Dumbing of Age: When You Smoke While Pregnant, You End Up With A Retarded Howard Edition.
Seriously, if Howie is supposed to be 16, then his obsession with Game of Thrones is either borderline retardation, Asperger's, or Willis having no idea how to write his own character and sticking to one single trait that was used as a one-off joke during his first appearance and creating an entire character and personality around that single facet.
Other urls found in this thread:
itswalky.tumblr.com
itswalky.tumblr.com
itswalky.tumblr.com
68.media.tumblr.com
rule34.paheal.net
twitter.com
Also, have this news post:
>Yay! The Dumbing of Age Book 6 Kickstarter is now over, and it made [DOLLAR AMOUNT TO BE FILLED IN LATER], and I’m so [ADJECTIVE] that all [NUMBER OF PLEDGERS] of you have once again come together to help me publish another collection of Dumbing of Age strips. I’m serious, I’m [OVERLY GRAPHIC SEXUAL METAPHOR WHICH WAS UNCALLED FOR AND UNWELCOME] with gratitude.
>That means it’s time to choose which character I’m gonna doodle into all the signed/autographed books, so there’s now a poll on the right hand side of the website, under the comic. You might ask, “WHERE IS SO-AND-SO???” and the answer is likely “they were already the default doodle for a previous book.” This is my thirteenth book, so that’s burned through a lot of folks, but there’s still plenty more to go!
>Also now that the Kickstarter craziness is over, I can go back to promoting other things, like my weekly Welcome To The Fuck Zone pages over at Slipshine. This week was more Billie and Ruth, also featuring some makeshift light bondage, sure, why not.
I dare somebody to go into the comments section and ask why Mary nor Carla are included in the poll.
ENOUGH WITH THE "GAME OF THRONES" SHIT ALREADY, WILLIS!!!
Is it possible for characters to be considered "flanderized" if they're one-note from the get-go?
It's possible, but Howard at least talked about more than Game of Thrones back in 2013.
Tonight, everyone's favorite bitch with a dick is back, and scaring Ruth's poor little, green eye-beetles up onto her scalp.
The GoT shit will continue until Willis is convinced that everyone who reads this schlock realizes that Howie is indeed autistic. Because...... idk spite filled reasons I'm sure.
...
Wow, it's fucking nothing.
well, this is nothing. time to post the only thing Carla is good for; lewds and suggestives implying he still has a fully working dick
Love that picture
So Ruth was given anti-depressants? Was that established at any point upon her dismissal from the hospital?
>What's-Her-Name
Which one is she?
>Carla can burn in hell!
Well, that's a vague callback to Billie yelling at Carla for twelve seconds about outing Ruth.
>He couldna been more than, what, 5'1"?
So this implies that Carla is 5'2" or more. As you can see, Ruth is shorter than Ca-
Oh my god, Ruth's got the Dobson eyebrows in the last panel.
Rejected DoA ideas:
itswalky.tumblr.com
Does Amber have DID?
>I mean, on the one hand, Amber’s entire deal is that she is afraid of her own capacity for violence and rage. She’s got 99 problems, and that’s all of them. And so her having DID would be extremely problematic because I’m reinforcing the idea that mentally ill folks are violent.
>On the other hand, I am pleaded with at every single public appearance I make for Amber to please have DID because that reader sees themself in her and wants their own experiences to be validated, because despite Amber being a violent person, she’s still a heroic protagonist who is using the lemons she was given to make badass superhero lemonade.
>So I ask myself, do I make these people happy? Do I make other, similar people enraged for the reasons outlined in the first paragraph?
>or do i just be extremely cagey about it forever, creating a new set of problems, and pleasing no one
itswalky.tumblr.com
Borderline personality disorder?
itswalky.tumblr.com
I have no comments about this right now. Cerberus has continued to be reasonable with and about me.
>So Ruth was given anti-depressants? Was that established at any point upon her dismissal from the hospital?
I think so. I know she was on them when in the hospital.
"What's-Her-Name" could be just about anyone, honestly. Other than Billie and the other people present on-panel.
>Was that established at any point upon her dismissal from the hospital?
I think Billie mentioned that the mental ward had her hopped up on drugs or something. Also I think it's implied that her rehab would generally include anti-depressant pills.
Notice how he answers this on his Tumblr but not at any point on his Patreon where people are literally paying him to draw comics and asking him these same questions.
Jesus Ruth, Howies like 16. Do you really need to shield him from such things? I mean I guess I can see why: Willis writes him like he's still 5 or something.
Interesting note is that someone on the latest DoA comic said he sent in those asks a very, very long time ago and was surprised that he had answered them after all this time.
>I think very early I wanted to cast Mary as more of a direct foil to Joyce, rather than as a direct foil to … I dunno, everybody else.
Honestly, that should have been one of the central aspects to DoA from the start. You primarily follow Joyce as she copes with reconciling her Christian upbringing with the secular environment she's entered. You could then have two foils for Joyce that show the extreme aspects of these two areas: Dorothy is a through-and-through atheist, while Mary is a devout Christian. The two could clash at times, and Joyce would find herself conflicted between choosing a side.
>I just wanted her to be happy. And that didn’t survive, because it turns out Amber’s life has to be pretty crappy for her to be Amber in my mind. She embodies so much of my own brain’s fears. Those fears have to be put down on paper, or I don’t excise them, I don’t sort them out for myself.
We were wrong about Cerberus using DoA for self-therapy. It was Willis all along.
>She’s got 99 problems, and that’s all of them
Yeah, Jay-Z's lawyers would like a word with you Willis
>I’m reinforcing the idea that mentally ill folks are violent.
That sounds like a very big stereotype.
>On the other hand, I am pleaded with at every single public appearance I make for Amber to please have DID because that reader sees themself in her and wants their own experiences to be validated.
I'm kinda concerned if a large amount of his readers implant themselves onto Amber for that reason. Also pandering to readers by fundamentally changing characters on a whim is a slippery slope.
Didn't Cerberus at one point say that a licensed therapist told her to keep reading DOA and participating in the comments section? That's not exactly "self-"therapy.
It's also not exactly a great reflection on the US mental health care system.
Why is Ruth explaining the concept of medicine to her brother when he shows surprise that she's taking pills? Surely he understands what medicine does generally, he want to know why Ruth's taking it specifically. Why does he accept that as a response?
Ruth should stop pawning off her tasks on Billie if she's gonna do this job right (or even if the meeting is her saying she's quitting no matter what she should still take more responsibility). I get not wanting to talk to Carla because she feels like she let her down or whatever, and maybe Mary, but she should just go tell Agatha and "What's-her-name" herself.
Willis really likes to do this stuff where he gives a person a set of traits that seem to point to some concept (usually a mental health diagnosis) but avoids ever using the label. It kinda protects him from criticisms of inaccurate representations while letting him appeal to those who identify with the collection of traits.
Feels pretty cowardly to me, especially since there is such a stigma around getting diagnoses for mental issues.
Also, regardless of what specific diagnosis Amber's exhibiting she's definitely suffering mentally due to trauma and her dad's abuse and being a violent asshole, so I don't think refusing to choose a label really helps that much.
>she's definitely suffering mentally due to trauma and her dad's abuse and being a violent asshole
Er, that is to say she is being a violent asshole *while* suffering mentally due to trauma and her dad's abuse.
Another example of people teleporting in the DoA dorm.
Does Willis not understand that handles turning and doors opening produce loud and easily noticeable noises unless done very carefully?
>>So I ask myself, do I make these people happy? Do I make other, similar people enraged for the reasons outlined in the first paragraph?
how about you make a character compelling and interesting and not worry about what diagnosis they might have at the hands of a mental health provider, since believe it or not,even people with fucked up brain problems can have problems that don't stem from chemicals in their heads.
I like to assume they're just coming from the bathroom and happen to overhear things.
>CARLA CAN BURN IN HELL
hate crime!
It's been theorized here that Cerb's therapist encourages her posting as a means to bypass any filters she has in a clinical setting.
>Why do things always happen when I'm taking a shit?
Did absolutely nothing wrong
>On the other hand, I am pleaded with at every single public appearance I make for Amber to please have DID because that reader sees themself in her
I really find it hard to believe that the overlap between people with DID, people who unironically enjoy this comic, and con-going people is large enough that Willis has been asked this more than once in public.
Unless Cerb just goes to every single con, just to ask Willis this.
>So this implies that Carla is 5'2" or more.
Definitely more. Someone last thread that Ethan is explicitly 6' and Carla is basically the same height (if not a bit taller) in this strip.
I always pitied Cerb's therapist for having to read to read DoA and its comment section.
Holy shit so Carla's like 6'1 at least.
>carla is 6'+
neat
She didn't brutally dom Carla then turn her into her perfect Christian 50s housewife.
>I WILL RULE HELL
unless somebody says you belong in boy's hell, then you'll freeze up and need rescuing
BOY'S HELL. WHERE THE BOY'S BURN.
Tumblr question:
>Walky and Joyce are approximately similar height when they stand next to eachother.
>But for some reason in my head Joyce is average height and Walky’s like four feet tall. Walky just seems really really short to me.
>Here are Walky and Joyce’s heights, as I internalize ‘em:
>Joyce 5'4"
>Walky 5'7"
>So Joyce is indeed average height for a female American, but Walky’s a few inches under average for a male American.
>I don’t know everyone’s height in feet-inches, but I know Walky and Joyce’s (they’re basically mine and my wife’s, so). Walky’s the same height as his sister and Billie, while Joyce shares her height with Dorothy and Becky.
This is new info!
Walky, Sal, Billie: 5'7"
Joyce, Dorothy, Becky: 5'4"
Ethan: 6'0"
Amber/Amazi-Girl: 5'2"
>Sal’s about 5'7". Same height as Billie and Walky, shorter than Ruth and Carla, taller than Joyce and Dorothy. Definitely taller than Amber and Dina.
Pic related from 4-ish years ago.
>Here’s my progress so far. Yay, height chart. I was kind of stuck in a 5'5"-5'7" rut for a while there in the middle.
5 years ago:
>And part of it is just looking at my art and realizing, Jesus Christ, Walky’s head is huge.
>Walky points at his twin sister's rack
>Joe eyes Danny's dick appreciatively
>Mary stares at Sarah's boobs
It's like a dozen different smutty fanarts just waiting to happen.
Dorothy is also clearly side-eyeing Sal.
>Joyce is hot for teacher
>Jacob staring directly into the camera
One day you'll find that burly black guy to take you to Poundtown, Willis.
Both Asian-descent characters are on the left.
All the black/partially black characters are on the right.
...
That hand is quite unfortunate but I'm not going to try and fix it. Just enjoy Dorothy's half-pinkie.
Dorothy isn't going to let something like losing her fingertips in a meatpacking accident slow her down.
There are a lot of people who claim to have DID, more than who actually exist. Could be them.
Even assuming a huge amount of fakers, how many of them are going up to Willis and talking about validating themselves through Amber?
>doesn't mind cussing around Howie
>dances around the topic of depression and anti-depressants
That's pretty believable. Mental issues have huge stigmas .
But doesn't he already know at this point?
She's just trying to keep her retarded brother from being upset since she knows that in a few years Clint will no longer be able to care for him and she'll have to ship Howie off to the halfway house.
His wife will film it. Then take over and make him watch.
Willis seems to have a habit of messing up her pinkies. Let's just decide it's canon for giggles.
Hey, so I know this is a weird place to ask, but I like you and am interested in your opinions, especially since most of you are males.
Dated a guy for 3 months back in my undergrad. Turned out to be a total liar and super-manipulative. Broke things off. Tried to remain on good terms with him. That was a bad idea, so I blocked him on Facebook.
He started working on campus and would often yell passive-aggressive remarks about me if I passed by.
Finally got past that part. Years have passed, and he has continued to try to get in touch with me, despite me being very firm about how I want nothing to do with him. I have explicitly asked him to leave me alone. And yet he persists.
It's been almost 8 years. Help a girl out?
If someone was made uncomfortable by you, what would it take for you to leave them alone?
What does it take to get rid of someone who doesn't care about personal boundaries at all?
I'd like to mention that he has known about my boyfriend for a long time, so I doubt anything about that will make a difference.
I'm just at a total loss here, and what better place to ask for advice than an anonymous board that is mostly composed of men?
If you have any suggestions or advice or support, please do let me know. I hate anxiety attacks, and I may be a terrible person, but I don't deserve to be cyber-stalked. .............. Probably.
Can you get anyone else to talk to him about this? Is there anyone you think he WOULD listen to?
Hmmm, maybe. I have a contact or two that may be of use.
If you're feeling threatened, your best bet is probably to have someone talk to him that he'd respect, as Zagreus mentioned, or possibly have a figure in authority do so.
Contrary to what certain groups think, making people they don't like feel uncomfortable while they live their life is very rarely acceptable. You deserve peace of mind.
Shit, if it's been 8 years I'd have made some official moves, though I dunno which branch of what to call on.
Have we gotten the latest pinup yet?
>Walky and Willis are the same height
Willis confirmed for manlet.
Also, this and make for awful height charts. the latter more so.
Personally, I haven't got any good advice. All I can offer is bad advice, like "Shoot him."
I'd check with about your situation, though.
Nope.
Bad news: Your comment didn't make it. But these did:
>Okay like geez. I know that Ruth did a lot of shitty things but… I also feel like Rachel is being an asshole right now. She had a point before that Ruth did some shitty things but this is just going too far with it in my opinion. Not to mention the way she condescends to Harold is just ew.
>[I think the in-book doodle should be Toe-Dad at the Women’s Rights March, wearing a pink knitted pussycat cap]
>While I can understand the sentiment, I think that Rachel’s kind of going over the line here. If Ruth’s being kept on, then that’s something to yell at management for.
>No Mike to vote for. I’m sad that I can’t vote for that sociopathic interdimensional asshole
>Part of me wants to say “HOW DARE YOU SAY THAT ABOUT RUTH, YOU HEARTLESS DEMON,” and then I realize they call her Ruthless for a reason. I wish I knew enough about Rachel to explain why she, in particular, is most hostile to Public!Ruth, but I think she’s just blunt and strongly opinionated, no matter how much less terrible Ruth is.
>oh god Howard’s not far from my age, guess I better start watching HBO.
>Ruth, no.
>Your heart is in the right place on this issue, for once.
>But a floor meeting is NOT A GOOD WAY TO DO THIS.
>Sit down one-on-one. Hear out everyone individually. Listen to all their concerns.
>Do NOT set up a situation where peer pressure, group think, and mob mentality can rear their ugly heads and more hesitant voices can get drowned out by the sharper ones.
>In Dumbing of Age, bad decisions are more active agents in their own right through some sort of fusion of animism and platonic idealism. People don’t make bad decisions… bad decisions make themselves. Ontologically.
>Y’know, if she’s that mad about Ruth, you’d think she’d have complained to the RM.
Among other comments, of course. The comments section is surprisingly split between hating and supporting Rachel.
wait, so someone picks and chooses which comments go through and actually show up in the comment section?
I have never seen Rachel do anything except shit on people from inside her room.
>But a floor meeting is NOT A GOOD WAY TO DO THIS
That's a good point. Mary or someone is going to raise valid concerns and complaints, Billie will punch them, then everyone will go back to their room feeling better about themselves.
>People defending Ruth when even she knows she isn't fit for the job
Exactly.
The first comment a poster makes has to be accepted by Willis himself, I believe. That's how it was originally. Then he said his twins were taking up too much of his time, so the comments would go unmoderated. That lasted like a day when people with dissenting opinions started to be able to voice them, then Willis locked and closed the comments saying that he didn't have the time to do this because babies are hard work.
...which is why he said he WOULDN'T be moderating the comments at all.
In previous /doag/ threads, others have said there's a different mod/admin approving comments, but I couldn't say whether that's true or not.
NORMALLY, your first comment has to be approved and if it seems sufficiently un-trolllike* it goes through and you can post at will, but certain posters often seem to find their comments requiring frequent moderator approval.
*for a given value. i.e. "How the fuck did Mary know Carla was trans?" is what a troll would say.
As someone who's dealt with too many of these sort of assholes, I'm really sorry you've had to deal with this guy.
That said, if he hasn't listened to 8 years worth of 'fuck off', another few tries aren't going to help. Either drive him off with the contacts you mentioned, or consider getting the cops involved. There may be downsides to getting law enforcement involved, but some people won't stop unless the consequences are dire enough.
itswalky.tumblr.com
>Translation: "I'd rather be a pussy and publicly admit to being one than taking a hard stance about my own work that might piss off some of my fans."
Goddammit, Willis, you're a 40-year-old father and the person who's been writing these characters for 20 fucking years. Stop acting like you're a 16-year-old fanfic writer who's afraid of contradicting canon. If you have an interpretation, own it. If the fanbase is anything like the other Tumblr fanbases I've witnessed, they'll be perfectly happy to attach their own interpretations to your work without your help. Honestly, if he parents his children the same way he parents his fanbase, they're going to grow up spoiled as shit.
Re: the google doc, who's the "boobies-photoshopping guy" anyway? Was someone editing comics into smut and Willis responded... by drawing kinda-admonishing smut?
Yeah, that was a response to edits of his art on Paheal ages before Slipshine or anything.
>How dare this person edit my comics into becoming smut!
>I know how to combat this! I'll confront the artist through an Author Avatar™ in which my own waifu is topless!
If all he's doing is trying to get in contact with you without flooding your social media accounts with requests and messages you might not have enough for the police to make an official response, unfortunately. If you can show that this is a long-term pattern of behavior you'll have a much better chance of getting them to take action. If there are any mutual connections like friends between the two of you see if they'll intervene. You should also find some local women's support groups who should be able to provide you with significantly better help and resources than the assholes on a Norwegian relief carving forum. Finally, there is always rolling up on him with a tire iron and breaking his knees; we can call that one Plan D.
He could introduce new characters with ambiguous mental issues and let his readers project onto them.
My knee jerk reaction is that it would be nice to just bring some dudes and beat (or threaten to beat) his ass, but that probably wouldn't fix anything in the long run, right?
Right?
I can't really get into that guy's head, so I dunno what else to do. If you can get the police to scare him and establish a paper trail that would be good, but I'm not sure if they'd actually do anything. Wouldn't hurt to try, though, right?
General note: I don't know if he knows I've moved to a different state.
Thank you for all of your thoughtful responses.
Yeah, you have to be very careful about what you post, especially if it's your first time posting.
If you can get in with a sufficiently reasonable post, he won't get too angsty about subsequent posts.
Just tell his boss, if he's harassing students then his campus job is fucked.
He's no longer working there, fortunately. He only made it for a few months. Good point, though!
>You have already been more kind and supportive of me than people were when my "friend" made those rape threats.
As someone who's previously been in a place where my only solace was a Croatian logo board, I'm really sorry that we, randos on a Croatian logo board who argue about a mediocre webcomic, are better help than your friends were. I hope you've traded up since then.
Even if he's since moved on from the university job, letting it slip to his boss or coworkers that he's being an ass would give him better things to worry about than harassing you.
Thanks, yes, I don't talk to many of the people who were around me at those times.
I accidentally found out where he currently works when I was blocking him, so that may be something to go on.
Wait, that's real???
So is there anyway to save Amber as a character or is she on the path to doom and un-likability?
>I will rule hell
>...........With my penis
Or whatever she's got going on down there.
Therapy?
What she needs is guidance and friends who are willing to tell her off.
Well Danny could have done something. But no, he left with no real fuss. Because I guess Willis is saving him for the eventual gay butt sex with Ethen and Mike
Yup. He even posted it to Paheal himself with the account name dorothykeener. Check it out (link is NSFW, obviously)
rule34.paheal.net
Drop the DID thing, go back to right when she dumped Danny and was simply having a mental breakdown.
All of her friends (which I guess is just Ethen) is convinced this behavior is totally normal and not a problem though. So really, are they just enablers at this point? Danny was the only one so far to say "hey, maybe you should stop this crazy BS before you die."
Actually do something with the Sal/Amber thing and either expand on it, conclude it, or develop it into something that isn't a waste of time.
They're not very bright and just see it as "Eh, she's fine, because she's not getting hurt or anything." Danny didn't even realize it was an issue until Sal pointed it out.
Everyone's just excited to have a superhero on campus.
Danny was cool with it until Sal pointed out that it was a bad idea.
Speaking of Danny and Ethan, outside of them bonding over Amber being a psycho, have they ever had any meaningful interactions?
The Amber stuff has always been there like background radiation but they've had some nice moments. Mostly because Ethan is one of the few characters who isn't an asshole, so they have nice talks, even when they're disagreeing about nerdy stuff.
...
They stared at each other and blushed one time.
Just like in Mary's Japanese cartoons!
But user, Mary is so Protestant she shits sola fide tracts.
Probably not. He hasn't gotten to that episode of Game of Thrones.
And they thought about kissing. They also discussed how it would be terrible for Amber if they dated. I say let her deal with it.
Danny and Jacob switch rooms, allowing Danny to go balls deep in Ethan's mangina every night with Amber being none the wiser.
>implying Amazi-Girl hasn't created an Amazi-anus tracker that would instantly know when Ethan's been penetrated
What are you, some kinda misogynist?
But Amber is blindsided by her thirst for Ethan's cock, remember? Her tracker would detect when he's fucking someone, but her paradigm of Ethan being the penetrator would leave her tracker vulnerable to backdoor exploits.