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Post by warrl on Aug 15, 2020 21:49:13 GMT
Yeah, she's hot in exactly the wrong way for that...
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Post by pyradonis on Aug 16, 2020 9:14:48 GMT
As for Annie, if I recall correctly Coyote once referred to "when" Annie has children, not if. And we know Coyote doesn't lie. Not being a liar does not mean speaking the truth all the time. Coyote is not omniscient and occasionally mistaken, just like a mortal. Sexual orientation feels quite relevant to reproduction, if we disregard the possibility of non-consent. That might have been the case for most of humanity's history, but today sexual intercourse is no longer necessary to induce pregnancy. |
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Post by wies on Aug 17, 2020 5:14:50 GMT
I think something went wrong with that link, since it refers back to this forum page. |
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Post by speedwell on Aug 18, 2020 6:14:44 GMT
Oddly, I wrote my latest comment without having seen this one. But you know how the Internet is  |
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Post by pyradonis on Aug 18, 2020 13:26:58 GMT
I think something went wrong with that link, since it refers back to this forum page. It seems I forgot to include the actual URL and so the default behavior is to link back to the page where it came from. Fixed the original post now.
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Post by merry76 on Aug 18, 2020 14:55:41 GMT
Now that the can of worms with the sexual orientation has been opened: why would she want to have a kid (herself) when there is no partner to raise it? Remember, she will die short after the kid is born... Getting an insemination is something like suicide for her in the long run. This is not something a mother usually wants for her child.
If she swings the other way, and prefers females (nothing wrong with that) there would be someone to raise the child. But it would be so much smarter to let the other female have a kid then. No dying involved that way.
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Post by speedwell on Aug 18, 2020 15:59:56 GMT
Now that the can of worms with the sexual orientation has been opened: why would she want to have a kid (herself) when there is no partner to raise it? Remember, she will die short after the kid is born... Getting an insemination is something like suicide for her in the long run. This is not something a mother usually wants for her child. If she swings the other way, and prefers females (nothing wrong with that) there would be someone to raise the child. But it would be so much smarter to let the other female have a kid then. No dying involved that way. We are in a world where magic is a thing. We don't actually know whether having a daughter is even avoidable for her. What issues are there around consent when you are in some sense parthenogenetic? Alchemy is a huge part of the Gunnerkrigg milieu: what if the generative impetus of the Court is not biology, but something more like metallurgy? (makes a saving throw for posting in Wild Speculation heh) |
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Post by merry76 on Aug 19, 2020 9:52:51 GMT
Now that the can of worms with the sexual orientation has been opened: why would she want to have a kid (herself) when there is no partner to raise it? Remember, she will die short after the kid is born... Getting an insemination is something like suicide for her in the long run. This is not something a mother usually wants for her child. If she swings the other way, and prefers females (nothing wrong with that) there would be someone to raise the child. But it would be so much smarter to let the other female have a kid then. No dying involved that way. We are in a world where magic is a thing. We don't actually know whether having a daughter is even avoidable for her. What issues are there around consent when you are in some sense parthenogenetic? Alchemy is a huge part of the Gunnerkrigg milieu: what if the generative impetus of the Court is not biology, but something more like metallurgy? (makes a saving throw for posting in Wild Speculation heh) Ouch, that would suck: Destiny deceided you needed to be pregnant, so you are carrying the child of James. Why James? Because of the memes. But why - they never had more than skin contact! Because Antimony is part magical creature, sex is optional, but not required. |
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Post by pyradonis on Aug 19, 2020 10:09:36 GMT
Now that the can of worms with the sexual orientation has been opened: why would she want to have a kid (herself) when there is no partner to raise it? Remember, she will die short after the kid is born... Getting an insemination is something like suicide for her in the long run. This is not something a mother usually wants for her child. With Tony being who he is, the same question could be asked about Surma's decision(?) to bear a child. Why have a child when she knows she will die and her partner is unable to raise a child? (And for that matter, also, why leaving the Court explicitly because she did not want her child being born in that place, but arranging for said child to be sent back to the Court as soon as Surma would have died?)
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Post by speedwell on Aug 19, 2020 11:12:05 GMT
Now that the can of worms with the sexual orientation has been opened: why would she want to have a kid (herself) when there is no partner to raise it? Remember, she will die short after the kid is born... Getting an insemination is something like suicide for her in the long run. This is not something a mother usually wants for her child. With Tony being who he is, the same question could be asked about Surma's decision(?) to bear a child. Why have a child when she knows she will die and her partner is unable to raise a child? (And for that matter, also, why leaving the Court explicitly because she did not want her child being born in that place, but arranging for said child to be sent back to the Court as soon as Surma would have died?)
I think the obvious answer has been in front of us all along... by leaving the Court (and presumably the Forest as well) for Annie's birth, she hoped to escape the influence of whatever powered her fire elemental side. It didn't work, so the only place that was considered safe for Annie was the Court. |
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Post by fia on Aug 19, 2020 23:19:31 GMT
I think folks are assuming there is already a set of explanations available to choose between for (a) why Surma decided/agreed to have a child even though she knew she would die (b) why Tony decided/agreed to have a child even though he knew, presumably, Surma would die (c) why Surma and Tony left the Court to have a child (d) why they wanted Annie to return to the Court for her education (e) why Annie might want or not want to have a child herself. But I am not sure Tom has given us any of (a)-(e). The closest in-comic explanation of (a) and (b) is Anja saying Annie is "proof of their love (but only in context of the question "Did Surma really love Tony or was it mind-control?" not the question "Why did Surma and Tony want to have a child?"), as well as apparently Tony thinking he could help cure her; the closest explanation of (c) is a remark by Tony that Surma was "proud", didn't want her child born there (why?), and did not want her friends to see her deteriorate, which sounds like an incomplete one; and we don't have great evidence about (d), which seems to be somewhere between "it's a good school, we went to it, and there are good people at that school who we like and trust" and "there is nowhere else for Annie to go because she's not fully human and the rest of the world won't understand her", with possibly an element of "it's almost the only place to live" or "the Court, or some other entity, wanted/needed/required her back" and "Tony planned it because he knew he wouldn't be able to cope after Surma died". We definitely don't know the answer to (e) because certainly Annie hasn't expressed a preference yet. The fact that she hasn't had a boyfriend yet is not abnormal. Before going to visit Loup, she was in Year 10 still, sort of, although she had to repeat year 9; after that, the Annies are meant to be in Year 10, which is Year 11 for her peers. That means the Annies are probably 15, or 16 at the most. It's clear she has had thoughts about boys (at the very least she has thought Andrew is handsome, been made to blush by Kamlen, and had an odd almost crush slash jealous streak with Jack), and has had a crush on someone as per her conversation with herself, but it's not so odd she has not had a relationship. I had a boyfriend briefly (for a month!) at 15, but then not again until I was 17. And you have to remember Annie's been pretty busy saving people/spirits and processing her mother's and then father's loss and then her father's return. There's a lot of trauma in her life and probably that will get in the way of serious romantic relationships a certain amount. Tom has previously seemed to not want to write a relationship for Annie during the run of the comic; I guess that could change if they get old enough. If GC goes into Year 12 or 13, we may get hints of something like Annie's inclination toward a serious relationship or family, I imagine, and whether the Annies agree or diverge. But I'm not sure the matter will be settled in-comic. My long-shot guess is that Tom will leave it up to readers' imagination what Annie does (or what the Annies do – maybe one of them will have a child and the other won't, or maybe they both will). EDIT: I'm glad this post was my 500th and that it is what gave me Gunner! I will treat myself to a long drag of something, because I feel old. I rarely post more than 2 or 3 times a week so 500 posts are... like 150-200 weeks, about 3 or 4 years' worth. Yikes! |
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Post by Dvandaemon on Aug 20, 2020 5:13:45 GMT
only if she makes that choice The "when" here implies it is less of a choice and more a biological (or etherical?) imperative. That seems more like a general choice of words. I don't think Coyote means to imply that Annie will inevitably choose to have a child (and etheric hybrid or not that story thread has so many issues) |
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Post by Runningflame on Aug 21, 2020 0:51:00 GMT
Destiny deceided you needed to be pregnant, so you are carrying the child of James. Why James? Because of the memes. Ew. No. The "when" here implies it is less of a choice and more a biological (or etherical?) imperative. That seems more like a general choice of words. I don't think Coyote means to imply that Annie will inevitably choose to have a child (and etheric hybrid or not that story thread has so many issues) Well, we don't know what Coyote means to imply, but the intensity of the speculation about that one word stems from the fact that Tom chose to draw attention to it in the page comment. We know that the exact wording of things can be important in this comic: exhibit A ( compare); exhibit B. When the author points out a character's choice of words, it seems even more likely to be important. |
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Post by Dvandaemon on Aug 21, 2020 7:10:48 GMT
Destiny deceided you needed to be pregnant, so you are carrying the child of James. Why James? Because of the memes. Ew. No. That seems more like a general choice of words. I don't think Coyote means to imply that Annie will inevitably choose to have a child (and etheric hybrid or not that story thread has so many issues) Well, we don't know what Coyote means to imply, but the intensity of the speculation about that one word stems from the fact that Tom chose to draw attention to it in the page comment. We know that the exact wording of things can be important in this comic: exhibit A ( compare); exhibit B. When the author points out a character's choice of words, it seems even more likely to be important. Sure but again, but making a storyline about a female protagonist revolve around inevitably having a child... that's, the word isn't cliche but it's one of those things that's just kinda pigeonholing? |
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Post by speedwell on Aug 21, 2020 9:04:49 GMT
Ew. No. Well, we don't know what Coyote means to imply, but the intensity of the speculation about that one word stems from the fact that Tom chose to draw attention to it in the page comment. We know that the exact wording of things can be important in this comic: exhibit A ( compare); exhibit B. When the author points out a character's choice of words, it seems even more likely to be important. Sure but again, but making a storyline about a female protagonist revolve around inevitably having a child... that's, the word isn't cliche but it's one of those things that's just kinda pigeonholing? Remember how tightly this whole comic is tied to ancient alchemy and metaphysics, not to mention mythology and magic, with all that implies. Holding it to strict feminist dogma because the main character is a magical phoenix seems a trifle beside the point. |
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Post by Dvandaemon on Aug 29, 2020 22:56:29 GMT
Sure but again, but making a storyline about a female protagonist revolve around inevitably having a child... that's, the word isn't cliche but it's one of those things that's just kinda pigeonholing? Remember how tightly this whole comic is tied to ancient alchemy and metaphysics, not to mention mythology and magic, with all that implies. Holding it to strict feminist dogma because the main character is a magical phoenix seems a trifle beside the point. "It's all references to ancient myths" is pretty weak justification to me because the ancient myths were all pretty sexist. This is a modern story that already plays liberties with the references it makes in the first place, why adhere to the sexist ones as well? It's not even a "strict feminist dogma" because "a story that doesn't end with the female focus character having a child" is as open ended as the bechdel test. Heck, contriving this whole narrative just to end with this single myopic outcome would be the strict dogma. |
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Post by speedwell on Aug 31, 2020 7:17:25 GMT
Remember how tightly this whole comic is tied to ancient alchemy and metaphysics, not to mention mythology and magic, with all that implies. Holding it to strict feminist dogma because the main character is a magical phoenix seems a trifle beside the point. "It's all references to ancient myths" is pretty weak justification to me because the ancient myths were all pretty sexist. This is a modern story that already plays liberties with the references it makes in the first place, why adhere to the sexist ones as well? It's not even a "strict feminist dogma" because "a story that doesn't end with the female focus character having a child" is as open ended as the bechdel test. Heck, contriving this whole narrative just to end with this single myopic outcome would be the strict dogma. |
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Post by Dvandaemon on Aug 31, 2020 10:19:00 GMT
Yes, really. What's adapted is already arbitrary. Why keep a convention like "a woman must always bear a child" and not literally anything else?
Please elaborate to me exactly how Annie ending up having a kid "because myths" is less dogmatic than doing something "feminist" like anything else.
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Post by warrl on Aug 31, 2020 22:49:37 GMT
There are a number of adult women named in this comic, and as far as I can recall only two or three of them are known to have had children. At least two of them are strongly indicated to have NOT had children. So where in this comic does this "a woman must always bear a child" come from?
Annie and Surma? That would, at most, be "a woman who is part fire elemental will inevitably bear a child if they don't get killed first" - and even that is not proven. Just because all Annie's part-fire-elemental ancestors did... just because Coyote, who is known to not be omniscient about the past or present let alone the future, thinks it will happen...
EVERY woman's (and man's) female ancestors all had children. And yet, many remain childless.
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Post by speedwell on Sept 1, 2020 22:39:25 GMT
Yes, really. What's adapted is already arbitrary. Why keep a convention like "a woman must always bear a child" and not literally anything else? Please elaborate to me exactly how Annie ending up having a kid "because myths" is less dogmatic than doing something "feminist" like anything else. You are missing context, perspective, humour, literary understanding, and the understanding of mythology itself. Your idea of feminism and indeed of cultural appropriation, so-called, has as its desired end result the eradication of fiction. What kind of literature do you expect to produce? And do you really expect to be one of the people on the Great Governing Board of Approval? Think. |
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Post by Dvandaemon on Sept 2, 2020 7:14:51 GMT
Yes, really. What's adapted is already arbitrary. Why keep a convention like "a woman must always bear a child" and not literally anything else? Please elaborate to me exactly how Annie ending up having a kid "because myths" is less dogmatic than doing something "feminist" like anything else. You are missing context, perspective, humour, literary understanding, and the understanding of mythology itself. Your idea of feminism and indeed of cultural appropriation, so-called, has as its desired end result the eradication of fiction. What kind of literature do you expect to produce? And do you really expect to be one of the people on the Great Governing Board of Approval? Think. You think. I literally never said any of this. Giving my opinion is not equivalent to any of that. I never said anything about feminism, you're making it about feminism; I'm just saying it's cliche to weave an entire story to set up and end with a female protagonist having a kid. To contrive such a narrative that yes, does have a lot of depth, to lead up to something not only mundane, but utterly typical. It's ludicrous to me that you're extrapolating the "end of all fiction" from "try something else" which again, is completely open ended. If anything you're the one pushing for it to end by stagnation. By acting like there is nothing else but following old tropes. It's one thing to justify Coyote, because anything other than him is conjecture after what's already happened. It's another thing entirely to assert what must happen because of some nebulous adherence to "myth". And God forbid I don't effusively praise everything. You can assert "the mythology" all you want but until you actually elaborate on that, I'm going to presume you're just talking out of your backside. It's incredibly simple to just assert "the mythology" as a reason for stories to go a certain way; I'm particularly interested in why you seem incredibly invested in the specific ending where Annie has to have a kid. Also why you couch it in ideological terms out of some apparent vitriol against what you think is feminism and conversations about cultural appropriation in some grandiose defense of the concept of all fiction itself. Seriously, please do calm down, nothing I say here will set a precedent to that. You can breathe easy knowing people will write whatever stories they want regardless of what someone on some forum says that strikes a nerve. Furthermore justifying it over "the context of the narrative" isn't going to be all that compelling to me. The fact that instead of actually constructing an argument you just ramble off a list of things, without qualifying any of them, that has nothing to do* with the presumed end of the story betrays all I need to know about how this conversation is going to go. It's going to be tedious to say the least if this is all you can muster. Just disagree and go fume to someone else because I am not licensed to handle your baggage. * However I'd really like to hear how you think Annie inevitably and tragically dying by having a kid just like her mother ties oh so intrinsically into the humor of the whole story. |
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Post by speedwell on Sept 2, 2020 10:52:59 GMT
You are missing context, perspective, humour, literary understanding, and the understanding of mythology itself. Your idea of feminism and indeed of cultural appropriation, so-called, has as its desired end result the eradication of fiction. What kind of literature do you expect to produce? And do you really expect to be one of the people on the Great Governing Board of Approval? Think. You think. I literally never said any of this. Giving my opinion is not equivalent to any of that. I never said anything about feminism, you're making it about feminism; I'm just saying it's cliche to weave an entire story to set up and end with a female protagonist having a kid. To contrive such a narrative that yes, does have a lot of depth, to lead up to something not only mundane, but utterly typical. It's ludicrous to me that you're extrapolating the "end of all fiction" from "try something else" which again, is completely open ended. If anything you're the one pushing for it to end by stagnation. By acting like there is nothing else but following old tropes. It's one thing to justify Coyote, because anything other than him is conjecture after what's already happened. It's another thing entirely to assert what must happen because of some nebulous adherence to "myth". And God forbid I don't effusively praise everything. You can assert "the mythology" all you want but until you actually elaborate on that, I'm going to presume you're just talking out of your backside. It's incredibly simple to just assert "the mythology" as a reason for stories to go a certain way; I'm particularly interested in why you seem incredibly invested in the specific ending where Annie has to have a kid. Also why you couch it in ideological terms out of some apparent vitriol against what you think is feminism and conversations about cultural appropriation in some grandiose defense of the concept of all fiction itself. Seriously, please do calm down, nothing I say here will set a precedent to that. You can breathe easy knowing people will write whatever stories they want regardless of what someone on some forum says that strikes a nerve. Furthermore justifying it over "the context of the narrative" isn't going to be all that compelling to me. The fact that instead of actually constructing an argument you just ramble off a list of things, without qualifying any of them, that has nothing to do* with the presumed end of the story betrays all I need to know about how this conversation is going to go. It's going to be tedious to say the least if this is all you can muster. Just disagree and go fume to someone else because I am not licensed to handle your baggage. * However I'd really like to hear how you think Annie inevitably and tragically dying by having a kid just like her mother ties oh so intrinsically into the humor of the whole story. Naah, I'll just route around you and your unbalanced dogmatism and go back to trying to create a world where both people and culture are properly valued and upheld. |
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Post by Dvandaemon on Sept 2, 2020 16:50:55 GMT
I'm the dogmatist but you're the only one framing all these arguments around ideology like feminism and raising the stakes to all fiction. Okay. It is absolutely hilarious you keep melodramatically calling it stuff like "unbalanced dogmatism" like I'm giving anything more than basic, not even acerbic or malicious, criticism or have any actual ability to enforce my views on this or any other work.
Someone who sincerely cares about people or culture wouldn't be so quick to dismiss either. They wouldn't be so prepared to belittled and mock someone for having misgivings about a work. Giving how you're behaving I highly doubt you're as altruistic as you boast to be. But keep patronizing I guess. Not like you have an actual argument anyway. Snidely copping out after impulsively engaging this conversation with nothing but baseless accusations is about all you can do to save face.
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Post by pinegreenjellybean on Oct 7, 2020 17:44:00 GMT
There are a number of adult women named in this comic, and as far as I can recall only two or three of them are known to have had children. At least two of them are strongly indicated to have NOT had children. So where in this comic does this "a woman must always bear a child" come from? Annie and Surma? That would, at most, be "a woman who is part fire elemental will inevitably bear a child if they don't get killed first" - and even that is not proven. Just because all Annie's part-fire-elemental ancestors did... just because Coyote, who is known to not be omniscient about the past or present let alone the future, thinks it will happen... EVERY woman's (and man's) female ancestors all had children. And yet, many remain childless. Which women are you referring to? |
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Post by warrl on Oct 7, 2020 18:52:26 GMT
We know that Anja and Surma had children. The head lady of the Anwyn, too. (Can I find her name? AH. Khepi.) I can't offhand think of another *named* female who definitely had children. (Obviously, other females did - since Kat and Annie aren't the only kids in the school.)
As for childless named females... ignoring the kids of course...
Jones is strongly implied to be childless. Juliette somewhat less strongly, but she obviously feels free to have a new romantic relationship and leave the court. Same for Jeanne, although rather in the past tense.
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Post by pyradonis on Oct 12, 2020 14:44:49 GMT
We know that Anja and Surma had children. The head lady of the Anwyn, too. (Can I find her name? AH. Khepi.) I can't offhand think of another *named* female who definitely had children. (Obviously, other females did - since Kat and Annie aren't the only kids in the school.) As for childless named females... ignoring the kids of course... Jones is strongly implied to be childless. Juliette somewhat less strongly, but she obviously feels free to have a new romantic relationship and leave the court. Same for Jeanne, although rather in the past tense. Betty (Mort's childhood friend) had a daughter. Brinnie, Lindsey, Bugsy, Idra, Shell and Marcia (the Dryad) are named adult female characters of whom we haven't been shown whether any of them are mothers. There are also the Norns and Mallt-y-nos, but as mythological beings with specific roles to fulfill, their familial status is probably determined by how most humans imagined them. |
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Post by pinegreenjellybean on Oct 18, 2020 0:45:01 GMT
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aslaug#Scholarship According to this story, Brinnie had a child named Aslaug. (Although it's just one of many Brunhilde myths and for all we know, Aslaug could be long gone by the time Gunnerkrigg rolls around  being an immortal parent may not be a walk in the park.)
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being an immortal parent may not be a walk in the park.)