Thumbs up to those of you who deduced that Heather wasn’t fully forthcoming about the hitting incident.
This right here is why you don't leave witnesses.
Thumbs up to those of you who deduced that Heather wasn’t fully forthcoming about the hitting incident.
GOOD. Get things cleared up, before making anymore rushed judgments.
You ever read Girl Genius? One of the aspects that most endeared me to the series was that on several major occasions, just when it looks like they’re building up to a total misunderstanding by one of the major characters that’s going to propel a ton of upcoming Drama — someone just steps in and says “Hey, this is how it went down, now we need to decide what to do about it.”
It spins the action in an entirely different direction and I don’t think I’d ever seen that before that comic.
Not that they don’t use plenty of misinformation, just that they have repeatedly stopped that train before it started. Leftover Soup has done the same thing (“I don’t do sitcoms. I did it, it’s my fault, I have no excuse” kind of thing).
In other words, doing a better job portraying what real people do.
You know, with all the people on the web, the webcomic community just keeps getting more and more “small town” to me… but yes, Girl Genius does that. Of course the Foglios (at least Phil) have been in comics since before the web was the web, so they’ve had a lot of practice with misdirection and switch-ups. This one is a good one. You can tell that Heather’s dad really has good parenting instincts… maybe he has experience with younger siblings?
HAH! I called it. “She’s crazy.” I knew it. Heather intentionally left out the bit about her betraying her best friend because she knew her weight in the argument would have less merit to it.
For one thing, Amanda was never really Heather´s friend – Amanda didn´t give a crap about Heather, or about Keisha for that matter. Amanda needed Keisha and Heather to take her along if either of them got adopted, and because bullying others is easier if you have lackeys, nothing more. Think of them – in Amanda´s mind – as the the Crabbe and Goyle to her Draco Malfoy.
For another, Heather revealed this information to her new friend – *actual* friend this time – in order to explain to her why she´s the target of Amanda´s viciousness. She was trying to help.
And Amanda *is* crazy. Or at least, she has very serious issues that need to be adressed ASAP.
Do you remember when Amanda heard Giselle say she was going to hurt Heather right after the fight and threatened to fuck her up if she did that?
Well that depends. Her father said “you had a disagreement, right?” so she didn’t try to pin everything on Amanda before. But clearly Heather didn’t give the full story, for one reason or another.
Sometimes kids leave out details for convenience. That does happen. But also she might have left out her part because she didn’t want to admit to herself what she had accidentally done to provoke Amanda in the first place.
From Amanda’s point of view, it felt like a betrayal, yes, but only because she didn’t dare let anyone know she’d been hurt so badly. In her universe, that would only mark her as weak, and weakness invites predators.
Heather knew Amanda felt like this. She does understand why Amanda was so angry. She also, though, has to feel that what she did wasn’t really wrong.
Finding anything in the archives here is SO difficult! But here:
Why Heather told Selkie: https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie237/
When Selkie told Amanda she knew: https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie328/
The punch: https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie358/
…and read forward for the rest of the fight. Words can wound, too. Amanda got hurt worse than Heather.
Why Heather is holding a grudge: https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie441/
Amanda isn’t crazy. People who write her off as a crazy bad child are the ones causing the problems. And I don’t think it’s fair to say Amanda was never friends with Keisha and Heather. She opened up to them both, which implies she had quite a bit of trust in them. If they were just lackeys as you claimrd, she’d never have told them anything at all. And she’s still friends with Keisha, she’s just been recently adopted and a lot has been going on. She still talks to Keisha regularly at school, there’s no reason to say that aren’t friends.
Also the whole disagreement thing, that very well can just be putting ‘had a fight’ nicely. I’ve heard people call a fight a disagreement. Like a physical fight.
Heather betrayed Amanda. Amanda got angry, yes, but she was also deeply hurt. She should have talked to Heather about things but she’s also just a kid. Heather is indeed holding a grudge. Amanda has not been going out of her way to do anything to Heather since Heather said they weren’t friends. Heather on the other hand glares at Amanda every chance she gets. Rolls her eyea, makes faces and is generally being nasty towards Amanda when Amanda hasn’t done a thing to her since their fight.
Heather is hurt too, don’t get me wrong. She’s probably way more upset about losing Amanda as a friend than she’s letting on and is using anger to cover the hurt up. The thing is though, she’s going out of her way to try and scorn Amanda when she claims to her parents she wants nothing to do with her, in turn making her father think Amanda won’t leave Heather alone, when in reality Heather won’t leave AMANDA alone.
I’m honestly wondering what Heather has to be afraid of here. Someone please do correct me if my memory is not serving me well, but from what I remember, Amanda punched Heather as a reaction to Heather talking about the party she was going to be having at her new house? Which pained Amanda as a reminder of what she lost in her first/adoptive family?
Heather admitting that she leaked Amanda’s secret now means admitting she leaked Amanda’s secret with all these other people in earshot. Heather does have a completely legitimate reason for not wanting to explain everything in public, in addition to possibly not wanting to admit that she and Selkie unintentionally provoked Amanda.
Thanks, but I’d already read others’ comments and figured it out. 🙂
whoop, disregard, I read the current comments, namely SpringPop’s comment. Memory restored!
Shouldn’t make a difference in my opinion, still no excuse to be punching people.
Glad Kenneth is being understanding though, he said his piece, and this isn’t the place or time to push it.
I’d think betrayal is one of the few occasions in which punching is a reasonable response — depending of course on the scale of the offense, though that must also be judged by the scales that are reasonable to the people involved. Kids don’t need to have “betrayed country and murdered the leader”-scale crimes to get to punching level.
Obviously you want to teach kids better ways to handle things, and I don’t know that this occasion was at all up to the level of a punchable offense (I don’t recall the details), and Amanda’s behavioral issues have to be taken into account (the line of expected behavior is a little lower for her due to her deficit… and right now I am trying hard not to go into a rant about the treatment of Spike from Buffy the Vampire Slayer).
But like, if you find your best friend in bed with your girlfriend (assuming a lot of details that make this example possible), and you punch him, that is a reasonable and expected response. If you restrain yourself, you are acting more civilized than most would in that circumstance. If you pulverize his face until he ends up in the hospital, you are acting less civilized than most would in that circumstance. Punching is not always unreasonable.
I sincerely disagree. The only time physical action is appropriate is to defend yourself if someone else had already made it physical. People have *died* from single blows to the head. It isn’t like the movies, it’s not as simple as one punch. Your hypothesis; what if your best friend was an injured war vet that a single punch *would* severely damage? A black belt that would comprehensively hand you your ass if you started something? Another woman? According to you, if your emotional pain is great enough you can justify doing physical damage, so theoretically you should be able to kick off on any of them. So emotional pain caused by your child? Your wife? Are you suggesting if you find out your partner cheated, you have free reign to break their nose? What about all the abusers out there who consider ‘spoke to another man’ cheating? Or the emotionally damaged who claim anything that upsets them is an enormous betrayal, do they have free reign to spend their days with their fists in people’s mouths because their emotional pain is so great?
There is *never* an excuse for initiating physical violence*. To suggest otherwise is abhorrent.
*- I don’t consider ‘I was being threatened with a weapon so I kicked him and ran’ initiating; they don’t necessarily need to have made contact to have started something.
“There is never an excuse for initiating physical violence” is, as I understand it, what Ayn Rand believes, and in general I agree with it as a principle of civilized vs. uncivilized — Ayn Rand (again, as I understand her beliefs, and I haven’t actually read anything by her directly) says that once you’ve initiated violence (not self-defense or defense of others), you’ve put yourself in the uncivilized category.
However, I would posit a distinction between “unacceptable” behavior and “unreasonable” behavior. Punching a traitor might well be put in the unacceptable category, but I don’t think I would put it in the unREASONABLE category.
Also, I find it interesting that you bring up gender as a counterpoint (“what if the traitor were female?”), which just makes me wonder if gender would be a counterpoint for the betrayed person as well (if a woman found her male best friend in bed with her girlfriend, would it matter that she was a woman for this illustration?).
Abusers who use “spoke to another man” as the same level of offense as “was having sex with another man when I walked in on them” are operating from a total disconnect from reality and proportional response.
Similarly, physically damaging a child, or a medically fragile person, over emotional pain is not proportional because there’s an inherent difference of quality between the two “combatants.” That’s why having a child hit a child is different from having an adult hit a child, and having a small child hit a large child is different from having a large child hit a small child. Not all hits are equal.
And not all circumstances are equal. That would be why certain places in the United States still separate “I walked in on my wife having sex with another man, and shot one or both of them” from “normal” murder, calling it “crime of passion.” I don’t think they should have different penalties, because they are still the taking of a human life, and I don’t think either one is ACCEPTABLE, but there’s a distinction to be made.
I mean, would you think differently of Amanda if Amanda punching Heather happened because Heather got first in line at the lunch counter and Amanda just didn’t like it? That’s a completely unreasonable reaction. It doesn’t make any sense and is purely self-centered.
Betraying a confidence that deep was different from just any old slight; betraying her to the one she’d set her sights on as her enemy made it worse; she’s a young child who hasn’t learned the level of self-control we expect of adults; and she’s a damaged person with emotional-control issues. Put all of these things together, and I have much less of a problem with Amanda’s physical response than I would in many other circumstances — I do not judge her as harshly for it as I would judge lots of other characters for lots of other reasons.
I also don’t judge Heather for severing the friendship. Getting free of anyone who initiates violence is a good move, regardless of whether the violence was reasonable or not. I was pleased with her choice when it first happened; I’m not so pleased with her lying about the circumstances now, especially as her lies are damaging Amanda further for no good reason.
Disagree as well, violence is only acceptable in protection or defense imo. Of course lashing out in anger happens but it shouldn’t be seen as acceptable behavior regardless the circumstances.
Uhhh I never implied that, of course hitting’s wrong -_-;;
Just glad to see Kenneth isn’t making an ass of himself here. Man enough to know he needs to back off from the situation, and hopefully now be more understanding in the future. His Papa Bear instincts were getting in the way of his logical thinking, so at least he’s not all, “Keep your monster away from my innocent angel!” Reminds me of when Amanda was in a fight with another girl: https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie259/
He was being as callous as that girl’s mother without knowing at all anything Amanda has experienced. This is my opinion, but under no circumstances is it alright for you to call someone’s kid a monster.
Can anyone link me to the comic where the punching went down so I can refresh my memory?
https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie358/
Here you are
I tried providing that link yesterday, but because I included links to other relevant pages, it’s still awaiting moderation. I guess Dave hasn’t gotten around to looking at the comments yet. Let me try including the others one at a time.
Why Heather told Selkie: https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie237/
Sorry about that. The last comic easel update changed things regarding moderated comments. I don’t get notices of pending comments anymore because if I turn those back on I get emails every time the true spam gets moderated. It cant tell the difference anymore
The page where Selkie told Amanda she knew: https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie328/
MacareuxMoine has provided the link to the punch itself, above. Read forward for the rest of the fight. Words can wound, too. Amanda got hurt worse than Heather.
…and, why Heather is holding a grudge? It wasn’t the hitting, she just shrugs that off. She’s been hit much worse in soccer. It was that Amanda did it on purpose. https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie441/
My take is that Amanda had a right to be angry with Heather, since Heather had hurt her deeply with telling that secret. However kids usually feel threatened or hurt when angry and thus take a more, direct route of releasing or displaying their anger such as acting out physically or yelling. Which is not necessarily wrong at times. But I highly doubt Amanda’s actions in this incident was one of those times however, with her poor experiences with her first adoptive family has probably enforced the idea of lashing out is her best way to defend herself. So while I do not condone Amanda for her decision, I don’t condemn it either.
Are we ever going to get to see Amanda’s former family appropriately punished? By “appropriately”, I of course mean “thumb screws at minimum”.
Again, a plausible reaction on Kevin’s part. He vented some preconceptions, has realized there’s more nuances to the situation and is getting Heather to clarify them.
I’m glad Kenneth is starting to understand the situation. I’ve always liked Selkie for the comic’s realistic yet still rational, goodhearted characters.
BTW I’ve been playing Fire Emblem Fates: Birthright and laughed when I had characters named Selkie and Sophie join the party.
Thanks. I’ve tried to avoid cartoony “evil because why not?” Characters over the years. It’s one reason I tend to think of the Trunchbull family as failures. They went too over the top and just don’t work.
I’m also playing Birthright, and I can’t wait to acquire Selkie! 😀 Im very slow though, got it on release day and Im only on Chapter 9.
I didn’t think the Trunchbulls were implausible. Some people in real life are self-centered and/or racist beyond what we’d like to think of as the norm, and that’s without getting into any recognized disorders. It’s an ugly truth that I think you handled well.
I concur on the Trunchbull. Extreme, but still well within the bounds of what can be expected from sane, yet arrogant and opinionate individuals.
Trust me, the Trunchbull family was completely within reason. I saw far too many families like that where I grew up. It was actually a pleasant turn to see a father who had his eyes opened and actually took responsibility for a change as opposed to ones I knew who maintained the “my child can do no wrong” attitude for far too long…
Perhaps his taking responsibility and changing his mind in the face of evidence is what Dave meant by “over the top and just don´t work”? 🙂
Sad but true. Some family members of mine still believe that they’ve done no wrong and blame other people for their mistakes, despite all the mental scars me and my Mom still carry.
Unless you’ve experienced it yourself, that level of arrogance is always a cliche villian thing. Just like true love is a cliche sob story until you actually feel it.
Reminds me of a story I heard about how Jason Alexander complained that George Costanza was too unbelievable a character, until someone told him George was based on one of the show’s creators.
I don’t find the Trunchbulls to be failures; I think you handled them incredibly well, turning what started out obvious into something far more subtle.
I think your only failure thus far was the principal, because he really never got a thing that made us understand his side of things (although “I’m a dad too” was mildly going in that direction). I kept expecting you to do more with the principal and then I thought maybe you just were finished with him and wrote him out or something.
The Trunchbulls got handled much better, and I’m glad you wrote them.
I am glad all is becoming clear, but I hope they don’t start ganging up on Heather. I want them to realise Amanda’s actions are often outlandishly unjustified.
But I get that Heather should have owned up straight away, with-holding the truth is bad, it gets people in trubz.
For reference, here is the moment Amanda finds out Heather told Selkie
https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie329/
And the moment Amanda hits Heather
https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie358/
On hindsight, going crazy randomly describes this situation rather well.
“Randomly crazy” means “I don’t see any reason for it!” From Heather, that’s a lie. Deep down, she understands exactly why Amanda lost it. Why else would she have begged Selkie so frantically, over and over again, not to tell? What she’s saying to her dad sounds like a defensive story she’s been telling herself. She may almost have come to believe it by now, but shifty eyes suggest almost is not entirely. She knows why.
People far older than Heather get caught in the secrets trap. Someone tells you a secret, but what if you later realize that someone else has a legitimate need to know?
No matter what twist Giselle puts on it — the real point is that what the Sandersons did is not going to be a secret any more.
And that’s healthy. Remember Amanda’s princess story, for her class?
What are the odds that Giselle presents a story as skewed in Amanda’s defense as the story that Heather told in her own defense?
It could happen, and kids do that, but I think this is close to run its course. I would not if I was writing have it bounce all the way on Amanda’s side. Not that I have the right to tell Dave what to write, I don’t, but I think it’s best if we don’t extend this much further and have Kenneth start making things right.
I don’t mind the lack of colors. Mostly I’m just glad Kenneth is being so cool about Amanda…. And that the truth is coming out
Good thing that this is finally coming out into the open. And that Kenneth is trying to find out what’s up.
5 more comics! WOO! Don’t ask, you will have to see why I’m excited for yourselves.
She saw it go down
and now She’s going down