That doesn’t mean it’s not medically harmful. Her mother might have been worried about the potential pursuit so much she would consider a little radiation or whatever the lesser evil. Pohl is the one familiar with sarnothi technology, I say we listen to the doctor’s advice in this case.
All the same it’s making me really paranoid. I mean Selkie’s been wearing the bow since she was dropped off at the orphanage right? You’d think even idiot human doctors who don’t know what a Sarnothi is would notice something physically wrong Selkie. Unless it was really Subtle damage I guess… I dunno I guess I’m with Todd in the Worried about Invisible Bad things Camp.
Why would her Mother give her something that could kill her? I doubt any forum goer here would doubt it was safe if Selkie’s father had given it to her.
I don’t think it’s an issue of a mother or father being considered inherently more trustworthy, here or in the comic world.
Pohl apparently only knows Selkie’s mom as a “war criminal” (whatever that means in a Sarnothi context) so I’m thinking his concern is rooted there.
Parents are generally a child’s best shot for trust. Doesn’t always hold true, and betrayal of it is utterly devastating, but horrific as they are, exceptions are… exceptions.
Also called her a hero. But whatever. I seriously doubt she’d try to kill her own kid. Or that the tech is radioactive. After all,Tai Li wouldn’t have gotten fed if it was.
and that’s what they thought about DDT too… here’s a link to a 1957 video about them spraying it on a bunch of kids at a swimming pool in order to show it was ‘safe’ to use breathe, and even EAT… yeah. up until they found out it was toxic, and stayed in the food chain… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZRGxw6w6kc i can guarantee that the parents sure as heck didn’t think they were harming their kids! but the same can be said here, the bow COULD be doing something or emitting some kind of energy that to a security guard (Mom) is either not known, or is known, but not taken seriously as a harmful effect, whereas a DOCTOR that is trained in both Sarnothi biology AND a techie enough to create the water-bending bracelets, knows of, or at least can infer the presence of a possible harmful effect, at least with enough of a basis for this hunch, without a detailed scan of the bow to verify either that it is or isn’t harmful…
I love how we’re fine with Pohl’s technology. But Selkie’s mother is evil evil evil and harmful for her kid. Cuz she obviously is just too stupid to design proper technology to keep her kid safe.
For human use, DDT is one of the safer pesticides, especially when taking into account the very low concentrations usually needed. When DDT was banned, one of the direct effects was multiple deaths among pesticide users who were used to its low toxicity. People keep pointing to toxicity studies without actually _comparing_ pesticide toxicity for equivalently effective dosages.
You should also read up on the relationship between DDT and malaria – there’s a lot of politics getting in the way of real science there, unfortunately, but the advent of DDT use brought malaria deaths way down, and the restrictions on its use likely contributed to an increase in malarial deaths.
In comic, the question isn’t whether the bow is dangerous, the question is whether the bow is more dangerous than not using the bow.
Yes because her Mother would give her something that would harm her that a Doctor hasn’t seen any side effects of at all. And Selkie’s SCIENTIST Mother would make harmful for her.
I doubt it. It’s a stupid plan and Pohl is being stupid. So is Todd for agreeing to it.
um… you sure about Selkie’s mom being a scientist? up until they saw the message, they knew nothing about her mom at all, because both the US. government AND Selkie knew nothing… as well as the fact that Pohl said that she is/was a Peacekeeper just a few strips ago, which I’m taking to mean as something along the lines of either Police, and /or National Guard/ UN Peacekeeper type of function… nothing was mentioned of the scientist-ness of her mom at all… that is, unless it WAS mentioned somewhere and i just missed it…?
We’re fine with Pohl’s stuff. Yet Selkie’s Mother’s invention is somehow toxic despite not being much different. It is gendered,Mikael. Just cuz you don’t see it doesn’t mean it isn’t.
Maybe it has something to do with Pohl being a doctor and her mom being rogue and we know very little about her? I don’t think it has anything to do with her being a woman.
And yet it seems this way. Especially when she hasn’t done anything evil. Also just because her government sees her as bad,doesn’t mean she is. Even when she’s been called a hero.
Except yes, you really are the only one making this about gender. The far more sensible and simple explanation has been mentioned: doctor vs. war criminal. Has there been ANYTHING in the comic to give you the impression that Dave has something against women? I find it to be quite the contrary personally he writes great male AND female characters. The hostility, especially with so little to base it on, seems highly unnecessary.
Selkie’s mother already endangered her in the past (dropping her off at an orphanage that is not equiped to take care for her to the point that they had been force feeding her fruit which makes her sick). Though I don’t think she would want to hurt Selkie intentionally her judgement so far has been less than stelar, though she probably had her reasons for that.
Same here, as I mentioned below I think the bow is stopping Selkie from awakening or developing sarnothi powers – so the intentions there would be good (don’t draw attention or scare the humans) but it is also technically harmfull as it is stopping her from developing the way she should.
So no, nothing to do with gender at all, stop trying to make this about something it isn’t.
Again, no, the ONLY person making this about gender is you. Further your own claims aren’t even accurate about the situation to begin with.
You state that the readers are the ones bring up the safety issue, but thats wrong, Dave (through Pohl) is the one who raised the issue (multiple times now).
In addition there are far more clear cut, straightforward and logical reasons for the disparity of reactions. On the one hand we have Pohl, a doctor who has helped Selkie, whose family uses technology that appears to be fairly common in Sarnothi society and who, unless we believe he’s a complete sociopath, wouldn’t want to put his own family in danger. On the other hand we have Selkie’s mother, who to Pohl’s knowledge may or may not be a war criminal, who is using technology that is either unknown to him, and thus not common Sarnothi tech, or known (or suspected) to him and he has reason to believe its dangerous or at least questionable.
Which is basically what everyone here is discussing except you who keeps insisting that we’re all misogynists. It seems to me that you should spend less time impugning the motives of others and more reading what people are actually talking about.
@Mikael
Seems she had no choice at all and was running out of time. So it was either give her up or have her possibly be injured by whomever is coming after her.
The readers are the only ones insisting that Selkie’s Mother gave her something radioactive and dangerous. And in all honesty have said nastier things about the girls of this comic,myself included unfortunately,and have done it many times.
But I never said “all of you are sexist” just that it happens. Again. Putting words in my mouth.
No one has insisted that the bow is radioactive, they have stated it’s a possibility that Pohl forsees. From a medical standpoint, he knows more about the potential dangers of their technology than we do. Perhaps older technology was more unstable than the newer ones. Perhaps it’s potentially dangerous when unmonitored. We don’t really know much about it at all.
Pohl seems nervous about it. I’ve no idea why. It’s confusing for sure. He’s either aware of something we aren’t or he’s concerned because of who her mother is. Maybe he doesn’t want his own family put in any danger. He might be worried the bow is actually doing the opposite of what we think it’s doing. A lot of people seem to think it’s cloaking her or subduing her abilities. Perhaps Pohl I’d worried her bow is actually something that can be used to track Selkie and inadvertently cause harm for his family.
He’s acting funny. I want to know why. He clearly knows something or assumes something that he’s failing to inform Todd of…
Selkie (with bow) is introduced
We learn that the bow was given to Selkie by her mother and its for her protection.
We meet Pohl who helps Selkie.
We meet Phol’s family who welcome Todd and Selkie.
Months pass in the real world.
Selkie reveals the bow to Pohl and company.
Pohl raises concerns about its safety.
Readers start speculating as to how it might be dangerous.
If your hypothesis was correct, and people doubted the bows safety for misogynistic reasons then they would have been raising that issue months (if not years) ago when the bow was first revealed to be from Selkies mother and to have some kind of power. Instead the far more logical and consistent explanation is:
Readers started speculating about why/how the bow might be unsafe when A CHARACTER IN THE COMIC GAVE THEM EXPLICIT REASON TO BELIEVE IT MIGHT BE.
Your continued insistence that misogyny is the root flies in the face of logic and facts. You are asserting something as true not only without evidence, but where the evidence proves otherwise. It’s obvious you have some issues to work with, but its unfair and rude to impugn the character of others without reason.
Which also explains the hostility you are experiencing. It has nothing to do with you being a female, and everything to do with the way you are treating, or rather mistreating your fellow readers. When you make repeated baseless accusations and assume the worse about others they have every reason to not be friendly towards you.
And yes given the glowy nature of Sarnothi technology anyone with even a passing familiarity with both real world technology and sci-fi plotlines in general might reasonable consider radiation as a possible source of unseen, not easily detectable with the naked eye danger. Because in reality some types of radiation absolutely work that way (as do other substances, but I don’t think asbestos or second hand smoke are suitable explanations why Selkie’s bow might be dangerous).
I’m the last person to shrug off gendered attitudes towards characters, but here I’m calling, at least for myself, ‘priority to the person who spoke last’. That is to say, Selkie’s mom isn’t around right now. Maybe she never intended to be away for too long. She can’t monitor Selkie’s environment. Leaving her at an orphanage was already a risky decision, and it DID have negative consequences for Selkie’s health as the people there didn’t know what to feed her, nor did she get properly sized footwear. There was definitely a ‘choose lesser evil’ side to Selkie’s mom’s decisions, and right now the sarnothi doctor might be better equipped to revise them according to the situation.
I’m not saying Selkie’s mom is evil or incompetent, all I’m sayin is _she’s_not_there_. She’s given up custody of her kid, and her decisions from way back when can’t be relied on forever.
Gender has nothing to do with it. Pohl has been shown to be supportive and helpful up until this point. If he says there may be something risky about the device, it’s worth paying attention to.
As for the argument that Selkie’s mother would never intentionally hurt her daughter, remember that she was in a desperate situation. If she was able to acquire an experimental device that would keep her daughter safe but had, let’s say, a 10% chance of giving her cancer, then the choice boils down to a 100% chance her baby will die now vs a 10% chance that her daughter will die later. I think any good mother would take the 10% chance.
We don’t know Selkie’s mother’s situation, but it’s very likely that she made the best choice available to her at the time. Selkie NEEDED that headband then. Why? We do not yet know. Does she STILL need it? Possibly. It could be that the danger the headband is protecting Selkie from has passed. Whether it has or not, though, if it IS potentially dangerous, it’s reasonable to minimize her exposure to it.
Let me repeat, though, NONE of this implies Selkie’s mother was a bad mother, or made a bad decision. Additionally, none of this implies that Pohl is an evil person or a bad doctor.
I don’t know if it is the idiot ball. They seem like a nice family, but for all we know Pohl is really an evil bastard. Just because someone seems friendly, kind and nice doesn’t mean they really are. It’s way suspicious how he is behaving about it.
I don’t think it’s him being evil. I suspect that he’s nervous about the danger the bow might bring to HIS family. I mean, originally it was just “oh poor little Sarnothi girl, she’s all alone without any other Sarnothi, we will help her” Now his family (including him) are attached to this little child who is walking around with a potential target on her.
Giving up her bow for no good reason is kind of idiotic. Especially when it’s possibly a cloaking device that keeps her undetected from any other Sarnothi technology.
Ya know. Just in case they decide to get retribution for her Mother’s crimes?
and that’s why Todd said NO to Pohl taking the bow away from Selkie… Todd DID say that he could STUDY it… but only at THEIR house instead of here, and under a bit more supervision where Todd is in HIS safe zone as well, i guess… so yes i agree that it would have been idiotic if the bow had stayed here for the duration of the testing, but i DON’T think it’s idiotic for them to want to know the most they CAN about what it is doing/could be doing/ and basically everything else they can find out about it.
As long as it’s not like Agatha Heterodyne’s spark-suppressing trilobite!
Mind you, when I was six (second year at school, way back in ’71), my dear Dad gave me an enamelled badge that I would never be parted from. It was just his old steelworks ID badge, but it meant so much to me. Trying to take it off my lapel would have been like slowly reaching for a rottweiler’s dinner- grrrRRRRRR…
Still have it, in a little box of keepsakes. Dad wore it so close to his heart for so many years, any wonder it’s now close to mine?
I see some people think Pohl is touching the idiot ball, and some what he is. but to me we don’t know much about the bow. what much we do know is that one selkie’s mom give it to her, and two selkie’s mom made it for her to keep her save. but we don’t know from what or who, and we don’t know what else the bow can do. Pohl knows a good bit about Sarnothi technology. hell to the point were he made the surface tension amplifiers for Sai Fen. and he is letting selkie keep the bow. what about Agent Brown, I mean does he know about selkie’s mom, if not and he found out about the bow. I think he would take it from selkie, to see what’s it about and to see if its save for her.
One hypothesis I have is that Selkie’s mother may have coded or recorded specific information into the bow. Also the sarnothi may have a different perspective of what they see as ‘protection’ than humans may. So it may be something like coding a memory wipe, self-destruction of the device or brain fry to occur should Selkie be harmed or used as leverage.
yeah, and that’s part of the part i don’t understand about how that bow is programmed… it stayed off of everyone’s radar for “Sarnothi Stuff” that is still classified, and it was only when she left the bow at home that it revved up and ultimately pinged on some sort of detector at the MIB HQ (i know they’re not called that, but you get my drift) so if it was designed to “keep her safe” and had successfully hidden her for this long… WHY generate such an huge energy signature that will practically PINPOINT Selkie’s location for anyone on the “other side” to notice (and to STAY in that state for as long as it did), and possibly send someone to Selkie with orders to “retire, with extreme prejudice” as the saying goes…
I don’t know. I’m inclined to believe in Pohl’s good intentions. Perhaps he has thought of some functions the bow could be performing and, for Selkie’s sake, he wants to make quite sure it’s not any of those! In other words, he could be telling the exact truth, he’s just not listing off in detail any of the more worrying possibilities that have crossed his mind.
Still, good intentions are no guarantee against making a mistake. And… this feels to me like a mistake. I’m among those who don’t think her mother would have asked her to wear something harmful.
Selkie’s only eight years old. If she gets out of the habit of wearing the bow every waking hour, there’s a good chance that sooner or later something is going to send her rushing out of the apartment without it.
I was initially inclined to believe in Pohl’s good intentions but I’m starting to wonder, he seems particularly obsessed/inssistent about the bow now.
I can see a few possible explanations:
First: he has a good reason to suspect its dangerous, in which case he should really give Todd more information to convince him why it might be in Selkie’s best interest for him to study it, even if it means she doesn’t keep possession for awhile.
Second: He doesn’t have a good reason to be suspicious of it other than Selkie’s mother has been described as a war criminal and *shrug* why not?
Third: He’s a Sarnothi spy sent to land to try and root out Selkie’s mother/rebels and wants to get his hands on the bow either because its dangerous to the government or he thinks he can get information from it.
His persistence is making me less skeptical of option three …
Well, Pohl’s wife did mention he designed the technology they use in their house for the baby. It’s entirely possible Pohl has a slightly selfish reason and just wants to see how it works.
What DAVE has carefully arranged for us to know, is that Pohl is a qualified expert in the fields of both Sarnothi (Echo) tech, and medicine… and Selkie’s mother, Pol Quar(sp?) is at BEST only the former.
If the barrette is radiating some energy field that hides her from, say, some sort of Sarnothi sensors that can be used to track specific biological organisms at range (remember, they are apex predators/hunters by nature and culture, have advanced energy-related tech, and fish do not exactly leave footprints to follow, so “bio-sensor tech” is a pretty logical branch of research)… that energy field might have side effects to Selkie’s health that her mom may not have known about. Like cell phones giving people cancer (I have no idea if that concern was debunked or not, actually).
god damnit
Tai Li may have to prescribe a corrective bow at some point.
Pohl. I doubt it’s something HARMFUL for Selkie. Can you please stop touching the idiot ball?
It’s most likely a cloaking device to keep her safe from people out for revenge.
That doesn’t mean it’s not medically harmful. Her mother might have been worried about the potential pursuit so much she would consider a little radiation or whatever the lesser evil. Pohl is the one familiar with sarnothi technology, I say we listen to the doctor’s advice in this case.
All the same it’s making me really paranoid. I mean Selkie’s been wearing the bow since she was dropped off at the orphanage right? You’d think even idiot human doctors who don’t know what a Sarnothi is would notice something physically wrong Selkie. Unless it was really Subtle damage I guess… I dunno I guess I’m with Todd in the Worried about Invisible Bad things Camp.
Leukemia can be real subtle until the doctor informs you that you have it. Hopefully her bow will be found to be nontoxic.
Why would her Mother give her something that could kill her? I doubt any forum goer here would doubt it was safe if Selkie’s father had given it to her.
I don’t think it’s an issue of a mother or father being considered inherently more trustworthy, here or in the comic world.
Pohl apparently only knows Selkie’s mom as a “war criminal” (whatever that means in a Sarnothi context) so I’m thinking his concern is rooted there.
Parents are generally a child’s best shot for trust. Doesn’t always hold true, and betrayal of it is utterly devastating, but horrific as they are, exceptions are… exceptions.
Also called her a hero. But whatever. I seriously doubt she’d try to kill her own kid. Or that the tech is radioactive. After all,Tai Li wouldn’t have gotten fed if it was.
and that’s what they thought about DDT too… here’s a link to a 1957 video about them spraying it on a bunch of kids at a swimming pool in order to show it was ‘safe’ to use breathe, and even EAT… yeah. up until they found out it was toxic, and stayed in the food chain… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZRGxw6w6kc i can guarantee that the parents sure as heck didn’t think they were harming their kids! but the same can be said here, the bow COULD be doing something or emitting some kind of energy that to a security guard (Mom) is either not known, or is known, but not taken seriously as a harmful effect, whereas a DOCTOR that is trained in both Sarnothi biology AND a techie enough to create the water-bending bracelets, knows of, or at least can infer the presence of a possible harmful effect, at least with enough of a basis for this hunch, without a detailed scan of the bow to verify either that it is or isn’t harmful…
I love how we’re fine with Pohl’s technology. But Selkie’s mother is evil evil evil and harmful for her kid. Cuz she obviously is just too stupid to design proper technology to keep her kid safe.
For human use, DDT is one of the safer pesticides, especially when taking into account the very low concentrations usually needed. When DDT was banned, one of the direct effects was multiple deaths among pesticide users who were used to its low toxicity. People keep pointing to toxicity studies without actually _comparing_ pesticide toxicity for equivalently effective dosages.
You should also read up on the relationship between DDT and malaria – there’s a lot of politics getting in the way of real science there, unfortunately, but the advent of DDT use brought malaria deaths way down, and the restrictions on its use likely contributed to an increase in malarial deaths.
In comic, the question isn’t whether the bow is dangerous, the question is whether the bow is more dangerous than not using the bow.
How exactly? Just why would she? Her own Mom hasn’t shown signs of being evil and yet we’re all pretty quick to say that she’d hurt her own child.
Also this isn’t a pesticide. This is a bow that could possibly be a cloaking device. Which isn’t the same thing AT ALL. But whatever.
I doubt she would deliberately hurt her own child, but a technology that could cloak you might have some unforeseen consequences.
How exactly? -___-
Yes because her Mother would give her something that would harm her that a Doctor hasn’t seen any side effects of at all. And Selkie’s SCIENTIST Mother would make harmful for her.
I doubt it. It’s a stupid plan and Pohl is being stupid. So is Todd for agreeing to it.
um… you sure about Selkie’s mom being a scientist? up until they saw the message, they knew nothing about her mom at all, because both the US. government AND Selkie knew nothing… as well as the fact that Pohl said that she is/was a Peacekeeper just a few strips ago, which I’m taking to mean as something along the lines of either Police, and /or National Guard/ UN Peacekeeper type of function… nothing was mentioned of the scientist-ness of her mom at all… that is, unless it WAS mentioned somewhere and i just missed it…?
Considering she can make technology with a hologram? Yes. I believe she’s a scientist. But whatever.
We’ve already been told she was a peacekeeper which I assume is basically sarnoth’s version of cops.
So basically she’s just one thing like humanity? Like wow. There aren’t women who were soldiers and scientists. It’s just too much. -___-
Just a sidenote, you are the only poster here making a deal out of her gender, her being a woman is irrelevant here to everyone but you.
Except no.
We’re fine with Pohl’s stuff. Yet Selkie’s Mother’s invention is somehow toxic despite not being much different. It is gendered,Mikael. Just cuz you don’t see it doesn’t mean it isn’t.
Maybe it has something to do with Pohl being a doctor and her mom being rogue and we know very little about her? I don’t think it has anything to do with her being a woman.
And yet it seems this way. Especially when she hasn’t done anything evil. Also just because her government sees her as bad,doesn’t mean she is. Even when she’s been called a hero.
This feels very one sided.
Except yes, you really are the only one making this about gender. The far more sensible and simple explanation has been mentioned: doctor vs. war criminal. Has there been ANYTHING in the comic to give you the impression that Dave has something against women? I find it to be quite the contrary personally he writes great male AND female characters. The hostility, especially with so little to base it on, seems highly unnecessary.
Except I never said he did and that the forum goers do have this attitude. But thanks for putting words in my mouth and ignoring this.
Selkie’s mother already endangered her in the past (dropping her off at an orphanage that is not equiped to take care for her to the point that they had been force feeding her fruit which makes her sick). Though I don’t think she would want to hurt Selkie intentionally her judgement so far has been less than stelar, though she probably had her reasons for that.
Same here, as I mentioned below I think the bow is stopping Selkie from awakening or developing sarnothi powers – so the intentions there would be good (don’t draw attention or scare the humans) but it is also technically harmfull as it is stopping her from developing the way she should.
So no, nothing to do with gender at all, stop trying to make this about something it isn’t.
Again, no, the ONLY person making this about gender is you. Further your own claims aren’t even accurate about the situation to begin with.
You state that the readers are the ones bring up the safety issue, but thats wrong, Dave (through Pohl) is the one who raised the issue (multiple times now).
In addition there are far more clear cut, straightforward and logical reasons for the disparity of reactions. On the one hand we have Pohl, a doctor who has helped Selkie, whose family uses technology that appears to be fairly common in Sarnothi society and who, unless we believe he’s a complete sociopath, wouldn’t want to put his own family in danger. On the other hand we have Selkie’s mother, who to Pohl’s knowledge may or may not be a war criminal, who is using technology that is either unknown to him, and thus not common Sarnothi tech, or known (or suspected) to him and he has reason to believe its dangerous or at least questionable.
Which is basically what everyone here is discussing except you who keeps insisting that we’re all misogynists. It seems to me that you should spend less time impugning the motives of others and more reading what people are actually talking about.
@Mikael
Seems she had no choice at all and was running out of time. So it was either give her up or have her possibly be injured by whomever is coming after her.
But that isn’t responsible at all.
@David K
The readers are the only ones insisting that Selkie’s Mother gave her something radioactive and dangerous. And in all honesty have said nastier things about the girls of this comic,myself included unfortunately,and have done it many times.
But I never said “all of you are sexist” just that it happens. Again. Putting words in my mouth.
No one has insisted that the bow is radioactive, they have stated it’s a possibility that Pohl forsees. From a medical standpoint, he knows more about the potential dangers of their technology than we do. Perhaps older technology was more unstable than the newer ones. Perhaps it’s potentially dangerous when unmonitored. We don’t really know much about it at all.
Pohl seems nervous about it. I’ve no idea why. It’s confusing for sure. He’s either aware of something we aren’t or he’s concerned because of who her mother is. Maybe he doesn’t want his own family put in any danger. He might be worried the bow is actually doing the opposite of what we think it’s doing. A lot of people seem to think it’s cloaking her or subduing her abilities. Perhaps Pohl I’d worried her bow is actually something that can be used to track Selkie and inadvertently cause harm for his family.
He’s acting funny. I want to know why. He clearly knows something or assumes something that he’s failing to inform Todd of…
Let’s review a timeline of events.
Selkie (with bow) is introduced
We learn that the bow was given to Selkie by her mother and its for her protection.
We meet Pohl who helps Selkie.
We meet Phol’s family who welcome Todd and Selkie.
Months pass in the real world.
Selkie reveals the bow to Pohl and company.
Pohl raises concerns about its safety.
Readers start speculating as to how it might be dangerous.
If your hypothesis was correct, and people doubted the bows safety for misogynistic reasons then they would have been raising that issue months (if not years) ago when the bow was first revealed to be from Selkies mother and to have some kind of power. Instead the far more logical and consistent explanation is:
Readers started speculating about why/how the bow might be unsafe when A CHARACTER IN THE COMIC GAVE THEM EXPLICIT REASON TO BELIEVE IT MIGHT BE.
Your continued insistence that misogyny is the root flies in the face of logic and facts. You are asserting something as true not only without evidence, but where the evidence proves otherwise. It’s obvious you have some issues to work with, but its unfair and rude to impugn the character of others without reason.
Which also explains the hostility you are experiencing. It has nothing to do with you being a female, and everything to do with the way you are treating, or rather mistreating your fellow readers. When you make repeated baseless accusations and assume the worse about others they have every reason to not be friendly towards you.
And yes given the glowy nature of Sarnothi technology anyone with even a passing familiarity with both real world technology and sci-fi plotlines in general might reasonable consider radiation as a possible source of unseen, not easily detectable with the naked eye danger. Because in reality some types of radiation absolutely work that way (as do other substances, but I don’t think asbestos or second hand smoke are suitable explanations why Selkie’s bow might be dangerous).
I’m the last person to shrug off gendered attitudes towards characters, but here I’m calling, at least for myself, ‘priority to the person who spoke last’. That is to say, Selkie’s mom isn’t around right now. Maybe she never intended to be away for too long. She can’t monitor Selkie’s environment. Leaving her at an orphanage was already a risky decision, and it DID have negative consequences for Selkie’s health as the people there didn’t know what to feed her, nor did she get properly sized footwear. There was definitely a ‘choose lesser evil’ side to Selkie’s mom’s decisions, and right now the sarnothi doctor might be better equipped to revise them according to the situation.
I’m not saying Selkie’s mom is evil or incompetent, all I’m sayin is _she’s_not_there_. She’s given up custody of her kid, and her decisions from way back when can’t be relied on forever.
Gender has nothing to do with it. Pohl has been shown to be supportive and helpful up until this point. If he says there may be something risky about the device, it’s worth paying attention to.
As for the argument that Selkie’s mother would never intentionally hurt her daughter, remember that she was in a desperate situation. If she was able to acquire an experimental device that would keep her daughter safe but had, let’s say, a 10% chance of giving her cancer, then the choice boils down to a 100% chance her baby will die now vs a 10% chance that her daughter will die later. I think any good mother would take the 10% chance.
We don’t know Selkie’s mother’s situation, but it’s very likely that she made the best choice available to her at the time. Selkie NEEDED that headband then. Why? We do not yet know. Does she STILL need it? Possibly. It could be that the danger the headband is protecting Selkie from has passed. Whether it has or not, though, if it IS potentially dangerous, it’s reasonable to minimize her exposure to it.
Let me repeat, though, NONE of this implies Selkie’s mother was a bad mother, or made a bad decision. Additionally, none of this implies that Pohl is an evil person or a bad doctor.
I don’t know if it is the idiot ball. They seem like a nice family, but for all we know Pohl is really an evil bastard. Just because someone seems friendly, kind and nice doesn’t mean they really are. It’s way suspicious how he is behaving about it.
I don’t think it’s him being evil. I suspect that he’s nervous about the danger the bow might bring to HIS family. I mean, originally it was just “oh poor little Sarnothi girl, she’s all alone without any other Sarnothi, we will help her” Now his family (including him) are attached to this little child who is walking around with a potential target on her.
How is taking something that is obviously meant to protect her helpful?
Giving up her bow for no good reason is kind of idiotic. Especially when it’s possibly a cloaking device that keeps her undetected from any other Sarnothi technology.
Ya know. Just in case they decide to get retribution for her Mother’s crimes?
and that’s why Todd said NO to Pohl taking the bow away from Selkie… Todd DID say that he could STUDY it… but only at THEIR house instead of here, and under a bit more supervision where Todd is in HIS safe zone as well, i guess… so yes i agree that it would have been idiotic if the bow had stayed here for the duration of the testing, but i DON’T think it’s idiotic for them to want to know the most they CAN about what it is doing/could be doing/ and basically everything else they can find out about it.
And they have no proof that it’s harmful but I guess we don’t have to worry until someone hurts Selkie.
When she sleeps, she takes off the bow but keeps it in her room, and it’s close enough to her that it doesn’t trigger the recording. Right?
That was Todd’s argument.
Looks more and more like the bow is inhibiting Selkie’s powers somehow.
I love this theory
It sounds like he almost has an idea what it is or what it may do. And if that’s the case then he should just say something meow.
pat’s the cat.
As long as it’s not like Agatha Heterodyne’s spark-suppressing trilobite!
Mind you, when I was six (second year at school, way back in ’71), my dear Dad gave me an enamelled badge that I would never be parted from. It was just his old steelworks ID badge, but it meant so much to me. Trying to take it off my lapel would have been like slowly reaching for a rottweiler’s dinner- grrrRRRRRR…
Still have it, in a little box of keepsakes. Dad wore it so close to his heart for so many years, any wonder it’s now close to mine?
I see some people think Pohl is touching the idiot ball, and some what he is. but to me we don’t know much about the bow. what much we do know is that one selkie’s mom give it to her, and two selkie’s mom made it for her to keep her save. but we don’t know from what or who, and we don’t know what else the bow can do. Pohl knows a good bit about Sarnothi technology. hell to the point were he made the surface tension amplifiers for Sai Fen. and he is letting selkie keep the bow. what about Agent Brown, I mean does he know about selkie’s mom, if not and he found out about the bow. I think he would take it from selkie, to see what’s it about and to see if its save for her.
One hypothesis I have is that Selkie’s mother may have coded or recorded specific information into the bow. Also the sarnothi may have a different perspective of what they see as ‘protection’ than humans may. So it may be something like coding a memory wipe, self-destruction of the device or brain fry to occur should Selkie be harmed or used as leverage.
yeah, and that’s part of the part i don’t understand about how that bow is programmed… it stayed off of everyone’s radar for “Sarnothi Stuff” that is still classified, and it was only when she left the bow at home that it revved up and ultimately pinged on some sort of detector at the MIB HQ (i know they’re not called that, but you get my drift) so if it was designed to “keep her safe” and had successfully hidden her for this long… WHY generate such an huge energy signature that will practically PINPOINT Selkie’s location for anyone on the “other side” to notice (and to STAY in that state for as long as it did), and possibly send someone to Selkie with orders to “retire, with extreme prejudice” as the saying goes…
Yes, that is very odd, isn’t it?
I don’t know. I’m inclined to believe in Pohl’s good intentions. Perhaps he has thought of some functions the bow could be performing and, for Selkie’s sake, he wants to make quite sure it’s not any of those! In other words, he could be telling the exact truth, he’s just not listing off in detail any of the more worrying possibilities that have crossed his mind.
Still, good intentions are no guarantee against making a mistake. And… this feels to me like a mistake. I’m among those who don’t think her mother would have asked her to wear something harmful.
Selkie’s only eight years old. If she gets out of the habit of wearing the bow every waking hour, there’s a good chance that sooner or later something is going to send her rushing out of the apartment without it.
I was initially inclined to believe in Pohl’s good intentions but I’m starting to wonder, he seems particularly obsessed/inssistent about the bow now.
I can see a few possible explanations:
First: he has a good reason to suspect its dangerous, in which case he should really give Todd more information to convince him why it might be in Selkie’s best interest for him to study it, even if it means she doesn’t keep possession for awhile.
Second: He doesn’t have a good reason to be suspicious of it other than Selkie’s mother has been described as a war criminal and *shrug* why not?
Third: He’s a Sarnothi spy sent to land to try and root out Selkie’s mother/rebels and wants to get his hands on the bow either because its dangerous to the government or he thinks he can get information from it.
His persistence is making me less skeptical of option three …
Well, Pohl’s wife did mention he designed the technology they use in their house for the baby. It’s entirely possible Pohl has a slightly selfish reason and just wants to see how it works.
So what is Pohl not telling us yet?
What DAVE has carefully arranged for us to know, is that Pohl is a qualified expert in the fields of both Sarnothi (Echo) tech, and medicine… and Selkie’s mother, Pol Quar(sp?) is at BEST only the former.
If the barrette is radiating some energy field that hides her from, say, some sort of Sarnothi sensors that can be used to track specific biological organisms at range (remember, they are apex predators/hunters by nature and culture, have advanced energy-related tech, and fish do not exactly leave footprints to follow, so “bio-sensor tech” is a pretty logical branch of research)… that energy field might have side effects to Selkie’s health that her mom may not have known about. Like cell phones giving people cancer (I have no idea if that concern was debunked or not, actually).