Grrl Power #704 – Trip to the vet
If it wasn’t clear, Sydney is trying to vet Frix. She doesn’t want to put herself in a situation where she does “stuff” with a guy, only to find out he’s a horrible womanizer, or unironically says “escape goat,” or is a racist, or doesn’t like Chris Claremont era X-Men.
Not that she’s necessarily had a lot of problems like that with her dating life. She’s not especially impulsive when it comes to her love life, so she usually has a pretty good idea of what she’s getting into. Never been in a hump and dump or anything. Not that this is likely to turn into a long term relationship. She just wants to know that he would pass muster if circumstances were different.
Cora’s hard light projector sits on her back usually, so she keeps a bunch of her old cybernetic limbs handy for massage time. The ones she has equipped right now have been described as having an upsettingly realistic skin texture.
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I often look for a mop when they say that they are about to melt down…
How does one melt down anyway, and why? Wouldn’t it just burst into flame first?
“melt down” is what can happen in nookular reactors if the system for cooling the fuel fails. See “China Syndrome” (movie)
Or don’t see that movie, it’s sensationalist BS that scared a generation away from nuclear power.
Only the idiots
The ‘China Syndrome’ was a very real fear at that time, was the fear founded on reality? Who knows, fortunately it has never happened
Meltdowns have happened at several plants over the years the most recent was at Fukushima. So not that great of a fantasy but a real danger with nuclear power. So how is the movie miss representing reality? Three Mile Island occurred 12 days after this movie came out partial meltdown, so how did they get the science wrong? Sure it isn’t going to melt all the way to China but it sure as hell will take time to cool and it tends to mess up everything around it. Like Fukushima and Chernobyl do you want to go live in those hot zones?
Neither Fukushima nor Chernobyl are ‘hot zones’
‘Partial meltdown’ is not a ‘full melt through the planet and come out the other side’, and if it did ‘mess up everything around it’ as you claim, how come Pennsylvania didn’t become an abandoned wasteland? o_O
How do you know it didn’t?
Three Mile Island was a success story: Everything went worst-case scenario, but the backup and safety measures worked and there was no real danger to the public. In Chernobyl, they literally disabled their safety measures before doing a very dangerous test, all in the middle of the night when everyone was tired with an inexperienced crew. It was an astonishingly stupid decision.
Fukushima is really the only place where safety measures have failed to prevent a major catastrophe. It was an extraordinary situation, to be sure, but if there’s anything to be worried about with nuclear power, it comes from Fukushima, and lessons learned there will inform the next generation of reactors… if they ever get built instead of just canceled all the time out of mindless fear-mongering. Ironically, one of the bigger dangers of nuclear power is that fear-mongering about nuclear power has prevented commercial nuclear power plants from being upgraded for decades, so aging equipment can’t be phased out.
I know that the fear of nuclear power is blamed for the lack of progress in developing the technology commercially, but from what I understand that’s not the only factor at play, and may not even be the biggest.
The biggest problem is that the early generations of nuclear plants were not commercially viable. They cost too much to build, and while people blame that on excessive regulation the reality is that the technology wasn’t mature enough to make them profitable in the short term. Since companies demand an essentially immediate return on their investment, the first generation only got built because the government wanted them built,and even with government underwriting a big chunk of their cost they weren’t especially profitable. If they had been, the power companies would have campaigned harder to maintain government support, and as climate change demonstrates the power companies can be very effective in convincing the government to ignore public sentiment and/or in manipulating public sentiment.
There are designs for better nuclear power systems out there that would likely be profitable much faster and be a much better return on investment for power companies. But the decision makers for the power companies (the top executives) don’t seem to get that, so they’re sticking with old technology. At this point, it will probably take an Elon Musk type to change things – someone who is in a position to allocate significant resources and actually understands the technology. You don’t end up running an energy company if you’ve got a degree in nuclear physics, so it’s unlikely that it will happen any time soon.
Anyway, the failure to develop nuclear power at this point is more of a market failure than an issue of the public being fooled by fear mongering. Contrary to popular belief, capitalism isn’t always the best system for developing new technology. It tends to be great at refining things that are known quantities, but there are systemic barriers to true revolutions.
Barbrady:- what? And you believe the early aeroplanes were ‘cost effective’ or even safe!? Not to mention the first automobiles
The two primary obstacles to nuclear power (and other ‘non-traditional’ forms) are the oil barons and fear (and the oil barons are behind the fear, they are also responsible for the slow down on alternative means of car propulsion), and they have been controlling the idiot masses for decades
Early cars and planes were built by hobbyists in their garages for the most part. The Wright Brothers built their plane in a bicycle shop. The technology had to advance a long way before it became commercially viable.
You could build a nuclear reactor in your garage (I know it’s been attempted and I’ve heard of one person succeeding) but doing it safely would be a challenge. Nuclear technology is inherently expensive to develop at this stage. It’s resource intensive in a way bikes and planes weren’t. Computers might be a better analogy – before the vacuum tube, computers were hugely expensive and did very little if they worked at all. After the vacuum tube was invented, they were ridiculously expensive but slightly more useful. Transistors made them slightly less expensive and easier to build and maaintain, but it wasn’t until the microchip that the technology matured to where a person could build one in their garage and do something cool with it.
Nuclear power is stuck in the vacuum tube stage.
The reason why Nuclear power is still in the vacuum tube stage… is because the stigma attached to it and the fact no one is ‘tinkering in their garage’
Building relatively save reactors is not the main issue with using/building nuclear power plants.
The big thing is trash. (Bear with my terrible english.) The waste produced by power plants must be transported and stashed. Both things that are really difficult to handle. Nuclear waste storages are rare and most of them are not meant for eternity. (I just skip the explanation why saltmines are a bad place to store something you just want to be savely away, but they are and yet they are often used for nuclear waste.) And nobody wants a transport of nuclear waste through their town. Which is a big issue in europe, where open space with no people is not really a thing, you have to transport through towns ect.
Well, that is my 2 cents.
The “waste” still has wonderful amounts of energy that can be utilized by sodium reactors, but they can’t get built here because of oilculture/fear. We could be powering small cities with our nuclear waste and the waste from those reactors is orders of magnitude less dangerous than what we have buried in Yukka Mountain.
Even in the case of Fukushima, it took a highly unlikely chain of events and timings, coupled with an old reactor design, to take out several layers of safety systems.
The reactors used there were a fairly early design, which needed external power available in order to drive the control systems from ‘running’ to ‘stable shutdown’. (More modern designs – as in 30-40 years old rather than 50-60 – invariably have passive shutdown systems that automatically go to and stay in a safe condition if they lose external power.) So as well as the connection to the local electricity grid, Fukushima had a set of backup diesel generators – everything running off the grid most of the time, with the generators available in case that connection got damaged by an earthquake. What the design hadn’t fully covered, presumably because it was considered so vanishingly rare, was what happened: an earthquake strong enough to take down the grid, swiftly followed by a large enough tsunami to flood out the diesels, with little enough time in between that the diesels hadn’t yet finished their job. If the grid had stayed up, or the generators hadn’t been flooded, or even if there had been that slightly longer delay between the two, then the safeties would have been fully engaged and probably no-one outside of Japan would know the station had had a problem.
Well, seeing as I was living in Harrisburg when Three Mile Island happened, I can safely say that is NOT a nuclear wasteland. The amounts of radiation that did get out at the time weren’t enough to cause massive amounts of cancer patients, and while I do have some health problems, it was guessed that it was because I was so young when it happened (I was a little over a year old) coupled with good old genetics. I recently drove through Harrisburg, and I assure you, the population is still about the same, and the area is doing well.
Because I live there.
Less than an hour from the reactor site.
Chernobyl is not a healthy place to be, decades after. You still can’t eat the mushrooms or bore in southern Germany because of Chernobyl. They are still places with 22 uSv/h out in the open. If you start moving earth it gets a lot worse. it is very much still a hot zone.
22 microSieverts an hour brings you up to a year’s worth of background radiation in about a week. You probably wouldn’t want to live there long term, but it really isn’t that dangerous.
The danger is relative to where you go. When they started cleanup they buried lots of exposed debris nearby. Lots of this debris were subject to insane levels of radiation (the trees they buried were reported to have glowed blue immediately after the incident, for example), and this debris is still buried there. You don’t want to go anywhere near these areas. If you take one of the tours there are specific locations you are not allowed to walk on or even get close to, because they’re just still too hot.
What about the reports that the trees bled yellow and cried like a wounded cat?
Chernobyl is still sufficiently hot that it is not considered safe for human habitation although the only real risk is an elevated risk of cancer there.
Fukashima wasn’t a meltdown, it was a spill of the waste storage which is a lot more minor than the news reports tried to make it sound. Chernobyll was, in fact, a meltdown (See “The Elephant’s Foot”) but was eventually contained within a massive building built over the site. There is a “Hot Zone” in the basement of the facility, but the area around the sarcophagus is back down to normal background radiation levels.
Actually the Exclusion Zone around Chernobyl still is very much necessary to prevent people from being stupid and dying of radiation poisoning. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_Exclusion_Zone
You wont get radiation poisoning in the Exclusion Zone, What will happen is in parts like the Red Zone & power plant, if you stay too long you will exceed your lifetimes dose and you _will_ end up coming down with cancer
Actually Fukushima was a meltdown Reactor Cores 1,2 & 3 melted down and melted fuel penetrated the containment vessels in all 3 cases. Only in Reactor 3 have they located the melted fuel in the primary containment structure. The location of the melted fuel in Reactor 1 and 2 is unknown, mainly because the radiation keeps killing the robots they send in to locate it.
Three mile island was not even a partial meltdown. There wasn’t even any radiation released into the surrounding area, as all of the contamination was contained within the facility. Zero people were significantly injured at 3 mile island, and the other reactor at the facility continued to operate, and is still in operation today.
Thank you pointing out all three :D
^ ^ ^
Nuclear has a ridiculous amount of energy compared to anything else, and the stigma around it needs to end in favor of serious efforts into more industrial and commercial applications.
For a great overview on how it’s even more eco-friendly than “renewable” energy sources, watch this great TEDx talk from Michael Shellenberger, a staunch environmental activist. (Also this older talk of his.)
You should read up before you make statements like that. TMI was a partial meltdown and there was a very minor release of radioactive isotopes resulting in a dose of minor 14 μSv for around 2 million people. Again the dose is minimal but it was there.
“minimal” is overstating it.
Your usual daily dose just standing around living is 10 μSv a day.
To put that into context, an airplane flight from New York to LA will give you 40μSv of exposure.
A mammogram is good for 400μSv and if you are over 45 they recommend you get one yearly.
14 μSv is thousands of times smaller that the smallest dose ever linked to an increased cancer risk. 100mSv
kinda depends on the person and what they have been exposed to in the past. those minor exposures for you might not be all that bad. for me my life time dose is much much higher so those places like Chernobyl and fukashima are a rather greater risk.
to be frank there is no room for things that make waste that needs several thousand years to be rendered safe we are not responsible enough to maintain that kind of long term effort. a good example is the forests that where planted to maintain some late 18th cent buildings. we couldn’t even manage to care for the trees for a hundred or so years nor keep to the plan even though it was funded. even the knowledge of how to grow the trees in the proper shapes has been lost. in the last 100 years we have lost so much tech world wide that would be of help to us today it is pathetic. I pour over old books all the time to find even hints at tech that was common 1 to 5 hundred years ago. sorry its 5: in the morning here and i haven’t slept yet.
So, because a small percentage of the population is allergic to peanuts, they should destroy every peanut plant in the world and declare them a noxious weed and the transport and slash cultivation of them illegal? o_O
And yeah, it sucks that so much ‘common knowledge’ has been lost in such a short time, butt not suck as much as people too scared (or lazy) to try and regain it (unless there is a ‘profit’ in it), apart from a vastly small percentage of ‘hobbyists’ such as your self.
So, thank you for attempting to regain, and hopefully pass on, that knowledge
Chernobyl didn’t suffer a meltdown initially. Most reactors are designed to create less heat the hotter they get. Chernobyl was the opposite so when the incident happened the power output exponentially increased until the coolant turned to hyperpressurized steam that blew apart the pressure vessel.
Or if something is made of too many Strange quarks. Up, Down, and Strange are the 3 (I think). Stuff melts because it just… does if it’s like that. Would rock melt? Yes. Would it warm up? No.
According to Astrophysics for People in a Hurry there are six types of quarks up down top bottom strange and charmed.
I was defeated by a quote from Neil. I think I’m honored?
A Bar owner makes 7, his bar makes 8, and there’s that tv show from the late 70s so thats 9…well 1o if you count the main character,
Took me a minute to figure out what you were saying. Good one.
To be fair though, a Chinese reactor that melts down is what they call The American Syndrome.
Hey, turnabout is fiar play.
Wow, I make a joke using an alternate meaning of the word “down”, and I trigger an in depth discussion of reactor accidents. That was a tangent I did not expect.
I love it. Tangents are fantastic.
Just shows the calibre of the readers here: able to turn a minor joke into a debate about reactors, and are able to keep it relatively civil :D
“Jane you ignorant slut” is from the ’70s for those who think discourse was more civil in “the old days”. But yes, the level of discourse in the comments has been extremely high by most standards>
In what universe do you consider SNL to be civil discourse, in the 70s or at any other time?
That was a gag from a comedy show, not an example of uncivil discourse.
I still think Sydney is going to be interrupted because of the time factor. Cora only promised Sydney enough time to eat, bathe, and take a nap. The more time that Sydney spends doing stuff like this (and including visiting doctor’s office), the less time she has for anything else.
I don’t know, Cora seems like the sort to do a lady a solid in this situation. I wouldn’t be surprised if she found a way to take the scenic route if she thought Sidney needed more time with Frix.
Agreed…especially with that last comment.
also the sort of ‘lady’ to kick syd right out of her closet in an amusing/embarrassing manner that dabbler would approve of.
But she wouldn’t mind interrupting the following nap.
Great use of light, shade and texture. I think the one fly in the ointment, for me, is that Sydney’s eyes (just in panel 1) have grown beyond my comfort zone. I know that she is done in a manga style, but when the eyes get too big it always puts me off an anime. Here, of course, it is always hindered that Sydney is surrounded by other characters who have more human eyes. Even the aliens!
Well, Sydney is in close-up in panel one, so her big beautiful eyes appear to be even bigger
Like when you wake up to a cat facing away from you, you would swear you were looking down the Chunnel and just waiting for an express train to emerge :P
I figure that the bottom of the food dish is visible.
I assumed it was just that DaveB forgot that Sydney wasn’t wearing her glasses, and didn’t adjust for the magnifying effect the glasses have, when he drew that panel. They do appear to be less exaggerated in the last panel.
That’s because she has half-closed them in the last panel :D
And no, her eyes are naturally that big, we just don’t normally get as close
Agreed. I think the changing art style is finally catching up with DaveB. The more realistic look makes the exaggerated features (such as Sydney’s eyes) stand out more and more. It’s similar to what happened when we saw the team and Math looked a few decades older. The character designs were founded on a very simple art style, and some features simply do not translate well.
I’ve actually met a girl who had a mutation that gave her abnormally large eyes, enough so where most people were creeped out about it. I guess anime de-sensitized me though, as I just found it adorable.
You know Amanda Seyfried? o_O
Looking at a page of google* images of her, I would not say that she has abnormally large eyes. They look pretty average size wise.
* If Google proceed with their planned changes and stop add blockers from working, I shall have to learn the term to use for Firefox results. And if there is not a popular one in usage, I shall have to coin one, to distance myself from google.
Her large eyes were mocked in the movie “Million Ways To Die In The West”
Don’t google it, bing it
“Startpage” should do nicely. It is basically Google by proxy…
Is ‘Startpage’ a search engine?
Yup. I know you don’t google stuff, on principle. But these guys advertise themselves as being “the world’s most private search engine”.
Which does not necessarily mean that it is true. However, if it is not, you could join in a class action law suit and get some compensation!
*wags tail in a win/win pattern*
Here is the link to it:
https://www.startpage.com/
Don’t really bother with a ‘homepage’ (the browsers’ default was to MSN, and simply glance at the headlines, then open a new, empty, tab and close the MSN one)
Personally use Bing (use to Ask Jeeves, butt not sure if he is even still around)
You actually trust Microsoft? Mostly kidding I totally get not using Google. But I usually still do anyway.
Like said, only browse the headlines, most of it is complete bullflunkies, butt it does list the deaths of people (sometimes) and other interesting facts (usually tailored to local interests)
The default search engine for this browser is Bing, so easy to avoid Google (for now)
Google use to be the homepage on an older version, would collect the logo because it would change to commemorate some event or person
Guesticus Bing is a subsitiary of Microsoft. They started it to complete against Google but the funny thing is that apparently at one point bing just used Google to get your results.
Meh, don’t care
You’re far better off making a bookmark with your trusted news sources, and then open them in tabs to see the daily news.
duckduckgo.com for safe searching
Brave as a non snitching browser.
My default, then Startpage. Google = “all your results are belong to us”
Yeah, I definitely overdid the eyes on that panel.
Was going to say it was one of your best depictions of Sydney so far
will assume that’s her reaction to when she sees or if she sees frix with out pants or a big sale in scifi stuff in convention. buuut I have feeling the mutual bathing thing is more like public bath in japan or so on no sexual tones to it unless you put your mind into gutter.
I had the feeling from Frix’s reaction that his culture considers mutual grooming to be an intimate activity. t might not be sexual per se, but then there’s an argument to be made that our culture makes an illogically big deal out of sex. I mean, sex is an intimate activity the way it’s usually done, but the culture I was raised in views it as an order of magnitude more intimate than (as an example) massage. Even though the only difference between sex and massage is the genital involvement, and even that varies by degree.
In fact, Frix might not view mating activity as a particularly intimate act, since in a sense it’s biologically mandated. Grooming could easily play a role in his culture similar to the one that sex plays in ours. So we could be looking at a situation where Frix would actually be relieved if he thought Sidney just wanted to have sex, but grooming seems forward to him.
Umm, not really: Frix’ reaction is how a normal person would react to having a strange other person suddenly pop in to their face begging to brush their fur (or hair, or touch their ears, or any other ‘odd’ request)
Yep I am with you on that one.
So… I’M polyamorous (RA preferring and tending toward KTP)…
Anyone else here willing to make a (perhaps semi-anonymous?) claim to that worldview with me?
I am also polyamorous, practicing, not sure of the exact term, so maybe a closed triad? 3 who are all involved with each other with no plans of sharing each other outside of that 3 person group.
Poly but only have been in one relationship involving it. I like the idea of a closed triad either MMF or MFF but haven’t made an effort to try and date anyone for a good three years and have no idea how to go about finding people who are mutually interested in that type of relationship.
*waves* Another polyamorous individual here. Definitely KTP, not exactly RA, but don’t like some of the assumptions that get made about hierarchical. There may be relationships that are secondary-style, but that doesn’t make them any less important, nor do the people involved count any less.
Poly here as well. It makes the most sense at the end of the day.
*waves*
wish I could like posts in the forum, but… oh well
friggin awesome to know there’re several of us here
While not in a poly situation myself, I am aware of the concept, and have met people who were in poly relationships. However I had to go look up what RA and KTP meant. I love this forum, always learning new stuff.
I have a friend/acquaintance that is poly, in a “closed triad” and I totally respect that. My question is “How on earth do y’all make big life decisions? Or even decide where to go for Thanksgiving? It can be tough just between two people. ”
Said friend moved to CA because the other two wanted to move to CA. :(
Short answer? With a great deal of difficulty XD But seriously, a pair is hard, but each additional person makes it exponentially harder. Every successful triad+ I’ve ever met put a huge amount of effort into communication and finding ways to express themselves to each other in a way that was clear, and generally not demanding. It’s a hard balance. (which is one reason that it’s pretty clear there’s a lot of love involved – there aren’t many things that make people want to work that hard)
I can say for me, that is one reason NOT to look for a triad+ type relationship (avoid that higher cohesion), and instead keep it parallel or KTP – my girlfriend and her husband and kids do the same thing they’ve always done for Thanksgiving and Christmas, etc. and my wife and I do likewise, going to our parents’ houses.
She and I have a relationship that is largely just between us and only involves our respective children or our respective spouses or their other partners as much as it needs to – no need to force things into something that doesn’t improve our lives.
Triads+ also have many benefits I cannot enjoy, tho – there is absolutely nothing wrong with that approach as long as everyone is satisfied with that paradigm – it’s all in what you want, and what you value.
I am, but am currently in a monogamous relationship because my partner isn’t poly, which I am content with.
Philosophically poly (both my partner and I), but not dating anyone else at the moment just due to a lack of options.
Poly ! And non-hierarchical , I currently have three other partners. Its honestly just the most comfortable for me
how much room is there in a poly-fun bunch
for someone that *WANTS* to be poly-fun ? :D
*waves* in a (mostly) parallel relationship with two other partners.
I am open to it, as is my girlfriend. We haven’t actually been in a situation where it would apply, but we both are okay with the other pursuing additional romances.
I’ve been in poly relationships on a few occasions, though I don’t identify as poly. Or mono for that matter, even though I’ve been in more mono relationships than poly ones. I don’t really feel as though I have a preference one way or the other, so I’m reluctant to identify one way or the other. I have whichever type of relationship feels right with the person / people I’m with, and have had relationships slip from one type to the other as they’ve grown.
Thinking about it, I’d be most comfortable with a label that meant “no preference” when it came to number of romantic partners. Poly and mono read like gay and straight to me, but I don’t know the word for bi in this context.
That sounds like you’re a relationship anarchist
Occasional Poster here and Poly as well. I live with my wife and cohusband and we have an internet girlfriend that we are slowly trying to get the money up to either move to her or move her to us. unfortunatly she is in a different country and all 4 of us are disabled. though in different ways
Poly, pan and currently single and dating.
(Also I don’t know how even to google for those abbrevations you used XD )
Sydney has had a love life? I had always assumed she’d get so embarrassed that she’d overheat and fly off like a bottle rocket.
Sydney has show that she isn’t afraid to take action when it is called for.
Sydney, in general, has less been paralyzed by embarassment, and more paralyzed by drooling.
And now she is not a awkward nerd with a failing business, now she is world famous and rich and still an awkward nerd.
Hello there I’ve been reading your comic and just got done your a good artist and story teller come check out my work actual it’s my story not my art but here it is https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Massia_/5590545/ there’s only cover art
What other intimate questions does Sydney have for Cora?
She forgot to ask the most important question of all.
Where do you keep the lint rollers?
Frix strikes me as the type of character that would handle that – provide that for after short trysts or helping in longer term relationships (having some backups in case his partner or partners forgot one day or another, that sort of thing)
I’m betting Sydney has one in her utility belt.
The question of anatomical compatibility comes to mind. Could become embarrassing otherwise…
Well, with Frix being the ship’s doctor, he probably knows about human/his species biological interactions (or is desperately checking the database right this second), so I wouldn’t worry too much. And Cora would have mentioned if there was anything really critical – like “don’t swallow, humans are allergic to his specie’s seminal fluids, and while we can counter anaphylactic shock, it’s better to just avoid having your throat swell shut”
Let’s hope he knows if birthcontrol is necessary, or other protection.
As far as anatomical compatibility goes, for both of them we see fingers and a tongue. Anything else is an added bonus but hardly mandatory or necessary.
Has anyone else been having problems with the comment highlighter not working since the site crash a few weeks ago?
Yes.
It hasn’t worked since 2018.
I think Chrome changed.
Semi-random fun fact: The word “harem” is derived from the Arabic “haram,” meaning “forbidden.” Among other things (such as the consumption of pork), it can refer to the women’s quarters of a house. It is forbidden for any man to enter, including the master of the house. You’ve got the whole extended family under one roof, and that’s the section of the house reserved so that women can have some peace and privacy. Young girls grow up there, free of the male gaze and safe from intrusion. Grandmothers retire there (in part to help raise the girls). Wives can retreat there when they need some space. It’s not forbidden as in “forbidden fruit.” It’s forbidden in the same way as a convent, only the sister’s are literally your sister (or cousin or niece or mother or aunt). But some European explorer decided it would be more fun to come home with stories of exotic fantasies and wild exploits, knowing that his countrymen would be completely ignorant of the realities of the culture, and that’s what stuck.
Let’s all be grateful for that misunderstanding and all of the stories it has inspired.
I would scoff at the use of “male gaze” with even the slightest bit of seriousness behind it, but given youre talking about the origin area with it’s rampant pedophilia…
You do realise that ‘paedophilia’ is a modern ‘illness’, just like homosexuality only became an ‘evil practice’ within the last two hundred years or so, heck, just sex in general became a disgusting topic let alone the naked form
It wasn’t that long ago where it was expected that a woman was ‘old’ and ‘unmarryable’ after 20 (heck, in some cases, by 18)
Just want to make sure that you realize that SLAVERY was only recognized as an evil practice in the last 150 years, at least in the United States. The fact that sexual relations with minors used to be socially acceptable in some contexts doesn’t mean it’s ever been healthy for the minors. Deciding that homosexuality is a sickness was a stupid judgment because of the lack of harm involved – if something doesn’t hurt people, it doesn’t make sense to see it as unhealthy. Even if the attitude towards sex with children changed at the same time as the attitude towards same-sex interactions, that doesn’t mean the two views are equally wrong.
First off, you need to define ‘minor’: physically, a girl can have a baby around 10 (recently an Australian girl gave birth at 12) and a boy can get a girl pregnant around the same age
Did you know, that prior around 1900 (give or take a decade or two), you didn’t have ‘teenagers’: they were a child until they were old enough to either work in the mines or start popping out more children, and then they became adults (usually around 15 or so)
The American’s would have you believing that slavery was invented around 150-200 years, and that they were the only slaves to ever exist (of course ignoring the history of forever, specially Moses and the Israelites) and it was the White Man who was responsible (again, ignoring their own neighbouring tribes, or even the Arabs who sold them to the Most Evil and Despicable White Man)
Nothing you said has much bearing on Barbrady’s comment. Heck, nothing you said to Solusandra had much bearing on their comment either.
Homosexuality certainly did not become an “evil practice” only in the last 200 years or so. While some may debate whether the Bible actually prohibits same-sex acts, the interpretation that it does has existed for almost as long as the Bible itself.
The fact that you would “scoff” at the use of the phrase “male gaze” suggests to me you might not actually understand the derivation of the phrase or its meaning.
Isn’t it a bit fast to jump into bed with someone you just met , from a different planet ?
She’s not jumping into bed with him, she’s getting bathed. From his perspective he might actually mean nothing by it any more so than mutual grooming. She’s letting her hormones rule her for a moment and sometimes… we see those chances and we grab them by the horns. To hell with normal courting procedures.
Many an one night stand happens for such reasons :).
She’s a full grown adult, and by her own admission isn’t a virgin or has at least had sexual encounters before. She is perfectly allowed to make this decision, and MOST people are always nervous before getting into bed, be it with a friend with benefits, sometimes even a long-time lover, and even with one-night stands.
I am not suggesting she is not “allowed” to do this , I am asking if it’s a good idea . Just because you can engage in casual sex does not mean it’s the right choice.
I think that is what Syd is checking out with Cora. Is this a good idea? Syd knows her own mind and emotions, so she is checking out Frix to be sure that this will be non-damaging fun/relaxation, and not scarring drama.
No
I think Frix may decline sex because he thinks it isn’t appropriate.
I ship it. Have fun Sydney.
DISCORD! You hoping for some more composite friends?
This all strikes me as a situation where Sydney’s impulsiveness combined with a lack of ADHD meds have landed her in a situation beyond her usual ability to properly process. If anyone from Archon were there, they’d have likely grabbed Syd by her collar and told her to find the showers, then explained things much more clearly and cleared it up. It would have just been yet another in a long line of hilariously embarrassing social mistakes from our intrepid heroine to be laughed at and generate days of teasing. Even Dabs would have likely teased her about it, but picked up on her extremely obvious nervousness/bordering on fear here. However, since Cora doesn’t know Syd that well, she’s not really detecting the true undertones of what is likely going on. At least that’s what I’m getting from the current situation so far
I was concerned about that, too, until Frix addressed it by his counteroffer.
That told me instantly that he understands which conditions are necessary for consent. That includes slowing things down to think about what is potentially about to happen. He wants to provide her with opportunities for the relative intimacy her request craves (bathing & grooming are indeed intimate acts; but decouple it from sexual activities in your minds, people!).
These are things that do not have to include sexual interactions, but could include them. Bathing & grooming can be a part of sexual intimacy, but they can be quite satisfyingly intimate all on their own even in a platonic sense. By slowing it down to a bath and some drying & brushing, he’s signalling that he’s willingly giving her the time and the space to change her mind…which either of them could do at any point. And he’s signalling that as well, by slowing down her rushed request for grooming.
Plus…she did recently visit a horribly wrecked world, got semi-buried in its rubble, coated in smoke and dust, probably sweated now and then–and fear/adrenaline sweat stinks–and then ate super-spicy food on top of all that.
If he’s got even one tenth the scent receptors of an Earth canine (dogs have 50x better scent sensitivity than humans, so that’d be 5x better than a human)…uh, well, she’s gonna stink. Some people are into those sorts of kinks (musk, sweat, filth, dirt, grease, grime, etc…) but he likes taking long hot baths, so I’m guessing that’s not really his thing.
No offense, but his captain had burned metal, bits of pavement and also flesh, bone, and other various bodily fluids (because one of them probably lost their bladder control) and this was treated as a common occurrence in her line of work.
If he didn’t expect someone to smell bad after her captain used any of her guns then he is in the wrong line of work… Also a good bath or shower could fix the smell problem.
Some smells soak into the skin and don’t go away for several days regardless of washing. Definitely true when skinning and butchering rabbits.
Are we talking about the same captain who has a hardlight body armor system so sophisticated, it follows her body’s every single movement? With a rig that sensitive, it could probably snap up a splatter-impervious shield in mere nanoseconds around its owner, and then stretch that field outward, spaning a space far enough both to ahve layers, and that when it cancels the outermost layer, anything clinging to that hardlight surface literally just drops to the ground, leaving her fresh as a daisy inside the innermost layer (save for personal body oils & sweat, etc).
Sydney, obviously, went for the forb and bubbled, letting Cora handle whatever…but she still walked around on the wreckage of the Alari homeworld, first arriving in a smoky fog, and then getting bits of wall shrapnel caught inside her shield, brushing (or thumping) and clinging to her bullet-resistant uniform while she rested and contemplated her final log entry.
I don’t read Sidney’s reaction as nervousness bordering on fear. I read it as Sidney wanting to do this, but lacking a lot of experience in accelerating from zero to sixty with a potential sexual partner. Comic 17 & 18 show that she’s a reasonably normal person in terms of lust, but that she might have a history of bashfulness in expressing said lust. She’s fine talking to Tony, but throws a shoe when someone points out that she finds him attractive. I’m sure Sidney’s “sealed the deal” on a number of occasions with people she’s found attractive, but she is a bit of a geek. This might be her first time saying “hey, you’re cute! We should have sex!”
And I just noticed I’ve been consistently misspelling Sydney’s name. Sorry Sydney.
Yups :D
Anyone from archon… Except Dabbler.
I think your a little early for this situation Valintines day is still 3 weeks away
que the switch back to Earth :-)
I noticed the list of webcomic recommendations. Just in the “If you like Grrl Power
Then you might like…” part, Love and Capes officially concluded in Feb 2016, and Superbitch‘s domain has expired. Further down, Wasted Talent and Leftover Soup have also officially concluded, and Atomic Laundromat hasn’t updated for nearly 2 years.
It’s okay to like things, even if they’re gone.
Do Syds eyes AND pupils look like manga character sized in the first panel?
That’s how Sydney is supposed to look like
I wonder if she suffers from Nomura Syndrome? That might explain why she seems immune to whatever normally gives people l superpowers
The next strip will be ‘meanwhile, back at the Ranch…’
No, we are going to see what Steve has been doing while Sydney was gallivanting about the galaxy
Steve? Is that a Questionable Content reference? If so then he’d probably eating cereal.
Better than Steve from ‘TMI’ :P
how about all of the Steve”s together (including Pizza Steve and Steven Universe)?
A whole universe full of Steve’s? o_O
I’m sure that Marik will enjoy it there.
Put it this way, Sydney: How many girls can say their first experience was with an alien dogman? It’ll make a good story is all I’m sayin’.
I mean, not to make assumptions about Sydney’s experience level, but…This IS Sydney we’re talking about. She owns an Edward Elric body pillow.
Sydney. Is. NOT!. A. Virgin!!
I’m seriously confused where people keep getting the idea that she is one from.
Wishful thinking?
In all seriousness? Because it fits her personality profile. Also probably because of extreme contrast to the rest of the cast. It’s just difficult to imagine her even being in any kind of relationship to begin with, she’s too scatterbrained and self-conscious.
In other words, its thanks to media portraying nerdy hyperactive characters as non-sexual beings.
Despite the fact Sydney has shown sexual interest and behavior already, only more normal versions of it than others have.
Its a terrible trope, media likes to portray only certain *perfect* characters as having sexual lives. But not the nerdy, tomboyish, intelligent, job oriented, or by contrast not even the major villains…go on try to imagine Apocalypse or Darkseid in a sexual relationship. But these tropes are just social programming; in reality its perfectly normal for them to have sexual interests.
Neither being scatterbrained nor self-conscious are preclusions to having a healthy sexual lovelife
For all we know, she could have been in a committed long-term relationship (with all that implies) prior to her holiday in Florida, after finding her balls she basically shut herself away from everyone
Oh, what’s that you are about to say? “She never mentioned having a lover!” There are many things she hasn’t mentioned in her past, and fairly sure there are some things in your past you don’t mention to people you have met for only a week!!
“because it fits her personality profile” isn’t really an explanation for why you think Sydney would be a virgin. It’s just another way of saying “I think Sydney should be a virgin.” Noting that Sydney is somewhat scatterbrained at times and that she has been self-conscious interacting with the cast so far is a start at an explanation, but I’m not sure it’s an accurate characterization of what we’ve actually seen from Sydney.
With regard to “scatterbrained” – being scatterbrained in no way inhibits sexual activity. If scatterbrained people couldn’t get laid, the “manic pixie dream girl” type wouldn’t have been so popular in media. Also, a lot of famous people are also famously scatterbrained (including people who are famously smart) and they have had no trouble getting into relationships or having sex.
With regard to self-conscious, Sydney’s self-consciousness so far has been limited to not wanting to be seen naked around a group of women she sees as ridiculously attractive / physically perfect. I’m comfortable with my body, but I’d still be awfully self-conscious if I found myself in room full of male models. Since most the fieldable personnel at Archon would make a super model self-conscious, Sydney’s decision to be a modesty-mummy doesn’t really seem too surprising.
I don’t know what’s in your heart, but I suspect that a lot of people who have been saying they thought Sydney’s a virgin say that because they want her to be a virgin. That could be because they have an unrealistic expectation about what makes a woman desirable and they want Sydney to fit that expectation, or it could be because they identify with Sydney and project their own anxieties around sex onto her.
so, using your own logic, does that mean being a close-minded jackass fits your personality profile?
He is not a dog, he is an analogue of a canine, but not a dog.
I mean, they wind up at the same result in this case, but they certainly don’t mean the same thing.
I see Cora has decided to go for the tongue this time around.
I am 100% on board with these sigil-lookin’ not-candles and am absolutely stealing them for background ambience in my next D&D encounter with high-wealth dwarven civilizations.
You think dwarves will burn animal fat if they have access to clean-lighting just-as-modular bricks with fancy runes on ’em? How positively PREHISTORIC!
Cora should be glad that Sydney wants to be a hero rather than a villain. After all, when Cora “put the crew at Sydney’s disposal,” a villain might take that a bit more literally and…dispose them, maybe right out the airlock or something.
Nah, a smart villain would try and stage a coup
No, that would damage morale and has a large potential of backfiring since these guys are clearly fairly loyal.
A SMART villain would just fall into decadence in constant orgies with Cora and her boys, partaking of the bounty of her newfound ally, while secretly lifting specs and tech Cora won’t miss that her planet isn’t ready for yet.
Said ‘smart’, not ‘intelligent’ :P
When you say ”upsettingly realistic skin texture” do you mean her prosthetics are covered in real skin or is it some kind of uncanny valley type of situation?
I mean did she skin someone, she was excessively violent a few pages back but I don’t know if that translates to skinning people.
And yes I do read to much into things.
Except, not so much into reading the comments…
The biggest problem I have with the comic? That bath room.
I mean, it would be a lavish waste of space and water ON A PLANET. On a SPACESHIP?? What if they lose gravity? Or worse, sustain even a micro-puncture? This room would be downright fatal in either of those circumstances.
The ethics of Syd having a ‘grooming session’ with a furry alien horndog? I could NOT care less. Sure, have fun, knock yerself out. BUT NOT IN THERE. A small, cozy, padded shower stall, maybe, with a couple of fold-out benches. But That Room… is just DUMB.
As I’ve said… there’s hardly any space on a spaceship.
Your reaction is based on an assumption related to the secondary ramifications of current tech… that motion is limited by some relative proportion of mass or friction relative to cross-sectional area, and mass or cross-section must therefore be strictly limited. (i.e. rocket mode).
Once you get away from rocket-based tech, and materials that have to be shipped u from Earth’s gravity well to orbit, there’s no particular reason that either limit needs to hold. Even at current level of tech, you can have as much space as you want up there, as long as you can surround it with enough metal or plastic to hold in the atmosphere.
Or, in her case, enough “hard light”.
not to mention that hard light can change shape at will, maybe this bathroom doesn’t even exist until they need it, that space could be a dining room, a hall, a cargo haul depending of the occasion
The great thing about sci-fi advanced tech is, it can do things that feasible at current limitations of Earth tech, like artificial gravity, molecular assembly *of which water molecules would be one of the easiest to produce*, atmosphere generators, having much lighter yet sturdier materials to build the ship out of so you can have more space inside.
Get advanced enough and you can just say screw all that stick this inside your ship
http://www.citricanime.com/ova/1992/Tenchi%20Muyo!%20Ryo-Ohki/Tenchi%20Muyo!%20ep%2005%20teleport.jpg
-granted the Jurains use sub-space for the insides of their ships, and the bigger ships can have farmland inside them.
“It would be a lavish waste of space and water ON A PLANET” – given that similar setups have existed on our planet for a very long time, that seems like a curious criticism. As technology advances, these setups have become increasingly easy to build and maintain. Given the technology on display, it seems unlikely that this would be seen as significantly wasteful.
I don’t want to see them DOING the nasty… I just want to see AFTER they’ve done the nasty.
In other words, I want to see the post-coitus cuddling.
Or just seeing Sydney arriving at Arc-Swat with a big stupid smile on her face and triggering Dabblers porno sense.
Possibly, Sydney thanking Cora for putting Frix at her disposal, and then WHAM! Right in the gazorpazovum! “And that’s for not warning me about the knot!” (Or possibly knots, plural.)
No, if Sydney couldn’t see the knot(s) in time, then that is her problem, not Cora’s
His canine like aspects are earning a lot of these knot jokes,
what if he is built like a goat?
Or has a four headed eight inch penis that grasps the insides of the female and self pumps loads of sticky cum so thick that it block the vaginal passage from potential rivals as it hardens like a thick mucus that says there for weeks to insure no other male can claim the female…and that’s why Cora didn’t mention his sexual resume?
Or if during the height of ejaculation his penis detaches inside the female along with one gonad that continues to produce semen for days after detachment, while also curling up inside the woman to both block other males’ attempts at breeding and provide additional nourishment for the litter that would develop for his species later on during their fuzzy tadpole stage just prior to squirming free as a swarm in the breeding pool. He of course in a few days would regrow another penis.
Or the semen for his species is 300 degrees F, or…insert other plausible yet uncomfortable for a human female alien genitals.
Fairly sure, if any of your “Or’s” were true, Cora would tell Sydney
Still think a knot would count for a warning as well. But again, this is likely Star Trek typical sci-fi alien rules. All humanoids with compatible genitals *with few exceptions to remind the audience they are aliens*
funny you mention the four-headed dick, given that actually exists on a Mammal on earth.
Echidnas!
I know I was going to stop there, but thought…its an alien and we are comparing his genitals to Earth animals that might be awkward for a human, so lets combine a few other different species traits in there with it.
Seriously doubt DaveB would show the act, at the most, he will show that Sydney is naked and ‘in contact’ with Mr Frix-it (just like He did with Dabbles and The Barberian), this is clearly not that sort of webic
I doubt he would show anything of Sydney in a sexual situation in a comic, but there is the VDSD promotion coming up. That could be anything from “just before” to “several minutes after” inclusive.
Dave has shown Sydney in various states of undress for narrative reasons (the testing of the orbs, battle wardrobe malfunctions) but never in a sexy situation.
considering the main comic doesn’t even show Dabs fully frontally mid-coitus, I doubt that’s a concern necessary for Syd either
I think the bathing room might be a touch of a reference Star Justice. The Nordar clans (at least the Vaish Overlord clan) have a main battlebase (I forget it’s name) where they have luxurious “spas” with full baths. At least that’s what I’m seeing. And someone with Cora’s level of tech likely have security features (localized backup gravity fields, emergency shields, etc) to prevent any events like the pool scene in Passengers.
Um…what’s an escape goat? I…dont’ recognize the meme, adn do NOT want to look up Urban Dictionary, after discovering what ‘peppering the tailgate’ means.
It was mentioned (couple times) on the first page of comments (or maybe it was the last comic page)
“A scapegoat” » “Escape goat”
I thought that the big eyes showed well how it feels having been off adhd meds for a few days after spending a lifetime on them. Plus when you are scared and/or nervous you naturally open your eyes much wider. Amazing comic can wait to read more, so going to re read from the start:)
No, that is Sydney’s normal appearance: she has always had more of the ‘anime’ look to her whereas everyone else had the ‘normal’ realistic Western style
Next time on GRRLPOWER: Sydney Gets Lucky!
Thought his name was Mr. Frix-It o_O
Eh, so long as sydney and Cora don’t mind regular hareems…
I have honestly never heard “escape goat” before this. Truely, ignorance is bliss.
Pretty sure by saying people who say things like “escape goat” un-ironically is more a general reference to Zap Barringon types who mispronounce or mis-use common terms by saying them incorrectly, like instead of saying scapegoat because they don’t understand it, dumb it down and expect you to accept it as the (proper way) by saying escape goat. its like hearing someone say unrelevent instead of irrelevant; when they KNOW the correct way to say but don’t like that so say it how they think it should be said and try to make that a thing.
Sometimes unconformists say things differently than the rest of the people because they reject the statist kwowe.
Other Chrons dis-conformatistists verbalize intentions dis-rently to the collective of the local language normatives due to their dis-acceptance of the acceptance of normies-attitude.
Ignorance can kill!
Don’t the limbs get in the way of the best possible massage?
Hereby requesting Frix mention a placebo has its effect even if you know its a placebo.
well, the whole point of placebo is tricking your brain into believing that you have dealt with the issue so it can stop sending alarm signals and instead work on making it better
if you know what a placebo is, but you also believe that taking it will trigger the placebo reaction, then it will still works, since by taking it, you convince yourself that it will fix the issue
Frix’s frantically searched internet History between the last page and this one:
Human
Human female
Human sex
Human genitals
Human stds
Can I have sex with humans
Can I get a human pregnant?
You forgot one:
Can a human get me pregnant?
During moments of heightened arousal our skin takes on a selectively permeable state allowing the passing genes just from touch,
-paraphrased from Futurama’s Kif Kroker. on how he got impregnated by Leela.
In nine months or so she can honestly add a new swear phrase:
“Son of a Frix!”
Yeah, Sydney wanted a daughter :P
As cute as that pun is…alas, Frix is a competent medic, who would definitely take steps to ensure that doesn’t happen. (But it is a good pun!)
Ya know, if Frix really is that good at his job, and has helped save crew & ship several times…plus he loves taking lots of long hot baths…then it make sense to have a fantastic bathing pool on board the ship.
I mean, if you had fantastic engineering skills, a deep love of hot baths, a grateful captain & crew, enough space on a ship, and the right kind of advanced tech to pull it off without causing a significant water hazard of any sort…wouldn’t you convince captain & crew (who seem to be decadent-minded sorts) to install a sensuous, glorious, extra-large bathing facility on board?
Not saying this “just because I’m female” (presuming my online name has anything to do with my gender). I know plenty of females who prefer showers to baths, and at least one who finds the sensation of water on her skin repulsive (grew up in a very dry desert that got most of its water from snowmelt). I know plenty of guys who love long hot baths, though toxic masculinity prods asshat bullies into attempting to shame them. (Shame on the bullies, I say; they’re flat-out idiots.) Same goes for nonbinary gender sorts, with plenty who don’t like it, and plenty more who do.
I’m saying it because if you have the tech, the space, and the approval of captain & crew (which, one presumes, includes fiscal approval)…then, frikkin go for it!
(…or perhaps that should be Frix-in’ go for it…?)
I usually don1t complain about page layout, but I can’t help being a bit sad that Frix’s head is covered by the speech baloons :|
Would it have been better or worse if Cora hadn’t answered? What she said was understanding and encouraging, but Sydney has been able to take a lot of leaps that she wouldn’t if she had her hand held.
Was there an X-Men era without Chris Clairmont? First I’ve heard of it. Preposterous.