Malaya is very real, even though the type of disregard is completely different.
Tell me where is fancy bred, in the heart or in the head?
In my experience, fancy bread comes from a bakery.
Fancy bakeries.
Is Becky thinking she “can be” straight? Something like that?
So, I could understand her “fear”: to be something totally contrary what she fought her entire life, fighting even against her parents.
I’m honestly not sure Becky is struggling with this concept as applied to herself at the moment. I think she has a good handle on her identity in terms of both sexuality and gender (I mean, I could be wrong on that but Willis likes to foreshadow and I haven’t seen anything that gives gender vibes from her). Her hesitation when answering Les seems more tied to her sudden realization that her mom might not have approved of her “I’d rather die” statement.
I think this is setup for another character to come to terms with themself, and I’m guessing that’s gonna be Joyce.
Could this be about religious crisis instead?
I think whatever Becks is confused by here is motivated by the fact that Joyce’s identity markers are changing so quickly (like Christian, never swears, straightedge). Becky digs her heels into the ground hard by mistake and tries to preserve everything about herself that she can because she’s lost so much, good and bad, that she’s repressing her own ability to explore her connection to religion or whatever else this could be idk. Yay Becky keg arc
Becky still wants Joyce to be her Old Joyce, not New Joyce.
Problem is, Joyce doesn’t want to be Old Joyce anymore and almost nobody else wants that for her either.
or she’s still upset over the “rather be dead” comment, and Leslie sees that she’s upset and assumes it’s about the topic of the next class?
But even the “rather be dead” came in reaction to the idea of her identity changing. Which might suggest she’s worried about something there.
Could be!
pretty sure becky is sad about her dead mom guys
not really an identity thing
um, but it still relates?
Becky doesn’t want to do what she perceives as giving up her lesbian identity, part of the reason is because it’s something which makes her feel closer to her mom who was also lesbian.
was she?
I’ve seen the theory floating around, but haven’t seen anything to support it.
Certainly not anything to suggest Becky thinks she was.
Pretty sure NGPZ was making a joke.
What? 🤨
…. please explain to the class what you thought the joke was.
Because right now, you don’t look good.
I thought they were making a substitution of the fact that Becky hold strongly to her Christianity despite everything in part because it is something that connect her to her mother to her being a lesbian in order to be humorous. I had never seen any speculation of Becky’s mother being a lesbian, so I assume they made it up on the spot. I apologize if I confused anyone.
nothing to joke about really
Becky’s mom literally committed suicide because of having to repress her true lesbian self within her cult
I apologize then.
no worries then ^^
although i am rather worried about Becky… T_T
Do you have a link to that? I didn’t remember Willis directly telling us that much about Bonnie.
I would absolutely love to know if this is a theory or a fact supported by Willis/the comic. No one else here seems to remember this coming up and I certainly don’t either.
Asking in good faith – Please can you link whatever makes you this certain Becky’s mom was a lesbian?
So, for whatever it’s worth, Becky’s mom didn’t literally commit suicide because she was a lesbian (nor is there any evidence she was a lesbian at all). I’m not sure why you got pounced on for not knowing people’s private fancanon, but here we are. Hope you read this.
I would absolutely love to know if this is a theory or a fact supported by Willis/the comic. No one else here seems to remember this coming up and I certainly don’t either.
Asking in good faith – Please can you link whatever makes you this certain Becky’s mom was a lesbian?
dang, I’ve ended up in some wild daydreams but never any so deep that I missed out on bailing out of class
is charlie deaf or is that a fake characteristic i invented?
Not deaf, merely *profoundly* spacey.
Everytime Carla is on screen is a good time. Carla/Charlie just amps up the good time to peak levels.
I love this pairing so much