She Said No 2013-09-13

[Timotheus]

All I'm going to comment on is that melting human bodies is a personal phobia and I avoid looking at drawings depicting them when possible. I've managed to avoid watching any of the "Blob" and "House of Wax" movies and do my best to stay away from comics and graphic novels that seem likely to embrace such images. Why this is I'm not certain and I really don't care to find out. Zombies and normal decay don't bother me but melting solid flesh is a no-no. So I'll be hiding until it's safe to look again.

[DilyV]

All I'm going to comment on is that melting human bodies is a personal phobia and I avoid looking at drawings depicting them when possible. I've managed to avoid watching any of the "Blob" and "House of Wax" movies and do my best to stay away from comics and graphic novels that seem likely to embrace such images. Why this is I'm not certain and I really don't care to find out. Zombies and normal decay don't bother me but melting solid flesh is a no-no. So I'll be hiding until it's safe to look again.

You must have LOVED Raiders of the Lost Ark and the incredible melting Nazis...

We all have our issues with certain imagery... lets hope the melting part is over...

[shadowinthelight]

You must have LOVED Raiders of the Lost Ark and the incredible melting Nazis...

And don't forget that guy from Robocop who got soaked in toxic waste.

[Dave]

You must have LOVED Raiders of the Lost Ark and the incredible melting Nazis...

And don't forget that guy from Robocop who got soaked in toxic waste.

And the Wicked Witch of the West!

[Timotheus]

And the Wicked Witch of the West!

The Oz meltdown wasn't a problem, just steam and an actress sinking through a trapdoor into the floor

[Atomic]

And the Wicked Witch of the West!

The Oz meltdown wasn't a problem, just steam and an actress sinking through a trapdoor into the floor

Spoilers, people, spoilers....

[DilyV]

And the Wicked Witch of the West!

The Oz meltdown wasn't a problem, just steam and an actress sinking through a trapdoor into the floor

Spoilers, people, spoilers....

You mean the wicked witch really didn't melt?

[shadowinthelight]

You mean the wicked witch really didn't melt?

Yeah, can you believe the audacity of some people to just blurt out information like that? What a world!

[Fairportfan]

Sled

[scantrontb]

Right. Except Tsillah tries on the supermodel bod before going out to meet the vampires: http://wapsisquare.com/comic/guard-dogs/

And Tsillah uses fashion industry-speak to introduce herself to Monica: http://wapsisquare.com/comic/assigned-to-you/

Which ultimately made Doubt a very happy... camper: http://wapsisquare.com/comic/your-liason/

Whatever Tsillah brought to work that day, it was better than pizza. But in any case, it's all really just the usual Sunday guesses here on Wapsi Square Forum.

I guess we'll just have to disagree then... the way "I" see it in your first link was that Tsillah was copying what she saw, sorta... Doubt was BIG, so she was big, Doubt was good looking, so was she... all because while Tsillah knew the basics, she didn't know the DETAILS of Monica's M.O. so she improvised.

Second link: HUH? that's "industry-speak"? I'm assuming you meant the line: "was I too severe?"... to me that's just her saying that she acknowledged that she may have over-acted. Granted, I'm an electrician and not a model (or other job in the field) but that just sounds like a normal person to me, maybe a bookish person with a larger vocabulary than you typically find in a 15 year-old (that seems to be her age to me, but...) so she's using words/phrases not commonly found in today's youth, not somebody using terms from the modelling field (whatever those may be)

and the third link is definitely just Doubt getting her grin on, because of the "squee" and kid-like enthusiasm of Tsillah's HUG... nothing to do with anything else... remember, as far as we the readers know, Doubt has never seen Tsillah before this point either, or she wouldn't have introduced her the way she did, so she's just as amused by the hug as Monica is!... I mean if you were walking down the street with a friend and a third person introduces herself to you both and gives your friend a squee/hug like that... wouldn't YOU give a grin like that too?

[Julie]

It never ceases to amaze me how upset people get when something with bad sexual overtones comes up, yet let gore and death, graphic and otherwise, slide right on by. Reminds me of an event which occurred when I was at a friends house and they were watching some gore filled movie, with their young kids. As if it were all fine family entertainment. A scene came up in which there was some soft core sex and nudity and they jumped into action to stop the tape and get past that scene. They congratulated themselves on their quick thinking so their kids would not be exposed to that awful nudity, then went back to the gore, death and blood of the rest of the movie. I pointed out to them what a strange standard they had. They had no idea what I was talking about. It's the same here. All this complaining about maybe being raped by some ooze and some are so upset they might leave the strip. I still think it's a strange standard that this (which you can't even see as such) is so much worse than all the blood and guts and eating of people (be they human or otherwise, they are all still "people"). In fact there were a host of jokes and parodies about the eating and blood and guts. I don't know, maybe I'm the strange one.

That being said, I too think Paul will pull this off just as he has all the other disturbing scenes. I don't think he should have to feel bad about drawing it, nor does he need to be made to feel bad or "dirty" by his fans for it either. I'm not saying love it or leave it, but let's wait before jumping on his back and stop the knee-jerk reactions.

I'd be willing to bet that the people who react strongly to rape or other negative sexual scenarios being portrayed have some personal connection with those kinds of situations. Maybe they didn't experience anything directly, but they might know someone who did and suffered as a result. There may not be as many people who have close associations with gore-filled violence, so they don't have any emotional connection in place to create the "knee-jerk" reaction you've seen.

Another theory is that most of the violence we've seen has either led to death or been "fixable" (due to the supernatural nature of the characters on the receiving end). There's a kind of finality there that makes it easier to emotionally disconenct (at least for me)...the victims either didn't suffer after the attack (because they were already dead) or fully recovered without elongated recovery times (and when there's immediate bounce-back, it's a lot easier to become numb to the implications of the violence...kind of like anvils being dropped on Wyle E. Coyote repeatedly). On the other hand, sexual violence can be survived but frequently leads to months or years of emotional trauma...and it's a lot harder for people to disassociate from feelings of wrongness when they know that the victim will not be "better" immediately.

For what it's worth, I don't think Paul should feel like a bad person for trying to address such an issue in his comic, but the fact that he feels bad for drawing these pages makes me respect him more. It shows that he feels just like a lot of people do, but he has the courage to move past that in order to make a point in the strongest and best way possible.

[Mark N]

I'd be willing to bet that the people who react strongly to rape or other negative sexual scenarios being portrayed have some personal connection with those kinds of situations. Maybe they didn't experience anything directly, but they might know someone who did and suffered as a result. There may not be as many people who have close associations with gore-filled violence, so they don't have any emotional connection in place to create the "knee-jerk" reaction you've seen.

Another theory is that most of the violence we've seen has either led to death or been "fixable" (due to the supernatural nature of the characters on the receiving end). There's a kind of finality there that makes it easier to emotionally disconenct (at least for me)...the victims either didn't suffer after the attack (because they were already dead) or fully recovered without elongated recovery times (and when there's immediate bounce-back, it's a lot easier to become numb to the implications of the violence...kind of like anvils being dropped on Wyle E. Coyote repeatedly). On the other hand, sexual violence can be survived but frequently leads to months or years of emotional trauma...and it's a lot harder for people to disassociate from feelings of wrongness when they know that the victim will not be "better" immediately.

For what it's worth, I don't think Paul should feel like a bad person for trying to address such an issue in his comic, but the fact that he feels bad for drawing these pages makes me respect him more. It shows that he feels just like a lot of people do, but he has the courage to move past that in order to make a point in the strongest and best way possible.

Well said. I agree with you an all points and add this to them; Paul is a #1 advocate of woman's empowerment and as such has seen in that news and through friends this very subject popping up with horrifying regularity. Maybe it is just that more people are getting past the (unjust and just plain stupid) stigma and reporting the incidents more (I hope that is the case because the inverse is just plain disgusting). Either way, he has taken a truly tough subject and finding a way to give it a way to face the light of day. After all, the only way to stop an injustice is for the people to learn about it and treat it as it should be treated (in this case like a disease that needs to be eradicated) (Sorry for the soap box rant)

[illiad]

I think the point is that we see violence and murder on TV every day as part of the news and even some films... yet something basically harmless like the naked body is censored in the extreme...

you can recover from an injury, and get a lot better, but when your 'personal privacy' is interfered with, it is deep psychological damage and you may never really recover..

[Mark N]

A little off the current thread here but I just have to say that the visual treatment of Jet's demons is very telling of her mind. Unlike Monica, whose demons are different in both body and face, Jet's demons (except Tar who seems to be an elemental state (probably all of the raw emotion that she has been keeping down over the years)) have very different bodies but the same mask of a face. I presume this is to show that Jet has been wearing a mask in public for a very long time and the need to shed the mask and be herself is part of the crisis she is undergoing. But this is just my guess on limited information.

Also Guidance's body seems to be a structured frame like you see in an artists reference maquette (The part that just goes through the motions while modeling perhaps).

[Heather_Dee]

I think the point is that we see violence and murder on TV every day as part of the news and even some films... yet something basically harmless like the naked body is censored in the extreme...

you can recover from an injury, and get a lot better, but when your 'personal privacy' is interfered with, it is deep psychological damage and you may never really recover..

I recall growing up that there were still a lot of older men who would opine that rape was really only a form of trespassing and theft and only then if she was married, as then the rapist would be stealing something that wasn't being given away freely. I recall others, designated 'modern' who would argue that this was in error as rape would be enough to motivate them to "Tie the animal down and pull his eyeballs out with pliers."

That quote would be my father. It's also my point of view on the subject, except that I think that I'd likely favor a melon-baller over pliers.

Yea, maybe in a sane society violence would be viewed with more disgust than sexuality is. It probably should be, given that to so many the only reason to avoid such brutal violence seems to be even more brutal violence. That said, a society that would consider rape to be mere trespassing is so far removed from sane that it's probably only idle speculation.

[Yamara]

I recall others, designated 'modern' who would argue that this was in error as rape would be enough to motivate them to "Tie the animal down and pull his eyeballs out with pliers."

Ancient Jin concurs.

[DilyV]

I recall others, designated 'modern' who would argue that this was in error as rape would be enough to motivate them to "Tie the animal down and pull his eyeballs out with pliers."

Ancient Jin concurs.

I think I'd prefer a wine bottle cork puller.... nice circular thingie to set into the eye socket to stabilize things... screw the thingie in and pop the handles!!!

[bmonk]

I think the point is that we see violence and murder on TV every day as part of the news and even some films... yet something basically harmless like the naked body is censored in the extreme...

you can recover from an injury, and get a lot better, but when your 'personal privacy' is interfered with, it is deep psychological damage and you may never really recover..

I recall a saying about such censorship: "You can stick a knife into somebody--but don't you dare kiss them!"
Of course, current thinking is that rape is really a form of violence and abusive control--so there is no difference between assault and rape, but a big difference between rape and, say, adultery.

[Fairportfan]

I recall a saying about such censorship: "You can stick a knife into somebody--but don't you dare kiss them!"

"They think we're gonna grab it if it gets within our reach..."