OOTS #1068 - The Discussion Thread

[Jaxzan Proditor]

I'm impressed that we managed to turn this into such a debate. I don't think that this needs to be a deep dive into the society of Frost Giants. Clearly, there's some kind of sexist pressure on the Frost Giant that makes her unwilling to be at the front of combat, and while you can argue that it doesn't make much sense, there's a lot that makes little sense about sexism. But that's really besides the point. The joke doesn't need to be examined in some wider cultural context; clearly all it is is a joke about sexism in the real world. And as someone who thought that strip #959 may have been a little awkward, but definitely still enjoyed, this strip really was not that awkward at all.

[Zernin]

Not every action is motivated by sexism. But many are. Including the one the comic is talking about and its real-world parallels. What's the problem?

How many more Straw People are we going to have set up in this thrad about how Word of Giant makes it so that this character faces sexism in an attempt to invalidate discussion? Nobody has ever argued that to not be the case. People are stating that it feels forced. So I guess I should thank you for proving the point by invoking that fact that the truth of the situation is indeed locked in by the author?

[Finagle]

Oh, no. The author went full SJW. You never go full SJW.

[Ganbatte]

I don't have any particular issues with our giantess's rant, though I do have to wonder what the point of it was narratively speaking.

Probably none. Sometimes the Giant likes to jump out from the OOts-verse and steer into teaching class for a few seconds. I wouldn't look too deep into it honestly in terms of storytelling.

[Themrys]

This nicely illustrates how all men profit from patriarchy - even Roy profited from her holding back and he doesn't even belong to the same species! (Her colleague is dead, but he profited insofar as he did not look bad, I suppose that is more important to frost giants than not dying.)

[Jasdoif]

I don't have any particular issues with our giantess's rant, though I do have to wonder what the point of it was narratively speaking.

I'm fairly sure it was a setup for the cutaway to Haley....Something which would have flowed better if Haley's part wasn't such an opaque reference to a book title that it felt like something's missing without prior knowledge of said book and title.

[Euclidodese]

This nicely illustrates how all men profit from patriarchy - even Roy profited from her holding back and he doesn't even belong to the same species! (Her colleague is dead, but he profited insofar as he did not look bad, I suppose that is more important to frost giants than not dying.)

Wait... 1980's gender politics is back? Oh my god... My time machine worked!

[Zernin]

Probably none. Sometimes the Giant likes to jump out from the OOts-verse and steer into teaching class for a few seconds. I wouldn't look too deep into it honestly in terms of storytelling.

There is some argument for it supporting the reason why Roy wasn't just getting his ass kicked from square one, but its also arguable that loosing his sword should be enough to suspend disbelief.

[Burner28]

Great strip as usual.

You know Belkar, if you keep this worrying up, you might start working your way towards Chaotic Neutral.

I doubt that is going to happen

[hroþila]

How many more Straw People are we going to have set up in this thrad about how Word of Giant makes it so that this character faces sexism in an attempt to invalidate discussion? Nobody has ever argued that to not be the case. People are stating that it feels forced. So I guess I should thank you for proving the point by invoking that fact that the truth of the situation is indeed locked in by the author?

For it to be a Straw Person, I'd have had to misrepresent your posture and argue against that misrepresentation instead. But I didn't even represent it. I didn't refer to your position at all.

Grey_Wolf_c: Yeah this thing happens IRL
You: Sometimes it's not about sexism
Me: But sometimes it is, and this once it is.
You: STRAW PERSON
???

I mean, I did get a very specific vibe from your post and your mention of third-wave feminism, but I purposely avoided going there in my reply.

[JoeyTheNeko]

I must confess, the title had me worried about the ship being destroyed.

it was a good bait and switch. I fell for it. glad to see that hopefully help is on the way for roy, elan and the crew.

[Snails]

Probably none. Sometimes the Giant likes to jump out from the OOts-verse and steer into teaching class for a few seconds. I wouldn't look too deep into it honestly in terms of storytelling.

Speaking for myself, I thought it was clever as an unexpected throw away line that may or may not tell us something important about frost giant society. After all, Bikini Barbara Barbarian could just be talking up her courage and trying to intimidate Roy by way of exaggeration.

The fact that her claim might be a true and rational description about a made up society we are unlikely to need to learn more about sure seems to make some people uncomfortable, though.

Which proves this tiny little dig was right on the mark. Hats off to the Giant!

[Legato Endless]

Curse these fighters and their tendency to hold back their full potential until narratively appropriate.

[nocoolnamejim]

I'm going to laugh if the Giant chooses to use an actual blue giant to join the Order of the Stick in a big plot twist to solve the Smurfette thing.

No, the purpose of the whole arc wasn't to get Bandana into the Order...it was to get the Frost Giant fighter.

Roy uses his intelligence score in combat: "Hey, you ARE pretty strong. We could really use you and you'd never have to pretend to not be as strong as you are...etc.etc."

No, not really serious.

[SilverCacaobean]

Alright, this change of focus from Roy to Haley and V caught me off guard. I have no idea what is going to happen with the sword now. Or on the ship for that matter.

I was half expecting the sword to return in this strip. Or at least to get informed about what Roy is going to do about it... The way things are going and judging by Rich's tendency to do nothing that big without a reason or only for shock value, the loss of the sword will have a great impact on the story.

Although I'll be honest, I don't know what to expect at all after Andi's wrenching.

On an unrelated note, I hope that if the giantess tries to make good on her promise of killing everyone on the ship, she'll start with the one who currently looks like the captain of the ship...


...Isn't it funny how a two panel joke about sexism prompted a rather disproportionate response here?
What, five pages, as of now? Huh. What does that mean, I wonder?

[Ganbatte]

This nicely illustrates how all men profit from patriarchy - even Roy profited from her holding back and he doesn't even belong to the same species! (Her colleague is dead, but he profited insofar as he did not look bad, I suppose that is more important to frost giants than not dying.)

Hah, good one
Let's not forget all the male boars and animals in general who profit from the tribe losing skilled hunters, the male bacteria and male humus in the soil who'll profit from the giant's burial mounds and all the vicious male air spirits getting valuable zeppelin fuel gas - all because of a single giantess unfair oppression.

[danielxcutter]

Indeed.

There have been airliner crashes where the 1st mate thought the captain was probably making an error, but kept his mouth tight shut because embarrassing his higher status boss would be too painful. Or it seemed so in the moment.

These are incidents where people died and potentially every life on board the airplane could have been lost. We know the details because enough of the crew survived to validate that the instruments said what they were supposed to say, and at least one member of the flight crew noticed as much as the danger approached.

This has happened multiple times. It happened at SFO not very many years ago with a Korean airliner.

Uh... you mean the 세월호 incident? That was a boat, and part of the reason it sunk was because of rampant corruption in the government, which is why we kicked out our former president a few days ago.

But yeah, the crew screwed up a lot.

[AuthorGirl]

Curse these fighters and their tendency to hold back their full potential until narratively appropriate.

Ha, yes. That actually seems to happen quite a lot, though not necessarily with just fighters . . . although, I might question the narrative appropriateness due to the fact that everything already went horribly wrong with the whole losing-the-sword thing. This feels a bit like belaboring the point, but it is a nice segue to Haley.

[AuthorGirl]

Hah, good one
Let's not forget all the male boars and animals in general who profit from the tribe losing skilled hunters, the male bacteria and male humus in the soil who'll profit from the giant's burial mounds and all the vicious male air spirits getting valuable zeppelin fuel gas - all because of a single giantess unfair oppression.

I am laughing at that pun even as I wish I had never read it, which proves it was a good one by the warped standards of punnery. Male boars

[Psyren]

These two comments remind me so much of the "complaints" about "bad writing" in the comic where Bandana off-handedly mentioned having had a girlfriend that I think I'll bow out of this conversation right now.

GW

Indeed, this is pretty wise.

This is indeed very much like the reaction when Bandana casually mentioned a female ex.

What I'm wondering is how long it will take the people with these objections to realize that the never-reminds-them-LGBT-people-exist-and-sexism-is-real-and-bad comic they were reading is never coming back.

Maybe they'll get the message after another 1000 strips?

For it to be a Straw Person, I'd have had to misrepresent your posture and argue against that misrepresentation instead. But I didn't even represent it. I didn't refer to your position at all.

Grey_Wolf_c: Yeah this thing happens IRL
You: Sometimes it's not about sexism
Me: But sometimes it is, and this once it is.
You: STRAW PERSON
???

I mean, I did get a very specific vibe from your post and your mention of third-wave feminism, but I purposely avoided going there in my reply.

And +100 this too. Wow.

[SaintRidley]

I don't have any particular issues with our giantess's rant, though I do have to wonder what the point of it was narratively speaking.

It provides a ready-made opportunity for a joke and a transition to Haley.

[Zernin]

For it to be a Straw Person, I'd have had to misrepresent your posture and argue against that misrepresentation instead. But I didn't even represent it. I didn't refer to your position at all.

Grey_Wolf_c: Yeah this thing happens IRL
You: Sometimes it's not about sexism
Me: But sometimes it is, and this once it is.
You: STRAW PERSON
???

I mean, I did get a very specific vibe from your post and your mention of third-wave feminism, but I purposely avoided going there in my reply.

Ooo, going from straw person to cherry picking. You're on a roll.

The whole conversation:

Ganbatte: She held back?! Holding back is dumb.
Spellbreaker26: I get the joke, but it's a bad corollary to real life.
Grey_Wolf_c: This thing happens IRL.
Me: it's not sexism just because it happens, so it doesn't make the use in this context more believable
You: This one is sexist because giant said so, whats your problem?
Me: That isn't relevant to the conversation about the believability of the context. Stop beating that dead horse.
You: OUT OF CONTEXT RE-ENGINEERED QUOTES!

See? I can do that, too.

[Gift Jeraff]

Somewhat clunky dialogue in this strip. I'm not feeling it.

[Grand Arbiter]

Holy crap, you're my hero!

Spoiler

Show

Happy to help.

[Liquor Box]

Not every action is motivated by sexism. But many are. Including the one the comic is talking about and its real-world parallels. What's the problem?

An interpretation of the scene that addresses all of Zernin and Gunbatte'a concerns might be that the female frost giant perceived sexism when none actually existed. Not all occssions where a person claims sexism result from actual sexism and we have seen no evidence of sexism amongst frost giant society (other than this one giant's perception) in the strip so far. Indeed (as some have pointed out) males and females seem integrated (for example the most prestigious group - the casters - includes two males and two females).

[littlebum2002]

The whole conversation:

Let's see if you're telling the truth here.

How many more Straw People are we going to have set up in this thrad about how Word of Giant makes it so that this character faces sexism in an attempt to invalidate discussion? Nobody has ever argued that to not be the case. People are stating that it feels forced. So I guess I should thank you for proving the point by invoking that fact that the truth of the situation is indeed locked in by the author?

OK, you're saying that your argument is that it felt forced, and that he made a straw-man argument. Let's look at the tape for review:

There are plenty of examples of people taking credit for other peoples work without it being motivated by sexism. Contrary to the third wave belief, every action isn't motivated by sexism. Some (maybe most) people are just self indulgent *******s.

Not every action is motivated by sexism. But many are. Including the one the comic is talking about and its real-world parallels. What's the problem?

And the ruling on the filed is that you're completely full of it. His argument was not a straw man, because your made a claim (not everything is motivated by sexism) and he directly responded to that claim.

I mean, perhaps you have a different definition of the term "straw man argument", but "someone directly addressing a claim you made and then attempting to refute it" usually isn't the accepted definition of that term.

[Snails]

Uh... you mean the 세월호 incident? That was a boat, and part of the reason it sunk was because of rampant corruption in the government, which is why we kicked out our former president a few days ago.

But yeah, the crew screwed up a lot.

I am thinking of Asiana Air Flight 214 where the captain approached under speed and the rest of the crew sat silent while it unfolded.

[Zernin]

An interpretation of the scene that addresses all of Zernin and Gunbatte'a concerns might be that the female frost giant perceived sexism when none actually existed. Not all examples of sexism result from actual sexism and we have seen no evidence of sexism amongst frost giant society (other than this one giant's perception) in the strip so far - indeed (as some have pointed out) males and females seem integrated (for example the most prestigious group - the casters - includes two males and two females).

I actually don't believe this to be the case in my head-cannon. I fully believe that the Frost Giant was subject to some really annoying bull**** in her life because she was a woman. I do find that it breaks my suspension of disbelief that any unit that regularly puts their life on the line would want someone to hold back, though I also believe that it's completely plausible that individual frost giants would try and take credit for the feats of others.

TL;DR: Frost Giant Lady faces sexism and others take credit for her work is plausible, others encouraging her to actually perform poorly in life or death situations is not.

[Zernin]

Let's see if you're telling the truth here.

The mental gymnastics required to formulate your reply to my post after quoting the first line of my post talking about the need for full context and then proceeding to focus on two posts is astounding. Gold star.

[goodpeople25]

I actually don't believe this to be the case in my head-cannon. I fully believe that the Frost Giant was subject to some really annoying bull**** in her life because she was a woman. I do find that it breaks my suspension of disbelief that any unit that regularly puts their life on the line would want someone to hold back, though I also believe that it's completely plausible that individual frost giants would try and take credit for the feats of others.

TL;DR: Frost Giant Lady faces sexism and others take credit for her work is plausible, others encouraging her to actually perform poorly in life or death situations is not.

Okay, does it break suppension of disbelief that the bolded isn't necessarily true?