Grrl Power #956 – Chromaphile
Imagine if everyone had to wear one of these and the colors randomized every morning. Yeah. I’m sure… something would be different. Fashion probably. And we could all learn some lesson like the Star Bellied Sneetches. Or just find other motivations for tribalism.
Yes, Daphne dyes her eyebrows. It’s probably an impractical thing to try and do honestly, which I assume mostly because of how many “blonde” girls have brunette eyebrows. Fortunately Daphne’s a natural strawberry blonde, so darkening them up to purple or black isn’t a major issue, but co-ed has white hair and Vogue is blonde, so in those cases, she probably has to bleach them out first before coloring them back in. Well, with Vogue she does. Co-ed is just a bleach job.
Being an officer, Maxima did go to college, but it was ROTC heavy and partially done online or at night while she also did military stuff. Still, that probably didn’t stop her from writing some fairly eye-roll inducing papers about feminist theory. Which isn’t to suggest there isn’t a lot of perfectly legitimate subject matter to be had there, but like a lot of people finding themselves in college for the first time, some of Max’s earlier thinking might have… overcorrected when it came to addressing gender balance in the world. Fortunately, she has mellowed out considerably on the subject matter. She still has the occasional urge to go on a tear though, especially after the Weinstein/Cosby/that guy who was digitally edited out of Army of the Dead/etc scandal of the month drops, or having to deal with the deeply institutionalized sexism of large swathes of military culture.
Obviously, Kenya has known Max long enough that she can tease her about her earlier collegiate theses. Especially the one about women having some kind of remote that controls whether or not men have erections. In Max’s defense, that one was half Juvenalian satire and half sexual fantasy.
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Could come in handy.
At first I thought that this would allow Max to appear normal human colors when off duty, but then I thought if all it does is change hues she’d still be awful shinny regardless of her coloration.
Being a ‘Magical’ artifact should allow it to compensate for her shininess.
Now she’ll be able to go out in public looking like a professional women’s basketball player
instead of the most recognizable super on the planet.
Oh wait… That’s Dabbler.
I suppose playing with the settings would be culturally insensitive.
Pretending to be Kenya’s little sister as an example.
{Don’t use Green around The General.}
Don’t use the Green setting around the General… or She-Hulk fans.
avoiding star trek fandoms is also recommended.
Star wars two if you have tatooes
Or MCU Guardians of the Galaxy fans…
Or… Kermit fans?
I think regardless of my skin color, I’d stay away from people who have a sexual fetish about frog puppets. :)
its not easy being green.
Sometimes it’s nice to get felt up…
Get out.
Bless you, Sigurther.
This is great, Max can be non-shiny and do things like wear bathing suits or even go out incognito without getting mobbed.
I wonder if Yves-Saint Laurent approved that logo.
Approved it? Where do you think he got the idea from in the first place?
Actually, Daphbe has to bleach anyway. Hair dyes have to get into the hair and substitute the natural pigment.
Wouldn’t Daphne actually say that she wants five of these?
It appears that if she puts on something, it appears as part of her “kit” she cloned out and each clone had a different look.
I don’t believe those are her other bodies but rather a series of different settings being used on the same body. Earlier in the comic Max had an issue requiring Daphne to have at least one of her bodies be in uniform at all times which would have been rectified quickly if Daphne had a void hammerspace.
The strawberry blonde there in panel 8 is her “natural” state, so she wouldn’t need a hue bending trinket for that one, other than just goofing around with it.
“Goofing around” is a perfectly valid reason to posses, and use, magic items! ^_^
Are these preset color schemes? Also, if this just changes the hue/color of her hair and skin I wonder if this will turn Maxima into flesh-colored metal (which in low light or from a distance would still make her stand out less than her current gold skin).
All in all I think Maxima will appreciate this gift.
Hopefully you can do presets.
As someone who has actually messed with “hue bending” on flesh before, it’s surprisingly easy to end up in an “uncanny valley” of almost-right.
What the hell did you do to Anvil’s face in panel 6?
That is not a flattering angle.
I was going to say something similar, along with Dabbler’s eyes looking a little big in the following panel.
You know, I just realized that Anvil kinda looks like the garudo thieves from legend of Zelda. Specially at certain angles.
Poor Anvil seems to be artistic style hell. Every other page she looks like she’s lost a fight with a wrecking ball after using her face to catch it.
Well, I see all of you have unrealistic standards for women.
She looks realistic in literally every panel on this page.
Hey bub, you’re doing a bit of that “overcorrecting” thing the author mentioned.
White knighting for a fictional woman and saying anyone who has a critique of the art depicted must therefore hate women, is a wild exaggeration.
I myself have voiced opinions on this comic before when the author attempted to replicate a certain perspective face and didn’t succeed as well as they intended. The fact of the matter is, Dave isn’t perfect, and sometimes what he intends to draw and what he draws aren’t the same.
Don’t get me wrong. I’ve seen plenty of women that looked like mister bean, doing that same exact face, but Xiane there is pointing out, accurately usually, I might add, that the artist sometimes has a problem with faces. That isn’t an unrealistic expectation of “women” because the expectation is that the fictional characters look the same from panel to panel, and not wildly different with a perspective change.
Tl;Dr art critique=\=misogyny, and white knighting/simping for fictional characters isn’t required. Knock yourself out if that’s what you enjoy though, I guess.
Except a couple of those comments literally were calling her ugly, you dipshit.
The unflattering angle, that’s a viable criticism.
The rest weren’t. So stop white-knighting for assholes, Grid.
…I wouldn’t be surprised if Anvil regularly picks fights with wrecking balls to charge up, given her powerset…
Anvil is giving Max “The Eyebrow”. Kudos to Dave for working with less common facial expressions. Not a professional artist myself but foreshortening can be tough.
Dude, not every woman cares to just look pretty 24/7. My advice is that if Anvil wants to pull a face to express how she is feeling then you would want to accept that.
Hey, unflattering angles exist IRL too. It’d seem… artificial, I guess, if the characters never had weird expressions.
She’s supposed to be looking up and smiling, like an expression that conveys “you’re a goof but I love ya'”. It is a challenging angle to get right admittedly.
Don’t worry, I myself have seen my girlfriend give me the mister bean face many times :P
A choker that can basically change a person’s entire appearance? I know she’s smart enough to know how useful this could be.
Why do I have a feeling Dabbler did something to that choker that only triggers when Max wears it? This seemingly sweet gesture feels a bit too good to be true. Then again Dabbler, while a complete pervert, does care about her team mates so maybe she behaved herself when enchanting it? Of course watch it just not work at all. Far too much about Max remains a mystery when it comes to her powers. For all we know she has some kind of anti-glamour skin on her or something.
I think after the discussion that Kenya and Xuriel had about Max before the latest meeting with Deus, Xuriel is on team “Get Max to loosen up in a safe environment first”
Yes exactly. She may be mischievous but what Xuriel really wants is for Max to get it on. Ideally with her. Complex women arouse her.
My bet is that she will get a whole body “reading” allowing her to see ALL of Max…
It doesnt only trigger when Maxima wears it. Harem just wore it in the above comic.
The as-advertised colour control works for anyone, true. Korg’s speculation was whether there’s a secondary effect that needs some trigger to activate it. Triggering as soon as Maxima puts it on I would consider unlikely (even without seeing the next page). Triggering automatically when certain conditions are met, or only when deliberately activated, would let Dabbler make sure her one shot with it gets the best effect.
The cape on the proposed costume for Maxima looks snazzy as fuck though, not gonna lie.
Why bother with a cape when you have a BOAT CLOAK though.
NO CAPES!!!
thank you. Capes are stupid…if you aren’t wearing them for the intended purpose. Heck anything not worn for the intended purpose is stupid. Not if you are doing it to look cool.
All super-related accessories are invalid if you don’t use them for their intended purpose.
I knew someone called Hue Bender.
Thats a lie :(
Maybe if you’d mentioned he was Welsh, and spelled his name correctly: Huw Bwndr.
“I can’t give you any complex holo-tech.”
No, you WON’T give us holo-tech because while you’re a US citizen your loyalty isn’t to Earth. Ugh this just makes me want to repeat my rant from Cora’s speech. Share or get the #$%& off our planet, and yes the “our” is intentional because you clearly don’t consider it yours. We’re not here to be your buffet.
Can’t, as in forbidden to. There’s a Prime Directive type of thing.
Storywise, she would single-handedly derail the story setting, Earth society would necessarily change, making it less relatable.
This has been discussed in and out of comic.
You’ve added a lot to the info on this page that is not there.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-690-gotterdammermcguffins/
Panel 1 literally says “Pre-FTL civs on the cusp […snip…] Each case is different.”
True, they have rules, but that doesn’t mean that they will chase down a preFTL civ that gets a ship and beat it out of them.
And, considering how slow the calendar moves, the Archon’s Earth decade it takes to destabilize Archon’s Earth is about a century of Dave’s efforts.
I think he can handle it.
You forget: https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-196-girls-go-to-the-bathroom-in-pairs-to-talk-star-trek-and-boobs-right/
Dabbler implies that there are lots of reasons, including a Star Trek-like (not that I’ve watched much myself, so I don’t know the inner workings) non-interference rule, but that reaching the FTL threshold without help aids you to join the community, which then opens you up to community tech.
I believe it was also mentioned at some point after the Twilight Council intro, but cannot currently spare the time to look.
Also, pretty sure Earth (in their eyes) falls in the “mostly faffing about” category, not the “near FTL” category, which means they are less inclined to share.
Also also, the whole Xenocidal bit.
that explanation is such bullshit. Always is, every time. While there are a multitude of problems with that idea, I’ll limit this to a few.
1) Relatability. People easily find themselves relating to cyberpunk, steampunk, syfy, wild west and various past historical settings so can that crap for me.
2) Dabbler alone. No, no she couldn’t. Dabbler isn’t going to be making an entire manufacturing base, advertisement apparatus and distribution platform all on her own. Even if she did, global penetration for new products is pretty slow, the newer, the slower. Never mind pricing.
Dude I wouldnt trust the human race with any tech either.We have a nack for being morons in spectacularly destructive ways and any alien etc sharing with one countrys just made an empire(which the us government totally would try for at the first opportunity if they were handed an I win button which couldnt be countered by nukes) while sharing with all just maximises the amount of people whod die horribly for stupid reasons.
Any sane Alien would share tech with us once-from orbit,explosively,to ensure we never get off our mudball and cause trouble elsewhere too.
99% that, not sure about the sane aliens sharing:
A) it would kill of the whole ecosystem to get rid of one dangerous species and
B) as observed from space, humanity might be usable for bad examples (in terms of ethics) and
C) maybe we’re funny. When observed from space.
Worst case scenario would be the Empowered universe where cannonically aliens did share some of their tech with the human race as a massive flex on how easily they could snuff us out at any time if we got uppity(Its also implied in that universe that everything thats happening is one long sadistic SAW style game that unknown aliens/beings are playing with humanity where if the human race survives self inlficted extinction we win the prize of not being wiped out).
Oh and that tech that they gave humanity?In universe it was misused and accidently made a supervolcano in america where for years since supers are still working in continuous shifts to keep from being a planet level disaster-and doing a surprisingly good job at too tbh.
My first thought on that “worst case scenario … if we got uppity” was that it could be considered a “best case scenario” provided that ONCE humanity as a whole manages to act like truly sentient beings in the face of an over-powerful force. I guess that the part about the SAW style game isn’t even necessary.
(Does it show that my trust in humanity is not very high? But it’s still above zero, so I have some hope left.)
The problem in that universe is that if there wasnt alien factions out there that didnt want humanity extinct the human race would be erased in seconds due to the sheer tech/power disparity regardless of our unity and armies of supers.
Empowered gets more and more dark as the series goes on.Especially when you get clued in on whats going on in the background and kept secret from most of the planets population,Oh and in that universe a good chunk of supers are implied to be caused by said aliens in question if not even darker sources.Fun read but damn is the protagonist in for a rough ride in helping things work out in the end!
Well, I ignored it the first time, but now: What Empowered universe are you talking about? A quick search showed nothing but commercials except Empowered the comic and I don’t think you’re talking about that one. So – a series of books?
Yeah Empowered by Adam Warren(graphic novels).I dunno if links work here but apparently you can read a good chunk of the early stuff here https://www.empoweredcomic.com/comic/volume-1-page-1
Starts off with Emp being something of an epic fail heroine but when things get serious enough she usually manages to pull through(Turns out that her powers are directly connected to her mental state which is why theyre so flaky),She goes through a fair bit of character progression though and as a mini spoiler turns out shes a lot smarter than she lets on which she uses to great effect much much later on.
While generally I would rant about what an idiotic take that is and how boring most people are with their use of weapons and whatnot, the COVID lab scandal kinda supports you here.
That sounds like a great way to get the Xevoarchy to do their best to wipe out the planet.
Intergalactic law. And I’d imagine that those cops are *much* scarier than the Earth variants.
Besides I’d say Dabbler more than makes up for not sharing tech by, you know, helping protect the planet.
That, and the Retards wanting to keep alien tech wanted to keep the, you know, Psionically corrupting tech that literally has wiped out entire solar systems and had been repeatedly told such by people who’d ACTUALLY DEALT WITH IT BEFORE.
Tech sharing is fine. Acting like spoiled children who’re trying to put their goddamned hands in an active oven to get a cookie and being told they’ll get burned is not.
Communist
In Maxima’s defence, I think she’s entitled to ask why it couldn’t be a bracelet
Very good point. Then she could wear it at work as well if she wanted.
Dabbler could make it a thong…
Dabller *would* make it a thong…
And then Max would always have to be fooling with the thong to change her “settings”.
I endorse this.
In that case a bra version would be popular as well. To people watching.
Anvil: “Here’s a thoughtful gift we got for you. A magical choker which can make you look normal and not get a lot of unwanted attention, which might be the first time you’ve been anle to have that since you were a teenager. Plus you can use it for stealth recon as well. Your team loves and respects you as both a leader and a friend.”
Macima: “couldnt you have made it a bracelet instead?”
I dunno seems like that would be a little thoughtless and rude at an amazing gift. :)
But why does it need to be a choker though?
Because that was the gifr
I don’t know, just saying that it seems a bit thoughtless and rude to give Max clothing they knew she might not be comfortable wearing.
A bracelet seems like a natural choice for their largely pragmatic friend.
I’m pretty sure Maxima doesnt worry about comfort from the choker. She wears one for work every day. Also she’s invulnerable.
She doesnt like chokers because of a mistaken idea that they’re analogs for collars (which is incorrect, they’re analogs for protective amulets or, more recently, for making fun of the French – nothing to do with feminism).
I meant emotionally uncomfortable, not physically. They pretty clearly aren’t her clothing item of choice.
Eh, she’s already shown a willingness to try things out. Like the date with Deus and Anvil’s choice of underwear. Plus, like I said, she wears a choker for work every day already.
Several potential reasons come to mind, for why a choker rather than a bracelet (or similar):
– It’s larger. If the size of an object affects the complexity or power of the effect it can carry, then you get about twice as much working area/volume for a given width if you put it around the neck rather than the wrist.
– It’s already part of ARC’s established uniform. The Hue-bender choker can be worn underneath, or even incorporated into, the ARC one and thus go unnoticed. This then conceals the fact that Maxima is carrying an extra bit of kit, helping its disguise effect remain under wraps.
– It’s a more protected location. Anything that manages to damage a choker is probably not going to be very healthy for the wearer; conversely, very few things will be dealing potential damage to the neck area. Compare that to the wrist, where it would be highly exposed to accidental damage even before those hands see the brunt of the rough handling in a fight or emergency.
Maybe cause it’s easier to project the colors straight up and down then starting at one point?
Goid for blending in as just a typical gorgeous woman instead of an atypical gorgeous golden shiny woman with purple hair… plus good for taking photos, plus good for stealth recon. :)
That’s a very nice present for Maxima. Now she can go out and be a bit more relaxed.
That wasn’t supposed to be a answer to Pander.
Yes if you were answering me it would have been in pun form. :)
Pander ponders paused puns.
palmvos perilously prods pun prohibitor. Previous pundits prepare protective precautions. Pander produces pencil.
“Pander? I didn’t even touch her!”
Ninja hit squad on their way. Multiple targets.
I just hope they’re not Pandermensional
Note to self – more ninjas.
I’m impressed. well done. did you know that Ninjas don’t burn for crap. not enough fat I guess.
Unless you are a Beverly Hills Ninja (that ninja was fat as fuck, ironic seeing how he was a virgin… )
Okay who here wants a next month’s vote incentive to be Max in that proposed outfit in some sort of action shot?
+1. Buuut… which skin color and hair color could we the readers agree on?
Hmm, this might require a poll… :D
Pish posh and piffle.
Set it up like the A-Team bit a little while back. I would love to see Max color variants with a few team members, to make her look like relatives. ^_^
Oh! And one where’s she’s doing the Simpson’s coloration gag. The kids in the room might not this, but Matt Groening originally chose the color scheme he did in order to have people futzing with their tv color balance, trying to get it to look “right,” instead of all yellow & stuff. X’D
I’d love to see a vote incentive of Pinky
If we all had to wear them and the colors randomized every morning, I would never have a single friend because I would never recognize ANYONE ever again. I’m TERRIBLE with faces! Hair color especially is VERY important to me until I get to know you *really* well.
Especially out of context! OMG, if I knew you from work, for ten years, and later met you at the grocery store, I would think you looked familiar but I would NOT know you — I know this because it really happened. Twice (2 different people, different places, one man, one woman). If you were a different coloration, forget it entirely!
I am a little confused about something DaveB said. Originally I thought the blonde was Harem’s natural color (strawberry blonde) but he just referred to Vogue as blonde. And he said she is maintaining four dye jobs instead of five, meaning one of them is not dyeing their hair. Which I would have assumed to be the blonde since Harem is blonde (strawberry blonde), not brunette, and obviously not white haired, pink haired, or purple haired.
So I am confused if DaveB thinks people who are strawberry blonde have naturally pink hair? I am reasonably sure DaveB knows that pink isnt a natural hair color or that strawberry blonde means pink :)
Because pink is mot a natural human hair color, and strawberry blonde is not pink like strawberry starburst candies. Its still blonde hair… with a tinge of redheaded hue.
Like Nicole Kidman or Deborah Ann Woll. Like this:
https://images.saymedia-content.com/.image/c_limit%2Ccs_srgb%2Cq_auto:eco%2Cw_400/MTc2MjcwOTA0OTIwMjUzNjEz/pictures-of-celebrities-with-strawberry-blonde-hair-color.webp
My other theory is all five of them have dye jobs and DaveB just made a minor mistake of saying four instead of five.
My ither other theory is its an anime coloring convention like how in anime girls might have blue hair but its ‘brown’ hair in universe, so maybe pink for us looks strawberry blonde in universe? So he makes the strawberry blonde Harem pink for the viewer’s benefit of being able to tell who the ‘natural look’Harem is, since people will see pink hair and associate pink with strawberry blonde, since that Harems nickname is strawberry.
Am I close on any of those guesses?
I prefer the Anime/Manga explanation, where odd hair colors are simply a device to make it easier for the reader to distinguish one character from another. This would be especially useful with Harem as all five bodies still have the exact same facial structure and body frame.
Yeah that anime coloring convention idea seems the most likely to me too.
Because in Ranma 1/2, Shampoo’s hair is canonically brunette, but it’s obviously blue to us. Which is sort of odd actually, because there ARE brunettes in the show who actually have brown hair, like Kasumi Tendo and Nabiki Tendo.
It’s an exaggeration of subtle variation that otherwise would be difficult to distinguish consistently, given a limited medium and situational impact of things like lighting. Readability outweighs realism in many mediums.
That actually makes sense to understanding the rationale :). Thanks.
Her hair looks practically fuchsia on this page, but in her earlier appearances, it was a much more pale shade that could be natural.
Even in that picture, it still looks pretty pink (just a lighter pink), but I get what you’re saying. But it definitely doesnt look strawberry blonde. :)
“A magical party favor”
That would make you billions EASY, lol. Hell. I’m male and I don’t give two sh*ts about makeup and I would buy one.
Way to be sexist, my dude.
Says the sexist making assumptions.
Plenty of men are interested in makeup, both today, and historically.
Suggesting that being male would be a reason to be surprised that someone would have such an interest, is sexist.
Now toddle off, dear.
I wear greasepaint on a regular basis, but I am a clown…
I also may or may not be hiding under your bed.
I’ll put my my money on “not.” ^_^’
I doubt you could squeeze in between the bunk warmer gear & my snow chains.
Easy, have you seen how many can fit into a Volkswagon Beetle.
Also pretty sure that most people on TV or who are celebrities need to wear makeup as well. Even the ‘macho’ guys. The camera otherwise picks up every little flaw and detail.
With the makeup on you only have to wait until they speak to pick up every little flaw and detail.
I think possibly the difference between magic and science is science is scalable and mass-repeatable with far more ease than magic.
ie, anyone can build something through a science-based means if they have the right equipment. Not anyone can build something magic.
But I could be wrong. I don’t know how magic works in Grrlpower. I just know that there’s a limited amount of mages apparently (in the Council) and a very small amount outside the Council working for Archon (Gwen, Zephan maybe?)
Or it could be that Dabbler just does not trust most of humanity to use stuff responsibly, but does trust Maxima, and magic is a workaround on the Xevoarchyh tech ban to lower civilizations.
Technology is also subject to artisan lvl bottlenecks. It’s a massive problem with the worlds electrical grid for example. MOST of it is custom made tech, built on the spot for the needs of the locality. Dabblers tech is worse in this regard, as it requires manufacturing proccesses that only she possesses, and in order to make even the manufacturing processes, she’d need another layer of machines, or else order it from galactic ebay. She’s limited to artisan work while on earth. No trillion dollar tech revolution for Dabbler.
“Technology is also subject to artisan lvl bottlenecks.”
Explain please? I don’t understand this term.
If I understand correctly, it’s about the degree to which tech might need to be tweaked and tuned to fit each installation individually.
While there probably is a ‘textbook’ layout for (say) an electrical transformer substation, few will follow it exactly. The directions in which the transmission lines come in and out will vary, there may be awkward terrain or land boundaries to fit around, the load required rating will be affected by proximity to supply or demand centres, and a host of other issues. Engineer training can teach you how to identify the issues and what the materials are capable of, but there’s a bit of an art involved in meeting all those individual constraints effectively and efficiently.
A better artisan – higher level – will (statistically) give a better solution to such customisations. If there aren’t enough of the really good ones to share around all of the really tricky bits, then most of the network will be limited to what the relatively uninspired local bods can do.
I still don’t understand, especially in context of what Dannik was saying.
Less about that, and more about there not being manufacturing capacity and the question of whether Dabbler can manufacture such equipment.
Oh okay. So you mean scalability. Yeah thats my theory too about the nain difference between magic and science. Although I admittedly stole that idea from Mage: The Acsension’s “Technocracy” books.
ok, throw this into the ring:
What is Magic? I ask because most magic systems/ideas are just Science with different rules. (ignoring the 2nd law of thermo is very popular) Almost all hard magic systems end up like that. a long time ago I ran into an alternate earth story where Newton derived the laws of motion in the first 1/2 of his life, then the 2nd 1/2 derived the laws of magic. its a reverse of Sagan’s comment ‘any tech sufficiently advanced is indistinguishable from magic’ or ‘any magic logical enough is indistinguishable from advanced tech.’ which is how this comic works. ‘Science’ isn’t really a religion or a profession its the idea that by organized objective study one can understand the world. so most magic systems are actually scientific.
What is magic?
Oh baby, don’t curse me.
Don’t curse me, no more.
Dabbler actually did a little lesson plan about magic.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-813-metaphysics-101/
Since Maxima is holding back her rant, I’ll hold back my rant about how men’s role throughout society has been to sacrifice their life to keep women safe, and that the role of the husband or father is a role of responsibility for the woman’s well being, not ownership.
And that’s why we fund battered women’s shelters with our taxes.
Or could be just having empathy for others and wanting to have a civilization that promotes that?
Also, and I could be wrong about this, but I think most battered women’s shelters are supported more by charitable contributions than by government funding.
And it’s why there are no battered men’s shelters
Because males are never victims of domestic violence: if they show up in the ER, it’s because they deserved it
Protecting women is a critical goal of every community for the sake of continuity. If a community is hurt so that 100 women and 10 men survive, it can recover. If instead there were only 10 women and 100 men, that community is doomed. Men are terribly redundant and easily sacrificed for their communities survival. With enough women one man could have over a hundred children. With enough men one woman is doomed when one of the men loses their jealous little mind.
Well …. humanity has been away from the only-10-women situation for about as long as there HAS been humanity, so perhaps it’s time to up our game.
Uhuh. *eyeroll*
Here’s the thing…”Me responsible for you be safe,” is universally used as the justification for “me am boss.”
This logic is, absent any other considerations, solid. Especially in the case of, say, children. But we are _not_ children, despite what any big swinging dick might like to assume. Neither are we poor, helpless little delicate flowers at the mercy of big, scary, dangerous Wild Nature. We’re just as capable of looking after after ourselves in a primitive setting.
The one and only scenario in which we are at any sort of increased risk…is when dealing with _men_!
And in the modern era, wherein you are supposed to be in control of yourselves, and in which we have access to equalizers like firearms, tasers, and various sprays, etc, we do not need a Big Strong Man to Protect Us from the Big Scary World.
Or, more specifically, from other men. In fact, your whole bit boils down down to “you need us to protect you from us,” which sounds like a bit of a racket, when you say it out loud.
Here’s a crazy ass idea: men should stop being “threats.”
Oh come on. “In a primitive setting” is one of the only scenarios were women and men are not equally capable of looking after themselves, and that sort of ancient setting is what people are talking about when they bring up historical protection and sacrifice. Modern technology making sexual dimorphism mostly irrelevant is what allowed us to move past that.
Also: men aren’t a monolith, you can’t blame every random guy for the actions of a small minority of sociopaths, and “maybe criminals should stop being criminals” is a stupid non-starter of a solution.
I hate these debates because they get no where but I will only make a couple points.
1. They didn’t say all men, they just said men, which can be assumed to be shorthand for “men who are a threat”. Acting like women are maligning every decent dude when they talk about issues of safety is disingenuous. If a man is not the sort to ever harm a woman, than he should already know that the statement isn’t about him.
2. If it was a small minority of men who caused harm to women, there wouldn’t be so many women who have a history of being harmed. There are behaviours that are excused and ignored because it’s “normal” or “in their nature”, just boys being boys, right? Which is honestly super insulting to men, way more insulting than saying that women need to be cautious around strange men. Like, the implication is that men are just slobbering beasts with no self control.
I would like to believe that most men are good men who do not want to harm, control, or abuse women in any way. But there is still a large enough proportion of them that it is a serious problem, and trying to dismiss it as a “small minority” minimizes how serious it is. A small minority is like… 10-25% say. But I would probably put the percentage of scumbag men closer to 40-45%. Some of them might not do it consciously, but the abusive behaviour is there nonetheless.
(side note that I am not saying that women cannot abuse men, they absolutely can and it’s equally disgusting. It’s just not as statistically prevalent and not what is being discussed in the present moment. Things like whether the numbers are lower because men are less likely to be believed, or because they are shamed into not coming forward, is a different discussion for a different day.)
These are all excellent and very relevant points, thank you.
((Also, just FYI, she/her, plx))
The only thing I would like to add, specifically to Point the Second, is that while the vast majority of men, as a class, aren’t consciously, willfully, deliberately, and with malice of forethought trying to dominate & control the women around them…there are a _lot_ of normalized social behaviors that make such deliberate malfeasance significantly easier for the genuine assweasles to get away with.
Starting with the extremely patronizing idea that women “need” men, materially, for anything outside of literal procreation of the species. Looking @ you, Miyokan.
We are perfectly capable of looking after ourselves in the wild, just by being human. Case in point: social behaviors. You know, the number one survival strategy of the species. We form groups just fine on our own, and we look after eachother’s vulnerabilities. The hell do you think we go to the loo in groups? And we will come together to protect someone who’s pregnant.
Hell, the most fundamental law of the culture of women in modern culture is that you always, always, fucking ALWAYS give someone a tampon or pad if they ask, zero questions, no matter _how_ much you hate her fucking guts and want to Murder her.
*deep meditative breath*
There are, of course, lots of other things that are “just normal” that tend towards the same vein. Pink Think, for one. The idea that we are “naturally” drawn to things that are pink, cutesy, frilly, sparkly, or other “girly.”
Tee-fucking-hee. -_-
This idea has lead to the pattern of making “women’s products” (especially clothing) as fragile as physically possible. Not only does this make us throw-away-capitalism’s bitch (ba dum tss), it also creates a lifelong habit of reinforcing the whole idea of “delicate, feminine behavior,” purely for the sake of not tearing holes in every pair of jeans or tunic top I own, every damn day!
Even the sturdiest stuff I own, from Duluth Trading Co., can’t keep up with their men’s gear. And this, unsurprisingly, feeds into motivating me to “let the man,” do this-or-that, just so I’m not throwing away an $80 pair of jeans. The gist here being, that these assumptions create a feedback loop that has us essentially policing ourselves into the “delicate, weak female” stereotype.
*another deep, meditative breath*
And don’t get me into the idea that “chivalry” dictates men always handle doorknobs & dollars _for_ us. I know it sounds like borederline paranoia, but if you analyze this for two seconds, you realize that this social convention essentially removes our mobility & agency in society. Wrap horses, boats, cars & planes up with doors, and property up with money, and you behind to see the parallels.
Again, not deliberately, willfully evil on the part of most guys…but it does normalize more controlling, possessive, objectifying behavior by genuine bad actors.
…okay, I didn’t mean for that to turn into such a rant. Beg your pardon, LexofGotham. Sorry!
I’m not implying modern women need men outside of procreation. But the example you brought up, surviving in the wild in a primitive setting, is one of the few where sex differences suddenly matter a lot. It seems like you seriously underestimate how much strength and stamina matter when all work is still physical and one angry bear is an existential threat to the group. Regarding behavior, men are similarly capable of pro-social attitudes and group cohesion, though the forms they take tend to look different (and are highly culture-dependent for both sexes).
Those sorts of physical differences are mostly irrelevant today, but you can’t ignore that context if you’re talking about the history of gender relations. And understanding where behaviors and attitudes came from can lead to better solutions to modern inequality than just assuming it’s because men are mean and bossy. Another example: the “doorknobs and dollars” thing you mention is at least partly disease related, originating when hygiene and medicine were both pretty poor so touching things like coins was at least a bit risky. It just quickly became controlling bullshit after that.
Humans are weak. In a primitive setting, fighting wild animals, a lone male human isn’t much more likely to survive than a lone female human.
Humans are tool makers though. Men, for the most part, do have higher levels of endurance, strength, and speed, which tend to be because of testosterone. In the modern world, this is not as much of a factor because of our technology, but in a primitive society, where you basically had very simple tools and weapons, males do have the edge on survival.
Heck, they did an actual show on this on TV once, where they pitted two teams of men vs women in the wild, on a deserted island, without technology. I think it was one season of Survivor or The Island. They were mostly British I think. I’ll see if I can find the season online to provide a link. Might be on the Discovery Channel website.
The men pretty much were flourishing, while the women…well… it wasnt working out well at all for them. By the time the men’s team had a hut, several lean-tos, tools, fire, even some makeshift beds, and were well fed from hunting wild boar, the women were still eating lichen off rocks and were suffering from malnutrition, had still not built anything, and were actually lost in the forest for several days. Several of them quit so they could leave the island. Several more had to be removed for medical reasons. The producers of the show had to drop in supplies for them to ‘find.’ They had to keep getting help from people on the men’s team, like using their fire, food, etc.
Now if you add some modern equipment, like firearms or modern protective gear, the sexual dimorphism of the human species becomes less relevant. But that’s not what Mikoyan is talking about. He (or she) is talking about basic physical advantages of both men on average and men at the extremes vs women on average and women at the extremes. There are some women who would do better in the wild than any man, sure, but this is a much smaller amount than the amount of men who would do better in the wild than women, without the benefit of modern technology to even the playing field.
And just to be clear, I’m a woman, I was NOT born in a city (although I live in one now), and this is not about sexism, it’s just about basic biological advantages for the majority of people, men and women.
PS – also, humans are not that physically weak actually. Compared to a bear or a lion or some other apex predators, sure, but on average we’re actually surprisingly good hunters, with just the simplest of tools at our disposal, like sharp sticks and stones. Or simple traps. We also have astounding endurance and healing ability compared to most higher level mammals. Humans used to primarily hunt by way of persistence hunting, which is still practiced today by primitive tribes. Persistence hunting is a hunting technique in which hunters, who may be slower than their prey over short distances, use a combination of running, walking, and tracking to pursue prey until it is fatigued or overheated. A persistence hunter must be able to run a long distance over an extended period of time. Humans are also much better at using the environment to our advantage.
Yes, using a reality tv show as a gauge of survival skill, especially among a curated group of individuals conditioned to a technological civilization, is totally going to be an indicator of anything useful.
Let me grab a team of tribeswomen from the Amazon, and we’ll see how well those lads do compared to them in the back ends of South America.
*sigh*
…anyway, you do know those shows are all about real as professional wrestling, right? That silliness was exposed years ago.
Before I post, just want to let you know I do respect you and your arguments, although I disagree with your conclusion.
“Yes, using a reality tv show as a gauge of survival skill, especially among a curated group of individuals conditioned to a technological civilization, is totally going to be an indicator of anything useful.”
It actually was pretty realistic. The only unrealistic thing was what the producers started doing to help the women’s team after they were unable to get any food other than lichens for days.
Look I’m a woman. I’m not someone who hates other women obviously. I’m just being realistic about where men have certain natural physical advantages.
“Let me grab a team of tribeswomen from the Amazon, and we’ll see how well those lads do compared to them in the back ends of South America.”
This is an argument about where the majority of the expertise on the extremes fall. Yes, if you take a few women on the high end of the curve and put them up against men from the middle or low end of the curve, the women are going to obviously have the advantage. But there are more men on the high end of the curve than women. Women tend to bunch up more in the center of the curve.
Just want to mention though, the men on that team were doing incredibly well. They were doing fine on the island, they’d probably do fine in the backwaters of south america as well. The only difference would be the amazon tribeswomen would also be doing well. But if you put them up against amazon tribesmen, I’m not sure it would remain as equal anymore.
Technique and skill are VERY important. And I definitely would not say women are helpless in survival. I know I’m not helpless in survival. But I also know I would have a much harder time taking down a wild pig than my cousin, who outweighs me by 150 lbs, would. You can’t completely divorce it from physical capabilities or the numbers of people on the extreme end of the curve who have interests in things which would help them in a survival scenario.
We can’t underestimate the difference that testosterone makes for physical abilities. Take armwrestling for example, since I happen to know a bit about armwrestling (I find it very cool). Gabriela Vasconcelos would probably be able to beat MOST average men. Not only does she have excellent technique, she’s pretty big and strong compared to most women. But most likely she’d win against most men because of technique, not strength. And against a man who also has technique, she’d likely lose. This is according to her own statements.
“…anyway, you do know those shows are all about real as professional wrestling, right? That silliness was exposed years ago.”
I’m aware it’s not realistic, but not how you might think. It’s not realistic because they were literally helping the women’s team so they didnt ALL quit or starve. They were trying to fix things to give the women an advantage, and they still were not doing well.
@Pander:
My point was never that men do not have some advantages, in terms of sheer strength.
It was that we do not “need” them to “take care of us.”
It was that, given the same set of appropriate knowledge & skills, we are perfectly capable of looking after ourselves. Not to put too fine a point on it, but there seems to be this idiotic tendency of people to think that unless you can single handedly hunt, fight, and kill a 500 lbs wild boar, you are somehow doomed.
That’s not how it works.
At all.
…and it really, really, REALLY pisses me off that people think that way. For various values of the word ‘think.’
There are a plethora of other ways to acquire plenty of food, build good shelter, etc. Snares & traps, ranged weapons, going for smaller game in the first place, fish, or hey, how about AGRICULTURE? You know, the thing that made surplus food production possible, and opened the door to animal agriculture?
*sigh*
The obsession with “big strong man,” just…it fucking infuriates me. At its core, it essentially assigns all value, all worth, all importance to men. It centers men as the sole source of all civilization.
Fuck that. We didn’t become the dominant species by being strong. We did it by being social, and smart.
@Pander
Supplemental:
I know you don’t have any personal animus towards me, that you are just trying to stick as close as you can to impersonal data & points of law…and I love you to death, my dear…however, you do manage to push all of my big red buttons, from time to time.
xoxo
@Bharda:
“It was that we do not “need” them to “take care of us.””
I completely agree with you there. Especially because of modern technology (and modern knowledge to an extent as well) narrowing any gaps in physical advantages.
“It was that, given the same set of appropriate knowledge & skills, we are perfectly capable of looking after ourselves.”
Just to be clear I was never implying I, or you, or any woman is incapable of looking after themselves. Apologies if it read that way. I’m just pointing out, in primitive societies, that the physical advantages men have tend to maximize their advantages in survival situations in the absence of significant technology.
“Not to put too fine a point on it, but there seems to be this idiotic tendency of people to think that unless you can single handedly hunt, fight, and kill a 500 lbs wild boar, you are somehow doomed.”
Definitely wasn’t implying that either. :) Even most primitive hunters did not hunt on their own. Humans are historically pack hunters, much like wolves are. Probably why wolves so quickly self-domesticated themselves to live with humans. I am saying it’s easier for someone, absent modern-ish technology (at least a firearm), to hunt a boar or other large wild game if they have the added advantages that high levels of testosterone give the human body in physical strength and endurance.
But I never meant to say or imply that a person is helpless if they can’t do that. You don’t need to be a ‘big strong male’ and you’re not doomed if you can’t take down a boar. Anyone can dig a trap, or make a simple snare, after all, and that doesn’t take superior levels of strength. Just knowledge.
Like you said in the other post, I’m just trying to stick to impersonal data when I say things sometimes. Part of being in my field of law is I find that emotional arguments tend to not be as effective as they might be back when I worked in the DA’s office, or if I was to work in personal injury or other fields where I’d have to argue in front of a jury.
“There are a plethora of other ways to acquire plenty of food, build good shelter, etc. Snares & traps, ranged weapons, going for smaller game in the first place, fish, or hey, how about AGRICULTURE?”
I totally agree with everything you said here. Some of that, though, is again easier if you have a higher level of strength and endurance (not impossible for women to do also, just easier if you have more muscle mass and natural strength/endurance), like pulling a plow if you don’t have access to farm animals or mechanical assistance, or building a shelter if you want it to be more than very temporary (logs can be pretty heavy, and usually need more than one person if you want to make more than a simple lean-to. But yes if you don’t also have the KNOWLEDGE, you’re screwed, man or woman.
There’s this Youtube channel which has this one guy who does build a log cabin entirely on his own with nothing but sticks and stones as tools. Although it took him months. I can’t remember the name of the channel, but it’s very cool. It’s named something like ‘Primitive Architecture’ or something along those lines.
“The obsession with “big strong man,” just…it fucking infuriates me”
It should. It’s condescending :) I wasnt trying to be condescending. I would be condescending to myself if that was the case. I’m not of the idea that women need a ‘big strong man’ to take care of them. I wasnt in any way suggesting that, I promise. I was just making a comparison of who, on average, is more likely to have an easier time in a survival situation in a primitive setting without any complex tools, assuming equal levels of knowledge.
“At its core, it essentially assigns all value, all worth, all importance to men. It centers men as the sole source of all civilization.”
I’ve honestly never felt that way about men or history. I feel that most of history has been about men AND women, working together to try to not have nature kill them all. :) The more modern a civilization becomes, technology-wise, the more equal in choices men and women have, for reasons of likelihood of survival of the species (ie, 500 women and 50 men is more likely to flourish than 50 women and 500 men, just because of the slow rate of birth in humans).
We are waaaay beyond that today, so the ‘big strong man’ aspect is not nearly as important now as it used to be when we were hunter-gatherers with sharp sticks.
“Fuck that. We didn’t become the dominant species by being strong. We did it by being social, and smart.”
Totally agree with you again. Although we did partially become the dominant species because of our unusually high endurance as well (primitive humans mainly hunted by means of persistence hunting), although they did DEFINITELY also use the advantages of their intelligence of tool-making and strategy, opposable thumbs, ability to throw things with accuracy, ability to vocalize sounds better than other animals, and gather into social groupings (the latter of which are not really affected by human sexual dimorphism).
“I know you don’t have any personal animus towards me, that you are just trying to stick as close as you can to impersonal data & points of law”
Thanks. I sometimes worry that I come off at unemotional. I just find it easier to argue if I base things on hard data.
“and I love you to death, my dear”
Okay I just smiled a lot at that :) Thanks!
“however, you do manage to push all of my big red buttons, from time to time.”
Totally unintentional I promise!!! Happy that you realize I’m not TRYING to push your buttons and don’t mean anything cruel about my posts, even when they are differing from yours.
I argue with people all the time, both in RL and on these types of online forums, usually just for fun. Sometimes even about things which I don’t like (ie, I argue about things where the facts lead to a conclusion I severely dislike), but I just try to separate things. It’s also why I can argue with people and still like them. I’ve argued with Guesticus, I think Guesticus is great, despite the inability of Guesticus to acknowledge Deus as the paragon of perfection that he obviously is. They’ll come around, eventually.
I’ve argued with you, and I think you’re great.
However, with Ro Jaws, who is a pun using maniac and is making that pun disease spread to the rest of the readers…. he is my mortal enemy. My archnemesis. One day we will have to fight if those ninja hit squads don’t get better at their jobs.
:)
“xoxo”
xoxo!!!! :)
Curiously, you start by conflating natural advantages with knowledge and skills, and then proceed to distinguish between them. From your telling, it wasn’t any natural advantage that allowed the men’s team to flourish, or led the women’s team to struggle, but their knowledge of how to survive in the wilderness, which men are socially conditioned to consider important, cool, or “manly”, and women are conditioned against learning.
Your example is informative, but doesn’t support your point.
I probably should have mentioned in my post about how testosterone is not JUST about physical advantage – it’s also about behavioral advantages in a survival situation in the wild (as opposed to modern civilization).
I think you need to watch the season of The Island -it was a combination of both natural advantages AND skills. The women had skills as well, but they didnt seem able to use them to their advantage. There were a couple of women who were VERY physically proficient, but they were in the minority of the female group, while the majority of the men had more endurance, strength, and general survival ability. For example, the men’s team didnt hesitate to kill a wild pig without any help (as well as killing snakes and other animals), while the women caught a young pig finally (after the show’s staff literally led it to their ‘camp’ and one of the more physically fit women managed to catch it with a sack that the producer staff also provided)…. and made it a pet instead, and didnt want to even try to kill snakes to eat them. That might be a bit of a mixture of ‘natural advantage’ and ‘social upbringing’ but most of the men were not exactly survivalists either.
I think if you watched the season you might agree with me more.
I do agree, though, that ‘being conditioned against learning’ certain things might be part of it, but there’s also the idea that women are more likely to choose, even without social conditioning’ to engage in more social activities instead of physically grueling. The most obvious example being that even at one day old, girls have more of a preference towards people, while boys have more of a preference towards ‘things.’ At one day old, there’s not much in the way of social conditioning.
That’s not me saying that btw – it’s the American Academy of Pediatrics and RosalindFrankling University’s studies in neural plasticity.
Testosterone does not only affect physical abilities – it affects behavior as well. Especially aggression, which is a detriment in many aspects of modern society, but a definite benefit in a survival situation.
Just to be clear, I’m not saying that women are incapable of learning skills for survival. I’m not even remotely saying that. I’m pretty good at camping and survival stuff. I’m pretty sure I’d do better than some guys who have spent their entire lives in a city learning absolutely nothing about camping or survival. But that’s comparing apples and oranges.
Assuming the same level of knowledge, men just will have a biological advantage due to testosterone. Even if there are a few women in a group who’s knowledge and behavioral mindset is on par with the man, they’re usually going to be a smaller percentage of the group. And that natural aggression from higher levels of testosterone in men is going to help more (in addition to the physical advantages).
Just like how girls tend to do better in western school settings because of lower levels of testosterone (calmer, more focused on the lessons, less distractible in a school setting), the higher levels of testosterone will tend to involve aggression, heightened levels of distraction and awareness around you, etc. – all of which help in hunting and surviving in a primitive setting).
And again – this is not meant as a monolith about all men or all women. Sorry if it seems at all like I’m saying that. It’s just about averages and the extremes.
So, here’s a few graphs of normal distributions, also known as “bell curves”, which come up in these sort of discussions about “averages and the extremes”. The issue is that when people bring them up as some kind of justification for their argument, they talk as if one of the things they’re comparing looks looks like the green line, and the other is any of the other colors, when in reality, the two things are usually closer than any of those lines are to each other. Statistically different, sure, but not significantly different enough to use as a rule of thumb, to make general statements about, and definitely not enough to justify policy or law.
Something can be true without being important. Statistical facts about populations are frequently useless when discussing individual members of those populations. They’re just a distraction, trotted out to justify treating someone unfairly.
“So, here’s a few graphs of normal distributions, also known as “bell curves”, which come up in these sort of discussions about “averages and the extremes”.”
You just listed a bell curve graph with no context of what it’s representing.
My point about averages and extremes is women tend to bunch up in the middle of the bell curve, while men have a much flatter bell curve because more of them wind up on the extremes than the women’s bell curve. Not sure what your graphs are representing though at all, but I also am not sure what point you were trying to make in the second paragraph other than saying statistical facts don’t matter.
Sorry but yes, statistical facts do matter. Otherwise you’re just arguing based on emotional manipulation or popular appeal. I tend not to do that. In patent law, it doesnt help to make an emotional argument to the judge in a patent case, like it might help in a criminal or personal injury case, making an emotional appeal to a jury.
Also, you’re trying to strawman my argument with your last sentence. Implying that I’m using facts to justify treating someone unfairly. I’m not. I’m just stating that men have a very significant advantage in survival situations compared to women, based on facts. It’s not treating anyone unfairly to point out statistical facts from peer reviewed studies by organizations like the American Academy of Pediatrics.
It doesnt diminish women for us to be aware of where our strengths OR where our weaknesses are. You need to know this in order to plan for it. You know, in order to try to overcome the physical disadvantage with additional training, or perhaps a modern workaround to make the physical disadvantage smaller or nonexistent.
If that’s not the point you’re making though, then I’m not sure what the point is so please elaborate. Thanks.
What the particular curves on that graph represent is irrelevant to the point I was making. People misrepresent factual, statistical differences as being more significant than they really are, and use them to make false generalizations, which they then use to make bad policy, particularly when applied to individuals that don’t actually match the generalizations they’re making.
For example, here’s a common chain of bad logic: Women are statistically weaker than men, therefore any given woman can be assumed to be weaker than any given man. Military work requires certain physical capabilities that not all men have, therefore all women can be assumed to be insufficiently capable of performing those activities, therefore we should exclude all women from military service.
The right thing to do would be to determine what the actual requirements are, and test for those, and anyone who can pass those tests qualifies, whether they’re a man or a woman, rather than using sex or gender as a proxy for the actual requirements.
In short, you should not make assumptions about individuals based on population statistics.
Doubling down? Okay.
So, I mentioned that whole social behavior thing? That’s how one deals with your assertion about “all work is still physical,” in a primitive environment. As the the saying goes, “many hands make for light work.” In fact, labor studies have demonstrated that division of labor not only lowers the demand on anyone individual, but also exponentially increases the output of the group, relative to their number.
Now, you could try making the argument that “big strong man group do more than little weak female group,” but once you reach the point of production surpluses, it’s all rather academic.
Add to this the fact that, in spite of the stereotypes perpetuated by men, we’re just as apt as tool-users as men are. And once you bring tools into the equation, “big strong man” becomes even less relevant.
As for your “bear” scenario…where do I even begin?
No lone human is going to successfully defeat a bear, bare handed. Get over that fantasy, right now. A handful of exceptionally large & strong exceptions may be able to manage in the face of smaller, less aggressive species, but these outliers do not make the rule. On the other hand, equipped humans, in a party, are going to much, much better able to hunt a bear.
And it would be a _hunt_, as bears are not, generally, inclined to wander into human habitations. Fire, and human activity, generally deter them. Yes, individual exceptions exist, no, they do not set the rule.
You sure seem invested in this.
Why is that, hmm?
Bharda?
I have a longstanding beef with the people who design womens’ clothing. The lack of pockets – and worse, the look of pockets on womens’ clothing (pocket flaps, zippers, jeans pockets, etc) without any actual pockets underneath, is a thing that has vexed me (because I like to feel that people important to me are safe and capable, and *worry* for someone when I know they can’t carry basics and a few tools and emergency-kit tin and so on around).
And then the fragility of womens’ fashions is a whole nother problem. I got mad as hell when I realized that the dress I had got someone – that she had really wanted – was fading in the sun only the third time it was worn. I have seen my date mortified when she got caught in the rain and, well, that cloth almost isn’t there when it’s wet and people were staring at her and I gave her my coat because that shouldn’t happen to anybody.
Understand. This actually makes me angry. This is somebody – and I don’t care if it’s a man or a woman designing the clothes and deciding what they’re to be made of – being lazy and, yes, evil. This is victimizing people.
All this leading up to this: I have made for myself, and my wife, good hard coats for when we go rough-country camping. They are made of #4 pre-shrunk (30-ounce) cotton canvas, lined with 14-ounce denim, and they have so many capacious pockets that hell, we don’t even really need backpacks now. If I wanted them to be the equivalent of armor, all I’d really have to do would be wax them, but the only real complaint I still have is that pockets empty, mine still weighs over 20 pounds. Waxing it would bring it to at least 30.
I’m just saying, this sounds like something you might appreciate. And I have yards and yards of canvas and denim left over. I would be happy to make these coats as a job, and as an in-your-damn-face to all the lazy and evil designers out there who sabotage people that way.
What would you like out of #4 canvas and heavy denim? Pair of Jeans? Coat? “jean jacket?” a vest for carrying some goddamn useful pockets around? Seriously, what? And what would you be willing to pay for it?
Bear, you’re a sweetheart.
I largely got around it by buying a Duluth men’s coat, a the getting their firehose canvas jeans tailored.
(That was expensive, but the material is a bitch to work with, and the tailor did amazing work)
Yea, don’t get me started on pockets. The short version is that nothing can be allowed to detract from showing off my “contours.” That is to say, women’s clothing is only supposed to be for looking pretty/sexy in. The reply is always, “well just stick whatever it is in your purse.” Which automatically assumes that I’m literally always going to be carrying my purse around with me.
*growls*
Oh yeah, I know Duluth coats. Love ’em. That ‘firehose canvas’ is #8 or #6 I think – 20 to 24 ounces. Heavy enough that no matter how hard a dog or wolf or a rattlesnake bites those teeth ain’t going through it.
Sewing machines that go through it easily aren’t really sold today except by outfits like sailrite and other specialty “industrial” manufacturers. I have a vintage machine that handles that part relatively easily, but even so the fabric can be challenging work with just because of stiffness.
Admittedly no significant protection against actual bears, but bear country, despite my nick, isn’t where we go.
Bharda, you need a dress with POCKETS like I have! :)
https://athleta.gap.com/browse/product.do?pid=531170042&vid=2&tid=atpl000049&kwid=1&ap=7&gclid=CjwKCAjwoNuGBhA8EiwAFxomA7uO8jUPhcCExJPJXhznjGbZ1_26R4MPg2XxJByUYZBFuNZ2GLOgAxoC0O4QAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds#pdp-page-content
1. Bullshit. That’s the exact same argument racists use when they get called out during a rant and try to backpedal, and it’s just as worthless here.
2. Most criminals have multiple victims, so yes, a small minority of men can harm a disproportionately large number of women. The portion of men who are abusive scumbags is probably not much more than 5%, ie. the portion who are sociopaths plus a little bit. If you legitimately believe nearly half of all men are scumbags that’s just absurd (and extremely sexist, if you’re not guessing similar numbers for women).
Given the current state of politics in the USA, as well as day-to-day interactions, I’d guess that the number is closer to 50% than it is to 5%.
I’m pretty certain that half of all men are not abusing scumbags.
While the majority of abusers are men, that does not equate to ‘most men are abusers.’ Or even a particularly significant number of men are abusers. As with all things, the difference is at the extremes. A very small number of men are the most aggressive in a societally negative way, but the majority are not.
And honestly, given the current state of politics, people could argue that women are becoming a lot more physically aggressive in societally negative ways than they have in the past, not the opposite.
Actually, no. I’ve worked the statistics here, for real. It really is about 5%.
But ask yourself how many people you’ve ever been on a first date with. Ever. In your life.
More than 14? Congratulations, you are 50% likely per 14 dates to be with someone who is part of any 5% minority you lack the information to avoid.
Most women *do* go on first dates with more than 14 guys. FIRST dates. Maybe she only ever develops a real dating relationship with 2 or 3 (or even just one!) in her whole life, but there are a lot of first dates, far fewer second dates, and just not very damn many third dates except when it’s possibly serious.
And that means spinning the wheel 14 times. By the fourteenth first date, at least half will discover an asshole the hard way. The assholes are *really* good at pretending not to be assholes, you have to understand. There really is just about no way to tell. Until they find out the hard way.
So yeah, #notAllMen. But that doesn’t mean any of us are owed a presumption of innocence. The only way that presumption could be extended to us would leave people unacceptably vulnerable to the very many and extremely varied assholes in our midst.
ok, lets ask the question differently.
what is the average frequency of scumbagery behavior? rather than try to claim that ‘this many people are scumbags’ and ‘this many people are not’ I say its a frequency thing. such as approximately 10% of Americans behind the wheel at any given moment will drive like scumbags. its not that the guy who tried to make a straight only lane into a second left turn lane into a frontage road one lane wide is always driving like a scumbag (though he was driving a Charger) its just that one incident. now with education and the judicious application of small amounts of metal I’m sure they can learn to drive better or at least not cause as many problems. this theory does mean that statistically everyone will be a scumbag in some context at some time it just a question of frequency- some do it rarely others… well.. they do it every other breadth. Naming no names… no really… naming no names.
>and that the role of the husband or father is a role of responsibility for the woman’s well being, not ownership
Factually incorrect.
Women couldn’t vote, own land, and were barred from certain financial services as well.
And that was just in early America.
You better believe that those policies lead to rampant abuse that women couldn’t properly fight for a long while due to them literally not having the rights to do so.
So get the fuck out of here with that “but men were merely responsible for women and protected them, we didn’t own them” absolute bullshit when in a lot of countries they could literally be bought and sold at a man’s discretion.
“…barred from certain financial services as well. And that was just in early America.”
You point is well taken, but “early America” would include the 1960s when it was super difficult for women to get credit, much less credit cards, without a husband’s permission.
Binge-watching classic comedies occasionally smacks us in the face with how often the core of the story is something like “Mary Tyler Moore can’t have her own money so she has to sneak it past her husband Dick Van Dyke isn’t that funny haha!” – and they were a healthy, loving, mutually supportive couple for their day.
But don’t get me started…
Loving? Maybe. Probably.
Healthy? Extremely debatable.
Mutually Supportive? Oh, fuck no. That was a purely one-sided dependency, created by a toxic, patronizing culture that asserted that all a Modern Woman needs to Be Happy and Fulfilled is a husband to serve, children to provide care for, and a house full of appliances to keep her perpetually occupied by domestic labor.
Hell, this is largely the plot of WandaVision.
Long educational post ahead. Be forewarned. :)
Most men also couldnt vote in the US. According to the state laws of the time, you had to be a landowner… the concept being that you effectively had ‘skin in the game’ of wanting the nation to succeed, rather then being based on sex. At least in the US.
So yeah, alot of men also couldnt vote. There was a constitutional basis for the rather large majority of men who argued in favor of womens suffrage.
Fun legal fact. The Constitution doesnt actually say only men could vote. It continually uses the word person, not man.
The “Right to Vote” wasn’t specifically addressed in the Constitution until Amendments 12, 14, 15, 17, 19, 20, 25, and 26. Election laws are the responsibility of each State, and i believe in most states they used the word landowner or persons who owned land when there were restrictions.
Also most countries did not buy and sll women exclusively. Where that sort of thing happened it tended to be men and women being sold into servitude.
Also chokers were not a symbol of leashing or collars. They started in Ancient Egypt, mainly for MEN… usually pharoahs and royalty as protective trinkets. They put jewelry on the parts of their bodies they felt needed the most protection — such as the neck, wrists, and head. When worn by non royalty women, the choker was usually for amuletic purposes, like a string of hippopotamus charms, symbolizing the pregnant hippopotamus goddess Tawert being worn by a pregnant woman to call for protection from this goddess of childbirth.
Then when they became popular in England, it again was mainly for the well-to-do and leaders, not servants or slaves. Mainly to mock the French apparently. Because of how the French beheaded so many people during their revolution. Queen Elizabeth seemed to love wearing them so it became popular among the masses.
So no it has nothing to do with collars and never did.
Ps- The UK never actually had slavery. The first time there was a slave in the UK, he was brought in from an outsider and freed by the courts. Diogo, an African taken to England by an English pirate in 1614, later reported to the Portuguese Inquisition that, when he laid foot on English soil, ‘he immediately became free, because in that Reign nobody is a slave’.
When the question arose in an English court of law in 1569, it was resolved ‘that England has too pure an Air for Slaves to breathe in’. Therefore they gave any slave that entered England their freedom.
Parliament never issued any law codes delineating slavery to compare with the Portuguese Ordenações Manuelinas (1481-1514), the Dutch East India Ordinances (1622), France’s Code Noir (1685) or the codes that appeared in Virginia and other American states from the 1670s.
Instead, arrival on English soil set one free.
William Harrison put it, in his Description of England:
As for slaves and bondmen, we have none; nay such is the privilege of our country by the especial grace of God and bounty of our princes, that if any come hither from other realms, so soon as they set foot on land they become as free in condition as their masters, whereby all note of servile bondage is utterly removed from them
Ps I’m not English. Or white or male for that matter. I just know the history of English commonlaw.
And i googled about the history of chokers, which had nothing to do with collaring women. You dont collar pharoahs and queens.
That isnt to say there arent countries where women are NOT second class citizens or seen as property…. it just didnt occur, outside of the ancient world, in nations that had chokers as fashion accessories for that purpose. It soundslike the type of theory someone would come up with without doing any research because chokers and collars are both worn around the neck.
But for the most part cultures that had or still have slaves tend to enslave both men and women, not just women.
“Not all .”
Right, got it.
Here, let me save you some time, next go around:
“I feel target by , and want to express that I am not personally responsible for , and want this discussion to stop, or be redirected in a direction I am comfortable with.”
I’m confused by this post.
Did I make you uncomfortable or something? I was just giving some historical and legal context. It’s probably about 75% of when I post stuff.
The other 25% are a mixture of praising Deus (all praise Deus, amen) or being annoyed by puns.
There is really no reason to be this obtuse.
Let’s snip this in the bud:
>Most men also couldnt vote in the US.
Irrelevant.
Nowhere in my post do I claim otherwise.
>Also chokers were not a symbol of leashing or collars.
Also irrelevant to my comment and I never claimed otherwise.
>Ps- The UK never actually had slavery.
Also irrelevant and I never claimed otherwise.
>That isnt to say there arent countries where women are NOT second class citizens or seen as property…. it just didnt occur, outside of the ancient world
I’m explicitly talking about things that happened in the past and so is the person I replied to.
The rest of your comment can be comfortably ignored because they in no way invalidate my main point that:
The idea that women weren’t property and deprived of rights (for the simple fact of being women) that men otherwise had is false and flies in the face of basic history.
“There is really no reason to be this obtuse.”
Really no reason to be this rude, but you managed it.
“>Most men also couldnt vote in the US.
Irrelevant.”
Not irrelevant, since the claim was that the ‘no women could vote is 1) no actually written anywhere in the Constitution or in the state constitutions, and 2) not JUST women. If a majority of men also could not vote, you can’t claim that the reasoning was just about being women.
So… the exact opposite of irrelevant. Very relevant.
“>Also chokers were not a symbol of leashing or collars.
Also irrelevant to my comment and I never claimed otherwise.”
That part would be in response to Maxima, not you. You know, on the very comic that you’re commenting on?
“I’m explicitly talking about things that happened in the past and so is the person I replied to.”
Except you’re giving it undue weight without recognizing the context that the rationale was more about land ownership than if you’re a man or a woman. Which was fixed in later amendments to the Constitution, which I listed.
“Also irrelevant and I never claimed otherwise.”
Again, not in response to you only. Although you did seem to imply it by saying ‘and this was only in early America’ implying that other European states. It’s mainly in response to the Maxima thing that Anvil said, since the choker was invented in ancient egypt, used primarily by men and a few women of high status, and didnt get used by more people until England, which is where I bring up how England did not actually practice slavery since the Magna Carta was created, although they did have serfdom until 1381 with the Peasant’s revolt (by 1500, serfdom was almost non-existent, and by 1574 it was completely non-existent).
“>That isnt to say there arent countries where women are NOT second class citizens or seen as property…. it just didnt occur, outside of the ancient world
I’m explicitly talking about things that happened in the past and so is the person I replied to.
The rest of your comment can be comfortably ignored because they in no way invalidate my main point that:
The idea that women weren’t property and deprived of rights (for the simple fact of being women) that men otherwise had is false and flies in the face of basic history.”
Good that you ignore things that refute what you’re saying. Double down on that ignorance. You do you, dude.
Except women WERENT property – especially not in places where chokers were used (except in ancient Egypt, although that had literally nothing to do with women either). You’re ignoring that basic history that you’re claiming to support.
E
Btw yes, women were property in some parts of the world (and still are). It would be ridiculous to claim otherwise in that broad a statement. There are open slave markets even today, based both on sex and race and ethnicity, and sometimes just because of geographic location (because humans have this ridiculous ability to tribalize over ANY differences). But women were NOT slaves in the places where chokers were in fashion (ie, England and some parts of the United States). But you’re directing your ire at the US, and by implication of the whole choker connection in the above comic, to England.
>But you’re directing your ire at the US, and by implication of the whole choker connection in the above comic, to England.
Except I’m not. You’re just weirdly fixated on the choker thing, something I never even brought up myself, and are defending it from precisely no one.
What I bring up about the US has been incredibly specific and has nothing to do with chokers.
“Except I’m not. You’re just weirdly fixated on the choker thing, something I never even brought up myself, and are defending it from precisely no one.”
It’s literally the focus of the first six panels of the comic.
“What I bring up about the US has been incredibly specific and has nothing to do with chokers.”
But even what you said about the US was incorrect, choker or no choker connection. Women were not legal property in the US at any point in time. Except for slavery, which was both men and women, and based on race rather than sex.
>It’s literally the focus of the first six panels of the comic.
But it’s not the focus of my comment.
You can keep harping on about it and arguing with an imaginary opponent, but I’m done.
I think that I’ve been very consistent actually.
Pander:
I don’t believe anybody’s accused you of being inconsistent, at least not in this particular discussion. The claim is that you’re not engaging in the same conversation, that you’re arguing a point that isn’t in contention, and ignoring those that are.
I’m just tying in the post to the comic, which is why i’m ‘fixated on the choker thing.’ Because why else would there be a bunch of posts on this particular comic strip if it’s not referencing…. this particular comic strip?
Why bother “tying it in” when neither posts mention the choker whatsoever?
Because it all ties into the choker thesis of Maxima’s, since that’s what the above comic strip is about. So I try to always tie, if at all possible, in any posts to what’s happening in the strip, although I admittedly sometimes get involved in tangents. But I still try to bring it back to the strip discussion.
No, it doesn’t, because no else but you has been talking about it in this particular comment chain. It’s not relevant to anyone else’s points.
>you can’t claim that the reasoning was just about being women.
Yes I can because the primary opponents to the Women’s Suffrage movement specifically used arguments that centered around women either being unfit or unwilling to vote.
Yes, others couldn’t vote, but that doesn’t somehow invalidate the experience of women and the reasons that some men couldn’t vote were also different.
>That part would be in response to Maxima, not you. You know, on the very comic that you’re commenting on?
Then why put it in a reply to my comment that doesn’t mention it whatsoever?
You can fill your comments with whatever you want, I guess. But it’s gonna be akward to have an arguement with you while your also just dropping random refutations to ficitional characters throughout.
>Except you’re giving it undue weight without recognizing the context that the rationale was more about land ownership than if you’re a man or a woman.
When women’s sufferage seriously gained speed, it quickly became about their gender specifically. That’s undeniable.
>Again, not in response to you only. Although you did seem to imply it by saying ‘and this was only in early America’ implying that other European states
1)Again, okay if you’re going to fill your comment with random off shoot points that arent’ relevant to who you’re replying to.
2)There are places outside of America that isn’t just Europe. Such as Egypt, China, Greece, Rome, etc etc.
Though British Isles weren’t much better when they had “voluntary servitude” and debt slavery in some instances.
>Except women WERENT property
https://chnm.gmu.edu/courses/omalley/120f02/america/marriage/
“Most American treated married women according to the concept of coverture, a concept inherited from English common law. Under the doctrine of coverture, a woman was legally considered the chattel of her husband, his possession.”
Sounds like property to me, dog.
You seem very well informed about history but somehow intesnley uncomfortable about acknowledging the more bigoted/hateful excuses and policies people in the past used to victimize others. It wasn’t “just about property ownership”.
“Yes I can because the primary opponents to the Women’s Suffrage movement specifically used arguments that centered around women either being unfit or unwilling to vote.”
Another funny historical fact that isnt mentioned frequently. The majority of women at the time did not want women’s suffrage. The majority of men, however, did. :) The reason was because they feared that they would become subject to several of the other requirements made of men. Again, it was about ‘skin in the game’ more than sex, at least for the legal arguments being made. I’m sure there were a few mysoginists who said it’s because ‘women are feeble minded’ or something, but those sorts of arguments would not have worked in court or in Congress. Plus it’s very unlikely that the majority of women who were against women’s suffrage were against it because they thought they were inferior.
“Then why put it in a reply to my comment that doesn’t mention it whatsoever?”
Because part of my post was in response to you, and I’m very verbose.
“When women’s sufferage seriously gained speed, it quickly became about their gender specifically. That’s undeniable.”
Sorry but that sentence doesnt make sense. You’re saying it became about gender because the people who were saying it was about gender said it was about gender. That doesnt change the law though. It was not about gender. There were no laws about anything other than land ownership as a requiement in most states. The amendment was just icing on the cake for any states that that might have had laws on the book that could be read in a discriminatory manner, since the U.S. Constitution supersedes state Constitutions and state statutes for that, when the Constitution specifically stated that women have the right to vote.
“2)There are places outside of America that isn’t just Europe. Such as Egypt, China, Greece, Rome, etc etc.”
It is true that in much of the middle east, parts of Africa, and parts of Asia, women were frequently legal property. None of those areas would be considered ‘western’ though. The whole reason I keep tying stuff in to the ‘choker’ argument is because Anvil was saying how Maxima believed that chokers were akin to collars and treating women like property. Which is obviously false to anyone who’s read anything on it. And, with the exception of Egypt (where the chokers were actually mostly worn by men, and some women of high status), most of the time, chokers were worn in places like England. Which is why I keep bringing that up.
“Though British Isles weren’t much better when they had “voluntary servitude” and debt slavery in some instances.”
Voluntary servitude. Do you mean a job? Because if you think a job is slavery, where you’re paid wages for work, I don’t think you have the definition of slavery correct. A slave is someone who is forced to work for another, involuntarily, and is considered to be property of another. If you’re working for someone else voluntary, that’s not slavery. Not to mention that’s not even remotely dealing with the person’s sex anyway.
Seriously – the UK might have many faults, but slavery is not one of them. It’s probably the nation most responsible for slavery being abolished throughout much of the world.
“Sounds like property to me, dog.”
Except everything said in that paragraph is factually incorrect, under the law. Like I’ve said, there may have been some men who were sexist and misogynistic, and they may have been in control of newspapers, but that doesnt change the law, or that a woman were NOT considered chattel. Not a single place in any statute or the Constitution, or any state constitutions, will you find ANYTHING supporting that paragraph. Not a single citation. Not a single reference.
“You seem very well informed about history”
I’m a lawyer, I know precedents of court cases and the history behind certain laws.
“but somehow intesnley uncomfortable about acknowledging the more bigoted/hateful excuses and policies people in the past used to victimize others.”
I’m not uncomfortable about acknowledging anything, if it can be proven to be accurate. If it’s not accurate, I’ll dispute it. What you said is not accurate.
>Another funny historical fact that isnt mentioned frequently. The majority of women at the time did not want women’s suffrage. The majority of men, however, did.
I can’t find any source on this, but ultimately it doesn’t matter.
I never implied women were a unified block. And however you want to deny it, anti-suffrage movements attacked women for, well, being women:
https://www.boredpanda.com/anti-suffrage-propaganda-voting-rights-postcards/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=organic
Here’s some of the most popular ones; many implying it’s not befitting of a woman’s station, that women would be too illogical, that women should just shut-up, that the founding fathers wouldn’t approve, etc etc (the usual bullshit)
Fact is, they specifically targeted their femininity as reasons for disallowing them.
>It is true that in much of the middle east, parts of Africa, and parts of Asia, women were frequently legal property. None of those areas would be considered ‘western’ though.
What made you think I was restricting myself to the western world?
>Voluntary servitude. Do you mean a job?
That may be the letter of the law, sure. But reality doesn’t often always stick to strict rules; laws abused, skirted, and sometimes outright broken by institutions.
>Not to mention that’s not even remotely dealing with the person’s sex anyway.
Per your own comment, you were talking about slavery in general;
“which is where I bring up how England did not actually practice slavery since the Magna Carta was created”
Which, uh, isn’t true: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_slavery#British_and_French_Caribbean
>Not a single place in any statute or the Constitution, or any state constitutions, will you find ANYTHING supporting that paragraph. Not a single citation. Not a single reference.
Except for Harvard and their several sources, I guess: https://www.library.hbs.edu/hc/wes/collections/women_law/
Seriously, you can just google this stuff and find several historical/credible sources.
Btw just to be clear, I don’t have any animosity to you personally. I just think your argument is poorly made, and I like arguing stuff if the facts are on my side. Using emotional arguments can be effective, but I prefer using facts. Like you said, I’m pretty well versed in my knowledge of history (at least the stuff that I decide to argue about). If I don’t know about it, I tend to mention that ‘I could be wrong’ in my posts. I’m not wrong here.
“I can’t find any source on this, but ultimately it doesn’t matter.”
I think it matters quite a bit because of the implications. That being, the only reason women got the right to vote was not simply because of the tireless work of a few dedicated suffragists, but more because the majority of land-owning men, who DID have the right to vote, were swayed or thought the inability for women to vote just because of land ownership went against the basic tenets of the Constitution. Especially since there was nothing IN the Constitution that denied them the right, plus several of the later amendments supported the idea that they MUST have the right to vote if we are going to use the Constitution as the law of the land.
I’m just telling you – this is actual legal history, not the glamourized and partially fictional version of it that you are more familiar with.
“I never implied women were a unified block.”
Good, but I don’t think you realize the suffragists were actually a significant minority, among WOMEN even. It does change how you’d see the social dynamics of the time if you realize that.
“And however you want to deny it, anti-suffrage movements attacked women for, well, being women”
I don’t deny there were misogynists and sexists back then. Of COURSE there were. Just like there are today. Just like there will always be as long as people have free will. As long as there’s free will, there will be people who have unfair views of women, etc. And honestly the posters you showed did not have a significant effect on the male public. Like I said, the majority of men WANTED women to vote – a higher percentage of men wanted women to vote than women wanted women to vote (and not because of feelings of women being incompetent or because of fears of female supremacy), which is surprising for most people to discover. You’re taking modern sensibilities and applying them to pre-1920s.
What I am denying is that it was a legal reasoning for not allowing women to vote. Because it WASN’T the legal reason. If you think it is, show me the statute or the part of the constitution which, pre- ERA, prevented women SPECIFICALLY from voting.
“Fact is, they specifically targeted their femininity as reasons for disallowing them.”
Those posters were not legal standards or even Congressional standards used. They were just by normal people who had misogynistic views of the ERA. They obviously did not influence the majority of land-owning men, because the 19th amendment was passed.
“What made you think I was restricting myself to the western world?”
Because most of modern feminism (sometimes 3rd, usually 4th wave) tends to ignore anything outside of the western world when dealing with institutional misogyny and sexism. Which is incredibly frustrating, since the western world is actually the least guilty of this, especially when compared with those other parts of the world that I mentioned, which engage in ACTUAL slavery of women, female sexual mutilation, and actual second class citizenship, supported by those governments.
Also because of the whole tie in to the above comic and ‘chokers’ which were mainly used in western societies, aside from ancient Egypt (in which it was used mainly by men and a few high status women as protective garments against bad luck or charms of good fortune).
If you are talking on a broader stance about the entire world? Then I agree with you. But you would still need to make that distinct from much of the western world – especially the United States and England.
‘>Voluntary servitude. Do you mean a job?
That may be the letter of the law, sure. But reality doesn’t often always stick to strict rules; laws abused, skirted, and sometimes outright broken by institutions.”
Okay you’re confusing me a lot here.
1) You’re strongly implying your belief that a VOLUNTARY JOB, for which you are paid and have agreed to the terms, is slavery. It’s not. If you don’t feel you are paid enough, get a different job. If you don’t feel you can, do what I did – get more education, specialize in a field, and start your own business. Be an entrepeneur. Then you can be the boss…. except when you’re working for a client who’s paying you. :) But your clients that are paying me are ALSO not enslaving me any more than I’m enslaving my employees.
2) You’re agreeing that the LAW doesnt allow for slavery via a job (voluntary servitude as you oddly call it). Then you’re saying ‘but some people skirt and break the law. Uh…. okay. That’s why there are penalties for breaking the law. That’s why we have laws in the first place. Why do you think another law saying ‘obey this law’ would work, if the initial law doesnt work? Seems redundant.
“Which, uh, isn’t true:”
It is VERY MUCH true. And again, you’re confusing what certain colonies, thousands of miles from Great Britain, did – which Great Britain actually ACTIVELY stopped them from doing. It was difficult because you couldnt just get on a plane and be in Barbados in a few hours. It would take months each way, and was extremely expensive. And yet the British spent a full fifth of their entire empire-spanning worth to end slavery in the entire world, including in the colonies who were practicing it in defiance of what the British Empire had decided, way back in the 1500s. That’s why if a colonist brought their slave to Great Britain proper, that slave was automatically freed. Because of the admitedly hubristic-in-belief, but noble-in-practice, concept that “The air of England is too pure for slaves to breathe” – and hence any slave who breathed English air was to be freed. Again I direct you to the case of the African slave of an English pirate, named Diogo, in 1614 who, as soon as he laid foot on English soil, “immediately became free, because in that Reign nobody is a slave.” That was the standard with respect to slavery.
Again, you are conflating the present and the past, thinking that it was simple to preside over what was happening in the Caribbean, thousands of miles away. But it wasnt England doing it. Those people were actually DEFYING English law.
“Except for Harvard and their several sources, I guess:”
1) I notice you couldnt produce any statute or part of the Constitution.
2) There are no sources at all in opinions on the web page you gave. It’s an opinion piece. An incorrect one, which didnt even have an accredited author.
3) You’re also conflating individuals who might be sexist or misogynistic with the insitutionalized standards in the law, which had no such language in it, which was part of the LEGAL reasoning of the suffragists and the majority of men who supported the suffragist movement. Emotional claims alone are usually not enough. What I’ve provided is a legally consistent reason for the 19th Amendment, and historically accurate.
“Seriously, you can just google this stuff and find several historical/credible sources.”
I’ve literally told you the parts of the actual U.S. Constitution which were the actual reason, and the source you gave was not even credible. Or even made a convincing argument. :/
Huh, I almost missed this.
>That being, the only reason women got the right to vote was not simply because of the tireless work of a few dedicated suffragists, but more because the majority of land-owning men, who DID have the right to vote, were swayed or thought the inability for women to vote just
Still waiting on that source.
>Good, but I don’t think you realize the suffragists were actually a significant minority, among WOMEN even. It does change how you’d see the social dynamics of the time if you realize that.
I don’t see how. Women thinking that other women shouldn’t be allowed to vote due to sexist preconceptions isn’t any less sexist.
>Like I said, the majority of men WANTED women to vote – a higher percentage of men wanted women to vote than women wanted women to vote
Still waiting on that source.
>It is VERY MUCH true. And again, you’re confusing what certain colonies, thousands of miles from Great Britain, did – which Great Britain actually ACTIVELY stopped them from doing. It was difficult because you couldnt just get on a plane and be in Barbados in a few hours. It would take months each way, and was extremely expensive. And yet the British spent a full fifth of their entire empire-spanning worth to end slavery in the entire world, including in the colonies who were practicing it in defiance of what the British Empire had decided, way back in the 1500s.
So, I was correct, is what you’re saying.
The British nation in general, and many of their colonies, practiced literal slavery.
Yes, they did stop, but that doesn’t change the fact that they did it.
(I also find it hard to believe that it took them hundreds of years to get the message across to all their colonies. Travel was slow back then, but it wasn’t that slow.)
I don’t know why you’re determined to die on the hill of denying that the British did the same thing that basically every nation on the planet did at some point.
>I notice you couldnt produce any statute or part of the Constitution.
It’s not stated in the Constitution, but that doesn’t change the fact that women were legally treated that way.
Just like how the enslavement of black people wasn’t in the Constitution but it still happened.
>There are no sources at all in opinions on the web page you gave. It’s an opinion piece.
An opinion piece supported by Harvard University, whose academic credentials I thought would speak for itself.
And they even have a list of historical documents detailing the experiences of women in those periods that lines up with the fact that coverture meant that married women, and their possessions, effectively became the property of their husband: https://www.library.hbs.edu/hc/wes/collections/women_law/marriage_coverture/
>You’re also conflating individuals who might be sexist or misogynistic with the insitutionalized standards in the law, which had no such language in it
Again, the Constitution isn’t the be-all-end-all of “the law”, especially not back then. The fact is that women just legally didn’t have the same property, fiscal, or human rights that men did back then even though the Constitution didn’t say anything on the subject.
Of course, the Suffragette movement and those they convinced managed to change the law but, just like with the British and slavery, that doesn’t change the fact that those things still happened.
As a lawyer, I imagine you would be surprised to learn that the real world doesn’t really care about law, statutes, or constitutions. People don’t know or care, until it becomes convenient for them to trot it out to support their position.
There are many laws that have been ignored throughout history, and many still on the books that are considered unenforceable, and yet little effort is made to remove them. Society and culture dictate behavior, not law. Law is simply a tool.
“As a lawyer, I imagine you would be surprised to learn that the real world doesn’t really care about law, statutes, or constitutions.”
I would, since the real world DOES care about law, statutes, and constitutions.
“People don’t know or care,”
I’m pretty sure most peole do know and care about what is and isnt the law, since they might not want to deal with the repercussions of breaking the law, or might want to fight an unjust law, or might want to fix an existing societal problem by having a law put in place.
“until it becomes convenient for them to trot it out to support their position.”
You’re sort of still making my point for me. :)
“There are many laws that have been ignored throughout history, and many still on the books that are considered unenforceable,”
What I’m discussing, though, was not ignored in history, and was actually the main arguments made, both in courts and in legislative bodies. Not sure why this is an argument, actually. :)
“many still on the books that are considered unenforceable, and yet little effort is made to remove them.”
If you’re talking about some of the ridiculous laws that are in place but havent been removed, there’s a good reason for that. There are only two real ways that laws get removed from the books. 1) They repeal the law legislatively, or 2) They declare the law unconstitutional or null judicially.
If a law is never actually broken, or a person is never actually arrested FOR a ridiculous law (because it’s unknown to the DA or the DA realizes they’d never win so what’s the point of wasting taxpayer money on a court case), then there’s no way to declare the law null or unconstitutional. It would lack standing, or be too ripe. Hence it would stay on the books until someone actually breaks that law and gets arrested for it, in order to bring it to court and argue against the law’s legitimacy.
And most legislators will not bother to put forth the limited time and energy and haggling to repeal a law that’s never broken or no one is ever charged for because of how ridiculous it is, when they can be using that time for more important matters (or for fund-raising or backroom deals, depending on how cynical one is about politician priorities0…. hence the law is not repealed.
“Society and culture dictate behavior, not law.”
Society and culture and law interact with and play off each other, actually.
“Law is simply a tool.”
People care about tools. You need tools. Tools are important.
The natural, physical world does not care about the laws that humans invent. They are fictions that only exist in human minds, and only affect human behavior. The rest of the world doesn’t care.
Most people also know very little law — they simply assume that the law corresponds to their own beliefs about what is right or wrong.
As a lawyer, I imagine you’re familiar with the distinction between “de jure” and “de facto”. Which is the law? Is it what’s written down? What’s believed by the average person? What’s actually prosecuted?
The law has no force of its own. It’s a belief system, a means of predicting the behavior of various agents within a society. But knowing whether something was legal or illegal in the past doesn’t tell you whether or not it actually happened in the past.
This seems to contradict some of your facts. Can you explain?
https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20200205-how-britain-is-facing-up-to-its-secret-slavery-history
Which of my facts are disputed? Everything I wrote was based on ACTUAL historical facts, which you can easily look up with even a simple google search. I gave names, dates, and if you’d like I can give the English court rulings as well.
In fact, even in the article you posted, it mentioned how England had spent almost 20% of its entire national budget in 1833 to buy freedom for slaves around the world. The author seems to have done almost no research, and seems to think that, because the English spent that money to buy the slaves from owners IN ORDER TO SET THEM FREE (without having to go to war with those other countries and colonies over it), this is somehow a bad thing. It is, in fact, a virtuous thing that they spent a full fifth of their nation’s wealth to FREE slaves around the world in a peaceful manner.
The rest of the article is almost completely devoid of facts, shifts blame to England for actions of colonies thousands of miles away, for absolutely no reason, and none of it disputes anything I said. Please point out where it does.
It honestly feels like lazy writing by the way, on the part of the author. Taking an Americanized view of the history of slavery and just acting like ‘Well, the British were white so lets just act like white people are a monolith.’ Seriously, no offense – really I I’m NOT trying to sound insulting, but you need to do some research on any of what I wrote if you’re wanting to dispute it.
The problem is when that “responsibility” extends to the assumption that women need to be “protected” from making their own choices.
well… at least I managed to hold myself back…
The amount of sophist diarrhea lol
Well I enjoyed it anyway. :)
Would give Maxima a chance to have human flesh,albeit it’s just an illusion…!
Well, Dabbs called it a hue bender. If she’s being *Terribly* literal, it would not change Maxima’s specularity.
So you’d have a tall woman apparently made of flesh-colored metal, every bit as shiny and reflective as Maxima is without the device.
So, assuming that she wants to look normal (and I’m not really assuming that) let’s hope for Max’s sake that Dabbler’s not being *terribly* literal.
Weird speculation: Let’s say Max uses the device to take an entirely different color besides gold. The new color is what people see reflected from her, by definition. But whatever the color of her illusion, would the reflected light still color things gold-ish when it illuminated them?
I think that if the hue bender works on people (changing the color their mind sees) then Max would be able to change her apparent specularity but things illuminated by light reflected from her (and not seen by the viewers) would still be illuminated by gold-ish light. Which the people might or might not see, I guess, depending on how deeply the device invades their mind’s perceptions.
But there might be a maximum number of people it works on at once, and it wouldn’t work via video recording or photograph, and it probably wouldn’t work on powerful psychics etc. So, that would be weird.
On the other hand, if the hue bender works on light, changing the wavelengths that actually reflect from maxima and reach the viewers’ eyes, then it would work on everybody who sees with their eyes, and via video, and on film – but in that case might not change how smooth and shiny she looks.
I also had some speculations on the specularity, but until Max is the test specimen, any speculations would be specious. As to whether spectators see reflected light or a mental image, you would need some special equipment. Specifically, a spectrograph.
Now that Harem has tried it she will want her own special version for clubbing. It will be sound activated and change colors in time with the music.
My own ‘weird speculation’: If it can be tuned to work with designated colors in the skin, then Harem could use it to de-freckle herself.
Oh, god, if Harem takes the device clubbing she’s going to ‘strobe’ her color in time with the dance music.
I mean … Harem. There’s no way she wouldn’t.
That might provoke quite a bit of speculation about her power set.
If Max doesn’t immediately test it out for use as a camouflage device I’m going to be vaguely disappointed. That gold is awfully conspicuous when you want to take the stealth approach.
Struth.
That said…”social camo” is a thing. Being able to fade into a crowd, as well as a tree line, is important for covert operations.
Plus just being able to ‘fit in’ which Maxima has never been able to do since she was ateenager. It can be annoying to ALWAYS stand out from the crowd, if you just want to do notmal things like go to the bank or have a quiet dinner at a restaurant that a billionaire stud whos into you doesnt already own.:)
So, do you think that we will be seeing Maxima going out in a “Gray Man” disguise. As an aside, one of the “Laundry Files” novels has an interesting spin on this concept. One of the characters, Monique, one of the most powerful magic users in the country, takes the tendency of middle aged women to go unnoticed as compared to their younger counterparts and most men in the halls of power and elevates it to a minor superpower. Her mixed feelings regarding this add a lot to the story.
Is there any reason it would not work to also change what you appear to be wearing?
In order to look like you’re changing shapes, you have to either actually change shape, or make the photons travel via something other than a straight line. IOW, twist your biology, or twist your spacetime. Either would be considerably more astonishing than changing the wavelength of the light while reflecting it.
OTOH, if this is a mind-affecting device instead of a physical-reality affecting device, it wouldn’t be much harder for it to fake a shapeshift. But it’s going to have some limits when it comes to artificial recording and playback devices.
“Or just find other motivations for tribalism.”
The horror. We’d have to resort to political tribalism or something. Can you imagine?
Look at Liberia. Almost all black, wracked with tribal civil wars.
Your point, being??
I think Saint Michael’s point, and rewinn’s point, is just that people will always find ways to tribalize, regardless of their skin color, regardless of what the differences are. If there are differences, factions and cliques tend to form, whether that’s in Liberia, where everyone is black, or most of Europe, where most people were while for most of its history.
Look at Europe. Almost all white, wracked with tribal wars. The Franks and the Germans have been killing each other since Charlemagne, and let’s not get started with the Irish and the English.
Perhaps the strong tendency for people to form tribes that practice violence on outsiders is a testimony to the universality of the human experience.
“What value do we share as one?”
“Tribalism!!!”
People in general are tribal, no matter the skin color or nationality or… pretty much anything. They will always find something to excuse separating into more closely knit groups or cliques. Look at high school.:)
So let’s not do anything about specific and dangerous/harmful instances of , right?
I’m just saying humans are naturally prone to forming cliques. They don’t tend to need an excuse. Pretty sure if everyone was nearly identical, they’d still figure some differnence to tribalize based on.
Sort of like that Star Trek episode, where those two aliens are forever fighting, and the only difference between them is one is black on the left, white on the right, while the other is white on the left, black on the right.
Or, in real life, the Rwandan genocide between the Tutsi and the Hutus, where the main difference seemed to be based on profession (Hutu farmed crop, Tutsi tended livestock). Because of this class division, it evolved into ethnic divisions, and despite the Tutsi being the local elite (cattle was considered more valuable than crops), the Hutu led the government and were the majority. Until the slaughtering began.
People just tend to tribalize. It takes a lot to get over that natural inclination.
I’m not saying it’s a good thing. I’m just saying it happens no matter what the differences are.
Tribalism is a core part of human interaction, and the subject of one of my favorite leadership books. Most of the main types of influence are tied to our identity as members of a social group; one of the most persuasive ways to change behavior is to appeal to that identity. “People like us do things like this.”
I might see if those two books are in ebook form to download to my kindle. They look interesting, thanks.
I have the digital versions myself so I know they exist; fully converted to my ereader several years ago, my library would take up multiple rooms otherwise. I’m big fan of the first author (Seth Godin); I recommend Linchpin for general reading as well; most of his other stuff is more marketing-focused.
If often remarked that this is the principle problem with how capitalism handles social media, and society as a whole.
It wants to microtarget everyone, so it breaks us into ever smaller blocs, emphasizing our differences in the online environment, even as corporations push us further and further into the “market society” model, reducing you to an economic unit, and nothing but. A source of labor value to be extracted, and a target for sales. Essentially, the consumer becomes the commodity.
I forget who it was, but a politician in Europe pointed this all out years ago, “When you reduce all of society to a market, you reduce people to commodities.”
It’s modern slavery, with chains made of ideas instead of iron, and the masters controlling us not with whips, but by convincing us to view each other as enemies.
In fairness to our fellow sufferers, however…we are confronted by the need to make space for each other. Solidarity requires us to give each other the space to live in ways that we ourselves don’t 100% agree with. Yes, we need to have certain universal standards of justice, and a common language of ideas, but…
Look, I’m going to play video games and some redneck is going to race lawnmowers. We need to be okay with that.
We need to let Tennessee be Tennessee, and let California be California, and figure out how stop demanding that everyone else do things “our way.”
Except me, of course. Everyone should always do things the way I want. X’D
But seriously…it doesn’t mean tolerating racist, sexist, trans/homo-phobic bullshit, at either the individual or systemic level, but it does mean not jumping down someone’s throat when they don’t know how to handle a new situation. Condemnation is easy.
Education, however, is fucking hard.
I tried to find the source of that quote but I couldn’t. Is it maybe paraphrased? Michael Parenti said something sort of similar to that quote, but he’s an American.
“The essence of capitalism is to turn nature into commodities and commodities into capital. The live green earth is transformed into dead gold bricks, with luxury items for the few and toxic slag heaps for the many. The glittering mansion overlooks a vast sprawl of shanty towns, wherein a desperate, demoralized humanity is kept in line with drugs, television, and armed force.” – Michael Parenti, Against Empire (1995)
“Look, I’m going to play video games and some redneck is going to race lawnmowers. We need to be okay with that.”
Fortunately, now there is a video game about lawnmower racing, so all sides can join in on it in peace and harmony.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1433890/Lawnmower_Game_Racing/
Because of course there is. Way to go, Internet!
I’ll raise you-not only is there a farm simulator… it was popular enough to get new versions. the personal brush with ‘why am I playing this’ is PC building Simulator. yes you get to work with simulated cool hardware… but in a job. its never as much fun in a job.
Have you played human VR simulator yet?
I have been avoiding VR. I don’t have the room and one of the cats here likes to try at trip me when I’m half awake, so I’m not sure what he will do when I’m wearing a big expensive blindfold. I fully expect to use it for work someday, by which point every bit of fun will be drained out.
It’s hilarious. You get to play Mr. Hugh Mann, and learn how to do things like moving your head, rms, and legs, in order to do wacky jobs that humans do, like officer worker, supermarket cashier, construction workers, etc.
I … uh… mean…. it would be wacky if you weren’t a human. Which I totally am. Human. Very much a human. I love air. I have skin. How about that opposable thumb movement, that’s just the best, amirite?
Dave, believe it or not, most natural blondes have eyebrows that are a few shades darker than their hair, same goes for their eyelashes. The ones who are blonde both on their head hair and their eyebrows and lashes generally tend to also visibly age faster. That is once they reach adulthood they rapidly begin to look much older than they really are. However, the former, also don’t tend to stay blonde and their hair will often turn brown at some random age after puberty.
Oh and I almost forgot… dying eyebrows is extremely uncommon. Even if your eyebrows are platinum blonde, you still need bleach unless you’re just going to be depositing color on the surface of the hair, which will last all of one wash. Bleach opens up the follicle and allows it to accept dye on the inside. Also, eyebrow hair is a lot thicker and a lot more coarse than head hair, requiring more aggressive bleaching to make any kind of effect even possible. So you need stronger bleach and multiple attempts at bleaching… and that’s bleach right above your eyes, right where it can drip into your eyes and blind you if you’re not careful.
Very few professional salons will do brow bleaching just because of the potential for blinding, and so I did it myself… I had to use a thick 40 volume bleach. It burned like hell and I had to do it like 4 times just to get my brows lighten up even enough to tint them (my hair is naturally black) where as 30 volume and only one time for 30 minutes was more than enough for the hair on my head.
I only did it twice and never again.
I would expect the salon to do that with the feet elevated and the head tilted back, so that dripping into the eyes would violate physics.
Nonetheless, I’d sure expect there was a better chemical process.
I have seen eyebrows done by a place that required the patrons to wear the kind of swimming goggles that cover each eye separately, so there’d be a seal keeping things from dripping into your eyes no matter what fool thing you did with your head if a squirrel should happen to run over your chest halfway through the process.
‘Cos really, that’s what they’re terrified about. Can they do eyebrow bleaching safely? Well, yes they can if the customer cooperates with them and doesn’t make any sudden foolish moves during the process. But, you know, somebody might accidentally dump water on the customer’s crotch, or a squirrel might run by, or whatever…. and then BAD things are likely to happen.
I hope you don’t shave your eyebrows and apply make-up. Hate seeing that. Reminds me of clowns.
It’s a lot more common to rock the caterpillar these days but there are lot of women, perhaps more than you realize, who do just that. Some are just more skilled/tasteful than others.
Maybe it’s not your job to critique a person’s aesthetic choices.
I tried covering my bald scalp with drawings of tiny rabbits once, but convinced no one that they were hares.
That… that was just awful.
I thought it was a pretty bunny joke.
How many ninja hit squads must I send out?
I haven’t seen any yet (which I admit is kind of the point), but I’m not worried as I have pretty high tolerance to personal ninjury. I’ll just tell them to hop along.
*shakes fist at you* damn you. Just…. just dammit on that last sentence.
Why does Pander shun us? We are not lepors.
more- I’m stocking up fuel for the next time Texas freezes over.
Oh, now is that really necessary?
At least let them finish celebrating Glen’s birthday, first.
I would love to live in a world where the traffic jams were color coordinated, the jet engines on the planes tuned in major fifths, and the drones flying by all sounded like wind chimes. I’d love to see copies of classic paintings painted on the sides of every building downtown, and have the traffic be mostly art cars of some sort or other whose horns all sounded like chimes.
But I gotta tell ya, I can’t really think about that as the first thing to care about, or I’d walk around disappointed all day. The people who own all those cars don’t give a crap what I think is beautiful. Most of them don’t even give a crap what they think is beautiful, they’re buying them in some kind of social game to impress others or for strictly utilitarian purposes, or to satisfy some kind of longing they have for freedom and power. None of which makes the vehicles beautiful. The people designing the horns don’t care if they sound like chimes, or if they sound pretty at all – they’re meeting specific safety requirements for the smallest manufacturing cost they can. And nobody has the time to make them into art cars. The people flying those planes don’t give a rat’s ass whether the exhaust sounds are tuned in chords or discordant. They’re trying to save fuel and maintenance while extracting maximum effective power.
And it just goes on. Pretty much every thing that happens – every building we pass, every person who passes us, every thing that moves around us – is a lost opportunity for the world to be more beautiful.
We just have to live with that. There’s no point getting annoyed with people about their eyebrows if you’re not going to get annoyed with them for failing to put one of Rubens’ greatest works on the side of their house.
And here’s the kick; how much should we allow our desire for beauty to make the lives of others uglier? It’s an unfair demand; they’re being singled out for our perception when, like all the thousands of other people in the world, our perception was not what they were working for. And that’s ugly. Worse still, for all we know they’re dealing with allopecia or chemotherapy or something and a demand like that would be SO much more ugly that we’d never break even.
No, I would never mock the afflicted.
I was referring to the ones who think it’s ‘trendy’ to replace their eyebrow hair with badly-applied make-up.
Nah, shaving the eyebrows is dumb… It’s easier to just use chalk for a temporary effect, which is what I do if I feel the need to color them.
Same issue with beards. I was stuck waiting at a salon once while my companion was getting their hair dyed, and we were chatting with the tech about unusual things people have asked them to try. We all had an hour to kill, so she put a black dye on my light-colored goatee*, looked very supervillain. When it washed off at the end of the hour, barely even a shade darker.
Tech offered to try again with pre-bleaching the next time we came by, but by the time we were back a couple months later I couldn’t get used to facial hair and had shaved it all off.
When I started getting my first grey hairs in the beard, I made the rookie error of trying to die it myself. “Surely it is as easy as the commercials on TV!” I told myself, “I will just follow the directions on the package.”
The cheap stuff I used (“Grecian Formula For Men”? what did the Greeks had to do with it?) turned my beard all one color. I congratulated myself for having defeated the passage of time, but gradually realized that it looked totally fake; the hair on my head had little variations but my beard looked like cheap anime.
I gained great respect for people who can dye hair to make it look natural, went clean shaven for a while, and learned to live with signs of aging. You young whippersnappers!!
I wish to see this anime beard. X’D
Are there picture somplace I can look at?
Yeah, I have a lot more variation in the grey in my facial hair. I’ve worn a moustache since the 1990’s but never really liked having a full beard as it never filled in in places. I tried a goatee a couple of years ago but just ended up with a blob of white on either side of an iron grey moustache. I’ve seen a few skillfully dyed beards but most of the time it is pretty obvious.
I once tried to dye my hair purple for Halloween to go as Ramona Flowers, but I didnt realize that with black hair I needed to first bleach it. The result was pretty weird because you could only see the purple a little on the end. Couldnt go as Ramona Flowers… :( Wound up doing an X-23 thing which cost alot more money from Hot Topic than some purple hair dye, goggles, purple sweater, jacket and skirt (since I had all the other stuff already)
In one post I said i try to tie my posts into the above strips… and then I make a post like this.
One thing I know from having a blonde sister is that how blonde her hair looks often depends on how much sun she’s been in recently – the sun naturally bleaches her hair lighter.
However eyebrows are shorter and replaced more often – they don’t get bleached by the sun as much, so they’re usually darker.
Well, now I want to see how the entire team would have looked if Arianna had been able to choose everyone’s entire outfits, and went with a capes-n-boots theme for everyone.
I think ‘boots’ must have been a misspelling. ‘Boots’ aren’t nearly as marketable as ‘boobs’.
And if you let a PR wench design outfits for a group of incredibly-hot women she’s supposed to promote and merchandise like crazy, you better believe ‘boots’ would be pretty far down the list by comparison.
Which, I’m guessing, is probably why Max put down a strong veto on letting anyone design “traditional” superhero outfits for the squad.
Aside from which, Uniforms are a VERY IMPORTANT part of military tradition and conduct. A hell of a lot of things would make no sense at all if not for the ‘uniform’ as a symbol of the organization itself and the expected conduct of members and its organizational discipline etc being among the very first and hardest-drilled concepts in the training of a recruit.
huh, a chroma picker, nice
Sydney would probably also like this
You can tell Harem really wants one (or more) of her own. In the last panel she is just green with envy.
Man Maxima has more issues than Marvel comics!Guess when you turn into a golden demigod who can do as they wish with zero consequences you get hyper opinionated about the dumbest of things cause people cant argue with you.On the plus side secret identity collars for everyone!
To be fair, there are plenty of people who are far more opinionated who are not golden demigods.
And almost everyone around her calls her out on it in every scene it occurs, so pretending that Max gets away with it is silly.
Only the people who really know her.Everyone else wouldnt dare piss off the Nappa level planetary threat (Id say Vegita level but he can kill planets even in his first appearance).
Lol, I’ve met normal people more opinionated than Max. Unless it’s revealed that she was really shy before, it seems odd to blame that on her getting powers.
Like Hiro said, Maxima is especially … besieged. Because of both her unique appearance and her super-induced perfect figure.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-523-field-flirt/
It’s understandable that it might make a person more opinionated because of having a particularly unique life experience, although honestly, people being opinionated is just a part of the human condition in general.
Oh Dave, you have definitely got ‘butts’ down. Turning on the “Wayback Machine’, I remember long ago when you said you don’t do butts well, or words to that affect. You certainly got blue Daphne’s butt just perfect in the last panel. Butt up level ACHIEVED!
Does Dabbler’s continued prohibition against tech sharing make sense anymore (well, assuming it ever made much sense)? As of recent comics, Earth has already joined the intergalactic community, and been given a warp capable ship apparently. Sydney, by herself, can go on shopping sprees for Alien tech in complete defiance of import / export protocol. And that’s ignoring the techsplosion that Deus is going to dump onto the world (although presumably Dabbler is unaware of that at this point).
All of which is to say, the Dabbler’s prime directive seems like an increasingly weird point to hang not sharing life-saving, or, in this case, simply useful technology on. Human’s may not have gotten there on their own, but we’ve been uplifted (and had apparently been uplifted for some time now if Cora’s story is accurate). Presumably, Dabbler could have just given Sydney the name of a shop on the tech bazaar space station to buy Max some holo-tech and not breached the rules (unless sharing the mysteries of the holy mall directory breaches her sacred vow not to tech share. I can see it now: “No no, I can not teach you the secrets of cartography.)
And that’s ignoring that the magical arm of Earth’s forces could have just given Max a functional glamour artifact (and we know that they could have, because that’s what Dabbler is claiming allows her to give this gift) enabling her to look like whatever she wished, and rendering the entire tech sharing thing moot. Human’s already had a home grown way of creating the effect. We’d achieved it centuries ago (presumably, if magic is the tool we’re using to do it. Stories about glamours / illusions go way back).
I don’t believe Earth has joined the Intergalactic community just yet? Or if they have then it’s still a transition period which I wouldn’t want to risk unleashing the Xevoarchy in.
Also I believe that each civilization is suppose to make the FTL breakthrough themselves normally, with the Tau’ri only getting a leg-up because of their unique position to fuck shit up if they don’t get their way (makes sense why we’re following a supergroup set in the USA). What technologies can/can’t be shared is going to need hashing out until the Tau’ri (other than Deus) makes it to a space mall.
As for Max being able to get this glamour another way… yeah probably? Doesn’t mean anyone would think of doing it or offer it freely. Plus Max doesn’t seem like the kind of person to say yes to the offer if it wasn’t being offer by people she trusts.
If Max can get a better glamour from another source “locally”, then there’s no reason for Dabbler to limit the gift to something simple. Dabbler’s prime directive would no longer apply. Dabbler might, for some reason, want to limit the gift to something simple. It’s her gift to give, after all. But if so she wouldn’t need to preface the comment with her mention of the restriction.
I still think handing one country a warp capable ships a dumb idea too tbh.Assuming we dont get killed by the reverse engineering and weaponising process its basically destabilising the entire world in a matter of decades.We need to evolve past the warring tribes era before were allowed to play with advanced toys for the good of everyone.
No, it just means that America has a chance to keep up with Deus. Besides, there are supers, including super-intelligent ones, alien tech dropped around NYC and other places, and your basic comic book geniuses all over the planet.
“De-stabilizing” presumes there was some stability in the status quo ante.
Americas not a smoking crater yet so im assuming things are still stable and Deus as a surprisingly smart villain is keeping what toys hes managed to aquire low key atm.One good trait of his is that his greed seems to make him reluctant to kill millions just to get easy power,hes a slow and smart game guy which is why i like him.
You accidentally wrote villain instead of paragon of humanity and savior of Earth.
………For the first time ever in the history of me using the comments section Im going to actually apologise for something XD.You win this round Pander!
No! Do not SmugD’s Propaganda Lawyer get to you! Stand by your claims, the same claims that even Maxi agrees with
1) Maxima will come around to the truth and see what a shining light of human progress and well-being Deus truly is.
2) Even if you do not believe in the good works of Deus, my child, he believes in you.
“America’s not a smoking crater – yet“ – Passing Critic, my emphasis added
Give it time. They’re not going to get all the really interesting access covers off and safeties disengaged overnight, let alone cobble together their own version from a gaggle of disparate and temperamental prototypes. And for the most effective methods, you have to also allow time for external reaction to their actions.
Nuance applies here. America got a warp capable shuttle (minus the manual probably) because a member of the American military one-shotted a warship/zombie plague/exceedingly bad thing. the the powers that be above would have resorted to glassing the planet to keep the planet from falling to the plague and making more ships. in that context this was handing the toddler a new toy to distract them from the really dangerous thing they just ‘found’.
We know the “received wisdom” is that this is a magical doodad rather than tech. That designation mainly ensures that Archon won’t try to take it apart and break it. We have no idea what it is really based on.
It is clearly powered by macguffions and engineered via sigils inlaid with unobtanium.
No, one human managed to get there. Not earth as a whole, or even a single nation.
Until then, it makes sense for Dabs to eer on the side of caution.
Recall that Cora mentions that a number of humans have been uplifted (from which she is descended). So… potentially millions, if not billions of humans can get there.
Even if we’re only counting humans born on earth – there’s Sydney, Deus, and anyone who rides in the ship America got in trade for the infected vehicle.
We’re talking about earth, as in the various/major nations of the planet’s dominant species.
A bunch of disperate individuals across the cosmos isn’t really a substitute for that.
And, as you say, the people born on earth who know only number in a handful at most and aren’t even inclined to tell the wider world yet.
It’s always fun to see the goal posts fly by as they get moved. Would you say that humanity never reached the moon because only a few people riding a ship owned by a single nation managed to get there?
No.
But not even a single nation has managed to establish transparent trade with the intergalactic community. Which is what I would assume to be the minimum for catapulting an entire planet’s worth of people into a new age.
It is quite clear that Dabbler doesn’t consider disparate humans across the cosmos and a few native individuals as enough reason to break the law. So it evidently doesn’t count yet.
The difference being that those few Humans left Earth using tech developed by Earth-Humans, whereas Galactic-Humans (or their ancestors) were taken from Earth using technology brought from elsewhere.
There’s no barrier of technical knowledge to stop any other group of Earth-Humans replicating the achievements of Apollo, even if there are barriers of politics or economics. There is a gulf of missing knowledge before an arbitrary group of Earth-Humans could replicate something like Cora’s ship or the Fel cruiser. A few special-case Earth-Humans have recently been off-world, but their means of doing so are not amenable to widespread replication or transfer to others. One could also argue that their methods of doing so are entirely reliant on off-Earth technology*, and so we don’t meet the ‘developed here’ criterion even if the ‘not tied to a single user’ criterion doesn’t apply.
(*Sydney, Orbs, probable Nth-tech. Deus, the Galytn Gate, powered by local energy but reliant on a one-of-a-kind-here Alari brane ripper. Am I missing anyone?)
Individual humans have been “uplifted”, and presumably integrated into a culture that can handle that level of technology without destroying itself. Humans on Earth? They’re already hard at work trying to destroy each other, the planet, and themselves. They don’t need any technology that would make that easier. Self-destruction is pretty much inevitable if moral development doesn’t keep ahead of technological development.
I’m finding myself remembering the “rule of thumb” scene from Boondock Saints.
People who wear shoulder pads are morally superior to roundarms.
Truth. The ‘80’s were correct about some things.
and it had the best music videos.
I want MY MTV not this crap. (insert obligatory lawn comment here)
Especially music videos, cartoons, and arcades.
My first thought was thinking that Max would likely have passive magic resistance, but I guess we’ve had previous examples of magic working on Max. (The Rage thing, and Dabbler’s cantrip).
I’m not sure this will be too helpful for Max to go incognito, since she’d still have a superhero form, but if it can tone down the shiny then she won’t have to worry about blinding people.
And the mesmerize thing from the supermannekiller. Which would have worked more effectively had the lens not been cracked.
Yeah Maxima doesnt have any magic resistance at all from what weve seen.The only time magics failed on her was when she got tagged with a weakening spell(cause even putting her to 10% power means shes still able to oneshot you).Still shocked the Twilight council of failure didnt pick any of the dozens of other debuffs that wouldve worked much better than that for their high security facility.Guess like most councils on this planet the pencil pushers went for the lowest bidder and got the quality they deserved.
Even if the hue-bender can’t disguise Maxima’s physique, it would still be useful. She may not be able to pass as ‘just a Baseline Human’, but she would be able to pass as ‘a Super who is not Lt.Col. Leander’. Which, depending on what she’s trying to do and where, may be all she needs.
Is it just me, or does Dabbler look extra anime in panel 7 to anyone else?
It’s not just you. My thought was she must be just coming down off a serious drug trip.
… you know that moment when you completely forget what your own characters look like and can’t be bothered to go back to when you last drew them?
Yeah that’s the point Dave’s at.
Max: My team shouldn’t run around with their logo on their chests.
Syndey: Woo! Free t-shirts!
Just saw a trailer for a Netflix blind dating show where the participants all wear elaborate costumes and only reveal their faces at the end if they’ve decided they want to keep dating. The narrator asks “could you fall in love with someone based on personality alone?” Although I personally don’t like dating shows, the premise seems interesting. Although it’s still a TV show, so obviously all the participants are going to be above-average attractiveness, and you can certainly still see their physical build, just not their face.
re: the author’s note on randomizing skin color / appearance every day, in case that wasn’t apparent.
““could you fall in love with someone based on personality alone?” ” Yes I can and I did, it’s common in Second Life!
I love Second Life. I used to DJ there :)
It would be good for tactics as well since she could do camo shades when in stakeout.
Small critique. The new art style feels a bit off. Not sure how to explain it, but faces do look weird. And I didn’t recognize Harem in the bottom left panel. Feels like you are putting too much work into meaningless details like realistic skin refraction, but forget about such core tenants of art direction as “interesting poses” and “personality though action”.
No offense.
If we’re getting into ‘small critiques’, you probably mean ‘tenets’ rather than ‘tenants’. One is a set of beliefs or principles. The other is the people who rent a building or part thereof. Also, refraction is what happens to light as it passes through a material; reflection is what happens to it as it bounces off the surface.
At one point in time that Nightcrawler had something like that
Coincidentally, the new strong-man super on the team is Hugh Bender.
Bravo!!!!!!
Sounds like a shifty character to me.