Remember I said changes?

I lied!  Well, no, but work has been a pain.  Next week.  Sorry.

Triggered!

So a couple weeks ago, in between trips out to the middle of nowhere, Dumbing of Age updated with a very special comic.

Trigger warnings have only come up in one other comic, Sister Claire, and usually it's pretty mundane stuff, typically blood.  And not much blood mind you, nose bleed levels.  I've considered talking about it, but when there's only one example, it would probably just come off as rather ranty, not that this one won't mind you, but still.

The thing is, Dumbing of Age doesn't usually do things like this, and in fact it's the first time a warning like this was outright posted.  So why?

After all, this is a comic that has featured as a storyline, attempted date rape, severe beatings, stabbings, and a man carrying a gun around a college campus.  And these are just the ones I can think of off hand.  A single panel that implies attempted (and a later strip just about confirms that it was successful) suicide isn't that much stronger of an issue really.

And yet, here's the trigger warning, that almost seems, um, reluctant.  Like he didn't really want to post a warning, but did because of other factors.  My thought is that he got a lot of complaints from the gun toting dad storyline, that the readers weren't warned that he might actually fire off a gun or something, and decided that rather than have them complain, again, he'd slap the warning on.  I could be wrong on that, but it seems to fit the fact that he basically tells those who don't want or need trigger warnings to just skip to the comic and actually read it.

It appears that this did start up some sort of conflict down in the comments as they were disabled at some point (I don't have the time or energy to read through to find out why), so he's got a good read on his various readers, so that's good, I suppose.  And his own commentary on the comic featured something about the National Suicide Hotline, so positive stuff there.

That said, I really don't think trigger warnings are necessary, and that those who claim to "need" them are mostly people who want attention in some way.  People who actually suffer from various disorders that can be grouped under Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder typically won't get "triggered" from the sight of blood, or implied suicide.  They'll be set off by a sound, a smell, or, like Becky, simply looking into a room.  Of course, I'm not a therapist, and I don't do much actual research, but that seems far more likely than something as silly as a drawing implying there might be a suicide, maybe (she might have just dropped the pill bottle, it happens).

I get why he put it up, though.  His comics are very popular, and tap into a wide variety of readers, including those convinced that even saying the word "rape" will set them off.  Cover the bases so the money comes in, David, like everyone else, likes to eat.  Me, I don't find any reason for it, and while this might have a better reason than the random nose bleeds in Sister Claire, I find them unnecessary, and possibly a little dangerous.

It's almost a form of self censorship, being careful not to "offend" someone when, honestly, this comic is about hitting that offend button, constantly, and frequently.  While I suppose more of these will show up in Dumbing of Age, I hope they are few and far between, just to keep the story rolling.

And for those who believe they are easily "triggered," go see a therapist, a real one, not some guy on Tumbler or with a Youtube account.  Odds are good, you probably don't really need these warnings.

Next time, um, I think I may have to make some changes around here.  I'll talk about it then.  Later kiddies.

Come on already

Even had some time off but I couldn't get the article I wanted to gel.  It happens enough, but not when I want to get something posted. Gah!

I have been to the middle of nowhere

And it's full of oil fields.  And no internet.  So no post.  I hate that.  I will have something next week, I hope.

Work, again

Didn't even have time to do all that rearranging I talked about last week.  God I'm tired.

Straightening Things Out

Hey look, an update.  That's mostly about maintenance.  Yeah, I'm trying to get back into comics but between the move and going back to work, I just haven't had the time.  Working on it kiddies, I swear.

In the meantime, it's site maintenance time!  Most of this is shuffling comics around the list and figuring out which ones are still alive and kicking, as it were.

So let's start with the Daily strips.

Legends of Whoelterra, which I'm surprised I'm still reading, has slacked from daily down to twice a week.  That means T-Th-S is a better fit for it so off it goes.

The Fifth Circle hasn't updated in quite a while, and I think it's time to accept it won't for a while longer.  Hiatus.

The M-W-F strips

Cerintha is actually on a Weekly schedule any more, though which day of the week seems to float around for some reason even the artist is unsure of.

The Whiteboard recently went Daily (as in 5 days a week) so it gets to go over there.

Eerie Cuties is updating, though what the schedule is I'm unsure.  I'm going to leave it where it is for now.

The T-Th-S strips

Skullkickers is, of course, Complete, so that's where it needs to go, mostly so I stop checking it.  Also apparently I was linking to the Keenspot site, and when it finished, Keen dropped it.  Annoying, this link works though.

Since their return, Licensed Heroes is mostly Weekly, so it heads there.

The Weekly strips

God damn it Elsie Hooper, just finish already.  To Hiatus with you until you do so.

Kiwis By Beat is still MIA, and no one knows what happened.  For no Hiatus, but I'm not confident it'll be back any time soon.

Out There recently announced that the comic will be wrapping up, but on an undetermined schedule.  Good news is he plans to finish In Here, before dropping off the face of the comic map.  Sad times.  Out There will be in Monthly until it's done.

Sister Claire has been updating more regularly than Weekly for a while (and it's easier since they broke off Missing Moments), so I'm moving it to T-Th-S.

The Monthly strips

Aptitude Test is Dead.  I'll be doing a Retrospective on it in the near future.

City of Reality's hosting is down, but at least I can track what's going on with it via other means.  It's moving to Hiatus.

I still don't know what happened with Kawaii Not.  I think it's actually Dead.

The Fancy Adventures of Jack Cannon is moving to Haitus since it probably should have been there for a while now.  Very sporadic updates and a message about burnout.

White Noise should have moved to Weekly a while ago.  No time like the present.

Hiatus Comics

The Wotch is updating regularly again.  Like I said in the last Touching Base, I do intend to do some catch up, and the best way to do so is to move it to Weekly for the time being.  We'll see how it goes.

And that's all the work I needed to do.  Next time, something, maybe, we'll see.  Until then kiddies.

The Successor: The Ether

Despite Gunnerkrigg Court taking place in our world, it makes pains to add a layer that is at once mysterious and frightening:  The Ether, the place that is above and beyond everything.

For all it's talk about gods and mythology, the Siddell seems to take pains not to alienate anyone from enjoyment.  There is no Christain God, for example, and the only deities that show up are, well, not really all that powerful, comparatively.  Their power stems from the Ether, and it is something that can only be kind of understood.

The Court does have a school for it, the etheric sciences, where there is an attempt to quantify and study it much as physics and chemistry do to there respective fields.  It's effective enough that Donald and Anja use it rather extensively, and almost easily in some cases.

Even then, though, the Ether remains almost unexplained.  Almost because there are entities that have some information, the Psychopomps.  They are the escorts of the dead, and it's through them we get some hint as to what the Ether really is and what it's for.  In their words, the keeps the world spinning, though I doubt it means that literally.

In any case, it binds everything together.  Every living being must, at some point, die and all of them have a Psychopomps that guide them to the Ether itself, even insects.  It is everywhere and just under what is visible.  It powers magic, IS magic, but it can also be farmed and produced.  Through it many of the characters can interact with the world in a new way, or view it in a different way, and be view through it as what they really are.

It's where the dead go, but it's also used by the dead.  The Realm of the Dead uses it to create the "creepshow" that is the source of ghosts, spooks and scary stories in the world.  At the same time, it seems the world uses it to give life to the myths of the world, including the seemingly powerful Coyote.

In a sense, the Ether unites the living and the dead, the magical and the scientific, and the image with the self.  It's not a Heaven or Hell, a God or anything like that, it simply is, and thus a kind of power source and where everything comes together, in the end.

The Ether and The World form a pair of opposites, but neither is opposed to the other, more like they flow into and through each other.  Complementary without being contradictory, and open enough to allow both to exist without problems.  Which is not to say everything in Gunnerkrigg Court does so.

Next time, The Forest.  Until then kiddies.