You’d think so, huh?
on February 14, 2016 at 12:01 amChapter: Is A Song Forever?
Characters: Jennifer Billingsworth, Mary Bradford
Location: indeterminate classroom
Happy Valentine’s Day!
Let me let you folks in on a secret: When I wrote this, I was still pretty damned conservative. Â I know! Â Surprise! Â And as generally included within the Conservative Beliefs Bundle, I was still kinda pretty strongly Pro-Life. Â And as this story was meant to be sort of a story about Mary being kind of okay now, clearly for her to be morally in the right she should have kept her Accident Baby. Â But, as I wrote this, I put myself in Mary’s position, and conceded that she might feel differently than me. Â So I had her do what I figured she felt was logical, my personal feelings be damned. Â And as a result, I grew a little empathy.
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…wait, is mary now reasonable, not radical, and empathetic? this is very different than when i read through the first time. glad i’m re-reading as you post the extra stuff! i know that we get to ‘hate mary’, but i like not having to write anyone off as just plain bad. thanks.
…now back to dumbing of age mary : |
Don’t worry, she’s awful again later.
oh no im sympathizing with mary
somebody help me
Seriously though, I did actually like delving into Mary’s character a bit. Not much, and she’s back to regular Mary in a few years, but it was nice to see there was at least something more to her.
Meanwhile in DoA she’s still a harpy.
That’s because she hasn’t had a character-building car chase yet.
♪caaaaaaan you feel the looooooove tonight♫
Oh come on.
… and she will be loved, ♫ yes she will be loved OK, maybe not.
My reaction is to think that’s a shitty thing for Billie to say. I’m not sure what a good thing to say would be though. Maybe something like “That must have been a hard decision for you. I”m sorry.” Not sure if that does it, but it’s got to be better than “Well aren’t you the hypocrite.”
“It’s funny how personal judgments die in the face of personal experience” is a decent logline for Dumbing of Age.
Put it in the FAQ, maybe.
It’s Empathy!
Well people like Mary are why this series of anecdotes exist, and keep going happening still http://www.prochoiceactionnetwork-canada.org/articles/anti-tales.shtml
Unlike many of the people mentioned in this article, Mary at least admits she might have been wrong, instead of rationalizing her hypocrisy. I can respect that.
Coming from Mary is a way harder try than most people actually do. so yes… it’s a nice change.
Damn you Willis, you made me feel sorry for Mary.
Mary doesn’t really admit she’s wrong. She rationalizes it as being necessary to do because it affected her personally.
She’s states that when she answers Billie.
Also, there is no admitting remorse for what she did based, on those personal beliefs: I’d sorta expect that from a person with such strong beliefs against abortion.
What I hear is that she did it because it was what she needed to do for herself. And now it’s negatively affecting her life style not because of remorse: but she doesn’t fit in with her old crowd and the new ones are a learning experience.
I feel sorry for Mary, because no one knows how a woman would feel in this situation. But, I recognize that as a young man with no experience as to how a woman would feel in these circumstances, you wrote it with no sermons and no judgements.. I applaud you.
BTW, I’m pro – choice. I have the right to do what I want with my own body, as does every woman, and the need to pay the consequences is my own.
There are too many reasons that abortion may ever be considered: and rape is at the top of the list.
Whatever Mary’s reasons were or how callous she may seem, I don’t think that that is really the case: Mary never was one to blurt out her personal feelings to anyone. So, she will keep it silent.
Deleting my original response spelling out other good reasons–prolly too many specific triggers in there–but the actual top is birth defects/disease in an otherwise wanted child, because why make the child suffer to ease your own conscience?
Yet I hear anti-choice supporters (which is what they are) argue that even in sparing someone pain, we shouldn’t “play God” and decide who lives and who dies.
Which is super funny coming from a country with an increasing number of mass shootings based on racism and misogyny and [????], seems like wanting to prevent a baby from living a short life of COMPLETE MISERY would be benevolent.
Also, all we’ve been fucking doing as a species is “playing God” since inventing the wheel and harnessing fire and creating civilization and shit.
Personally the only time I really have a problem with the pro-choice thing is in cases like this one chick that I am no longer friends with.
She hated birth control. All kinds. I understand hating condoms; those things are gross. But she wouldn’t take birth control pills. She wouldn’t use a diaphragm or whatever they’re called. She refused to take morning-after pills.
She literally said “I love sex. I hate birth control. My only form of birth control is abortion, and I’ve had so many by now.”
I mean… even if you want to put aside the whole is-it-murder-or-not thing, this is pretty fuckin irresponsible. Like also specifically to your own body. It can’t be healthy to just keep getting abortions over and over again, can it? I dunno, it’s only in cases like that where I have a problem with it.
Well, getting a whole bunch of abortions over and over can’t be considered healthy, but birth control pills aren’t really all that healthy either. They can really mess you up. (And then there’s the environmental damage they cause, but that’s a whole other matter)
Eh, I’ve been on continuous birth control since I was 16 because I have endometriosis, which means massive amounts of pain if I get my period. Like, I broke my neck in high school (hairline fracture but still) and was back in wrestling practise two weeks later, and that is nothing compared to endometriosis pain type of massive amounts of pain. So taking it continuously (i.e., minus that week of iron pills or whatever at the end of each pack) means I never get a period. I’m 32 now and I don’t feel messed up over it. Maybe it’s just on an individual basis, I don’t know.
The Irony is people are “playing God” every-time they have a baby. or try.
And raise a kid.
Its all playing god with another life ,that didnt even exist.
Most human conceptions do end in failures, too. People are just as morally culpable for them, now we know this scientifically.
If every bad conception had to come to full term, people would be horrified. They wouldn’t be able to say “Im not responsible for creating 9 monster babies to create 1 normal kid”
and Abortion would be a religious sacrament by the church.
People with kids who are sanctimonious about abortion arent morally superior. They just have nature doing their dirty work for them out of sight. Spontaneous abortion is the most likely result of a human conception.
@Jen Aside and @Adam Black, screw you.
Go tell a disabled person they don’t deserve to be alive to their face, right now. Because that’s what you’re saying.
Abortion would not and will never be justifiable. It is always morally wrong.
Yeah, shootings are bad. That doesn’t justify murdering the innocent simply because they’re inconvenient to you.
“My life is a do-over” seems telling. And she’s not saying she’s special unlike all those other women, as is commonly reported.
She’s also being honest; she could have told Billie she had a miscarriage.
You’re a Hellofawriter: David Willis.
And young Willis’ heart grew three sizes that day…
mary seems to have an interesting relationship with Willis as he developed as a person and as Mary accumulated her own experiences in comic.
Okay, who else wants a new Walkyverse comic about Mary?
I do a lil’ bit. Probably a terrible idea, but the heart wants what it wants.
I want a comic set after the events of Joyce and Walky! about Jason.
Jason Chesterfield: Agent of SEMME
I would absolutely read this comic.
Not the Mary comic though, she reminds me too much of my own sister, coincidentally also named Mary. Not the religious stuff, but the hypocrisy and general jerkiness.
But that’s the beauty of it. Super flawed and assoholic bitch goes through shitloads of shit to reach character development.
That’s Bildingsroman right fucking there, boiiii!
Filed under: reasons why David Willis is my favorite webcomic author.
She’s just a murderer now. She feels no guilt about slaughtering an innocent. There is no justification for abortion, and there never will be.
This version of Mary is not as… well.. evil as the Dummies, but at the same time… she’s about the Evil…