[1027] Dating Tips For Boys, Part 1 Of 4
└ posted on Thursday, 4 October 2018, by Novil
Horse girls are enticing. Don’t fall for them! Or you’re a goner.
- Sign: Dating Tips for Boys – Part 1 of 4
- Ethan: I wish I had a girlfriend…
- Cloud: It’s true, having a girlfriend like Sandra is the best thing in the world! But: Being single is way better than a bad relationship!
- Ethan: Avoid man-hating harpies. Roger that!
- Cloud: Unfortunately, it’s not that easy. Terrible women are often much harder to spot than terrible men.
- Caption: Will make her life miserable.
- Caption: Will make his life living hell.
- Cloud: But here are some types of girls to avoid at all cost!
- Girl #1: I did some soul-searching and came to the conclusion that I need more diamonds to be truly happy!
- Girl #2: Horse. Horse. Horse. Horse. Horse.
- Girl #3: Like, oh my gawd, I hate drama!
- Girl #4: Snippedy snippedy snap!
![[1027] Dating Tips For Boys, Part 1 Of 4](/comics/2018-10-04-1027-dating-tips-for-boys-part-1-of-4.png "[1027] Dating Tips For Boys, Part 1 Of 4")
Snippedy snippedy snap!
I think Landon already kinda both failed and not really… There are not that many differences between “Snippedy snippedy snap!” and “Fire fire fire!!!”
@ Trimutius:
True. I guess the saving grace of that relationship is that both sides are getting what they want out of it for now.
Well, that issue was mentioned in several strips at the beginning of their relationship. I guess that makes me at least a consistent author.
Zoey didn’t get a live interest AAAAAAAAAHAHHHHHHH
Dawhale wrote:
*love interest
So we’ve had dating tips for girls, and now dating tips for boys, so what’s next? Dating tips for raccoons?
@Novil
Is Zoey ever gonna get a girlfreind
I dont understand the horse one
@ shago00:
You don’t want to.
Wait a second, horse-girl looks distressingly like Larissa…
oledakaajel wrote:
Yup.
@ shago00:
Horses take a lot of time so there will basically be no time left to actually do anything in the relationship.
@ shago00:
My brother once dated a horse girl. It did not end well.
Basically horse people can only be happy with other horse people. We normals simply don’t understand their craziness.
Also, my room mate also dated a horse girl with similar results.
I think part of it might be that both girls were very controlling. This might be fine for some men but a turn off for others.
But then again, both girls were mischievous, spontaneous, energetic, smart and playful so I can certainly see the attraction.
Well, I love horses, so maybe the “horsewoman” isn’t one to avoid for me. At least, she is obsessed with something I like.
I’m totally up for dating tips for raccoons.
Don’t at all agree with the idea that it’s easier to spot a man who will ruin your life than a woman, that’s a total fallacy steeped in antiquated ideals. A perfectly nice and debonair man can easily be a womanizer, be a gold digger the same as a woman, or be abusive behind closed doors. Comparing a white trash redneck man to a normal looking woman is idiotic. You could make the same argumentioned reversed by showing a trailer trash woman in a dirty rube top next to a nice looking man in a suit who is a controlling and emotionally abusive asshole.
@ Trimutius:
Depends on what’s getting cut. Someone who just loves to burn things is one thing, someone who has every intention of shortening you, on the other hand…
I believe the word is “emasculate”.
@ Novil:
Flawed characters in flawed relationship?! This isn’t the idealized escapism fluff I ordered!!
So let’s translate those stereotypes. Here’s how I personally parse them:
1: Women who are obsessed with accumulating and showing off status symbols,
2: Women who like horses to the exclusion of most other things (is this an actual problem outside of rural areas? I don’t think it is…)
3: Drama queens who are oblivious to their drama-seeking behavior,
4: Actual sociopaths.
1, 3, and 4 both parse as real, but these are problems with all genders regardless of what the labels imply. So, is there a point to the characterization other than implying boys are oblivious to obvious social problems with people when women are the people in question?
I mean, not that I’d be surprised if that’s the implication, but I feel like the quality of every self-help PSA like this would benefit from addressing both sides of the room.
Time for another round of pin the cameo on the comment!
Will not have to look back very far this time either.
Y’know, for a high school kid, Cloud don’t half got a big ol’ bag of Teh Knowledge…
@ Morbidmort:
And the dude talking to Cloud almost looks like a Rule-63 Luna…
That horse girl’s favorite song must be …….. OPPA GANGNAM STYLE!!
Switch the genders through this whole comic and it’s no different. Personality traits aren’t attached to physical sex.
@ Novil:
Can’t wait for that.
@ Red5:
This. It’s no easier or harder to spot a bad man than a bad woman. Either could, at a glance, look like a complete slob or a respectable person and you’d never know otherwise until it’s too late.
For those not in the know: when it comes to horse-lovers, no matter what you do, you will never be as important as the horses. Any life decision you make that involves your SO will see you taking second priority. It sounds completely silly, but it’s rather shocking (and emotionally devastating) to get blind-sided by your SO unashamedly putting an animal ahead of you or your relationship.
@ TachyonCode:
Women and horses are like men and golf: It’s not that there’s many of them, but if you do hook up with one, I hope you like spending a lot of time in big, flat, green areas you’re paying for and not exactly for bonding purposes
@ TachyonCode:
Are people who exist in rural areas not real? Abstracted more the horselady represents people who are obsessed with their particular hobby at the expense of everything else. Horses are one of those hobbies that take up all of your time.
Also of course boys are oblivious to obvious social problems, so are girls and nearly everyone is. There are mounds of obvious things that humans can easily ignore, especially when they are young.
From my vast experiences …
I’ve never had to deal with #1 (The Gold Digger). at least not personally. but I have beheld them with their victims. Not pretty.
#2 can be generalized into “Obsessed Person”. I’ve known the Feminist, the Anti-Feminist, and the Motorcyclist variants. Some people have so much focus on one blessed thing that there’s no room left for other people.
#3 (The Drama Queen) and #4 (The Complete Loon) are types I have had waaay too much experience with. But I must admit that #4 has a certain … dark appeal. Like a lovely poisonous flower.
@ MidoriLuna:
The Escapist is three doors down on the interwebs. Follow the signs to Zero Punctuation, turn left at MovieBob and it’ll be on your left.
So, the fourth one is holding…customized shears? She must be a gardening enthusiast. An extremely cheerful gardening enthusiast.
Well, that doesn’t seem so bad.
I dunno man, horse girl seems like she knows how to enjoy life. Then again, why would she even need a lover? She’s got it all set.
A few people in the comments mentioned how this could apply to either sex and they aren’t wrong, the thing of it is that the examples given are mostly normalized personality traits for the female gender, now nothing is ever 100% true for every case but for the most part this is how I’ve seen things go.
1. If a guy is always trying to get their significant other to purchase them expensive gifts no one is going to shrug and say “Men, what are you gonna do?” the way they would with a woman.
2. I’ve only every seen guys portrayed as being allowed to obsess over cars or motorcycles anything else sends up some sort of flag while women can fawn over just about anything
3. Do I even need to explain
4. Hard to believe but even this one, women are given much more leeway with their emotions than men, if a guy gets upset or angry that their SO forgot a birthday or anniversary he’s being a baby, obviously there’s a line for when emotional behavior becomes psychotic behavior but its drawn much father for women.
and on top of this because of these norms women get more experience identifying these problem behaviors and personality traits while guys are outright expected to be clueless on this subject. The comic was targeted at the group who probably needed the most help in this area, and by complaining about it not being inclusive enough or general enough you are not helping.
@ TachyonCode:
It’s been clear for some time now that the author has some very skewed idea of women, especially feminists and feminism. So it’s entirely in sync with other comics he wrote.
I just hope he thinks that depicting society’s ideas of sexism over the top make this a critique of them. Doesn’t work that way, though.
His comics about coders are hilarious though, he knows what he is writing about there.
CJ wrote:
Novil has opinions about it. More people have opinions about it btw.
Anyone can be selfrighteous zealot.
Just because you believe you are right about something does NOT obligace anyone to agree with that.
Judge not, less ou want to be judged. (I would say better – if you want to jistě something you should have the defence to bear judgment of the other side without complian)
Being single IS better than a bad relationship, and it’s not always the man’s fault that it doesn’t work out. “A woman’s worst fear is being held accountable to her own actions and statements.”
(1 and 4 are my “It could work…”) 1 I don’t know, can I turn it into a sort of Catgirl relationship? Is she flighty and vain, or is she a collector? (not a boyfriend collector) Could I just be the boyfriend/wheelman for her jewellery store robbery hobbies? Do I have to wave a frond fan at her on a throne?
2 Horses are [b]super expensive[/b]. And then there’s all that nature. Not even counting the nature that’ll get stuck on the bottom of your shoes. Having a hobby isn’t a bad thing, but one _that_ time and money intensive can be. The shower would definitely feature strongly in our love life.
3 Drama girls are the worst. It’s not that it’s all about them, it’s that everything HAS to be on the point of shattering breakdown OR ELSE. I want to see the Drama Bucket empty on her. That would be the compromise over seeing if Larrissa can set drama on fire.
4 I shall call her Mad Harriet and immediately shop for sturdier athletic cups. And protective gear for every other artery-carrying part of the body. She looks more like a Doom player than an emasculator.
@ Novil:
that one can give me nightmares!
TachyonCode wrote:
They do indeed exist outside of rural areas. There are stables where a person can rent space to stable their horse in, much like people rent spaces in a marina to keep their boat when they’re not out boating. Horse owners that do that simply drive to and from their home to the stable.
My guess is the ones that are rural and live on farms tend to be a bit less obsessed, because they can see their horse anytime they want, with minimal effort.
@ TachyonCode:
You would be surprised how many “City” Girls are just so in love with horses. I actually worked in a horse barn for a summer camp for several years. There were sane individuals and then there were slightly less sane.
I’m going to go ahead and state very clearly that toxic men can be just as hard to spot as toxic women.
In fact, in the traditional society roles where the man was the breadwinner for the family, men were more likely to become abusive over the long term than the women, because they held more power in the relationship (Though this is changing with the rise of women towards equality)
Snippedy girl is kinda cute, though
What comes next? The hot vs crazy matrix? (In this comic, I guess Larisa is supposed to be right on the line.)
Seriously, to this list I’d add, if a woman tells you she’s bipolar, run away screaming. You might think it’s the chivalrous thing to be supportive, and only a cad would break off a relationship over something like that, but no, take it from me: Run away screaming.
TachyonCode wrote:
I’d say there is a serious difference between breaking off a serious relationship because of a flaw of your partner (especially one that is not her responsibility, like being bipolar or otherwise disabled) and not starting a relationship with someone in the first place. Bearing hardships together and supporting your partner in difficult times is part of any good relationship. But flirting with someone to try to get into a relationship in the first place is different, it is only reasonable to try to get to know someone who doesn’t bring a shitload of baggage that is difficult to stand.
Brett Bellmore wrote:
TachyonCode wrote:
I think you don’t have all of them translated quite as intended. No. 1 is not only obsessed with accumulating status symbols, she is the carricature of a gold digger, she will expect her partner to cover all bills and buy her expensive things frequently, or will otherwise exploit him (do my homework, repair my bike, walk my dog etc.) while not giving much back beside the occasional making out.
No. 2 is the horse fanatic or maybe just a specific proxy for any woman who is crazy about some very time consuming and expensive hobby – which is a red flag unless you are into the same hobby, because if you can’t share that with her, she won’t have much time to you in her life and during that time she will frequently want to talk about her hobby, which will seriously annoy you in the long run if it is something you have zero interest in.
No. 4 I think is not necessarily meant to be a psychopath, but rather an exaggerated depiction of an extreme feminist (aka menhater, aka feminazi, aka female supremacist).
@ doomedelf:
With all due respect, I don’t know any city people who are really into horses save for one girl from primary school (but I don’t know her anymore). I believe that the horse-girl stereotype is just a stereotype perpetuated nowadays by shows aimed at little girls such as Saddle Club and My Little Pony (yes, it’s for little girls, not grown men).
@ someguy:
At the risk of giving Novil credit where it isn’t due, I don’t see an extreme feminist or a gold digger on this page.
Not to say that my analysis of #1 can’t equally apply to gold diggers, but nothing about the portrayal of “Snippedy snippedy snap!” screams “hey look at me, I’m a chauvinist with my head a mile up my bum, and this is what feminism looks like from there!”
Which either tells me he’s making progress, or is saving the worst for last. There are three more pages of this on the way…
As for the horse fetish thing: if it’s a proxy for obsession with a hobby to the exclusion of all else, that’s also universal enough it scans as real, and yet I can think of ten times more stereotypical examples in men than in women (gaming, gambling, drinking, fishing, sports, work, hunting, survivalism, finance, and hanging out with “bros”).
Which is really to say, the horse thing may as well have been a woman obsessed with her image, because that’s the most stereotyped obsession for women that comes immediately to mind.
*sigh*. What is an over-all a wonderful strip once again descends into offensive stereotypes for a few days. Oh well.
It does say something (good) about the over-all quality of the strip that these digressions into cheap (and harmful) stereotypes aren’t enough to taint the whole comic for me, but I’m hoping he doesn’t decide to turn an equally keen sense of observation, nuance, and understanding to race or religion.
Horse girls are the type that always expect more, if you catch my drift. No man can compare to their desires.