5/16/05

[SolidusRaccoon]

Cool stuff Ralph, bout time she got the point.

[Madmoonie]

AWWWW!!!! (sniff)

[The JAM]

[...unWARP!!!]

Good evening.


Difficult.

VERY difficult.


Tuck honestly doesn't know how hard it is to plow through n years of low self esteem for her to say that, but at least she finally said it AND meant it.

Now, let's hope she can retain enough sense to NOT swing from self-depreciation to the other extreme of vanity.


This is the most intense strip yet, Ralph! Keep them coming!

[Squirrelly61104]

Awkward interruption sense... tingling
I suspect both of our young paramours will be grateful for an interruption though.
Once they get past the intensity of the moment, they are going to realize that pretty Thelma is wearing pretty little, and I doubt either of them is ready to go too far just yet.

[The JAM]

[...unWARP!!!]

Good evening.


That, or we'll cut again to Hortense and Nip.


This reminds me of a story a minister told us a few years ago. He was counceling a woman who had a problem about 1,000 times worse than Thelma's. I don't what horrors she must have gone through childhood and adolescence, or who took care of her at the moment, but she refused to go out of her house, and all she could say "I'm so ugly! I'm so ugly!" It took the councelor ONE YEAR of counceling BY PHONE to finally get her to accept to meet him in person. He was actually expecting someone with a birth defect or something, but when he saw her, she looked like a normally beautiful woman. Still, it took another year to get her to admit it, oi...

So Thelma got off quite easily, and she's learing that she's only as pretty as she thinks.

There was an article in Reader's Digest a few years back. An anthropologist was doing some research on a Pacific island, where the natives still buy their wives from their fathers. The married women get together and basically brag about how many cows their husbands paid for them, the upper limit being 4 cows, I think (basically, in that culture, 1 cow could very much equal to 1 car to us Westerners). Then he heard of a woman, whom the married ladies took pity upon, as apparently she wasn't much to look at. "It would be VERY kind to call her 'plain'," they said. Then they went on wondering just WHY a man decided to buy her for a wife, with her being so ugly. They expected the man to pay something much less than a cow, say, a chicken or two, but he was shocked to hear that the husband paid TEN COWS for his wife (well, I don't recall if it was 10 or 18, it was around there). So they thought that either the man had poor eyesight or he was just crazy. He went to the hut where the man and his wife lived, and when he saw her, he more or less described her as actually SHINING, or something.

Self-esteem can do wonders.

[StrangeWulf13]

Bah. Enough of this "self-esteem" dreck. Call what it really is: confidence.

Confidence to see the truth and not let others get to you. Confidence to see your true self no matter how much people try to tear you down.

Confidence to turn yourself from something just a shade this side of ugly into a head-turner.

I don't mean to come down on ya, JAM, but I've had enough of the "self-esteem" idealogy we get here in the United States. Feeling good about yourself doesn't do a lick of good if you don't have the confidence to go out and do something!

Imagine if the next generation of children around the world was filled with an indominatable sense of confidence.

Things would never be the same again. And we'd be glad for it.

[Albert the Absentminded]

You have just described a short film called "Johnny Lingo", produced at BYU 1969. I got it for Christmas a few years back as one of several short films in a collection entitled "The Worth of Souls".

I understand it's been made into a somewhat longer movie.

-Albert

PS. The theme is extraordinarily politically incorrect. Yet another bonus, eh?

[Albert the Absentminded]

Bah. Enough of this "self-esteem" dreck. Call what it really is: confidence.

Confidence to see the truth and not let others get to you. Confidence to see your true self no matter how much people try to tear you down.

Confidence to turn yourself from something just a shade this side of ugly into a head-turner.

I don't mean to come down on ya, JAM, but I've had enough of the "self-esteem" idealogy we get here in the United States. Feeling good about yourself doesn't do a lick of good if you don't have the confidence to go out and do something!

Imagine if the next generation of children around the world was filled with an indominatable sense of confidence.

Things would never be the same again. And we'd be glad for it.

That confidence would shatter on cold reality. Now, if the next generation was filled with _competence_, that might do something.

In any event, Mahana was undoubtably prepared for the role she was expected to play. A large part of the issue derives from the ugly truth(which is no less truthful for being ugly) that unattractive women generally have very little sway over their vastly stronger husbands or even-more-vastly stronger fathers.

-Albert

[Sharuuk]

I just like panel #6! That is the coolest shot of Tuck with the most sincere, warm and compassionate look for Thelma on his face I've ever seen. And Thelly's tears of acknowledgement as to her true beauty are an excellent touch.

GREAT JOB RH!!!!


Shaaruuk

[SolidusRaccoon]

I don't mean to come down on ya, JAM, but I've had enough of the "self-esteem" idealogy we get here in the United States. Feeling good about yourself doesn't do a lick of good if you don't have the confidence to go out and do something!

Imagine if the next generation of children around the world was filled with an indominatable sense of confidence.

Things would never be the same again. And we'd be glad for it.

Indeed, confidenence is a strong tool to have. Along with an iron clad faith will make one unstopable in what they can acheive.

[Nome]

Are there really that many Mormons around here, or has Johnny Lingo just spread? Goodness, I never even saw it myself until I was 12 or so, then have only seen it once in Mutual since.

And I would not say the theme was politically incorrect. The idea of paying for a wife based on her beauty is, of course, but it's accepted practice there. Plus, the movie made the point that Johnny grew up with Mahana, and always saw her as beautiful. Being told she was ugly got to the point where she became that way -- when Johnny showed her how much he valued her, she had the confidence to believe it herself.

Anyway, pontificating aside, a very nice strip today. And is it just me, or is Tuck's hard-working-farm-boy background really showing? mmmnicearms. But he's taken, so it's purely aesthetic. Yesss. VERY aesthetic.

[Shyal_malkes]

Are there really that many Mormons around here

if not you may have just opened up a rather heated topic.

*slowly stalks back to his bunker under the hill*

[NydaLynn]

Are there really that many Mormons around here

if not you may have just opened up a rather heated topic.

*slowly stalks back to his bunker under the hill*

Doesn't seem a big deal to me. Why the hiding?

[Shyal_malkes]

Doesn't seem a big deal to me. Why the hiding?

*from deep in the basement of said bunker*

if you knew how badly the mormons were made fun of at my hometown school, you'd hide from the flames of the topic like solidus was on the warpath!

[The JAM]

[...unWARP!!!]

Good evening.


Well, being from Mexico, I see I used an incorrect term. The Bible reference I'm thinking of, however, is this:


As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.

And we just saw a shining example of that. Good job, Ralph!

[Albert the Absentminded]

Are there really that many Mormons around here, or has Johnny Lingo just spread? Goodness, I never even saw it myself until I was 12 or so, then have only seen it once in Mutual since.

And I would not say the theme was politically incorrect. The idea of paying for a wife based on her beauty is, of course, but it's accepted practice there. Plus, the movie made the point that Johnny grew up with Mahana, and always saw her as beautiful. Being told she was ugly got to the point where she became that way -- when Johnny showed her how much he valued her, she had the confidence to believe it herself.

Anyway, pontificating aside, a very nice strip today. And is it just me, or is Tuck's hard-working-farm-boy background really showing? mmmnicearms. But he's taken, so it's purely aesthetic. Yesss. VERY aesthetic.

RHJunior's attitudes are remarkably compatible with LDS morals and culture. So it's not surprising to find a number of LDS around here.

Heck, my only problem with his comics is that he's not very good at portraying the actual arguments of the Left. However, since getting a grip on how the other side thinks is _really_ hard when theres such a huge gulf between the two, it doesn't significantly detract from my enjoyment.

(Of course, a _lot_ of self-proclaimed intellectuals _do_ pull out the hate card at the first sign of opposition.)


Anyway, of _course_ the theme is politically incorrect. Instead of Mahana discovering her own inner beauty through self-actualization, she's been forced by the patriarchal hegemony to equate her value with the outcome of an evil capitalistic transaction. By the way, can someone get me a bandaid?, my tongue just poked a hole through my cheek.


As a tangent, it's amusing how much the left claims to despise corporations and such when leftists and managers share so many traits, a love of buzzwords being one of them.

-Albert

[The JAM]

[...unWARP!!!]

Good evening.


I wonder how this would look like if Tuck had shown some fangs ...

[UncleMonty]

Personally, I think Tuck is being portrayed as just a little bit short-tempered.
He could have been a good deal gentler in getting Thelma to look into the mirror than grabbing her muzzle and twisting. On the other hand, maybe they're a good match that way. It'll make for some spectacular fights during the first few years of their marriage, but maybe the making up to each other afterward will be worth it.

[Kerry Skydancer]

RHJunior's attitudes are remarkably compatible with LDS morals and culture. So it's not surprising to find a number of LDS around here.

Heck, my only problem with his comics is that he's not very good at portraying the actual arguments of the Left. However, since getting a grip on how the other side thinks is _really_ hard when theres such a huge gulf between the two, it doesn't significantly detract from my enjoyment.

(Of course, a _lot_ of self-proclaimed intellectuals _do_ pull out the hate card at the first sign of opposition.)

As a tangent, it's amusing how much the left claims to despise corporations and such when leftists and managers share so many traits, a love of buzzwords being one of them.

-Albert

I dunno - most of the left doesn't seem to have any arguments beyond the preschool 'I want it to be this way, or I'll hold my breath until I turn blue!' routine. Ralph portrays the net result of their attitudes quite well.

[Sharuuk]

Personally, I think Tuck is being portrayed as just a little bit short-tempered.
He could have been a good deal gentler in getting Thelma to look into the mirror than grabbing her muzzle and twisting. On the other hand, maybe they're a good match that way. It'll make for some spectacular fights during the first few years of their marriage, but maybe the making up to each other afterward will be worth it.

You seem to forget that it was Thelma's unceasing feelings of inadaquacy ("No sense puttin' a mule in horse harness") that pushed Tuck to force her into the model search in the first place. After all, she was "feeling like a princess... while she was doing the legit (such as it was) modeling earlier on. Now she's back to that "I'm so ugly" mindset and Tuck's not havin' any part of it.

Besides, look at panel #6.....while he may have grabbed her muzzle to force her to look in the mirror in # 4 & 5, he's now ever so gently holding her chin with his fingertips, cradling her face if not framing it so she can actually see how pretty she really is......and most importantly, acknowledge it. He loves her and is sick and fed up with her downing herself and isn't going to let her get away with it any more......simple as that.

Shaaruuk