Comic Discussion > QUESTIONABLE CONTENT
WCDT 30 August- 3 September 2010
snubnose:
--- Quote from: Tergon on 03 Sep 2010, 05:27 ---Yeah, I sincerely doubt that where Sven's at counts as "obsessing". He strikes me more as the kind of guy who covers the heavy topics with a joke as a defense thing.
--- End quote ---
Uh.
No, not really.
And thats not what going in the comic either.
--- Quote --- The fact that he felt genuinely shitty about how things turned out with Faye isn't something he's used to; so, when confronted with the mental image of Faye not wearing very much, he knee-jerks into Flippant Jerk mode and tosses off a joke completely irrelevant to the serious things Marten is saying to him.
--- End quote ---
Except he's serious.
--- Quote --- That stops him from thinking about a subject that's probably still a reasonably open wound for him.
--- End quote ---
Yeah, obviously he's quite immature about serious relationships, but thats a different issue altogether.
--- Quote --- I imagine that once Marten gets genuinely annoyed, Sven will back down and take the conversation, and Marten's dillemma, seriously.
--- End quote ---
Thats not what I expect. I expect Sven being unable to help Marten.
--- Quote --- Either way, Jeph's too much of a storyteller to have a random meeting with Sven be completely spent on one joke.
--- End quote ---
Again, Sven ISNT JOKING. He's serious.
no one special:
--- Quote from: Tergon on 03 Sep 2010, 05:27 ---when confronted with the mental image of Faye not wearing very much, he knee-jerks into Flippant Jerk mode and tosses off a joke completely irrelevant to the serious things Marten is saying to him. That stops him from thinking about a subject that's probably still a reasonably open wound for him.
--- End quote ---
I don't think it was a joke at all - he just stopped listening. He heard "Faye" and "underwear," then basically just tuned out(having dropped into a patented Bianchi fugue-state) and waited for Marten to stop talking so he could ask his question. No defense mechanism here, just 100% animal instinct.
--- Quote from: Mojo on 03 Sep 2010, 08:44 ---I've had two serious relationships in my time. The first, we'll call her Jane, cheated on me. It was the first time I'd experienced that kind of betrayal, and it changed me. I used to be completely trusting. If she wanted a "girls' night out," I had no problem with it. But that changed. That ability to trust was forever damaged.
Thus, when I started seeing the second woman, we'll call her Doris, I couldn't help feeling an intense paranoid dread whenever she was away from me. I knew it was irrational. Doris wasn't Jane, there was no logical reason to expect Doris to betray me as Jane had done. The heart, however, is an irrational organ. No matter how much I knew I was being paranoid and jealous, I still felt the pain and desperation. The difference was that I choked it down and kept it to myself. That's what Dora has to learn to do.
Of course, Doris did eventually cheat on me too, going home with her ex after a "girls' night out," so maybe Dora has a leg to stand on...
--- End quote ---
I wouldn't say that Dora has a leg to stand on at all. I've been cheated on twice, but those were just two individual circumstances. I've also had an amazing relationship where she and I had 100% complete trust in one another. Women can't be judged by the actions of others of their gender, just as men can't.
themacnut:
People don't consciously set out to judge others by the actions of their gender, but when you're someone who's been badly hurt by someone of that gender, and especially if it's happened more than once by different members of that gender, it take real mental effort for many people to take other members of that gender as individuals and not hold them "responsible" for the actions of the ones that hurt you.
In simpler terms, if, for example, you're a guy who's been cheated on more than once by women you've been in relationships with, it will probably take real mental effort (and maybe therapy) to avoid looking at future dates as possible cheaters. It gets worse if the guy starts doubting his ability to find and/or choose women who won't cheat. Such a guy may just choose to forgo relationships altogether. Sad, but probably better than subjecting future dates to unfounded paranoia and jealously.
Dora's problem is most likely that she needs to confront her issues and deal with them, probably in therapy as Faye has done. If she doesn't, she will end up chasing Marten away.
reicreature:
--- Quote --- I think Marten is one of the few people around understanding enough (not a wimp, and I don't think those who keep calling him that know how truly silly they are. Marten is a man, a better one than Steve, and Sven doesn't even come close, although Angus does)
--- End quote ---
Can I just say thank you for saying this?
I get so tired of people saying "grow a pair" and all of that nonesense when Martin is clearly not a wimp (and hell, even if he was, is he really any less of a man for it?).
There's nothing weak about taking a quieter approach and being patient with someone you love when they are imperfect and sometimes make you mad. There's nothing weak about walking away from an argument before things take a turn for the sort of language and actions that can't be undone.
Tergon:
*shrugs*
If you think that my view on the comic's wrong, that's fine. But I stand by it. All it takes is to actually look at the setup for this comic and then put it all into context.
Marten's walking around at night, very obviously angry and frustrated. He, apparently by chance, bumps into Sven, who greets him. He asks Marten how he is, either casually or because he can recognise that Marten is in a bad mood. The conversation reaches the point where the two of them take a seat on a nearby park bench, because their chat has gone on long enough that they don't want to stand around talking. Everything up until this point must have happened, whatever the specifics may be.
From here, either Marten or Sven steers the conversation around to how frustrated Marten is at Dora right now. And at this point, Marten launches into a semi-rant explanation about how he feels Dora is being unreasonable toward him. Again, not conjecture: this is the comic as we see it.
Given Marten's mood, there is a zero percent chance that he would have kept talking to Sven this long, or opened up as much as he has, if Sven had been acting like an asshat for the entire conversation. And the conversation absolutely must have been going on for a while to reach this point.
And it is at this moment that Sven chooses to completely ignore the point of what Marten's saying and discuss Faye's boobs.
Either Sven is joking, or even for him, this is an utterly new level of asshattery that's made far, far worse by the buildup to it. He may be a douche, but this is beyond even him.
Therefore, I chose the only other possible option - he's making a joke.
Seriously, I'm trying to keep an open mind here, but I cannot think of another way to explain how this comic came to pass. And as such I refuse to believe that Sven is serious.
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