Comic Discussion > QUESTIONABLE CONTENT

WCDT: 2006-2010 (5-9 Sep 2011)

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jwhouk:
...It's a long story.

See, there was this thing that happened in the late 1950's - Brown v. Board of Education. It basically struck down the concept of "separate but equal" in terms of schooling, which led to school districts across the nation suddenly being required to have an equal number of minority youth at every school in their districts.

Many school districts realized they could do this by providing bus service to suburban youth to inner-city schools. That was about two generations ago. Now, because of things like school choice, busing is essentially the only way for some kids to get to their school.

Of course, one thing that most Europeans don't realize is how spread out most American cities are. I live in a relatively small city of about 10,000; it's located in an area roughly 6 miles by 3 miles, or about 18 square miles (46.62 square km). While that may not sound like much, you need to realize we have two rivers that divide the city into three sections, and that we are also in a rather hilly part of the state. Add to that the little thing we call "Winter" here (very bitter cold temperatures, occasional snowstorms and the like) and busing doesn't seem like a luxury as much as a necessity.

There's also the cultural thing about Americans and the open road and such, but that's for those of driving age. The situation within the comic here (bringing the topic back to QC) is rather unusual compared to most parts of the US. The fact that only Dora, Steve and Raven own cars (and Dora doesn't use hers much) isn't normal, unless you live in either the northeastern US, or in a large city where transit is an option.

Border Reiver:

--- Quote from: Akima on 09 Sep 2011, 19:22 ---
--- Quote from: Mad Cat on 09 Sep 2011, 08:11 ---
--- Quote from: pwhodges on 09 Sep 2011, 07:02 ---I'm noticing recently that Jeph has started showing eyebrows through light hair - he didn't in the past, e.g. 1588.

--- End quote ---
That's just Momo. She is still culturally Japanese and that's in keeping with the manga style she's drawn after.
--- End quote ---
Not just Momo, and not just light hair. See Marigold in the first panel of 2003. Unless anime conventions apply to her too?



--- End quote ---

If they did her outfit and body would be slightly different...  More of one, less of the other.

YourMaster:
I lived in a rural Canadian town, population 7000 -- and the largest community for some distance in any direction.  I could and did walk or bike to school, but I was the exception, not the rule, since I lived right nearby.  Sometimes kids had to sit in the bus more than an hour in winter each way to and from the high school, and the bus wasn't going slowly.  Elementary schools are smaller are more distributed, but biking would still be impractical for a large portion of students.  In fact, my elementary school was closer to home than the high school, but I did take the bus there in winter -- at first because I was too young to trek that far in the dead of winter, and later because I was leading my cousins to and from school and they were too young.

That said, I see nothing weird at all about a 13 year old being alone in a bakery, especially since the outside doesn't seem like a winter wonderland.  I'm sure I did that at 13.  In more densely populated areas I'd expect it to happen much, much more.

rje:
oh man the school bus...I grew up in a rural town of about 3000-4000 people give or take, but the actual city part of it (where the businesses/schools/shops etc were located was only about 3 square miles or so. The majority of students actually lived waaaay out of town, spread out in all four directions - we had a hell of a lot of buses and most bused students rode them all the way from K-12, unless they were lucky enough to have a car when they hit 16 and got permits/licenses. I was lucky enough, and let me tell you I was so happy xD
Especially since the area were the buses started out from was a ten minute walk from my house so I was literally the second person on my bus in the morning and the last person off my bus after school. Getting up at 5:00am, waiting out in the freezing dark at 6:00 and riding a cold (or sometimes overheated in the winter hurr) bus for an hour and a half was not enjoyable.
Got me used to commuting though I guess.

Closely clustered cities with public transport are actually pretty rare in the US I think, with some things even rarer. I've still never been on a subway or above-ground train, for instance.

bhtooefr:

--- Quote from: Skewbrow on 10 Sep 2011, 03:08 ---How do you get millions of kids to/from school, if they never go out by themselves? Is *everybody* using a school bus in the U.S? I would have thought that school buses are used only in areas where no other method of transportation is available?
--- End quote ---

In the recent past, yes, but nowadays, quite a few parents drive their kids to school, because they don't trust the school bus. :psyduck:

(Then again, based on my experience being in school buses (and I've had 2 hour bus rides, for a school ~30 minutes by car or so away), that's not necessarily unfair.)

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