I don’t see it as bizarre. Joe is expressing, sort of, the old wisdom that no can be all things to anyone. Simply, Joe can be her Joe and Dorothy can be her Dorothy.
ARRGH! You just stirred up a bad 34 year old memory of my employment with them! I lasted 16 weeks before I ran running and screaming out of the place and went back to my previous employer (Where I stayed another 10 years).
The indie band I was in at that time even had a song about my time there entitled “Appropriate Attire”.
One can be a fan of anime but not care for, or even really be aware of, JoJo’s.
The only reason I know this is a JoJo’s Reference is because I watched Gigguk’s Attack on Titan parody which ends with two characters discussing whether or not one of them made a JoJo’s reference by making more JoJo’s references.
Hormones don’t buy into compartmentalisation. And social support structures also tend to take a dim view on it. This tends to demand a lot more ongoing effort than diversifying your financial assets.
Son of the man who requested the police come in to monitor a peaceful protest. Ie, is Tony capable of breaking from the Dean’s conservative views? It’s a mirror to Carla coming to grips with her parents likely helping the “Bulmarian” genocide.
I vaguely recall, but can’t find the link for, that we heard the university system’s board of directors held the emergency vote and called in law enforcement. All of that is over the head of the campus’s head admin.
Honestly: I think he popped up too conveniently and too perfectly for Sarah. I think it’s easy to read some of his comments as snide, and I just generally think he’s too narratively simplistic for “Sarah’s boyfriend” to be the only thing going on there.
I’m keen to see where it goes, but I don’t trust him to be a good person or to be dating Sarah for good reasons. It’ll be fun either way tho!
they could stand to rope Dorothy in on this discussion though, no sense causing unnecessary ripples, even if it does look like Joe wants the world for them
I think they need to rope Dorothy in on this discussion before she has one with Walky. I would think it could have some effect on how receptive she is.
Well yes, but having the discussion between the two of them first also makes sense.
[Canon summary]
“I have to break up with you because I’ve realised I have feelings for somebody else”
“I want you to have what makes you happy. I know you have feelings for them that I can’t compete with. I’m not going to try. But why do you need to break up with me? You still have feelings for me too. I am willing to take what you are happy to offer to me?”
[hypothetical future]
“I don’t want to cheat on anybody. I feel awful that Dorothy and I started off kissing behind your back as it is!”
“If all three of us are in agreement then it’s some form of throuple with you as the hinge I think? Definitely not cheating because there’d be openness and honesty.”
“… Do I talk about this to Dorothy with you, or on my own first?”
“I assume she’s gone to find Walky? So possibly better on your own first”
as a poly person i am very happy for Joe to be figuring this out so naturally, and to Joyce BAD *grabs squirt bottle* you shouldn’t be rewarded for this behavior so heres some reminder what you did was incorrect approach!
Joyce has always been impulsive and true to her desires. I think being granted permission to double date might actually set off enough endorphins where she’ll want to sleep with Joe nearly immediately, fully cementing her as being the horny one, just like Ruth predicted at the start of the semester.
This also means that Lucy was actually right in that Joyce is a bit like a bisexual version of her.
Actually, was it Ruth? It might have been Sarah or Billie who had said that once Joyce has her first orgasm, she’ll bang half the town. I couldn’t find that when doing some digging just now so maybe the collective memory of the comments can tell me who it was.
This is a really good point. We won!! We got a prize!! … But not the jackpot, yeah.
I’m hopeful, though, because the way I see it there can be so much narrative goodness in all three of them getting together — Including the “not being on board” (at first) part from Joyce and/or Dorothy. So, still celebrating ;33
Outlook is very good, but declarations of victory are still slightly premature. These two may consent to continuing this relationship, but there’s a third person who needs to sign off on it before it can really be solidified.
… No, get out of here, Jesus, you don’t get a say in this, I’m talking about Dorothy.
That’s an incredibly strained reading of that strip. He was joking, maybe even a little concerned.
You’ll notice they don’t go on to explicitly clarify that they actually are exclusive, just proceed as if they are. Like every other serious couple in this comic.
I agree that people should talk to their partners and establish clear boundaries, what bothers me is the idea that if you haven’t explicitly done so, you should assume you’re not exclusive, because that leads to people getting hurt.
yeah, strictly speaking the mistake to begin with is to rely on the norms of established (white Christian) culture to establish the boundaries for you
but I guess we can only expect so much healthy communication and understanding from 18-something-year-olds in a religious red state
as much as we can give them leeway for this mistake, exclusivity as the default is still an instance of white Christian culture passive-aggressively re-establishing itself as the center of the universe when really this is NOT a given for all people from different cultures and walks of life (group marriage was very commonplace among indigenous cultures in the pre-colonial era, and group marriage was originally outlawed for the sole purpose of taking power away from these people)
While that’s true, it doesn’t change the fact that they’re in a context where exclusivity is the default (regardless of the reasons for that); while it’s good to communicate regardless of expectations, it’s especially important when your boundaries don’t match the local social normal, whatever that may be.
Besides… as I understand it, many non-monogamous relationships still insist on discussion before one of its members gets intimate with a (currently) non-member, for a number of reasons that others in this comment section are much better qualified to explain than I am.
It also makes the inclusion of the scene with Rachel and Joe in the gym make much more sense – she is degrading his confidence and illustrating his low self-worth. He no longer feels like he deserves (and thus can’t have) Joyce’s full heart so he is settling for a piece of it.
It absolutely is but what Joe is describing isn’t a healthy poly dynamic it’s him getting whatever scraps Joyce is willing to give him because he doesn’t feel like Joyce values him as much as she does Dorothy.
He’s not expecting or asking for the level of care and attention that a partner should have in a polyamorous relationship formation, and very crucially he has not said a thing about what he actually personally wants or what would make him happy besides Joyce being happy and having what she wants. That’s not healthy.
idk why you think any of that. he never said he wants less, and has explicitly stated that he wants all the stuff he’s already been getting, which is honestly more than Dorothy’s gotten.
i think saying you want a loved one to be happy and being willing to talk to them about that isn’t a bad thing for a guy to do, actually
The first half of that seems like reading something into the text that’s not there, to me. He’s acknowledging that Joyce loves Dorothy in a way that’s different to how she loves him, and would like to keep their relationship the same while encouraging Joyce to explore the former, because it’ll make her happy.
The second half is true, but it also doesn’t seem relevant for him to start listing off all the things he wants from life in this particular conversation.
This. “You love Dorothy in a way that I’ll never be able to match” has that subtext to me. He does not feel worthy of being given the consideration that one should give every partner in a relationship, be it poly or not. And that is not a healthy base for a relationship, be it poly or not.
I don’t think is inherently unhealthy – it’s not that different from what I would tell certain people if they asked – but I do think he seems miserable in a way I wouldn’t be, and honestly she’s showed her priorities here in a way that I think fairly clearly shows that she’s Not A Reliable partner, at least at this moment.
I’m not saying you can’t work through this, but I *am* saying that this certainly isn’t healthy at this time.
Joe has, on several occasions, spoken of Joyce as “perfect” and too good for him. Given that, I think a reading where Joe is settling for scraps or a lower standard of care/respect makes sense. We’ll have to wait and see what’s happening here, but there’s definitely a case to be made that Joe is letting self loathing lead him to accept lesser treatment.
Putting a partner on a pedestal is bad in any relationship. However, this Joe is a complete switch from It’s Walky Joe and I remember when this was new and broke my heart https://www.itswalky.com/comic/youre-not-safe-around-me/
So seeing Dorothy/Joyce have a relationship framed around shared trauma, Walky/Joyce in It’s Walky having a relationship that was framed around trauma. I just want everyone to take care of each other and be friends. Joe in DoA is anything but self loathing. He’s being extremely brave and vulnerable. If I were in Joe’s shoes I would have an extremely difficult time trusting Dorothy after how she has treated Danny and Walky (though I don’t know how much Joe knows about how Dorothy was treating Walky as a fun distraction temporary boy toy).
All three of these characters love big and love deep. Joyce and Joe have complicated parent dynamics. Dorothy is the one who had the “normal” “stable” “supportive” “emotionally mature” parents from what we’ve seen.
I’m thrilled about a polyamorous solution, because I have yearned for that kind of relationship for forever and never understood why people had to be paired off.
Maybe he’d accept lesser treatment, but I don’t think he’ll have to. And maybe he knows Joyce well enough that he doesn’t think so either.
Note that “continue occupying the space” line — her feelings for Dorothy don’t need to displace him. After all, she’s had them since before she and Joe even got together, even if she wasn’t acting on them as blatantly.
I mean there’s the part where he says “you love Dorothy in a way I will never be able to match.” That with his expression certainly feels like a self put-down. I also like many people here want a poly outcome but also feel like with the current state of things that if it does happen it’s gonna be extremely rocky and potentially unhealthy at least at the start.
I dont understand where peopke are getting this low self esteem. He doesnt seem to be saying oh ill take whatever he literally says I get it you feel ways about her and have your love for her I cant give you that but I want to keep our love too. It doesnt come from self hatred or unworthniess but understanding that love isnt limited. And if he was that self loathing he wouldn’t have been able to defend himself agaisnt that woman in the gym by saying I owned uo to my failings and mistakes and I did change and just so you know if you ever decide to change I wont hold this mistake agaisnt you
I’m not saying it isn’t, simply that Joe’s facial expressions here and his concerned if happy look in the strip “sabbatical” make me believe, perhaps wrongly, that he is not giving his blessing to Joyce, confident that he will always have her love and glad to make her happier, but making a crippling compromise, fearful that he neither could nor should have Joyce’s heart and believing this is the only way he can have her love, which in his mind is not being multiplied but divided.
Why are yall so bizarre about polyamory, sure the cheating and lack of communication was bad, but this is a very healthy approach and attitude about it. When you’re monogamy obsessed, you cant see it. I’d recommend doing more than doomscrolling bad representations of it on tiktok or whatever and listening to people who participate in it and are happy.
I am in a poly relationship right now and I can see that Joe is approaching this in an overall good way but there’s definitely a tinge of him feeling like he doesn’t deserve Joyce. I feel like it would be a very incorrect reading to act like there’s none of that in the way Joe has acted, we’ve seen an awful lot of that with his mentality about this relationship.
I think it’s possible for things to improve but given his statement of “You love Dorothy in a way that I’ll never be able to match.” that uh, feels like the statement of a person who doesn’t have a great view of himself with regards to this relationship.
I can see why you feel that way, and I do think you’re onto something what with how Joe is so very thoughtful about Joyce and joyce is uhhh devil-may-care about how Joe might get hurt by things (though this may be an attempt at portrayal of autism, which as someone who is on the spectrum… hoping that’s not it), but “we fill different spaces in your heart” is more what he was saying I think. I could be wrong but that was my take on it.
I’m sure healthy polyamory exists, but every example I’ve met IRL has always been on fire for one reason or another. They were just pure drama factories.
People are drama factories, and getting more people involved increases the drama output. That accounts for most of the difference, I think — just a higher number of relationships that can be running into issues at any given time.
To expand on that: a two-person relationship (e.g. Joyce&Joe) only has one connection that can get messy. Adding just one more person increases that to three connections (e.g. Joyce&Joe, Joyce&Dorothy, Joe&Dorothy)… well, if it’s a fully connected polycule instead of just a hinge or chain, that is, but even those have more connections to mess up than a simple monogamous relationship*.
There’s also, I suppose, the fact that sometimes people in monogamous relationships aren’t being treated well, but don’t protest because they don’t have better treatment to compare it to or can’t see it from the inside (potentially leading to a bad yet non-dramatic situation), whereas in a poly relationship, people can compare how they’re being treated to how the other members are, and reacting to unfairness (whether affecting themselves or their loved ones) may result in justified drama.
* Still, a poly relationship does have the advantage that, if one connection breaks down, there are other people to support the hurt members. Also good protection against abusive relationships, I’d think; much harder for a single person to abuse multiple partners (and the whole “if you leave me, you’ll never find anyone else to love you” claim doesn’t work as well when there’s another lover right there). This wouldn’t work if there were multiple abusers, but I don’t think such people like sharing their victims.
And my experience has been the opposite irl. The polyam folk have been really content and chill, and the monogamous folk are sometimes also chill… but I much more often get coworkers complaining about their spouses.
I think this is a really unfair take. A lot of people here are poly or have been in poly relationships (I’m monogamous but I dated someone poly for years, they had another partner when I meet them and it didn’t bother me in the slightest). However what Joe is saying indicates he is settling to not lose Joyce (which is what I’m getting from the “can’t match” bit). Poly is fine, adding new people to a relationship to paper over cracks is not a good idea. And I’ve seen that happen pursuing new people and not breaking up with an incompatible partner. Poly doesn’t solve relationship problems any more than being monogamous.
One issue here is he hasn’t really had a minute to think things through. If it was me and this happened like a week into my relationship I would cut my losses. Less because I’m not open to poly but more because my partner didn’t have enough consideration to talk about it before it happend.
Also it’s still not clear to me that Joyce can have romantic feelings for two people at once. The reason I know I’m monogamous is because I just don’t do that, even when I was obviously allowed to explore that.
Now I’m interested to hear how Joe feels outside of talking to Joyce. Maybe he’ll talk to Danny? Or Sarah, that could be an interesting conversation.
This isn’t some spur-of-the-moment thing. He encouraged Dorothy to recognize her feelings for Joyce, probably because he’d *already* thought this was what would be best for the three of them. It also looks like at that time he already assumed Joyce had romantic feelings for both him and Dorothy, and felt it was working for him, but wanted to make sure they’d also both get what they wanted.
I’m sure he would have preferred Joyce communicating with him better and not planning to break up with him. But I’m also sure Joe has been on board with the idea of Joe-Joyce-Dorothy poly for days, if not weeks.
You can read that scene that way and I think it’s more likely in retrospect, but it’s also easily possible to read it as “recognize your feelings so you stop doing like sending lewds and pretending it’s a joke”.
Yeah, this is definitely a conclusion I’ve come to from rereading the scene now rather than how I originally read it. But I think it’s the only reasonably way to square what he’s saying now with what he said then. And it helps clarify why he took to that conversation so positively – Dorothy saw their interests as conflicting, but Joe didn’t.
I think it’s pretty clear from what happened the first time Joyce tried to break up with Joe that she can and does have romantic feelings for two people at once.
It is! Two adults having a mature conversation in which one of them admits fault, the other forgives her, and then says he wants to continue being happy together is, in fact, a healthy thing all around. Idk why anyone would think its not
I mean except for the part where they haven’t considered relationship dynamics, issues with poly relationships, this is both their FIRST relationship so they have no fucking idea how to handle one relationship nevermind four, this is literally built on wishful thinking on Joe’s part, etc.
I mean this is Dumbing of Age, predictable shitshow is the name of the game, but this is one.
well personally, I’ve had several issues with monogamous relationships and don’t really think anyone should jump into one without being prepared. it was honestly pretty unhealthy of joe and joyce to not bring danny and sarah into their initial hook-up, cuz like, what do you do if something bad happens and you’re all alone? like for your FIRST relationship you should really have that loving safety net to take care of you, anything else is wishful thinking. idk, sounds like a shitshow to me
Okay, but you do get that a polyamorous relationship is a lot harder and needs a lot more work than a monogamous one, right? It’s like saying “I had problems working one job, people have problems working three” like those are equivalent situations.
No it isn’t. Like that’s just a bigoted assumption you’re making about a relationship that you don’t seem to respect very much. It’s like saying being gay is “harder” than being straight. Like no it’s not, full stop. You are deeply incorrect.
I’ve been in a poly relationship for two years now and it is absolutely more work than a monogamous one. The highs are higher in my opinion and I wouldn’t change it for the world but it is absolutely mathematically more complicated.
Same, I’ve been poly/ENM for over two decades at this point, and it’s always felt to me that the basic fact that any close partnership’s communications needs and difficulty scales non-linearly, with the maximum being “everyone is with everyone in some way”-style that scales the number of different lines of communication by the SQUARE of the number of participants.
These folks don’t seem likely (given Dorothy’s feelings about Joe, and Joe/Walky’s so-far apparent heterosexuality, but both of those could easily change) to have a full-on poly clump, but they ARE all friends and they DO all talk independently, which is going to make it complicated.
Hey there! I’m gay living in a deeply conservative state and city, and I’ve been in poly relationships in university. Both of them ARE harder than being straight – it’s more work finding people willing to be in a relationship, there’s active discrimination, poly relationships require WAY more active communication because there are literally more people… Calling that person bigoted is incredibly rude, especially when you yourself seem to be downplaying and ignoring the hardships, hard work, and challenges that a “non-traditional” relationship have to overcome to be stable and healthy.
It won’t let me reply to you Li but I think you are giving Megan a lot of benefit of the doubt when I’m looking right at them accusing someone of Bigotry when the person is making a pretty reasonable, grounded observation about how difficult it is being gay or poly. It all feels pretty “i’ve decided you’re a bad person so I’m gonna dismiss your argument by calling you The Enemy”
“so they have no fucking idea how to handle one relationship nevermind four”
I’m stumped where four relationships comes from.
Two people have one relationship.
Three people have three relationships.
Four people have six relationships.
Where did you get four?
This part I understand but I don’t really think it applies in their situation. If three people (ABC)are in a triad relationship, there are 4 relationships – AB, BC, AC, ABC. Every part of the relationship is it’s own relationship that should be nurtured. But in this situation, Joe and Dorothy would not be involved at all. Joyce would be the main person having to juggle multiple relationships unless it’s decided that Joe would date others as well
A relation is defined as a subset of a Cartesian product, meaning it’s a set of ordered pairs. A relationship simply drops the ordering. ABC is not a pair.
Hopefully they would at least be friends? At present, Dorothy sees him as less than a friend – an unfortunate acquaintance she was saddled with because he was part of the package deal that came with having her ex, who is still in her life…
And no, Dorothy and Joe will not have “no relationship.” It might not be a sexual one, but if they’re both involved with Joyce’s life long-term, they will both be involved with each other. Both with and without the context of Joyce.
Of course if it’s a short term or casual thing, that would not be necessary, but do you think that’s what Joe or Dorothy expect?
Yeah, no, this is not how poly works. Three people have four relationships:
AB
AC
BC
A-B-C
All of these are their own dynamic. If any one of them aren’t functional, or aren’t working as everyone expects, it’s going to create friction. And this scales up as you add people.
I am dating people who are dating people I have never met in my entire life. My fiance has to introduce me to “friends,” every once in a while. Dorothy and Joe can date the same woman and, if they don’t want to, never have to speak to one another at any point in time.
Forcing this kind of thing if you’re not feeling it is unhealthy, for sure. But Joe strikes me as the kind of dude who’s thought out what he wants and needs from a relationship, and has landed here. As long as everyone is on the same page and keeps up solid, honest communication, this sounds great. It’s just an open relationship in more words.
This part I understand but I don’t really think it applies in their situation. If three people (ABC)are in a triad relationship, there are 4 relationships – AB, BC, AC, ABC. Every part of the relationship is it’s own relationship that should be nurtured. But in this situation, Joe and Dorothy would not be involved at all. Joyce would be the main person having to juggle multiple relationships unless it’s decided that Joe would date others as well
This seems extremely healthy.
A single person cannot be all things to you. That is called obsession. Humans are social creatures – we need a network. Family. Friends. And yes, sometimes multiple lovers, with consent.
Joe gave consent. Anything else is you reading your own personal biases into the dialogue.
Or it’s us correctly reading characterization in the dialogue.
Consent is of course required, but people can consent for unhealthy reasons. It’s okay to be concerned about this.
Could be interesting if Joyce pushes to break up with him and it kicks off a development arc for Joe when he doesn’t diminish himself like this, but realistically I’m cope-seething. Might just not enjoy some of the strips for a while going forward.
This is unfortunate condescension to read as a poly person. I’d encourage you to remember that, among the group of people who would care enough to put an opinion out here, a decent chunk of them are probably poly.
There is a difference between non-exclusivity established at the start of a relationship, with all partners’ agreement, and betrayal leading to non-exclusivity to try and salvage things.
If the non-exclusivity was established earlier, no reasonable person would say the things we are saying.
of course, i should have considered that she’s a recently ex-Puritan Christian for whom according to her ingrained morality, adultery, abortion and anything adjacent is loaded with religious shame, and this includes non-exclusivity itself
even now she’s driven internally to confess when girl don’t even know her RIGHTS
This level of intensity and sarcasm feels more than is necessary for like, you’re talking to a poly person, they imply exclusivity wasn’t established, you say “but why would we ASSUME that,” and they provide a solid textual read to explain their position.
Obviously, being poly doesn’t mean I’m automatically right – I’ll talk about the actual material in a second. But like, your march against assuming heteronormative defaults loses some luster when it’s, going through a person of the deviance you position yourself as advocating for. If you’re comfortable disclosing, are you poly yourself?
Anyway, for the actual question at hand. It’s very plausible that part of Joyce’s anxiety comes from religious sources, true. But let’s zoom out. Suppose your idea was Willis’s intent. Suppose in his mind, Joyce and Joe had always agreed they were non-exclusive, and Joyce does not believe she betrayed Joe specifically, just that she is filled with religious shame about her behavior.
When most people read the situation of the comic, they are primarily interpreting the depicted situation as a violation of Joe and Joyce’s prior understanding. Even when people don’t think Joyce cheated, even when they support the poly development, they mainly are saying the violation was not big enough. They are rarely, if ever, believing that Joe and Joyce committed to non-exclusivity.
This common interpretation would mean that Willis failed to clearly communicate the situation to his audience. If he wanted to clearly communicate the situation, this would be easy – have Joe and Joyce commit to non-exclusivity on screen. I find it more plausible that the common interpretation is the correct one, instead of “Willis had an easy chance to make the common interpretation more correct, and failed.”
But if you’re writing a story where the conflict is that Joyce has religious trauma, and you want to communicate this to the audience… why potentially mislead your readers by inserting this incorrect frame into the character’s dialogue?
@clif I think there’s a really strong argument that he DID take that as the default, hence not even considering the fact until Dorothy brought up loving other people.
@TerribleTransit: Not only did he take it as the default (and so did Dorothy), but they didn’t even clarify it afterwards. They just continued assuming exclusivity. Like every other couple in the comic.
He brought it up as a joke (or as a ha ha, you’re not really serious right?) when Dorothy talked about loving other people. When she clarified, he dropped the exclusivity part.
Did they agree to be non-exclusive, or do they have a deeply societally ingrained expectation that they’re now discussing with each other that they might not care to hold to?
Them having an ingrained expectation versus a clear communication is DEFINITELY possible, I agree. In fact I think it’s likely, and a lot of interesting discussion could happen from it.
However, I don’t think the answer matters in our immediate question right here, though.
Because, whether it is an ingrained expectation or an explicit agreement, Joyce perceived her own action subjectively as a betrayal, and the difference wouldn’t change whether Joe views her actions as a betrayal.
Like, even if they had explicitly agreed to be non-exclusive, we could still have a development where they discuss exclusivity further, and find that they might not care to hold to it.
To say the same thing in a different way, being non-exclusive is still bad when both players deeply believe that they ought to be exclusive with each other, because you’re doing something you believe is wrong and that your partner believes is wrong.
(Clear communication is great in relationships woo!)
“Because, whether it is an ingrained expectation or an explicit agreement, Joyce perceived her own action subjectively as a betrayal, and the difference wouldn’t change whether Joe views her actions as a betrayal.”
Joyce also viewed herself as betraying Dorothy after Joe gave her the blanket. And Dorothy didn’t. Joyce frequently has ridiculous and inaccurate ideas, but she learns.
Because they live in a society and a culture where this has been the state of things for centuries. Why is green considered “go ahead” and red “stop”? Why is a thumbs up positive? Why is gold a symbol of getting first place? Because that’s been the tradition of things.
I’m checking wikipedia here so the stats may be wrong, but “While still uncommon, about 4% of people practice polyamory, and up to 17% are open to it”. If there is a situation where, at best, there’s a one in five chance that someone will agree to something, then you have to presume the answer is “no” unless otherwise specified.
Nah, monogamy-normativity is a terrible cultural norm. Like Joyce clearly thought she was cheating, so it’s a moot point here, but upholding the systems that marginalizes polyamorous people and our relationships suck.
Ugh, I don’t want to have a civil rights conversation about this, can we just skip the next half century of bullshit and go to the good part now where people are normal about polyamory? I never want to write about the ways we are decentered by normative assumptions again, and I’m not looking forward to the point in the middle distance where Third Way tells politicians not to talk about polyamory.
Much as I am pro-people living how they want, I just do not see how we’ll EVER get to the point where people don’t presume that the way more statistically probably option is the default. :/
It’s pretty simple, you just actually talk to your partners about what they want? Like do you just assume your partner has the most statistically likely result to wanting sex in a particular way, or do you talk to them? I really don’t see why a one-in-five chance your wrong isn’t a good enough reason to talk about a thing before you feel comfortable binding people to your ASSUMPTIONS about them
Relationship agreements have to be AGREEMENTS. If you want a thing, you gotta say it, it isn’t fair to demand your partner comply with your assumptions about what they want.
It’s a good reason to talk about it. That should become the norm, but it’ll take a long time for that to happen because cultural norms shift slowly.
In the meantime, it’s bad to treat non-exclusivity as the default when it isn’t and when doing so is more likely to hurt someone you care about. By all means discuss it and that’s even more true if you want to not be exclusive.
It can be a terrible cultural norm while still actually being the cultural norm. Which it is. In a perfect world everyone would be making sure what their expectations are and trying to meet them, but that’s definitely not the world we live in, so there’s going to have to be some amount of assumption, and violating one of the most common assumptions just because it’s stupid is probably bad form.
Green go ahead, red stop is widely considered to be a mistake by cognitive scientist
Red was used as a warning. But Red is also a symbol for speed and green for calmness.
Then there is the issue of red green color blindness being the most common.
Above, someone linked the strip where Walky and Dorothy (inadvertently) bring up the non-exclusive nature of their relationship (and, as an added bonus, Dorothy mentions loving Joyce). From the looks of the art, this was a couple of years ago at least, so probably last month in strip time.
This is dramatic fiction and the relationship in question has been official-ish for like a week. Dorothy and Joyce quasi-fucked before that. At this point anyone clutching pearls about “cheating” like she betrayed their marriage vows is simply off-topic.
The non-exclusivity was established earlier. Joe had just said that he is totally aware (as anyone reading the comic should be) of the non-exclusivity of Joyce’s feelings.
I agree with what you’re saying, but it ignores the tone INITIALLY put forth, which is hating on polyamory in the first place. Which is what a lot of these replies are responding to.
but im actually in a non-exclusive sexual relation with someone I met here not too long ago
heck a couple weeks ago was the two year anniversary of when we first started sexting LOL
they’re really open about being polyamorous and doing sex stuff with others sometimes, but we really appreciate each other as friends and have a lot of fun, it’s lovely never been happier ^^ <3
it is physically impossible to cheat on someone who has expressed their comfort and endorsement with your other romantic partners, that’s just literally not what cheating is or ever will be. Joyce can’t continue to do that because she is now literally incapable of doing it.
unless Sal gets really cool with some stuff really fast
I think the issue here is Joe’s endorsement doesn’t necessarily denote comfort or being in the right frame of mind. He’s not saying “Yeah, go for it babe!” He’s downplaying his own worth to her while playing up Dorothy’s.
That’s not how polyamory works though. It’s not “I can’t be your *everything* so i might as well be your quirky sidepiece,” it’s “you love in so many different ways and I’m happy to be one of them.” It doesn’t make anyone less anything, just different. That’s explicitly what Joe is citing here. He knows Joyce still loves him, in a way that is different to but not lesser than how she loves Dorothy. And reading up to now, i don’t think anyone can really disprove that.
Okay, being genuine here. I can see from your other posts that you’re very invested in them being poly, and I don’t think anything I say is going to be more important than that to you, but just so I feel like I’ve given you a proper response:
Yes, Joe *is* citing that, on the surface, but pay attention to his expression and his phrasing. “You love Dorothy in a way that I’ll never be able to match. I can’t… occupy that space in your heart.” Is not the language of someone who feels like he has Different But Equal value to the other partner.
The second point I want to bring up on that front is Joe’s own baggage.
He doesn’t think very highly of himself as a person at all, and very much sees Joyce, and relationships in general, as something he felt was unachievable. He also has known issues regarding infidelity, and I think it’s a very understandable step for someone in his position, with his issues, to do this even when he isn’t fully comfortable with it because it keeps Joyce, who “feels like she’s everything” to him, from going away.
“I can’t occupy that space in your heart,” in a vacuum, sounds self-deprecating. if that panel was the only thing in the update, i’d probably agree with you. but the following panel where he says explicitly “I could continue occupying the space you already had for me” shows that he isn’t really saying it that way. he *knows* joyce still loves him. especially after the blanket thing last night
like i think he’s just done research into this stuff or asked the other poly throuple about it off screen, because he’s just using all the normal words to say about this kind of thing. I think he *wanted* to have this conversation with her soon anyway, i genuinely do believe he wanted this from the start, *especially* with how he talked to Dorothy about it before.
What people aren’t inferring that I think might be more obvious with future context is that Joyce loves Joe in ways Dorothy can’t match, too. And we’ve seen that kind of thing before, she just feels safer and more honest around him in general, she felt that way before they started dating. it really doesn’t *need* to be a lesser or greater thing, and I think its a much more beautiful story if it isn’t
I mean yeah, it’d be great if it worked out, genuinely. I just don’t think that’s what this strip is conveying given my understanding of Joe’s character and the narrative leading up to tis point.
I’m really hoping Joyce sees the signs and rightfully points out his happiness matters just as much, and that he has every right to ask for it, and see what can be done. I don’t think he realises this.
I mean frankly what this strip is telling me is that Joe has been somewhat actively facilitating this. He had the I want you to have what you want conversation with Joyce. He had the stop lying to yourself conversation with Dorothy. He views being a good wingman as one of the best traits someone can have.
Of COURSE this conversation is scary. His girlfriend thinks she has to break up with him for this very important to her thing he’s been trying to make sure she gets. If I were Joyce I would be reassuring him in the next strip about how much I loved him. But like. They are both AWARE Joyce loves Dorothy incredibly deeply, it’s why he’s been trying to set them up!
The insecurities are realistic and a bummer, but they are not like. Defining of Joe’s involvement in this to me. I think he genuinely wants it, and I think he’s been putting in some not particularly subtle work to make it able to happen. He loves his girlfriend. He wants her to have the girlfriend she wants. He will be pretty sad if she breaks up with him about it.
But he clearly thinks he’s inferior. He’s not saying “you love Dorothy in a way that’s different than how you love me,” he’s saying “I can’t match up to how you love Dorothy.” He is explicitly saying he is not good enough.
you’re just wrong. that’s literally the opposite of true, Dot. Reread the comic a few times and try again, because you are interpretting the exact inverse of what the comic is actually attempting to convey to you.
It can be read in both ways… note that “never be able to match” and “never be able to match up to” can be different things. They can also be the same thing, but it could simply mean he thinks they provide Joyce different things in their relationship; Joe can’t be Dorothy for her, but he’s quite experienced at being Joe.
To add, though… even if Joe is “begging for scraps”, as some other commenters have been putting it, I’m pretty sure Joyce will be capable of loving him just as much as before.
Also… people have also said stuff about her not “giving him her whole heart”. Being aroace, I’m working from second-hand information at best, but I don’t think that’s really how it works? I mean, I’ve read a lot about this stuff trying to understand it, and have never seen any evidence that love works like pouring water out of a container, with more recipients meaning smaller shares for everyone; there aren’t so many poly examples to work from, but definitely there’re lots of couples who were in love, had a child and managed to produce love for that child without diminishing the love they already had for each other.
Admittedly, they’re likely to be too tired to express that love so much for the next few years, but that’s a “raising a baby” thing, not a “competing for love” thing.
No, delivery, you pretty much nailed it. My wife doesn’t love me any less because of her other husband, any more than she loved me any less after each of the kids was born. It’s not a pitcher, with a limited supply; in my experience, the more you love (as someone once observed) the more you can love.
If you read the literal words in the panel, he is saying he’ll never be able to love Dorothy as much as Joyce loves Dorothy. That’s not what he means, but he doesn’t mean I’m not as worthy of your love as Dorothy either.
That isn’t what he says. He says “You love Dorothy IN A WAY that I’ll never be able to match. I can’t occupy THAT space in your heart.” (Emphasis mine.)
He did not say “more than I can match” or “to a degree I’ll never match” or “as much space in your heart” or anything that implies an amount of love. He’s only talking about the kind of love.
He also says he wants to continue occupying “the space you already had for me.” He’s very aware that she loves him, and he is happy with the love they share, just as much as previous times when he’s expressed his love and appreciated hers. Acknowledging that she loves others in a different way that she’ll never feel for him doesn’t devalue that unless you assume that his love is territorial, possessive, and incompatible with her loving anyone else. Which it’s clearly not.
I swear to god this entire comment chain with people trying to nitpick individual words to get their own meaning to be “FACTUALLY CORRECT” is the most annoying the comment section has been these past 2-3 months. If not longer.
It brings up an interesting question
Joe does not see it as cheating necessarily but Dorothy and Joyce both did, and intentionally continued engaging in behaviour they saw as cheating. There’s also the issue of Walky’s perspective.
I personally do see it as reprehensible behaviour. I don’t like it, but i do like how DW explores tricky topics, so I’m keen to see what happens.
Much as I’ve been hoping for these poly happenings, I’d still like Joyce to at least take some time to contemplate what it means that she was willing to go against her own stated morals for the sake of her desires, despite it having been forgiven.
I don’t think it’ll be quite as consequence free as some comments suggest, and I do expect there to be at least some reflection/exploration of that either through dialogue with other characters (like Sarah or Sierra et al) or independently because of guilt and shame.
No you’re absolutely right, now that Joyce has realized her latent bisexuality, she would 100% make out with Sal if Sal ever gave her the opportunity. But at that point, Dorothy would be dating like, jennifer, or some shit.
Sal is one of the other women (along with Jennifer) Joyce has shown unaknowleged attraction to. Although I doubt she’ll try to add them to the polycule. Just a joke about Joyce finding her hot as well.
To be fair, she doesn’t want to continue cheating on him, that’s exactly why she’s stated she’s breaking up with him. Because she recognizes continuing to cheat on him is wrong and she doesn’t wanna do it. hence, “If I want more Dotty time, I clearly cannot cheat on my boyfriend and as far as I know I can only have one partner and I pick Dorothy.”
I mean, that is true and good, but she’s also saying “I value being with Dorothy more than you being my partner.” That’s not a comfortable position for a relationship to be in.
Maybe I’m being overly generous, but I can’t help feeling she’s been dragged around between her morals and her desires so much, she hasn’t been thinking clearly since before the protest kiss.
I read it that way too, that she felt like the options of “staying with partner she cheated on” vs “partner she cheated with” that clearly she could no longer stay with the one she cheated on because she did a bad.
In my experience, that’s not “second place”. J does things for H that I don’t, and vice versa – we’re two different men, we have two different sets of traits that she loves. Neither of us is “in the lead”, and the past 20 years have been pretty good for all of us.
I think what a lot of folks are driving at is less “CAN poly relationships be even and fair”, and more “can these kids, two of them who are in their first REAL relationship, transition from ‘I thought I was cheating on you and was going to break up with you to be with the person I want more’ to ‘functioning poly relationship’?”
As a poly person for decades myself, this is starting out kinda like my first attempt at ethical non-monogamy did, and at some point I should enumerate the ridiculous amount of downstream damage caused by the way it ran and then collapsed.
That’s totally fair but two separate people have said this is a lot like how a relationship of theirs started that turned out to be totally healthy and fine, and a third has said they know friends whose story looks like this.
It would be “true to life” for it to go either way, really.
Fair enough! I guess there was just a point months ago when “this is Not how healthy poly starts, ever” was very much the dominant narrative in the comments.
There was, but today’s early comments feature a surfeit of “I am assuming you don’t know anything about poly if you disagree with me” so I felt like it needed to be (respectfully) restated.
Yeah, but that has been true for almost *every* relationship in this strip. Several of which have been actually, physically abusive. And yet we’ve had the most condescending comments about an emotionally mature conversation about polyamory. (Also, you’re about the hundredth person in the comment section to “put that out there”)
Joe probably would have been happier if his girlfriend hadn’t cheated on him in the first place, though, regardless of how he’s trying to make it suck less at the current moment.
I think he would have been happier if Joyce had been more straightforward with him and not made plans to break up with him. But I think he got on board with the prospect of Joyce dating both him and Dorothy a while ago.
It’s important to me whenever that Joe & Dorothy scene gets brought up to mention that Willis’s first draft of it (which they talked about on a Patreon post, I think) included Joe directly offering to step aside so Dorothy could “have” Joyce because he thinks Dorothy is better and he’s not worthy.
Maybe Willis completely threw out Joe’s insecurity and low self worth after that, but my guess is that’s still going to be an issue going forward.
No matter what Joe says in this comic, both Dorothy and Joyce THOUGHT they were cheating and KEPT GOING before coming clean. I do believe that’s supposed to inform Joe’s position here: “I’ll never be as good or as loved as Dorothy but I’ll stay because this is the best I can ever hope for.”
And I think it’s a setup for the whole thing to implode catastrophically.
Ah yes, she wants to continue cheating on him, as evidenced by just seconds ago her trying to break up with him to persue a relationship with Dorothy without cheating on him until he told her that he didn’t consider her and Dorothy to be cheating.
Can people stop making up things that didn’t happen to be mad about?
It was cheating when Joe wasn’t aware of it. But now he’s aware of it, and is cool with it, and endorses it continuing to happen. That is a non-monogamous relationship.
I’m sort of hoping Dorothy struggles to be cool with it, trying to balance her attraction to Joyce (and wish for her to be happy) against her ingrained repulsion from Joe (fighting against Joyce’s insistence that he’s changed)… and then, just as she’s beginning to come to terms with it, she suddenly remembers that Walky exists, triggering another crisis over how to proceed.
To be clear, I don’t want bad things for Dorothy… but, while this whole poly thing is promising, despite issues with how it started, we trash goblins still crave mess. Besides, after her recent spiraling, a more immediate problem might do her good.
Oh 100%, this is the way I see it going. And even after the initial dust settles, there’ll be more adjustment period to come as the three (or, less likely, four) of them figure out how this is gonna work. Relationships are messy sometimes, and when you start adding in more people, they can get messier! But, speaking as someone who’s in a poly relationship that’s had its share of mess over the years, it’s worth working through it all with the people you love
I so badly want to see Walky be entirely unsurprised by Joyce/Dororhy, only to fall out of his chair when he hears that Dorothy is in any sort of relationship with Joe.
Incidentally, this is one reason I’m hoping none of them understand the concept of hinge relationships. Dorothy+Joe thinking they have to get along has so much potential for delightful disasters.
I mean shit, I think Joe has been trying pretty hard to be on Dorothy’s good side, pretty consistently, for quite a while now. She’s right to be reluctant to trust him, all things considered, but he’s been the epitome of diplomatic with her for a lot time.
“And after that, if Dorothy thinks she can be cool with having Joe as a metamour, THEN we get to see what Walky thinks of the whole situation!”
This assumes that Dorothy doesn’t break up with Walky first, which would put things on a completely different footing. I wonder if Booster will show Walky the paper. Mike would have.
Pretty sure it’s impossible for Joyce to “continue to cheat on Joe” if Joe is proposing a poly relationship that explicitly includes Dorothy, and explicitly includes his understanding, and approval, of the fact that Dorothy and Joyce will be making out and doing other things that flow from making out.
Also pretty sure that Joyce is the one who thought that *would* be cheating, and was attempting to initiate a breakup so that she would no longer be cheating! Unsure how that got parsed as “intends to continue cheating on you,” the one thing she is explicitly acting to prevent!
The other day someone linked back to Joyce telling Joe that she masturbated with Dorothy and how she felt she was cheating already then.
I think Joe has come to terms with how this relationship is taking shape before Joyce has because she is still stuck in many of her hangups, and he just rolls with them.
Ive been a relationship paladin throughout all of this, and im just happy seeing that Joe has had the emotional maturity to embrace what it means to be with Joyce. I still think he has some issues with selfworth that makes him accept her bullshit, and he has damage from his dad’s cheating, but i can absolutely see him embrace non-monogamy in a healthy manner once he has worked through that he in particular is in fact deserving of respect, love and consideration.
**in Janet voice** “Not cheating.”
You can’t cheat if you aren’t exclusive, and Joe has just indicated that they were not exclusive.
You know, cheesy as it was, I miss the days where you were “dating” and then “going steady”.
Dating meant casual. You could date lots of people.
Going steady meant exclusive. Dating only one person or in an exclusive poly relationship (yes, there was poly then too – and has been all of human history).
The line was clearly delineated by the terms.
These days? People say dating and others assume going steady by default.
Do you think that everyone who goes to a Speed Dating event is instantly cheating on everyone else present?
At least with the college kids I talk to these, days, it’s “Dating” vs. “Boyfriend/girlfriend” for a lot of them — as soon as you title your relationship partner, it’s generally assumed to be exclusive unless discussed.
It’s so weird to me that people think that since the term “going steady” dropped out of use, a single date means permanent commitment. The lines are less formalized than they were generations ago. If we’re talking “going steady”, that’s basically the 50s and 60s. Maybe the 70s in more traditional places. Well before my time and I’m not a spring chicken.
Things may be messier now (or even in my college years), but no one assumes a first date or a casual hookup means you’re now exclusive. The transition isn’t as clear, but like you say, it’s indicated by things like “boyfriend/girlfriend” and just the general shift to being more serious.
This also has nothing to do with poly, but with a casual/serious distinction. Back in the old days, people having casual dates with lots of people weren’t necessarily poly. Any more than Speed Dating or lots of internet hookups are today. Poly requires some form of serious relationship along with others.
I feel like this distinction gets blurred a bit in these discussions. Even if they hadn’t discussed it explicitly, Joe and Joyce were clearly in the serious phase, not just going on casual dates.
I was a bit young to be in relationships at the time and got a late start there anyway due to being a heavily traumatized autistic who didn’t really trust it when someone made their attraction obvious and didn’t pick it up when it wasn’t blatantly obvious but I recall going steady being a plot point in multiple shows aimed at the teen audience in the mid to late 80’s.
I assumed it was still going on then if for no other reason than the younger more inexperienced teens emulating the media they were watching.
I seem to remember the last vestiges of “going steady” being replaced by “girlfriend/boyfriend” as the verbal marker for exclusivity around the early 1990s when I hit middle school.
There was a fairly short time there too when “exchanging class rings” became such an important signifier of “we are in an exclusive relationship” that people were briefly getting them as early as freshman year in some cases, at least where I went to high school in the early/mid-1990s.
I don’t think Joyce wants to continue cheating. That’s why she’s here to confess to Joe and break up with him. (Took her a couple tries, but that’s chickening out, not intent)
She’s not going to give up Dorothy, but that’s not the same as continuing cheating.
We’re not there yet. Postpone the euphoric celebrations for now. Well, okay, some euphoric celebration is called for, but be sure to keep your “Damn you, Willis’s handy.”
I said it yesterday, but Joe has the most sexual experience of any cast member. He understands that relationships are not so clear cut.
And I fully agree, Clif. Joe finally laying down the groundwork of an open relationship is not, yet, poly. That depends on how Dorothy (and Walky?) want to proceed.
He was the only one to immediately internalize that non-monogamy was an option, despite the fact that everybody involved takes the same women’s studies class. That’s how his sexual experience is relevant to this otherwise relationship-centered discussion.
I think the immediate stumbling block here is Joe’s phrasing. If I were Joyce, I’d have so many problems with him describing himself like that. But we can’t see her face for the last two panels so she might not have picked up on it? It’s possible her head just kind of exploded and she lost the ability to hear for a moment.
Wow, I am shocked that Joe is this dedicated to Joyce. I knew he loved her, but caring less about Joyce kissing Dorothy, and caring more about her being able to have the things she wants is a level I did not expect.
Well done Joe; you truly care, and that is admirable.
i dont disagree that he is very dedicated to her but i do think he might have this kind of reaction regardless. He just seems pretty capable of being poly, or at least totally open to the idea
The pain isn’t from the kissing. It’s because he knew from the get go that Joyce loved her other friends in specific ways that he wasn’t going to be supplanting, and that Dorothy’s space in her heart was very large. The pain is acknowledging that Dorothy’s space is bigger than his own space, but so long as she doesn’t lock him out he’s basically okay with that.
Nope. Joe has always loved Joyce and cared about her above himself. Even in the It’s Walky universe. No surprise, I’m just surprised DoA got here after the date Mike chaperoned at the beginning. I’ve been in giddy and hopeful disbelief, but also a fan long enough to not get too comfortable.
Joe changed Joyce’s number on his list to a zero after their failed date – we know he changed it, because if Joyce was a zero, he wouldn’t have dated her, and Joyce herself susses this out, immediately. He cared about Joyce before he even had the list leaked, and started his slow-burn redemption arc.
Nah, it follows very logically from his telling her “I just want you to have the things you want” after Joyce and Dorothy’s night out drinking, (which Joe probably realized was a date even though neither of them did.)
Joe will take what he can get (even in a way that’s not good for him) but I’ll print this strip out and eat it if Dorothy’s willing to share, particularly with him.
Yeah. Both of them have been in a really bad place lately, I would be amazed if it goes well at all.
Walky has had enough hints to not be surprised, exactly, but it feels like we are going to see a big contrast between Joe’s understanding of Dorothy and Joyce’s interactions and Walky’s deflection of reaching understanding by turning things into jokes about “my girlfriend’s girlfriend”. Walky loves to deflect with humour so he doesn’t have to deal with feelings, but he’s not going to be able to avoid a direct conversation with Dorothy in the same way and his self esteem is much lower than Joe’s.
Maybe Walky wasn’t going to be upset about Dorothy breaking up with him, but Dorothy’s break-up speech sucks so bad, it ends up being the thing he crashes out about, not the actual break-up.
I don’t think this is winning. I hope not. The whole lead up was Joyce not doing anything hurtful because of happenstance and technicality. I think we’re seeing Joe’s hurt peaking through in this strip.
The characters feeling hurt or hurting each other, regretting, that’s where learning from their experiences comes from.
Joyce is probably comfortable with polyamory. I’m not personally, but from what I’ve read from folks here who are, she’s fumbled this.
Joe might be in the future, he doesn’t seem ‘enthusiastic’ now though. I think he’ll try, it may hurt more, he might settle into it, I dunno.
Dorothy is not cut out for it. Her jealousy triggers PTSD. She has a need to be in control, to be the only one whose needed. She may try for a week or two, because it’s a project. But there’s any number of her issues that will cause the whole thing to collapse.
The way Walky wins is by finally tearing down his Dorothy pedestal. Not in a Walkyverse Walky rage, that would be a huge L. But a simple, deserved “fuck you” to Dorothy, like the one he got from Lucy.
Some of these commenters are about to get the whiplash of the century if they think this is gonna work out how they think it will.
Joe is a great guy, a great boyfriend, but this is not healthy for him. He is literally begging for scraps here. Scraps that I doubt Dorothy would be fine with giving him.
If Joyce is 100% on board with this situation, im 90% sure that Dorothy will be hurt by her inability to commit to her after everything that Joyce said. That being said, if Dorothy asks Joyce to commit to her 100%, I have no doubt Joyce will say yes with little hesitation. Joyce came to this room wanting to end the relationship, she had made up her mind, so any change to that plan would be on a greedy whim or wanting to have her cake and eat it to.
Not to mention that the way Joe is drawn shows this is hurting him, and I don’t think it’s the initial slap of having it confirmed, but a long term extension of his low self esteem
A vision popped in my mind of Dorothy asking Joyce to commit to her 100%, her agreeing, and then the two quickly falling out, leaving Joyce with 0 partners.
SO many of the people calling for poly have explicitly said they want it to be messy and full of heartbreak so, like, maybe recalibrate your estimation of our expectations a little.
My best friend has been in poly relationships for 9 years nowm. He’s got 2 primary partners and a few secondary ones. His first wife is not and to my knowledge has not seen anyone else, while his second wife has at least one other primary partner- nice guy, he’s cool.
Both partners are also dear friends of mine. And I used to worry a great deal about Wife 1, that she was being taken for granted. At their wedding, it was like 95% guests who knew the couple through him. They were initially monogamous until he started seeing other people. It’s super, super easy to see their relationship as him doing whatever he wants while she just meekly accepts it.
And if that was what it actually was, I’d punch him in the face. Because wife 1 is one of the best people you’d ever meet. And it’s not what’s happening. He still gives her all kinds of concern and attention, she’s not secondary at all. He very much will respect any boundaries she gives him and take her feelings into consideration.
But he’s also twice the age of the people here and has way more experience. My friends have a normal and healthy relationship. What Joe is saying here *isnt*. It’s an attempt to avoid jealousy that’s turning toxic. Joe isn’t allowing himself to have a say in his relationship- he’s completely focused on what Joyce wants.
Is this meant to be a reply to me? Because I agree that Joe’s dialogue is concerning. My main argument was that “people cheering right now are in for whiplash if they think this will go how they expect it too [implicitly: well]” is silly because so many of the people cheering for poly have explicitly said they don’t expect it to go well.
I then also took issue with Switchris’s phrasing, because they called Joyce “just greedy” for even being interested in polyamory and Joe’s pitch “begging for scraps”, when what he’s actually SAYING is that, if Joyce is okay with it, he wants to keep occupying the place in her heart that he already has.
To characterize that as “begging for scraps” seems super negative about polyamory (generally), not just worried about whether or not Joe is martyring himself.
I just don’t actually think this will lead to drama anymore. Willis has had so many chances to put obstacles in front of Joyce and he has *consistently* refused to commit.
Joyce could have felt some sort of way about realizing she’s bi? Nope, she just goes with it.
DoJo are stuck in Dunn Meadows and might get arrested/hurt? Amazi-girl shows up.
Dorothy could have felt some sort of way about this being a reckless mistake? Nope, she’s all in on wanting Joyce.
Sarah gives Joyce pause about how what she’s doing is going to hurt Joe? Not only does it go in one ear and out the other as referenced by Joyce’s desire to get busy with Dorothy in the shower, but as it turns out, Joe isn’t an obstacle at all.
And the big one, the notion that Joe might feel some sort of way about being cheated on, that’s shunted aside.
All of these potential obstacles, all the points where we might have seen drama, they just haven’t materialized. And if the biggest, most important obstacle- the idea that Joyce cheated on Joe- didn’t matter, why should we expect any other obstacle to matter?
I mean, I feel differently about them than you do, but you’re certainly welcome to your feelings and you’ve laid out your reasons for them very clearly.
I just don’t understand why they’re here, in reply to my comment, in a thread about:
1. Whether or not people cheering right now are in for a rude awakening of some sort
2. Whether or not it’s cool to dismissively describe interest in polyamory as “greed” and “begging for scraps”
I think there’s some crossfire from people talking about how they’re interpreting Joe and Joyce specifically and the general concept of poly. Which I understand. Being poly is met with bigotry and it’s not a protected class (I literally got fired for mentioning I was dating someone poly at work, it was very “don’t discuss your sex life” but the way people use that against queer people who just mention their orientation or same-gender partner, absolutely wild).
So I think we should be careful in our phrasing. I would say it seems to me that Joe hasn’t had much time to process and he’s offering what he thinks means Joyce will stay with him. Arguably that is unhealthy. The fact he isn’t acting upset at all when he specifically has issues around infedility makes me think he’s hiding his real feelings. I feel “I’m really hurt you did this behind my back, but let’s talk about it” would have indicated that he was okay with exploring poly but was also being honest (that’s just my opinion).
Now if Joe isn’t really hurt that’s fine but he’s a character, not a real person, so that just seems inconsistent with what we know of him.
Agreed with your first paragraph completely and also I’m sorry that happened to you! I mostly agree with the second paragraph too, but:
“I would say it seems to me that Joe hasn’t had much time to process and he’s offering what he thinks means Joyce will stay with him.”
(Emphasis mine.)
I actually don’t think this is true. I think Joe is telling us directly in this comic that he’s been thinking about this since at LEAST when Dorothy and Joyce went out for #dranks last book. So I think the key is that he’s not at all surprised right now, and in fact expected this.
Which, wow, I have (gentle) notes for him on how he handled expecting this to happen and trying to hint to Joyce that it would be okay at a time when Joyce definitely couldn’t have imagined it happening, and therefore couldn’t process his hint. But mostly they’re notes of concern for him! Like oh honey, you could have talked to her about it instead of just waiting for it to “inevitably” happen… spared yourself AND her a lot of heartbreak…
(But also I imagine the conversation intimidated him. I’m not judging!!)
I think that Joe may have just had the wisdom to treat Joyce’s obvious bisexuality as an “egg” situation, in trans circles: don’t spell it out for them, they have to realize it for themselves, and you bringing it up directly could actually end up making things harder or more traumatizing for them. Even when they’re really obviously egg. Because you might still be wrong!
Ohhh, no, that’s not what I was thinking he could have been more direct about. I was thinking he could have been more direct about not expecting monogamy.
BUT. If he had said that more directly, Joyce would PROBABLY have been like ?!?! who would I even want to…?! and, then… egg situation back on the table.
(I’m also worried about the second to last panel, worried that Joe means his words in a more self-deprecating way than they technically need to mean — but I don’t think “hasn’t had time to process and is rushing to bargain with Joyce” isn’t one of the problems here.)
Yep, reminds me of when my first boyfriend said he wanted to bang other girls in college so we could either be in an open relationship or break up. Choice to be open because I was terrified to lose him and didn’t think anyone else would ever love me.
I remember when I said that after my then-SO said they didn’t think they could do a long-distance relationship due to their sex drive. And we sat down and had a apparently-great conversation about boundaries and ground rules.
The net result of the next six months included:
– two messy breakups
– one additional poly relationship that exploded so hard that 2/3 of the parties involved have been mono since
– four friendships that ended permanently
– one police/EMS call due to “if you reveal what I did to parties who had a right to know, I’ll self-harm”
– at least one Greyhound bus driver getting seduced, apparently out of spite
I don’t think he ever found out exactly WHY a random college sophmore lady was SUPER into, well, sleeping with whatever dude she thought would annoy me the most after I dumped her for exploding two separate friend groups with the shenanigans that led to the above list.
Oof, I can tell how that hurts Joe because I know flat out I’d have the same feelings for my fiancee (one of her friends did a test without her knowing via, “She’s banging somebody right now” lies and I found that I was not jealous and would rather her happy over all else)
Note: It’s more the pain of that happening in the moment. Not commenting on Poly or anything, just that it can hurt in the moment when first slapped in your face
Oh for sure. But the initial shock and pain and confusion in the moment is something I can relate with. He’s just probably not going to go down the same path as me and let it eat him up inside instead of going, “Oh wow I really am fine with this”
No joke, I kind of called this?
I have had this sort of discussion with a bisexual woman I was seeing, “I can’t manifest a vagina, so you might as well get a girlfriend too.”
This feels like an entirely honest and healthy response from Joe “I have deep trauma from cheating” Rosenthal, and he will not at some point have a breakdown in front of Danny about not being enough but not wanting to lose what he has.
Oh no, he’s doing it for him. If he doesn’t give her permission to be with Dorothy, he loses her entirely. He’d rather have 50% of something than 100% of nothing.
That said, A) Will Dorothy be okay with this? She doesn’t like Joe.
B) Can Joyce balance two partners or will this 50/50 be more like an 80/20?
C) Will it even matter when Becky comes for them all?
Given everything we’ve seen of Joyce’s behavior in this arc, I think he 100% loses her anyway (or more accurately, SHE 100% screws up and loses HIM).
Granted this is all secondhand, but I’ve been told repeatedly that you need MORE emotional intelligence and maturity in poly relationships, not LESS. And Joyce’s actions up to this point really don’t inspire confidence.
Oh, you absolutely need more. Thats actually why i went poly, i rather have relationships crash and burn early on because they arent sustainable than commit myself to a monogamous relationship with a nymphomanic mamaboy that just wants me to be a bangmaid and i convinced myself being a good girlfriend means i need to make myself smaller and “compromise” by giving up myself for the sake of the relationship…
If it is gonna crack it might as well crack as soon as possible.
I’m of the opinion that, had everybody involved laid the grounds for this poly relationship to happen in advance, it had a very, very high chance of being stable long-term and working. However, I see absolutely zero way everybody involved could have come to know they needed to process this situation in advance, or else, they would have done it the right way from the start. They just didn’t, because they couldn’t.
I think their implication is that Joe, like his mom, has been cheated on. Idk if we’ve ever seen any evidence that she accepted/tolerated/endorsed it though.
And yeah I know, people are still debating whether Joyce & Dorothy’s actions constitute cheating, but THEY have both used the word several times to describe their own actions so I do think it at least bears comparison.
He cheated more then once, and she kept forgiving him/accepting him back. We’ve not been given a full account of it, just that his dad was a serial cheater to Joe’s mom.
Nah, I wouldn’t object to that. I think the fuzziness of Joe and Joyce’s relationship is interesting as a separate conversation, but I didn’t think it was going to be relevant until yesterday. (And it still isn’t, Joe’s not saying he didn’t think they were exclusive here.)
Anyway, thanks. I didn’t even remember that his mom forgave his dad more than once. I don’t think that’s the same thing as this, but I at least somewhat understand the comparison, I suppose.
I’m not doing any kind of “called it” dance here, this was just one of like eight possibilities I originally envisioned two months ago.
Also, Joyce hasn’t said yes yet, and I kind of thought her saying yes would have to involve Joe hiding his insecurities and not being this honest, though as I noted above, maybe she can’t hear him over her head exploding from being told she can have everything she wants, going so directly against a lifetime of being told everything she wants is sinful and to be repressed!
Still hoping they manage a yes, I want to see these kids Attempt a Poly for so many reasons, but ye, Joe is being more honest here than I expected.
I think he does mean what he’s saying, but is also considering himself the lesser partner due to his personal issues.
By contrast, I think Joyce — once she gets over the shock of this new revelation — won’t consider him any less worthy of love than Dorothy is. I’m expecting her to be bad at poly in many ways, but not that one.
There’s ALSO the critical fact that none of this is a surprise and that he’s been thinking about it since at LEAST #dranks. That reframes what he’s saying a LOT. Folks are worried he’s making a Hail Mary, a desperate thoughtless grab for as much as he can get (paraphrasing), but this isn’t spur of the moment. Raises the odds that he means what he’s saying, even if he winds up being wrong about being okay with the reality of it!
I saw his expression as tenderness, vulnerability, and maybe a little worry that Joyce will still decide to break up with him. And that worry makes as much sense if he really 100% wants this as it does if he’s just doing this to keep the relationship.
Yeah… I think there are two equally plausible reads of the last two panels.
Which is obviously true of all the rest of the commenters too, but many of us seem to be very sure that only one of the two readings makes any sense at all.
As much as I want to declare Infinite Sicko Victory I feel like Joe is being a bit too self sacrificing here, especially considering his existing hang ups with cheating.
Booster is probably going to be very key for Joe’s arc, since they’ll be able to read that Joe is lying to himself and is setting himself on fire due to thinking he’s not worthy of the kind of love he wants (exclusive, monogamous)
Does Joe want exclusivity and monogamy, or does he simply want to feel valued? Because what I hear from Joe that doesn’t seem healthy here is that he feels devalued, not that he thinks that polyamory will make him unhappy per se; it’s not that he wants what he has and doesn’t mind if Dorothy also has that, what seems unhealthy here is that he explicitly thinks Joyce values him less (which, like, objectively she does – she’s chosen Dorothy over him in ways that involve genuine betrayal, which, even if he was prepared for it, makes it pretty clear that he’s less important to her than Dorothy is!)
Like, I don’t even think this is unfixable, just that it’s a LOT of work to fix because Joe seems very reasonably unhappy after what happened to him..
Sorry, meant the kind of love he wants from Joyce. He may be find with polygamy for other relationships, but definitely doesn’t seem that way with Joyce, at least not in this way and at this point in time
As opposed to polyamory which doesn’t inherently involve marriage and is not itself specifically a crime although I’m not denying that other laws are abused to punish people for it. But currently polyamorous relationships alone are not grounds for either fines or arrests, they need to find something else to use as an excuse. Not legally recognized is not the same as illegal.
The distinction also helps differentiate from the abusive practices of some of the more culty Mormon sects which are more accurately a(n abusive) form of polygyny although I’ve often heard those practices referred to just as polygamy because people think they’re synonyms forgetting the existence of polyandry.
In addition to meaning words also have connotations, and the connotation of someone who has been very vocal about how much they don’t like what’s been going on in these past few strips saying polygamy when what they’re currently discussing is polyamory . . .
well it could have been a mistake was is why I corrected them in case it was but it’s not a good look for someone who seems to be outside that community to use a word that means a crime that is a felony in some states punishable by up to five years in prison and/or a $10,000 fine when what they mean is a style of relationship that is legal.
But also these are distinctions I recall poly people finding very important well over a decade ago when polyamory first came to my attention. It’s possible the distinction isn’t considered important anymore.
I… don’t even think I want to entertain “it’s not technically against the law” as an argument against the idea of discrimination. That way lies entirely too many rabbit holes.
More relevantly: polyamory is not a protected class, so there don’t have to be laws against it. People can discriminate against polyamorous people in perfectly legal ways, like firing them for being polyamorous, denying them housing for being polyamorous, etc.
Also: I’m not really a fan of the illegality of polygamy, either. As you said, it is a “style of relationship”. It was made illegal mostly to attack Mormons, and like, cool, Mormons are creepy, but what a great example of attacking an identity instead of the actual problem (e.g., abuse).
@Li None of which is related to what I’m trying to say. I blame the five hours of sleep I got. I am not at all attempting to deny discrimination. And things are probably not helped by what may be an issue I have where I over explain due to my autism leading to the point I’m trying to make getting lost in the weeds and a point I’m not trying to make getting found instead.
The important points I was trying to make, and this time I’ll lead first with the one I ended with (and keep in mind if this still read off I’m still running off that five hours and it’s much later in the day):
1: When I first learned about poly relationships well over a decade ago the distinction between the words polygamy and polyamory seemed to be considered very important by polyamorous people. Again, this may have changed while I wasn’t looking. I’ve only been on the outside of the community looking in, but I assumed when I wrote the post that started this thread of discussion that the distinction was still considered important.
2: One is something that’s not a protected class that shitty people discriminate over. The other can get you five years in prison. That’s not an endorsement of polygamy being punished by fines or imprisonment. It’s recognition that one is accusing someone of a crime (which in the case of most polyamorous people is not being committed due to the way marriage is currently structured – again not an endorsement of the way marriage is currently structured or polygamy being a crime simply a statement of fact) and the other is not.
Like anything else involving consenting adults it should not be a crime, but it currently is and saying someone is a member of a persecuted minority that gets discriminated against and saying someone is committing a crime are (in most cases) two different things to say.
Which is why saying one when someone is talking about the other reads as fishy to me.
I would offer examples to illustrate point 2 but every comparison I can come up with is calling someone (thing that’s often confused with a second thing) vs calling them (second thing that absolutely should be a crime). And doing that would probably sound like I was equating the second thing with polygamy which is not my intent. But again, regardless of what the legal status of multiple marriages should be (as long as everyone is a consenting adult it should be legal, and the disclaimer about consenting adults is an attempt to prevent bad faith readings) to say someone is polygamous is to accuse them of a crime.
Which I assume is why point 1 was true when I first ran across polyamory as a concept.
Hey, I skimmed this (ADHD and late at night, I’m sorry!), and I just wanna apologize also for MY first comment because I was way too terse and bleh. I am sorry for my tone. I think we pretty much agree!! And furthermore you were just trying to pass along what you’ve gathered from polyam people in very good faith.
The thing that throws me and I suspect the reason I screw up this usage if I’m not careful is we casually talk about monogamy without meaning marriage, so it’s very easy to just swap the prefix.
Now that’s obviously different, since monogamy isn’t illegal and there’s no history of discrimination, but it’s an easy connection to make.
Maybe not even/only Booster. He went to his “ex” (de Santo jr.) for advice earlier, and she has enough experience of both him and relationships to figure out what he’s not saying here.
There are both healthy and unhealthy elements to Joe’s choice here. De-centering jealousy and possessiveness and being supportive is great. He’s shown very good awareness and understanding of where Joyce is at in life, and is willing to have a relationship that allows her to continue to grow and learn about herself free from repression.
However, he is insecure and does have the underlying fear of his parents’ relationship that he is trying to compensate for, and perhaps overcompensate for. The real test is how well he discusses and establishes boundaries from here on in, now that the topic is out in the open.
Lots of debate above about whether this is a healthy poly choice or an unhealthy low-self confident choice, but as it stands right now I’m going with “why not both”.
Joe’s doing his best, saw this coming, and genuinely wants to try this out. He also has some hidden self-esteem issues that he keeps failing to tell Joyce about and Joyce keeps failing to take into account (and that’s not Joyce’s fault, she isn’t psychic).
Well of course, his entire hang up is self sacrifice in the name of other people being happy. This is just another version of that, where he gets to eat the scraps off the floor, because he thinks that’s all he’s worth.
Apparently Willis had an earlier version of the “Joe confronts Dorothy” scene where Joe just…straight up offers to step aside and let Dorothy “have” her, because he feels so inadequate and insecure.
This feels like a repurposing of some of that idea. I agree, I don’t think Joe is coming at this from the healthiest mindset, and I wonder how that will play out.
Isn’t this infinite sicko loss? The reason people wanted Joyce to cheat on Joe was to see the world burn and now Joe’s like “That’s cool I guess” so no burning.
Can’t speak for sickos in general, but this trash goblin notes that Joe and Joyce breaking up would be a quick intense burn with perhaps only fairly minor embers later on.
But this? Neither Joe nor Joyce have been in a truly loving relationship before, and Dorothy is still dealing with her issues with Joe, and they’re jumping into polyamory (and don’t forget that Dorothy doesn’t even know about it yet). This has the potential to keep the flames burning bright for quite some time.
The drama of Joe being hurt by this, and suggesting something that’s probably going to hurt him more is what makes it a Sicko win. “And then everything works out perfectly, nobody’s hurt by this so technically nobody did anything wrong through no effort of their own” would be a sicko loss.
Continuing to hope drama comes in the form of both Joe and Joyce are down for poly but Dorothy isn’t and What Does That Mean For Them, and it’s feeling closer right now.
Honestly, same vibe as when I came out as trans to my now-husband. Not only was he not shocked at all, but he had already figured it out and was basically just waiting for me to connect the dots.
Yeah, it’s worth keeping in mind that this isn’t some frantic attempt to salvage things after the kiss. Joe has had a good idea of how Joyce felt about Dorothy for a long time, and he’s probably been thinking about what it would be like for both him and Dorothy to be dating Joyce since before they got together in the first place.
Which doesn’t make his perspective on this completely healthy, but it does make it more thought-out than a lot of people seem to be assuming.
Yeah, that was my assumption when he told Dorothy to be honest with herself about her feelings for Joyce. And he observed previously, “a lot of I love yous between you two.” He’s been considering this possibility for a while.
And I might be alone in this, I have no idea, but personally, I don’t think we can say for sure (yet) whether he’s coming at this from a healthy direction or not. His phrasing points to at least knowing what the healthy direction IS – he knows intellectually that he’s not competing for Joyce’s affection; he and Dorothy occupy different niches. But whether or not he *actually* feels okay with this or if he just *wants* to feel okay with this… well, we’ll find out. I do think it could go either way at this point.
I think one of the biggest difficulties is that for us, this whole thing has played out over weeks and weeks. For the characters, everything from Joyce and Dorothy kissing through now has been less than 24 hours, unless I’m getting the timeline wrong.
It’s only been maybe 30 second since Joe revealed he saw the newspaper. One does not build a fully functional, healthy polyamorous relationship in 30 seconds, so trying to judge where they’re at now by such standards is a bit silly. I certainly think this is a great beginning, which is worth being excited and hopeful about.
Yeah, people don’t seem to be realizing just how far back he must have had this realization and thus, how much thought he’s given. He’s pretty clearly been thinking about this for quite some time. I also imagine that given how carefully he’s phrased quite a few things here, he might have even been doing some research into polyamory to prepare.
I think I might just take a break from Dumbing of Age for maybe a year or so and just come back later and binge until I’m caught up again. Maybe by then, the comic will have moved on from this to other, less aggravating stuff. Not giving up entirely, but this current storyline is really grating.
I feel that feeling. I’ve been checking in at least once a week (and usually daily) for over a decade and this is the first storyline that has stressed me out like this.
Sometimes, webcomic arcs get better for me with distance, where I can read them in a burst and not have the difficult parts feel so prolonged. Maybe that’s a better approach than me reading each up and down of the rollercoaster and picking fights in the comments to tide me over till next update.
Because it’s the exact same sentiment as “he hits me because he loves me”.
That’s going to extremes, I know, but ultimately it comes from the same place- being unwilling to assert one’s own needs and preferences in a relationship.
Unconditional love is deeply unhealthy. If you are always willing to accept what your partner does, you’re going to end up in a bad place when your partner does something that by any objective standard should hurt you.
Rogue 7. Nooooooooo. No no no. That first comparison is really crummy. Joe’s last two panels are legitimately ambiguous, people reading them differently are not in any way endorsing abuse.
I said that Joe is projecting the same sort of attitude as someone who tolerates their partner being abusive. That’s obviously only one interpretation of what he’s doing, but it’s a valid one to make based on the text presented to us. And those of us who interpret it that way are not happy about it.
Look, problems in relationships, fundamentally, all boil down to one person saying “my wants are more important than your needs”. Cheating is “my want to fuck this other person is more important than your need for trust and honesty”. A “hobosexual” says “my want to slack off is more important than your need for support and assistance”.
So when Joe straight-up says “I want you to have what you want”, with no regard whatsoever for his needs, that setsoff some alaem bells.
If y’all interpret him as saying “hey, I’m cool being equals to Dorothy”- and that’s a valid interpretation- that’s cool.
But I’m interpreting it as “I’m cool with whatever, I just want you in my life” and giving Joyce carte blanche to completely disregard him.
But you’re talking to people who are cheering and telling them the thing they’re cheering for is “the exact same sentiment as ‘he hits me because he loves me’.”
They’re reading it differently than you, and that’s okay.
The person I responded to explicitly said “I find it baffling how many people see [the sentiment being expressed] as remotely negative.”
So i pointed out why I see what he said as negative.
If folks are happy with this turn of events, I’m fine with that. But if they ask “why would anyone hate this?”, I’m well within my rights to explain why.
Wow… You seriously think this situation is even remotely close to physical abuse? This is like saying “they experience romantic and sexual attraction, which people in abusive relationships also feel, so it’s bad.”
The bad part of such abuse is not the form of love. It’s the disregard of one’s own needs, which we haven’t seen that from Joe. What he’s saying isn’t “I’m willing to disregard my own need for monogamy.” It’s “I don’t have a need for monogamy.”
I think the disconnect here is that there’s just enough ambiguity that it’s possible to project your own needs and views of romantic love (whether monogamous or not) onto Joe. So people who assume he has the same need for a monogamous relationship and has the intense, black-and-white view of cheating can only understand his behavior as this desperate plea to keep what he has. Meanwhile, polyamorous people don’t see any conflict with Joyce’s love for Dorothy and are more likely to see the kissing as a minor mistake (especially considering she’s here to tell him and accept full responsibility less than 24 hours later), which can be forgiven and moved past without a lot of issue. Thus, the latter view sees this as an extremely sweet moment of compersion and non-monogamous love.
You’re free to interpret things that way. But what I’m seeing is not “I’m putting aside my need for monogamy” but “I’m putting aside *all* my needs*. ”
Not because he’s proposing that Joyce dates both of them. Because he’s saying “I want you to get what you want” and “You love Dorothy in a way I’ll never be able to”. He is *not* setting up himself as an equal to Joyce, he’s setting himself up as someone who accepts whatever Joyce does.
If I thought he was coming at this from a perspective of equality, from one where he knows he’s just as good for Joyce as Dorothy…well, full disclosure, I still wouldn’t like it. It would still be another instance of the story warping itself in order to give Joyce everything she wants. But it’s 100% valid to read Joe here as saying he’s OK with a secondary role.
I get exposure to stable, healthy poly relationships often. Enough to know that I don’t have the capacity to give more than one person the attention they deserve, and so I’m happily monogamous.
Healthy poly relationships have lines and standards. And I see Joe here as saying “I have no line, no standard for your behavior, Joyce”.
I don’t guarantee that that’s how this is supposed to be taken. Other readings are valid. But to be honest, the uncharitable readings of these characters that I’ve made in the past have all turned out to be true.
The core of my issue with how the past few months of the comic have gone is that Joe and Joyce’s relationship has been considered secondary to Joyce and Dorothy. And today, Joe reads to me as saying “yes, I am secondary and I accept that”.
Hence the comparison to an abusive relationship. Not because Joyce is in any way being abusive, but because people who defend their abusers willingly step into secondary roles. And that’s what I see Joe doing right now.
The problem here is that you can’t use a situation where there’s no conflict between what Joe wants/needs for himself and what he wants for Joyce to evaluate whether Joe is willing to sacrifice his own needs for Joyce to a degree that’s unhealthy.
If you assume he wants/needs a monogamous relationship or that he wants/needs some kind of serious punishment or other consequence for Dorothy and Joyce kissing before having this conversation, then yes, this probably isn’t healthy.
However, if you don’t assume those things, the opposite is true, and this is a perfectly healthy expression of compersion and non-monogamous love.
I think there’s more than enough evidence in this comic and prior ones that the latter is the case. I honestly don’t see any evidence for the former except hyper fixating on the word “match” and its comparative meaning (though cultural pressure towards monogamy sure adds a big push in that direction).
Ultimately, the best proof will be in upcoming comics if/when he clarifies his feelings in more detail.
Could be why that one preview panel of a future strip where Dina looks ticked. Becky may want in on this and Dina explodes over it as she feels more the fiercely monogamous type
I think the biggest issue is that Joyce isn’t in love with Becky. Becky is never going to be that person to Joyce. But everyone else will, and that’s goons really suck.
Okay, cool. Sickos win.
But what about WALKY? What does HE want/get through all of this? Last I recall he wasn’t into Dorothy softballing the idea of Joyce being involved in their sex life
How dare people not assume that they’re allowed to dictate a story that was written over a year ago, and decide to just trust the creator of the story instead?
Interesting, couching Joe being okay with Joyce being polyamorous/being in a polycule/being ethically non-monogamous/what you want to call it by establishing that Joe had begun to suspect that Joyce and Dorothy shared feelings since their night of drinking does surprisingly make it work better.
Now presuming that Joyce is receptive to the idea (and I have feeling she ultimately will be (after some initial hesitation and surprise) as I feel Joyce has a lot of love for both Dorothy and Joe), I think the biggest obstacle may end up being Dorothy. I don’t know if Dorothy is going to be receptive to “sharing” Joyce with Joe.
Yeah, there’s many avenues for interesting and complex drama going on here. I’m always a fan of drama between people who generally want the best for one another!
considering Dorothy’s entire core character flaw is her obsession with being in control of things I don’t really think she could abide having to share Joyce with Joe who she does not like and would likely not let her dictate things for Joyce
It’s really shitty that Joyce goes, “Ugh, because it’s hot.” It’s acting like he is perverted when Joyce is the one who was cheating on him before he tried to be understanding.
Did not think about this. True, although I cut her some slack for being in a very emotionally intense situation and probably not thinking a ton about her words, but this does raise some questions. Like, how much of this is her deep-down view of Joe?
i think thats more of a nod to the audience than anything. people were calling out this possibility for the reason of “Joe’s gross, he’d like it.” It’s a way to disprove that to readers and show he has his full trust in this outcome
In spite of herself, Joyce often falls back on stereotypes and constructed mental simulacra of people when trying to empathize with them. It’s a good touch of characterization, not uncommon for autistic people.
Well you see, the author just had to slip in another example of how any woman who thinks Joe’s past actions still matter is an unreasonable hysterical bongo and Joe is an infinitely forbearing saint about it. Couldn’t go five minutes without reminding the readers of that.
???
Of course they still matter. They are what prompted him to mature.
Neither Joe nor Willis deny Joes mistakes. They only suggest that Joe has learned from them and grown as a person.
Even getting this far is worth celebration. I mean, we have Joe starting out a conversation about the possibility of being poly together with one of the sweetest and most emotionally mature expressions of love in the strip is just amazing even if it doesn’t end as well as many of us hope.
I actually really appreciate that this comment sat up all day and no one felt the need to run in and ruin my fun and enjoyment of this. I only got positive comments on my hype. Ty everyone, good work.
Call him out for what? Being in love and proposing something that Joyce might be interested in? Joe is doing this in a way that isn’t healthy, but Dorothy isn’t exactly the most concerned for his wellbeing.
It feels like this is meant to be the final relationship configuration of the webcomic and they’ll live happily ever after. Not that I have any problems with that, I was just expecting this to be a lot messier, due to all the build-up.
There’s still more to the comic though (presumably) and I’m sure Willis has a few more rugs to pull out from under us. Joe could be bottling up his feelings. Walky could take it really badly, resulting in Dorothy feeling yet more shame. Amazi-girl is presumably wanted by the cops, which could throw wrenches everywhere.
Like I said above, party at my place for my fellow poly-shippers. Sure, for all we know tomorrow may upend it, but tonight, we celebrate, we feast, we shake the halls of Valhalla with our merry making!
Oh that is not good, not good at Joe is begging and pleading to be tossed whatever scraps Joyce can give him. That felt like a knife in my stomach to read… Joyce is gonna force the breakup isn’t she, because she can see just how demeaning this is for him even if he’s pushing through, isn’t he?
Yeah no all I am seeing is desperate hope, the “please don’t throw me away I will do anything”. I’ve had that smile myself, I’ve begged and demeaned myself because I was so in love that I’d accept literally anything no matter my own personal boundaries. My stomach sank when seeing it, and if it’s meant to be a “nah I can share” smile then yeah, I really didn’t see that at all.
I could not agree more that “This is not a sad strip.” Like… At worst, he’s worried Joyce won’t agree to it and nervous about navigating such complex emotional topics (he very recently thought something along the lines of “Did I just manage to navigate an emotional conversation well?”)
But more importantly, this is one of the sweetest expressions of love in the strip. No possessiveness. No jealousy. No entitlement. No desire to control and dominate her heart. Just love, acknowledgement of her feelings, and hope that he can still be close to her in the way he wants. I seriously struggle to understand how that’s “begging for scraps.”
100% there are so many (degrees of) points of view that would not easily occur to me, or that I might not see if I just read the comic and moved on with my day, immediately forgetting the comic until the next strip.
Dorothy is gonna implode over this isn’t she? Given her own worldview of Joe is generally negative, and here he’s going to be, in her view, making her look like the unreasonable one
(I don’t think what he’s doing is healthy from his own standpoint purely because yeah he’s self deprecating and that’s not great. But let’s see how this all plays out.)
I feel like that’s resolvable though. Just because Joe and Dorothy are dating the same person doesn’t mean they have to be lovers or even be very close. It’ll be friction though. Dorothy might feel possessive (which would be really funny because she certainly would expect it to be the other way around).
Oh, certainly, it could be a hinge situation, where Joe and Dorothy don’t need to have anything to do with each other.
I’m hoping they don’t realise that.
counter-point: we get to see the inverse of Joyce’s disgust with yucky stinky inferior Walky dating her Perfect Dorothy, played out with Dorothy and Joe. That might be really funny.
Joe’s reaction to Joyce cheating being to stifle his trauma related to cheating and to make a heartbroken lil uwu face while asking her to “Please still notice me senpai” might be the most ridiculous thing from this comic in a hot minute.
I made a joke a while ago that this was going to turn into a Joyce-centric harem manga, and here we are.
I don’t see how “You realized you’re in love with a girl, kissed her, and then came to me to discuss it and accept the consequences less than 24 hours later” is remotely in the same ballpark as the chronic deception his dad was involved in.
I know for us it might feel like this has been a festering secret lasting over a month since in real time, the kiss happened over a month ago. However, in-comic, it was a moment of passion yesterday evening, and it’s still morning.
Do you think trauma needs a 1:1 reenactment to be triggered? Don’t be obtuse.
“Moment of passion” doesn’t cover Joyce’s actions since returning to the dorms. By her own intent, Joyce was cheating, sneaking, and prioritizing her feelings for Dorothy over whatever hurt it might cause Joe. It’s taken Dorothy repeatedly pumping the brakes for them to not have done even more before this conversation with Joe went down. Whether you’re a paladin/pro-poly/team sicko/DoJo OTP/whatever, that’s the text that we’re working with.
I mean I think it’s pretty relevant that this does not seem to be triggering Joe in any way. I don’t think the trauma worked like that for him. He very clearly identified with his dad in his parents relationship, and he has a lot of hang up surrounding his own behavior, but I don’t think it’s about being cheated on so much as about worrying about being a cheater himself.
Just the other day I was saying that his trauma has always been presented in comic as ye old “fear of becoming my asshole father”. This situation does nothing to trigger that.
The text we’ve been given is “Dorothy and Joyce kissed twice last night. Now they are telling their boyfriends and accepting responsibility less than 24 hours later.”
The worst you can say is that they’ve procrastinated some and have been “sneaky” so that they can tell Joe and Walky on their own terms. At no point have either of them even considered the idea of continuing their existing relationships while making out or anything else that involves serious long term deception.
Also, as the others have said, this doesn’t seem to be triggering Joe, which makes sense given the fact that his trauma is about his own promiscuity and its potential conflict with having a loving relationship. At no point has he expressed any kind of trauma related to other people cheating on him.
I gotta agree.
While I am interested in the turn this comic is taking, this is a bit unrealistic.
I don’t want him to be angry at Joyce or anything, but she is not treating him right by her own standards. He is emotional intelligent enough to see that and it doesn’t seem like he values himself enough.
This comic sometimes have the issue with people being defined by their partner (currently Sal maybe even Dina, for a time this comic didn’t seem to know what to do with Dorothy post break-up) and it would be sad to see Joe being defined by Joyce, especially as a side piece
“Joe’s reaction to Joyce cheating being to stifle his trauma related to cheating and to make a heartbroken lil uwu face while asking her to “Please still notice me senpai” might be the most ridiculous thing from this comic in a hot minute.”
I mean…isn’t it exactly what Joe’s Mom would do, in the same situation? We know she did it many, many times.
Aww. I really wish it worked so well IRL when shit like this happens. But i love this for them, and for anybody else who can find more than two for whom it works
I don’t think people are really grasping onto the level of hurt being portrayed in the 5th panel. This is a guy who has been being pushed down and kicked again and again since he started school. At first it was justified over his chauvanism but now he gets kicked for trying to better himself, and now he’s in a situation where he legitimately loves someone and has to go with the knowledge that he is second place to her… That’s a really nasty kick you know…
I think a lot of people here are so invested in the idea of a poly relationship with major characters in this comic that they either don’t notice or don’t care how much this situation is hurting Joe.
Sooooo many of the people cheering for poly right now were hoping for messy poly and heartbreak. Joe’s potential distress is not a bug in this code, it is a feature.
I was cheering, and tonight I’m CELEBRATING! I know it will be hella messy! And that IS fun for me as a reader.
But also, as you know, I want my favs to be happy. Joe’s distress to me is a feature in the sense that, it HAS to be explored. This is not going to be easy, fingers snapped, BAM STABLE POLYCULE. I just, y’know, wanna believe that distress will be acknowledged, not only for me as a reader. But for him as a character… And that it will be worth it.
Yes, that’s fair, a lot of the poly cheering section were open about wanting the drama and the fallout. But you can also see a LOT of people in today’s comments treating this like a 100% good thing and saying Joe isn’t being low-self esteem, he’s *actually* being emotionally mature or something, and there’s nothing wrong or misguided with the way he’s approaching this.
(“Bad” as in “Joe being too self-effacing”, versus a “Good” reading where Joe is saying he and Dorothy give Joyce different things, and he’s calling Dorothy irreplaceable right now, but might NOT mean he himself IS replaceable…
“I don’t think people are really grasping onto the level of hurt being portrayed in the 5th panel”
I’m looking at panel 5 and I’m just not seeing this hurt at all. He looks bashful, to lead into panel 6. I don’t think Joe’s going to have any problem with this at all because this is the Endgame Ship.
Oh, boo-hoo, he got the silver medal at the fuckin’ Olympics (not to be confused with the Fuckin’ Olympics™, which take place two hours later), what a truly horrible fate for him. Can I get some epic sadgefaces in chat for Joe “Slightly Less Shiny Diamond” Rosenthal?
Actually, I don’t think he’s experiencing the level of hurt that you seem to see because I don’t think he sees himself as “second place.” His wording is very deliberately about a different kind of love, not more/less love. Even the mouseover text is playing to the same theme: a “Dorothy hole” and thus, an implied “Joe hole.” He could never be Joyce’s Dorothy, but Dorothy could never be her Joe either.
The care with which he’s saying this combined with the fact that he’s clearly been thinking about this for a while has me thinking that he might have done some looking into how to navigate this. Most likely as far back as his conversation with Dorothy about her loving Joyce.
So I see it as nervousness about navigating a complex emotional topic and worry that she might not still want him. However, this soul crushing “second place” thing doesn’t fit with how Joe has been acting at all to me.
I’ll see if I can top my prediction of Joyce and Dorothy getting photographed kissing at the protest (and published in the news) with another bold prediction:
The drama from this newly poly relationship will not come (much) from Joe feeling like he’s diminishing himself for Joyce’s happiness. It will come when Joe starts exercising his side of this open relationship by dating Rachael, and Joyce having to deal with that.
Ugh… can platonic friendships not just exist between men and women? Sarah has started a seemingly healthy thing with Tony, even if she still has to reckon with some insecurities surrounding their height difference.
Sarah standing up to Joyce for Joe in the sense of him being good / trying and undeserving of being lied to doesn’t mean she ~wants~ him…
When Tony’s 0% nonsense and Sarah’s some % nonsense eventually cause a difference, they split in an oddly formal manner. And then Sarah meets Arnold, the perfect match for her snark, and they live happily ever after.
Joe and Arnold can fuck until then though, Sarah and Tony are going to be together for a little while still.
Nope. Billy x Ruth. Mike x Ethan. Sal x Danny. I think it’s more about not repeating end games. Joe x Sarah were a great couple but I think it was short lived due to aliens.
The drama will come from Joyce and Joe doing a big hackneyed performance of being mono-romantic and hetero-normative to convince Joyce’s Mom, and Dorothy will have a jealousy-induced angst implosion.
Sounds like Joe already figured this out and came to terms with it way before Joyce did. Not stoked about how we got here, but if everyone’s happy then I’m happy for them
So the great war between the Paladins (who wanted everyone to behave ethically) and the sickos (who wanted chaos and drama) ended with Joyce behaving unethically but no chaos and drama.
For example if this all works out and it’s great, imagine the Sarah reaction. Especially after the most recent conversation Joyce and Sarah had about polyamory.
Or like. Imagine a drama that consists of actually navigating polyamory like normal people but it’s difficult and work like it is for normal people and people have varying feelings and needs in that relationship and Joyce’s carelessness still needs to be addressed.
Or like. The fact that the Becky fallout is still to be seen and this eliminates the comfortable “be angry and hurt in behalf of someone else” route for her.
I know I’ve commented about serial vs archival reading before, but all those comments still stand. Give it time.
I am genuinely baffled by the people who think that Joyce being in a relationship with both Joe and Dorothy, potentially with Walky in the mix, is somehow a neat and easy solution that will result in no chaos or drama.
Haha, no, not NO chaos or drama. The point is that this is entertainment, and a lot of people are happily forgetting that this is a FUNNY comic. If it goes super serious and realistic at the same time, it’s no longer doing it’s job. Being RELATEABLE, sure, it can do that.
But Walky will absolutely flip his lid about this. I will be disappointed if he turns out to be as reasonable as Joe is here. The thing about Walky is that he’s been… courted by Dorothy for a while, and knows that every sticking point in this relationship has been about her requirements, her dreams, her desires. Sometimes, very clearly, her SELFISH desires.
He’s also seen the thoughtless cheating impulse rear it’s head and had to say no to it before, while he was still tied to Lucy. At this point he MIGHT despair that he only deserves complicated people with complicated needs, but I fully expect him to explode with a “WHAT ABOUT ME, DOTTY, this has always been about you, this has always been put on hold for your grades, your white knighting that you need to do better than ME, and didn’t it hurt even at the time? But now you want to SHARE? Maybe I’m done with this, then! You’ve taught me a whole stinking lot about being selfish… so congratulations, you’ve got yourself a true STUDENT of THAT going on, but this, no longer works. Some things can be shared, some other things lose their value when they’re not exclusive.”
All said, the reaction to the animosity between him and Danny was relatively non-confrontational but also, not ceding ground for it. So I’m fully EXPECTING and reveling in the chance for drama. No, it won’t be pretty perfect with a quip every six pannels. That’s the beauty of the medium for me.
Just because it looks like it will work *now* doesn’t mean it won’t get messy. Dorothy might not be cool with non-monogamy. Dorothy still has to break up with Walky. Joe might regret this decision and get jealous. Joe might be heartbroken secretly but hiding it so Joyce doesn’t feel bad, since he wants her to be happy. There is so much mess that can still come and probably will.
In fact… if Joe had broken up with Joyce, what drama would that really produce? A little initially, maybe, but after that? They’d presumably mostly stop interacting, greatly reducing chances for drama there.
Joyce wouldn’t be happy, but she came here to break up with him, so it’s no surprise — again, little if any drama; she’s already gone through angsting about breaking up with him before she even got here.
Earlier strips indicate Joe had more than minor hints that DoJo may be a thing, so while he’d be upset, he wouldn’t be blindsided by it… and, besides, what could he do about it? The healthiest thing, in that hypothetical situation, would be for him to just avoid the situation… Maybe go and mope with Roz a bit, who would likely be both sympathetic and willing to take his mind off it. Not much drama, though maybe a Slipshine.
Dorothy just checks it off the list. No drama.
Most of the drama that could come from cheating has already been milked out of the situation in advance (albeit largely by the comment section). Poly drama remains as yet untapped.
This is a really interesting comic! There are kinda two reads of it. The first is one where Joe, believing that he is never going to be able to be with joyce the way he wants, allows himself to compromise for the sake of her. This read is one where he will presumably either be rejected, or the relationship will fail.
The other read is that Joe is recognising that the type of feeling she is having for dororthy is different to the type she has been having for him, and that it has always been like that. And even before she realised it, he was happy with the relationship. Nothing has to change because this is how it has always been. This is the more optimistic read, naturally.
I think Panel 5 and 6 are really good arguments for both sides respectivley. And neither other panel really deconfirms the other. I could genuinley see it going either way.
Oh and as for why he doesn’t care about the cheating, that is made pretty clear here. It’s not that big a deal. He knew that she loved dorothy, and that eventually she would figure that out, so there isn’t any surprise here. She figured it out, decided she didn’t want to reject those feelings (which he agrees with) and then told him within a day. If you personally feel you would be more upset about it then that is fair, but I think his emotions are pretty clear and obvious.
There’s a third possibility: Joe is compromising, as the first read predicts, based on the principle that “some Joyce is better than no Joyce”, but later comes to realise that her love for Dorothy doesn’t reduce her love for him.
These are definitely the two readings of it. However, I think panel 5 has plenty of evidence that he sees the two feelings as different, neither better than the other. Yeah, his face is a bit down, but his words are incredibly carefully chosen to paint the latter picture. I don’t think a Joe who has terrible self confidence and is simply compromising would word things so perfectly. It’s “in a way that I’ll never match” not “more than I can ever match” and “that space in your heart” not “as much space in your heart.”
I think he also case less about the cheating than many commenters because in comic she had a moment of passion yesterday evening and is here to tell him about it and accept full responsibility immediately. For us, it may have been a month ago, but for them, that kiss was less than 24 hours ago.
* Joyce is confused by how this would work, and Joe explains more about poly relationships.
* Joyce raises the concern of Joe’s feelings about infidelity. He explains that to him, it’s a matter of dishonesty, and that while this could have gone better, he doesn’t see Joyce as trying to hide things from him.
* Joyce expresses concern about making sure the arrangement would be fair to Joe. He admits that he’s not sure about all the specifics, but says he went into the relationship knowing it would mean sharing Joyce’s heart with Dorothy and that he’s been happy with that so far.
* Joyce says she’ll have to talk about it with Dorothy. As soon as she leaves, Joe’s expression turns nervous.
* Cut to Dorothy having a messy breakup with Walky.
Something about that thematically rhymes with Dorothy constantly trying to get people to cheat with her lately. I haven’t quite figured out all the details, but there’s something in it.
God I know this is wishful thinking but I really want Amber/Amazigirl involved in this situation, not with Joe of course Christmas was already awkward enough.
And if Dorothy breaking up with Walky for Joyce (only for it to be poly) doesn’t shatter Walky, her then ALSO hooking up with Amazi-girl (before? after? while?) he goes to them for support… ouch!
Ooh, new twist in the polymer chain: Dorothy dumps Walky, comes back to find that Joyce has not only not dumped Joe, but does not intend to do so. Walky rebounds into Amber’s arms. Dorothy starts spending time with Amazi-Girl when Joyce is with Joe, helping her get back on her feet after her injuries, and then one night they kiss…
Joe/Joyce/Dorothy/Amazi-Girl||Amber/Walky. All the mess!
I believe that Amazi-Girl would prove to be a paladin, but her and Amber are not the same person, so she doesn’t have much reason to be unhappy with that arrangement.
Of course she’d get permission from Joyce and Joe first. Walky, however, is not her boyfriend; he’s Amber’s.
She may be a paladin, but I don’t think she’s above petty passive-aggression against her alter ego. They’ve already escalated from Amber getting drunk and leaving A-G to deal with the hangover to A-G getting the shit beat out of them and leaving Amber to deal with the injuries.
I worry this will be another night where people will be at each other’s throats so I’ll just start my own thread.
Polyamory is a super valid way to live your life and your relationships and isn’t inferior or superior to monogamy in any way. However what Joe seems to be doing here is trying to hold onto a crumb of Joyce’s affection because she’s the best thing that’s ever happened to him and despite her cheating on him and clearly being in love with someone else he can’t and doesn’t want to imagine a world bereft of her company. This feels less like a desire for a polyamory and moreso a desire to hold fast to a relationship he fears will reach it’s conclusion abruptly. Joe doesn’t have it in him to be hurt, or betrayed. He’s only terrified. Terrified of losing her.
Also this discourse has definitely reminded me why it’s often not really fun to discuss a narrative comic that deals with issues that involves with marginalized groups. Because everyone has their guard up people will just throw out personal insults and accusations of bigotry at the the drop of a hat. When you’re not often included you will defend any hint of inclusion you can muster with your entire chest. There’s a reason why if you ask any black man over the age of 25 they will die on the Hill that Piccolo from DBZ is Black.
Joyce/Joe/Dorothy isn’t just “a ship” It’s your representation. You WANT it to happen not necessarily because it suits the characters but because if it’s in the comic you’ll feel seen. Heard. People go nuts over Joyce kissing a girl. Or for Joe to accept polyamory. And it only partially has anything to do with the characters themselves. So any argument against any of this doubles a rejection of your being. Your life. And FUCK THEM for saying you don’t have a right to exist. Which means we’re having two completely different arguments. And that makes it frustrating to engage with.
I really don’t think that’s why people have gotten mad tonight. I think that actual aggression, macro and micro, have happened repeatedly in ways that extended well beyond the narrative, and that’s why folks have their guards up. Like this is not My Representation TM, it’s just kinda fun, and I’ve definitely experienced being stressed on and made to feel second class, both in the explicit framing of my relationship style as too rare to justify normalization and implicit frames of people like me not fully loving our partners.
Like, no biggy, it’s a comment section and it’s nowhere near the worst aggression that has happened to me today in a comment section, but I really hate the kinds of minimization that happens when certain classes of Queer people (ie non cis, mono, middle class, white probably but I wouldn’t know, etc) express hurt.
Like people have actually said hurtful things! People aren’t just being hypersensitive!
Yotomoe’s not necessarily wrong, but the whole issue is 100% complicated by the existence, both in the (mostly) removed comments here and the very much not removed comments on Reddit and other places that are just dripping with exactly the bigotry folks are angry about.
I’ve been on the record as saying a lot of that hostility seems to be mis-aimed at people who are in the same general place as the bigots and that’s a problem, but it’s not a big mystery WHY that hostility exists!
Yes, I get what you’re saying, and I agree with most of your assessment. But Joe has, himself, not been monogamous ever in his life. It isn’t his default or his norm. Before Joyce he slept with who he wanted when he wanted. He didn’t Love those girls, but he was intimate with them with the full expectation they would be intimate with others.
Having had to work with my partner to navigate a monogamous relationship into polyamory, there are two things here:
1. Polyamory isn’t being sold a difficult bill of goods. It is a different way of viewing and approaching love. It involves trust in the importance you have to someone and the importance they have to you, regardless of who else you or they are also seeing – that applies to each person.
2. Polyamory will always have to start as being sold a difficult bill of goods in a monogamous context though, because people in a monogamous society have been raised to believe they own one another.
I think ultimately what a lot of you may be doing is projecting your feelings onto Joe – I don’t think Joe started this assuming he’d be monogamous with Joyce, he is not jealous so far, and his solution to cheating baggage is not to hold monogamous expectations.
The thing about polyamory is yes, right -now- Joe is accepting that he is sharing Joyce’s heart with Dorothy. But Joe knows he can get girls, this is not his issue. He likely even knows he could have another monogamous relationship he could be happy in, probably. He. Loves. Joyce. And Joyce would not keep him from seeing other girls, she would not have to Own Him, meaning he could also sleep with and have other relationships, and in relationship anarchy there would not be any nest couple, they would just be allowed to take things how things go. So people acting like this is under duress and therefore unforgivable and Bad Poly: tbqh I’m pretty sure Joe expected this maybe even before starting this with Joyce and knew this whole situation would be hard for him – Including his efforts at monogamy. I see amazing clarity of what they both want in Joe, I don’t see him begging for scraps. The only problem I see here is Dorothy, who has shown a fair amount of jealousy and possessiveness over Joyce, so would need to work on a lot to be able to accept that getting Joyce doesn’t mean Owning her.
Not really a fan of the implication that Monogamy means you “own” one another but otherwise a decent read. Though yeah I don’t exactly buy into this being Joe’s intention for their relationship the entire time. Perhaps he was always open to the idea but I honestly don’t get any hint that Joe had any expectation of nonmonogamy in this particular relationship.
I think unfortunately that’s how it kinda feels to a lot of orientation poly folks bc it’s how it would feel if someone imposed that on them. I describe the feeling of monogamy as having someone build fences around me instead of being a home I can come back to.
This is NOT how monogamous people feel about it. Monogamous people are doing something I don’t really relate to, and they’re extremely happy doing it, and polyamory would make them feel bad and unappreciated. But it’s probably worth knowing that for all the stuff monogamous folks project onto poly, many poly folks also do some projection when trying to model monogamy world and it’s about equally helpful to understanding the things they actually value. Which is to say it’s not.
I flat out disagree Joe didn’t expect this, as I discussed further up I think he’s been pretty actively wingmanning it for some time. But we’ll see.
You are one of the only commenters pointing out Dorothy is the snag in the nonmonogomy . It’s Dorothy why I think this won’t work. She has been dying Inside thinking of Joyce with Joe.
Also not fond of casting Old Joe’s behavior as non-monogamy in any sense that helps with navigating a polyamorous relationship. Having casual sex with lots of girls isn’t related to polyamory. He wasn’t jealous of who those other girls slept with because he didn’t care about them, which is completely different.
Even more, “I don’t think Joe started this assuming he’d be monogamous with Joyce, he is not jealous so far, and his solution to cheating baggage is not to hold monogamous expectations.” This trashes Joe’s entire character arc. Joe may feel, as he said not long ago, that he doesn’t have the right to feel jealous, but he absolutely intended to be monogamous. His whole deal was not being like his father. If he didn’t think he could do that he either wouldn’t have tried the relationship or he would have made it absolutely clear that it was an open relationship – which we know he didn’t since Joyce was freaked out about cheating on him.
I mean… I just don’t see what you see in the strip. I see Joe as worried he’ll lose Joyce, but I don’t see someone who is “settling” or “holding onto a crumb” or “begging for scraps” or any of the other many ways people have taken this so negatively.
I see someone expressing compersion (the opposite of jealousy, meaning a feeling of happiness when someone you love is loved, even if not by you), understanding of the importance of another person in his girlfriend’s life, and hope that he can continue to be as close to her as he is now. I also see someone who will be sad yet okay if Joyce does ultimately break things off with him.
I also see a Joe who is being either exceedingly careful with his words (likely due to research since he first realized the potentially romantic nature of Joyce and Dorothy’s feelings) or is speaking 100% from the heart and is 100% in line with a polyamorous view of the situation: valuing and respecting the love Joyce has for both of them, not seeing one as less valuable because both exist.
I also think it’s important to understand that some of the pushback when people react negatively in these situations is because there are a lot of assumptions and ways of thinking people have that can subtly impact marginalized groups. Things that are not malicious, overt bigotry yet still hurt.
It’s things like the way you say “clearly being in love with someone else” which feels like a very monogamy-centric way of thinking about the situation. Even the way it’s phrased frames Joyce loving Dorothy as an inherent challenge to Joyce’s love for Joe. Think of what it would be like if the concern was over Joe’s relationship with his sister Amber because she was “clearly in love with someone else.” It would feel really silly to see the existence of Amber’s romantic love as an inherent issue to Joe and Amber’s familial love.
Polyamorous people generally see multiple romantic relationships similarly. There’s no inherent challenge or issue here. They need to work out how the relationships interact and how any rules might need to change, but it’s not the same issue as if you’re thinking about it from a more monogomy-centric lens.
It would be relevant if Amber was slowly paying less attention to Joe, Avoiding Joe and choosing to remain distant from him in favor of her new romantic partner. At least in the long term. Some people’s relationships with their families ARE strained by romantic relationships. Joyce came here to break up with him. Maybe she felt like she had to, but even then she chose to. She placed her new thing with Dorothy before her thing with Joe.
While Joyce has been avoiding Joe lately due to her recent (less than two days old) relationship with Dorothy, that was because she was assuming monogamy as the only option and putting off the break up (because she’s immature and inexperienced with relationships). With a poly relationship, she won’t have that (flawed) reason.
We can’t reliably judge how she’ll treat a poly relationship based on a past in which she’s never been in one.
If she does end up remaining distant from Joe despite the new situation, that will indeed be a problem, and a sign of (at the very least) a failing poly relationship. This far from inevitable, though. On the other hand, this is Dumbing of Age… The poly relationship is likely to struggle, at the least. Joyce becoming distant from Joe despite the option to have both him and Dorothy is one of the possible sources for drama (though I personally think other problems are more likely).
Anyway, whatever’s happening’s happening. All we can do is wait and hope.
I mean… Last night she not only spoke with Joe but did a lot more than just “talk” with him. How is her spending the remainder of the evening with Dorothy “avoiding Joe and choosing to remain distant?”
Like, when has she avoided Joe or been distant from him? She kissed Dorothy last night, tried to talk to him later that evening, and is now here the next morning.
It’s alarming how many of you are ignoring Joe’s conversations with Roz and Rachel (and his trauma about cheating). This isn’t what Joe wanted, and this was still cheating, not ‘poly’. Joe’s just convinced himself that that’s all he deserves.
Calling people anti-queer bigots for saying that’s unhealthy is wild.
Well no, I think the people being called anti-queer bigots are having that happen because they’re being judgmental about poly relationships in general. At least, in the single thread where I’ve seen the accusation in play at all.
I mean, it was cheating and is poly and the thing people were getting called bigots for was unambiguously about people implying that monogamy was somehow better or The Right way !9& about whether this specific relationship being healthy.
Be straight (ha) with me: is this a whipping horse, or did you misread the room?
No, I just disagree that that’s what was being implied and think y’all are ignoring context. Y’all are acting like “no, you deserve someone’s whole heart” was posted under, say, a strip about Mandy, Grace, & Sierra’s relationship which–at least as far as we’ve been led to assume–*they all wanted* and *all agreed to up front*. If that’d happened, I’d have been right there with you. But it’s completely different to say it about Joe, who *wanted* Joyce’s whole heart, got cheated on and betrayed instead, and let his regrets/insecurities (and sorta Rachel) convince him that that’s all he deserved.
What about the context where in earlier in the week in comic, Joe ripped off his clothes in front of Joyce at the offer to bang Sarah?
And Joyce shrugged it off.
That IS a thing that just happened.
What Joe wants and has been fighting for is his own internal feelings. To maintain a sense of emotional intimacy and depth despite sex. He wants all the other things he’s been skipping. But he feels like Joyce is the one for him because of the slow burn of their connection. That’s a lot to rebuild from scratch.
He’s never said he “wanted Joyce’s whole heart”. He’s trying to prove to. Himself he is trustworthy. I don’t think he feels betrayed because he just told Joyce he thinks being a wingman is the best a person can be. And Joe has wingmaned them even encouraging Dorothy to be honest with her feelings. He Expressed zero jealousy or possessiveness.
I think Joe should be taken at his word. He doesn’t want to lose Joyce and doesn’t think Dorothy detracts with what he has. ( Unfortunately I think he’s probably wrong. But because Jorothy will go unexpected places and probably will eclipse his relationship)
This entirely. Like Joe has seen this coming and had been an ethical slut uo to this point and has always had fantastic romantic communication. He even asked his father does she know you struggle with monogamy this isnt knew to him and he also knows the polycukw who lives here.
Perhaps neither Joe nor Joyce realize the place she has in her heart for him. She adores Dorothy and “wants to be her”, but she confides in Joe, Joe sees her growing, accepts her changing. Joyce shared her apostasy journey with Joe. When Joyce was distracted by the Becky’s mom’s birthday, Joe noticed, tried to figure out what was going on, and help, by talking to the people involved.
When Joyce asked, “are you that kind of friend now?” The actual answer was Yes (which he showed later in the chapter). But also he’d been that kind of friend. For months, while Dorothy’s been too busy.
She feels a stronger spark for Dorothy, but I think she’s better friends with Joe and doesn’t realize it.
Leaving polyamory aside, Dorothy and Joyce have a really unhealthy power dynamic, one that doesn’t make for a stable or empowering relationship in the long term. I don’t think that Joe is thinking about it this way, but by standing still and being consistent, loving, and supporting Joyce’s self-actualization, he’s demonstrating how to be a better partner than Dorothy is capable of being (at least right now, when her core identity is spiraling).
He is too much of a himbo to think “sure, let’s try that and I’ll be here to help you pick up the pieces when she Dorothies the whole thing up,” but that’s a likely outcome.
You know it didn’t occur to me until you used her name as a verb but with her possibly getting more into activism dororthy is kind of turning into the Britta of the group.
“Dorothy and Joyce have a really unhealthy power dynamic”
Whut?
“he’s demonstrating how to be a better partner than Dorothy is capable of being”
What? Where are you getting that from? The only arguably “unhealthy” aspect of Joyce and Dorothy is that they were cheating. That’s it.
There is no actual power dynamic and have been pretty much equal since the beginning.
Yeah for some reason there are some people who think Dorothy and Joyce have an unhealthy power dynamic and the closest explanations have been “because Dorothy is like a mom to her” and “because Joyce values Dorothy’s opinion too much to disobey her” neither of which are the case. Joyce has ‘disobeyed’ Dorothy many-a-time when she feels like she ought to. Dorothy is very clearly not a mom to Joyce, as evidenced by the kissing and also they’re the same damn age.
I see where the unhealthy power dynamic people are coming from, but man it does require a leap of logic to arrive to the conclusion they are at. DOES Dorothy handle pretty much all of Joyce’s affairs? Like doctor appointments, extracurriculars, etc.? Ya she totally does. Could she abuse that power? Probably. Will she? Not without one hell of a villain arc first.
This. I get the concrrn Joyce is incredibly stunted and immature ina way dorothy isnt because of her culty hyper religious childhood but were seeing Joyce start to advance and learn fairly quick and dorothy is not abusing that dynamic though she does have of I boundary issues
I’m not joining the dogpile. There is something unhealthy with their dynamic, but it’s not “power dynamic” as is typically meant. Obviously you’re talking about their dynamic causing an unstable relationship, because that’s what you said. Not a “villain arc” or abusing power or whatever other strawman people are coming up with.
It isn’t a strawman if this commenter says ‘power dynamic’ and I respond about whether there’s a ‘power dynamic’. They have trauma rolled up into their relationship, there is indeed some unhealthy aspects to them, I just think it is important for people to not roll out the phrase ‘power dynamic’ because that’s a very specific phrase. Ruth and Billie had a power dynamic. Jason and Sal did too. Dorothy and Joyce do not.
Joe’s self-esteem took a hit but he was prepared for this. He knows poly is a thing, he’s already been bracing for it since… who knows when, but by the time he talked to Dorothy he already had seen the writing on the wall, and decided he’d stay with Joyce if Joyce still wanted him. Like, yeah, we all can see it stung but he’s willing to try it on for size. See if they can make it work.
David “best I can aspire to is being her boytoy” Walkerton, “self-esteem in the negative numbers” Walky? Oh, this’ gonna wreck him.
I hope that he and Dorothy do have a major breakup. I like Walky with Amber. They enjoy the same things (Games, junk food, superheroing, garbage roof) and Amber needs someone to keep her even and give her love.
Gotta say I really don’t see this being an unhealthy thing for Joe? I see a lot of talk about him doing this because he’s so hurt by his parents issues and desperately trying to keep Joyce in his life. But what *I* see is an emotionally mature young man who knows what he wants and is asking for it, and is ready to accept the answer. If he has feelings for Joyce and knows she has feelings for him…how is that any less healthy than them dating in the first place? And even if he is expressing some holdover things from his parents – why is that a dealbreaker? Why is that not something they can talk about and work through? Like this has been cooking between them since she was a brainwashed Christofascist and he was willing to support her growth then. Was that also unhealthy for Joe to do?
Sometimes learning to be healthy means taking the chance to go for what you want and being hurt by it because you learn from it. Even if this doesn’t work out, I don’t think he’s wrong or inherently unhealthy for wanting to keep his place in Joyce’s heart. Maybe he’s making a mistake, but nobody is perfect at relationships when they’re in college.
Honestly, I think some cultures have been so inundated with the idea that a person can only ever have love and devotion to one person that anything challenging that is hard for people to hear. It’s never made sense to me.
But that’s just my .02 please argue with me by sending donations to Doctors Without Borders, that would make me soooo mad and prove you are right and I am wrong
I had basically the same feeling. This is super emotionally mature and extremely sweet in my eyes, and it’s just baffling to me how people are spinning it into such a negative thing. Like, is monogamy-centric socialization really *that* powerful?
Not to be like “damn, the autistic exvangelist comic’s commentariat is autistic and exvangelist” but some of y’all have unbelievably rigid standards of ethics about how Healthy Relationships are Supposed to go
It isn’t even the “unbelievably rigid standards of ethics about how Healthy Relationships are Supposed to go” that is the issue, it is the assumption that everyone else must and ought to have the same ” unbelievably rigid standards of ethics about how Healthy Relationships are Supposed to go”. I mean…. I know there are people who have “unbelievably rigid standards of ethics about how Healthy Relationships are Supposed to go” and I know there are people who think people can actually cast off a lot of the imposed rules of society and things will still work. And many other positions on things.
I don’t have “Unbelievably rigid standards” of what other people should think! We are all different. Huzzah. Thank goodness for that.
I think that this was a very emotionally mature side of Joe, understanding and talking through his feelings and what he wants. Season one Joe could NEVER.
I do take a little issue with some of the stuff on Patreon and kinda on the main site yesterday that gave me the vibe that Joe not being angry is what’s emotionally mature here and – no. Joe would not have been immature or wrong if he’d been angry, even if he’d yelled at Joyce (I’m thinking yelling ‘what the FUCK? We’re done, now get the hell out of my room’ or something along those lines before anyone jumps to conclusions about what I mean by that). Yelling at someone who did something hurtful to you is not immature, emotionally or otherwise.
I am really curious how this is gonna go. I think Joe means what he says but I also think some of it is coming from a place of low self worth and that’s rarely a good place to start a relationship. That’s also not even getting into Dorothy and potentially Walky’s reaction.
Yeah, I understand not liking that vibe. That vibe was a little hovering around and it does suck. It’s okay to get mad and to be angry, even if the anger is wrong, it doesn’t make you evil. Joe would not have been evil if he was upset.
The rest of it, well; you know I already co-signed that 🤣
Yeah, there’s lots of times anger can be wrong but not evil like if you snap at someone for being ‘a little annoying but usually tolerable’ because it’s been a long day full of irritating things. “Angry because girlfriend cheated on you” is entirely reasonable. Sure, he could’ve been a dick in this hypothetical scenario but he also could’ve just as easily just gone ‘GTFO and lose my number’ which would be fine.
Now as for what happens next – well, that’s the fun part. 😉
As a cis guy I often have to temper my anger because I feel the second I get angry or shout or mad I’ve basically lost.So I tend to hold back my emotions and try to deescalate.
My greatest fear is being perceived as unhinged, beastly or dangerous so I always try to be on my best behavior and consequentially let people walk all over me. I’m not saying Joe shoulda gotten violent but he woulda been. I dunno…justified at being angry and even yelling at her. Even if that wouldn’t be the most “mature” thing to do.
Different in that women are less often viewed as dangerous, certainly, so there’s less of a need to compensate by letting others take advantage of you*. Sorry, hope it didn’t seem like I was trying to dismiss your point — it’s entirely valid. Some people will use whatever they can to help them take advantage of others, or make them look bad, or whatever else suits their purposes.
* Of course, often, a woman refusing to let herself be taken advantage of, even without displaying anger, results in her being regarded as a bongo. Everyone gets to be treated unfairly. What fun!
It’s especially a problem for cis guys who are (like Joe and myself) relatively gigantic — ANY sign of anger on me is rated significantly more scary by most by virtue of the fact I’m a 250lb ex-linebacker — or who have other attributes (like being non-white) that causes idiots to rate their anger as relatively more dangerous.
A LOT of my readings of Joe’s emotions are colored by that knowledge that “He’s of a size and musculature that he likely KNOWS he’s not ‘allowed’ to get angry, and that might have a bearing on how he’s performing his emotions.”
Yep. There are certain privileges that make you less likely to be read as “dangerous” instead of “strong and capable”, but. Plenty of disprivileges that do the exact opposite.
It really does matter. You learn from a very young age, to treat yourself as a threat, because if you’re big enough at a young enough age, you actually can hurt your peers, completely by accident. We, as a society, simply do a terrible job of predicting the trauma from this outcome, and giving young men the tools to unpack that trauma.
In my particular case, it definitely did not help that one of my set of little mental illnesses is Intermittent Explosive Disorder (along with Major Depressive. College was FUN with those two living in my head, especially because the depression almost completely masked the IED until I got treated, then I briefly because the kind of dude who literally flipped a table, and back to the pshrink I went.)
I am thankful literally every day that I’m one of the people for whom consistent CBT/DBT “just works”, as it’s now been over two decades since I’ve thrown a piece of furniture for a stupid reason.
I think “Joe accepting this shows he’s emotionally mature” is the intended read. Joe really is 100% fine with this and the fact that he’s 100% fine with this is meant to show his emotional growth. Willis has been very open about Joyrothy being the endgame ship and thus it’s going to be the happy one.
The people who are upset with that comic are the people who are upset with that read from either a “cheating is wrong and shouldn’t be normalized” perspective or a “I wanted Jerry Springer and instead I’m getting Questionable Content” perspective. Personally I don’t really care if Joyce is “ethical”, she’s not real, but everyone being mature and accepting does kind of feel anticlimactic. But, like, Questionable Content is popular for a reason, people like seeing queer relationships portrayed as positive and happy. I’m a big “Chaos!” guy but they’re not invalid for wanting that.
I think the WAY Joe accepts it is emotionally mature – thinking through and talking through his feelings is a great step! I don’t think Joyrothy being the planned endgame* means that Joe would be immature if he HAD been angry he was cheated on, even if other people might think so. For whatever it’s worth, I don’t think Sarah was meant to be immature for yelling at them for cheating so I don’t think that that’s what Willis would’ve gone for IF he had chosen for Joe to be angry.
I’m not really ‘upset’ they’re working it out but I stand by saying this feels anticlimactic after all the build up for ‘this is gonna really upset Joe’. It feels too early. Of course, that assumes his proposed poly relationship goes smoothly, if it goes at all. If a narrative isn’t meant to involve big, comic blowing up drama, that’s fine, but I get a little put out if there’s all this talk of big drama and no big drama emerges. 😛 Now thankfully I don’t think that will be the case.
And for sure! There’s nothing wrong with wanting positive, happy queer or poly or queer AND poly relationships. There’s lots of other kinds of conflict a strip can have besides that. I am a drama craving goblin who wants mess but it doesn’t specifically happen to be relationship mess. As I said, my issue is that this was described as blowing up the comic and well….where was the kaboom? There was supposed to be a comic shattering kaboom! (And there probably is one coming, I still smell dynamite).
I mean, we don’t actually *know* if everyone is happy yet?
We don’t know if Joyce wants two lovers. We don’t know if that’s a thing she feels comfortable with or wants to have. She likes Joe, and Dorothy, but some people are just monogamous by nature.
And even if she’s about it, that doesn’t mean *Dorothy* is. She might want an exclusive relationship. It’s clear from the way she’s been talking that she *expects* one. Until we know how she feels about this, we haven’t actually found a resolution.
If Dotty isn’t into the idea, and Joyce comes back saying “Joe says he’s okay with me dating both of you, is that okay?” then that puts Dorothy in the position of either accepting a romantic dynamic she might not be okay with, or it puts the responsibility of breaking up Joyce and Joe unfairly on Dorothy’s shoulders. Which puts an *immediate* strain on their relationship.
And suppose Dorothy IS fine with it. Suppose she’s conceptually okay with the notion of Joyce dating both of them. At this particular moment, most likely, the girls have split up in order to go break up with their respective boyfriends. Dorothy is probably talking to *Walky* right now. She might have, at this moment, already broken up with him. There may have been tears! We don’t actually know how he’ll react, but unless he’s made the same suggestion to Dorothy that Joe made to Joyce, there’s a good chance that Dorothy’s first thought when Joyce asks is going to be “well then what did I break up with *Walky* for??”
It’s one of the reasons why this kind of thing working out is so *rare,* because it’s actually really hard to *enter* this kind of situation in a way that is fair to everybody. There is a possible world state where this works out and everybody’s happy, but it isn’t actually very probable. A definite majority of people *want* exclusivity in a relationship. Having four that don’t is pretty unusual. Does that mean it’s not going to happen? Not necessarily. But it’s certainly not a given that it is going to.
(that said, I’m happy about today’s strip, in general. I’m on team Joyce-hinge, and this is literally just the BEGINNING of this conversation, so I’m happy to give them all time to work things out)
i do like that this was perfectly well-established as something joe had in his conceptual space, when he asked his dad if he’d told amber’s mom that he needed an open relationship. joe isn’t determinedly monogamous, and that’s not just from slutting around, that’s been a component of how he talks about more durable relationships for ages
SICKOS STAY WINNING HELL FUCKING YES!!! I feel high. I feel drunk. This will be SO STUPIDLY FUN TO EXPLORE, ups and downs and everything in between!!!
It’s started messily. Nobody involved has done anything like this before. It originated in, yes, cheating. Joyce has hangups. There’s unexplored tension between Dorothy and Joe. Joe is somehow being the most mature one while also being a martyr. All of them are stupidly young, wounded, and have so, so much to learn– assuming it’s doomed?? BY DEFAULT?? FAM! These are gourmet ingredients, let Willis cook omg!!!
(Goddamn, I love Joe. He’s grown so much, what a beautiful man fr, he deserves all the happiness in the world.)
FRIENDS, SCHOLARS, PEOPLE OF THE JURY. WE’VE GOT CANON MESSY POLY REPRESENTATION and I’m incredibly excited to see what the fuck comes out of this narrative choice.
It’s so good, it’s that lottery win I’ve talked about, it’s so so good
Funny Patreon story: I slept through the initial update over there and was greeted with like three comment threads declaring my total cultural victory and I’m like I WON???
At this point I really need to just stop reading the comments for a bit. The absolute absurd level of digging into the minutiae and predicting what will happen in a conversation which, in real time will take a few minutes, is kinda driving me bonkers (and yes I know that I have participated in it too). I think I need to just take a break for a couple weeks from the comic entirely, then catch up when this whole conversation exists in one chunk.
oh yeah totes if this is stressing you out thats what i usually do at least when it comes to reading the comments
noah fence to anybody i like reading peoples thoughts but this comic updates literally every day man
The very first emotion I felt about this was pity. Then I got sad because Joe’s face in the 3rd panel looked heartbreaking.
I wonder if part of this is desperation. Like, it’s not so much that he’s OK with it all but he’s willing to put up with it because he’s on that whole “I Want My Beloved To Be Happy” thing which just… brings on my pity.
I don’t like Joe saying that Joyce “loves Dorothy in a way that I’ll never be able to match”, it feels like he’s selling himself short! They both offer Joyce different things, even aside from being man and woman!
I do kind of agree where you’re coming from, but only because I’ve seen the arguments that come from the other direction, which is where bisexuals get a lot of suspicion that they’re gonna cheat on their partner sooner or later because “I can’t offer what the other gender does”, which is TOTALLY the wrong way to think about it.
I think the key is he says “in a way that I’ll never be able to match” not “to a degree I’ll never be able to match.” The words seem extremely carefully chosen to be different kinds of love, not greater or lesser love. This was likely due to a lot of care and research on Willis’s part, but in-universe, it means either Joe has been doing his research so he could understand and talk about these feelings or he’s speaking a very sweet declaration of non-monogamous love directly from the heart, which happens to be in a very good place.
See to me if Willis wanted to convey that he shouldn’t have used that line at all. To me “never be able to match” or “I can’t match that” is used to say “I can’t get up to that level”. Now I have no idea if this is some cultural difference but I’ve never heard that phrases used to mean “same but different”. Which is really where I’m getting the impression Joe is indicating he isn’t as valued. So you’re saying it doesn’t indicate greater or lesser when to me that’s exactly what it means. So we’re left with opposite understandings of Joe’s feelings.
Looking forward to future strips where I presume we’ll get some clarification.
I suppose I can see “I can’t match that” being about comparisons, but I feel like that reading still requires you to completely ignore everything else strongly pointing in the other direction to focus in on that one bit of phrasing.
And yeah, I’m sure we’ll get some good clarification on Joe’s feelings very soon.
I love that Joe’s good with it, and really being clear with his feelings, but I have a feeling Dorothy’s not gonna like this solution. I HOPE she does, but idk. It’s part that she doesn’t like Joe (and she doesn’t have to, to be with Joyce, but I could see it grating at her) and part that like, she’s given up a lot for Joyce, directly or indirectly, and while I don’t think she resents her, I dunno that she’ll love Joyce saying she’s not all in on her (Dorothy).
(I also do recognize that you can be all in with more than one person, but even if Dorothy knows that logically, I don’t know that she’ll FEEL that way)
Also man, “I don’t get to be jealous” definitely sounds like unhealthy territory. Also in the process of finding the strip I ran into a lot of other Joyce/Dorothy/Joe strips and man this has been getting foreshadowed for a damn long time in retrospect.
I don’t think the jealousy comment is that unhealthy. I think it’d be more unhealthy to be jealous of a partners friends and of them spending time together. Folks need their friend space. If Joe looks a little sad about it, then I think he’s mostly just remembering his past actions objectifying people and being as shallow as possible. He doesn’t get to be jealous because that would be both wrong and hypocritical of him.
In high school I was cuddling with my boyfriend in his bed, door open, and his older sister jumped into the door frame and goes, “No compromising positions!”
And I hugged him and said, “Aw why not? Everyone gets what they want with a compromise, right?”
She screeched and ran out and still gets mad when I bring up compromises (and this was 20 years ago)
I’m hoping it’s coming. The usual sort of breaking up for cheating has been done many times in other fiction. Messy poly? Not so much. May last much longer, too.
Is it possible that everyone (in and out of the strip) except Joe is overthinking this? It’s normal, especially among young people, to casually date multiple people before committing to one (or more). Granted, Joyce does nothing casually, but there ya go.
Orrrrrrrr it could be a first step to a V-type polyamorous situation. Who knows?
It is still done and I haven’t seen anyone saying otherwise and a lot of people correcting statements like this.
But the real point is Olofa’s “Joyce does nothing casually”. Is there any indication anywhere that Joe or Joyce are treating their relationship as casual?
Some commenters were so ready to toss the “cheating” accusations and claimed so much ethos superiority over these 2 characters – when, the whole thing was just 2 young women realizing they are loving each other (something they were never going to accept themselves without outside forces) and then deciding to not take any more serious steps till they talk to their relation(situation)ships.
The HORRROR!!!!
(Ye i think there has been some overthinking in the comments during the last weeks…) 😛
Joe is being incredibly brave with this relationship. Joyce isn’t just his first girlfriend, I’m pretty sure she is his first friend that is a girl. Those are the best relationships that start when two people are friends.
I just explained why the polyamory symbol is a pi sign to my buddy, “Because love is infinite and irrational.” I also stole that from a meme I read about chronic pain conditions rating 3.14 on a doctor pain scale because it is irrational, not very big, but never ending.
Joe has been with many, many women. He had a flippant and pessimistic view of relationships and dating. Healthy and respectful about consenting sex, but very down on anything long term.
> Joyce has made him feel worthy of more. Of better. For the first time he’s been in love and not just horny, teenage lust.
> Joyce has had a lot of lust for men, but for the most part, very little towards women (Sal being the only other example I can think of off the top of my head). She was friends with Dorothy first.
> Dorothy is a good relationship foil to Joe because Dorothy has also put Joyce on a pedestal and said that Joyce makes her want to be a better person.
Joe is patient, Joe is kind, Joe is love. Joe isn’t bothered because when he is around Joyce he feels safe and valued. He doesn’t think Dorothy is a threat, because he trusts Joyce. Joyce didn’t cheat on Joe because Joe has told her that he trusts her with Dorothy. Blame it on teenagers (young adults? I was 19 by this point my freshman year of college) not explicitly explaining things or on Joyce’s Evangelical shame or neurodivergency on not understanding. I know I struggled to realize my partner really trusted me and wasn’t upset if I wanted another partner because they’re asexual. For many years I took it as that meaning they didn’t love me, but they’ve actually been the most emotionally mature and confident person I’ve ever been with. That counts for a lot more than the possessive cishetnormative monogamous relationships I’ve been in before.
I can see this still breaking bad w Dorothy clinging to a requirement of exclusivity the same way she did to heterosexual identity, but if that happens I still look forward to the three of them having a V-shaped relationship in 2032 when Dorothy gets over herself and apologizes
O-KAY! I did not see this coming. Hm. Well, assuming Joe is really OK with it, all the more power to them. Now to see if Dorothy is equally OK with sharing Joyce… (And possibly Walky too? Because there’s still the possibility at least one heart gets broken.)
I’ll take a guess. You feel melancholy and a little bit responsible. You don’t know why you feel it’s partially your fault this has happened, but your heart is telling you it has something to do with the place this all began. You feel like you need to go back there, that she’ll be waiting for you somehow, that she’ll help you make sense of all this.
This reminds me of the closing scene from Casablanca when the Inspector says to Rick, “Yes she went with him, my friend, but she knew you were lying”.
Joe’s obvious in love with her but won’t make that claim on her.
While disapproving (of character/s, not author!) regarding actions taken while perceiving them as infidelity, this gentle resolution of them is happier to witness than a train wreck would have been.
Introspecting, I note that having experienced Danny’s reaction/s to Dorothy-Walky I have little curiosity either way about Walky’s reaction/s to Dorothy-Joyce, though I would be amused if this ends up bringing about Walky-Joyce again in polycule form.
I’m probably forgetting someone significant and look forward to witnessing future developments.
Joe does, “Rank wing-personness as the number one quality someone can have.” I’m thinking that these guys might just stumble and fumble their way to something healthy and happy.
Looking forward to Walky and Joe becoming buds and hanging out together. Lots of potential in that.
Yeah I think people are weirdly discounting Dorothy’s agency in this situation? She doesn’t like Joe to begin with, and she’s not obligated to enter into a poly dynamic with Joyce and him if that’s what Joyce decides she wants. She can decide that being poly is a bridge too far, or specifically being poly and involving Joe. She mentally equates Joyce being with Joe with her losing Joyce, and she may not get over that in a poly dynamic because those feelings are so tangled up with her untreated PTSD. Assuming Joyce is on board, Dorothy is the wild card here.
idk, I see a LOT of people specifically assuming Dorothy will blow up about this, not only today and yesterday but every time the topic of a potential poly situation has come up. I don’t think anyone’s discounting her.
…Are people saying that? We’re coming up on 800 comments, so ABSOLUTELY possible I’ve missed a thread, but mostly I’m seeing: “I don’t think Dorothy’s gonna be on board for this!” and “Dorothy’s going to make Joyce choose!” and the like.
IDK, I think this is like the earlier idea that Joe was being denied a say in whether or not Joyce dates both him and Dorothy. The answer is the same in both cases: they get a say in whether or not they want to be part of that relationship, but not in whether or not it happens without them.
e.g., Joe had every right to break up with Joyce, but no right to forbid Joyce from being with Dorothy; Dorothy likewise has every right to break up with Joyce, but no right to forbid Joyce from staying with Joe and trying polyamory with someone else.
That is not what was said, this is misreading a poly talking point, which fair enough for people not in the cmmunity – Dorothy doesn’t get a say in whether Joyce and Joe are a thing, because Dorothy can only set boundaries for herself. There is not an option where Dorothy gets to make Joyce dump Joe, *that* would be relationship ending, if not eight away then at some point in the future. It’s also potentially hinted at, with Dorothy’s need to Be The One doing everything for Joyce, and her clear difficulty coping with Joyce going off with Joe.
“There is not an option where Dorothy gets to make Joyce dump Joe”
That would be Dorothy trampling Joyce’s agency (again).
If Dorothy wants Joyce all to herself, she has three options:
– Wait it out until Joyce dumps Joe on her own (which she may never)
– Manipulate them into breaking up (full villain Dorothy)
– Give the “him or me” ultimatum (never make an ultimatum unless you’re willing to follow through with both outcomes)
I don’t know what Dorothy thinks, but either way, it’s cool that this conversation is happening. In so much of media, it would be a simple, “Oh, you kissed someone else? We’re through.” Or it would be “Well, you love her, so yeah, we’re breaking up.” It would be 100% pure presume monogamy with no acknowledgement that anything else is even a possibility.
Regardless of how it ends, the fact that a character is expressing very non-monogamous love and asking for a non-monogamous relationship is awesome. It’s like how Becky kissing Joyce and coming out was a great moment even if it didn’t end with the two of them together.
I’m also sure that what Dorothy thinks will be brought up very soon in the conversation, and that if Joyce is willing, they’ll immediately discuss it with Dorothy. At which point I hope Dorothy is cool with this, and I don’t feel like it would be out of character for her to be. It’s very possibly she’s read about polyamory and will immediately be fine with it. It’s also possible that it’ll take some time or that she’ll try and it won’t work or that it’ll blow up.
It’s all still way better than the presumed-monogamy version where this possibility isn’t even brought up or addressed.
Dorothy disappears for a week (in-comic time). When she reappears she has three copies of a 300-page Non-Monogamy Draft Agreement outlining everything from the name of the group-chat between the three of them to how to divy up walking-Joyce-to-class to handling birthdays to various elaborate “In the case of…” scenarios for e.g. if there’s a movie all three want to see, or if they’re all in the same room when one starts feeling frisky, or…
That’s a lot of footwear being tossed up on that high shelf that’s not particularly well-attached to the wall. Gravity always wins, so they say.
Meanwhile, I’m in awe that some of the folks here are so hellbent on this thing happening that they disclaim even the possibility that panel five Joe is essentially resigning himself to second place.
Genuinely a little wild how many people are insisting that “you love Dorothy in a way I can never match” cannot possibly be interpreted as Joe devaluing himself
Yeah, I’m avoiding entire swathes of thread today just based on some people seemingly deciding that thinking any objections to what’s happening here are coming from “oh you don’t understand poly!”
It’s as myopic as the people who have this weird insistence that “if you never discussed exclusivity, in college in the US in 2025, no matter what the cultural context is or how you’ve been acting it can’t possibly be exclusive” despite the fact that at least some of the participants have been calling things “cheating”, and “cheating” can ONLY be sanely defined by the participants in a relationship!
That particular brand of commenter is definitely one of the odder ones in this discourse.
The other that that amuses me about it is that Willis has specifically talked about writing a cheating arc and this strand of the comments are determined to insist he was wrong and he didn’t actually write about cheating.
Which suggests to me that he didn’t go far enough with it. 🙂
He might not have. We’re still in the middle of the arc, and Joe and Joyce aren’t the only people involved in the cheating.
Hell, it’s still not even ruled out that Joyce shuts this down — although I suspect she won’t be the one to do it, that panel four face might well be her “Holy shit, everything DOES work out if you just believe really hard and have good intentions” fundie program coming back online back in the brainstem.
It really depends on his goals. If his goal was to have long term deception, devastating emotional pain, and the relationship equivalent of nuclear bombs, yeah, he didn’t go far enough. If he wanted to tell a story of a messy transition from one relationship configuration to another that involved mistakes, some hurt, forgiveness, and some funny shenanigans along the way, this feels about right.
Both of these could be reasonably called a “cheating arc,” but they are very different.
Mind you: this might be me overreacting to wording.
It’s definitely the same exact issue I had yesterday with the idea that people are “bending over backwards” to defend Joyce’s cheating. Both wordings, to me, imply cognitive dissonance and denial: that if the “other side” were honest with themselves, they’d agree with us, and they’re just determined to explain away the obvious truth of our position.
Which, again, is definitely going both ways today. Lots of “I can’t BELIEVE some people are pretending Joe is unhappy”, too.
– it seems like MOST folks can see both readings, even if they have a preferred one
– there are a couple people I have seen today who were HOSTILE about the idea that anyone could imagine Joe is sad/hurting/self-sacrificing here
Yes, there are. There ARE also people who are hostile about the opposite. It’s a pretty hot topic, I think, especially for folks who strongly identify with Joe here, either as someone super excited and hopeful for Wholesome Poly OR as someone who’s been cheated on and either tried this or was tempted to try it in desperation.
The confusion applies equally from the other side. I was baffled to see people interpreting his words as “second place” rather than “two different places in her heart” (especially considering the latter is the literal verbiage used by Joe twice and referenced in the mouseover text).
I think it boils down to the fact that there’s enough ambiguity that your own preconceptions and feelings about relationships can fill in the blanks to strongly point in one direction or the other.
Here’s hoping Joe clarifies in the next comic or two.
To be perfectly honest I have never once seen the specific phrasing Joe uses to mean “two different places.” “Can’t match up” always means “can’t LIVE up.” Not as good. Second place. It’s not about my preconceptions about relationships, I’m a tranny dyke living in a major city, I’m surrounded by polyamorous people every day, I’ve become more than accustomed to polyamory as a relationship structure, it’s my interpretation of a very specific phrase that you are insisting should actually be read in a way I have quite literally never seen it been before.
“I can’t match up to my boyfriend’s other BF’s skill in League of Legends, but I still love playing Stardew Valley together.”
Different, not better or worse. He may not “match up” to Dorothy’s ability to fill the “Dorothy hole,” but he doesn’t have to because Joyce also has her “Joe hole.” (The wording from the mouseover text is ridiculous, but I am HERE for it. lol) Too much focus is being put on the comparative nature of “match up” to the exclusion of everything else being said, all of which points in the opposite direction.
Perhaps my brain also goes this direction because I’m aromantic, so I’m used to people having relationships I can never “match up” to because I don’t experience the fundamental attraction involved. However, it doesn’t bother me much because what I want is a good, fun, platonic friendship anyway. To me this reads much the same except it’s two different kinds of romantic love.
More and more I’m thinking that this is a verbal slip up on Joe’s part which Willis intentionally included to keep some ambiguity around and set up a conversation about how he’s not Joyce’s “second place.” If so, it was brilliantly done, since it feels like people are reading two completely different strips based entirely on which way they interpret this one line. It gets people talking and keeps the anticipation for what comes next high. It’s been a long time since I’ve been this tempted to jump on the Patreon for a bit to see the next comic.
“I can’t match up to my boyfriend’s other BF’s skill in League of Legends, but I still love playing Stardew Valley together.”
I wonder if there’s a subtle English dialect difference here, because that sentence sounds wrong in my head compared to “I can’t match my boyfriend’s…”
so we’re not just getting Joe being down with poly and telling Joyce this…but Joe understanding poly well enough to be able to explain why it works? i can feel myself healing from years of reading shitty love triangles
It kind of makes sense for him. I can see him working on his whole ‘trying to grow out of being a sex pest’ thing over the timeskip, finding himself still effortlessly chill with the idea of threesomes and poly stuff, going ‘I wonder if that’s something I need to grow out of or something I need to grow into’ and researching it.
This is also definitely one of those storylines that is hampered by the lack of any real insight into the internal monologues of the characters — aside from a potential reading of a couple of Joe’s comments re: Joyce and Dorothy, that in-universe all happened within the last week or so, we have no way of actually telling whether this is something Joe’s been thinking about for a while or if this is something he’s pulling up on the spur of the moment in order to salvage what he can of his relationship with Joyce.
And having some idea of how long he’s been thinking about a poly situation and what he thinks his place in it might or should be would go a long way to me deciding how to interpret Panel 5 in particular.
So the way it looked yesterday is the way it turned out.
My issue here is that, honestly? I don’t think there *is* going to be drama. There might be disagreements and characters saying mean things but the status quo of “Joyce and Dorothy are accepted” will prevail.
Because look at what happened when Joyce and Becky clashed over their faith. They had a *substantial* disagreement, yelling, uncharitable readings (both in-character and in the comments) and what was the outcome? They’re still close friends, Becky just passive-aggressively plays religious tunes at Joyce.
I just don’t see the mess coming. I think we’re supposed to see Joe as entering into a healthy place here, and probably gradually fading into the background of the DoJo relationship until it ends with a whimper.
If things go the way they’re looking now, there’s going to be even less drama than Joyce and Becky. Sure, it blew over but they at least had a big fight about it.
I very much agree. I think their recent conversation about their feelings for Joyce might be a decent foundation for them to develop a closer friendship than she had with Joe while she dated Danny.
However, I’m not sure Joe is supporting a polycule because he’s okay with it rather than because he actually has terrible self-esteem. I mean, look at his face.
I’ve been reading the more down faces as worry that Joyce won’t go for a polycule, not low self esteem. Also I think he’s super nervous about navigating a very emotionally complex situation. He recently came away from that chat with Dorothy somewhat amazed that he navigated an emotional conversation reasonably well: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2025/comic/book-15/03-me-and-who-you-say-i-was-yesterday/vocab/
It’s not a done deal yet. I hope it works, but only Willis knows.
Disclaimer: I am not poly and have personally known only one poly household which lasted for many years, but eventually broke messily in two. But worked better than many married couples I have known and lasted longer than some.
Better than what? Opening his relationship? There’s no indication that he has to stay faithful to her while she fucks around – it sounds a lot like Joe knows how this works either from being with poly people or reading up on it, and he is understanding that he and Joyce still love eachother and that they can *both* love other people, while being honest and not destroying what they have.
even if this doesn’t go through, acknowledging that such strict monogamy rules can hold people back from happiness and growth is a shockingly mature direction for anyone in the ‘trash goblin who craves mess’ storyline and I’m pleasantly surprised to hear it from joe. i was expecting his family history to make him uncomfortable with this, and i reckon there’s a bit of that he hasn’t shown the camera yet, but i think i hadn’t been paying enough attention to the joe-dorothy dynamic to see how that’d play into things here. clearly he admires her a lot, and acknowledging that they wouldn’t be competing so much as filling different niches is proof that he’s been paying attention and cares about everyone’s happiness in the equation. character growth!!
Not much to add, except wanted to say thank you to Willis because this story is so well-written and fun. Nice to see a poly relationship in a story that’s not toxic. (And this is coming from a happily monogamous person. It’s fun to read fiction about stuff I don’t actually want to do in real life but it’s so frustrating trying to find good writing for non-heteronormative stuff that isn’t also trauma-bating.
It’s been such a long time since I gasped IRL and told everyone around me about the comic I’m reading. The comic could end here and I would be happy. This is what I wanted.
Oh, Joe…. I would have been ok with Joe being onboard with an open relationship, but this hits way to hard as “Joyce is too good for me and I am lucky to have even a little attention from her, so I’m willing to put up with anything just to not lose her” vibes. The 5th panel feels like Joe continuing to feel guilty for his past and wanting to make up for it by putting Joyce first and actively not thinking about what he actually wants. I don’t have anything against poly relationships. They can be healthy, but this doesn’t feel like it’s coming from that space.
The impression I’m getting is that he found the newspaper. First thought was shock, then “hot” because some mindframes are hard break away from, and the next was “I can’t lose her.” So he spent the next few hours thinking out how to react. Eventually landing on “If I can’t be enough for her, maybe I can still be SOMETHING for her.” Not actually taking the time to think about what he wants or needs, just focusing on doing whatever he needs to so that he can not lose the thing that he still feels inadequate for, and maybe part of Joyce is all he deserves anyway.
Look at the last two panels, 4th he is sad, 5th he is Hoping that there is still room in Joyce’s life for him.
He WAS Cheated on and now is fighting to keep at least a Part of Joyce’s interest.
That’s not what I’m getting at all. I have no experience with polyamory, married to one woman for almost half a century. But what Joe is saying rings true. Maybe the patriarchal assumptions are bullshit. Love is not pie.
I certainly know that I would throw a lot of rules overboard if my wife’s happiness were at stake.
I have hangups about how this is unfolding (in broad strokes, polyamory solving cheating), but I’m happy for the readers who are hyped for the representation, and I hope it leads to interesting developments if they give this a try. It would be a twist for Joe and Joyce to embrace this for and for Dorothy to struggle with it.
I’m not sure that would qualify as a twist. Joe being okay with it was a twist, albeit a ambiguously foreshadowed one. As many people have pointed out Dorothy has had some issues with Joe, though perhaps not as many as she used to.
My first reaction was Joe is handling this way better than expected, and I’m glad a poly solution is on the table, but other comments have pointed out that this may very well be coming from a place of bad mental health for Joe which is less than great. But I have hope that Joe’s love for Joyce is what’s motivating this rather than hatred of himself.
I’ll freely admit that I don’t grasp all the nuances of polyamory. But Joe’s comments here sound like they’re coming from a place of low self-esteem. Like he’s settling for 2nd place with Joyce because he doesn’t believe he deserves to be anyone’s first choice. And that just… needs to be fixed.
This is like, super unhealthy. Joe has had low self-esteem since at least the whole list debacle, probably longer because he has never opened his heart to someone long enough to be in a relationship. He has zero model of how healthy relationships happen.
He basically had his dad who cheated like the biggest man-whore on Earth and his mom who knew and let it happen until she finally divorced him. Joyce started this relationship with an obvious betrayal that Joe is clearly hurt by but not letting it show because he is stuffing those feelings down.
Y’all, this very much seems like a trainwreck in slow-motion. I honestly hope I’m wrong, but this isn’t usually how healthy poly relationships start.
I agree its not how they start but Joe has shown again and again that hes likely one of the people this would work for. He’s always been an ethical slut and never been prone to jealousy he seems to be thriving getting to soften up and explore actual intimacy instead of just sexual. I think getting to know he is now not solely responsible for Joyce’s sexual exploration may be a relief to him given his nerves about that element of the relationship. I think the issue will be walky.
Thank you for this take. Obviously everyone is gonna interpret a piece of media differently, but that final panel didn’t read “resigned” or “defeated” at all to me… it was the wholesome sparkling eyes and an adorable soft boy smile and it made meso all d’aaawwwwwwwww
This 100% Joe is not self loathing really or insecure so im not getting where this read that hes resigned abd begging for crumbs comes from it makes little sense. He got smackednhardbwithbhisbproblemstoc behavior faced bit head on and is improving he jasnt shied away from criticism and takes it in stride and he doesn’t crumple under it either given how he handled Rachel and Sarah.
I assume this is intentionally a BAD reason to start a poly relationship. In the same vein as Danny explicitly saying that cheating isn’t a Bi-thing, but an Asshole-thing.
Because Joe isn’t doing this because he wants to alloe Joyce to explore, but because he’s hurt and doesn’t want to let Joyce go.
Bear in mind, Joyce cheated. Even IF Joe knew after the fact, Joyce cheated and entered into a physical/romantic relationship, even if only minimally, against what she felt the rules of her relationship with Joe was.
It’s unhealthy.
If the DeSantos siblings hear about this, they’d likely recognize the same signs in him. Of someone who was hurt by and doesn’t want to be without that person.
At the same time, Joyce knows of at least one polycule, and they can likely give her some pointers on how and why this can be managed… assuming they have more experience, though they are also pretty close in age.
Also wondering again how much of this is still semi-autobiographical.
This is thinking intentionally a messy start but genuinely not bad for them Joe has never been jealous he has been an ethical slut his whole run. He probably finds not being soley responsible for joyces exploration a bit of a relief given his worries there and seemsbto be thriving on the non sexual intimacy which he sorely needed. I don’t think this will block put long term but I can see Joe being down
And if you’re still feeling down, remember they don’t have a disturbing parasocial fixation on you in particular, frequently bringing you up by name and hypothesizing about your real-life mental state, jerking each other off over how much of a freak they think you are.
I’ve checked that place three times since Willis brought up the sock puppet conspiracy, and all three times they’ve been having a delightfully nasty conversation about me. It’s creepy, and they should let go of this insane concept of me they’ve invented. Freaks.
I can’t judge because I’m not poli, and I dont really know how normal or not this is.
But what I am, is a 40 year old man who remembers college like it was yesterday, has been in a number of relationships, not all of them healthy at different times, and struggles very much with anxiety, depression, loneliness, feelings of worthlessness and inadequacy.
What Joe says here concerns me.
For a while I’ve felt their relationship was one-sided. That Joe clearly was head over heels for Joyce, and Joyce simply loved being loved by Joe. There were a number of things that Joyce did which, alone, wouldn’t have been an issue, but together, paint a picture of a toxic relationship.
I know what it’s like to throw myself further in a relationship by giving more and more and more to someone who just does not seem to care enough to give love back, each time thinking, well, NOW they’ve got to see that I love them, NOW they’re going to be swept off their feet, only to be quietly torn down a little, bit by bit, with all those same slights and criticisms and digs, while they pour their joy and uncritical love into something else.
And I understand. If I, back then, discovered her doing something like this… I might rationalize it the same way. I might say, ‘look, she’s really not competing with you, she can explore her feelings.’ I might look up stuff on poly, read about how love is infinite, and just tell myself that she’ll only love me more for this. Or, if I had been reading this comic right at that exact time – hell, I’d probably do EXACTLY what Joe was doing, and feel in that moment that I was being the best, most loving boyfriend ever.
When really, someone should’ve just took me by the shoulders and said, “Dude, she’s just not that into you. She will never be that into you. And its OK to say that you deserve better.”
But all that is, admittedly, projecting. This is not *my* autobiographical tale. This could come out completely different, maybe.
But people, please just remember to be kind to yourself. And if you are ever in a situation like Joe, it’s not a moral failing in the slightest to *not* do what he’s doing here.
I totally get where you’re coming from, I’ve been on both sides of what you’re describing, before I knew anything about polyamory.
But what comes with this perspective requires a few assumptions frankly incompatible with the way humans actually love:
1. Passionate love is the truest love
2. Kissing someone else is itself a betrayal that someone with self esteem wouldn’t tolerate and someone that did kiss-cheat is now the scum of the earth.
3. Being with someone who is with someone else means you are settling for second place or a prolonged breakup, and not also free to explore other relationships while retaining a bond with this partner that may evolve or not.
Dishonesty and hiding are the problems with cheating. It took me being cheated on a few times to map it exactly, but it is not actually your partner being intimate with someone else that hurts – nobody owns anybody else. It’s when your partner doesn’t trust you to share that with you and pretends like nothing is going on.
Passionate love is a primal thing meant to lead to babies, in the modern era it clears almost entirely within 2 years and often leaves people, especially teens, feeling depressed and at odds with one another in a relationship. Joe has a crush on Joyce that may stem from his desire to be better than his dad and therefore going for someone he saw that seemed pure and that he could shepherd into adulthood rather than simply bang and leave as he had in the past, and who also didn’t have the judgemental baggage of women who have had more experience who pigeonhole him. I also don’t think he would have tried to grow without Joyce’s influence.
Joe’s proposal is sensible, self aware and not self minimising, because he acknowledges that he does have -part- of Joyce’s heart, he does think he is good for her and good to her or else he would have just handed her the end of the relationship on a platter. Admitting that you share a kind of romantic love with someone who feels more strongly for another person isn’t problematic, as long as it is coming from solid observation and awareness of the situation.
Joe is fine, he is going to be fine regardless of this, he will also only do what feels right to him for as long as it feels right. He is not looking to hold on like a withered husk to Joyce’s bright attitude, he values his relationship with Joyce and rightly assumes she values it too.
Some of what you’re saying I understand; some I don’t. I’m not sure I follow with your three assumptions – the first I flat-out disagree with (insomuch that I feel like calling it the “highest” is a mislabel – there are many different kinds of love, and it is not a linear scale) the second is overblown, and the third is inconsequential to me.
I guess, to have that perspective, I would have to first be the kind of person who wants to pursue other relationships, or be fine with only being a lesser part of my partner’s life. That doesn’t sound enticing; that sounds exhausting.
And you might disagree with that – you may feel like every relationship you have you develop to the level that a solid monogamous relationship does. Having no experience there, I can’t argue with that; I can only say that I really don’t know how. It’s the Red Mage’s paradox. In a world with limited time, energy, and resources, the jack of all trades is a master of none.
There’s one thing though that I disagree with. There is definitely a hierarchy here. There is absolutely a hierarchy here. Joe is absolutely second place. She’s here to break up with him; when she thinks he’s advocating for her to be with him *instead* she says no, I kissed, and I intend to *keep* kissing. She expresses disgust when she assumes the reason he’s fine with it is because it’s “hot.”
But this may work out well for them. A lot depends, I suppose, on if everybody involved is OK with the other relationships.
I guess the main thing is, I can understand poly relationships if everyone is the way you described it – if nobody feels jealous, or hurt, or like they’re second place; if everyone is fine with everyone else seeking other relationships, and everyone *wants* to seek other relationships, then it seems perfect.
But I see the world, in which sometimes love is unrequited; sometimes love is simply met with affection, or friendship; sometimes one person is giving and the other is simply receiving. Sometimes love fades and has to be rekindled, and if one person wants to do it and the other doesn’t, it’s heartbreaking. Human relationships are insanely complicated; I can’t imagine trying to do the same with two, or three, or more people; and then to understand that to them, I’m just one of many.
Not understanding polyamory is totally fine! It’s a complicated thing and there’s no reason a monogamous person would ever need to look it up or interact with it until they encounter it in the wild (like this). I think you’re coming at this earnestly, so I want to engage with you on that level.
I’ve been polyamorous (presumably my whole life) but in practice for a nice long while now, and I can tell you that it doesn’t feel like a bad thing to me to be “one of many” and I kind of recoil at saying that because it just doesn’t match my worldview at all. I don’t think of my metamours (the partners of my partners) as competition or others who fill my space. I think of them as branches on the relationship I’m having, sometimes as family, sometimes they stay strangers, and everything in between. I’m a lot richer for those interactions.
I’m one of one, the only Nymph any of my partners are with. My partners are not individual parts of a single whole relationship (and therefore are not receiving less than they might in a monogamous relationship) they are other poly people in individual whole relationships with me. What those relationships amount to varies a great deal (the way any monogamous relationship varies from other ones involving different people) but that doesn’t make them lesser to me. It doesn’t make me less happy to share that time with them, less excited to see them, less desperately in love when I fall in love.
People have multiple friends, who they love, and no one thinks that means they’re receiving “part” of a friendship. Multiple children who aren’t receiving “part” of a parent. Multiple parents who aren’t receiving “part” of a child. It is very easy to love two or more people to a similar degree in different ways because they are different people.
It CAN be complicated, there is definitely jealousy sometimes or serious issues to deal with, people get hurt, relationships are relationships and polyamorous people aren’t robots (which sucks because I would be so down to be a robot). But all of those things are true in monogamous relationships too, being monogamous doesn’t protect you from worrying that someone isn’t in love with you the way you want them to be, and neither does being polyamorous. They’re just different styles of relationship, neither is better or worse, they’re just For You or Not For You and that’s okay.
This is gonna come out of nowhere but I do appreciate your explanation of polyamory. As someone not much older than the characters, I do feel inexperienced with the world and glad for the story’s exploration of all sorts of scenarios, as well as the comments sections many anecdotes, even if they clash at times hah!
Not sure where exactly I fall in the grand scheme, though I regrettably say one of my vices is jealousy over time spent (even with friends).
[Unrelated: I totally didn’t expect Joe to be onboard but when I caught on that he was, I was quite excited for the storyline.)
I also really appreciate your explanation of polyamory. It’s truly a different way to look at it. “Branches of the relationship I’m having” was really eye-opening, and also highlighted what I was feeling with what eskimolos was saying before- that the “relationship” isn’t simply the tie between two people, but the “relationship” is this tree, and you’re the trunk of it, and some branches are stronger and some are weaker and that doesn’t make one branch “better” or “worse” but all just part of the whole.
And (to make a jump in logic) I’m guessing that to *restrict* yourself to just one person in which to express those few types of love, would probably feel like overpruning a tree, to where you took most of the main branches that supported it, and now it’s struggling to survive.
It’s absolutely different, but I think I can understand it. And perhaps (again, taking a logical leap here) maybe having that net of partners helps insulate you from a hurt that might come from a relationship growing distant or evolving into something that you’re no longer happy with. Perhaps being loved by so many people means that if someone you’re in a relationship with no longer wants to be there, it’s easier to wish them well and hope for the best for them, because you *do* still love them and want the best for them, and you aren’t alone.
I’d imagine that to do that you’d have to have a really strong sense of self-esteem and be a very social person. Hell, I can barely manage adult life, supporting my family, and having a very small amount of adult friendships; I in no way have enough spoons to even entertain something like that. I think I understand what you mean when you say it’s different styles and it’s either for you or not. I am *not* drawn to that sort of relationship, and so having it wouldn’t feel like being a tree with a decent number of branches, it would feel like being a juggler with a decent number of bowling pins.
With this new understanding, I think that I understand more about what was giving me anxiety here. I think I’ve also realized that the next strip (dated 8/25) addressed some of that anxiety. By Joe’s admittance, he’s on his very first “relationship,” the encounters that he had were casual and specifically designed to have zero emotional attachment. All of that is because he saw how badly his father hurt his mother, and vowed to not do the same. From all of that, my assumption was that, while Joe’s escapades suggested that he was poly, he was in fact monogamous at heart. His obsession and anxiety with Joyce seemed to further cement that.
And if he was, then this would just seem like someone who was OK with only getting a portion of someone’s love and affection while they gave them everything, and that would just sort of feel sad.
But on the next day Joe takes credit for having pushed Dorothy towards her, whch sure makes all of that seem intentional and this result seem thought through, rather than simply being reactionary to being dumped by the girl he loves. Which is really a big argument for him actually being OK with this after all, and me just projecting onto the situation
You know im actually really pleased with this. And I can actually see Joe being super chill about this. Hes always been incredibly sex positive and ethical because of his dad and knows how messy it can be. I can totally see him being way more comfortable being aware of it. I think he may have been upset about the lying if he hadn’t seen this coming from space and if it had been stretched past the one night. But I can actually see Joe being a big compersion lerson. I dont think walky will be though
Of the many turmoiling thoughts regarding this sudden revelation of Joe’s willingess to the situation, one thing that comes to mind is this: now that we know Joe is okay with Joyce being with him and Dorothy, is Dorothy okay with Joyce being with her and Joe, or does she want Joyce all to herself?
We know she’s willing to break up with Walky in order to maintain this relationship (or at least we hope she will), but would she take offense that Joyce isn’t breaking up with Joe for her sake?
I agree there, especially considering that this will be the second time Dorothy has broken up with Walky, so this will certainly be a blow to his self-esteem.
Well, Joyce was willing and preparing to break up with Joe so that she and Dorothy could be together, so we know she had her moral priorities straight in not wanting to lead Joe on for longer than needed.
However, now that we know Joe’s open to the poly relationship, the question remains: is Dorothy?
His expressions in the last two panels do indicate some stress, but as someone else noted further up, he -is- making an offer to Joyce knowing he can’t compete with Dorothy in a monogamy situation. Whether it’s self esteem undervaluing himself as worthy of a passionate love, or fear of rejection/being outweighed, he *is* concerned and grappling with some hard emotions here.
this strip made me so happy i teared up a little, and then I foolishly read the comments and forgot that a lot of monogamous AND polyamorous people seem to genuinely forget or never realize that a lot of us, possibly most of us, get to a healthy relationship through the process of trying to figure out how to treat ourselves and each other, partially by trial and error, and a lot of that looks like unhealthy. Joe’s response here does seem like he has low self esteem! but “I love you and you love me but I recognize there’s someone else you love differently and maybe more intensely than me, and that’s fine,” isn’t actually inherently unhealthy or even part of low self esteem. and part of how you get to the healthy parts of life and love are by working through the unhealthy parts, sometimes with people you love, and I think that’s beautiful (even though it also sometimes hurts).
Like, I am mono as hell, but something about seeing this (potentially, obviously we have yet to hear Dorothy’s decision) positive wholesome poly representation makes me giddy as a clam. I think it is so cool to see.
While I personally prefer Joe/Joyce over Joyce/Dorothy, I really like where this is currently headed and look forward to the drama that is coming. And if it all ends in a polycule, then it’s a win for everyone! I just suspect it will be very very messy first.
This might work because this is fiction and it will work if the author wants it to work, but I’ve seen this sort of thing happen more than once in real life and every “ethical non-monogamy” relationship that in fact started unethically ended horrifically, or even worse, lasted horrifically.
scrolls 1 million years past everything else to just say: man i love Joe.
He knows joyce. He pays attention to her, because he likes her so much. And we already learned with Danny 5million years ago hes a lot more cool about things then you’d think. Hes very good.
It’s been hard for me to enjoy the last few weeks of strips because I also feel this “man I love Joe” 😅 too much for a fictional character, probably. This strip gave me a lot of relief of like: finally, we know he knows and can be on more even footing, at least
I think this is probably something Joyce would be willing to try, now that it’s being brought up. I’m not sure how Dorothy would feel about dating Joyce while Joyce has another partner. But I hope she’s willing to try it. Cause if they *do* go the non-exclusivity route, it’ll be interesting to see Joyce’s reaction to Joe having other partners than her. Even with her being in multiple relationships, I feel like she’d still have (rather hypocritical) extremely mixed feelings about that and a lot of guilt *because* she has mixed feelings about that and I think that’d be fun drama to read. It’s just kicking the conflict down the road.
(There’s also a lot of other, immediate conflict that’s still presumably gonna come of this. I doubt Walky is gonna have as calm a reaction as Joe did, and there’s definitely gonna be conflict with Becky. So having joe react well to this news makes sense; it’s more true to his character, and it means that the narrative focus is less split over the immediate conflict in the aftermath.)
Yeah, what Dorothy’s response will be is key. But I think also that Joyce might find it hard to accept the idea because she’s very much grown up with the idea of “One True Love” and monogamy, and even if she’s accepted alternate sexualities, I think she still very much holds to that ideal of “lifetime soulmate”.
Oh, look. All sides communicating about what they want/expect out of a relationship. It’s not cheating if everyone is open and honest.
And that was always the issue- not being a ‘sicko’ or ‘relationship paladin’. I just don’t like betrayal. If everyone’s being a consenting adult, bang whoever you want. Joyce, you are forgiven. Dotty… we still have issues.
i don’t know whether Joyce or Joe or Dorothy is ready for poly, but the *way* Joe says it is VERY poly. <3
i love the concept of “the space you already had for me” <3
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YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
JoyJoe’s adventure takes sudden, BIZARRE turn
I LOVE >:3
*plays “Awaken Pillar Men” on hacked muzak*
what a bizarre winter they’re having here
Really?? Really? That one and not “Roundabout”? C’mon!
I don’t see it as bizarre. Joe is expressing, sort of, the old wisdom that no can be all things to anyone. Simply, Joe can be her Joe and Dorothy can be her Dorothy.
not a fan of the japanese cartoons, I take it
Anny May killed their father.
Are you sure? I heard it was Japanny Mation.
Anny May? Is that the Federal National Mortgage Association?
ARRGH! You just stirred up a bad 34 year old memory of my employment with them! I lasted 16 weeks before I ran running and screaming out of the place and went back to my previous employer (Where I stayed another 10 years).
The indie band I was in at that time even had a song about my time there entitled “Appropriate Attire”.
One can be a fan of anime but not care for, or even really be aware of, JoJo’s.
The only reason I know this is a JoJo’s Reference is because I watched Gigguk’s Attack on Titan parody which ends with two characters discussing whether or not one of them made a JoJo’s reference by making more JoJo’s references.
omg im still pondering on why these 18-year-old University students have not made ANY JoJo references (as far as I know)
Hormones don’t buy into compartmentalisation. And social support structures also tend to take a dim view on it. This tends to demand a lot more ongoing effort than diversifying your financial assets.
Filling her Joe-shaped hole!
Arg, with Danny as a profile picture this is even worse than with Mr Rosenthal saying it!
Link, in case anyone wants it:
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2020/comic/book-10/04-is-a-song-forever/replace/
Joe offers to fill her Joe hole while Dorothy fills her Dorothy hole!
(how about if Amber’s mom says it?)
just gotta fill that Joehole in my heart
and Joe just became the manliest of men, damn, between him and Tony, we have two of the best written guys in history. ~<3
Oh yes, that’s for sure!
The bar is not very high to be fair. (I am being facetious, please nobody lecture me about how good male characters are).
I think facetious might not mean what i thought it did
Inconceivable!
If you meant that you were joking, then yes you did use facetious correctly. But also there is some truth in your first statement.
I’m very suspicious of Tony tho, so we’ll see on that one.
Hey not stealing someone else’s bit. Not cool.
Your mom’s someone else’s bit.
The student has become the master 🫡
Hi, I’m not stealing a bit because this isn’t a bit. I genuinely don’t trust Tony. I’ve said so since very early days of him being around.
Someone else turning that phrasing into a bit isn’t going to stop me saying when I don’t trust someone.
I know. I was making a joke.
Genuinely curious what Tony has done to be worthy of mistrust besides hanging with Beef who barely counts as a character
Son of the man who requested the police come in to monitor a peaceful protest. Ie, is Tony capable of breaking from the Dean’s conservative views? It’s a mirror to Carla coming to grips with her parents likely helping the “Bulmarian” genocide.
Inviting the cops in almost certainly happened at a higher level than the Dean.
I vaguely recall, but can’t find the link for, that we heard the university system’s board of directors held the emergency vote and called in law enforcement. All of that is over the head of the campus’s head admin.
The link Steamweed has requested: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2025/comic/book-15/04-the-only-exception/trustees/
Honestly: I think he popped up too conveniently and too perfectly for Sarah. I think it’s easy to read some of his comments as snide, and I just generally think he’s too narratively simplistic for “Sarah’s boyfriend” to be the only thing going on there.
I’m keen to see where it goes, but I don’t trust him to be a good person or to be dating Sarah for good reasons. It’ll be fun either way tho!
Best written guys or best guys written ?;)
An entirely DIFFERENT Joseph watching this whole scene unfold through a keyhole: “NIIIIICE-U!”
they could stand to rope Dorothy in on this discussion though, no sense causing unnecessary ripples, even if it does look like Joe wants the world for them
…speedwagon
I think they need to rope Dorothy in on this discussion before she has one with Walky. I would think it could have some effect on how receptive she is.
Well yes, but having the discussion between the two of them first also makes sense.
[Canon summary]
“I have to break up with you because I’ve realised I have feelings for somebody else”
“I want you to have what makes you happy. I know you have feelings for them that I can’t compete with. I’m not going to try. But why do you need to break up with me? You still have feelings for me too. I am willing to take what you are happy to offer to me?”
[hypothetical future]
“I don’t want to cheat on anybody. I feel awful that Dorothy and I started off kissing behind your back as it is!”
“If all three of us are in agreement then it’s some form of throuple with you as the hinge I think? Definitely not cheating because there’d be openness and honesty.”
“… Do I talk about this to Dorothy with you, or on my own first?”
“I assume she’s gone to find Walky? So possibly better on your own first”
That’s a very good road for them to follow, and fast. Before Dorothy and Walky fall into peril.
It would certainly be best to loop Dorothy in before she talks to Walky.
I don’t think they’ll be fast enough.
Can’t they have just a little bit of peril?
As a treat.
No, it’s too perilous.
Bet you’re…(frantically updates)…heteronormative! Palatinate! No, that’s a place….
Alternate Version Of Joyce: *suddenly wonders what that Rikk guy is up to, for no particular reason*
Oh, he’s probably up to his ears in Alisin’s thighs, unless it’s Rumy’s night
I believe it’s now DoeJoyJoe.
actually, if joyce is a hinge here, then it’s… DoJo JoJo.
I cannot express my delight that Joe is down for consensual polyamory.
WE WIN!!!!!!!!!!!! EVERYBODY GO HOME, WE EFFING WIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
QUICK EVERYONE BE NORMAL AND RESPECTFUL ABOUT THIS
No thank you.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
“Just this once Rose, just this once, everybody lives!”
*loves
Thanks for letting me know, Vanessa.
Just ignore that this was said in the middle of the Godsdamn Blitz, with Nazi bombs falling all around and NPCs getting blown up on the regular…
But yeah, sentiment appreciated.
I could be respectful but i am incapable of being normal about anything ever
embrace the chaos! accept the abnormal! normal is nothing but a mathematical concept!
That explains it, i am really bad at math. (And most others subjects)
I am good at math, still entirely incapable of being normal. That’s not it.
I could be either respectful or normal, but not both.
MISSION FAILED!!! TRY HARDER, SOLDIER!!!
Congratulations Joycy — mission failed successfully!
as a poly person i am very happy for Joe to be figuring this out so naturally, and to Joyce BAD *grabs squirt bottle* you shouldn’t be rewarded for this behavior so heres some reminder what you did was incorrect approach!
Joyce has always been impulsive and true to her desires. I think being granted permission to double date might actually set off enough endorphins where she’ll want to sleep with Joe nearly immediately, fully cementing her as being the horny one, just like Ruth predicted at the start of the semester.
This also means that Lucy was actually right in that Joyce is a bit like a bisexual version of her.
Actually, was it Ruth? It might have been Sarah or Billie who had said that once Joyce has her first orgasm, she’ll bang half the town. I couldn’t find that when doing some digging just now so maybe the collective memory of the comments can tell me who it was.
It was indeed Ruth. https://www.dumbingofage.com/2018/comic/book-8/04-of-mike-and-men/need-2/
You got there first, but I’ll add a similar one by Jacob:
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2014/comic/book-4/02-i-was-a-teenage-churchmouse/therepressions/
Oh, but also, that Lucy reference:
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2019/comic/book-9-comic/04-vote-for-robin/proselytize/
Thank you both for being so on top of the reference links, I really appreciate it.
Wait a minute… when did Lucy say that? Can you link the strip where she did? That sounds hilarious
See deliverything’s second link above.
WOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! YEAH BABY!!!!!!
I’m in shock. Shock and awe. I’m…………..
ohmygod. I’m BSODing but, like. In a good way. Just…
We……… we won
Not yet. This requires Dorothy on board as well. And we are making the reasonable assumption that Joyce will be on board.
This is a really good point. We won!! We got a prize!! … But not the jackpot, yeah.
I’m hopeful, though, because the way I see it there can be so much narrative goodness in all three of them getting together — Including the “not being on board” (at first) part from Joyce and/or Dorothy. So, still celebrating ;33
Outlook is very good, but declarations of victory are still slightly premature. These two may consent to continuing this relationship, but there’s a third person who needs to sign off on it before it can really be solidified.
… No, get out of here, Jesus, you don’t get a say in this, I’m talking about Dorothy.
I actually think Jesus should sign off on this, too. He’s a good guy, he’d probably do it. It could help win future arguments.
I dunno, Dorothy being okay with sharing Joyce with Joe seems like a long shot at best.
Dorothy will lay on top of Joe who will lay on top of Joyce who will obtain THE ULTIMATE SQUISH
Eventually the entire cast will be stacked on top of Joyce.
As recommended by Mr. Walkerton!
The senior.
“Get in one big fuck pile and get it over with.”
Ruth was right all along
That would be optimal for squishing Joyce, but at the moment Joyce is the one to be sandwiched. For reasons of bulk Joe should be at the bottom.
no, optimal squish will be achieved by making a joyce sammich
I was rereading this strip and I just found in it funny and sorta relevant to this storyline, at least on Walky’s/Dorothy’s side. It might not matter but it is funny.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-5/02-threes-a-crowd/exclusivity/
Geez, how often does Dorothy mention Joyce in the post-sex aftermath??
so many people have argued “there wasn’t any foreshadowing” and like i do not understand
That strip has Dorothy wistfully desiring to be more “hands-on” with Joyce, a course of action approved by Joe in today’s strip.
Has the strip been leading up to this for a decade?
Legitimately, yes. See also this supercut: https://www.tumblr.com/semtitulo/791023871456329728
For realsies, just. Look at this strip from 2010. Look at who’s here and look at what Leslie is saying. https://www.dumbingofage.com/2010/comic/book-1/02-uphill-from-here/why/
“There were no signs!” Thousands of parents of queer people, all of human history
also holy fuck i’m so glad somebody collated this many examples. sources have officially been cited
See?
Even fuckin Walky knows that, if you don’t specify exclusivity, it does not exist.
Talk to your partner’s people. Establish boundaries. Do NOT assume them.
That’s an incredibly strained reading of that strip. He was joking, maybe even a little concerned.
You’ll notice they don’t go on to explicitly clarify that they actually are exclusive, just proceed as if they are. Like every other serious couple in this comic.
I agree that people should talk to their partners and establish clear boundaries, what bothers me is the idea that if you haven’t explicitly done so, you should assume you’re not exclusive, because that leads to people getting hurt.
yeah, strictly speaking the mistake to begin with is to rely on the norms of established (white Christian) culture to establish the boundaries for you
but I guess we can only expect so much healthy communication and understanding from 18-something-year-olds in a religious red state
as much as we can give them leeway for this mistake, exclusivity as the default is still an instance of white Christian culture passive-aggressively re-establishing itself as the center of the universe when really this is NOT a given for all people from different cultures and walks of life (group marriage was very commonplace among indigenous cultures in the pre-colonial era, and group marriage was originally outlawed for the sole purpose of taking power away from these people)
While that’s true, it doesn’t change the fact that they’re in a context where exclusivity is the default (regardless of the reasons for that); while it’s good to communicate regardless of expectations, it’s especially important when your boundaries don’t match the local social normal, whatever that may be.
Besides… as I understand it, many non-monogamous relationships still insist on discussion before one of its members gets intimate with a (currently) non-member, for a number of reasons that others in this comment section are much better qualified to explain than I am.
Oh yeah, that’s polly. We did it
I dunno, this does not seem healthy.
It isn’t! But it is finally getting interesting!
It also makes the inclusion of the scene with Rachel and Joe in the gym make much more sense – she is degrading his confidence and illustrating his low self-worth. He no longer feels like he deserves (and thus can’t have) Joyce’s full heart so he is settling for a piece of it.
Polyamory is a perfectly valid shape for relationships to take.
It absolutely is but what Joe is describing isn’t a healthy poly dynamic it’s him getting whatever scraps Joyce is willing to give him because he doesn’t feel like Joyce values him as much as she does Dorothy.
I don’t see “I can continue occupying the space you have for me” as scraps. He’s saying Dorothy holds a different space in Joyce’s heart than he does.
He’s not expecting or asking for the level of care and attention that a partner should have in a polyamorous relationship formation, and very crucially he has not said a thing about what he actually personally wants or what would make him happy besides Joyce being happy and having what she wants. That’s not healthy.
idk why you think any of that. he never said he wants less, and has explicitly stated that he wants all the stuff he’s already been getting, which is honestly more than Dorothy’s gotten.
i think saying you want a loved one to be happy and being willing to talk to them about that isn’t a bad thing for a guy to do, actually
The first half of that seems like reading something into the text that’s not there, to me. He’s acknowledging that Joyce loves Dorothy in a way that’s different to how she loves him, and would like to keep their relationship the same while encouraging Joyce to explore the former, because it’ll make her happy.
The second half is true, but it also doesn’t seem relevant for him to start listing off all the things he wants from life in this particular conversation.
This. “You love Dorothy in a way that I’ll never be able to match” has that subtext to me. He does not feel worthy of being given the consideration that one should give every partner in a relationship, be it poly or not. And that is not a healthy base for a relationship, be it poly or not.
I don’t think is inherently unhealthy – it’s not that different from what I would tell certain people if they asked – but I do think he seems miserable in a way I wouldn’t be, and honestly she’s showed her priorities here in a way that I think fairly clearly shows that she’s Not A Reliable partner, at least at this moment.
I’m not saying you can’t work through this, but I *am* saying that this certainly isn’t healthy at this time.
Joe has, on several occasions, spoken of Joyce as “perfect” and too good for him. Given that, I think a reading where Joe is settling for scraps or a lower standard of care/respect makes sense. We’ll have to wait and see what’s happening here, but there’s definitely a case to be made that Joe is letting self loathing lead him to accept lesser treatment.
Putting a partner on a pedestal is bad in any relationship. However, this Joe is a complete switch from It’s Walky Joe and I remember when this was new and broke my heart https://www.itswalky.com/comic/youre-not-safe-around-me/
So seeing Dorothy/Joyce have a relationship framed around shared trauma, Walky/Joyce in It’s Walky having a relationship that was framed around trauma. I just want everyone to take care of each other and be friends. Joe in DoA is anything but self loathing. He’s being extremely brave and vulnerable. If I were in Joe’s shoes I would have an extremely difficult time trusting Dorothy after how she has treated Danny and Walky (though I don’t know how much Joe knows about how Dorothy was treating Walky as a fun distraction temporary boy toy).
All three of these characters love big and love deep. Joyce and Joe have complicated parent dynamics. Dorothy is the one who had the “normal” “stable” “supportive” “emotionally mature” parents from what we’ve seen.
I’m thrilled about a polyamorous solution, because I have yearned for that kind of relationship for forever and never understood why people had to be paired off.
Maybe he’d accept lesser treatment, but I don’t think he’ll have to. And maybe he knows Joyce well enough that he doesn’t think so either.
Note that “continue occupying the space” line — her feelings for Dorothy don’t need to displace him. After all, she’s had them since before she and Joe even got together, even if she wasn’t acting on them as blatantly.
Joyce says she’s breaking up with him to be with Dorothy instead; so yeah, Joe is looking for the scraps.
I wouldn’t say this is a healthy polyamory setup. It might evolve into one, but it’s not starting as one.
I mean there’s the part where he says “you love Dorothy in a way I will never be able to match.” That with his expression certainly feels like a self put-down. I also like many people here want a poly outcome but also feel like with the current state of things that if it does happen it’s gonna be extremely rocky and potentially unhealthy at least at the start.
Why should he love Dorothy in way that matched Joyce?
I dont understand where peopke are getting this low self esteem. He doesnt seem to be saying oh ill take whatever he literally says I get it you feel ways about her and have your love for her I cant give you that but I want to keep our love too. It doesnt come from self hatred or unworthniess but understanding that love isnt limited. And if he was that self loathing he wouldn’t have been able to defend himself agaisnt that woman in the gym by saying I owned uo to my failings and mistakes and I did change and just so you know if you ever decide to change I wont hold this mistake agaisnt you
I’m not saying it isn’t, simply that Joe’s facial expressions here and his concerned if happy look in the strip “sabbatical” make me believe, perhaps wrongly, that he is not giving his blessing to Joyce, confident that he will always have her love and glad to make her happier, but making a crippling compromise, fearful that he neither could nor should have Joyce’s heart and believing this is the only way he can have her love, which in his mind is not being multiplied but divided.
Why are yall so bizarre about polyamory, sure the cheating and lack of communication was bad, but this is a very healthy approach and attitude about it. When you’re monogamy obsessed, you cant see it. I’d recommend doing more than doomscrolling bad representations of it on tiktok or whatever and listening to people who participate in it and are happy.
I am in a poly relationship right now and I can see that Joe is approaching this in an overall good way but there’s definitely a tinge of him feeling like he doesn’t deserve Joyce. I feel like it would be a very incorrect reading to act like there’s none of that in the way Joe has acted, we’ve seen an awful lot of that with his mentality about this relationship.
I think it’s possible for things to improve but given his statement of “You love Dorothy in a way that I’ll never be able to match.” that uh, feels like the statement of a person who doesn’t have a great view of himself with regards to this relationship.
I can see why you feel that way, and I do think you’re onto something what with how Joe is so very thoughtful about Joyce and joyce is uhhh devil-may-care about how Joe might get hurt by things (though this may be an attempt at portrayal of autism, which as someone who is on the spectrum… hoping that’s not it), but “we fill different spaces in your heart” is more what he was saying I think. I could be wrong but that was my take on it.
I’m sure healthy polyamory exists, but every example I’ve met IRL has always been on fire for one reason or another. They were just pure drama factories.
People are drama factories, and getting more people involved increases the drama output. That accounts for most of the difference, I think — just a higher number of relationships that can be running into issues at any given time.
To expand on that: a two-person relationship (e.g. Joyce&Joe) only has one connection that can get messy. Adding just one more person increases that to three connections (e.g. Joyce&Joe, Joyce&Dorothy, Joe&Dorothy)… well, if it’s a fully connected polycule instead of just a hinge or chain, that is, but even those have more connections to mess up than a simple monogamous relationship*.
There’s also, I suppose, the fact that sometimes people in monogamous relationships aren’t being treated well, but don’t protest because they don’t have better treatment to compare it to or can’t see it from the inside (potentially leading to a bad yet non-dramatic situation), whereas in a poly relationship, people can compare how they’re being treated to how the other members are, and reacting to unfairness (whether affecting themselves or their loved ones) may result in justified drama.
* Still, a poly relationship does have the advantage that, if one connection breaks down, there are other people to support the hurt members. Also good protection against abusive relationships, I’d think; much harder for a single person to abuse multiple partners (and the whole “if you leave me, you’ll never find anyone else to love you” claim doesn’t work as well when there’s another lover right there). This wouldn’t work if there were multiple abusers, but I don’t think such people like sharing their victims.
And my experience has been the opposite irl. The polyam folk have been really content and chill, and the monogamous folk are sometimes also chill… but I much more often get coworkers complaining about their spouses.
It’s almost like…. PEOPLE are drama….
Someone offering to be their partners second choice out of not wanting to lose them completely isnt what I’d call healthy.
I think this is a really unfair take. A lot of people here are poly or have been in poly relationships (I’m monogamous but I dated someone poly for years, they had another partner when I meet them and it didn’t bother me in the slightest). However what Joe is saying indicates he is settling to not lose Joyce (which is what I’m getting from the “can’t match” bit). Poly is fine, adding new people to a relationship to paper over cracks is not a good idea. And I’ve seen that happen pursuing new people and not breaking up with an incompatible partner. Poly doesn’t solve relationship problems any more than being monogamous.
One issue here is he hasn’t really had a minute to think things through. If it was me and this happened like a week into my relationship I would cut my losses. Less because I’m not open to poly but more because my partner didn’t have enough consideration to talk about it before it happend.
Also it’s still not clear to me that Joyce can have romantic feelings for two people at once. The reason I know I’m monogamous is because I just don’t do that, even when I was obviously allowed to explore that.
Now I’m interested to hear how Joe feels outside of talking to Joyce. Maybe he’ll talk to Danny? Or Sarah, that could be an interesting conversation.
This isn’t some spur-of-the-moment thing. He encouraged Dorothy to recognize her feelings for Joyce, probably because he’d *already* thought this was what would be best for the three of them. It also looks like at that time he already assumed Joyce had romantic feelings for both him and Dorothy, and felt it was working for him, but wanted to make sure they’d also both get what they wanted.
I’m sure he would have preferred Joyce communicating with him better and not planning to break up with him. But I’m also sure Joe has been on board with the idea of Joe-Joyce-Dorothy poly for days, if not weeks.
You can read that scene that way and I think it’s more likely in retrospect, but it’s also easily possible to read it as “recognize your feelings so you stop doing like sending lewds and pretending it’s a joke”.
Yeah, this is definitely a conclusion I’ve come to from rereading the scene now rather than how I originally read it. But I think it’s the only reasonably way to square what he’s saying now with what he said then. And it helps clarify why he took to that conversation so positively – Dorothy saw their interests as conflicting, but Joe didn’t.
I think it’s pretty clear from what happened the first time Joyce tried to break up with Joe that she can and does have romantic feelings for two people at once.
What? No!
Look that’s not how love works [for some people, e.g. me].
It’s definitely not healthy. Joe deserves better.
It is! Two adults having a mature conversation in which one of them admits fault, the other forgives her, and then says he wants to continue being happy together is, in fact, a healthy thing all around. Idk why anyone would think its not
I mean except for the part where they haven’t considered relationship dynamics, issues with poly relationships, this is both their FIRST relationship so they have no fucking idea how to handle one relationship nevermind four, this is literally built on wishful thinking on Joe’s part, etc.
I mean this is Dumbing of Age, predictable shitshow is the name of the game, but this is one.
well personally, I’ve had several issues with monogamous relationships and don’t really think anyone should jump into one without being prepared. it was honestly pretty unhealthy of joe and joyce to not bring danny and sarah into their initial hook-up, cuz like, what do you do if something bad happens and you’re all alone? like for your FIRST relationship you should really have that loving safety net to take care of you, anything else is wishful thinking. idk, sounds like a shitshow to me
Okay, but you do get that a polyamorous relationship is a lot harder and needs a lot more work than a monogamous one, right? It’s like saying “I had problems working one job, people have problems working three” like those are equivalent situations.
No it isn’t. Like that’s just a bigoted assumption you’re making about a relationship that you don’t seem to respect very much. It’s like saying being gay is “harder” than being straight. Like no it’s not, full stop. You are deeply incorrect.
I’ve been in a poly relationship for two years now and it is absolutely more work than a monogamous one. The highs are higher in my opinion and I wouldn’t change it for the world but it is absolutely mathematically more complicated.
Same, I’ve been poly/ENM for over two decades at this point, and it’s always felt to me that the basic fact that any close partnership’s communications needs and difficulty scales non-linearly, with the maximum being “everyone is with everyone in some way”-style that scales the number of different lines of communication by the SQUARE of the number of participants.
These folks don’t seem likely (given Dorothy’s feelings about Joe, and Joe/Walky’s so-far apparent heterosexuality, but both of those could easily change) to have a full-on poly clump, but they ARE all friends and they DO all talk independently, which is going to make it complicated.
Hey there! I’m gay living in a deeply conservative state and city, and I’ve been in poly relationships in university. Both of them ARE harder than being straight – it’s more work finding people willing to be in a relationship, there’s active discrimination, poly relationships require WAY more active communication because there are literally more people… Calling that person bigoted is incredibly rude, especially when you yourself seem to be downplaying and ignoring the hardships, hard work, and challenges that a “non-traditional” relationship have to overcome to be stable and healthy.
If I might: I think the point about being gay being “harder” than being straight is that that’s not inherent; that’s society making things harder.
Also, both kind of……. presuppose a choice being made, which I’m sure Megan doesn’t think is very fair.
Monogamous relationships might be less complicated, but is it really easier for a polyamorous person to suppress so much of themselves to be in one?
Is it really easier for a gay person to suppress so much of themselves to “be” straight”
It won’t let me reply to you Li but I think you are giving Megan a lot of benefit of the doubt when I’m looking right at them accusing someone of Bigotry when the person is making a pretty reasonable, grounded observation about how difficult it is being gay or poly. It all feels pretty “i’ve decided you’re a bad person so I’m gonna dismiss your argument by calling you The Enemy”
Megan’s had a rough time in the comments. I’m not unsympathetic to her defensiveness.
“so they have no fucking idea how to handle one relationship nevermind four”
I’m stumped where four relationships comes from.
Two people have one relationship.
Three people have three relationships.
Four people have six relationships.
Where did you get four?
This part I understand but I don’t really think it applies in their situation. If three people (ABC)are in a triad relationship, there are 4 relationships – AB, BC, AC, ABC. Every part of the relationship is it’s own relationship that should be nurtured. But in this situation, Joe and Dorothy would not be involved at all. Joyce would be the main person having to juggle multiple relationships unless it’s decided that Joe would date others as well
A relation is defined as a subset of a Cartesian product, meaning it’s a set of ordered pairs. A relationship simply drops the ordering. ABC is not a pair.
People aren’t math problems.
I feel like that shouldn’t have to be stated, but here we are.
Hopefully they would at least be friends? At present, Dorothy sees him as less than a friend – an unfortunate acquaintance she was saddled with because he was part of the package deal that came with having her ex, who is still in her life…
And no, Dorothy and Joe will not have “no relationship.” It might not be a sexual one, but if they’re both involved with Joyce’s life long-term, they will both be involved with each other. Both with and without the context of Joyce.
Of course if it’s a short term or casual thing, that would not be necessary, but do you think that’s what Joe or Dorothy expect?
Yeah, no, this is not how poly works. Three people have four relationships:
AB
AC
BC
A-B-C
All of these are their own dynamic. If any one of them aren’t functional, or aren’t working as everyone expects, it’s going to create friction. And this scales up as you add people.
I am dating people who are dating people I have never met in my entire life. My fiance has to introduce me to “friends,” every once in a while. Dorothy and Joe can date the same woman and, if they don’t want to, never have to speak to one another at any point in time.
They don’t have to, but the important counterpoint is that they already DO speak to each other, independently of the existence of Joyce.
Forcing this kind of thing if you’re not feeling it is unhealthy, for sure. But Joe strikes me as the kind of dude who’s thought out what he wants and needs from a relationship, and has landed here. As long as everyone is on the same page and keeps up solid, honest communication, this sounds great. It’s just an open relationship in more words.
Well, it’s probably a limited open relationship.
This part I understand but I don’t really think it applies in their situation. If three people (ABC)are in a triad relationship, there are 4 relationships – AB, BC, AC, ABC. Every part of the relationship is it’s own relationship that should be nurtured. But in this situation, Joe and Dorothy would not be involved at all. Joyce would be the main person having to juggle multiple relationships unless it’s decided that Joe would date others as well
Sorry reply to wrong thread
This seems extremely healthy.
A single person cannot be all things to you. That is called obsession. Humans are social creatures – we need a network. Family. Friends. And yes, sometimes multiple lovers, with consent.
Joe gave consent. Anything else is you reading your own personal biases into the dialogue.
Or it’s us correctly reading characterization in the dialogue.
Consent is of course required, but people can consent for unhealthy reasons. It’s okay to be concerned about this.
This, exactly.
Saying “they consented so there’s NOTHING iffy about it, NO need to read between the lines” is its own dangerous pitfall.
Joe, you deserve better than someone who’s already cheating on you and wants to continue doing so.
Yeppers.
Could be interesting if Joyce pushes to break up with him and it kicks off a development arc for Joe when he doesn’t diminish himself like this, but realistically I’m cope-seething. Might just not enjoy some of the strips for a while going forward.
Y’all really do not grasp non-exclusivity, huh.
This is unfortunate condescension to read as a poly person. I’d encourage you to remember that, among the group of people who would care enough to put an opinion out here, a decent chunk of them are probably poly.
There is a difference between non-exclusivity established at the start of a relationship, with all partners’ agreement, and betrayal leading to non-exclusivity to try and salvage things.
If the non-exclusivity was established earlier, no reasonable person would say the things we are saying.
that kind of begs the question tho,
I don’t think at any point Joe / Joyce (or Dorothy and Walky for that matter), have ever discussed exclusivity specifically on-screen
why is exclusivity necessarily the assumed default?
Because if they had agreed to be non-exclusive, Joyce wouldn’t have expected the kiss to lead to a break up.
of course, i should have considered that she’s a recently ex-Puritan Christian for whom according to her ingrained morality, adultery, abortion and anything adjacent is loaded with religious shame, and this includes non-exclusivity itself
even now she’s driven internally to confess when girl don’t even know her RIGHTS
This level of intensity and sarcasm feels more than is necessary for like, you’re talking to a poly person, they imply exclusivity wasn’t established, you say “but why would we ASSUME that,” and they provide a solid textual read to explain their position.
Obviously, being poly doesn’t mean I’m automatically right – I’ll talk about the actual material in a second. But like, your march against assuming heteronormative defaults loses some luster when it’s, going through a person of the deviance you position yourself as advocating for. If you’re comfortable disclosing, are you poly yourself?
Anyway, for the actual question at hand. It’s very plausible that part of Joyce’s anxiety comes from religious sources, true. But let’s zoom out. Suppose your idea was Willis’s intent. Suppose in his mind, Joyce and Joe had always agreed they were non-exclusive, and Joyce does not believe she betrayed Joe specifically, just that she is filled with religious shame about her behavior.
When most people read the situation of the comic, they are primarily interpreting the depicted situation as a violation of Joe and Joyce’s prior understanding. Even when people don’t think Joyce cheated, even when they support the poly development, they mainly are saying the violation was not big enough. They are rarely, if ever, believing that Joe and Joyce committed to non-exclusivity.
This common interpretation would mean that Willis failed to clearly communicate the situation to his audience. If he wanted to clearly communicate the situation, this would be easy – have Joe and Joyce commit to non-exclusivity on screen. I find it more plausible that the common interpretation is the correct one, instead of “Willis had an easy chance to make the common interpretation more correct, and failed.”
Especially with writing choices like Sarah very specifically framing the issue in terms of infidelity (https://www.dumbingofage.com/2025/comic/book-16/01-not-so-smooth-criminals/hushesandmumbles/, panel 3). I get that, in-universe, Sarah doesn’t know everything about the relationship and could just be mistaken.
But if you’re writing a story where the conflict is that Joyce has religious trauma, and you want to communicate this to the audience… why potentially mislead your readers by inserting this incorrect frame into the character’s dialogue?
Unless there is an agreement of exclusivity, it isn’t the default. People have implied this is a generational thing, but it seems that Walky thinks so as well.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-5/02-threes-a-crowd/exclusivity/
@clif I think there’s a really strong argument that he DID take that as the default, hence not even considering the fact until Dorothy brought up loving other people.
@TerribleTransit: Not only did he take it as the default (and so did Dorothy), but they didn’t even clarify it afterwards. They just continued assuming exclusivity. Like every other couple in the comic.
He brought it up as a joke (or as a ha ha, you’re not really serious right?) when Dorothy talked about loving other people. When she clarified, he dropped the exclusivity part.
First off, I’m in a relationship with someone whose polyamorous who I actually met here, see below.
Second,
….
bad faith read much? (-_-)
Did they agree to be non-exclusive, or do they have a deeply societally ingrained expectation that they’re now discussing with each other that they might not care to hold to?
Them having an ingrained expectation versus a clear communication is DEFINITELY possible, I agree. In fact I think it’s likely, and a lot of interesting discussion could happen from it.
However, I don’t think the answer matters in our immediate question right here, though.
Because, whether it is an ingrained expectation or an explicit agreement, Joyce perceived her own action subjectively as a betrayal, and the difference wouldn’t change whether Joe views her actions as a betrayal.
Like, even if they had explicitly agreed to be non-exclusive, we could still have a development where they discuss exclusivity further, and find that they might not care to hold to it.
To say the same thing in a different way, being non-exclusive is still bad when both players deeply believe that they ought to be exclusive with each other, because you’re doing something you believe is wrong and that your partner believes is wrong.
(Clear communication is great in relationships woo!)
“Because, whether it is an ingrained expectation or an explicit agreement, Joyce perceived her own action subjectively as a betrayal, and the difference wouldn’t change whether Joe views her actions as a betrayal.”
Joyce also viewed herself as betraying Dorothy after Joe gave her the blanket. And Dorothy didn’t. Joyce frequently has ridiculous and inaccurate ideas, but she learns.
That’s a terrible example, it wasn’t the blanket that made her feel that way but the fact that she gave Joe oral sex.
A better example is that she viewed masturbation as betraying Joe. The solo kind, without Dorothy involved.
Because they live in a society and a culture where this has been the state of things for centuries. Why is green considered “go ahead” and red “stop”? Why is a thumbs up positive? Why is gold a symbol of getting first place? Because that’s been the tradition of things.
I’m checking wikipedia here so the stats may be wrong, but “While still uncommon, about 4% of people practice polyamory, and up to 17% are open to it”. If there is a situation where, at best, there’s a one in five chance that someone will agree to something, then you have to presume the answer is “no” unless otherwise specified.
Nah, monogamy-normativity is a terrible cultural norm. Like Joyce clearly thought she was cheating, so it’s a moot point here, but upholding the systems that marginalizes polyamorous people and our relationships suck.
Ugh, I don’t want to have a civil rights conversation about this, can we just skip the next half century of bullshit and go to the good part now where people are normal about polyamory? I never want to write about the ways we are decentered by normative assumptions again, and I’m not looking forward to the point in the middle distance where Third Way tells politicians not to talk about polyamory.
Much as I am pro-people living how they want, I just do not see how we’ll EVER get to the point where people don’t presume that the way more statistically probably option is the default. :/
It’s pretty simple, you just actually talk to your partners about what they want? Like do you just assume your partner has the most statistically likely result to wanting sex in a particular way, or do you talk to them? I really don’t see why a one-in-five chance your wrong isn’t a good enough reason to talk about a thing before you feel comfortable binding people to your ASSUMPTIONS about them
Relationship agreements have to be AGREEMENTS. If you want a thing, you gotta say it, it isn’t fair to demand your partner comply with your assumptions about what they want.
It’s a good reason to talk about it. That should become the norm, but it’ll take a long time for that to happen because cultural norms shift slowly.
In the meantime, it’s bad to treat non-exclusivity as the default when it isn’t and when doing so is more likely to hurt someone you care about. By all means discuss it and that’s even more true if you want to not be exclusive.
It can be a terrible cultural norm while still actually being the cultural norm. Which it is. In a perfect world everyone would be making sure what their expectations are and trying to meet them, but that’s definitely not the world we live in, so there’s going to have to be some amount of assumption, and violating one of the most common assumptions just because it’s stupid is probably bad form.
Green go ahead, red stop is widely considered to be a mistake by cognitive scientist
Red was used as a warning. But Red is also a symbol for speed and green for calmness.
Then there is the issue of red green color blindness being the most common.
Just ask orks what red means. “Da red wuns go fasta!”
Above, someone linked the strip where Walky and Dorothy (inadvertently) bring up the non-exclusive nature of their relationship (and, as an added bonus, Dorothy mentions loving Joyce). From the looks of the art, this was a couple of years ago at least, so probably last month in strip time.
Last semester.
The date stamp is 2015, which would make it last semester, and (I think) their first go-round
This is dramatic fiction and the relationship in question has been official-ish for like a week. Dorothy and Joyce quasi-fucked before that. At this point anyone clutching pearls about “cheating” like she betrayed their marriage vows is simply off-topic.
The non-exclusivity was established earlier. Joe had just said that he is totally aware (as anyone reading the comic should be) of the non-exclusivity of Joyce’s feelings.
I agree with what you’re saying, but it ignores the tone INITIALLY put forth, which is hating on polyamory in the first place. Which is what a lot of these replies are responding to.
I implore you to remember that these are 18 year old college kids who are discovering things about themselves for the first time.
i dunno about you all
but im actually in a non-exclusive sexual relation with someone I met here not too long ago
heck a couple weeks ago was the two year anniversary of when we first started sexting LOL
they’re really open about being polyamorous and doing sex stuff with others sometimes, but we really appreciate each other as friends and have a lot of fun, it’s lovely never been happier ^^ <3
Maybe it’s a little off-topic, but congratulations!
Dorothy and Joyce have both been working under the assumption that they are actively cheating.
it is physically impossible to cheat on someone who has expressed their comfort and endorsement with your other romantic partners, that’s just literally not what cheating is or ever will be. Joyce can’t continue to do that because she is now literally incapable of doing it.
unless Sal gets really cool with some stuff really fast
I think the issue here is Joe’s endorsement doesn’t necessarily denote comfort or being in the right frame of mind. He’s not saying “Yeah, go for it babe!” He’s downplaying his own worth to her while playing up Dorothy’s.
That’s not how polyamory works though. It’s not “I can’t be your *everything* so i might as well be your quirky sidepiece,” it’s “you love in so many different ways and I’m happy to be one of them.” It doesn’t make anyone less anything, just different. That’s explicitly what Joe is citing here. He knows Joyce still loves him, in a way that is different to but not lesser than how she loves Dorothy. And reading up to now, i don’t think anyone can really disprove that.
Okay, being genuine here. I can see from your other posts that you’re very invested in them being poly, and I don’t think anything I say is going to be more important than that to you, but just so I feel like I’ve given you a proper response:
Yes, Joe *is* citing that, on the surface, but pay attention to his expression and his phrasing. “You love Dorothy in a way that I’ll never be able to match. I can’t… occupy that space in your heart.” Is not the language of someone who feels like he has Different But Equal value to the other partner.
The second point I want to bring up on that front is Joe’s own baggage.
He doesn’t think very highly of himself as a person at all, and very much sees Joyce, and relationships in general, as something he felt was unachievable. He also has known issues regarding infidelity, and I think it’s a very understandable step for someone in his position, with his issues, to do this even when he isn’t fully comfortable with it because it keeps Joyce, who “feels like she’s everything” to him, from going away.
“I can’t occupy that space in your heart,” in a vacuum, sounds self-deprecating. if that panel was the only thing in the update, i’d probably agree with you. but the following panel where he says explicitly “I could continue occupying the space you already had for me” shows that he isn’t really saying it that way. he *knows* joyce still loves him. especially after the blanket thing last night
like i think he’s just done research into this stuff or asked the other poly throuple about it off screen, because he’s just using all the normal words to say about this kind of thing. I think he *wanted* to have this conversation with her soon anyway, i genuinely do believe he wanted this from the start, *especially* with how he talked to Dorothy about it before.
What people aren’t inferring that I think might be more obvious with future context is that Joyce loves Joe in ways Dorothy can’t match, too. And we’ve seen that kind of thing before, she just feels safer and more honest around him in general, she felt that way before they started dating. it really doesn’t *need* to be a lesser or greater thing, and I think its a much more beautiful story if it isn’t
I mean yeah, it’d be great if it worked out, genuinely. I just don’t think that’s what this strip is conveying given my understanding of Joe’s character and the narrative leading up to tis point.
Either way, it’s going to be interesting reading!
I’m really hoping Joyce sees the signs and rightfully points out his happiness matters just as much, and that he has every right to ask for it, and see what can be done. I don’t think he realises this.
I mean frankly what this strip is telling me is that Joe has been somewhat actively facilitating this. He had the I want you to have what you want conversation with Joyce. He had the stop lying to yourself conversation with Dorothy. He views being a good wingman as one of the best traits someone can have.
Of COURSE this conversation is scary. His girlfriend thinks she has to break up with him for this very important to her thing he’s been trying to make sure she gets. If I were Joyce I would be reassuring him in the next strip about how much I loved him. But like. They are both AWARE Joyce loves Dorothy incredibly deeply, it’s why he’s been trying to set them up!
The insecurities are realistic and a bummer, but they are not like. Defining of Joe’s involvement in this to me. I think he genuinely wants it, and I think he’s been putting in some not particularly subtle work to make it able to happen. He loves his girlfriend. He wants her to have the girlfriend she wants. He will be pretty sad if she breaks up with him about it.
But he clearly thinks he’s inferior. He’s not saying “you love Dorothy in a way that’s different than how you love me,” he’s saying “I can’t match up to how you love Dorothy.” He is explicitly saying he is not good enough.
you’re just wrong. that’s literally the opposite of true, Dot. Reread the comic a few times and try again, because you are interpretting the exact inverse of what the comic is actually attempting to convey to you.
I am very literally reading the words in the panels.
It can be read in both ways… note that “never be able to match” and “never be able to match up to” can be different things. They can also be the same thing, but it could simply mean he thinks they provide Joyce different things in their relationship; Joe can’t be Dorothy for her, but he’s quite experienced at being Joe.
Acknowledging that two things are different things does not presume that one is lesser than the other.
To add, though… even if Joe is “begging for scraps”, as some other commenters have been putting it, I’m pretty sure Joyce will be capable of loving him just as much as before.
Also… people have also said stuff about her not “giving him her whole heart”. Being aroace, I’m working from second-hand information at best, but I don’t think that’s really how it works? I mean, I’ve read a lot about this stuff trying to understand it, and have never seen any evidence that love works like pouring water out of a container, with more recipients meaning smaller shares for everyone; there aren’t so many poly examples to work from, but definitely there’re lots of couples who were in love, had a child and managed to produce love for that child without diminishing the love they already had for each other.
Admittedly, they’re likely to be too tired to express that love so much for the next few years, but that’s a “raising a baby” thing, not a “competing for love” thing.
…Was I really being an aromantic trying to lecture monoromantics on misconceptions about polyromantics? Hopefully I didn’t mess up too badly.
No, delivery, you pretty much nailed it. My wife doesn’t love me any less because of her other husband, any more than she loved me any less after each of the kids was born. It’s not a pitcher, with a limited supply; in my experience, the more you love (as someone once observed) the more you can love.
If you read the literal words in the panel, he is saying he’ll never be able to love Dorothy as much as Joyce loves Dorothy. That’s not what he means, but he doesn’t mean I’m not as worthy of your love as Dorothy either.
That isn’t what he says. He says “You love Dorothy IN A WAY that I’ll never be able to match. I can’t occupy THAT space in your heart.” (Emphasis mine.)
He did not say “more than I can match” or “to a degree I’ll never match” or “as much space in your heart” or anything that implies an amount of love. He’s only talking about the kind of love.
He also says he wants to continue occupying “the space you already had for me.” He’s very aware that she loves him, and he is happy with the love they share, just as much as previous times when he’s expressed his love and appreciated hers. Acknowledging that she loves others in a different way that she’ll never feel for him doesn’t devalue that unless you assume that his love is territorial, possessive, and incompatible with her loving anyone else. Which it’s clearly not.
I swear to god this entire comment chain with people trying to nitpick individual words to get their own meaning to be “FACTUALLY CORRECT” is the most annoying the comment section has been these past 2-3 months. If not longer.
also stating “wants to continue doing so” when she tried to break up with him so she would not be cheating… ~<3
It brings up an interesting question
Joe does not see it as cheating necessarily but Dorothy and Joyce both did, and intentionally continued engaging in behaviour they saw as cheating. There’s also the issue of Walky’s perspective.
I personally do see it as reprehensible behaviour. I don’t like it, but i do like how DW explores tricky topics, so I’m keen to see what happens.
Much as I’ve been hoping for these poly happenings, I’d still like Joyce to at least take some time to contemplate what it means that she was willing to go against her own stated morals for the sake of her desires, despite it having been forgiven.
Same here.
I don’t think it’ll be quite as consequence free as some comments suggest, and I do expect there to be at least some reflection/exploration of that either through dialogue with other characters (like Sarah or Sierra et al) or independently because of guilt and shame.
That’ll probably take time, though.
Explain Sal reference please?
Joyce just seems to also be really into her, is all. I don’t think anything would ever come of that, but it would be wonderful to watch happen
No you’re absolutely right, now that Joyce has realized her latent bisexuality, she would 100% make out with Sal if Sal ever gave her the opportunity. But at that point, Dorothy would be dating like, jennifer, or some shit.
I get Joyce is into Sal.but if Joe wants her to have what she wants, presumably hooking up with Sal.wojld also not be cheating?
I mean, Sal could cheat on Danny…but that wouldn’t mean Joyce was cheating, just being “the other woman/person.”
Sal is one of the other women (along with Jennifer) Joyce has shown unaknowleged attraction to. Although I doubt she’ll try to add them to the polycule. Just a joke about Joyce finding her hot as well.
Joyce is attracted to women and Joe is her only exception.
I still like this joke, but it seem to make some bi people inconfortable, so… Maybe it would be best to stop it?
Yeah as a bi person I appreciate your allyship. There’s been a lot of bi erasure in the comments the past few weeks :(.
She was very obviously into Ethan and Jacob, though…? Am I missing a joke?
It’s a simple inversion of the expected “straight with an exception”, so I considere it a joke, and that they were omited for the sake of it.
The joke is also that Joyce said “The Only Exception” reminded her of Joe.
To be fair, she doesn’t want to continue cheating on him, that’s exactly why she’s stated she’s breaking up with him. Because she recognizes continuing to cheat on him is wrong and she doesn’t wanna do it. hence, “If I want more Dotty time, I clearly cannot cheat on my boyfriend and as far as I know I can only have one partner and I pick Dorothy.”
I mean, that is true and good, but she’s also saying “I value being with Dorothy more than you being my partner.” That’s not a comfortable position for a relationship to be in.
Well, it might also have been that, after cheating on Joe, she no longer felt worthy of him, and so thought Dorothy was her only remaining option.
Maybe I’m being overly generous, but I can’t help feeling she’s been dragged around between her morals and her desires so much, she hasn’t been thinking clearly since before the protest kiss.
I read it that way too, that she felt like the options of “staying with partner she cheated on” vs “partner she cheated with” that clearly she could no longer stay with the one she cheated on because she did a bad.
I was going to write something longer and then realized it was summarizable as “thirded.”
He deserves to not be second place
In my experience, that’s not “second place”. J does things for H that I don’t, and vice versa – we’re two different men, we have two different sets of traits that she loves. Neither of us is “in the lead”, and the past 20 years have been pretty good for all of us.
I think what a lot of folks are driving at is less “CAN poly relationships be even and fair”, and more “can these kids, two of them who are in their first REAL relationship, transition from ‘I thought I was cheating on you and was going to break up with you to be with the person I want more’ to ‘functioning poly relationship’?”
As a poly person for decades myself, this is starting out kinda like my first attempt at ethical non-monogamy did, and at some point I should enumerate the ridiculous amount of downstream damage caused by the way it ran and then collapsed.
That’s totally fair but two separate people have said this is a lot like how a relationship of theirs started that turned out to be totally healthy and fine, and a third has said they know friends whose story looks like this.
It would be “true to life” for it to go either way, really.
That’s all I’m sayin, really — I wanted the “yeah, this is not always a thing that goes well at all” out there, too.
Fair enough! I guess there was just a point months ago when “this is Not how healthy poly starts, ever” was very much the dominant narrative in the comments.
There was, but today’s early comments feature a surfeit of “I am assuming you don’t know anything about poly if you disagree with me” so I felt like it needed to be (respectfully) restated.
Yeah, but that has been true for almost *every* relationship in this strip. Several of which have been actually, physically abusive. And yet we’ve had the most condescending comments about an emotionally mature conversation about polyamory. (Also, you’re about the hundredth person in the comment section to “put that out there”)
You’re dumb, Joe deserves to be happy no matter how you think he should feel.
Joe probably would have been happier if his girlfriend hadn’t cheated on him in the first place, though, regardless of how he’s trying to make it suck less at the current moment.
I think he would have been happier if Joyce had been more straightforward with him and not made plans to break up with him. But I think he got on board with the prospect of Joyce dating both him and Dorothy a while ago.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2025/comic/book-15/03-me-and-who-you-say-i-was-yesterday/suggestion/
It’s important to me whenever that Joe & Dorothy scene gets brought up to mention that Willis’s first draft of it (which they talked about on a Patreon post, I think) included Joe directly offering to step aside so Dorothy could “have” Joyce because he thinks Dorothy is better and he’s not worthy.
Maybe Willis completely threw out Joe’s insecurity and low self worth after that, but my guess is that’s still going to be an issue going forward.
No matter what Joe says in this comic, both Dorothy and Joyce THOUGHT they were cheating and KEPT GOING before coming clean. I do believe that’s supposed to inform Joe’s position here: “I’ll never be as good or as loved as Dorothy but I’ll stay because this is the best I can ever hope for.”
And I think it’s a setup for the whole thing to implode catastrophically.
…or possibly start unhealthily but gradually improve as Joe comes to realise he’s not actually a lesser partner in the relationship.
As a trash goblin shipper who craves both mess and loving relationships*, I’m beginning to hope for some version of this.
*Yes, I’m aroace and don’t want to be in a relationship. Doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy it when characters I like are.
I mean, at the end of the day, some people like horror movies, but rarely want to get stabbed by a dude in a mask!
Ah yes, she wants to continue cheating on him, as evidenced by just seconds ago her trying to break up with him to persue a relationship with Dorothy without cheating on him until he told her that he didn’t consider her and Dorothy to be cheating.
Can people stop making up things that didn’t happen to be mad about?
In THIS comments section?
Stop understanding the words that are written on the comic. It’s making me upset.
So that’s why you’re so rarely upset. Low reading comprehension in the general public to the rescue.
I am the calm center in the middle of the raging river that is Zelink.
For my sanity, I think I should start commenting like you lmao.
Not to self-deprecate, but that seems counterproductive. I’ve seen how people talk about me. You don’t want that hanging over your head, too.
For what it’s worth, you’re one of my favourite commenters on this site.
I dunno honestly I’ve come to appreciate and look forward to your comments
Some commenters really want to hold the ethical higher ground, with made up senarios, don’t they?
Truthfully, nobody really cheated anyone.
It was cheating when Joe wasn’t aware of it. But now he’s aware of it, and is cool with it, and endorses it continuing to happen. That is a non-monogamous relationship.
The question is, will DOROTHY be cool with it if Joyce decides she wants them both.
And after that, if Dorothy thinks she can be cool with having Joe as a metamour, THEN we get to see what Walky thinks of the whole situation!
I’m sort of hoping Dorothy struggles to be cool with it, trying to balance her attraction to Joyce (and wish for her to be happy) against her ingrained repulsion from Joe (fighting against Joyce’s insistence that he’s changed)… and then, just as she’s beginning to come to terms with it, she suddenly remembers that Walky exists, triggering another crisis over how to proceed.
To be clear, I don’t want bad things for Dorothy… but, while this whole poly thing is promising, despite issues with how it started, we trash goblins still crave mess. Besides, after her recent spiraling, a more immediate problem might do her good.
Oh 100%, this is the way I see it going. And even after the initial dust settles, there’ll be more adjustment period to come as the three (or, less likely, four) of them figure out how this is gonna work. Relationships are messy sometimes, and when you start adding in more people, they can get messier! But, speaking as someone who’s in a poly relationship that’s had its share of mess over the years, it’s worth working through it all with the people you love
I so badly want to see Walky be entirely unsurprised by Joyce/Dororhy, only to fall out of his chair when he hears that Dorothy is in any sort of relationship with Joe.
Incidentally, this is one reason I’m hoping none of them understand the concept of hinge relationships. Dorothy+Joe thinking they have to get along has so much potential for delightful disasters.
I mean shit, I think Joe has been trying pretty hard to be on Dorothy’s good side, pretty consistently, for quite a while now. She’s right to be reluctant to trust him, all things considered, but he’s been the epitome of diplomatic with her for a lot time.
I assume he’s being trying to get on her good side at least in part because of how important to Joyce it’s been incredibly obvious she is.
“And after that, if Dorothy thinks she can be cool with having Joe as a metamour, THEN we get to see what Walky thinks of the whole situation!”
This assumes that Dorothy doesn’t break up with Walky first, which would put things on a completely different footing. I wonder if Booster will show Walky the paper. Mike would have.
Pretty sure it’s impossible for Joyce to “continue to cheat on Joe” if Joe is proposing a poly relationship that explicitly includes Dorothy, and explicitly includes his understanding, and approval, of the fact that Dorothy and Joyce will be making out and doing other things that flow from making out.
Also pretty sure that Joyce is the one who thought that *would* be cheating, and was attempting to initiate a breakup so that she would no longer be cheating! Unsure how that got parsed as “intends to continue cheating on you,” the one thing she is explicitly acting to prevent!
The other day someone linked back to Joyce telling Joe that she masturbated with Dorothy and how she felt she was cheating already then.
I think Joe has come to terms with how this relationship is taking shape before Joyce has because she is still stuck in many of her hangups, and he just rolls with them.
Ive been a relationship paladin throughout all of this, and im just happy seeing that Joe has had the emotional maturity to embrace what it means to be with Joyce. I still think he has some issues with selfworth that makes him accept her bullshit, and he has damage from his dad’s cheating, but i can absolutely see him embrace non-monogamy in a healthy manner once he has worked through that he in particular is in fact deserving of respect, love and consideration.
Im rambling. Tldr, i support Joe.
A+ comment
**in Janet voice** “Not cheating.”
You can’t cheat if you aren’t exclusive, and Joe has just indicated that they were not exclusive.
You know, cheesy as it was, I miss the days where you were “dating” and then “going steady”.
Dating meant casual. You could date lots of people.
Going steady meant exclusive. Dating only one person or in an exclusive poly relationship (yes, there was poly then too – and has been all of human history).
The line was clearly delineated by the terms.
These days? People say dating and others assume going steady by default.
Do you think that everyone who goes to a Speed Dating event is instantly cheating on everyone else present?
At least with the college kids I talk to these, days, it’s “Dating” vs. “Boyfriend/girlfriend” for a lot of them — as soon as you title your relationship partner, it’s generally assumed to be exclusive unless discussed.
It’s so weird to me that people think that since the term “going steady” dropped out of use, a single date means permanent commitment. The lines are less formalized than they were generations ago. If we’re talking “going steady”, that’s basically the 50s and 60s. Maybe the 70s in more traditional places. Well before my time and I’m not a spring chicken.
Things may be messier now (or even in my college years), but no one assumes a first date or a casual hookup means you’re now exclusive. The transition isn’t as clear, but like you say, it’s indicated by things like “boyfriend/girlfriend” and just the general shift to being more serious.
This also has nothing to do with poly, but with a casual/serious distinction. Back in the old days, people having casual dates with lots of people weren’t necessarily poly. Any more than Speed Dating or lots of internet hookups are today. Poly requires some form of serious relationship along with others.
I feel like this distinction gets blurred a bit in these discussions. Even if they hadn’t discussed it explicitly, Joe and Joyce were clearly in the serious phase, not just going on casual dates.
I was a bit young to be in relationships at the time and got a late start there anyway due to being a heavily traumatized autistic who didn’t really trust it when someone made their attraction obvious and didn’t pick it up when it wasn’t blatantly obvious but I recall going steady being a plot point in multiple shows aimed at the teen audience in the mid to late 80’s.
I assumed it was still going on then if for no other reason than the younger more inexperienced teens emulating the media they were watching.
Probably it was more that screen writers were writing about what was going on in their youth.
I seem to remember the last vestiges of “going steady” being replaced by “girlfriend/boyfriend” as the verbal marker for exclusivity around the early 1990s when I hit middle school.
There was a fairly short time there too when “exchanging class rings” became such an important signifier of “we are in an exclusive relationship” that people were briefly getting them as early as freshman year in some cases, at least where I went to high school in the early/mid-1990s.
I don’t think Joyce wants to continue cheating. That’s why she’s here to confess to Joe and break up with him. (Took her a couple tries, but that’s chickening out, not intent)
She’s not going to give up Dorothy, but that’s not the same as continuing cheating.
Nobody really cheated.
IN MY HEART I KNEW IT WAS POSSINLE BUT I DIDNT BELIEVE
IT’S HAPENINGGGGG
WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE ARE THE CHAMPIONS, MY FRIENDSSSSSSSSSSS!!!
HELL YEAH!
Joe stocks going up
Poly stocks skyrocketing
We’re not there yet. Postpone the euphoric celebrations for now. Well, okay, some euphoric celebration is called for, but be sure to keep your “Damn you, Willis’s handy.”
I said it yesterday, but Joe has the most sexual experience of any cast member. He understands that relationships are not so clear cut.
And I fully agree, Clif. Joe finally laying down the groundwork of an open relationship is not, yet, poly. That depends on how Dorothy (and Walky?) want to proceed.
The most sexual experience, but basically no relationship experience.
I’m not really sure how sexual experience helps him here.
He was the only one to immediately internalize that non-monogamy was an option, despite the fact that everybody involved takes the same women’s studies class. That’s how his sexual experience is relevant to this otherwise relationship-centered discussion.
Close enough! Party on, sickos!
holy shit, two cakes!! hell yeah
YAYYYYY
Joyce processing the idea “wait…I…I can be poly? I can have a girlfriend AND a boyfriend?” is going to lead to an interesting Joyce reaction face.
The part where she tells her dad about this week is going to blow both their minds.
I think the immediate stumbling block here is Joe’s phrasing. If I were Joyce, I’d have so many problems with him describing himself like that. But we can’t see her face for the last two panels so she might not have picked up on it? It’s possible her head just kind of exploded and she lost the ability to hear for a moment.
Wow, I am shocked that Joe is this dedicated to Joyce. I knew he loved her, but caring less about Joyce kissing Dorothy, and caring more about her being able to have the things she wants is a level I did not expect.
Well done Joe; you truly care, and that is admirable.
Anyone else as shocked?
i dont disagree that he is very dedicated to her but i do think he might have this kind of reaction regardless. He just seems pretty capable of being poly, or at least totally open to the idea
not shocked tbh, his growth arc has been steady and really good, he’s becoming a good man. ~<3
Not shocked, but also seeing a at least as much “thinks he is undeserving” as “caring less about Joyce kissing Dorothy”. There’s pain in panel 5.
The pain isn’t from the kissing. It’s because he knew from the get go that Joyce loved her other friends in specific ways that he wasn’t going to be supplanting, and that Dorothy’s space in her heart was very large. The pain is acknowledging that Dorothy’s space is bigger than his own space, but so long as she doesn’t lock him out he’s basically okay with that.
Nope. Joe has always loved Joyce and cared about her above himself. Even in the It’s Walky universe. No surprise, I’m just surprised DoA got here after the date Mike chaperoned at the beginning. I’ve been in giddy and hopeful disbelief, but also a fan long enough to not get too comfortable.
Joe changed Joyce’s number on his list to a zero after their failed date – we know he changed it, because if Joyce was a zero, he wouldn’t have dated her, and Joyce herself susses this out, immediately. He cared about Joyce before he even had the list leaked, and started his slow-burn redemption arc.
Nah, it follows very logically from his telling her “I just want you to have the things you want” after Joyce and Dorothy’s night out drinking, (which Joe probably realized was a date even though neither of them did.)
Joe exhibiting more emotional intelligence than Dorothy is frankly better at making her settle her shit than causing a big fight, here.
Daaaang! It sounds like he knew she wanted dat peach of hers when she went
Everybody not named Joyce and Dorothy has known it for months longer than Joyce and Joe have been dating.
this… ~<3
Oh right, especially Sal lmao
Joe will take what he can get (even in a way that’s not good for him) but I’ll print this strip out and eat it if Dorothy’s willing to share, particularly with him.
It’s not going to happen but wouldn’t it be so funny if Joyce wanting to be poly is the hard line that sinks her and dorothy
Okay, this is fine for now, sure, but I can’t wait to see how Walky and Dorothy fuck up their breakup
Yeah. Both of them have been in a really bad place lately, I would be amazed if it goes well at all.
Walky has had enough hints to not be surprised, exactly, but it feels like we are going to see a big contrast between Joe’s understanding of Dorothy and Joyce’s interactions and Walky’s deflection of reaching understanding by turning things into jokes about “my girlfriend’s girlfriend”. Walky loves to deflect with humour so he doesn’t have to deal with feelings, but he’s not going to be able to avoid a direct conversation with Dorothy in the same way and his self esteem is much lower than Joe’s.
Always assuming that the discussion happens before Walky sees the paper that Dorothy doesn’t yet know exists.
Maybe Walky wasn’t going to be upset about Dorothy breaking up with him, but Dorothy’s break-up speech sucks so bad, it ends up being the thing he crashes out about, not the actual break-up.
YEAHBOIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
Holy shit. I did not actually expect this. I don’t love that Dojoy start off intentionally cheating but dammit I’m interested in where this goes.
BEST BOY BEST BOY BEST BOY
Everybody wins! …Maybe? I think? At least, on this particular side of the equation. Jury’s still out on Walky.
Nah, Joe’s lost. He’s just happy to have the scraps because his self esteem is that bad.
I don’t think this is winning. I hope not. The whole lead up was Joyce not doing anything hurtful because of happenstance and technicality. I think we’re seeing Joe’s hurt peaking through in this strip.
The characters feeling hurt or hurting each other, regretting, that’s where learning from their experiences comes from.
Joyce is probably comfortable with polyamory. I’m not personally, but from what I’ve read from folks here who are, she’s fumbled this.
Joe might be in the future, he doesn’t seem ‘enthusiastic’ now though. I think he’ll try, it may hurt more, he might settle into it, I dunno.
Dorothy is not cut out for it. Her jealousy triggers PTSD. She has a need to be in control, to be the only one whose needed. She may try for a week or two, because it’s a project. But there’s any number of her issues that will cause the whole thing to collapse.
The way Walky wins is by finally tearing down his Dorothy pedestal. Not in a Walkyverse Walky rage, that would be a huge L. But a simple, deserved “fuck you” to Dorothy, like the one he got from Lucy.
And Amber’s internal Mike wins.
Brace for impact. It’s about to get bad in here.
Some of these commenters are about to get the whiplash of the century if they think this is gonna work out how they think it will.
Joe is a great guy, a great boyfriend, but this is not healthy for him. He is literally begging for scraps here. Scraps that I doubt Dorothy would be fine with giving him.
If Joyce is 100% on board with this situation, im 90% sure that Dorothy will be hurt by her inability to commit to her after everything that Joyce said. That being said, if Dorothy asks Joyce to commit to her 100%, I have no doubt Joyce will say yes with little hesitation. Joyce came to this room wanting to end the relationship, she had made up her mind, so any change to that plan would be on a greedy whim or wanting to have her cake and eat it to.
I want there to be an attempt so that it can crash down in a blazing inferno.
Not to mention that the way Joe is drawn shows this is hurting him, and I don’t think it’s the initial slap of having it confirmed, but a long term extension of his low self esteem
Joyce came into the room feeping like she had to end the relationship. That’s not the same as wanting to end the relationship.
Fucking touch screen keyboard. feeling.
feeping is like feeling, but with more pee.
If it wasn’t before, it is now.
A vision popped in my mind of Dorothy asking Joyce to commit to her 100%, her agreeing, and then the two quickly falling out, leaving Joyce with 0 partners.
That would be intense if it happened.
SO many of the people calling for poly have explicitly said they want it to be messy and full of heartbreak so, like, maybe recalibrate your estimation of our expectations a little.
Also good grief your phrasing, friend.
“begging for scraps”
“greedy”
Those are extremely negative words you’re using to describe a totally normal and healthy type of relationship.
OK so:
My best friend has been in poly relationships for 9 years nowm. He’s got 2 primary partners and a few secondary ones. His first wife is not and to my knowledge has not seen anyone else, while his second wife has at least one other primary partner- nice guy, he’s cool.
Both partners are also dear friends of mine. And I used to worry a great deal about Wife 1, that she was being taken for granted. At their wedding, it was like 95% guests who knew the couple through him. They were initially monogamous until he started seeing other people. It’s super, super easy to see their relationship as him doing whatever he wants while she just meekly accepts it.
And if that was what it actually was, I’d punch him in the face. Because wife 1 is one of the best people you’d ever meet. And it’s not what’s happening. He still gives her all kinds of concern and attention, she’s not secondary at all. He very much will respect any boundaries she gives him and take her feelings into consideration.
But he’s also twice the age of the people here and has way more experience. My friends have a normal and healthy relationship. What Joe is saying here *isnt*. It’s an attempt to avoid jealousy that’s turning toxic. Joe isn’t allowing himself to have a say in his relationship- he’s completely focused on what Joyce wants.
Is this meant to be a reply to me? Because I agree that Joe’s dialogue is concerning. My main argument was that “people cheering right now are in for whiplash if they think this will go how they expect it too [implicitly: well]” is silly because so many of the people cheering for poly have explicitly said they don’t expect it to go well.
I then also took issue with Switchris’s phrasing, because they called Joyce “just greedy” for even being interested in polyamory and Joe’s pitch “begging for scraps”, when what he’s actually SAYING is that, if Joyce is okay with it, he wants to keep occupying the place in her heart that he already has.
To characterize that as “begging for scraps” seems super negative about polyamory (generally), not just worried about whether or not Joe is martyring himself.
No, not particularly.
I just don’t actually think this will lead to drama anymore. Willis has had so many chances to put obstacles in front of Joyce and he has *consistently* refused to commit.
Joyce could have felt some sort of way about realizing she’s bi? Nope, she just goes with it.
DoJo are stuck in Dunn Meadows and might get arrested/hurt? Amazi-girl shows up.
Dorothy could have felt some sort of way about this being a reckless mistake? Nope, she’s all in on wanting Joyce.
Sarah gives Joyce pause about how what she’s doing is going to hurt Joe? Not only does it go in one ear and out the other as referenced by Joyce’s desire to get busy with Dorothy in the shower, but as it turns out, Joe isn’t an obstacle at all.
And the big one, the notion that Joe might feel some sort of way about being cheated on, that’s shunted aside.
All of these potential obstacles, all the points where we might have seen drama, they just haven’t materialized. And if the biggest, most important obstacle- the idea that Joyce cheated on Joe- didn’t matter, why should we expect any other obstacle to matter?
That’s a pretty clean summary of why I’m not finding this really all that satisfying.
ah well.
I… don’t disagree with any of that, but I don’t see how it’s a reply to anything I said.
I mean, I feel differently about them than you do, but you’re certainly welcome to your feelings and you’ve laid out your reasons for them very clearly.
I just don’t understand why they’re here, in reply to my comment, in a thread about:
1. Whether or not people cheering right now are in for a rude awakening of some sort
2. Whether or not it’s cool to dismissively describe interest in polyamory as “greed” and “begging for scraps”
In this comic, I’d expect “messy and full of heartbreak” to go without saying!
I think there’s some crossfire from people talking about how they’re interpreting Joe and Joyce specifically and the general concept of poly. Which I understand. Being poly is met with bigotry and it’s not a protected class (I literally got fired for mentioning I was dating someone poly at work, it was very “don’t discuss your sex life” but the way people use that against queer people who just mention their orientation or same-gender partner, absolutely wild).
So I think we should be careful in our phrasing. I would say it seems to me that Joe hasn’t had much time to process and he’s offering what he thinks means Joyce will stay with him. Arguably that is unhealthy. The fact he isn’t acting upset at all when he specifically has issues around infedility makes me think he’s hiding his real feelings. I feel “I’m really hurt you did this behind my back, but let’s talk about it” would have indicated that he was okay with exploring poly but was also being honest (that’s just my opinion).
Now if Joe isn’t really hurt that’s fine but he’s a character, not a real person, so that just seems inconsistent with what we know of him.
Agreed with your first paragraph completely and also I’m sorry that happened to you! I mostly agree with the second paragraph too, but:
“I would say it seems to me that Joe hasn’t had much time to process and he’s offering what he thinks means Joyce will stay with him.”
(Emphasis mine.)
I actually don’t think this is true. I think Joe is telling us directly in this comic that he’s been thinking about this since at LEAST when Dorothy and Joyce went out for #dranks last book. So I think the key is that he’s not at all surprised right now, and in fact expected this.
Which, wow, I have (gentle) notes for him on how he handled expecting this to happen and trying to hint to Joyce that it would be okay at a time when Joyce definitely couldn’t have imagined it happening, and therefore couldn’t process his hint. But mostly they’re notes of concern for him! Like oh honey, you could have talked to her about it instead of just waiting for it to “inevitably” happen… spared yourself AND her a lot of heartbreak…
(But also I imagine the conversation intimidated him. I’m not judging!!)
I think that Joe may have just had the wisdom to treat Joyce’s obvious bisexuality as an “egg” situation, in trans circles: don’t spell it out for them, they have to realize it for themselves, and you bringing it up directly could actually end up making things harder or more traumatizing for them. Even when they’re really obviously egg. Because you might still be wrong!
Ohhh, no, that’s not what I was thinking he could have been more direct about. I was thinking he could have been more direct about not expecting monogamy.
BUT. If he had said that more directly, Joyce would PROBABLY have been like ?!?! who would I even want to…?! and, then… egg situation back on the table.
Very true I didn’t register that bit (Joe indicating he thought about this for longer).
(I’m also worried about the second to last panel, worried that Joe means his words in a more self-deprecating way than they technically need to mean — but I don’t think “hasn’t had time to process and is rushing to bargain with Joyce” isn’t one of the problems here.)
Well, I’ll behave.
Oh, please don’t. That’s no fun.
Please notice that at no time did Taffy specify how they would behave.
[extremely loud correct buzzer]
“Called it!” – Everyone
And that space for Joe is the poly pocket.
I burst out laughing at this one. Well played. 10/10 pun.
For the youngsters. Polly Pocket was a small doll you could carry in your pocket. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polly_Pocket
You can carry any doll in your pocket if your pockets are big enough.
Haha, I remember when *I* said that after my ex-SO cheated on me!
…thank god they didn’t humor it. It would never have worked. That was a dead relationship and they didn’t care about me at all long before that.
Yep, reminds me of when my first boyfriend said he wanted to bang other girls in college so we could either be in an open relationship or break up. Choice to be open because I was terrified to lose him and didn’t think anyone else would ever love me.
Just extending sympathy to both of you, that really sucks 😞
I remember when I said that after my then-SO said they didn’t think they could do a long-distance relationship due to their sex drive. And we sat down and had a apparently-great conversation about boundaries and ground rules.
The net result of the next six months included:
– two messy breakups
– one additional poly relationship that exploded so hard that 2/3 of the parties involved have been mono since
– four friendships that ended permanently
– one police/EMS call due to “if you reveal what I did to parties who had a right to know, I’ll self-harm”
– at least one Greyhound bus driver getting seduced, apparently out of spite
man, i’d hate to be that bus driver’s therapist
I don’t think he ever found out exactly WHY a random college sophmore lady was SUPER into, well, sleeping with whatever dude she thought would annoy me the most after I dumped her for exploding two separate friend groups with the shenanigans that led to the above list.
Oof, I can tell how that hurts Joe because I know flat out I’d have the same feelings for my fiancee (one of her friends did a test without her knowing via, “She’s banging somebody right now” lies and I found that I was not jealous and would rather her happy over all else)
Note: It’s more the pain of that happening in the moment. Not commenting on Poly or anything, just that it can hurt in the moment when first slapped in your face
I think Joe still thinks very little of himself and doesn’t think he deserves more than to be second choice
Oh for sure. But the initial shock and pain and confusion in the moment is something I can relate with. He’s just probably not going to go down the same path as me and let it eat him up inside instead of going, “Oh wow I really am fine with this”
Once again, Joe saw this coming before Joyce and Dorothy did. Reread Joe’s conversation with Dorothy one more time.
If I found out my friend was performing tests like that on my SO, there would be so much hell to pay. JFC.
For real, that is not great friend behavior
No joke, I kind of called this?
I have had this sort of discussion with a bisexual woman I was seeing, “I can’t manifest a vagina, so you might as well get a girlfriend too.”
This feels like an entirely honest and healthy response from Joe “I have deep trauma from cheating” Rosenthal, and he will not at some point have a breakdown in front of Danny about not being enough but not wanting to lose what he has.
He’s definitely not martyring his own happiness for the sake of Joyce!
idk maybe it’s that way or maybe not. some ppl are just poly like that
Oh no, he’s doing it for him. If he doesn’t give her permission to be with Dorothy, he loses her entirely. He’d rather have 50% of something than 100% of nothing.
That said, A) Will Dorothy be okay with this? She doesn’t like Joe.
B) Can Joyce balance two partners or will this 50/50 be more like an 80/20?
C) Will it even matter when Becky comes for them all?
Given everything we’ve seen of Joyce’s behavior in this arc, I think he 100% loses her anyway (or more accurately, SHE 100% screws up and loses HIM).
Granted this is all secondhand, but I’ve been told repeatedly that you need MORE emotional intelligence and maturity in poly relationships, not LESS. And Joyce’s actions up to this point really don’t inspire confidence.
Oh, you absolutely need more. Thats actually why i went poly, i rather have relationships crash and burn early on because they arent sustainable than commit myself to a monogamous relationship with a nymphomanic mamaboy that just wants me to be a bangmaid and i convinced myself being a good girlfriend means i need to make myself smaller and “compromise” by giving up myself for the sake of the relationship…
If it is gonna crack it might as well crack as soon as possible.
I’m of the opinion that, had everybody involved laid the grounds for this poly relationship to happen in advance, it had a very, very high chance of being stable long-term and working. However, I see absolutely zero way everybody involved could have come to know they needed to process this situation in advance, or else, they would have done it the right way from the start. They just didn’t, because they couldn’t.
He was so scared of becoming his father, he ran full tilt into becoming his mother.
Exactly, and wow it’s heartbreaking to read.
This! 100% this!
Genuine question: is that something I’m forgetting? Did Joe mention his mom ever attempting polyamory?
I think their implication is that Joe, like his mom, has been cheated on. Idk if we’ve ever seen any evidence that she accepted/tolerated/endorsed it though.
And yeah I know, people are still debating whether Joyce & Dorothy’s actions constitute cheating, but THEY have both used the word several times to describe their own actions so I do think it at least bears comparison.
He cheated more then once, and she kept forgiving him/accepting him back. We’ve not been given a full account of it, just that his dad was a serial cheater to Joe’s mom.
Nah, I wouldn’t object to that. I think the fuzziness of Joe and Joyce’s relationship is interesting as a separate conversation, but I didn’t think it was going to be relevant until yesterday. (And it still isn’t, Joe’s not saying he didn’t think they were exclusive here.)
Anyway, thanks. I didn’t even remember that his mom forgave his dad more than once. I don’t think that’s the same thing as this, but I at least somewhat understand the comparison, I suppose.
I don’t remember that either. We know he cheated a lot, but I’m not sure we know how it came out or that she forgave him at all.
Not polyamory so much as putting up with a relationship where she wasn’t happy I think was the intent there.
I realized this was partly what was happening as late as just yesterday, I’m ashamed to admit.
B’aww, Joe. 😢
I’m not doing any kind of “called it” dance here, this was just one of like eight possibilities I originally envisioned two months ago.
Also, Joyce hasn’t said yes yet, and I kind of thought her saying yes would have to involve Joe hiding his insecurities and not being this honest, though as I noted above, maybe she can’t hear him over her head exploding from being told she can have everything she wants, going so directly against a lifetime of being told everything she wants is sinful and to be repressed!
Still hoping they manage a yes, I want to see these kids Attempt a Poly for so many reasons, but ye, Joe is being more honest here than I expected.
Additional thought: actually the last two panels DO have two valid readings. I saw the sad one first, but he might mean what he’s saying… maybe.
I think he does mean what he’s saying, but is also considering himself the lesser partner due to his personal issues.
By contrast, I think Joyce — once she gets over the shock of this new revelation — won’t consider him any less worthy of love than Dorothy is. I’m expecting her to be bad at poly in many ways, but not that one.
Joe meaning what he is saying becomes more likely when you review his previous conversation with Dorothy.
There’s that.
There’s ALSO the critical fact that none of this is a surprise and that he’s been thinking about it since at LEAST #dranks. That reframes what he’s saying a LOT. Folks are worried he’s making a Hail Mary, a desperate thoughtless grab for as much as he can get (paraphrasing), but this isn’t spur of the moment. Raises the odds that he means what he’s saying, even if he winds up being wrong about being okay with the reality of it!
I saw his expression as tenderness, vulnerability, and maybe a little worry that Joyce will still decide to break up with him. And that worry makes as much sense if he really 100% wants this as it does if he’s just doing this to keep the relationship.
Yeah… I think there are two equally plausible reads of the last two panels.
Which is obviously true of all the rest of the commenters too, but many of us seem to be very sure that only one of the two readings makes any sense at all.
“Talkin’ about YOUR VAGINA.”
I’m guessing they’ll be seeking Grace, Mandy, and Sierra’s advice on forming a polycule.
Why would you guess that? Points to name of comic.
“Don’t start by cheating.”
I can half-ass imagine a world where Joe sheepishly admits he tried to ask at least one of them about it, lol
FASCINATING
Oh. THAT’s what Joe meant back then. He’s known this whole time.
I’m thriving
As much as I want to declare Infinite Sicko Victory I feel like Joe is being a bit too self sacrificing here, especially considering his existing hang ups with cheating.
Booster is probably going to be very key for Joe’s arc, since they’ll be able to read that Joe is lying to himself and is setting himself on fire due to thinking he’s not worthy of the kind of love he wants (exclusive, monogamous)
Does Joe want exclusivity and monogamy, or does he simply want to feel valued? Because what I hear from Joe that doesn’t seem healthy here is that he feels devalued, not that he thinks that polyamory will make him unhappy per se; it’s not that he wants what he has and doesn’t mind if Dorothy also has that, what seems unhealthy here is that he explicitly thinks Joyce values him less (which, like, objectively she does – she’s chosen Dorothy over him in ways that involve genuine betrayal, which, even if he was prepared for it, makes it pretty clear that he’s less important to her than Dorothy is!)
Like, I don’t even think this is unfixable, just that it’s a LOT of work to fix because Joe seems very reasonably unhappy after what happened to him..
I think you hit the nail on the head.
Well I’m pretty agnostic on whether it is fixable specifically, but details.
Sorry, meant the kind of love he wants from Joyce. He may be find with polygamy for other relationships, but definitely doesn’t seem that way with Joyce, at least not in this way and at this point in time
Polyamory. Polygamy is specifically marying multiple people, which is illegal in the united states.
As opposed to polyamory, which is…? Not legally recognized anywhere.
Like not only can they not get married, there are SO MANY housing ordinances that forbid too many unrelated adults from living together.
As opposed to polyamory which doesn’t inherently involve marriage and is not itself specifically a crime although I’m not denying that other laws are abused to punish people for it. But currently polyamorous relationships alone are not grounds for either fines or arrests, they need to find something else to use as an excuse. Not legally recognized is not the same as illegal.
The distinction also helps differentiate from the abusive practices of some of the more culty Mormon sects which are more accurately a(n abusive) form of polygyny although I’ve often heard those practices referred to just as polygamy because people think they’re synonyms forgetting the existence of polyandry.
In addition to meaning words also have connotations, and the connotation of someone who has been very vocal about how much they don’t like what’s been going on in these past few strips saying polygamy when what they’re currently discussing is polyamory . . .
well it could have been a mistake was is why I corrected them in case it was but it’s not a good look for someone who seems to be outside that community to use a word that means a crime that is a felony in some states punishable by up to five years in prison and/or a $10,000 fine when what they mean is a style of relationship that is legal.
But also these are distinctions I recall poly people finding very important well over a decade ago when polyamory first came to my attention. It’s possible the distinction isn’t considered important anymore.
I… don’t even think I want to entertain “it’s not technically against the law” as an argument against the idea of discrimination. That way lies entirely too many rabbit holes.
More relevantly: polyamory is not a protected class, so there don’t have to be laws against it. People can discriminate against polyamorous people in perfectly legal ways, like firing them for being polyamorous, denying them housing for being polyamorous, etc.
Also: I’m not really a fan of the illegality of polygamy, either. As you said, it is a “style of relationship”. It was made illegal mostly to attack Mormons, and like, cool, Mormons are creepy, but what a great example of attacking an identity instead of the actual problem (e.g., abuse).
@Li None of which is related to what I’m trying to say. I blame the five hours of sleep I got. I am not at all attempting to deny discrimination. And things are probably not helped by what may be an issue I have where I over explain due to my autism leading to the point I’m trying to make getting lost in the weeds and a point I’m not trying to make getting found instead.
The important points I was trying to make, and this time I’ll lead first with the one I ended with (and keep in mind if this still read off I’m still running off that five hours and it’s much later in the day):
1: When I first learned about poly relationships well over a decade ago the distinction between the words polygamy and polyamory seemed to be considered very important by polyamorous people. Again, this may have changed while I wasn’t looking. I’ve only been on the outside of the community looking in, but I assumed when I wrote the post that started this thread of discussion that the distinction was still considered important.
2: One is something that’s not a protected class that shitty people discriminate over. The other can get you five years in prison. That’s not an endorsement of polygamy being punished by fines or imprisonment. It’s recognition that one is accusing someone of a crime (which in the case of most polyamorous people is not being committed due to the way marriage is currently structured – again not an endorsement of the way marriage is currently structured or polygamy being a crime simply a statement of fact) and the other is not.
Like anything else involving consenting adults it should not be a crime, but it currently is and saying someone is a member of a persecuted minority that gets discriminated against and saying someone is committing a crime are (in most cases) two different things to say.
Which is why saying one when someone is talking about the other reads as fishy to me.
I would offer examples to illustrate point 2 but every comparison I can come up with is calling someone (thing that’s often confused with a second thing) vs calling them (second thing that absolutely should be a crime). And doing that would probably sound like I was equating the second thing with polygamy which is not my intent. But again, regardless of what the legal status of multiple marriages should be (as long as everyone is a consenting adult it should be legal, and the disclaimer about consenting adults is an attempt to prevent bad faith readings) to say someone is polygamous is to accuse them of a crime.
Which I assume is why point 1 was true when I first ran across polyamory as a concept.
Hey, I skimmed this (ADHD and late at night, I’m sorry!), and I just wanna apologize also for MY first comment because I was way too terse and bleh. I am sorry for my tone. I think we pretty much agree!! And furthermore you were just trying to pass along what you’ve gathered from polyam people in very good faith.
Internet gesture of support!
The thing that throws me and I suspect the reason I screw up this usage if I’m not careful is we casually talk about monogamy without meaning marriage, so it’s very easy to just swap the prefix.
Now that’s obviously different, since monogamy isn’t illegal and there’s no history of discrimination, but it’s an easy connection to make.
Maybe not even/only Booster. He went to his “ex” (de Santo jr.) for advice earlier, and she has enough experience of both him and relationships to figure out what he’s not saying here.
There are both healthy and unhealthy elements to Joe’s choice here. De-centering jealousy and possessiveness and being supportive is great. He’s shown very good awareness and understanding of where Joyce is at in life, and is willing to have a relationship that allows her to continue to grow and learn about herself free from repression.
However, he is insecure and does have the underlying fear of his parents’ relationship that he is trying to compensate for, and perhaps overcompensate for. The real test is how well he discusses and establishes boundaries from here on in, now that the topic is out in the open.
Lots of debate above about whether this is a healthy poly choice or an unhealthy low-self confident choice, but as it stands right now I’m going with “why not both”.
Joe’s doing his best, saw this coming, and genuinely wants to try this out. He also has some hidden self-esteem issues that he keeps failing to tell Joyce about and Joyce keeps failing to take into account (and that’s not Joyce’s fault, she isn’t psychic).
Well of course, his entire hang up is self sacrifice in the name of other people being happy. This is just another version of that, where he gets to eat the scraps off the floor, because he thinks that’s all he’s worth.
Imagine telling commenters from 10 years ago “Joe’s arc will be interrogating his internalized misandry” and blowing everybody’s minds
Apparently Willis had an earlier version of the “Joe confronts Dorothy” scene where Joe just…straight up offers to step aside and let Dorothy “have” her, because he feels so inadequate and insecure.
This feels like a repurposing of some of that idea. I agree, I don’t think Joe is coming at this from the healthiest mindset, and I wonder how that will play out.
Isn’t this infinite sicko loss? The reason people wanted Joyce to cheat on Joe was to see the world burn and now Joe’s like “That’s cool I guess” so no burning.
Can’t speak for sickos in general, but this trash goblin notes that Joe and Joyce breaking up would be a quick intense burn with perhaps only fairly minor embers later on.
But this? Neither Joe nor Joyce have been in a truly loving relationship before, and Dorothy is still dealing with her issues with Joe, and they’re jumping into polyamory (and don’t forget that Dorothy doesn’t even know about it yet). This has the potential to keep the flames burning bright for quite some time.
yeah i don’t get anyone thinking that this current strip leads to less drama in the future, like damn
The drama of Joe being hurt by this, and suggesting something that’s probably going to hurt him more is what makes it a Sicko win. “And then everything works out perfectly, nobody’s hurt by this so technically nobody did anything wrong through no effort of their own” would be a sicko loss.
I can never be normal about this
Continuing to hope drama comes in the form of both Joe and Joyce are down for poly but Dorothy isn’t and What Does That Mean For Them, and it’s feeling closer right now.
I be honest, asa member of te Patreon i was laughing out loud at some of the comments yesterday knowing this was coming.
Honestly, same vibe as when I came out as trans to my now-husband. Not only was he not shocked at all, but he had already figured it out and was basically just waiting for me to connect the dots.
Yeah, it’s worth keeping in mind that this isn’t some frantic attempt to salvage things after the kiss. Joe has had a good idea of how Joyce felt about Dorothy for a long time, and he’s probably been thinking about what it would be like for both him and Dorothy to be dating Joyce since before they got together in the first place.
Which doesn’t make his perspective on this completely healthy, but it does make it more thought-out than a lot of people seem to be assuming.
Yeah, that was my assumption when he told Dorothy to be honest with herself about her feelings for Joyce. And he observed previously, “a lot of I love yous between you two.” He’s been considering this possibility for a while.
And I might be alone in this, I have no idea, but personally, I don’t think we can say for sure (yet) whether he’s coming at this from a healthy direction or not. His phrasing points to at least knowing what the healthy direction IS – he knows intellectually that he’s not competing for Joyce’s affection; he and Dorothy occupy different niches. But whether or not he *actually* feels okay with this or if he just *wants* to feel okay with this… well, we’ll find out. I do think it could go either way at this point.
I think one of the biggest difficulties is that for us, this whole thing has played out over weeks and weeks. For the characters, everything from Joyce and Dorothy kissing through now has been less than 24 hours, unless I’m getting the timeline wrong.
It’s only been maybe 30 second since Joe revealed he saw the newspaper. One does not build a fully functional, healthy polyamorous relationship in 30 seconds, so trying to judge where they’re at now by such standards is a bit silly. I certainly think this is a great beginning, which is worth being excited and hopeful about.
Yeah, people don’t seem to be realizing just how far back he must have had this realization and thus, how much thought he’s given. He’s pretty clearly been thinking about this for quite some time. I also imagine that given how carefully he’s phrased quite a few things here, he might have even been doing some research into polyamory to prepare.
*enervated sigh*
I think I might just take a break from Dumbing of Age for maybe a year or so and just come back later and binge until I’m caught up again. Maybe by then, the comic will have moved on from this to other, less aggravating stuff. Not giving up entirely, but this current storyline is really grating.
I haven’t gotten there yet, but I’m tempted to take a break from the comments again soon.
I feel that feeling. I’ve been checking in at least once a week (and usually daily) for over a decade and this is the first storyline that has stressed me out like this.
Sometimes, webcomic arcs get better for me with distance, where I can read them in a burst and not have the difficult parts feel so prolonged. Maybe that’s a better approach than me reading each up and down of the rollercoaster and picking fights in the comments to tide me over till next update.
D’aaaawwwww! I love it when love takes the form of wanting the best for another person, and not the form of needing to “have” them.
Same. I love the sentiment expressed here. I find it baffling how many people see it as anything remotely negative.
Because it’s the exact same sentiment as “he hits me because he loves me”.
That’s going to extremes, I know, but ultimately it comes from the same place- being unwilling to assert one’s own needs and preferences in a relationship.
Unconditional love is deeply unhealthy. If you are always willing to accept what your partner does, you’re going to end up in a bad place when your partner does something that by any objective standard should hurt you.
Rogue 7. Nooooooooo. No no no. That first comparison is really crummy. Joe’s last two panels are legitimately ambiguous, people reading them differently are not in any way endorsing abuse.
I…never said they were.
I said that Joe is projecting the same sort of attitude as someone who tolerates their partner being abusive. That’s obviously only one interpretation of what he’s doing, but it’s a valid one to make based on the text presented to us. And those of us who interpret it that way are not happy about it.
Look, problems in relationships, fundamentally, all boil down to one person saying “my wants are more important than your needs”. Cheating is “my want to fuck this other person is more important than your need for trust and honesty”. A “hobosexual” says “my want to slack off is more important than your need for support and assistance”.
So when Joe straight-up says “I want you to have what you want”, with no regard whatsoever for his needs, that setsoff some alaem bells.
If y’all interpret him as saying “hey, I’m cool being equals to Dorothy”- and that’s a valid interpretation- that’s cool.
But I’m interpreting it as “I’m cool with whatever, I just want you in my life” and giving Joyce carte blanche to completely disregard him.
But you’re talking to people who are cheering and telling them the thing they’re cheering for is “the exact same sentiment as ‘he hits me because he loves me’.”
They’re reading it differently than you, and that’s okay.
The person I responded to explicitly said “I find it baffling how many people see [the sentiment being expressed] as remotely negative.”
So i pointed out why I see what he said as negative.
If folks are happy with this turn of events, I’m fine with that. But if they ask “why would anyone hate this?”, I’m well within my rights to explain why.
I’m just saying. I think you picked a bad thing to compare it to, and that’s gonna be distracting from the resulting conversations.
Wow… You seriously think this situation is even remotely close to physical abuse? This is like saying “they experience romantic and sexual attraction, which people in abusive relationships also feel, so it’s bad.”
The bad part of such abuse is not the form of love. It’s the disregard of one’s own needs, which we haven’t seen that from Joe. What he’s saying isn’t “I’m willing to disregard my own need for monogamy.” It’s “I don’t have a need for monogamy.”
I think the disconnect here is that there’s just enough ambiguity that it’s possible to project your own needs and views of romantic love (whether monogamous or not) onto Joe. So people who assume he has the same need for a monogamous relationship and has the intense, black-and-white view of cheating can only understand his behavior as this desperate plea to keep what he has. Meanwhile, polyamorous people don’t see any conflict with Joyce’s love for Dorothy and are more likely to see the kissing as a minor mistake (especially considering she’s here to tell him and accept full responsibility less than 24 hours later), which can be forgiven and moved past without a lot of issue. Thus, the latter view sees this as an extremely sweet moment of compersion and non-monogamous love.
You’re free to interpret things that way. But what I’m seeing is not “I’m putting aside my need for monogamy” but “I’m putting aside *all* my needs*. ”
Not because he’s proposing that Joyce dates both of them. Because he’s saying “I want you to get what you want” and “You love Dorothy in a way I’ll never be able to”. He is *not* setting up himself as an equal to Joyce, he’s setting himself up as someone who accepts whatever Joyce does.
If I thought he was coming at this from a perspective of equality, from one where he knows he’s just as good for Joyce as Dorothy…well, full disclosure, I still wouldn’t like it. It would still be another instance of the story warping itself in order to give Joyce everything she wants. But it’s 100% valid to read Joe here as saying he’s OK with a secondary role.
I get exposure to stable, healthy poly relationships often. Enough to know that I don’t have the capacity to give more than one person the attention they deserve, and so I’m happily monogamous.
Healthy poly relationships have lines and standards. And I see Joe here as saying “I have no line, no standard for your behavior, Joyce”.
I don’t guarantee that that’s how this is supposed to be taken. Other readings are valid. But to be honest, the uncharitable readings of these characters that I’ve made in the past have all turned out to be true.
The core of my issue with how the past few months of the comic have gone is that Joe and Joyce’s relationship has been considered secondary to Joyce and Dorothy. And today, Joe reads to me as saying “yes, I am secondary and I accept that”.
Hence the comparison to an abusive relationship. Not because Joyce is in any way being abusive, but because people who defend their abusers willingly step into secondary roles. And that’s what I see Joe doing right now.
The problem here is that you can’t use a situation where there’s no conflict between what Joe wants/needs for himself and what he wants for Joyce to evaluate whether Joe is willing to sacrifice his own needs for Joyce to a degree that’s unhealthy.
If you assume he wants/needs a monogamous relationship or that he wants/needs some kind of serious punishment or other consequence for Dorothy and Joyce kissing before having this conversation, then yes, this probably isn’t healthy.
However, if you don’t assume those things, the opposite is true, and this is a perfectly healthy expression of compersion and non-monogamous love.
I think there’s more than enough evidence in this comic and prior ones that the latter is the case. I honestly don’t see any evidence for the former except hyper fixating on the word “match” and its comparative meaning (though cultural pressure towards monogamy sure adds a big push in that direction).
Ultimately, the best proof will be in upcoming comics if/when he clarifies his feelings in more detail.
Fuck, now Becky has to deal with Joyce dating all of her best friends except for her…
Could be why that one preview panel of a future strip where Dina looks ticked. Becky may want in on this and Dina explodes over it as she feels more the fiercely monogamous type
I think the biggest issue is that Joyce isn’t in love with Becky. Becky is never going to be that person to Joyce. But everyone else will, and that’s goons really suck.
Oh for sure
Yup, future panels show Becky with a changed haircut. Her current hasn’t changed almost since Book 6.
This points to a radical change in her personality, and I dread it will be for the worst.
I feel we got cheated out of Dorothy hitting rock bottom and shaving her head.
Don’t give up hope yet.
I mean, I don’t expect that to happen any time soon, but hope is important.
And I mean… if you’re really into the short hair or even bald look, a person can totally choose that style without bottoming out.
This is gold. Joe and Walky will fuck one day while Joyce and Dotty watch
Dear Willis: Please? My birthday is in November, you have time to arrange this. lmao
Oh, now I understand! Willis didn’t do this to keep the poly fans happy, he was just expanding the Slipshine options!
(joking, obviously)
I’d settle for that sketch someone imagined way back of Joe bench pressing Walky while Walky dips nuggets into a sauce packet on Joe’s chest.
cinema.
… joke aside, I would not mind that.
I think I squee’d so loud reading this that I woke my cat up from across the house.
Okay, cool. Sickos win.
But what about WALKY? What does HE want/get through all of this? Last I recall he wasn’t into Dorothy softballing the idea of Joyce being involved in their sex life
I bet if we let the comic happen, we’ll find out soon!
How dare people discuss what they think will happen in a comic in the comic’s discussion section.
That’s a funny way to interpret my response to that post!
How dare people not assume that they’re allowed to dictate a story that was written over a year ago, and decide to just trust the creator of the story instead?
When they got back together, he made Dorothy promise to stop talking about Joyce during the sex afterglow. So I think he might be less thrilled. Although his facial expressionsn and pseudo blush in this page and the prior might suggest otherwise. https://www.dumbingofage.com/2024/comic/book-14/04-for-me-it-was-tuesday/participant/
What about Walky?
/s
Interesting, couching Joe being okay with Joyce being polyamorous/being in a polycule/being ethically non-monogamous/what you want to call it by establishing that Joe had begun to suspect that Joyce and Dorothy shared feelings since their night of drinking does surprisingly make it work better.
Now presuming that Joyce is receptive to the idea (and I have feeling she ultimately will be (after some initial hesitation and surprise) as I feel Joyce has a lot of love for both Dorothy and Joe), I think the biggest obstacle may end up being Dorothy. I don’t know if Dorothy is going to be receptive to “sharing” Joyce with Joe.
Yeah, there’s many avenues for interesting and complex drama going on here. I’m always a fan of drama between people who generally want the best for one another!
Joe asked Joedad if he was in an open marriage when he married Stacy.
So he seems okay with that.
considering Dorothy’s entire core character flaw is her obsession with being in control of things I don’t really think she could abide having to share Joyce with Joe who she does not like and would likely not let her dictate things for Joyce
Joe at the beginning of DoA: ugh god this jerk is one note horny sexist jfc
Joe now: based based based based based based based based ba-
Right? I fully would never have expected to like Joe this much when the comic started. Good dude
Truer words have never been spoken, DoA has good male characters but Joe IS the Best Boy. No questions.
There’s still time for other boys to catch up!
And, there’s still time for other boys to get worse, too!
BAAAAAAAAHAAAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHA LETS FKIN GOOOOO
“Wait you already knew I was in love with Dorothy? Why the heck didn’t you tell me?”
“people have been telling you, you usually ignore them.”
Or get mad at Walky, I mean them.
It’s really shitty that Joyce goes, “Ugh, because it’s hot.” It’s acting like he is perverted when Joyce is the one who was cheating on him before he tried to be understanding.
Did not think about this. True, although I cut her some slack for being in a very emotionally intense situation and probably not thinking a ton about her words, but this does raise some questions. Like, how much of this is her deep-down view of Joe?
i think thats more of a nod to the audience than anything. people were calling out this possibility for the reason of “Joe’s gross, he’d like it.” It’s a way to disprove that to readers and show he has his full trust in this outcome
This completely.
Although it’s not the first time Joyce has expected Joe to be hornier than he is.
In spite of herself, Joyce often falls back on stereotypes and constructed mental simulacra of people when trying to empathize with them. It’s a good touch of characterization, not uncommon for autistic people.
Yeah…
And I mean, I do think it makes sense, but it has consistently made me feel like gosh darn it, she’s not listening to Joe as closely as she should be.
Well you see, the author just had to slip in another example of how any woman who thinks Joe’s past actions still matter is an unreasonable hysterical bongo and Joe is an infinitely forbearing saint about it. Couldn’t go five minutes without reminding the readers of that.
???
Of course they still matter. They are what prompted him to mature.
Neither Joe nor Willis deny Joes mistakes. They only suggest that Joe has learned from them and grown as a person.
Confusing Willis’s attitude towards Joe with a segment of the readership, there!
IT’S HAPPENING!!! IT’S HAPPENING!!! IT’S HAPPENING!!!
I’m so fucking excited💕I didn’t actually think it would! Main-character polyamory rep 😭
“Well we don’t actually know…”
“Dorothy still has to…”
“Walky…”
“Becky…”
I don’t care, I do not care today. Nothing is popping my balloon, even if this is temporary I’m so hype.
HOLY SHIT, I JUST SAW THIS, I CAN’T BELIEVE THE POLY-SHIPPERS HAVE COME THIS FAR! PARTY AT MY HOUSE, BRING SNACKS AND DRINKS!
Will there be a separate quiet room where i can be on my phone?
Would I be a good host if I didn’t provide such amenities to my guests? There is absolutely one of those.
Bless you
This is the way
Fortifying the pillow fort ❤️ We will be heroes at least for one day.
Nay, not a pillow fort, but a pillow feast hall! Let its soft and fluffy walls shake with our merry-making like Heorot of old!
SICKOS KEEP WINNING. I’m still processing this has happened. I cannot, fr??? OMG??? YES LET’S PARTY!!!
Even getting this far is worth celebration. I mean, we have Joe starting out a conversation about the possibility of being poly together with one of the sweetest and most emotionally mature expressions of love in the strip is just amazing even if it doesn’t end as well as many of us hope.
I CAN’T BELIEVE IT. I CAN’T BELIEVE IT. THE ONE TIME I DECIDE TO GO TO BED ON TIME AND IT’S WHEN POLYAMORY SHOWS UP WITH THE STEEL CHAIR
I actually really appreciate that this comment sat up all day and no one felt the need to run in and ruin my fun and enjoyment of this. I only got positive comments on my hype. Ty everyone, good work.
❤️
I’m a sicko now I want this to go so badly
I want Dorothy to freak out in revulsion and call out Joe.
I want Booster to drill right to Joe’s core and call him out for setting himself on fire to get scraps when he doesn’t want to share Joyce at all
Dotty’s reaction will just be a bonus
Call him out for what? Being in love and proposing something that Joyce might be interested in? Joe is doing this in a way that isn’t healthy, but Dorothy isn’t exactly the most concerned for his wellbeing.
Yes and then Joe point out how hypocritical it makes her!
Bwahahahaha.
I think I like Dorothy and Joe’s budding jealousy rivalry more than I like Joyce and Walky’s, all things considered XD
That’s the spirit!
Half kidding, but genuinely hopeful folks will find things to like here.
It feels like this is meant to be the final relationship configuration of the webcomic and they’ll live happily ever after. Not that I have any problems with that, I was just expecting this to be a lot messier, due to all the build-up.
There’s still more to the comic though (presumably) and I’m sure Willis has a few more rugs to pull out from under us. Joe could be bottling up his feelings. Walky could take it really badly, resulting in Dorothy feeling yet more shame. Amazi-girl is presumably wanted by the cops, which could throw wrenches everywhere.
Hey, they could still endure to the end, and still have things get a lot messier in the interim!
Joe you beautiful sweet brick of a man I could KISS YOU, you actually SUGGESTED it
Like I said above, party at my place for my fellow poly-shippers. Sure, for all we know tomorrow may upend it, but tonight, we celebrate, we feast, we shake the halls of Valhalla with our merry making!
AMEN DUDE! AMEN!
Oh that is not good, not good at Joe is begging and pleading to be tossed whatever scraps Joyce can give him. That felt like a knife in my stomach to read… Joyce is gonna force the breakup isn’t she, because she can see just how demeaning this is for him even if he’s pushing through, isn’t he?
I certainly hope so. Joe deserves better than staying with someone who’s been cheating on him, even if he doesn’t realize it yet.
the cute, puppy-eyed small of a demeaned and broken man.
idk why people are reading his faces as upset and sad, he looks outright hopeful in the last panel. This is not a sad strip
Yeah no all I am seeing is desperate hope, the “please don’t throw me away I will do anything”. I’ve had that smile myself, I’ve begged and demeaned myself because I was so in love that I’d accept literally anything no matter my own personal boundaries. My stomach sank when seeing it, and if it’s meant to be a “nah I can share” smile then yeah, I really didn’t see that at all.
I could not agree more that “This is not a sad strip.” Like… At worst, he’s worried Joyce won’t agree to it and nervous about navigating such complex emotional topics (he very recently thought something along the lines of “Did I just manage to navigate an emotional conversation well?”)
But more importantly, this is one of the sweetest expressions of love in the strip. No possessiveness. No jealousy. No entitlement. No desire to control and dominate her heart. Just love, acknowledgement of her feelings, and hope that he can still be close to her in the way he wants. I seriously struggle to understand how that’s “begging for scraps.”
This comments section is a really interesting look into the hearts of the readers more than anything else, I think
100% there are so many (degrees of) points of view that would not easily occur to me, or that I might not see if I just read the comic and moved on with my day, immediately forgetting the comic until the next strip.
the comments actually only suck like 1/100 days. most days the comments are pretty rad. you take the bad with the good imo
Woo hoooo! We’re getting what we want!
But why do I feel like somewhere out there, the finger of a monkey’s paw is curling…
Because we still haven’t seen Dottie tell Walky yet.
Yeah I thought Walky would be very “whatever” about it but I’m starting to suspect that will NOT be the case at all any more.
For that matter, we haven’t even seen Dottie find out yet.
So am I the only one who cackled out loud at the Junji Ito reference?
The story the original line is from is so upsetting!
It really is; Ito-sensei is the master of making completely innocuous things terrifying.
Gosh dang it
The Joe face at the end
These crazy kids just might make it work
Dorothy is gonna implode over this isn’t she? Given her own worldview of Joe is generally negative, and here he’s going to be, in her view, making her look like the unreasonable one
(I don’t think what he’s doing is healthy from his own standpoint purely because yeah he’s self deprecating and that’s not great. But let’s see how this all plays out.)
I feel like that’s resolvable though. Just because Joe and Dorothy are dating the same person doesn’t mean they have to be lovers or even be very close. It’ll be friction though. Dorothy might feel possessive (which would be really funny because she certainly would expect it to be the other way around).
Oh, certainly, it could be a hinge situation, where Joe and Dorothy don’t need to have anything to do with each other.
I’m hoping they don’t realise that.
Whoa, I didn’t think of that. Maybe Dorothy is the one who will break herself off from this.
counter-point: we get to see the inverse of Joyce’s disgust with yucky stinky inferior Walky dating her Perfect Dorothy, played out with Dorothy and Joe. That might be really funny.
Go joe!
Joe’s reaction to Joyce cheating being to stifle his trauma related to cheating and to make a heartbroken lil uwu face while asking her to “Please still notice me senpai” might be the most ridiculous thing from this comic in a hot minute.
I made a joke a while ago that this was going to turn into a Joyce-centric harem manga, and here we are.
I don’t see how “You realized you’re in love with a girl, kissed her, and then came to me to discuss it and accept the consequences less than 24 hours later” is remotely in the same ballpark as the chronic deception his dad was involved in.
I know for us it might feel like this has been a festering secret lasting over a month since in real time, the kiss happened over a month ago. However, in-comic, it was a moment of passion yesterday evening, and it’s still morning.
Do you think trauma needs a 1:1 reenactment to be triggered? Don’t be obtuse.
“Moment of passion” doesn’t cover Joyce’s actions since returning to the dorms. By her own intent, Joyce was cheating, sneaking, and prioritizing her feelings for Dorothy over whatever hurt it might cause Joe. It’s taken Dorothy repeatedly pumping the brakes for them to not have done even more before this conversation with Joe went down. Whether you’re a paladin/pro-poly/team sicko/DoJo OTP/whatever, that’s the text that we’re working with.
¯\_(‘-‘)_/¯
I mean I think it’s pretty relevant that this does not seem to be triggering Joe in any way. I don’t think the trauma worked like that for him. He very clearly identified with his dad in his parents relationship, and he has a lot of hang up surrounding his own behavior, but I don’t think it’s about being cheated on so much as about worrying about being a cheater himself.
Just the other day I was saying that his trauma has always been presented in comic as ye old “fear of becoming my asshole father”. This situation does nothing to trigger that.
The text we’ve been given is “Dorothy and Joyce kissed twice last night. Now they are telling their boyfriends and accepting responsibility less than 24 hours later.”
The worst you can say is that they’ve procrastinated some and have been “sneaky” so that they can tell Joe and Walky on their own terms. At no point have either of them even considered the idea of continuing their existing relationships while making out or anything else that involves serious long term deception.
Also, as the others have said, this doesn’t seem to be triggering Joe, which makes sense given the fact that his trauma is about his own promiscuity and its potential conflict with having a loving relationship. At no point has he expressed any kind of trauma related to other people cheating on him.
So much valid way to see the happenings.
What cheating?
People jumping on the “cheating” wagon really say more of themselves than of Joyce and Dorothy. <.<
I gotta agree.
While I am interested in the turn this comic is taking, this is a bit unrealistic.
I don’t want him to be angry at Joyce or anything, but she is not treating him right by her own standards. He is emotional intelligent enough to see that and it doesn’t seem like he values himself enough.
This comic sometimes have the issue with people being defined by their partner (currently Sal maybe even Dina, for a time this comic didn’t seem to know what to do with Dorothy post break-up) and it would be sad to see Joe being defined by Joyce, especially as a side piece
“Joe’s reaction to Joyce cheating being to stifle his trauma related to cheating and to make a heartbroken lil uwu face while asking her to “Please still notice me senpai” might be the most ridiculous thing from this comic in a hot minute.”
I mean…isn’t it exactly what Joe’s Mom would do, in the same situation? We know she did it many, many times.
Aww. I really wish it worked so well IRL when shit like this happens. But i love this for them, and for anybody else who can find more than two for whom it works
I don’t think people are really grasping onto the level of hurt being portrayed in the 5th panel. This is a guy who has been being pushed down and kicked again and again since he started school. At first it was justified over his chauvanism but now he gets kicked for trying to better himself, and now he’s in a situation where he legitimately loves someone and has to go with the knowledge that he is second place to her… That’s a really nasty kick you know…
I think a lot of people here are so invested in the idea of a poly relationship with major characters in this comic that they either don’t notice or don’t care how much this situation is hurting Joe.
Sooooo many of the people cheering for poly right now were hoping for messy poly and heartbreak. Joe’s potential distress is not a bug in this code, it is a feature.
I was cheering, and tonight I’m CELEBRATING! I know it will be hella messy! And that IS fun for me as a reader.
But also, as you know, I want my favs to be happy. Joe’s distress to me is a feature in the sense that, it HAS to be explored. This is not going to be easy, fingers snapped, BAM STABLE POLYCULE. I just, y’know, wanna believe that distress will be acknowledged, not only for me as a reader. But for him as a character… And that it will be worth it.
Exactly.
Yes, that’s fair, a lot of the poly cheering section were open about wanting the drama and the fallout. But you can also see a LOT of people in today’s comments treating this like a 100% good thing and saying Joe isn’t being low-self esteem, he’s *actually* being emotionally mature or something, and there’s nothing wrong or misguided with the way he’s approaching this.
The last two panels are ambiguous. I can see both readings, though I saw the Bad one first.
That said, a lot of folks are also just excited for Polyamory Even Getting Suggested By a Main Character. That by itself is so very very rare.
(“Bad” as in “Joe being too self-effacing”, versus a “Good” reading where Joe is saying he and Dorothy give Joyce different things, and he’s calling Dorothy irreplaceable right now, but might NOT mean he himself IS replaceable…
Not “bad” as in “wrong” or anything like that!)
…Or don’t agree with you about Joe, about the C-word and the M-word.
“I don’t think people are really grasping onto the level of hurt being portrayed in the 5th panel”
I’m looking at panel 5 and I’m just not seeing this hurt at all. He looks bashful, to lead into panel 6. I don’t think Joe’s going to have any problem with this at all because this is the Endgame Ship.
Oh, boo-hoo, he got the silver medal at the fuckin’ Olympics (not to be confused with the Fuckin’ Olympics™, which take place two hours later), what a truly horrible fate for him. Can I get some epic sadgefaces in chat for Joe “Slightly Less Shiny Diamond” Rosenthal?
Actually, I don’t think he’s experiencing the level of hurt that you seem to see because I don’t think he sees himself as “second place.” His wording is very deliberately about a different kind of love, not more/less love. Even the mouseover text is playing to the same theme: a “Dorothy hole” and thus, an implied “Joe hole.” He could never be Joyce’s Dorothy, but Dorothy could never be her Joe either.
The care with which he’s saying this combined with the fact that he’s clearly been thinking about this for a while has me thinking that he might have done some looking into how to navigate this. Most likely as far back as his conversation with Dorothy about her loving Joyce.
So I see it as nervousness about navigating a complex emotional topic and worry that she might not still want him. However, this soul crushing “second place” thing doesn’t fit with how Joe has been acting at all to me.
I’ll see if I can top my prediction of Joyce and Dorothy getting photographed kissing at the protest (and published in the news) with another bold prediction:
The drama from this newly poly relationship will not come (much) from Joe feeling like he’s diminishing himself for Joyce’s happiness. It will come when Joe starts exercising his side of this open relationship by dating Rachael, and Joyce having to deal with that.
Joe/Rachel is just not happening in this universe.
Joe/Sarah, though…
Ugh… can platonic friendships not just exist between men and women? Sarah has started a seemingly healthy thing with Tony, even if she still has to reckon with some insecurities surrounding their height difference.
Sarah standing up to Joyce for Joe in the sense of him being good / trying and undeserving of being lied to doesn’t mean she ~wants~ him…
No everyone must fuck
As recommended by Charles.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2023/comic/book-13/04-but-dont-give-yourself-away/mysake/
Not according to fandom.
Especially when the characters are hot, or played by hot actors.
When Tony’s 0% nonsense and Sarah’s some % nonsense eventually cause a difference, they split in an oddly formal manner. And then Sarah meets Arnold, the perfect match for her snark, and they live happily ever after.
Joe and Arnold can fuck until then though, Sarah and Tony are going to be together for a little while still.
Arnold is also Tommy’s older brother, from yesterday’s comment section prophecy. Unlike Tommy, Arnold is totally cool, and not a dick.
Joe and Sarah hooked up in Roomies! so that’s a no go for DoA, right?
Nope. Billy x Ruth. Mike x Ethan. Sal x Danny. I think it’s more about not repeating end games. Joe x Sarah were a great couple but I think it was short lived due to aliens.
Sal and Danny are fucking as we speak
Joe x Rachel would take a heck of a lot of development to be plausible, but we can’t entirely discount Justin8448’s track record.
i know what you meant but im choosing to read this as “they are canonically fucking at this moment in the comic, during this strip”
I assume that’s what they’re doing any time they aren’t on screen.
The drama will come from Joyce’s mom seeing the photo so that the storyline can have a villain.
The drama will come from Joyce and Joe doing a big hackneyed performance of being mono-romantic and hetero-normative to convince Joyce’s Mom, and Dorothy will have a jealousy-induced angst implosion.
*Monkey’s Paw Curls*
Just let us have this… for twenty four hours at least, ha ha.
Sounds like Joe already figured this out and came to terms with it way before Joyce did. Not stoked about how we got here, but if everyone’s happy then I’m happy for them
Nice, this is good. Hopefully the next strips(s) (minus cutaways) have them work out the details a bit. But this is a good direction overall.
POLYCULE FANS STAY WINNING
🤯😱🤯😱🤯😱🤯😱🤯😱🤯😱🤯😱
Points to Joyce for being honest with “I kissed Dorothy, and I plan on doing it again.”
So the great war between the Paladins (who wanted everyone to behave ethically) and the sickos (who wanted chaos and drama) ended with Joyce behaving unethically but no chaos and drama.
Hooray.
So you know how sometimes when you set up dominos to fall sometimes that chains into another set of dominos falling
Speaking as a trash goblin, rather than a sicko, I’m still holding out for Joe-Joyce-Dorothy-Walky-Amber.
hey, don’t leave out Amazi-Girl! She’s got the Lois Lane thing goin’ on with Dorothy!
So Walky dates Amber and Dorothy (and maybe Asher. Or Joe. Or Asher and Joe) while Dorothy dates Walky and Amazi-girl.
For example if this all works out and it’s great, imagine the Sarah reaction. Especially after the most recent conversation Joyce and Sarah had about polyamory.
Or like. Imagine a drama that consists of actually navigating polyamory like normal people but it’s difficult and work like it is for normal people and people have varying feelings and needs in that relationship and Joyce’s carelessness still needs to be addressed.
Or like. The fact that the Becky fallout is still to be seen and this eliminates the comfortable “be angry and hurt in behalf of someone else” route for her.
I know I’ve commented about serial vs archival reading before, but all those comments still stand. Give it time.
I am genuinely baffled by the people who think that Joyce being in a relationship with both Joe and Dorothy, potentially with Walky in the mix, is somehow a neat and easy solution that will result in no chaos or drama.
Yeah, that is a puzzler.
Me when the Riddler’s been talking for a while and I kinda spaced out but he hasn’t noticed and I wanna make it seem like I was paying attention
Haha, no, not NO chaos or drama. The point is that this is entertainment, and a lot of people are happily forgetting that this is a FUNNY comic. If it goes super serious and realistic at the same time, it’s no longer doing it’s job. Being RELATEABLE, sure, it can do that.
But Walky will absolutely flip his lid about this. I will be disappointed if he turns out to be as reasonable as Joe is here. The thing about Walky is that he’s been… courted by Dorothy for a while, and knows that every sticking point in this relationship has been about her requirements, her dreams, her desires. Sometimes, very clearly, her SELFISH desires.
He’s also seen the thoughtless cheating impulse rear it’s head and had to say no to it before, while he was still tied to Lucy. At this point he MIGHT despair that he only deserves complicated people with complicated needs, but I fully expect him to explode with a “WHAT ABOUT ME, DOTTY, this has always been about you, this has always been put on hold for your grades, your white knighting that you need to do better than ME, and didn’t it hurt even at the time? But now you want to SHARE? Maybe I’m done with this, then! You’ve taught me a whole stinking lot about being selfish… so congratulations, you’ve got yourself a true STUDENT of THAT going on, but this, no longer works. Some things can be shared, some other things lose their value when they’re not exclusive.”
All said, the reaction to the animosity between him and Danny was relatively non-confrontational but also, not ceding ground for it. So I’m fully EXPECTING and reveling in the chance for drama. No, it won’t be pretty perfect with a quip every six pannels. That’s the beauty of the medium for me.
Just because it looks like it will work *now* doesn’t mean it won’t get messy. Dorothy might not be cool with non-monogamy. Dorothy still has to break up with Walky. Joe might regret this decision and get jealous. Joe might be heartbroken secretly but hiding it so Joyce doesn’t feel bad, since he wants her to be happy. There is so much mess that can still come and probably will.
Joyce is behaving dramatically, Joe is behaving ethically. And this inflection point here heralds the start of chaos.
Everyone wins, and everyone loses. The story stays on top.
In fact… if Joe had broken up with Joyce, what drama would that really produce? A little initially, maybe, but after that? They’d presumably mostly stop interacting, greatly reducing chances for drama there.
Joyce wouldn’t be happy, but she came here to break up with him, so it’s no surprise — again, little if any drama; she’s already gone through angsting about breaking up with him before she even got here.
Earlier strips indicate Joe had more than minor hints that DoJo may be a thing, so while he’d be upset, he wouldn’t be blindsided by it… and, besides, what could he do about it? The healthiest thing, in that hypothetical situation, would be for him to just avoid the situation… Maybe go and mope with Roz a bit, who would likely be both sympathetic and willing to take his mind off it. Not much drama, though maybe a Slipshine.
Dorothy just checks it off the list. No drama.
Most of the drama that could come from cheating has already been milked out of the situation in advance (albeit largely by the comment section). Poly drama remains as yet untapped.
This is a really interesting comic! There are kinda two reads of it. The first is one where Joe, believing that he is never going to be able to be with joyce the way he wants, allows himself to compromise for the sake of her. This read is one where he will presumably either be rejected, or the relationship will fail.
The other read is that Joe is recognising that the type of feeling she is having for dororthy is different to the type she has been having for him, and that it has always been like that. And even before she realised it, he was happy with the relationship. Nothing has to change because this is how it has always been. This is the more optimistic read, naturally.
I think Panel 5 and 6 are really good arguments for both sides respectivley. And neither other panel really deconfirms the other. I could genuinley see it going either way.
Oh and as for why he doesn’t care about the cheating, that is made pretty clear here. It’s not that big a deal. He knew that she loved dorothy, and that eventually she would figure that out, so there isn’t any surprise here. She figured it out, decided she didn’t want to reject those feelings (which he agrees with) and then told him within a day. If you personally feel you would be more upset about it then that is fair, but I think his emotions are pretty clear and obvious.
There’s a third possibility: Joe is compromising, as the first read predicts, based on the principle that “some Joyce is better than no Joyce”, but later comes to realise that her love for Dorothy doesn’t reduce her love for him.
These are definitely the two readings of it. However, I think panel 5 has plenty of evidence that he sees the two feelings as different, neither better than the other. Yeah, his face is a bit down, but his words are incredibly carefully chosen to paint the latter picture. I don’t think a Joe who has terrible self confidence and is simply compromising would word things so perfectly. It’s “in a way that I’ll never match” not “more than I can ever match” and “that space in your heart” not “as much space in your heart.”
I think he also case less about the cheating than many commenters because in comic she had a moment of passion yesterday evening and is here to tell him about it and accept full responsibility immediately. For us, it may have been a month ago, but for them, that kiss was less than 24 hours ago.
My guesses for the rest of this conversation:
* Joyce is confused by how this would work, and Joe explains more about poly relationships.
* Joyce raises the concern of Joe’s feelings about infidelity. He explains that to him, it’s a matter of dishonesty, and that while this could have gone better, he doesn’t see Joyce as trying to hide things from him.
* Joyce expresses concern about making sure the arrangement would be fair to Joe. He admits that he’s not sure about all the specifics, but says he went into the relationship knowing it would mean sharing Joyce’s heart with Dorothy and that he’s been happy with that so far.
* Joyce says she’ll have to talk about it with Dorothy. As soon as she leaves, Joe’s expression turns nervous.
* Cut to Dorothy having a messy breakup with Walky.
[Two hours later]
Dorothy: So how did it go with Joe?
Joyce: Um…
Dorothy: Oh my god, you actually banged him, didn’t you?
Joyce: POWERFUL SEXUAL KINDNESS, DOROTHY!
Also, he’s apparently okay with you and me dating while I date him.
Something about that thematically rhymes with Dorothy constantly trying to get people to cheat with her lately. I haven’t quite figured out all the details, but there’s something in it.
Joyce: “… and he says that we can pretend that we’re still cheating if that makes it hotter for you.”
Dorothy: “We are! I’m going to seduce you away from him!”
Joyce: “Mm, it’s so hot that we’re cheating, wink wink.”
Dorothy: “Don’t say ‘wink wink’!”
Joyce: “‘Nudge Nudge, say no more?'”
Dororthy: “How do YOU even know what that is?”
Joyce: “I watched Joe and Walky say that to each other for five minutes straight. I had to look it up just to see if this was some secret man code.”
Dorothy: “I mean, how are you so sure? It could still be some kind of secret man-code.”
Joyce: “…say sike right now”
God I know this is wishful thinking but I really want Amber/Amazigirl involved in this situation, not with Joe of course Christmas was already awkward enough.
I want Dorothy/Amazi-Girl sooo bad
The look in Dorothy’s eyes when she was on the floor looking up at Amazi girl was everything.
And if Dorothy breaking up with Walky for Joyce (only for it to be poly) doesn’t shatter Walky, her then ALSO hooking up with Amazi-girl (before? after? while?) he goes to them for support… ouch!
Ooh, new twist in the polymer chain: Dorothy dumps Walky, comes back to find that Joyce has not only not dumped Joe, but does not intend to do so. Walky rebounds into Amber’s arms. Dorothy starts spending time with Amazi-Girl when Joyce is with Joe, helping her get back on her feet after her injuries, and then one night they kiss…
Joe/Joyce/Dorothy/Amazi-Girl||Amber/Walky. All the mess!
I believe that Amazigirl would prove to be a paladin of sorts, but I admire your vision.
I believe that Amazi-Girl would prove to be a paladin, but her and Amber are not the same person, so she doesn’t have much reason to be unhappy with that arrangement.
Of course she’d get permission from Joyce and Joe first. Walky, however, is not her boyfriend; he’s Amber’s.
She may be a paladin, but I don’t think she’s above petty passive-aggression against her alter ego. They’ve already escalated from Amber getting drunk and leaving A-G to deal with the hangover to A-G getting the shit beat out of them and leaving Amber to deal with the injuries.
I worry this will be another night where people will be at each other’s throats so I’ll just start my own thread.
Polyamory is a super valid way to live your life and your relationships and isn’t inferior or superior to monogamy in any way. However what Joe seems to be doing here is trying to hold onto a crumb of Joyce’s affection because she’s the best thing that’s ever happened to him and despite her cheating on him and clearly being in love with someone else he can’t and doesn’t want to imagine a world bereft of her company. This feels less like a desire for a polyamory and moreso a desire to hold fast to a relationship he fears will reach it’s conclusion abruptly. Joe doesn’t have it in him to be hurt, or betrayed. He’s only terrified. Terrified of losing her.
That’s my read.
I’m REALLY hoping Joyce has enough love to go around, that he winds up not feeling that way, eventually, if this gets off the ground.
You’re 753% correct.
Today’s strip, but it’s Richard and Karen and she’s terrified of losing him.
This is a very good take.
Also this discourse has definitely reminded me why it’s often not really fun to discuss a narrative comic that deals with issues that involves with marginalized groups. Because everyone has their guard up people will just throw out personal insults and accusations of bigotry at the the drop of a hat. When you’re not often included you will defend any hint of inclusion you can muster with your entire chest. There’s a reason why if you ask any black man over the age of 25 they will die on the Hill that Piccolo from DBZ is Black.
Joyce/Joe/Dorothy isn’t just “a ship” It’s your representation. You WANT it to happen not necessarily because it suits the characters but because if it’s in the comic you’ll feel seen. Heard. People go nuts over Joyce kissing a girl. Or for Joe to accept polyamory. And it only partially has anything to do with the characters themselves. So any argument against any of this doubles a rejection of your being. Your life. And FUCK THEM for saying you don’t have a right to exist. Which means we’re having two completely different arguments. And that makes it frustrating to engage with.
I really don’t think that’s why people have gotten mad tonight. I think that actual aggression, macro and micro, have happened repeatedly in ways that extended well beyond the narrative, and that’s why folks have their guards up. Like this is not My Representation TM, it’s just kinda fun, and I’ve definitely experienced being stressed on and made to feel second class, both in the explicit framing of my relationship style as too rare to justify normalization and implicit frames of people like me not fully loving our partners.
Like, no biggy, it’s a comment section and it’s nowhere near the worst aggression that has happened to me today in a comment section, but I really hate the kinds of minimization that happens when certain classes of Queer people (ie non cis, mono, middle class, white probably but I wouldn’t know, etc) express hurt.
Like people have actually said hurtful things! People aren’t just being hypersensitive!
Have to agree.
Yotomoe’s not necessarily wrong, but the whole issue is 100% complicated by the existence, both in the (mostly) removed comments here and the very much not removed comments on Reddit and other places that are just dripping with exactly the bigotry folks are angry about.
I’ve been on the record as saying a lot of that hostility seems to be mis-aimed at people who are in the same general place as the bigots and that’s a problem, but it’s not a big mystery WHY that hostility exists!
100% well said, Yotomoe
You’ve put to words something I have been thinking a while but did not dare try to convey for fear of messing it up. Bravo!
Yes, I get what you’re saying, and I agree with most of your assessment. But Joe has, himself, not been monogamous ever in his life. It isn’t his default or his norm. Before Joyce he slept with who he wanted when he wanted. He didn’t Love those girls, but he was intimate with them with the full expectation they would be intimate with others.
Having had to work with my partner to navigate a monogamous relationship into polyamory, there are two things here:
1. Polyamory isn’t being sold a difficult bill of goods. It is a different way of viewing and approaching love. It involves trust in the importance you have to someone and the importance they have to you, regardless of who else you or they are also seeing – that applies to each person.
2. Polyamory will always have to start as being sold a difficult bill of goods in a monogamous context though, because people in a monogamous society have been raised to believe they own one another.
I think ultimately what a lot of you may be doing is projecting your feelings onto Joe – I don’t think Joe started this assuming he’d be monogamous with Joyce, he is not jealous so far, and his solution to cheating baggage is not to hold monogamous expectations.
The thing about polyamory is yes, right -now- Joe is accepting that he is sharing Joyce’s heart with Dorothy. But Joe knows he can get girls, this is not his issue. He likely even knows he could have another monogamous relationship he could be happy in, probably. He. Loves. Joyce. And Joyce would not keep him from seeing other girls, she would not have to Own Him, meaning he could also sleep with and have other relationships, and in relationship anarchy there would not be any nest couple, they would just be allowed to take things how things go. So people acting like this is under duress and therefore unforgivable and Bad Poly: tbqh I’m pretty sure Joe expected this maybe even before starting this with Joyce and knew this whole situation would be hard for him – Including his efforts at monogamy. I see amazing clarity of what they both want in Joe, I don’t see him begging for scraps. The only problem I see here is Dorothy, who has shown a fair amount of jealousy and possessiveness over Joyce, so would need to work on a lot to be able to accept that getting Joyce doesn’t mean Owning her.
Not really a fan of the implication that Monogamy means you “own” one another but otherwise a decent read. Though yeah I don’t exactly buy into this being Joe’s intention for their relationship the entire time. Perhaps he was always open to the idea but I honestly don’t get any hint that Joe had any expectation of nonmonogamy in this particular relationship.
I don’t think it was Joe’s intention, but there being an attraction between Joyce and Dorothy certainly isn’t news to him.
I think unfortunately that’s how it kinda feels to a lot of orientation poly folks bc it’s how it would feel if someone imposed that on them. I describe the feeling of monogamy as having someone build fences around me instead of being a home I can come back to.
This is NOT how monogamous people feel about it. Monogamous people are doing something I don’t really relate to, and they’re extremely happy doing it, and polyamory would make them feel bad and unappreciated. But it’s probably worth knowing that for all the stuff monogamous folks project onto poly, many poly folks also do some projection when trying to model monogamy world and it’s about equally helpful to understanding the things they actually value. Which is to say it’s not.
I flat out disagree Joe didn’t expect this, as I discussed further up I think he’s been pretty actively wingmanning it for some time. But we’ll see.
You are one of the only commenters pointing out Dorothy is the snag in the nonmonogomy . It’s Dorothy why I think this won’t work. She has been dying Inside thinking of Joyce with Joe.
She has been dying inside thinking Joyce is off limits to her. We won’t know how she feels about poly til she tells us.
Also not fond of casting Old Joe’s behavior as non-monogamy in any sense that helps with navigating a polyamorous relationship. Having casual sex with lots of girls isn’t related to polyamory. He wasn’t jealous of who those other girls slept with because he didn’t care about them, which is completely different.
Even more, “I don’t think Joe started this assuming he’d be monogamous with Joyce, he is not jealous so far, and his solution to cheating baggage is not to hold monogamous expectations.” This trashes Joe’s entire character arc. Joe may feel, as he said not long ago, that he doesn’t have the right to feel jealous, but he absolutely intended to be monogamous. His whole deal was not being like his father. If he didn’t think he could do that he either wouldn’t have tried the relationship or he would have made it absolutely clear that it was an open relationship – which we know he didn’t since Joyce was freaked out about cheating on him.
I mean… I just don’t see what you see in the strip. I see Joe as worried he’ll lose Joyce, but I don’t see someone who is “settling” or “holding onto a crumb” or “begging for scraps” or any of the other many ways people have taken this so negatively.
I see someone expressing compersion (the opposite of jealousy, meaning a feeling of happiness when someone you love is loved, even if not by you), understanding of the importance of another person in his girlfriend’s life, and hope that he can continue to be as close to her as he is now. I also see someone who will be sad yet okay if Joyce does ultimately break things off with him.
I also see a Joe who is being either exceedingly careful with his words (likely due to research since he first realized the potentially romantic nature of Joyce and Dorothy’s feelings) or is speaking 100% from the heart and is 100% in line with a polyamorous view of the situation: valuing and respecting the love Joyce has for both of them, not seeing one as less valuable because both exist.
I also think it’s important to understand that some of the pushback when people react negatively in these situations is because there are a lot of assumptions and ways of thinking people have that can subtly impact marginalized groups. Things that are not malicious, overt bigotry yet still hurt.
It’s things like the way you say “clearly being in love with someone else” which feels like a very monogamy-centric way of thinking about the situation. Even the way it’s phrased frames Joyce loving Dorothy as an inherent challenge to Joyce’s love for Joe. Think of what it would be like if the concern was over Joe’s relationship with his sister Amber because she was “clearly in love with someone else.” It would feel really silly to see the existence of Amber’s romantic love as an inherent issue to Joe and Amber’s familial love.
Polyamorous people generally see multiple romantic relationships similarly. There’s no inherent challenge or issue here. They need to work out how the relationships interact and how any rules might need to change, but it’s not the same issue as if you’re thinking about it from a more monogomy-centric lens.
It would be relevant if Amber was slowly paying less attention to Joe, Avoiding Joe and choosing to remain distant from him in favor of her new romantic partner. At least in the long term. Some people’s relationships with their families ARE strained by romantic relationships. Joyce came here to break up with him. Maybe she felt like she had to, but even then she chose to. She placed her new thing with Dorothy before her thing with Joe.
While Joyce has been avoiding Joe lately due to her recent (less than two days old) relationship with Dorothy, that was because she was assuming monogamy as the only option and putting off the break up (because she’s immature and inexperienced with relationships). With a poly relationship, she won’t have that (flawed) reason.
We can’t reliably judge how she’ll treat a poly relationship based on a past in which she’s never been in one.
If she does end up remaining distant from Joe despite the new situation, that will indeed be a problem, and a sign of (at the very least) a failing poly relationship. This far from inevitable, though. On the other hand, this is Dumbing of Age… The poly relationship is likely to struggle, at the least. Joyce becoming distant from Joe despite the option to have both him and Dorothy is one of the possible sources for drama (though I personally think other problems are more likely).
Anyway, whatever’s happening’s happening. All we can do is wait and hope.
I mean… Last night she not only spoke with Joe but did a lot more than just “talk” with him. How is her spending the remainder of the evening with Dorothy “avoiding Joe and choosing to remain distant?”
Also, wasn’t this date the day before yesterday:
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2025/comic/book-15/04-the-only-exception/midnight/
Like, when has she avoided Joe or been distant from him? She kissed Dorothy last night, tried to talk to him later that evening, and is now here the next morning.
It’s alarming how many of you are ignoring Joe’s conversations with Roz and Rachel (and his trauma about cheating). This isn’t what Joe wanted, and this was still cheating, not ‘poly’. Joe’s just convinced himself that that’s all he deserves.
Calling people anti-queer bigots for saying that’s unhealthy is wild.
Well no, I think the people being called anti-queer bigots are having that happen because they’re being judgmental about poly relationships in general. At least, in the single thread where I’ve seen the accusation in play at all.
Literally not true at all. The person who was accused of bigotry was literally only talking about this relationship.
In a way that implied unpleasant views about polyamory in general, yes. You don’t have to say the quiet part loud to show what you’re really thinking.
I mean, it was cheating and is poly and the thing people were getting called bigots for was unambiguously about people implying that monogamy was somehow better or The Right way !9& about whether this specific relationship being healthy.
Be straight (ha) with me: is this a whipping horse, or did you misread the room?
I think it’s so considerate that you ask that when it’s very obvious which one it is.
You’re wrong.
I’m really, really not, but okay. 😙
No, I just disagree that that’s what was being implied and think y’all are ignoring context. Y’all are acting like “no, you deserve someone’s whole heart” was posted under, say, a strip about Mandy, Grace, & Sierra’s relationship which–at least as far as we’ve been led to assume–*they all wanted* and *all agreed to up front*. If that’d happened, I’d have been right there with you. But it’s completely different to say it about Joe, who *wanted* Joyce’s whole heart, got cheated on and betrayed instead, and let his regrets/insecurities (and sorta Rachel) convince him that that’s all he deserved.
What about the context where in earlier in the week in comic, Joe ripped off his clothes in front of Joyce at the offer to bang Sarah?
And Joyce shrugged it off.
That IS a thing that just happened.
What Joe wants and has been fighting for is his own internal feelings. To maintain a sense of emotional intimacy and depth despite sex. He wants all the other things he’s been skipping. But he feels like Joyce is the one for him because of the slow burn of their connection. That’s a lot to rebuild from scratch.
He’s never said he “wanted Joyce’s whole heart”. He’s trying to prove to. Himself he is trustworthy. I don’t think he feels betrayed because he just told Joyce he thinks being a wingman is the best a person can be. And Joe has wingmaned them even encouraging Dorothy to be honest with her feelings. He Expressed zero jealousy or possessiveness.
I think Joe should be taken at his word. He doesn’t want to lose Joyce and doesn’t think Dorothy detracts with what he has. ( Unfortunately I think he’s probably wrong. But because Jorothy will go unexpected places and probably will eclipse his relationship)
This entirely. Like Joe has seen this coming and had been an ethical slut uo to this point and has always had fantastic romantic communication. He even asked his father does she know you struggle with monogamy this isnt knew to him and he also knows the polycukw who lives here.
Perhaps neither Joe nor Joyce realize the place she has in her heart for him. She adores Dorothy and “wants to be her”, but she confides in Joe, Joe sees her growing, accepts her changing. Joyce shared her apostasy journey with Joe. When Joyce was distracted by the Becky’s mom’s birthday, Joe noticed, tried to figure out what was going on, and help, by talking to the people involved.
When Joyce asked, “are you that kind of friend now?” The actual answer was Yes (which he showed later in the chapter). But also he’d been that kind of friend. For months, while Dorothy’s been too busy.
She feels a stronger spark for Dorothy, but I think she’s better friends with Joe and doesn’t realize it.
“This is my best friend Joe!”
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2021/comic/book-12/01-sister-christian/goodenergy/
JOYCE
used BREAKUP!
It’s not very
effective…
Hoo boy. These characters need to learn a lot of about polyamory, and they needed to learn it LAST WEEK. Polyamory is valid, but… This ain’t it.
Leaving polyamory aside, Dorothy and Joyce have a really unhealthy power dynamic, one that doesn’t make for a stable or empowering relationship in the long term. I don’t think that Joe is thinking about it this way, but by standing still and being consistent, loving, and supporting Joyce’s self-actualization, he’s demonstrating how to be a better partner than Dorothy is capable of being (at least right now, when her core identity is spiraling).
He is too much of a himbo to think “sure, let’s try that and I’ll be here to help you pick up the pieces when she Dorothies the whole thing up,” but that’s a likely outcome.
You know it didn’t occur to me until you used her name as a verb but with her possibly getting more into activism dororthy is kind of turning into the Britta of the group.
“Dorothy and Joyce have a really unhealthy power dynamic”
Whut?
“he’s demonstrating how to be a better partner than Dorothy is capable of being”
What? Where are you getting that from? The only arguably “unhealthy” aspect of Joyce and Dorothy is that they were cheating. That’s it.
There is no actual power dynamic and have been pretty much equal since the beginning.
Yeah for some reason there are some people who think Dorothy and Joyce have an unhealthy power dynamic and the closest explanations have been “because Dorothy is like a mom to her” and “because Joyce values Dorothy’s opinion too much to disobey her” neither of which are the case. Joyce has ‘disobeyed’ Dorothy many-a-time when she feels like she ought to. Dorothy is very clearly not a mom to Joyce, as evidenced by the kissing and also they’re the same damn age.
I see where the unhealthy power dynamic people are coming from, but man it does require a leap of logic to arrive to the conclusion they are at. DOES Dorothy handle pretty much all of Joyce’s affairs? Like doctor appointments, extracurriculars, etc.? Ya she totally does. Could she abuse that power? Probably. Will she? Not without one hell of a villain arc first.
This. I get the concrrn Joyce is incredibly stunted and immature ina way dorothy isnt because of her culty hyper religious childhood but were seeing Joyce start to advance and learn fairly quick and dorothy is not abusing that dynamic though she does have of I boundary issues
I’m not joining the dogpile. There is something unhealthy with their dynamic, but it’s not “power dynamic” as is typically meant. Obviously you’re talking about their dynamic causing an unstable relationship, because that’s what you said. Not a “villain arc” or abusing power or whatever other strawman people are coming up with.
It isn’t a strawman if this commenter says ‘power dynamic’ and I respond about whether there’s a ‘power dynamic’. They have trauma rolled up into their relationship, there is indeed some unhealthy aspects to them, I just think it is important for people to not roll out the phrase ‘power dynamic’ because that’s a very specific phrase. Ruth and Billie had a power dynamic. Jason and Sal did too. Dorothy and Joyce do not.
Now the big question. Can Dorothy still occupy the space in Walky’s heart that isn’t taken up by Chicken McNuggets?
Really hoping the overemphasis on Joe’s reaction has been a misdirect and Walky is the one who’s gonna take it really badly
Joe’s self-esteem took a hit but he was prepared for this. He knows poly is a thing, he’s already been bracing for it since… who knows when, but by the time he talked to Dorothy he already had seen the writing on the wall, and decided he’d stay with Joyce if Joyce still wanted him. Like, yeah, we all can see it stung but he’s willing to try it on for size. See if they can make it work.
David “best I can aspire to is being her boytoy” Walkerton, “self-esteem in the negative numbers” Walky? Oh, this’ gonna wreck him.
Definitely. I hope he gets angry! I hope he yells and shouts.
I hope that he and Dorothy do have a major breakup. I like Walky with Amber. They enjoy the same things (Games, junk food, superheroing, garbage roof) and Amber needs someone to keep her even and give her love.
There is such a space?
The space has a type.
Willis, I am begging you to take the spy camera out of my bedroom
Joe is too good for this world and I am so happy for him and Joyce and Dorothy right now 🥹
Gotta say I really don’t see this being an unhealthy thing for Joe? I see a lot of talk about him doing this because he’s so hurt by his parents issues and desperately trying to keep Joyce in his life. But what *I* see is an emotionally mature young man who knows what he wants and is asking for it, and is ready to accept the answer. If he has feelings for Joyce and knows she has feelings for him…how is that any less healthy than them dating in the first place? And even if he is expressing some holdover things from his parents – why is that a dealbreaker? Why is that not something they can talk about and work through? Like this has been cooking between them since she was a brainwashed Christofascist and he was willing to support her growth then. Was that also unhealthy for Joe to do?
Sometimes learning to be healthy means taking the chance to go for what you want and being hurt by it because you learn from it. Even if this doesn’t work out, I don’t think he’s wrong or inherently unhealthy for wanting to keep his place in Joyce’s heart. Maybe he’s making a mistake, but nobody is perfect at relationships when they’re in college.
Honestly, I think some cultures have been so inundated with the idea that a person can only ever have love and devotion to one person that anything challenging that is hard for people to hear. It’s never made sense to me.
But that’s just my .02 please argue with me by sending donations to Doctors Without Borders, that would make me soooo mad and prove you are right and I am wrong
I had basically the same feeling. This is super emotionally mature and extremely sweet in my eyes, and it’s just baffling to me how people are spinning it into such a negative thing. Like, is monogamy-centric socialization really *that* powerful?
Not to be like “damn, the autistic exvangelist comic’s commentariat is autistic and exvangelist” but some of y’all have unbelievably rigid standards of ethics about how Healthy Relationships are Supposed to go
It isn’t even the “unbelievably rigid standards of ethics about how Healthy Relationships are Supposed to go” that is the issue, it is the assumption that everyone else must and ought to have the same ” unbelievably rigid standards of ethics about how Healthy Relationships are Supposed to go”. I mean…. I know there are people who have “unbelievably rigid standards of ethics about how Healthy Relationships are Supposed to go” and I know there are people who think people can actually cast off a lot of the imposed rules of society and things will still work. And many other positions on things.
I don’t have “Unbelievably rigid standards” of what other people should think! We are all different. Huzzah. Thank goodness for that.
Okay, thing is, I don’t think Dorothy would be fine with that.
Yes, well, that’s Future Joyce’s problem.
Dumbing of Age is probably the last place I would ever expect a Junji Ito reference, and yet here we are.
The last place I expected one was Steven Universe. A reference in a web comic aimed at adults who may have read the comic makes more sense.
I think that this was a very emotionally mature side of Joe, understanding and talking through his feelings and what he wants. Season one Joe could NEVER.
I do take a little issue with some of the stuff on Patreon and kinda on the main site yesterday that gave me the vibe that Joe not being angry is what’s emotionally mature here and – no. Joe would not have been immature or wrong if he’d been angry, even if he’d yelled at Joyce (I’m thinking yelling ‘what the FUCK? We’re done, now get the hell out of my room’ or something along those lines before anyone jumps to conclusions about what I mean by that). Yelling at someone who did something hurtful to you is not immature, emotionally or otherwise.
I am really curious how this is gonna go. I think Joe means what he says but I also think some of it is coming from a place of low self worth and that’s rarely a good place to start a relationship. That’s also not even getting into Dorothy and potentially Walky’s reaction.
This is gonna be so much fun.
Yeah, I understand not liking that vibe. That vibe was a little hovering around and it does suck. It’s okay to get mad and to be angry, even if the anger is wrong, it doesn’t make you evil. Joe would not have been evil if he was upset.
The rest of it, well; you know I already co-signed that 🤣
Yeah, there’s lots of times anger can be wrong but not evil like if you snap at someone for being ‘a little annoying but usually tolerable’ because it’s been a long day full of irritating things. “Angry because girlfriend cheated on you” is entirely reasonable. Sure, he could’ve been a dick in this hypothetical scenario but he also could’ve just as easily just gone ‘GTFO and lose my number’ which would be fine.
Now as for what happens next – well, that’s the fun part. 😉
As a cis guy I often have to temper my anger because I feel the second I get angry or shout or mad I’ve basically lost.So I tend to hold back my emotions and try to deescalate.
My greatest fear is being perceived as unhinged, beastly or dangerous so I always try to be on my best behavior and consequentially let people walk all over me. I’m not saying Joe shoulda gotten violent but he woulda been. I dunno…justified at being angry and even yelling at her. Even if that wouldn’t be the most “mature” thing to do.
For what it’s worth, that’s not just a thing for cis guys (as illustrated in https://www.dumbingofage.com/2016/comic/book-6/03-when-god-closes-the-door/prevented/ and discussed beneath it).
Same ailment, different poison.
Different in that women are less often viewed as dangerous, certainly, so there’s less of a need to compensate by letting others take advantage of you*. Sorry, hope it didn’t seem like I was trying to dismiss your point — it’s entirely valid. Some people will use whatever they can to help them take advantage of others, or make them look bad, or whatever else suits their purposes.
* Of course, often, a woman refusing to let herself be taken advantage of, even without displaying anger, results in her being regarded as a bongo. Everyone gets to be treated unfairly. What fun!
Just wanna say: what you’re describing is a real problem and it sucks.
It’s especially a problem for cis guys who are (like Joe and myself) relatively gigantic — ANY sign of anger on me is rated significantly more scary by most by virtue of the fact I’m a 250lb ex-linebacker — or who have other attributes (like being non-white) that causes idiots to rate their anger as relatively more dangerous.
A LOT of my readings of Joe’s emotions are colored by that knowledge that “He’s of a size and musculature that he likely KNOWS he’s not ‘allowed’ to get angry, and that might have a bearing on how he’s performing his emotions.”
Yep. There are certain privileges that make you less likely to be read as “dangerous” instead of “strong and capable”, but. Plenty of disprivileges that do the exact opposite.
It really does matter. You learn from a very young age, to treat yourself as a threat, because if you’re big enough at a young enough age, you actually can hurt your peers, completely by accident. We, as a society, simply do a terrible job of predicting the trauma from this outcome, and giving young men the tools to unpack that trauma.
In my particular case, it definitely did not help that one of my set of little mental illnesses is Intermittent Explosive Disorder (along with Major Depressive. College was FUN with those two living in my head, especially because the depression almost completely masked the IED until I got treated, then I briefly because the kind of dude who literally flipped a table, and back to the pshrink I went.)
I am thankful literally every day that I’m one of the people for whom consistent CBT/DBT “just works”, as it’s now been over two decades since I’ve thrown a piece of furniture for a stupid reason.
I think “Joe accepting this shows he’s emotionally mature” is the intended read. Joe really is 100% fine with this and the fact that he’s 100% fine with this is meant to show his emotional growth. Willis has been very open about Joyrothy being the endgame ship and thus it’s going to be the happy one.
The people who are upset with that comic are the people who are upset with that read from either a “cheating is wrong and shouldn’t be normalized” perspective or a “I wanted Jerry Springer and instead I’m getting Questionable Content” perspective. Personally I don’t really care if Joyce is “ethical”, she’s not real, but everyone being mature and accepting does kind of feel anticlimactic. But, like, Questionable Content is popular for a reason, people like seeing queer relationships portrayed as positive and happy. I’m a big “Chaos!” guy but they’re not invalid for wanting that.
I think the WAY Joe accepts it is emotionally mature – thinking through and talking through his feelings is a great step! I don’t think Joyrothy being the planned endgame* means that Joe would be immature if he HAD been angry he was cheated on, even if other people might think so. For whatever it’s worth, I don’t think Sarah was meant to be immature for yelling at them for cheating so I don’t think that that’s what Willis would’ve gone for IF he had chosen for Joe to be angry.
I’m not really ‘upset’ they’re working it out but I stand by saying this feels anticlimactic after all the build up for ‘this is gonna really upset Joe’. It feels too early. Of course, that assumes his proposed poly relationship goes smoothly, if it goes at all. If a narrative isn’t meant to involve big, comic blowing up drama, that’s fine, but I get a little put out if there’s all this talk of big drama and no big drama emerges. 😛 Now thankfully I don’t think that will be the case.
And for sure! There’s nothing wrong with wanting positive, happy queer or poly or queer AND poly relationships. There’s lots of other kinds of conflict a strip can have besides that. I am a drama craving goblin who wants mess but it doesn’t specifically happen to be relationship mess. As I said, my issue is that this was described as blowing up the comic and well….where was the kaboom? There was supposed to be a comic shattering kaboom! (And there probably is one coming, I still smell dynamite).
I don’t know y’all I just don’t buy that anyone could possibly
I’m glad the comments are being SUPER normal about this.
The normalest.
The comment section right now is
* 90% “Everyone is happy, this is great”
* 5% “Joe is unhappy, this sucks”
* 5% “Everyone is happy, this sucks”
I’m on that last group, but mine is clearly the minority opinion and this development is being met with overwhelming praise from the comment section.
I mean, we don’t actually *know* if everyone is happy yet?
We don’t know if Joyce wants two lovers. We don’t know if that’s a thing she feels comfortable with or wants to have. She likes Joe, and Dorothy, but some people are just monogamous by nature.
And even if she’s about it, that doesn’t mean *Dorothy* is. She might want an exclusive relationship. It’s clear from the way she’s been talking that she *expects* one. Until we know how she feels about this, we haven’t actually found a resolution.
If Dotty isn’t into the idea, and Joyce comes back saying “Joe says he’s okay with me dating both of you, is that okay?” then that puts Dorothy in the position of either accepting a romantic dynamic she might not be okay with, or it puts the responsibility of breaking up Joyce and Joe unfairly on Dorothy’s shoulders. Which puts an *immediate* strain on their relationship.
And suppose Dorothy IS fine with it. Suppose she’s conceptually okay with the notion of Joyce dating both of them. At this particular moment, most likely, the girls have split up in order to go break up with their respective boyfriends. Dorothy is probably talking to *Walky* right now. She might have, at this moment, already broken up with him. There may have been tears! We don’t actually know how he’ll react, but unless he’s made the same suggestion to Dorothy that Joe made to Joyce, there’s a good chance that Dorothy’s first thought when Joyce asks is going to be “well then what did I break up with *Walky* for??”
It’s one of the reasons why this kind of thing working out is so *rare,* because it’s actually really hard to *enter* this kind of situation in a way that is fair to everybody. There is a possible world state where this works out and everybody’s happy, but it isn’t actually very probable. A definite majority of people *want* exclusivity in a relationship. Having four that don’t is pretty unusual. Does that mean it’s not going to happen? Not necessarily. But it’s certainly not a given that it is going to.
I mean, we don’t know everything is going to work out, but this did just defuse one of the big probable dramatic fallouts from the cheating.
I’m over at “This is going to crash and burn spectacularly, this is great”
Oh this is going to end SO badly, and I am delighted.
This makes me really like Joe.
*subreddit’s collective heads explode*
HOW DARE THESE YOUNG PEOPLE LEARNING WHO THEY ARE TRY AND DISCOVER WHERE THEIR LIMITS AND BOUNDARIES ARE INSTEAD OF JUST BEING ANGRY AT EACH OTHER?
Glorious
I feel like Becky and Joe are going through something very similar right now (per panel five of this strip: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2025/comic/book-15/03-me-and-who-you-say-i-was-yesterday/masc-2/)
(that said, I’m happy about today’s strip, in general. I’m on team Joyce-hinge, and this is literally just the BEGINNING of this conversation, so I’m happy to give them all time to work things out)
*FOUR, PANEL FOUR =_=
i do like that this was perfectly well-established as something joe had in his conceptual space, when he asked his dad if he’d told amber’s mom that he needed an open relationship. joe isn’t determinedly monogamous, and that’s not just from slutting around, that’s been a component of how he talks about more durable relationships for ages
SICKOS STAY WINNING HELL FUCKING YES!!! I feel high. I feel drunk. This will be SO STUPIDLY FUN TO EXPLORE, ups and downs and everything in between!!!
It’s started messily. Nobody involved has done anything like this before. It originated in, yes, cheating. Joyce has hangups. There’s unexplored tension between Dorothy and Joe. Joe is somehow being the most mature one while also being a martyr. All of them are stupidly young, wounded, and have so, so much to learn– assuming it’s doomed?? BY DEFAULT?? FAM! These are gourmet ingredients, let Willis cook omg!!!
(Goddamn, I love Joe. He’s grown so much, what a beautiful man fr, he deserves all the happiness in the world.)
FRIENDS, SCHOLARS, PEOPLE OF THE JURY. WE’VE GOT CANON MESSY POLY REPRESENTATION and I’m incredibly excited to see what the fuck comes out of this narrative choice.
Well said and excellent choice of avatar
Thank you!! Yours is super topical too ;33
It’s so good, it’s that lottery win I’ve talked about, it’s so so good
Funny Patreon story: I slept through the initial update over there and was greeted with like three comment threads declaring my total cultural victory and I’m like I WON???
Okay that was actually the strip before this one, but still. STILL.
THE SATISFACTION. Congratulations, friend!! 8DD
At this point I really need to just stop reading the comments for a bit. The absolute absurd level of digging into the minutiae and predicting what will happen in a conversation which, in real time will take a few minutes, is kinda driving me bonkers (and yes I know that I have participated in it too). I think I need to just take a break for a couple weeks from the comic entirely, then catch up when this whole conversation exists in one chunk.
oh yeah totes if this is stressing you out thats what i usually do at least when it comes to reading the comments
noah fence to anybody i like reading peoples thoughts but this comic updates literally every day man
Panel 4: Dang, Joe. You are really good at getting BJs by now seeming to ask for them. Props, dude. Props.
*not
i actually headbutted my screen so hard, he’s so adorable
I FUCKING KNEW IT!
GO JOE!
The very first emotion I felt about this was pity. Then I got sad because Joe’s face in the 3rd panel looked heartbreaking.
I wonder if part of this is desperation. Like, it’s not so much that he’s OK with it all but he’s willing to put up with it because he’s on that whole “I Want My Beloved To Be Happy” thing which just… brings on my pity.
That’s our Joe, always occupying the space women have for him…
I don’t like Joe saying that Joyce “loves Dorothy in a way that I’ll never be able to match”, it feels like he’s selling himself short! They both offer Joyce different things, even aside from being man and woman!
“They both offer Joyce different things”. So, you’re saying they don’t match?
Ok, maybe Joe is selling himself short here, but I’m pretty sure Joyce isn’t going to love him any less than she used to.
I do kind of agree where you’re coming from, but only because I’ve seen the arguments that come from the other direction, which is where bisexuals get a lot of suspicion that they’re gonna cheat on their partner sooner or later because “I can’t offer what the other gender does”, which is TOTALLY the wrong way to think about it.
I think the key is he says “in a way that I’ll never be able to match” not “to a degree I’ll never be able to match.” The words seem extremely carefully chosen to be different kinds of love, not greater or lesser love. This was likely due to a lot of care and research on Willis’s part, but in-universe, it means either Joe has been doing his research so he could understand and talk about these feelings or he’s speaking a very sweet declaration of non-monogamous love directly from the heart, which happens to be in a very good place.
See to me if Willis wanted to convey that he shouldn’t have used that line at all. To me “never be able to match” or “I can’t match that” is used to say “I can’t get up to that level”. Now I have no idea if this is some cultural difference but I’ve never heard that phrases used to mean “same but different”. Which is really where I’m getting the impression Joe is indicating he isn’t as valued. So you’re saying it doesn’t indicate greater or lesser when to me that’s exactly what it means. So we’re left with opposite understandings of Joe’s feelings.
Looking forward to future strips where I presume we’ll get some clarification.
I suppose I can see “I can’t match that” being about comparisons, but I feel like that reading still requires you to completely ignore everything else strongly pointing in the other direction to focus in on that one bit of phrasing.
And yeah, I’m sure we’ll get some good clarification on Joe’s feelings very soon.
I love that Joe’s good with it, and really being clear with his feelings, but I have a feeling Dorothy’s not gonna like this solution. I HOPE she does, but idk. It’s part that she doesn’t like Joe (and she doesn’t have to, to be with Joyce, but I could see it grating at her) and part that like, she’s given up a lot for Joyce, directly or indirectly, and while I don’t think she resents her, I dunno that she’ll love Joyce saying she’s not all in on her (Dorothy).
(I also do recognize that you can be all in with more than one person, but even if Dorothy knows that logically, I don’t know that she’ll FEEL that way)
It’s going to be great when Dorothy is the one who sabotages this
FUCKING FINALLY. So in case anyone else is wondering what Joe was referencing today, here’s the strip in question: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2024/comic/book-14/04-for-me-it-was-tuesday/flush/
Also man, “I don’t get to be jealous” definitely sounds like unhealthy territory. Also in the process of finding the strip I ran into a lot of other Joyce/Dorothy/Joe strips and man this has been getting foreshadowed for a damn long time in retrospect.
I don’t think the jealousy comment is that unhealthy. I think it’d be more unhealthy to be jealous of a partners friends and of them spending time together. Folks need their friend space. If Joe looks a little sad about it, then I think he’s mostly just remembering his past actions objectifying people and being as shallow as possible. He doesn’t get to be jealous because that would be both wrong and hypocritical of him.
Not being jealous is not unhealthy.
Saying “I don’t get to be jealous” implies he is, but he’s repressing it because that would be, as you say, both wrong and hypocritical of him.
That’s not going to work in the long run and has implications for his choice in today’s strip.
Long foreshadowing is right. One of my favorite Joe strips is when the universe ‘beanballs’ Joe and his instinctual reaction is ‘this is someone I want to change for’
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2011/comic/book-1/03-men-are-from-beck-women-are-from-clark/dress/
MY USERNAME FINALLY PAYS OFF
WE
JUST
KEEP
WINNING
CONGRATS TO YOU
If I may ask: How long have you had it?
JOE!JOE!JOE!JOE!JOE!JOE!JOE!
(Joyce will not be able to process this easily I’m afraid… :P)
“You’re saying that we can choose to love and we don’t have to hurt ourselves? I dunno, that sounds fake.”
Joe is proposing a compromise. Dorothy LOVES compromising, right? She’s going to shoot this idea down so fast.
She said it herself – she wants Joe to ‘check out’ when it comes to Joyce so she can ‘check in’. She won’t be keen on ‘sharing the room’.
In high school I was cuddling with my boyfriend in his bed, door open, and his older sister jumped into the door frame and goes, “No compromising positions!”
And I hugged him and said, “Aw why not? Everyone gets what they want with a compromise, right?”
She screeched and ran out and still gets mad when I bring up compromises (and this was 20 years ago)
Be honest, was it a “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” screech or more of a “howling of the banshee” kinda deal? 😆
Howling banchee meets a Peanuts-esque “Aurg!”
boo! hiss! Willis blew up this strip for drama, so where’s the drama?
I’m hoping it’s coming. The usual sort of breaking up for cheating has been done many times in other fiction. Messy poly? Not so much. May last much longer, too.
The drama is in the comments section.
Bingo. We have a winner.
Is it possible that everyone (in and out of the strip) except Joe is overthinking this? It’s normal, especially among young people, to casually date multiple people before committing to one (or more). Granted, Joyce does nothing casually, but there ya go.
Orrrrrrrr it could be a first step to a V-type polyamorous situation. Who knows?
That’s what I thought, but people have been telling me that’s no longer done..
It is still done and I haven’t seen anyone saying otherwise and a lot of people correcting statements like this.
But the real point is Olofa’s “Joyce does nothing casually”. Is there any indication anywhere that Joe or Joyce are treating their relationship as casual?
Some commenters were so ready to toss the “cheating” accusations and claimed so much ethos superiority over these 2 characters – when, the whole thing was just 2 young women realizing they are loving each other (something they were never going to accept themselves without outside forces) and then deciding to not take any more serious steps till they talk to their relation(situation)ships.
The HORRROR!!!!
(Ye i think there has been some overthinking in the comments during the last weeks…) 😛
A cuckholded Joe was not where I thought this was going to go.
Worthless concept. Best to erase it from your mind and move on.
But what about those with cuckhold fetish? This is discrimination! Kinkshaming! /j
I’d have more sympathy if they were expressing their chokehold fetish.
I mean I guess that slipshine could be hot
This isn’t what that word means, goodness.
Just here to say if you told me I’d relate to a Joe strip genuinely a couple of years or so ago, I’d blow you up on the spot
Anyway, popcorn time!
I’m befuddled cuz I didn’t expect this from Willis.
Joe is being incredibly brave with this relationship. Joyce isn’t just his first girlfriend, I’m pretty sure she is his first friend that is a girl. Those are the best relationships that start when two people are friends.
I just explained why the polyamory symbol is a pi sign to my buddy, “Because love is infinite and irrational.” I also stole that from a meme I read about chronic pain conditions rating 3.14 on a doctor pain scale because it is irrational, not very big, but never ending.
Joe has been with many, many women. He had a flippant and pessimistic view of relationships and dating. Healthy and respectful about consenting sex, but very down on anything long term.
> Joyce has made him feel worthy of more. Of better. For the first time he’s been in love and not just horny, teenage lust.
> Joyce has had a lot of lust for men, but for the most part, very little towards women (Sal being the only other example I can think of off the top of my head). She was friends with Dorothy first.
> Dorothy is a good relationship foil to Joe because Dorothy has also put Joyce on a pedestal and said that Joyce makes her want to be a better person.
Joe is patient, Joe is kind, Joe is love. Joe isn’t bothered because when he is around Joyce he feels safe and valued. He doesn’t think Dorothy is a threat, because he trusts Joyce. Joyce didn’t cheat on Joe because Joe has told her that he trusts her with Dorothy. Blame it on teenagers (young adults? I was 19 by this point my freshman year of college) not explicitly explaining things or on Joyce’s Evangelical shame or neurodivergency on not understanding. I know I struggled to realize my partner really trusted me and wasn’t upset if I wanted another partner because they’re asexual. For many years I took it as that meaning they didn’t love me, but they’ve actually been the most emotionally mature and confident person I’ve ever been with. That counts for a lot more than the possessive cishetnormative monogamous relationships I’ve been in before.
Based Joe momence
I can see this still breaking bad w Dorothy clinging to a requirement of exclusivity the same way she did to heterosexual identity, but if that happens I still look forward to the three of them having a V-shaped relationship in 2032 when Dorothy gets over herself and apologizes
Also REALLY looking forward to the arc in 2087 when Dorothy and Joe transition; I’m a big Saul/Joyce/Dinah shipper in my 90s
O-KAY! I did not see this coming. Hm. Well, assuming Joe is really OK with it, all the more power to them. Now to see if Dorothy is equally OK with sharing Joyce… (And possibly Walky too? Because there’s still the possibility at least one heart gets broken.)
tHAT’S ADORABLE. wEIRD, BUT ADORABLE.
YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This is among the sweetest, most wonderful expressions of love I’ve ever seen. No possessiveness. No jealousy. Just love.
sigh
I dont know how i feel about this.
I’ll take a guess. You feel melancholy and a little bit responsible. You don’t know why you feel it’s partially your fault this has happened, but your heart is telling you it has something to do with the place this all began. You feel like you need to go back there, that she’ll be waiting for you somehow, that she’ll help you make sense of all this.
Taffy what is this from? It sounds so familiar but nothing comes up on searches of any part of what you said.
I made it up.
:^0
It does have Silent Hill 2 vibes though, reading it after sleeping.
Morningstar, are you James Sunderland IRL?
Never looked at Silent Hill 2 (or 1) but it has a very noir feel.
The remake is really, really good.
…the alt text, tho
This reminds me of the closing scene from Casablanca when the Inspector says to Rick, “Yes she went with him, my friend, but she knew you were lying”.
Joe’s obvious in love with her but won’t make that claim on her.
A bit sad, he is resigning himself to the fact that he can’t be everything Joyce loves.
that explains why joe has been looking kind of emotional when seeing dorothy and joyce hanging out
Ha I friggin called it.
Walky is gonna be less preceptive
I genuinely did not expect “never read the comments” to apply to the actual site of the comic itself, and yet here we are.
This is genuinely sweet. Joe actually loves her.
And thusly was the Joyce polycule born.
Sickos stay winning i guess
“Ran so hard from being his dad that he became his mom,” was a quote from the subreddit I liked.
I think I’ll pass on the drama for today.
I do love Joyce’s face in panel 4, though. He really touched her, and not in the sexy times way.
(Own current emotional state: Peaceful, relaxed, soothed. From this grows curiosity about Dorothy’s and Sarah’s reactions.
Gratitude to another comment for linking https://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-5/02-threes-a-crowd/exclusivity/ regarding Dorothy and polyamory.
While disapproving (of character/s, not author!) regarding actions taken while perceiving them as infidelity, this gentle resolution of them is happier to witness than a train wreck would have been.
Introspecting, I note that having experienced Danny’s reaction/s to Dorothy-Walky I have little curiosity either way about Walky’s reaction/s to Dorothy-Joyce, though I would be amused if this ends up bringing about Walky-Joyce again in polycule form.
I’m probably forgetting someone significant and look forward to witnessing future developments.
Joe does, “Rank wing-personness as the number one quality someone can have.” I’m thinking that these guys might just stumble and fumble their way to something healthy and happy.
Looking forward to Walky and Joe becoming buds and hanging out together. Lots of potential in that.
I think what ends up happening here is Dorothy is no longer with Walky but Joe and Joyce stay a thing
For all the polyamory fans I see cheering and arguing in the comments…
One question. What does Dorothy think? Does she want to share Joyce (with Joe)?
Too bad if she doesn’t, that’s not her decision to make.
I mean, she could give Joyce the “him or me” ultimatum, that’s definitely her decision to make.
Yeah I think people are weirdly discounting Dorothy’s agency in this situation? She doesn’t like Joe to begin with, and she’s not obligated to enter into a poly dynamic with Joyce and him if that’s what Joyce decides she wants. She can decide that being poly is a bridge too far, or specifically being poly and involving Joe. She mentally equates Joyce being with Joe with her losing Joyce, and she may not get over that in a poly dynamic because those feelings are so tangled up with her untreated PTSD. Assuming Joyce is on board, Dorothy is the wild card here.
idk, I see a LOT of people specifically assuming Dorothy will blow up about this, not only today and yesterday but every time the topic of a potential poly situation has come up. I don’t think anyone’s discounting her.
That’s not the issue, it’s people like the above acting as if she somehow just doesn’t get a say.
…Are people saying that? We’re coming up on 800 comments, so ABSOLUTELY possible I’ve missed a thread, but mostly I’m seeing: “I don’t think Dorothy’s gonna be on board for this!” and “Dorothy’s going to make Joyce choose!” and the like.
IDK, I think this is like the earlier idea that Joe was being denied a say in whether or not Joyce dates both him and Dorothy. The answer is the same in both cases: they get a say in whether or not they want to be part of that relationship, but not in whether or not it happens without them.
e.g., Joe had every right to break up with Joyce, but no right to forbid Joyce from being with Dorothy; Dorothy likewise has every right to break up with Joyce, but no right to forbid Joyce from staying with Joe and trying polyamory with someone else.
That is not what was said, this is misreading a poly talking point, which fair enough for people not in the cmmunity – Dorothy doesn’t get a say in whether Joyce and Joe are a thing, because Dorothy can only set boundaries for herself. There is not an option where Dorothy gets to make Joyce dump Joe, *that* would be relationship ending, if not eight away then at some point in the future. It’s also potentially hinted at, with Dorothy’s need to Be The One doing everything for Joyce, and her clear difficulty coping with Joyce going off with Joe.
Exactly!
“There is not an option where Dorothy gets to make Joyce dump Joe”
That would be Dorothy trampling Joyce’s agency (again).
If Dorothy wants Joyce all to herself, she has three options:
– Wait it out until Joyce dumps Joe on her own (which she may never)
– Manipulate them into breaking up (full villain Dorothy)
– Give the “him or me” ultimatum (never make an ultimatum unless you’re willing to follow through with both outcomes)
IIRC Dot is also poly.
I don’t know what Dorothy thinks, but either way, it’s cool that this conversation is happening. In so much of media, it would be a simple, “Oh, you kissed someone else? We’re through.” Or it would be “Well, you love her, so yeah, we’re breaking up.” It would be 100% pure presume monogamy with no acknowledgement that anything else is even a possibility.
Regardless of how it ends, the fact that a character is expressing very non-monogamous love and asking for a non-monogamous relationship is awesome. It’s like how Becky kissing Joyce and coming out was a great moment even if it didn’t end with the two of them together.
I’m also sure that what Dorothy thinks will be brought up very soon in the conversation, and that if Joyce is willing, they’ll immediately discuss it with Dorothy. At which point I hope Dorothy is cool with this, and I don’t feel like it would be out of character for her to be. It’s very possibly she’s read about polyamory and will immediately be fine with it. It’s also possible that it’ll take some time or that she’ll try and it won’t work or that it’ll blow up.
It’s all still way better than the presumed-monogamy version where this possibility isn’t even brought up or addressed.
Dorothy disappears for a week (in-comic time). When she reappears she has three copies of a 300-page Non-Monogamy Draft Agreement outlining everything from the name of the group-chat between the three of them to how to divy up walking-Joyce-to-class to handling birthdays to various elaborate “In the case of…” scenarios for e.g. if there’s a movie all three want to see, or if they’re all in the same room when one starts feeling frisky, or…
Joe “cheating sucks and I hate it” Rosenthal just suggested poly as a way to patch over cheating.
He’s got it bad for Joyce.
That’s a lot of footwear being tossed up on that high shelf that’s not particularly well-attached to the wall. Gravity always wins, so they say.
Meanwhile, I’m in awe that some of the folks here are so hellbent on this thing happening that they disclaim even the possibility that panel five Joe is essentially resigning himself to second place.
Genuinely a little wild how many people are insisting that “you love Dorothy in a way I can never match” cannot possibly be interpreted as Joe devaluing himself
Yeah, I’m avoiding entire swathes of thread today just based on some people seemingly deciding that thinking any objections to what’s happening here are coming from “oh you don’t understand poly!”
It’s as myopic as the people who have this weird insistence that “if you never discussed exclusivity, in college in the US in 2025, no matter what the cultural context is or how you’ve been acting it can’t possibly be exclusive” despite the fact that at least some of the participants have been calling things “cheating”, and “cheating” can ONLY be sanely defined by the participants in a relationship!
That particular brand of commenter is definitely one of the odder ones in this discourse.
The other that that amuses me about it is that Willis has specifically talked about writing a cheating arc and this strand of the comments are determined to insist he was wrong and he didn’t actually write about cheating.
Which suggests to me that he didn’t go far enough with it. 🙂
He didn’t
He might not have. We’re still in the middle of the arc, and Joe and Joyce aren’t the only people involved in the cheating.
Hell, it’s still not even ruled out that Joyce shuts this down — although I suspect she won’t be the one to do it, that panel four face might well be her “Holy shit, everything DOES work out if you just believe really hard and have good intentions” fundie program coming back online back in the brainstem.
“Anything is okay in the name of true love” preconceptions MAINTAINED.
It really depends on his goals. If his goal was to have long term deception, devastating emotional pain, and the relationship equivalent of nuclear bombs, yeah, he didn’t go far enough. If he wanted to tell a story of a messy transition from one relationship configuration to another that involved mistakes, some hurt, forgiveness, and some funny shenanigans along the way, this feels about right.
Both of these could be reasonably called a “cheating arc,” but they are very different.
I reaaaaally think people are just reading the last two panels differently, not being “hellbent” on pretending it says something it doesn’t say.
And that goes for both sides.
I can personally see both readings, though I saw the “Joe’s hurting and sad and martyring himself” reading first.
Mind you: this might be me overreacting to wording.
It’s definitely the same exact issue I had yesterday with the idea that people are “bending over backwards” to defend Joyce’s cheating. Both wordings, to me, imply cognitive dissonance and denial: that if the “other side” were honest with themselves, they’d agree with us, and they’re just determined to explain away the obvious truth of our position.
Which, again, is definitely going both ways today. Lots of “I can’t BELIEVE some people are pretending Joe is unhappy”, too.
I’ll be clear:
– it seems like MOST folks can see both readings, even if they have a preferred one
– there are a couple people I have seen today who were HOSTILE about the idea that anyone could imagine Joe is sad/hurting/self-sacrificing here
Yes, there are. There ARE also people who are hostile about the opposite. It’s a pretty hot topic, I think, especially for folks who strongly identify with Joe here, either as someone super excited and hopeful for Wholesome Poly OR as someone who’s been cheated on and either tried this or was tempted to try it in desperation.
The confusion applies equally from the other side. I was baffled to see people interpreting his words as “second place” rather than “two different places in her heart” (especially considering the latter is the literal verbiage used by Joe twice and referenced in the mouseover text).
I think it boils down to the fact that there’s enough ambiguity that your own preconceptions and feelings about relationships can fill in the blanks to strongly point in one direction or the other.
Here’s hoping Joe clarifies in the next comic or two.
To be perfectly honest I have never once seen the specific phrasing Joe uses to mean “two different places.” “Can’t match up” always means “can’t LIVE up.” Not as good. Second place. It’s not about my preconceptions about relationships, I’m a tranny dyke living in a major city, I’m surrounded by polyamorous people every day, I’ve become more than accustomed to polyamory as a relationship structure, it’s my interpretation of a very specific phrase that you are insisting should actually be read in a way I have quite literally never seen it been before.
“I can’t match up to my boyfriend’s other BF’s skill in League of Legends, but I still love playing Stardew Valley together.”
Different, not better or worse. He may not “match up” to Dorothy’s ability to fill the “Dorothy hole,” but he doesn’t have to because Joyce also has her “Joe hole.” (The wording from the mouseover text is ridiculous, but I am HERE for it. lol) Too much focus is being put on the comparative nature of “match up” to the exclusion of everything else being said, all of which points in the opposite direction.
Perhaps my brain also goes this direction because I’m aromantic, so I’m used to people having relationships I can never “match up” to because I don’t experience the fundamental attraction involved. However, it doesn’t bother me much because what I want is a good, fun, platonic friendship anyway. To me this reads much the same except it’s two different kinds of romantic love.
More and more I’m thinking that this is a verbal slip up on Joe’s part which Willis intentionally included to keep some ambiguity around and set up a conversation about how he’s not Joyce’s “second place.” If so, it was brilliantly done, since it feels like people are reading two completely different strips based entirely on which way they interpret this one line. It gets people talking and keeps the anticipation for what comes next high. It’s been a long time since I’ve been this tempted to jump on the Patreon for a bit to see the next comic.
“I can’t match up to my boyfriend’s other BF’s skill in League of Legends, but I still love playing Stardew Valley together.”
I wonder if there’s a subtle English dialect difference here, because that sentence sounds wrong in my head compared to “I can’t match my boyfriend’s…”
As far as I know, you’re fine — I’m definitely hair-splitting on the difference between:
– I see both readings (possibly with a preference)
– I only saw reading X at first, but yeah reading Y could make sense if you squint
vs.
– I only saw reading X, and I’m angry about people who think reading Y makes sense
Ahhhh. The poly feast!
(*puts cutlery on plate, covers with napkin)
So full. Totally stuffed. No, really, can’t eat another bite.
(*burps)
[ we still got more courses coming, don’t we. ]
😀
omg joe <3 this strip made me cry thanks
so we’re not just getting Joe being down with poly and telling Joyce this…but Joe understanding poly well enough to be able to explain why it works? i can feel myself healing from years of reading shitty love triangles
It kind of makes sense for him. I can see him working on his whole ‘trying to grow out of being a sex pest’ thing over the timeskip, finding himself still effortlessly chill with the idea of threesomes and poly stuff, going ‘I wonder if that’s something I need to grow out of or something I need to grow into’ and researching it.
This is also definitely one of those storylines that is hampered by the lack of any real insight into the internal monologues of the characters — aside from a potential reading of a couple of Joe’s comments re: Joyce and Dorothy, that in-universe all happened within the last week or so, we have no way of actually telling whether this is something Joe’s been thinking about for a while or if this is something he’s pulling up on the spur of the moment in order to salvage what he can of his relationship with Joyce.
And having some idea of how long he’s been thinking about a poly situation and what he thinks his place in it might or should be would go a long way to me deciding how to interpret Panel 5 in particular.
So the way it looked yesterday is the way it turned out.
My issue here is that, honestly? I don’t think there *is* going to be drama. There might be disagreements and characters saying mean things but the status quo of “Joyce and Dorothy are accepted” will prevail.
Because look at what happened when Joyce and Becky clashed over their faith. They had a *substantial* disagreement, yelling, uncharitable readings (both in-character and in the comments) and what was the outcome? They’re still close friends, Becky just passive-aggressively plays religious tunes at Joyce.
I just don’t see the mess coming. I think we’re supposed to see Joe as entering into a healthy place here, and probably gradually fading into the background of the DoJo relationship until it ends with a whimper.
If things go the way they’re looking now, there’s going to be even less drama than Joyce and Becky. Sure, it blew over but they at least had a big fight about it.
Maybe between Walky and Dorothy. Maybe.
I knew it!!!!
Joe loves her enough to give her the freedom to grow. Damn I actually like Joe now. Hell of a character arc.
Ok but I want Dorothy to make up with Joe and be the best metamor to him
I very much agree. I think their recent conversation about their feelings for Joyce might be a decent foundation for them to develop a closer friendship than she had with Joe while she dated Danny.
Now that’s what I call powerful sexual kindness.
POLY POLY POLY POLY POLY
This is everything I could have ever hoped for in this storyline~
🙂 Joe’s a good boy.
Polycule of Age… Dumbing of Polycule…
Is that anything?
So, I fully support a polycule.
However, I’m not sure Joe is supporting a polycule because he’s okay with it rather than because he actually has terrible self-esteem. I mean, look at his face.
I’ve been reading the more down faces as worry that Joyce won’t go for a polycule, not low self esteem. Also I think he’s super nervous about navigating a very emotionally complex situation. He recently came away from that chat with Dorothy somewhat amazed that he navigated an emotional conversation reasonably well: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2025/comic/book-15/03-me-and-who-you-say-i-was-yesterday/vocab/
So joe is a simp with no pride I guess?
Because he’s not part of this he’s just hanging on like a barnacle.
I mean i guess if you are reading with your eyes closed.
You don’t understand what you mean.
Ah, “simp”. Much like “whipped” before it, a word only used by people who can’t hold on to a relationship to try (and fail) to insult those who can.
Ooof, babygirl this is so weird, I’m actually a little embarrassed for you. Are you okay? Is everything alright at home?
*throws popcorn at screen* booo I wanted a mess boooo
Ah well, grats poly folks. I hope this relationship stays healthy cause y’all deserve some positive rep that gets actual time in the plot
It’s not a done deal yet. I hope it works, but only Willis knows.
Disclaimer: I am not poly and have personally known only one poly household which lasted for many years, but eventually broke messily in two. But worked better than many married couples I have known and lasted longer than some.
She’s going to fuck him in the next hour or so isn’t she. (justifiably so, this is the kindest thing anyone’s ever done for her)
We better get a god damn slipshine out of it, I WILL PAY THE 25 BUCKS!
Joe what the fuck man you deserve better than this
Better than what? Opening his relationship? There’s no indication that he has to stay faithful to her while she fucks around – it sounds a lot like Joe knows how this works either from being with poly people or reading up on it, and he is understanding that he and Joyce still love eachother and that they can *both* love other people, while being honest and not destroying what they have.
I knew eventually chanting poly at media I like would pay off
even if this doesn’t go through, acknowledging that such strict monogamy rules can hold people back from happiness and growth is a shockingly mature direction for anyone in the ‘trash goblin who craves mess’ storyline and I’m pleasantly surprised to hear it from joe. i was expecting his family history to make him uncomfortable with this, and i reckon there’s a bit of that he hasn’t shown the camera yet, but i think i hadn’t been paying enough attention to the joe-dorothy dynamic to see how that’d play into things here. clearly he admires her a lot, and acknowledging that they wouldn’t be competing so much as filling different niches is proof that he’s been paying attention and cares about everyone’s happiness in the equation. character growth!!
Personally, I’m worried about Becky.
my government-assigned roz gravatar perhaps never more fitting
It’s me sized!.
Walky-Dorothy-Joyce-Joe Fourple!
Not much to add, except wanted to say thank you to Willis because this story is so well-written and fun. Nice to see a poly relationship in a story that’s not toxic. (And this is coming from a happily monogamous person. It’s fun to read fiction about stuff I don’t actually want to do in real life but it’s so frustrating trying to find good writing for non-heteronormative stuff that isn’t also trauma-bating.
I never expected such pure love, feelings, and beauty from….JOE. >tears starting<
It’s been such a long time since I gasped IRL and told everyone around me about the comic I’m reading. The comic could end here and I would be happy. This is what I wanted.
Oh, Joe…. I would have been ok with Joe being onboard with an open relationship, but this hits way to hard as “Joyce is too good for me and I am lucky to have even a little attention from her, so I’m willing to put up with anything just to not lose her” vibes. The 5th panel feels like Joe continuing to feel guilty for his past and wanting to make up for it by putting Joyce first and actively not thinking about what he actually wants. I don’t have anything against poly relationships. They can be healthy, but this doesn’t feel like it’s coming from that space.
The impression I’m getting is that he found the newspaper. First thought was shock, then “hot” because some mindframes are hard break away from, and the next was “I can’t lose her.” So he spent the next few hours thinking out how to react. Eventually landing on “If I can’t be enough for her, maybe I can still be SOMETHING for her.” Not actually taking the time to think about what he wants or needs, just focusing on doing whatever he needs to so that he can not lose the thing that he still feels inadequate for, and maybe part of Joyce is all he deserves anyway.
Yeah it’s not that he accepts it, it’s that he is resigned, sad that he can’t be all that Joyce needs in a partner.
I’m amazed how eager people are to impute desperation to Joe. I mean, maybe they’re right, but I’m not seeing it yet.
Look at the last two panels, 4th he is sad, 5th he is Hoping that there is still room in Joyce’s life for him.
He WAS Cheated on and now is fighting to keep at least a Part of Joyce’s interest.
In panel 5 he is intense. In panel 6 he is giving a supportive encouraging little smile. There are six panels.
Yeah my mistake, my point still stands though.
That’s not what I’m getting at all. I have no experience with polyamory, married to one woman for almost half a century. But what Joe is saying rings true. Maybe the patriarchal assumptions are bullshit. Love is not pie.
I certainly know that I would throw a lot of rules overboard if my wife’s happiness were at stake.
Same.
I have hangups about how this is unfolding (in broad strokes, polyamory solving cheating), but I’m happy for the readers who are hyped for the representation, and I hope it leads to interesting developments if they give this a try. It would be a twist for Joe and Joyce to embrace this for and for Dorothy to struggle with it.
I’m not sure that would qualify as a twist. Joe being okay with it was a twist, albeit a ambiguously foreshadowed one. As many people have pointed out Dorothy has had some issues with Joe, though perhaps not as many as she used to.
My first reaction was Joe is handling this way better than expected, and I’m glad a poly solution is on the table, but other comments have pointed out that this may very well be coming from a place of bad mental health for Joe which is less than great. But I have hope that Joe’s love for Joyce is what’s motivating this rather than hatred of himself.
It’s love and resignation “I’m not enough for her.”
Never really cared for this bit but I’m feeling too victorious not too
*Plays industry baby on the God damn hacked Muzak*
BABY BACK, AYY
COUPLE RACKS, AYY
COUPLE GRAMMYS ON HIM
COUPLE PLAQUES, AYY
THAT’S A FACT, AYY
THROW IT BACK, AYY
THROW IT BACK, AYY
AND THIS ONE IS FOR THE CHAMPIONS
I AINT LOST SINCE I BEGAN YEAH
FUNNY HOW YOU SAID IT WAS THE END, YEAH
THEN I WENT DID IT AGAIN, YEAH
I’ll freely admit that I don’t grasp all the nuances of polyamory. But Joe’s comments here sound like they’re coming from a place of low self-esteem. Like he’s settling for 2nd place with Joyce because he doesn’t believe he deserves to be anyone’s first choice. And that just… needs to be fixed.
I’ve been poly for two decades and change, and yeah you are not the only one reading this as potentially a not great place for Joe to be in.
This is like, super unhealthy. Joe has had low self-esteem since at least the whole list debacle, probably longer because he has never opened his heart to someone long enough to be in a relationship. He has zero model of how healthy relationships happen.
He basically had his dad who cheated like the biggest man-whore on Earth and his mom who knew and let it happen until she finally divorced him. Joyce started this relationship with an obvious betrayal that Joe is clearly hurt by but not letting it show because he is stuffing those feelings down.
Y’all, this very much seems like a trainwreck in slow-motion. I honestly hope I’m wrong, but this isn’t usually how healthy poly relationships start.
I agree its not how they start but Joe has shown again and again that hes likely one of the people this would work for. He’s always been an ethical slut and never been prone to jealousy he seems to be thriving getting to soften up and explore actual intimacy instead of just sexual. I think getting to know he is now not solely responsible for Joyce’s sexual exploration may be a relief to him given his nerves about that element of the relationship. I think the issue will be walky.
Joe had enough self-esteem to tell off whatshername in the weight room, and he used to think she was really something. He’s doing fine.
Thank you for this take. Obviously everyone is gonna interpret a piece of media differently, but that final panel didn’t read “resigned” or “defeated” at all to me… it was the wholesome sparkling eyes and an adorable soft boy smile and it made meso all d’aaawwwwwwwww
*made me go
This! He looks so sweet and cute and shy about it and I love that.
This 100% Joe is not self loathing really or insecure so im not getting where this read that hes resigned abd begging for crumbs comes from it makes little sense. He got smackednhardbwithbhisbproblemstoc behavior faced bit head on and is improving he jasnt shied away from criticism and takes it in stride and he doesn’t crumple under it either given how he handled Rachel and Sarah.
I assume this is intentionally a BAD reason to start a poly relationship. In the same vein as Danny explicitly saying that cheating isn’t a Bi-thing, but an Asshole-thing.
Because Joe isn’t doing this because he wants to alloe Joyce to explore, but because he’s hurt and doesn’t want to let Joyce go.
Bear in mind, Joyce cheated. Even IF Joe knew after the fact, Joyce cheated and entered into a physical/romantic relationship, even if only minimally, against what she felt the rules of her relationship with Joe was.
It’s unhealthy.
If the DeSantos siblings hear about this, they’d likely recognize the same signs in him. Of someone who was hurt by and doesn’t want to be without that person.
At the same time, Joyce knows of at least one polycule, and they can likely give her some pointers on how and why this can be managed… assuming they have more experience, though they are also pretty close in age.
Also wondering again how much of this is still semi-autobiographical.
This is thinking intentionally a messy start but genuinely not bad for them Joe has never been jealous he has been an ethical slut his whole run. He probably finds not being soley responsible for joyces exploration a bit of a relief given his worries there and seemsbto be thriving on the non sexual intimacy which he sorely needed. I don’t think this will block put long term but I can see Joe being down
https://bsky.app/profile/damnyouwillis.bsky.social/post/3lx63kjrso22b
Wherever you get tired of the endless discourse just remember that at least you are not on the subreddit.
And if you’re still feeling down, remember they don’t have a disturbing parasocial fixation on you in particular, frequently bringing you up by name and hypothesizing about your real-life mental state, jerking each other off over how much of a freak they think you are.
I’ve checked that place three times since Willis brought up the sock puppet conspiracy, and all three times they’ve been having a delightfully nasty conversation about me. It’s creepy, and they should let go of this insane concept of me they’ve invented. Freaks.
I wish them many ills on your behalf.
Personally, I wish they’d just shut up about me. Or at least talk about my music instead of my mental health.
… do they ever talk about me and that one DoA fan game I made?
I’m not entirely sure, since I don’t go there much. I haven’t noticed anything though.
Personally, I’ll assume they are all my adoring fans and talk about me incessantly, until proven otherwise.
This is a good headcanon, I’m joining you in it.
God dayum that sounds like a nightmare. Hope they didn’t take it beyond shitposting. I’ve had a real life stalker and I would not wish that on anyone.
I mean… he’s been pretty open about Joyce being [at least at the start] a SEMI-autobiographical author self-insert.
That’s going to, regardless of the current story, give people a bit of a question mark in their head of “how much of this is what he went through?”
I didn’t know there even was a subreddit, but I assume they take it to an uncomfortable extreme, even with any speculation.
I can’t judge because I’m not poli, and I dont really know how normal or not this is.
But what I am, is a 40 year old man who remembers college like it was yesterday, has been in a number of relationships, not all of them healthy at different times, and struggles very much with anxiety, depression, loneliness, feelings of worthlessness and inadequacy.
What Joe says here concerns me.
For a while I’ve felt their relationship was one-sided. That Joe clearly was head over heels for Joyce, and Joyce simply loved being loved by Joe. There were a number of things that Joyce did which, alone, wouldn’t have been an issue, but together, paint a picture of a toxic relationship.
I know what it’s like to throw myself further in a relationship by giving more and more and more to someone who just does not seem to care enough to give love back, each time thinking, well, NOW they’ve got to see that I love them, NOW they’re going to be swept off their feet, only to be quietly torn down a little, bit by bit, with all those same slights and criticisms and digs, while they pour their joy and uncritical love into something else.
And I understand. If I, back then, discovered her doing something like this… I might rationalize it the same way. I might say, ‘look, she’s really not competing with you, she can explore her feelings.’ I might look up stuff on poly, read about how love is infinite, and just tell myself that she’ll only love me more for this. Or, if I had been reading this comic right at that exact time – hell, I’d probably do EXACTLY what Joe was doing, and feel in that moment that I was being the best, most loving boyfriend ever.
When really, someone should’ve just took me by the shoulders and said, “Dude, she’s just not that into you. She will never be that into you. And its OK to say that you deserve better.”
But all that is, admittedly, projecting. This is not *my* autobiographical tale. This could come out completely different, maybe.
But people, please just remember to be kind to yourself. And if you are ever in a situation like Joe, it’s not a moral failing in the slightest to *not* do what he’s doing here.
I totally get where you’re coming from, I’ve been on both sides of what you’re describing, before I knew anything about polyamory.
But what comes with this perspective requires a few assumptions frankly incompatible with the way humans actually love:
1. Passionate love is the truest love
2. Kissing someone else is itself a betrayal that someone with self esteem wouldn’t tolerate and someone that did kiss-cheat is now the scum of the earth.
3. Being with someone who is with someone else means you are settling for second place or a prolonged breakup, and not also free to explore other relationships while retaining a bond with this partner that may evolve or not.
Dishonesty and hiding are the problems with cheating. It took me being cheated on a few times to map it exactly, but it is not actually your partner being intimate with someone else that hurts – nobody owns anybody else. It’s when your partner doesn’t trust you to share that with you and pretends like nothing is going on.
Passionate love is a primal thing meant to lead to babies, in the modern era it clears almost entirely within 2 years and often leaves people, especially teens, feeling depressed and at odds with one another in a relationship. Joe has a crush on Joyce that may stem from his desire to be better than his dad and therefore going for someone he saw that seemed pure and that he could shepherd into adulthood rather than simply bang and leave as he had in the past, and who also didn’t have the judgemental baggage of women who have had more experience who pigeonhole him. I also don’t think he would have tried to grow without Joyce’s influence.
Joe’s proposal is sensible, self aware and not self minimising, because he acknowledges that he does have -part- of Joyce’s heart, he does think he is good for her and good to her or else he would have just handed her the end of the relationship on a platter. Admitting that you share a kind of romantic love with someone who feels more strongly for another person isn’t problematic, as long as it is coming from solid observation and awareness of the situation.
Joe is fine, he is going to be fine regardless of this, he will also only do what feels right to him for as long as it feels right. He is not looking to hold on like a withered husk to Joyce’s bright attitude, he values his relationship with Joyce and rightly assumes she values it too.
Some of what you’re saying I understand; some I don’t. I’m not sure I follow with your three assumptions – the first I flat-out disagree with (insomuch that I feel like calling it the “highest” is a mislabel – there are many different kinds of love, and it is not a linear scale) the second is overblown, and the third is inconsequential to me.
I guess, to have that perspective, I would have to first be the kind of person who wants to pursue other relationships, or be fine with only being a lesser part of my partner’s life. That doesn’t sound enticing; that sounds exhausting.
And you might disagree with that – you may feel like every relationship you have you develop to the level that a solid monogamous relationship does. Having no experience there, I can’t argue with that; I can only say that I really don’t know how. It’s the Red Mage’s paradox. In a world with limited time, energy, and resources, the jack of all trades is a master of none.
There’s one thing though that I disagree with. There is definitely a hierarchy here. There is absolutely a hierarchy here. Joe is absolutely second place. She’s here to break up with him; when she thinks he’s advocating for her to be with him *instead* she says no, I kissed, and I intend to *keep* kissing. She expresses disgust when she assumes the reason he’s fine with it is because it’s “hot.”
But this may work out well for them. A lot depends, I suppose, on if everybody involved is OK with the other relationships.
I guess the main thing is, I can understand poly relationships if everyone is the way you described it – if nobody feels jealous, or hurt, or like they’re second place; if everyone is fine with everyone else seeking other relationships, and everyone *wants* to seek other relationships, then it seems perfect.
But I see the world, in which sometimes love is unrequited; sometimes love is simply met with affection, or friendship; sometimes one person is giving and the other is simply receiving. Sometimes love fades and has to be rekindled, and if one person wants to do it and the other doesn’t, it’s heartbreaking. Human relationships are insanely complicated; I can’t imagine trying to do the same with two, or three, or more people; and then to understand that to them, I’m just one of many.
Not understanding polyamory is totally fine! It’s a complicated thing and there’s no reason a monogamous person would ever need to look it up or interact with it until they encounter it in the wild (like this). I think you’re coming at this earnestly, so I want to engage with you on that level.
I’ve been polyamorous (presumably my whole life) but in practice for a nice long while now, and I can tell you that it doesn’t feel like a bad thing to me to be “one of many” and I kind of recoil at saying that because it just doesn’t match my worldview at all. I don’t think of my metamours (the partners of my partners) as competition or others who fill my space. I think of them as branches on the relationship I’m having, sometimes as family, sometimes they stay strangers, and everything in between. I’m a lot richer for those interactions.
I’m one of one, the only Nymph any of my partners are with. My partners are not individual parts of a single whole relationship (and therefore are not receiving less than they might in a monogamous relationship) they are other poly people in individual whole relationships with me. What those relationships amount to varies a great deal (the way any monogamous relationship varies from other ones involving different people) but that doesn’t make them lesser to me. It doesn’t make me less happy to share that time with them, less excited to see them, less desperately in love when I fall in love.
People have multiple friends, who they love, and no one thinks that means they’re receiving “part” of a friendship. Multiple children who aren’t receiving “part” of a parent. Multiple parents who aren’t receiving “part” of a child. It is very easy to love two or more people to a similar degree in different ways because they are different people.
It CAN be complicated, there is definitely jealousy sometimes or serious issues to deal with, people get hurt, relationships are relationships and polyamorous people aren’t robots (which sucks because I would be so down to be a robot). But all of those things are true in monogamous relationships too, being monogamous doesn’t protect you from worrying that someone isn’t in love with you the way you want them to be, and neither does being polyamorous. They’re just different styles of relationship, neither is better or worse, they’re just For You or Not For You and that’s okay.
This is gonna come out of nowhere but I do appreciate your explanation of polyamory. As someone not much older than the characters, I do feel inexperienced with the world and glad for the story’s exploration of all sorts of scenarios, as well as the comments sections many anecdotes, even if they clash at times hah!
Not sure where exactly I fall in the grand scheme, though I regrettably say one of my vices is jealousy over time spent (even with friends).
[Unrelated: I totally didn’t expect Joe to be onboard but when I caught on that he was, I was quite excited for the storyline.)
I also really appreciate your explanation of polyamory. It’s truly a different way to look at it. “Branches of the relationship I’m having” was really eye-opening, and also highlighted what I was feeling with what eskimolos was saying before- that the “relationship” isn’t simply the tie between two people, but the “relationship” is this tree, and you’re the trunk of it, and some branches are stronger and some are weaker and that doesn’t make one branch “better” or “worse” but all just part of the whole.
And (to make a jump in logic) I’m guessing that to *restrict* yourself to just one person in which to express those few types of love, would probably feel like overpruning a tree, to where you took most of the main branches that supported it, and now it’s struggling to survive.
It’s absolutely different, but I think I can understand it. And perhaps (again, taking a logical leap here) maybe having that net of partners helps insulate you from a hurt that might come from a relationship growing distant or evolving into something that you’re no longer happy with. Perhaps being loved by so many people means that if someone you’re in a relationship with no longer wants to be there, it’s easier to wish them well and hope for the best for them, because you *do* still love them and want the best for them, and you aren’t alone.
I’d imagine that to do that you’d have to have a really strong sense of self-esteem and be a very social person. Hell, I can barely manage adult life, supporting my family, and having a very small amount of adult friendships; I in no way have enough spoons to even entertain something like that. I think I understand what you mean when you say it’s different styles and it’s either for you or not. I am *not* drawn to that sort of relationship, and so having it wouldn’t feel like being a tree with a decent number of branches, it would feel like being a juggler with a decent number of bowling pins.
With this new understanding, I think that I understand more about what was giving me anxiety here. I think I’ve also realized that the next strip (dated 8/25) addressed some of that anxiety. By Joe’s admittance, he’s on his very first “relationship,” the encounters that he had were casual and specifically designed to have zero emotional attachment. All of that is because he saw how badly his father hurt his mother, and vowed to not do the same. From all of that, my assumption was that, while Joe’s escapades suggested that he was poly, he was in fact monogamous at heart. His obsession and anxiety with Joyce seemed to further cement that.
And if he was, then this would just seem like someone who was OK with only getting a portion of someone’s love and affection while they gave them everything, and that would just sort of feel sad.
But on the next day Joe takes credit for having pushed Dorothy towards her, whch sure makes all of that seem intentional and this result seem thought through, rather than simply being reactionary to being dumped by the girl he loves. Which is really a big argument for him actually being OK with this after all, and me just projecting onto the situation
This took a more poly turn than expected
You know im actually really pleased with this. And I can actually see Joe being super chill about this. Hes always been incredibly sex positive and ethical because of his dad and knows how messy it can be. I can totally see him being way more comfortable being aware of it. I think he may have been upset about the lying if he hadn’t seen this coming from space and if it had been stretched past the one night. But I can actually see Joe being a big compersion lerson. I dont think walky will be though
Of the many turmoiling thoughts regarding this sudden revelation of Joe’s willingess to the situation, one thing that comes to mind is this: now that we know Joe is okay with Joyce being with him and Dorothy, is Dorothy okay with Joyce being with her and Joe, or does she want Joyce all to herself?
That is the immediate question, yes.
We know she’s willing to break up with Walky in order to maintain this relationship (or at least we hope she will), but would she take offense that Joyce isn’t breaking up with Joe for her sake?
I think dorothy might be. I think walky will not be.
I agree there, especially considering that this will be the second time Dorothy has broken up with Walky, so this will certainly be a blow to his self-esteem.
I prefer Joyce to break up to Joe, to have Dorothy 100% for her. But a poly a price I can accept.
Well, Joyce was willing and preparing to break up with Joe so that she and Dorothy could be together, so we know she had her moral priorities straight in not wanting to lead Joe on for longer than needed.
However, now that we know Joe’s open to the poly relationship, the question remains: is Dorothy?
ALT-TEXT!!! NO!!!!
oh wow this poly arc is gonna be so bad.
Whatever about the rest of this, it’s at least comforting to know I’m far from alone in struggling to interpret facial expressions.
His expressions in the last two panels do indicate some stress, but as someone else noted further up, he -is- making an offer to Joyce knowing he can’t compete with Dorothy in a monogamy situation. Whether it’s self esteem undervaluing himself as worthy of a passionate love, or fear of rejection/being outweighed, he *is* concerned and grappling with some hard emotions here.
this strip made me so happy i teared up a little, and then I foolishly read the comments and forgot that a lot of monogamous AND polyamorous people seem to genuinely forget or never realize that a lot of us, possibly most of us, get to a healthy relationship through the process of trying to figure out how to treat ourselves and each other, partially by trial and error, and a lot of that looks like unhealthy. Joe’s response here does seem like he has low self esteem! but “I love you and you love me but I recognize there’s someone else you love differently and maybe more intensely than me, and that’s fine,” isn’t actually inherently unhealthy or even part of low self esteem. and part of how you get to the healthy parts of life and love are by working through the unhealthy parts, sometimes with people you love, and I think that’s beautiful (even though it also sometimes hurts).
1000000% you are so right
+1
Like, I am mono as hell, but something about seeing this (potentially, obviously we have yet to hear Dorothy’s decision) positive wholesome poly representation makes me giddy as a clam. I think it is so cool to see.
Very, very true.
Willis watching this comment section: Steepling fingers together, evil grin. “Yes. Yeeeeeeeeeeees. Dance, puppets, dance!”
Oh absolutely, 200% No question.
While I personally prefer Joe/Joyce over Joyce/Dorothy, I really like where this is currently headed and look forward to the drama that is coming. And if it all ends in a polycule, then it’s a win for everyone! I just suspect it will be very very messy first.
Iiinteresting. This is not an outcome I foresaw.
Very wizard coded sentence.
Wizard the commenter or wizards in general? :0
I read it in a Emperor Palpatine voice, myself.
This is not the outcome. This is a midpoint.
https://www.tumblr.com/kalina-c/792789349204918272/so-i-made-a-really-smart-decision-for-my-reddit?source=share
Amazing (also rip their reddit mentions)
Triggering reddit people is a honour. Godspeed!
That alt text is fucking thermonuclear holy shit
that manga is cursed
Next panel: “You want to occupy my space?” Snickering*
This might work because this is fiction and it will work if the author wants it to work, but I’ve seen this sort of thing happen more than once in real life and every “ethical non-monogamy” relationship that in fact started unethically ended horrifically, or even worse, lasted horrifically.
POLY YES???
Alt: Willis, we already talked about Amigara Fault!
scrolls 1 million years past everything else to just say: man i love Joe.
He knows joyce. He pays attention to her, because he likes her so much. And we already learned with Danny 5million years ago hes a lot more cool about things then you’d think. Hes very good.
It’s been hard for me to enjoy the last few weeks of strips because I also feel this “man I love Joe” 😅 too much for a fictional character, probably. This strip gave me a lot of relief of like: finally, we know he knows and can be on more even footing, at least
Joe has a big heart.
I think this is probably something Joyce would be willing to try, now that it’s being brought up. I’m not sure how Dorothy would feel about dating Joyce while Joyce has another partner. But I hope she’s willing to try it. Cause if they *do* go the non-exclusivity route, it’ll be interesting to see Joyce’s reaction to Joe having other partners than her. Even with her being in multiple relationships, I feel like she’d still have (rather hypocritical) extremely mixed feelings about that and a lot of guilt *because* she has mixed feelings about that and I think that’d be fun drama to read. It’s just kicking the conflict down the road.
(There’s also a lot of other, immediate conflict that’s still presumably gonna come of this. I doubt Walky is gonna have as calm a reaction as Joe did, and there’s definitely gonna be conflict with Becky. So having joe react well to this news makes sense; it’s more true to his character, and it means that the narrative focus is less split over the immediate conflict in the aftermath.)
Yeah, what Dorothy’s response will be is key. But I think also that Joyce might find it hard to accept the idea because she’s very much grown up with the idea of “One True Love” and monogamy, and even if she’s accepted alternate sexualities, I think she still very much holds to that ideal of “lifetime soulmate”.
I have a bad feeling about this.
1000 already, woah :0
I feel like this was telegraphed so far back it was Samuel Morse himself who started it, but YAYYYYYY
JOOOOEEEEEEEEE
YOU HUGGABLE SWEETHEART!!!!
YOU HAVE GROWN SOOO MUCH!!!!!
“Yeah, Joyce and Dorothy doing other things is really hot, like doing laundry… and getting into more hi-jinx”
so we are expecting more kisses in the future, got it
Oh, look. All sides communicating about what they want/expect out of a relationship. It’s not cheating if everyone is open and honest.
And that was always the issue- not being a ‘sicko’ or ‘relationship paladin’. I just don’t like betrayal. If everyone’s being a consenting adult, bang whoever you want. Joyce, you are forgiven. Dotty… we still have issues.
i don’t know whether Joyce or Joe or Dorothy is ready for poly, but the *way* Joe says it is VERY poly. <3
i love the concept of “the space you already had for me” <3
BELARED BUT EXTREMELY HEARTFELT CHEERING
BELATED