10-05-18 More than a lover

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gormadoc
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by gormadoc »

Vitocap wrote:
Thu May 10, 2018 7:35 pm
Up to the 19th century, and even to the first decades of the 20th century, if you looked up 'friendship' in a dictionary you would find: "Friendship: the highest form of love."
I was suspicious of the veracity of this, so I looked up "friend" in Samuel Johnson's 1792 dictionary:

1. One joined to another in mutual benevolence and intimacy; more than acquaintance.
2. One without hostile intentions; not an enemy.
3. One reconciled to another.
4. An attendant or companion.
5. Favourer, one propitious.
6. A familiar compellation.

The entry for "friendship" includes "the highest form of intimacy," but "intimacy" had not yet taken on the modern connotation of "sexual intimacy" yet and wouldn't do so until the 1880s. At the time it just meant "close familiarity," also from Johnson. Nothing indicates that friendship is the "highest form of love."

samtheman
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by samtheman »

I get the feeling that Saturday's update is going to go back to the Didi, Lynn, and Maura plot thread which will segue right back into the wrestling plot for who knows how long then that will somehow segue into the wrap-up arc for SDB. We'll find out what happens between Gary and Zii in the last five strips of the entire comic.

And who the hell is this Kiley that people on here keep mentioning? Was she an important character or something?

corwinargentus
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by corwinargentus »

magnetoo wrote:
Thu May 10, 2018 11:00 pm
corwinargentus wrote:
Thu May 10, 2018 5:36 pm
Spidrift wrote:
Thu May 10, 2018 4:45 pm

Yes it has. Ever since Zii told DiDi she was accepted.

(Ménage à trois literally means “household of three”. Missing that point is Not Getting The Joke on an industrial scale of cluelessness.)
Tut tut. Not all are students of the literal, historical, etymological meaning of phrases. The commonly accepted meaning of the term as it commonly used, is, “A ménage à trois is a domestic arrangement in which three people have romantic or sexual relations with each other, typically occupying the same household. It is a form of polyamory.”

So leave us not be too harsh on those who only know the common use of the phrase. :p
I appreciate your support, but (to respond to spidrift more than you) this is a case where the common meaning IS the meaning, whatever its etymology. For example, "deus ex machina", in Greek theatre, originally meant that an actor portraying a god was lowered by a device onto the stage (hence, "god from the machine") and then solved the problems. Nowadays it means a plot device which is introduced out of nowhere to solve a problem: it is not limited in meaning to gods being lowered by machines. Similarly, a "clue" is now understood to mean "something that helps one solve a mystery", and is no longer limited to its original meaning of "ball of yarn given to Theseus to allow him to find his way out of the Minotaur's maze".

"Showing someone the ropes" means explaining how any place of business operates, not merely which rope on a ship has which effect. People would understand "don't touch that dial" still to mean "don't change the channel" even though televisions have not had dials for decades. "Bite the bullet" means "put up with something difficult", even though the invention of anaesthesia has made it no longer literally necessary during amputations.

So yes, the literal translation of "menage at trois" is "household of three", but that is not what anyone means when they use the phrase. That's like insisting that everyone who talks about two people "sleeping together" actually just means they are in a platonic bed-sharing arrangement.
And I do not disagree with you at all. I am just hopelessly diplomatic.

EvilSnack
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by EvilSnack »

Here's the odd twist: Gary can get Zii off, but not Didi. Zii can get Didi off, but not Gary. And Didi can get Gary off, but not Zii. So they all wind up needing each other.

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TheFoolishOne
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by TheFoolishOne »

Oh, I like that one EvilSnack

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DrkChld
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by DrkChld »

I've had a theory for a while...ever since Didi started thinking of the 'open relationship' idea: Didi is not running to Anna, but to GARY! She wants him to be the third member of the relationship; taking them from roommates, to the titular "Menage á Trois" (in both the original, and more recent aspects of the term).

Next comic or two has her running to his work, discovering he is not there, and rather than returning home, she seeks him out through a series of secondary and tertiary characters across the Ma3 and spin-off series SDB & SotR. She tells each person her plans, which has him/her/them think back to how Gary has been a part of their own sexual story (with few exceptions...Jung, for example) and they join the search. Eventually, Didi goes back to the apartment to discover Gary is there with a sexually-supercharged Zii (who is considering jumping Gary more because of her need, but also because she sees how much more open and respectable he has grown since under her tutorage). Didi makes he suggestion that they become a poly trio, and all parties consider and accept. Just as they are starting to engage, the search party arrives, bursting through the door as happens throughout and is a callback to the first comic in the whole series. The story ends. Then in the printed final book, each character gets a "where are they now?" ending for a panel or two. Once again, everyone looks back and sees how their sexual escapades are intertwined with the three main characters, and we harken back to the "Boneularity."
http://www.ma3comic.com/strips-ma3/Boneularity_-_guest

But I've been wrong before.

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Spidrift
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by Spidrift »

Very clever. But completely out of character for DiDi, who explicitly gave up on the idea of getting it from Gary a while back, and directly contradicted by DiDi's last thought balloon.

(Now, the idea that Gary will one day get some thanks from Jung for showing him and the rest of the world that one can have a very healthy sex life while retaining one's geek credibility, is something I can believe. Seeing Gary bump into Aaron, with the latter arm-in-arm with a cute buck-toothed geek girl, and Aaron giving him a respectful thanks-for-the-confidence-boost nod, strikes me as a good possible coda for Gary's personal story.)
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ThePonyGuy
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by ThePonyGuy »

How? Just because she was saying that Lynn would be happy about it doesn't mean that she's going to Lynn for the open relationship. She could just as easily be thinking, "I can't wait to tell Lynn about how I'm having sex with Gary, too!" The "we" is ambiguous, too. She could be thinking of her and Zii as "we."

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Error of Logic
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by Error of Logic »

Unlikely, given that her one-night stand with Gary left her disappointed and him upset. (Yes, I know he had the dumb "a woman like DiDi wanted me for meaningless sex, kewl"-response, but he was also upset that a friend would use him like that.)

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Spidrift
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by Spidrift »

Okay, so let’s get back to my theory that the whole comic is actually the illustrated report filed with the Vulcan science council by Sonya, who’s actually an undercover field sapientologist who over-comitted to her cover story...
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Spidrift
"Brevior vita est quam pro futumentibus negotium agendo."
-- Motto of Hogshead Publishing of fond memory, and wise words to set your Foes List by.
Avatar misappropriated from the wonderful XKCD.

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SailorDh
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by SailorDh »

But she's still not a lesbian...

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Patton
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by Patton »

Why do I get the sense that Thanos is about to make a cameo in the Ma3 ‘verse? 🤔
The antediluvian kings colonized the world
All the Gods who play in the mythological dramas
In all legends from all lands were from far Atlantis

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Rosa
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by Rosa »

gormadoc wrote:
Fri May 11, 2018 12:25 pm
The entry for "friendship" includes "the highest form of intimacy."
Yes, exactly, that's her point. The highest form of intimacy must include love, but needs not include sex, which is a physical act even an animal can perform; thus friendship > coupling. That's what she was talking about. The idea of true friendship as the highest form of love is as old as the Greek philosophers, and as widespread as Asia, Oceania or Africa. You find it often in Japanese animation, for example. In the U.S.A. it is a sad but historically accurate fact that there was an explosion of anti-gay hysteria in the 20s that ravaged the country and pretty much eradicated the idea that friendship is the highest form of caring for someone else. In other countries, the homophobic wave did hit but it wasn't so bad. Here's a link to a French fable from the 17th century that is still taught in schools (remember that Giz and Dave are born French-speakers, with English as their 2nd language):

http://www.la-fontaine-ch-thierry.net/deuxamis.htm
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Vitocap
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by Vitocap »

Rosa wrote:
Sun May 13, 2018 3:17 pm
The idea of true friendship as the highest form of love is as old as the Greek philosophers, and as widespread as Asia, Oceania or Africa. You find it often in Japanese animation, for example.
Oh so true.

It was the main message of Sailor Moon, as I recall. :x

Mamoru: "That's right! I turned evil, and now I serve the Dark Kingdom! And we killed all those girls you called friends! Bwahahaha! So I guess the only path left for you is to join me! Do as I say and don't argue! Follow your man, like a good obedient Japanese woman!"
Usagi: *grabs a big-ass sword and skewers him like a hotdog*
We, the old ghosts of Pizen Bluff, who still roam about this dead forum screaming imprecations at the characters and whatnot.

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worldshaking00
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Re: 10-05-18 More than a lover

Post by worldshaking00 »

I thought it was about love, specifically Usagi's seemingly limitless love, but I like your rendition too.
Image
I imagine Mamoru had moments like this.
"Be excellent to each other." - Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure
"Like my old grand daddy used to say, 'The less a man makes declarative statements, the less apt he is to look foolish in retrospect.'" - Chester Rush, Four Rooms
Chivalry isn't dead, it just followed wherever being lady-like went.

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