Dina is having the worst day of her life right now, and has every right to call Joyce out like this.
Silver lining is, at least Joyce is finally facing this truth about herself and her feelings with sober senses and bringing at least some kind of closure with it. *plays “Soft Light” from Super Paper Mario on hacked muzak*
the problem is that while Joyce may be acknowledging that she’s being selfish she’s also spinning it with the mentality that she’s the victim in the whole thing and that she’s “sacrificing” to make it work. She doesn’t really care that she hurt Joe badly or damaged Sarah’s trust in her by doing so no no the real problem is that she felt bad doing it so she’s the one who was hurt the most in all this.
Dina is absolutely right, especially in panel 2. Not sure where Joyce is going with this because Becky and Dina’s issues have nothing to do with whether Dina is being ‘selfish’ or not.
I disagree with this entirely. Valuing yourself isn’t giving up on someone. It’s the opposite that has happened here, Becky has given up on Dina whether it was said or not. It shouldn’t be on Dina to go to Becky and convince her she’s good enough, Becky has to figure that out herself.
People generally don’t enjoy being in relationships where their partner considers them their silver medal.
Vukodlak
So basically if you get turned down by the girl you like. You can’t ask anyone out again because the next person will be the silver medal?
clif
Those are the rules.
Take it up with the anti-silver defamation league.
But I’m always pleased by evidence that you too have an inner Mike.
clif
What the heck. I have no idea how that last line repeated from a previous comment. But I’m going to blame it on Mike’s ghost.
Bill Erak
I think Sirk has a point. Don’t get me wrong I want beckysaur back together RIGHT NOW but There’s a difference between ‘asking someone else out’ and rebounding.
Dina is a rebound. Becky’s feelings for Joyce were stronger than her feelings for Dina, at least in that moment. Hopefully it was a momentary shock-related thing, years of pinning just exploding. But Dina does have a right to feel slighted, and it’s mainly on Becky to try to solve this.
I feel like if my partner wanted me to give up on our relationship because of their hangups about another person, I would also maybe not want to continue that relationship.
It’s more selfish (positive) for Dina to finally say “Y’know what. I deserve more than being 1st runner up in the heart of my loved ones”
Sirksome
I am very confused by what Joyce is getting at here. Even if Dina wants to still be with Becky being selfish here just feels like more work Dina would have to do and I honestly believe Dina has done more than enough.
NGPZ
THIS. Dina deserves much better TT~TT
Thing 2
Sirksome: You expect what Joyce says to make sense??!
Lys
@Skirksome: Joyce is saying that Dina should ignore Becky’s internal conflict and continue the relationship despite it, because that’s pretty much what Joyce did with Dorothy. You remember how Joyce got together with Dorothy? She had previously rejected Joyce’s advances, right before the big date with Joe. Then at the protest Dorothy was practically begging Joyce to leave her. Despite this, Joyce ignored Dorothy’s pleas and charged into her arms anyway, and was rewarded with everything she wanted. Consequently, Joyce is advising Dina to do the same: Be selfish! Ignore Becky drama! Obtain Becky kisses!
Imo both are correct answers. Dina and Becky could put in the work and overcome this and grow stronger from it. On the flip side, dina or Becky have every right to look at their relationship and decide that it would be better not to salvage it, but to try to bury the feelings and move on.
it’s really the most joyce thing ever for her to stumble into something actually profound in this last panel after floundering a bit in her opening. sometimes you need to be a bit selfish! you gotta sometimes!
People were discussing yesterday if it was really the best idea to let Joyce handle this, surely Dorothy can words better. But I think this is exactly why Dorothy let plan “say some dinosaur facts or something to get Dina back with Becky” go ahead without comment – Joyce flounders but her heart is usually in the right place.
100% in favor of putting seeing the bony poindexters come together. dorpy would explode several times over from the various forms of erotic torture dina’d put her through
Like after all that’s happened I really don’t think she’s earned the right to be this voice of sincerity and reason. She has been such an insufferable little shit and I really need her to do some actual self-reflection before I will tolerate this kind of thing out of her.
I hope that Dina (correctly) points out that this is a conversation she needs to be having with Becky instead, because *she* is the one who gave up on Dina, not the other way around. But Joyce wouldn’t do that, because she’s currently avoiding uncomfortable conversations with the people she actually needs to be having conversations with.
Becky can join Joe in that club! They might have t-shirts ready by the time Joyce actually gets around to either of them.
I think my feelings on that are going to depend on how effective this talk ends up being. Because I do like this as Joyce characterization, but it doesn’t feel like it should be persuasive.
Not sure where Joyce is going re:selfishness, but I’m both a) very dubious that it will achieve her intended goal, and b) very interested in what it does achieve instead.
Well, Joe did need to hear that. He’s known he’s not going to win and he needs to know Dorothy will never share with him. He needs to take it all as lessons learned and figure out where to go from here.
Dina, as usual, has her romance head screwed on better than the allos and closer-to-typicals.
Maybe Joyce could just learn to mind her own business while not viewing Becky and Dina’s relationship as some sort of platonic ideal for gay relationships. Sometimes people break up, it’s not easy, but it’s not world shattering. Get over it.
I like Joyce’s honesty in panel 4, and she’s totally right in panel 5. The only problem is, it’s not really a lack of selfishness on Dina’s part that’s stopping her and Becky from being together.
Also, nice for her to have this big emotional moment while Joe’s presumably just standing off-panel in the same room like he’s some sort of video game npc.
I mean, him being an off-screen NPC instead of a character has been the status quo ever since she got with Dorothy. Don’t see it changing now or anytime soon.
It’s like a VN, she went down the Joe relationship path, then at the last second she switches to the Dorothy relationship path, the game isn’t designed to react to this state and you get these weird conversations that real human beings wouldn’t actually have.
clif
I don’t know. I’ve heard some real human beings have some pretty weird conversations.
I mean, I assume they were real. I can’t actually prove anything.
I’m assuming Joe stepped out to give them privacy while they chatted but then Joyce was loud enough he can hear them anyway so now it’s super awkward as he’s stuck standing around waiting to be invited back in
I vote for Dina choosing to be dateless for a while and focusing on self love
would be healthy, and frankly, realistic for an autistic woman after a sting of rejection and having just about the worst day of her life TT~TT
She was outed publicly as a gay woman even though no one but her closest friends seems to even recognize her. I guess she outed herself to her dad. Joe counts I guess. Joyce claiming she’s thrown away so much does feel a little hollow though considering she’s so far skirted most responsibility here. I guess she couldn’t talk to her friends about fucking Dorothy. What a sacrifice. Maybe the other things are her religion and sense of identity now that she’s atheist and identifies as least in part as a queer woman?
I think her thought process is that meeting Dorothy, an atheist who was very kind to her and didn’t eviscerate her like a hell demon, was the first lynchpin in Joyce re-thinking the religion she was raised in. She stood up to her parents to defend Dorothy, has unlearned a lot of things because of the connection they’ve had, and a lot of the past 6 months would be very different if she hadn’t met her.
I’ve said don’t trust Joyce several times. I think we all understand her perspective on this Becky and Dina scenario is self serving. Instead maybe don’t trust those drawings or photos on the wall in the background. What are those about? Nothing trustworthy!
111 thoughts on “Kindest”
NGPZ
Dina is having the worst day of her life right now, and has every right to call Joyce out like this.
Silver lining is, at least Joyce is finally facing this truth about herself and her feelings with sober senses and bringing at least some kind of closure with it.
*plays “Soft Light” from Super Paper Mario on hacked muzak*
Thag Simmons
Dina was held at gunpoint once and kidnapped, so maybe not the worst day of her life.
Cameron Stone
No, being lectured to by Joyce is worse, for Dina especially.
Astariel
Technically, she wasn’t kidnapped, she just followed social cues.
ProfNekko
the problem is that while Joyce may be acknowledging that she’s being selfish she’s also spinning it with the mentality that she’s the victim in the whole thing and that she’s “sacrificing” to make it work. She doesn’t really care that she hurt Joe badly or damaged Sarah’s trust in her by doing so no no the real problem is that she felt bad doing it so she’s the one who was hurt the most in all this.
Jon
Dina/Becky. Because Joyce/Dorothy is already built into the structure of the universe.
apocryphascribe
Exactly, it would be a wasted vote! I’d argue we need Billie/Ruth there instead.
clif
That would be a toughy, alt text.
But I’m always pleased by evidence that you too have an inner Mike.
jeffepp
Well, at least she’s aware of that part of her nature.
Doopyboop
Dina is absolutely right, especially in panel 2. Not sure where Joyce is going with this because Becky and Dina’s issues have nothing to do with whether Dina is being ‘selfish’ or not.
Jon
Dina is giving up on Becky because she thinks that’s what Becky wants. She never asked if that was what Becky wanted, though.
Sirksome
I disagree with this entirely. Valuing yourself isn’t giving up on someone. It’s the opposite that has happened here, Becky has given up on Dina whether it was said or not. It shouldn’t be on Dina to go to Becky and convince her she’s good enough, Becky has to figure that out herself.
Cameron Stone
People generally don’t enjoy being in relationships where their partner considers them their silver medal.
Vukodlak
So basically if you get turned down by the girl you like. You can’t ask anyone out again because the next person will be the silver medal?
clif
Those are the rules.
Take it up with the anti-silver defamation league.
But I’m always pleased by evidence that you too have an inner Mike.
clif
What the heck. I have no idea how that last line repeated from a previous comment. But I’m going to blame it on Mike’s ghost.
Bill Erak
I think Sirk has a point. Don’t get me wrong I want beckysaur back together RIGHT NOW but There’s a difference between ‘asking someone else out’ and rebounding.
Dina is a rebound. Becky’s feelings for Joyce were stronger than her feelings for Dina, at least in that moment. Hopefully it was a momentary shock-related thing, years of pinning just exploding. But Dina does have a right to feel slighted, and it’s mainly on Becky to try to solve this.
Thag Simmons
I feel like if my partner wanted me to give up on our relationship because of their hangups about another person, I would also maybe not want to continue that relationship.
Yotomoe
It’s more selfish (positive) for Dina to finally say “Y’know what. I deserve more than being 1st runner up in the heart of my loved ones”
Sirksome
I am very confused by what Joyce is getting at here. Even if Dina wants to still be with Becky being selfish here just feels like more work Dina would have to do and I honestly believe Dina has done more than enough.
NGPZ
THIS. Dina deserves much better TT~TT
Thing 2
Sirksome: You expect what Joyce says to make sense??!
Lys
@Skirksome: Joyce is saying that Dina should ignore Becky’s internal conflict and continue the relationship despite it, because that’s pretty much what Joyce did with Dorothy. You remember how Joyce got together with Dorothy? She had previously rejected Joyce’s advances, right before the big date with Joe. Then at the protest Dorothy was practically begging Joyce to leave her. Despite this, Joyce ignored Dorothy’s pleas and charged into her arms anyway, and was rewarded with everything she wanted. Consequently, Joyce is advising Dina to do the same: Be selfish! Ignore Becky drama! Obtain Becky kisses!
Amara
Imo both are correct answers. Dina and Becky could put in the work and overcome this and grow stronger from it. On the flip side, dina or Becky have every right to look at their relationship and decide that it would be better not to salvage it, but to try to bury the feelings and move on.
QueenofSodor
it’s really the most joyce thing ever for her to stumble into something actually profound in this last panel after floundering a bit in her opening. sometimes you need to be a bit selfish! you gotta sometimes!
mads_in_zero
People were discussing yesterday if it was really the best idea to let Joyce handle this, surely Dorothy can words better. But I think this is exactly why Dorothy let plan “say some dinosaur facts or something to get Dina back with Becky” go ahead without comment – Joyce flounders but her heart is usually in the right place.
Nono
Meanwhile Joe, off to the side, coughing and twiddling his thumbs as his girlfriend(?) talks about how much she’s given up for her Dorothy already
Lumino
Nobody in the DoA universe actually cares about what Joe thinks, least of all Joyce.
John Campbell
I vote for Dina/Dorothy.
QueenofSodor
100% in favor of putting seeing the bony poindexters come together. dorpy would explode several times over from the various forms of erotic torture dina’d put her through
Dot
I don’t like that Joyce gets to be the one to have this talk with Dina.
Dot
Like after all that’s happened I really don’t think she’s earned the right to be this voice of sincerity and reason. She has been such an insufferable little shit and I really need her to do some actual self-reflection before I will tolerate this kind of thing out of her.
Grimey
You know who would have been great for this talk? Billie.
It would have been a fun parallel that while Ruth checked up on Becky, Billie for whatever reason ran into Dina.
clif
Oh, Billie would have given her good advice. We have every reason to believe.
Grimey
My favorite genre of Billifer.
Decent advice for everyone else–a human trashfire on dealing with her own issues.
Yotomoe
I concur.
apocryphascribe
I hope that Dina (correctly) points out that this is a conversation she needs to be having with Becky instead, because *she* is the one who gave up on Dina, not the other way around. But Joyce wouldn’t do that, because she’s currently avoiding uncomfortable conversations with the people she actually needs to be having conversations with.
Becky can join Joe in that club! They might have t-shirts ready by the time Joyce actually gets around to either of them.
Dot
Right? Becky is the one who hurt Dina here!
clif
Right, but Dina should be selfish enough to ignore that fact.
Thag Simmons
I think my feelings on that are going to depend on how effective this talk ends up being. Because I do like this as Joyce characterization, but it doesn’t feel like it should be persuasive.
Fail Earnhardt
Panel 2 Dina knows it too and is probably setting up for a nasty dunk on Joyce
Jay
something something negative comment cause all I do is bongo and moan something something.
Jon
Try snaring instead of bongoing? I dunno.
Taffy
Add in some 808s, while you’re at it. Women love 808s.
clif
Here Jay is, emotionally wounded and moaning, and we’re talking about women’s BoBs?
AMagicalDuck
Not really disproving the claim here are you?
RassilonTDavros
Not sure where Joyce is going re:selfishness, but I’m both a) very dubious that it will achieve her intended goal, and b) very interested in what it does achieve instead.
Adam Black
She confused attachment, greed and being a doormat with selfishness. Because she knows it was selfish to toss Joe aside with no second thought.
BSD
Well, Joe did need to hear that. He’s known he’s not going to win and he needs to know Dorothy will never share with him. He needs to take it all as lessons learned and figure out where to go from here.
Dina, as usual, has her romance head screwed on better than the allos and closer-to-typicals.
Yotomoe
Genuinely watching Joyce wave every red flag and telling Joe to Get out like it’s a horror movie.
RexLatro
Yeah…considering the cheating and hurt done by Joyce towards him already only to listen to this rambling dialogue?
Joe honestly deserves better from a partner, and friend. Dina shouldn’t have to put up with this nonsense either
Cameron Stone
Maybe Joyce could just learn to mind her own business while not viewing Becky and Dina’s relationship as some sort of platonic ideal for gay relationships. Sometimes people break up, it’s not easy, but it’s not world shattering. Get over it.
Dot
Where the fuck is her girlfriend, why is Dorothy not stopping any of this
Astariel
I like Joyce’s honesty in panel 4, and she’s totally right in panel 5. The only problem is, it’s not really a lack of selfishness on Dina’s part that’s stopping her and Becky from being together.
Erica
Exactly. If anything Dina is being “selfish” (that is, acting in her own best interest) by breaking up because she won’t accept being a second choice.
Cameron Stone
Also, nice for her to have this big emotional moment while Joe’s presumably just standing off-panel in the same room like he’s some sort of video game npc.
apocryphascribe
I mean, him being an off-screen NPC instead of a character has been the status quo ever since she got with Dorothy. Don’t see it changing now or anytime soon.
Cameron Stone
It’s like a VN, she went down the Joe relationship path, then at the last second she switches to the Dorothy relationship path, the game isn’t designed to react to this state and you get these weird conversations that real human beings wouldn’t actually have.
clif
I don’t know. I’ve heard some real human beings have some pretty weird conversations.
I mean, I assume they were real. I can’t actually prove anything.
Techhead
I’m assuming Joe stepped out to give them privacy while they chatted but then Joyce was loud enough he can hear them anyway so now it’s super awkward as he’s stuck standing around waiting to be invited back in
NGPZ
I vote for Dina choosing to be dateless for a while and focusing on self love
would be healthy, and frankly, realistic for an autistic woman after a sting of rejection and having just about the worst day of her life TT~TT
Yotomoe
THANK YOU, Dina. That’s exactly how I was feeling. Joyce’s kindness is just guilt and and selfishness masked as benevolence.
Erica
That plus unhealthy idolizing of Dina and Becky’s relationship
Throwatron
Just more evidence that Joyce was, in fact, raised a fundamentalist.
Erica
What has Joyce given up other than the boyfriend she immediately forgot about?
Sirksome
She was outed publicly as a gay woman even though no one but her closest friends seems to even recognize her. I guess she outed herself to her dad. Joe counts I guess. Joyce claiming she’s thrown away so much does feel a little hollow though considering she’s so far skirted most responsibility here. I guess she couldn’t talk to her friends about fucking Dorothy. What a sacrifice. Maybe the other things are her religion and sense of identity now that she’s atheist and identifies as least in part as a queer woman?
Dot
She’s “given up” Joe in the sense that my dog “gives up” a toy that falls off the bed. She can go pick it back up anytime she likes.
Doopyboop
I think her thought process is that meeting Dorothy, an atheist who was very kind to her and didn’t eviscerate her like a hell demon, was the first lynchpin in Joyce re-thinking the religion she was raised in. She stood up to her parents to defend Dorothy, has unlearned a lot of things because of the connection they’ve had, and a lot of the past 6 months would be very different if she hadn’t met her.
Sirksome
I’ve said don’t trust Joyce several times. I think we all understand her perspective on this Becky and Dina scenario is self serving. Instead maybe don’t trust those drawings or photos on the wall in the background. What are those about? Nothing trustworthy!
Tan
Don’t trust that the person just off-panel can’t hear you.
DiDi