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Early update for August 12, 2025 (Patreon)

Published:
2025-08-11 03:55:01
Imported:
2026-06

Content

the body betrays

Files

Comments

KaylaZX

joyce: ooh great idea. dorothy can you help me exercise some thigh muscles?

C

Damn, that was cold blooded.

Anna Phylaxis

yessssss, good, good, let the hate flow through you, yesssssss

GPanda

Sarah not holding back is best Sarah 😎

Heatth

No Sarah! Please let Joyce and Dorothy shower first! They *really* need it!

Logibear

Up until the last panel I thought she was showing physical pain from defending Joe

Andrea Andrew

Okay, I know this is a tense scene, but I just noticed Joyce and Dorothy took their pants off. So sexy and adorable. 🏳️‍🌈 Damn, Sarah. That was harsh but fair, and I feel your pain. Even an experienced walker/hiker can admit when pain strikes.

Dahlia Rose

Okay but logically I get that Sarah probably means she knows Joyce less because she never expected her to cheat on someone. But just reading it without thinking it kinda makes Sarah look bad.

Sajuuk-Khar

Oof size: Maximum overdrive

Jim Avery

Two years ago I worked out for the first time in over a decade and the next day I could not fully extend my arms.

MrShoggoth

That line was so cold blooded it died out at the end of the Permian

GundamBradley

This feels like a rare situation where Sarah is in her dorm room and the only one with pants on. Bit of a role reversal versus the earlier days. That aside, this isn't really uncalled for. It's not even what they're doing, though that isn't helping matters. It's that Joyce is trying to rationalize, Dorothy is downplaying things with how they'll totally get around to doing the thing they've got to do, etc, and it's just a bunch of excuses.

EnterTheHero

Nah, he even told her when she was working out that she was gonna hate him the next day

5099 5618 v2.0

So, uh... how was the Pants-Off Dance-Off, ladies? (And how did you manage that without falling off that twin loft bed? (No b.s.: I'm genuinely impressed, at that. Are the both of you contortionists?)

Heatth

Btw, really rich of Sarah to say that when she herself conspired with Joyce to do something similar to Jacob, lol. Like some other Paladins Sarah believed Joyce to be more 'pure' and moral than she actually demonstrated being.

Logibear

Which is kinda ironic because here shes also expressing admiration for him. Willis you magnificent bastard!

Harold

@Logan Mathieson: Well, probably that, too.

5099 5618 v2.0

@KaylaZX I suspect that is a mission she would choose to accept.

Harold

@Heatth: "OK, you two can go shower first... No! NO! Not TOGETHER!!!"

Prognostic Hannya

Sarah is taking this... way more harshly than I thought tbh. Like, yeah it's not great, but they weren't carrying on an affair or anything. They literally intend to leave the room and directly go break up with their SOs. If they'd been clandestinely meeting for weeks or something, then yeah her anger would be warranted

Grace Serenity

I have a personal trainer that I see on Mondays. I can very much relate to Sarah here! Leg day SUCKS

Railway Series Book Club

"i mean, i knew you'd do an infidelity to someone else if it was for my sake, but doing an infidelity to *your own boyfriend* for *your own sake*? it's like i don't even know you!"

Kelly (they-them)

And NOW Sarah's EVEN madder because her storm off got ruined by delayed onset muscle soreness! Sucks to be in both emotional and physical pain

Jay

Given her past being cheated on, her reaction is fair.

5099 5618 v2.0

(Somehow they did so without knocking the laptop to the floor, as well. Just masterful technique, really)

Smoochie

I can’t help but feel like Sarah had a similar feeling with her biological little sister before she realized something similar. Long term, I think Sarah will get over it and herself—in the short term she’s right now not sure how to process that no, Joyce isn’t this moral pillar you thought. This person you convinced yourself was morally better than you— —and you still tried to once move her like a chess piece to put Raidah’s relationship in check.

Lea

When was Sarah cheated on?

5099 5618 v2.0

@Queen of Sodor Perhaps, Your Majesty. That would put the "we just cuddled" comment in doubt, mind you.

Kelly (they-them)

"This whole thing stinks." "Of betrayal?" "No! Of tear gas! Go shower!!"

Mariah

it was implied that sarahs sister got with her boyfriend

Dan Rabin

That was then. This is now. People can change.

Dan Rabin

The latest fashion: pants that disintegrate after being worn for 18 hours. Just peel a new pair off the roll each morning, and you'll be ready for all your daytime and nighttime activities!

Ignolian Thorne

This stuff with Sarah feels... weird. Like, way too sudden. She's had multiple bad experiences with Joe, with his Do List, to the stuff with her sister, and also tried to use Joyce as a weapon to hurt Raidah by trying to use her to get Jacob to cheat on Raidah with her. And now after one Gym session with Joe, she's going full relationship paladin on Joyce and Dorothy? I can understand Sarah being conflicted over this, but to be this bitter and hostile over it feels... kind of out of character. If Joe was the catalyst for Sarah and Tony getting together, or if her old roommate she reported had been a cheater, then I could understand this better, but he didn't, she wasn't, and overall I question where this is going...

Bronxden

Honestly this a good moment to reflect because I’ve been seeing people say Sarah feelings aren’t justified but this is one of the best moments we seen with her being genuine but also admitting her errors with Jacob and saw how people can change. In this case it rough because the one person she believed to do no wrong just did one of the worst things you can do (at this moment) but the one that was wrong changed into something better.

Jesse

In the words of one Thomas Wiseau, “Everybody betray me! I fed up with this world!”

Heatth

It is a joke. Also, it would be really awkward for Dorothy and Joyce to follow Sarah now anyway. These 3 aren't showering at the same time, not today.

Logibear

Imagining Sarah finding a puppy in the hallway "Hai Doggy"

AE Gonzalez

Dorothy also down to her panties, guarantee that helped piss Sarah off.

Kelly (they-them)

I am (as always) super eager to tomorrow's comic. I'm having trouble parsing the expressions Joyce is making in this strip. She looks thoughtful and maybe a little surprised. She doesn't look guilty. She doesn't look sad or upset or even angry. Joyce is an incredibly expressive person and right now, all I can get out of her is that she's thinking. Meanwhile, Dorothy and Sarah both have faces full of emotion; guilt, rage, discomfort. It's a stark contrast to Joyce. I think Joyce personally is polyamorous, at least to some degree. I do *want* some sort of polycule situation to happen with her, Joe, and Doorthy, but I'm not saying that'll necessarily resolve well. Joyce romantically loves Dorothy AND Joe (I'll accept arguments that it's not quite love, but it's at least intense romantic affection). My best guess is that Joyce is considering how a triad would between her, Dorothy, and Joe. I really can't think of anything other possibilities, but I'm certain it's no variant of, "I'm a bad person doing a bad thing."

Leon

I like where this is going. The pedestal Joyce is put on vs her own self-perception along with the numerous identity issues that have flared up, I can see this going down an interesting path of inner turmoil and self discovery for Joyce.

Kelly (they-them)

I genuinely wondered if she was stepping on something in the penultimate panel. I was like, "What the heck is on the floor? Legos?? Why would there be lego???"

Logibear

I could be a mixture of all three?

Terra Bruder

I don't think Sarah is being fair about saying she doesn't know Joyce. This is not about Sarah. Although to be fair, it's a pretty typical cishet response: a queer person navigates difficult process of arriving at self-understanding, but friends and family say "how could you do this to me?" Sarah is absolutely in a position to be disappointed, but absolutely none of this is about her.

Dan Rabin

Compositionally, this strip has two parts. In the first part, Joyce and Dorothy remain silent in reaction to Sarah's speech, which now continues the mea culpa that ended the previous strip and pivots to her surprise at the night's events. This part of the strip is shot as a standard reverse-angle conversation, with lots of subtle expressions from all three of them. Panel 4 is visually within this part of the strip, but uses the dialog to pivot to Sarah's exit. The second visual part of the strip changes to a framing that shows Sarah's promised motion towards the door by having her walk across our view of Dorothy and Joyce and on out of the frame, accompanied by motion lines. Dorothy breaks her silence to show concern for Sarah, whose evident pain could conceivably be psychological as far as Dorothy knows. Sarah's explanation calls back to the gym session that formed a key part of her reevaluation of Joe, and it's also a punchy line that lightens the mood and ends her focus on Dorothy and Joyce's actions. [In my comments I often generalize the notion of "punch line" from its origin in comedy to mean any dialog or action that is somehow distinct from the body of the strip and forms a terminus. I think use of generalized punch lines within the strip-a-day format is analogous to conventions in poetry about line meters and grouping of lines into stanzas.]

Kelly (they-them)

This is splitting hairs (and I love splitting hairs - I am deeply pedantic person) they conspired to do something to Raidah *with* Jacob. In that situation, Raidah was the Joe and Jacob was the Dorothy. Or maybe Joyce was the Dorothy But yes, yes. I agree with you

James Miller

I think she is talking about how she thought Joyce would be more upfront about things and not seeming to go behind Joe’s back to be with Dorothy. She is realizing she didn’t understand this side of Joyce which she is used to her usually considering things a bit more.

Maude Reads Things

Oooof, yeah, that's a rough talk. And also, yeah, exercising something you aren't used to exercising = ow the next day

Joeblow

....Did she need to cheat on her boyfriend to arrive at Self-Understanding? I think that Sarah has every right to be disappointed in someone who she had come to view as being moral.

el

Notice how she didn't say anything about Walky

James Miller

Mainly because she was much more disappointed in Joyce and was focused on her. I think she would have mentioned Walky if she was focused on Dorothy as well with this speech.

Logibear

Yeah, it doesn't really feel like she's talking to Dorothy at all here following her response to Joyce in the last strip.

Packy Anderson

Yeah, Sarah's response has everything to do with Joyce cheating on Joe and nothing to do with Joyce's queer awakening. Remember, yesterday she posited that neither one had broken things off with their significant others before jumping into this. I think Sarah's being exceedingly fair.

Packy Anderson

I dunno. Joyce in panel three looks to me like she's thinking "Uh-oh..."

Vivian

Sarah also probably is blaming herself a little here because she pushed Joyce at Jacob, intentionally disrespecting his existing relationship and while claiming to be Jacob's girlfriend to his brother was certainly a 100% Joyce original move, ultimately Sarah created a situation that normalized disrespecting relationship boundaries for Joyce

Tessea

Holy crap! With all the hoopla at the protest I'd completely forgotten about Joe and Sarah at the gym!

Tessea

Joe did warn her!

Tessea

Sarah is so used to being disappointed in everyone that she just anticipates it happening now. Joyce was pretty much the first person to really break that streak, and here she is reaffirming Sarah's general disdain in human behavior. I really hope she doesn't revert.

Maybeeus

I feel like we're beginning to touch upon a lot of late pre-timeskip Joyce stuff again here. I think back to... I had a whole thing planned out here but it turned out to be the wrong book so i kinda fell on my ass here. But it's the scene where Sal and Joyce are talking and she shares some of her anxieties specifically about always being seeing as "The Annoying Christian Girl" and how no matter how hard she tries it's hard to break that history. A bit later (i think???) she has a conversation with Jocelyne where she confides about wanting to be someone people can trust which also feels very apt to bring up with current happenings. Joyce has very much been going through change after change since but those moments are among the most important relating to Joyce to me. A lot of people still put Joyce on a pedestal and are bewildered when she does stunts like this because it turns out she's not a very morally sound person. (who woulda thought the ex christian fundamentalist bigot could at times be... Morally questionable???) Joe specifically probably puts her on the highest pedestal and views her as this perfect divine thing and is afraid of breaking that and has fallen so deeply in love with her that he's been completely blindsided by what should be the most obvious sword of damocles of all time. A lot of Joyce's post-timeskip arc has been centered around her newfound athiesm and how her own views on morality have shifted because of it. It's what her and Becky's blowup was about, the issue was she basically used being an Athiest as a free reign excuse to be an asshole. I got way too distracted and this post has become a mess so i'm skipping to the last point i wanted to make but don't know how to make my way to which is that... Endgame ships as a concept kinda fucking suck! Even the idea of "endgame" kinda sucks. The idea you have to save everything for the "endpoint" and that entering a relationship marks the point where everything neatly wraps up like that's the end of your life, this too also sucks. Joe by all means is Joyce's original endgame and she's finally "got it" the perfect god given husband who fulfills all of her needs but after getting it she finds it's boring. She doesn't want that anymore she wants a partner in crime to do stupid New shit with.

Smoochie

Is it wrong to say that there’s hardly anyone in this world who would be surprised when Dorothy/Walky comes to an end?

Dan Rabin

I don't think Joe is unaware of the current possibility, but he may possibility be downplaying the probability. He knows that Dorothy helped Joyce "do laundry"; he knows that "doing laundry" means masturbating; he knows that Dorothy is into Joyce; and he knows, as does every one of their friends, that Dorothy and Joyce are very special friends. Joe is not stupid, and his love for Joyce has him wanting to learn everything about her so he can make her comfortable—and not just with him: the weighted blanket is for her comfort in general.

James Miller

Honestly there is a part of me that wonders if despite the clear sexual tension and longing between Joyce and Dorothy, on Dorothy's end what if this is in part her trying to escape from her clear mental and emotional break down due to losing all direction in her life. She is kinda gone full Billie-style impulsive lately and not considering how this impact her friendships with Sarah, Joe, Walky, Dina, Becky, and Danny. Like I feel like a lot of this is going to explode in their faces in a way beyond even Sarah's understandable freak out and could wreck a lot of friendships. Dorothy hasn't been in a healthy mind space in months and I just hope she doesn't end up hurting herself and Joyce if this is part of her still stuck in a mental spiral. Since really I want things to work out for them both and for them to happy after resolving things with their boyfriends.

Terra Bruder

As I've said more than once, _this is not fuccboi behavior_. It's not fundamentally selfish, so much as it's inaction out of fear. Joyce and Dorothy both have a responsibility to their previous partners, but it's not hedonism or thrill seeking. It's not a long term pattern of deceit. That matters. There are plenty of ways Sarah could have found nuance between "you're a bad friend to me" and "you get a free pass." There has never been a time when Joyce has needed her support more. But she chose to judge instead of interrogating with compassion. And to be clear, I say this as a person who has been cheated on multiple times for all the wrong reasons. There is simply no way to neatly untangle this. When you breach the surface after too long underwater, you breathe, and then tend to your wetsuit. Do you honestly think that, of all people, Joyce and Dorothy don't know what's at stake? Do you honestly think they won't try to make it right? This is 100% Sarah making something about herself that shouldn't be.

5099 5618 v2.0

@Smoochie No, that seems accurate. Also, probably for the best. She hasn't been all that great to him, lately.

MiqoRems

That... is possibly the most brutal thing we've ever seen Sarah say.

MiqoRems

Going to your partner with the intention of breaking up, NOT breaking up with them and instead bringing a new level of physical intimacy to the relationship than was already there, then leaving while still not breaking up with them to go spend the night making out with someone else goes WAY past the point of 'inaction out of fear'. And the 'typical cishet response' line is particularly foul to try and downplay what happened. The failed attempts to break up are inaction out of fear. They *actively chose* to get together AGAIN after that happened, and that's absolutely fundamentally selfish.

MiqoRems

Sort of like how they literally intended to go break up with their SOs before spending the night together

Gale Tazzin

YEAH HONESTLY! Dorothy has been in a self-destructive tailspin for awhile now, it's entirely possible that this is a subconscious extension of that

NinjaZaku

That has to be a hell of a thing to hear for Joyce, and it probably hurts Sarah just as much to say it. It took a lot of time and effort (and trauma) for Sarah to be vulnerable around Joyce, and Joyce knows that. Now Joyce is smacked in the face with the prospect that Sarah feels she can't be vulnerable around Joyce - or hell, maybe even feels she can't trust Joyce at all anymore - as a direct consequence of the decisions Joyce is making right now. That has to *hurt*, for both of them.

Astariel

@Terra Bruder Very well said, and completely true.

Astariel

Adulterers? Did Joe & Joyce get married off panel somewhere?

Astariel

People can change. But other people can still call them out for being hypocritical.

Seth Aaron Hershman has they/she pronouns

so like. march 27 and 28 2024 has joyce express to sarah that maybe sarah needs to take the next step from passively having friends to being actively emotionally available. from june 1 to 3 2024 sarah makes a conscious decision to trust joyce about joe. and then on june 15 to 18 2024 sarah finally opens up to jacob about her feelings about him for the first time. obviously from there, lucy and jacob get together, sarah puts on a show of being happy and chipper, and then gets to be herself with tony. so like. i think from sarah's perspective a huge part of this is that be it joyce or jacob, the people who most want sarah to open up just...don't reward that behavior from her. sarah did all this work to come around on joe just for joyce to dump him! s gotta be exhausting

Harold

@Ren Doiron: I fully expect my comment here to not make sense very soon because yours will likely be deleted, but WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?!?!?

Rob McBobson

Fun fact: In one of the languages I speak, "contortionist" literally translates to "snake human". :)

Uniquitous

It's worse than hate. It's disappointment.

zee

Yes...YESSS!

zee

I'm sicko moding so hard rn

zee

...it's only been like a day and I am already so sick of people trying to inject queerphobia into Sarah's negative reaction to Joyce cheating

zee

I also have no clue why you'd expect an emotionally raw and deeply traumatized 20 year old in the moment of finding out one friend did something incredibly hurtful to another friend, to come at it like "hm yes I see I'm disappointed in your actions but also this is clearly a big time for you and here let's talk it out blah blah blah" Like I'm sorry, does "they're dumb college students I'd expect no better" only apply to DoJo?

Harold

Willis has been quite explicit, in the creative-process commentaries posted here and on Tumblr, that he has been planning for a long time for Joyce and Dorothy to eventually be together. He said he didn't necessarily plan for it to happen this soon, and definitely not in this way (acknowledging in so many words that *how* it happened "blew up" the entire comic), but - as Seth Aaron Hershman's satiric callback above to Dorothy's own recent words indicates - this looks to be a very real thing for both of them. They (and we as readers and commenters) are in for a very rough ride, but this is a long-haul (U-haul?) situation.

Harold

What are the odds that they'll start making out again the minute Sarah's out the door? I mean, she's certainly given them food for thought, but counterpoint THE BACK OF DOROTHY'S NECK

Mariah

some of the paladins are really not beating the misogyny allegations

DannyBoy

I think Sarah's disdain is mostly about how much they are clearly trying to hide what is happening. The line from yesterday (i think) about how clearly they know what they're doing is wrong because of how much they're hiding it comes to mind.

James Miller

True but even if they are end game this is going to be an extremely bumpy ride. It gives me a Ruthe/Billie flashback to a degree but not nearly as toxic. Still extremely likely to impact everyone around them and create a ton of learning experiences.

Harold

@Mariah: Now, now, let's not jump to conclusions. I'm sure they're calling Joyce a 2-ton hoo-ah from a place of love.

zee

I interpret it as a "...I might have fucked up" face. And just, stunned. Sarah's never talked like this to her before

Thunderking8

I very much agree, but i want to add that yea this is part of Dorothy's self-destruction, it would be wise not to forget that Joyce's volatile reconstruction is also playing a part in this, she's aggressively trying to find herself all at once after having her entire world view and view of herself shattered in the most, leaving her incredibly impulsive on top of the impulsiveness that was already there. With all of this for both of them, combined with the intense infatuation both of them have had with with idea of the other for a while now culminating in this, with neither really willing to confront the cold truth of what is REALLY going on between them nor the consensuses of the initial event AND especially of their continued action and inaction on the situation, only really feeling it once sarah, someone both of them have trusted and (at least for joyce) have seen as a dependable and close member of their found family, calls them out on it and shows that this has and will affect more than just themselves and their respective boyfriends and becky, it will and has changed how people see them, will see them and the amount of trust any of their friends are will to give them

Gale Tazzin

both can be true! it can be the appropriate culmination of an arc AND also dorothy blowing everything up

tifani

Sarah is doing exactly what I thought she would and I am extremely glad she reacted this way because I think it’s going to force Dorothy and Joyce to actually do the right thing and TELL Joe and Walky. Without this I think they would have dragged the situation out much longer and made it even worse. The fact that in the previous comic they presented it as something Sarah would be happy about tells me that they are completely unprepared for how this is going to alter the fabric of their social lives. Before this the reaction they were most worried about was Becky’s. And make no mistake this is going to have severe consequences that ripple through their entire friend group and while I’m rooting for polyamory as an endgame I think A LOT is going to happen before that.

zee

And she's supposed to know that...how? All she knows is they made out yesterday and spent all night and morning canoodling and flirting and kissing in the bunk across from her, she could probably see them. And then they tried to lie to her face like nothing happened. That's the information she's got and she's reacting pretty reasonably imo

zee

@Ren Dorian Oh shut the fuck up bro nobody wants to hear that from you. Fucks sake you can condemn someone's actions without being a fucking asshole and a misogynist

zee

It's called character growth friend, look it up. And besides didn't she try to call off the whole thing because she realized it was wrong all the way back then? But Joyce carried it on anyway?

tifani

I think Sarah successfully burst the love bubble. Reality has killed the mood.

Sajuuk-Khar

I think actually in that last part you touch on both a limitation of narrative vs. real life (the “ending” is ultimately just death) that authors have always struggled with, AND a character flaw of Joyce’s that I mentioned yesterday that I find both entertaining and infuriating—as much as she is reinventing herself, she also gets into these states where she is “in the endgame” of life, all the time Like, that was her attitude as a fundie—she had it all figured out because JESUS and THE BLOOD! And then that was her attitude as an atheist—actually, not believing in God has made me enlightened now, I am a skeptical sage! And now, she’s discovered she’s bisexual, and her Dorothy feelings have been unlocked, and so of course she’s an amazing beautiful queer blossom whose new love should be celebrated, by everyone! Sarah why are you mad??!?? Sarah nooooooo

Sajuuk-Khar

Joyce: Sarah check this out—I’m just a girl in loooooove! I can’t be held responsible for my aaaaactions! 🥰 Please celebrate my beautiful lovely new love! Sarah: FUCK you! FUCK your new love! You are an ASSHOLE! I hope Doris DIES! In the next arc! In a FIRE! I’m fuckin’ DONE with you! Audience: Clearly one of these people is the North Star of ethical behavior, if we could only figure out which one

Sajuuk-Khar

I think their feelings are very real and valid, they are in love I also think that Dorothy is in a bad mental state and Joyce is not the paragon of mental health and they are making rash, shitty decisions It is: Two Things

James Miller

@Sajuuk-Khar yeah I do think their feelings are real but I don’t think either of them is in a great headspace mentally so I am just prepping popcorn for the immense drama to come.

Sajuuk-Khar

God and after the freshman year shit for her Everyone was worried about Joe “reverting” but like if this is the prize I got as Sarah for Faith In People I think I might go Saul Goodman for a year (Of course, as Sarah, I did do the Raidah Elimination Chess Moves Scenario, I am not blameless, it’s cognitive dissonance baybeeeee)

Mariah

I have no underlying issues to address.

Mariah

Appreciate the crazy ex girfried refrence feels like people don't talk about that show anymore.

Sajuuk-Khar

She’s certifiably cute and adorably obsessed!

Sajuuk-Khar

THEY SHOULD! It’s really good! The musical numbers!!!

tifani

I think Joe’s going to be hurt but Walky’s going to be PISSED. Not just about being cheated on but with how Dorothy has treated him for months now. They get together. They go on pause. She breaks up with him after he thinks they’re back together. He gets with Lucy at her suggestion. She tries to hook up with him while he’s with Lucy. They get back together post break up with Lucy and then THREE DAYS LATER she cheats on him and then dumps him? And the way she plans to do it (break up speech) is just so condescending on top of it all. She has never taken him seriously has she? (Is what I think he would think )

Rob McBobson

SUCH a good show. I'm still mad at myself for not having watched more than a season and a half (yet).

zee

I see you are a fellow cultured individual. Respect bro, respect

Anna Phylaxis

I do find myself repeatedly wondering how many of the angry commentators are queer, or have any experience with queer self discovery or queer relationships. The vibe I have gotten is that the paladins are largely hets, folks who don't have any life experiences to help them understand what it's like to only discover your sexuality and your selfhood later in life, and how messy and difficult that process can be.

Heatth

I feel most of you guys are all misunderstanding what I was saying. I wasn't talking about Sarah's hypocrisy. I was pointing out that this sort of thing shouldn't be *that* much of a surprise from Joyce. Like, yeah the context is different, it is not exactly the same. But it is still close enough, I feel Sarah doesn't get to say "this is not you".

Anna Phylaxis

Like, bluntly, sometimes you spend your entire life up to that point thinking that you must be a heterosexual, because everyone tells you that's what you're supposed to be, and there are no other possibilities. And you spend your life in a haze of unsatisfying relationships that cannot possibly give you what you need to thrive. And I think we see some of this with Joyce's fear and reluctance around penises in general, and Joe's in specific. (Her repeated nightmares, her sudden withdrawal from full sexual intercourse with Joe) And then you suddenly have this awakening, and you make a connection on a level that you had never known existed or was possible before, and, genuinely, everything in your life changes in that moment. And I see that in how Joyce is acting, the way she's behaving and emoting. And it feels to me, I guess, like a lot of the readers have no touchstone for this, no way to connect to it, so for them, it's as if Joyce suddenly became an alien. They have no context for her behavior, because nothing in their life has given them context for this experience.

Kelly (they-them)

Fortunately Dorothy is behind Joyce so the back of her neck is outta sniffin range

Harold

"Ha, ha! What a story, Joyce!"

Sajuuk-Khar

People are very strange these days, Sarah

Mariah

Than again queer people are not immune to this puritanical mindet especially the younger generation respectibility politics have come back in a big way I have seen some people who think joyce and dorothy are "bad representation" or that they are fitting into the cheating bisexual steryotype. So no I don't think paladins are all straight or even rightleaning they sure are acting culturally christian though.

Sajuuk-Khar

Some of the loudest paladins are very openly queer and poly, both here and/or on the main site!!

Sajuuk-Khar

Sarah is not under an obligation to be fair any more than Joyce and Dorothy have an obligation to perform perfect relationship divestment This isn’t queerphobia, this is called getting mad at your friend for being a jerkoff

GPanda

I suspect I’m somewhere on the ace spectrum and this whole storyline just leaves a bad taste in my mouth because of multiple contributing factors

Sajuuk-Khar

Also like Comphet is real and incredibly damaging and I don’t want to downplay it but Joyce has specific trauma from being sexually assaulted by a dude. That’s. That’s why she pulled away from intercourse with Joe. That’s why she has nightmares. She was sexually assaulted. It has nothing to do with her relationship with Joe being unsatisfying??? Or not giving her what she needs to thrive???? Yes, she was told she had to be heterosexual because Evangelicals are the fucking worst, but she’s horny for Joe/needs control because she was a victim of violence and has trauma, not because Joe is Jakey and can’t possibly satisfy her!

Sajuuk-Khar

Like…one of her reasons for being so attracted to Dorothy and wanting to move so fast on this, expressed *very textually*, is “this would be so much easier with you”. *Because Dorothy isn’t threatening, because a woman has never SA’d her. * I understand that comphet happens and hurts, Leslie is living proof, but that’s just, not what’s going on here

Smoochie

I am het, but I had a similar situation happen with Dorothy & Joyce and their respective boyfriends. So I do empathize for them both of discovering that ‘oh hey, this person I’m really close to makes me feel feelings I didn’t realize—and I have to put new context the sometimes rocky friendship I have with their boyfriend. Oh crap. She feels the same things I do. Oh crap, this isn’t the best way we could have handled it. And it tumbles down from there with some fun trauma that I held onto for years later… I empathize for all they’re going through, it just doesn’t invalidate that they have consequences and drama fallout. Because that’s life.

Amós Batista

Dorothy:... but you will still vote in me, right?

zee

I'm pretty damn queer. The nature of my sexuality is an enigma that cannot be grapsed by mere man, least of all myself. Most of that is a shifting grey flavor of asexuality so ig that gives me a different perspective. I also live in a country so homophobic and misogynistic that gay sex is illegal, but only for men. Anyway I've been getting really annoyed at people trying to call negative reactions to the cheating bad or "unfair" bc of the queer aspect. I'm giving people the grace of not interpreting their words as "it's gay so it's okay", but pushing queerphobia on people and characters who are just reacting to something that is objectively hurtful, is really fucking shitty and it's made the comments a god damn pain. Maybe it's the asexuality making it so that my horniness/attraction is unlikely to supercede my principles or sense of empathy, I'm resistant to the heat of the moment. So it's hard to fully empathize. Like I don't ID as a pali, i dont think dojo are morally stained or whatever. But like. Cheating bad. There's deeper conversations to be had about it sure but, that's the baseline. This is a shitty thing they did. There's beauty in it, but it's still shitty

zee

Also idk I'll die on the hill of Sarah being correct, reasonable in her reaction all things considered and over all having done nothing wrong here

Mariah

To be fair I have seen quite a few homophobic and misogynistic comments both on the mainsite and on the patreon I mean someone literally called joyce a whore earlier today. I agree its wrong to paint all paladins as homophobic but the general far right anti lgbt push especially in the west has made people way more wary of homophobia even in progressive spaces.

Astariel

Makes sense to me.

Astariel

We can only hope they will.

Sajuuk-Khar

Dorothy: “Sarah, please, Electoral College votes. I need them to live.”

Astariel

Nah, I just reread a strip from three years ago where Sarah gave a very similar speech to Joyce after she dared to be vocally atheist. Sarah really doesn't like it when Joyce steps outside her box.

Anna Phylaxis

Yeah, Mariah, that's the kind of energy I'm responding to. Surely not all the "paladins" are het or cis, but I'd been picking up a lot of specifically very judgy comphet fundie vibes from some of them, the ones who are the loudest and most eager for Joyce (weirdly, not Dorothy, just Joyce) to be "punished."

Sam G

Eh on the contrary, most of the people I've chatted to who are critical of J&D's choices are gay and trans. I'm bi and trans myself. I've been reading the site comments a bit and I haven't really seen much to identify people either way either. I was also pretty heavily involved in queer clubs at uni, and I know tons of queer people who've come out later in life. The vast, vast, vast majority were able to avoid cheating on their partners. I'm not trying to argue with how you feel about the story. Just suggest caution about making assumptions about internet strangers. You can just disagree with people. No need to spin a yarn about why they're wrong haha. What Joyce & Dorothy ARE doing is selfish, that's what makes this storyline interesting. When you've spent a lot of time around queer folks, you learn that sometimes those queer folks can be shitheads! They can hurt the people around them and not have a real justification for it. Just a fact of life.

Grace Serenity

From what I've seen, it seems mostly like people are wanting an instant resolution to a daily comic that stretches a single day into weeks of strips. People have been up in arms since before Joyce's date with Joe, and in universe that was only about 30 hours ago! Joyce and Dorothy are doing the whole breakup poorly, but it's not like they've been having clandestine hookups for months, it's been a day and change. I'm assuming they haven't gone all the way, yet, and were just snuggling and maybe making out last night. Yes, that's not great, but this isn't like church where sin is a binary. There is nuance, and there are levels of cheating that are worse than others.

Harold

...aaannnddd that particular comment is gone

Daniel S

Oof. When you lay it all out like that... poor Walky, despite it all.