The Dumbing of Age Book 11 Kickstarter continues!
We’re– wait, at $42800 already? Dang, I thought Sundays were slower. Anyway, that means we’re more than halfway to our next stretch goal of unlocking JENNIFER! But even still, we’ve got the free JOYCE magnets and all the other magnets unlocked so far — CARLA, DINA, BOOSTER, DAISY, ROBIN, and LESLIE! T’ain’t bad! I’m excited!
I Excised All my Anxieties into Cartoon Characters Who Definitely Don’t Have Feelings for Each Other will collect “Year Eleven,” spanning the five storylines that start on September 10, 2020, and complete on August 26, 2021. This includes new commentary, 24 Patreon bonus strips, behind-the-scenes artwork, and new character designs into an 224-page tome with luxurious glossy paper all bound up into a sturdy presentation. Plus: a foreword by Kendra Wells!
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oops, broke the Sal
For some reason thinking of, “Daddy, I got cider in my ear.”
As long as you’re not clocking Mindy’s strudel and cheesecake, you’re fine.
I read this as, “not clocking their menstrual cycle,” and had to read it thrice to sort out what I actually read. Sounds like cheesecake is on order either way.
Warranty void if Sal is broken.
It would make weird kind of sense if Sal’s brain is just a complex series of Vinyl disks and a record player.
I think Sal is stuck in a loop. Not a “do” loop, a “who” loop.
What, him ?
Raidah, you have no idea what you’re walking into.
What she’s Walkying into.
She is about to enter the Walky Verse
She called him “David” she clearly doesn’t.
“friends with Jennifer for a while” is a pretty dismissive way to put it
I think Raidah’s a pretty dismissive person of anyone not in her immediate circle.
And I get the vibe that even those in her circle can be dismissed whenever she feels like it. Or being in or out of the circle could just be a moment to moment thing.
and it vaguely sounds she’s trying to find some dirt on Billie
I do have a lot of suspicion and distaste for Raidah, but this is an instance where I think she maybe just doesn’t know very much about their connection, so she might not be being intentionally shitty or anything there.
That said, certainly wouldn’t put it past her.
When people show you who they really are, believe them the first time. Raidah is awful. She was awful to Dina with zero cause. She’s an awful person looking for ways to be awful.
These people really exist, be vigilant.
Oh, the first sentence is Maya Angelou
…she made a bad assumption about Dina’s mental state based on limited information. That’s bad and wrong, but it’s not awful. Or are you still under the mistaken impression that she’s the one that called Dina the R-word?
Use of the r word isn’t the only way to be ableist. Even if Dina did have mental disabilities, that would not excuse talking to her as if she was a child. I’m sure raidah thinks that she was just being nice to the poor ‘mentally challenged’ girl, but the way she spoke to Dina was still incredibly condescending.
That said, it’s true that raidah isn’t the only jerk in the comic. Joyce for example has said some similarly condescending things to Dina and others as well, so there is a degree of protagonist centred morality going on here.
If I lived in the world of the comic, I would prefer not to associate with raidah for the reason stated by decidedly orthogonal. I would also probably prefer not to hang out with Joyce either. However as a comic character I am interested in seeing her character developed, just as I am interested in seeing more of Joyce’s story arcs. Hope that makes sense.
Ruth was horrible the first time too.
Ruth was objectively pretty dang horrible in her most recent appearance run, too… But gets a pass for being something like a quaternary protagonist of the series.
(In-universe, her pass has been that she was lucky enough to be horrible to someone who unwittingly liked it, thus instead of being punished for being horrible, she was rewarded)
I mean, that’s how Jennifer puts it, and that’s where Raidah is getting her information about Walky from, soooo…
Tbf billies been pretty dismissive about it
Yeah that.
The audience certainly knows better or at least has reason to believe she’s putting on airs, but since the timeskip she’s refused to refer to Walky as her friend. She’s probably still really fond of him (let alone that we just learned they met the first day of school and immediately gave their permanent nicknames to each other after ten minutes), but she sure ain’t saying that.
The things humans do to climb these loathsome social ladders. 🙄
Anyone got any ideas for movies I should put on in the background while I work?
Hurry, my brain itches!!! 😖
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me.
Oh wait, is the goal to make your brain stop itching? Nevermind, I didn’t understand the assignment.
LotR extended edition is my go-to for background noise. Long enough you don’t have to mess with the player as often, I know it well enough I don’t feel like I miss anything when I’m concentrating on other stuff, and it’s good enough I can pay attention to it when I need a break.
You SHALL pass!!! Thank you slick! ~Aaaaahhh~ 🧠 😌
I usually play the Scream movies when I want something I can enjoy and not pay attention to at the same time.
Not a movie, but rebinging The Good Place works do me.
I like old comedies. The Great Race is fun. Murder By Death is solid, through as a warning it does include a quite broad Asianface by Peter Sellers. (There’s a reason for it, I don’t know if that makes it better or not.) The Cheap Detective.
Late to the game, but Spirited Away works for me.
I never considered Ghibli marathon when I need background noise. Definitely keeping that in mind for next time.
Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie. Always a good idea to watch/listen to in the background.
She’s either going to ask them to join their polygamous thing, or their cult.
Or, maybe both.
Damn. Tantalizing offer, not gonna lie.
Raidah is part of an obscure sect that worships the title characters of the movie Heathers.
They consider the parts of that movie about Winona Ryder and Christian Slater to be heretical and non-canon.
Eh, it’d be better if it was the….. uh, what was the name of the one where you couldn’t wear clothes to its church?
The question is are their gospel songs from the musical Heathers?
Cuz if so, I might need a pamphlet.
I would actually love a gospel version of Candy Store.
Y’know, Raidah might like it at Forest Quad. I think she wouldn’t mind a little group of easily mesmerised henchwomen.
The way she goes out of her way to call him ‘David’ kinda rubs me the wrong way
Kind of odd she knows to call him David.
From Jennifer I assume, possibly related to her going back to that name?
Lucy, spending time with popular people is not the prize you think it is.
Oh, yes. Poor Lucy! Maybe this terrible experience with a ruthless social climber who wants to steal her boyfriend, a mob family golden boy, and a rigidly repressed cheerleader will teach her some needed life lessons.
I didn’t know college even *had* popular people, outside the sister/brother cult thingies – even then it only seems like it matters within those circles?
There’s an official word for them, sorry, I just can’t words right now tonight
Sororities and Fraternities, respectively.
Eh, it doesn’t really, I think that comment is just meant to be a sign that Lucy is still caught up in a highschool way of thinking.
Yeah, it’s much more fun to spend time with people who are interested in the same things you like, rather than popular people. When I was in college I was glad to hang out with a group of friends who had similar nerdy interests as me. Far better than going to hang out with a group of people just because they’re “popular”.
Does…Lucy not have ears? She’s normally a very sweet girl, but she’s thrilled to hang out with this girl who just flung insults at two of the people she is currently walking to class with.
Lucy might be sweet, but she’s never been particularly socially aware. She has her internal narratives and has a hard time seeing anything outside of them.
I don’t think Lucy likes Joyce and Sarah didn’t seem particularly upset.
Joyce is her natural rival. She’s known this since they met.
Lucy strikes me as someone who wants to think the best of people. She probably assumed, charitably, that Raidah’s “happy to see you’ve finally found some friends” and “I hope you find the help you need” were completely sincere remarks, made in good faith. (Plus I don’t think she knows Sarah and Joyce’s respective histories with Raidah, anyway.)
I don’t know if I’d go as far as to think she didn’t know there was shittiness intended, but I will second the notion she sees the best in people sometimes when maybe it’s unearned. I do also think she’s sometimes exhibited a desire to be liked and popular, like with the movie thing she’d try to get going at her dorm, and obviously, we’ve seen she wants Jennifer to like her. I totally get why she’d jump at this opportunity, as she’d see it.
And yeah, she’s not in the know on a lot of the deeper complexities here, certainly, she is a later addition to the friend group.
Even if Lucy is the most naive person in the world, Raidah did also say Joyce looked like shit. Kind of hard to interpret that one as Raidah being nice!
Actually, I interpreted that as the most positive thing Raidah has done so far. Because Joyce IS in bad shape. Jennifer added a wow. Neither followed it up with an insult, they simply recognized Joyce and recognized she was in bad shape. That’s empathy. Though it only held their attention five seconds.
Blah, you’re right about yesterday, she did follow it up with an insult and was being bad. I was remembering several days back.
You’re still right. Those last two responses from yesterday’s strip are by far the most normal, and least intentionally spiteful things Raidah has said during this conversation.
The first one didn’t seem intended to harm, Joyce replied with a seriously weird comeback, and she acknowledged said comeback as being seriously weird in a very normal, sarcastic fashion.
(Because it *is* weird to respond to someone stating that you don’t look to good by bragging about your super-niche ‘cool’ thing that’s providing you some alleviation, which is more or less what Joyce did. Also, having that weird niche thing be a published comic in a college paper would strike *anyone* as weird at first glance.)
It might be a little weird, but it doesn’t warrant the response.
I think Lucy does want to be popular and liked, and is sort of ignoring some warning signs here.
I think she’s a sweet, nerdy kid who is established as being awed by Cool People. Please see: the entirety of her history with Jennifer.
Lucy reads to me as a geeky kid who has done pretty well in her own circles, and who’s social and extroverted enough to at least try to run her own events, but has struggled to attract the degree of friendship and attention that would make her happy/valid in her current sense of self. She’s at the right age to still be trying to figure out how much social attention/external validation she needs. A cool person looking in her direction—even if it’s just because she’s standing next to her hot boyfriend—is OMG! How can I make sure they notice me, too! Can I get a new friendship out of this! That would be amazing! I’d also like to be cool! Say, do you think I can also be admired? Could I also maybe become friends with the cool people?
Seems like an accurate reading to me (esp. with the exclamation marks!)
What, him? Pajama jeans boy?
And Sal is dating Danny and kinda friends with Amber now.
Nerd! Nerrrrd!
I get the impression that Sal is straight up friends with Amazi-Girl, while sharing more of a mutual toleration with Amber.
But yeah. NEEEEERRRRD!
Speaking about Walky, Fun.
https://imgur.com/a/F216bv4 (NSFW)
Fun indeed.
I commend you, sir.
♫ F is for the fucking that we do together ♫
♫ U is for you and me ♫
♫ N is for enamored by all this ♫
♫ OH what ecstasy! ♫
😊😊😊
https://imgur.com/a/btxcaBt
An extra one cuz I’m on a roll.
This one is also NSFW just so you know.
Very nice.
Also, as my gravitar already suggests, Billie is a woman after my own heart. Blowjobs are for edging, not completion.
They’re for both but the amount of control you have when performing a blowjob is pretty great <3
I just enjoy edging people. **evil grin**
😈😈😈🥵🥵🥵
https://imgur.com/a/pWTsCB0 (NSFW)
Ok. Now I’m done.
😍😍😍 🤩🤩🤩
WOW!!! Such MARVELOUS work Yoto, in such a short order too!!! 😮
You TRULY have what it takes to become a Hentai Sama, friend!!!
*plays “Hero Song of Hope” by Flow on hacked muzak*
good
old-fashioned
american
fun
♫ Popular! You’re gonna be popular! ♫
But not as popular as THEE.
Nobody’s Playing THIS on ANY Muzak, hacked or otherwise!
The only reason I know about it is it being performed on Prairie Home Companion, probably a dozen years ago or more.
She wants the presence of “David”, not Walky.
So we’re good.
Who’s the most confused in this shot? Sal, Jennifer, or Walky?
“David”
And now we know why Billie is going by Jennifer, I suppose…
I think it’s too early to make that call, its certainly possible but also it could just be she felt like she outgrew a nickname she got in elementary school
Eehhh, I’m not sure I buy that explanation. The montage of people saying “Billie” in Jennifer’s dream/flashback definitely makes it look like that name was something she wanted to escape from.
The real question is how the hell Raidah knows his name is David when she didn’t even recognize him three strips ago.
The answer is in panel 5 of the strip you linked. “You’ve met Walky” Presumably she learned his first name at some point; she just didn’t remember him being hot. And since his hotness is apparently now on the level of “boy band member in a show aimed at preteens,” as opposed to “Cute but you might wanna scrub off the mustard stains first” it’s a bit of a difference.
Maybe, but I think there’s a connection implied here. The Walky/David thing could naturally come up if she was talking to Raidah about the Billie/Jennifer thing and I could certainly see Raidah pushing her to drop the silly nickname.
It’ll be a breakfast Raidah will never forget, as much as she tries.
What the heck are piggy pancakes?
Pigs in a blanket?
Or maybe pancake art shaped like pig faces?
Pancake wrapped sausage links, maybe? Or pancakes with sausage bits cooked in?
Google Bob Evans piggy pancakes; they’re pancakes that look like cute lil pig faces! … I kinda want some now lol
Sal’s jealous.
I don’t know what weird, effed up game Raidah is playing here, but I hope it ends with Walky making a gross scene of himself and embarrassing her so goddamn badly.
Every single thing she’s said in this scene has dripped with condescension. I am *not* excited to see her shitty, social-climb-at-all-costs personality back in the story.
Taking away Sarah’s friends.
That makes sense. Plus she wants to break up miraculously hot Walky from his girlfriend to get back at Joyce.
There is literally no indication she wants to do that to get back at Joyce… who wouldnt give a poop anyways.
Could just be Rule of Acquisition #76: Every once in a while, declare peace. It confuses the hell out of your enemies.
Honestly, I hope Walky straight up turns her down. Not only because he has a girlfriend, but because he’d probably find Raidah boring as hell.
Yep, pretty much what I’m hoping for too.
Oh god, please yes. Walky and Raidah interacting for any length of time sounds PRICELESS and I want it.
hmm… wouldn’t it go along the lines of Walky saying things and Raidah pretending not to hear it? What doesn’t sound so priceless, bc, see Raidah seems to likes to see the price tag on things.
I’ll start by saying, this isn’t a complaint and I really enjoy this comic…
…but I do think the high-school mentality of omg-the-popular-girls is a little weird from people in their second semester of university. Maybe it’s my experience that’s unusual, and this is the norm, but I didn’t know anyone who talked or behaved like that.
Just surprised me is all!
it’s not generally as pronounced and obvious as it is in the comic, but that mentality does thrive in the adult world, and people do remain that petty and shallow. usually it’s more passive aggressive and it’s way more obvious to the tragically unpopular people they target with said passive aggressiveness, ie the autistic girl (i’ve been dealing with this at work so I’m especially bitter about it these days), but adults have more practice with subtlety and also subtlety doesn’t always translate well to comics.
I haven’t seen it either, but I didn’t go to a big state school, I went to a tiny liberal arts college, which was like the mothership for gifted weirdos who wanted to change the world. Kids from money seemed slightly embarrassed about their privilege, not eager to go get more of it. We definitely did not care about highschool popularity. Some of us started a circus. My school easily balances out the popularity-minded social climbers of Indiana University.
It’s the kind of dynamic that only survives out of its home environment when people who are really emotionally invested in it insist on recreating it elsewhere.
two words:
law school
well it can be management, or international business, or HR too.
Just people who are here for networking and not for the other university gifts (like thousand of books, and thousand of people who might have read them and be OK to speak about this massive blackhole of knowledge).
Can second that. Undergrad didn’t have any of the stereotypical social foodchain clique-iness, but law school showed me that there are adults that absolutely still live and breathe by that.
Me too. But I’m foreign. The whole thing seems alien to me.
It is rather unusual, IMO, and I think that’s intentional.
There’s less of that mentality after high school, but it definitely doesn’t go away completely, unfortunately.
Ew! Ew! Ewwwwww! Every part of this invitation makes my skin crawl.
I would like to joke that I’d enjoy watching the clusterfuck of Raidah, Walky, Jennifer, and Lucy interacting but…you know what, I just would not. If there’s gonna be any humor in this, it’s probably going to be cringe humor, and Raidah being casually horrible. It just sounds like a really unpleasant afternoon. Maybe something’s gonna be illuminated in all this about Jennifer, or about Jennifer and Walky? Because euurgh, otherwise I would prefer not to be here.
I don’t think Raidah is The Worst Person Who Ever Lived, and she’s a pretty good antagonist to multiple characters. But boy do I not enjoy spending time with her. The ratio of her casual cruelty to “anything enjoyable about her as a character/person” is a little too high for me.
Egg?
I suddenly have the notion that Billie will be the hero of this plotline.
Oh I like that idea. It gives me hope she might break off from this friend group and Asher, maybe.
Asher seems fine. It’s not his fault his dad’s the godfather
For me the trouble with Raidah is that she’s not actually as obvious as she seems to those of us reading the comic. ‘Hey, let’s do breakfast sometime, you’re an old friend of my new friend and your girlfriend is her roommate, it might be fun to hang out and see if we’re friends too’ is a perfectly pleasant thing to say. I’d go so far as to say it’s a downright chummy thing, using ‘chummy’ as ‘warm and friendly’.
It’s just that when you’ve seen enough Raidah to know how she operates, it becomes ‘chummy’ in the sense of ‘this water is full of blood and bits to attract sharks’. A trap. jaws waiting to close.
She might actually be serious about wanting to be friends with Jennifer’s old friend and roommate. She might think messing with Walky and Lucy will upset Sarah or Joyce. It might be both!
She be a social shark, and I enjoy watching it but would also prefer that people I like keep well away and outside bite radius.
I think Raidah is VERY obvious, and not as clever or smooth as she thinks she is. She would like to be a social barracuda! However, she is in fact just a barely medium-sized minnow in a small pond. Fellow minnows in the same pond notice.
Well, it’s also that we’re seeing the side comments – like asking Jennifer how well off Walky’s parents were.
Raidah: *Is understandably upset when someone tries to break her and her boyfriend up to wedge themself in*
Raidah three months later: *Sure as hell seems like she’s trying to break someone else’s relationship up to wedge herself in*
Well, there’s a look. Though I don’t expect it to last once she talks to Walky for any length of time.
She invited Lucy. I think this is just her generally networking. Which… she’s kinda allowed to do, even if it’s done in a kinda ehhhhh way.
She seems to have some ulterior motives, at least based on the strip from a few days ago where she doesn’t seem swayed by Billie informing her that Walky has a girlfriend.
Eh. Maybe, but that seems convoluted considering her stance against people who cheat on her in the first place.
It’s more likely that she thought about dating him for social climbing, found out he had a girlfriend, and figured she could still be friends with him for social climbing anyway.
It’s not exactly unheard of for people to be against having things done to them that they’re perfectly fine doing to other people.
The sequence of events with Walky started with the visual – she found him hot, then asked about his parents. Didn’t get an answer and has now made her move anyway.
I kinda hope it doesn’t play out in that exact way, if only because it sounds super lame for the protagonist who did an unprompted wrong to be retroactively vindicated because her target is a huge big jerk who’ll do it to a completely random person. Raidah is and should be an unpleasant person, but she can be unpleasant in a way that’s not “it’s okay to roll up and ruin her day, because she’s such a jerk.”
I don’t think that’s where this is going, in that it feels really incongruous with a series about the people we are under the mask (occasionally a literal one), and I hate that kinda approach to character writing so much anyway, where the protagonists are just innately good and their mistakes are being lesser than their best selves, but anyone who slights them is a monster and the only distinction here is that the latter has less panel time and audience investment. It’s such an “I’m the hero of my own life” kinda take.
I believe the right thing Raidah could do is took Joe from Joyce.
But they aren’t a coupleYes, but why should we risk it, right??
yeah, Raidah is such an asshole.
*reads title text* oh walky gender moments?
but in seriousness god does the ‘david’ make my skin crawl. raidah really has a knack for being the tiniest bit short of openly cruel huh
I’m pretty sure the “Her..?” is an Arrested Development reference.
. . . pretty sure “her?” was meant to reference Lucy.
Will Jennifer be able to protect her brother and his relationship with Lucy from Raidah, “The Wild Predator”, or is that something not cool enough for her? Seriously, Raidah’s true intention here is crystal clear! But if this could lead Walky to tell Jennifer that he no longer considers her a friend and he will stop greeting her and talking to her…
Wanting to spend time with ‘popular’ people is such an alien idea to me. The interesting people are much more fun.
Good thing Raidah is in a committed relationship with that guy, otherwise this might be seen as her making a move.
What guy?
You know, that boyfriend guy.
I thought Carl was Dana’s boyfriend.
He was, yeah. Nothing’s been said about Raidah dating him or anything.
What, you think she’s a no-boyfriend looser who can’t get herself a replacement boyfriend?
Does Jacob have a new girlfriend? No, I didn’t think so. Because he’s a looser. Raidah isn’t. She totally has a boyfriend.
On unrelated notes, she’s totally not bitter about Jacob dissing her.
Raidah very explicitly tells Jacob to his face as he is breaking up with her that she’s going to feel sorry when she sees him and Joyce walking by.
THIS IS MOVING FORWARD TOO FAST
I MISS THE OLD DAYS
WHERE’S AMAZI-GIRL
I was thinking “Lo, there shall be much opening of mouth and inserting of foot”.
And then it occurred to me that there might have been an awkward thing already in this very strip where Walky asked a Muslim woman if they could get specifically haram food for breakfast.
Although I suspect Raidah is resigned to that sort of thing, living as she does in a dominantly non-Muslim society.
Wait, is that what piggy pancakes are? I was thinking they were pancakes that were stacked to look like a pig’s face. Big circle for the face and a smaller one for the snoot and then whip cream or some other decoration for the eyes….
Now I feel silly. lol
I think I’ve heard of a variation of those, called “cat fish cakes”, although these are made with brownies instead of pancakes LOL.
You’d be right, Bob Evans piggy pancakes are literally pancakes made to look like a pig’s face, except it’s chocolate sauce for the eyes and a banana slice to create the nostrils of the smaller pancake snout. That being said the usual side that goes with it is a sausage link which is kinda morbid when you think about it, but as with all breakfast places you can of course just request a different side instead.
But bacon tastes good, pork chops taste good…
I sincerely doubt that Walky knows Raidah’s religious affiliation, so it’d be weird to hold it against him when he mentions “piggy pancakes” (either shaped like or served with pig, I assume) in her company.
1: I wager he doesn’t know that Raidah’s Muslim. He doesn’t seem to know much about her, she’s not wearing any obvious signifiers of Muslim faith that he’d be able to recognize, and its not like she goes around introducing herself in that manner.
2: Apparently, based on what others have said, Piggy Pancakes are just pancakes in in the shape of a pig. Not actually made out of any pig bits.
3: Even if they were, Raidah probably wouldn’t care. He’s saying what he’d like to order, not what she should have. Raidah’s an asshole in many, many, many, many, many, many, many ways (although not as many as some insist on her, seriously, by the comments you’d like she were Satan in disguise), but she’s shown religious tolerance and acceptance at every point. Even with Joyce, her mockery was more out of a classist sense, while sitting next to her very Christian boyfriend.
I think Raidah is used to people eating pork around her. I’m not even sure how strict she is with religious dietary guidelines.
I’m gonna go ahead and assume she’s not so strict as to impose those guidelines on others around her, if she even follows them herself.
Before anyone asks, Bob Evans is a chain restaurant that serves “country food” and similar. It’s pretty decent. We have ’em here in the Midwest.
Why do I feel like that’s something Sal would suggest then?
I’ve heard of it, but never seen one. Maybe they can’t spread further because they’re in a symbiotic relationship with Menards.
Is it kind of like Howard Johnson’s?
Sure, it’s like Howard Johnson’s, assuming that Howard Johnson’s is kind of like Bob Evans. Never been to one.
Bob Evans! I miss that chain. They’re nowhere to be found in Phoenix.
Oh no looks like it’s not about Sal, how is she gonna deaaaaaal
The hell are you on about?
Sal’s standing next to her dorkass brother and he’s getting attention instead of her, which has probably never happened unless we’re talking about her parents, in which case it happened exclusively.
Nonsense. Sal got plenty of parental attention…
…when there was a desire to apply negative criticism or assign blame.
I’d be confused if people started falling all over my dork-ass brother, and it wouldn’t necessarily be jealousy.
I said it on Patreon about yesterday’s strip, but I’m really peeved that we can’t take people who act and talk like Raidah, and just use their base nutrients for food. It’s not like they view others as people anyway, so what’s the harm?
Long pig is haram. Feed them to bears.
I can’t wait to see people shit on Lucy for being a social climber too.
I feel like there is a difference between “I want to use people to get job opportunities etc” and “I wanna feel special bc people with arbitrary popularity like me”. And I’m not condemning the first neccessarily if both parties are fine with it and both get smth out of it. But Raidah doesn’t seem interested in a quid-pro-quo, or letting the person know she uses them. And that’s kinda shitty.
I hate to break it to you, but if you want to make actual good money as a lawyer, then using people to get job opportunities, aka networking, is the name of the game. Criticising Raidah for doing it is just that “and yet you participate in society” comic.
(as a side note, this is why Dorothy is fucked, and not in the good sense – networking is THE fundamental part of a successful political career, and Dorothy has all the social skills of an amoeba. Like, her only consistent friend is the girl who’ll socialise with anyone)
Lets remember how Becky essentially gave herself a free ticket to any entry level political job she wants just because Robin likes her. I don’t think Dorothy is fucked though, a pretty, intelligent, white girl, will probably be snatched up very quickly, especially since she got into Yale or (insert ivy league college here).
That strip where Becky calls Roz a legacy admission and Dorothy goes “wow don’t talk over the homeless lesbian” when Becky was living in an apartment paid for by a Republican who was also giving her a scholarship remains the peak of comedy.
Yeah, yeah, I watched How To Get Away With Murder, too. But I hate to break it to you – just because shitty behaviour is expected, doesn’t make it less shitty.
But Raidah doesn’t seem interested in a quid-pro-quo, or letting the person know she uses them.
I’m gonna question this part, not necessarily totally argue against it, but wrt “letting people use her,” she did define herself as someone Jacob needs for making his brother proud and then when Harrison describes the kind of girl he was hoping Jacob would avoid, he describes Raidah.
Again, I’m not gonna use this one line to say “here is the secret tragic dark truth behind Raidah,” but I don’t think she views herself as someone who doesn’t get used either if she does define her relationships as using people. She thought of herself as someone Jacob needed, and for the specific reason of looking good for someone else.
We all know Lucy’s social climbing dreams will end in tears. No need to make it even worse.
Is popular people still a thing in college?
Only if you haven’t grown out of clique-y high school bullshit.
I sure am glad Jenny and Raidah are too mature for that.
Isn’t popular people still a thing in, erm, everything?
In my experience of adulthood, “the popular kids” type clique hasn’t really been a thing? Then again I only recently realized how incompetent I am at reading social situations, so maybe I have just been oblivious.
Lucy and Walky are freshmen (Lucy in particular has been vaguely implied to have some hangups about her own popularity amongst her peers) and Raidah’s friend group was introduced by defining themselves as So Adult, so it’s probably a good mix of focus groups who’d buy into that.
I mean, yeah, in the sense that there are people who have a lot of friends, more than others. They tend to participate in hall activities a lot more. Though my experience might be different, here the halls of residence aren’t just a place to live, they have all this hall pride crap and try to force you into participating in stuff. So it kind of keeps that highschool atmosphere.
I was friends with the “popular kids” when i lived on campus. Love them but it was kind of annoying bc every time we went out we’d stop for like ten minutes bc they ran into one of their bagillion friends
Mary better watch out because Raidah is coming in hot for that “meanest asshole in college” trophy.
I don’t like Raidah, but she is nowhere near Mary-level. Not even close.
Is it odd that I’m curious where this Jennifer/Asher & Walky/Lucy double date + Raidah thing goes?
Well I went to bed early and missed the update. I really only have one question for this strip. Is “the popular kids” still a thing in college? People still had cliqs and friend groups of course but at least to me there was less pressure to try and fit in. People partied too but most everyone was just trying to get their shit done. This feels a little high school to me. Frankly Lucy’s new friend group is larger which technically makes them “the popular kids”. I know.what is popular though….me not trusting Asher! Still! That is all.
My experience in college was that there were some people that were more “popular” than others, but only in the sense that you tended to see them around more frequently at parties and campus stuff and a lot people knew who they were—usually athletes and student council types. (Mind you, I went to a small liberal arts college so it was a lot easier to at least recognize most people that went to school there.) It definitely wasn’t the same as it was in high school, with the “popular kids” crapping on the “unpopular kids” and everyone jockeying for a place in the inner circle.
Truth be told, Raidah comes off as such a pill all the time, I’m kind of surprised she has that many people hanging around her to begin with.
I suspect part of the difference is simply that most colleges are bigger. Far bigger.
Enough bigger that you’re not really all one social group. More circles and you didn’t really need to interact with the “popular” ones if you didn’t seek them out – even getting admitted close enough to them to be snubbed wasn’t easy.
Anyway “a social climber” feels like a normal thing to be in college when you participate in a rat race defined by knowing the right people and if you don’t know the right people then you don’t get a job, let alone in this day and age.
I know that it’s more specifically about being two-faced in personal relationships, like no one here is going “damn you Raidah, putting yourself in a position where you’ve networked enough to land a good job out of college,” but the action itself feels like something that’s probably worth doing in a setting like being a lawyer. Even way back in the flashback strips with Dana she says college is about networking, and she’s correct about that even if it’d do the social hermits among us like myself a lot of good if it weren’t.
Law is one of those careers that is specifically much more about WHO you know than what you know, unless somebody’s gonna try to convince me that Rudy Giuliani is competent (and good luck with that).
Like, there’s only so many surgeries you can botch because you got the job by being BFFs with the hospital manager before you get fired from everything forever, but a well-paying law career pretty much runs on BFFing the right people, with success rate being a desirable, but optional, extra.
Getting your name and face out there as much as possible probably matters a whole lot more when you’re a Muslim woman in middle America too.
I’m sure Dollars McWhite will happily check out the resume of someone named Raidah when looking for new applicants.
Obligatory panel 7 (of 6) from Sal: “…is he funny or something?”
The question of Radahs place on the jerk tier will be defined by whether this is just regular networking or if she spends the whole meal focused on Joyce and Sarah. I find Radahs networking kind of at an off putting level, I have a friend who studied law and she didn’t talk to people like this, but also while awful it’s only ever in certain contexts so it’ll be something to see when she’s socialising with walky who has barely a connection to what hurt Radah.
I’d think it’d be much more defining concerning her jerk tier if she spends time trying to drive a wedge between Walky and Lucy, though it’s arguable that Raidah’s smart enough to not have specifically invited Lucy along if that’s her intent. OTOH, this isn’t called Smarting of Age, so.
Actually yeah, that reminds me. Did anyone ever tell Raidah that Walky’s name is David on-panel?
Not that I can find. My guess is that it came up when Jennifer was deciding not to be Billie anymore, since we know that the origins of “Billie” and “Walky” are linked.
That’s a good catch!
Oh geez, yep, that would be pretty bad, though I guess less obsessive bad?
So it’s either obsessive jerk or wedge jerk
At least Sal gets a SURPRISE magnet and not… him
These are Little Piggy Hotcakes?
Does it bother anyone else how no characters ever seen bothered at how Sarah is treated by Raidah?
Yeah, it’s definitely a little weird.
They barely comment on how Sarah treats them and each other, I doubt they’d care about someone being ornery in her direction.
Extremely. Sarah may have her rough exterior but that’s all it is. a defense mechanism. Raidah’s vitrol is spiteful and classist. She only seems nice when theres something she can get out of it.
Not really. In the flashback to their freshman year, Raidah’s just kinda outright nice to Sarah with no stipulations and insists that Sarah “let people be nice to her if they want to.” Sarah notes in the next strip that even if they didn’t hang out all the time, they still made efforts to include her.
She’s a huge shithead when she meets Dina for the first time, but she’s perfectly amicable to Joyce for all the two strips she had before she saw Sarah again, whereupon she got nasty. I dunno what this counts for either but she’s not opposed to Jacob hanging out with Joyce either until Joyce makes a move on him.
Plus I dunno what being a pill because of a defense mechanism really counts for if the end result is still being a pill, let alone when what she’s defending herself from is “other people acknowledging she is alive.”
Eh, Sarah has been kind of awful towards Billy since they meet, so I doubt Billy is in any hurry to defend Sarah.
“Do breakfast.” Nah, something is fishy.
Lucy, stop looking after popular people: Raidah is looking at your girlfriend.
Haha good ol’ Bob Evans. Worked there for years, glad to see it finally popped up in this comic.