Sign. That’s such a sad situation. I understand where Rissa is coming from – when you are this young, with a healthy body, you are still in that “feeling indestructuble” mentality, and grown up in a happy, safe enviroment – it’s so easy to look only on the bright side. Infantuation and youth make it so so easy to sweep aside a million of red signs, to pick up and compromise for someone, who’ll never respond in kind. I hope she’ll grow out of it before actual damage is done…

Ow. What a page. It totally makes full sense Meriam’s aversion to men. But I think Rissa isnt entirely wrong about there being a double standard?

I think something I wish a lot more parents understood from my line of work… Is that regardless of how valid or real part of your concerns are! You still can do deep damage to your kids with your issues.

Idk I know how an adult can (unintentionally) deeply reject you. It struck a chord because the kind of language Meriam uses were used by my own mother to emotionally abuse me.

Im rambling haha. It’s messy and I dont see either of them fully in the right on this, but I think that makes it more realistic.

aaaaaa this update broke my freaking heart </3 i do sympathize w rissa (especially given that she’s so young) but my heart rly goes out to meriam…she’s been through so much, and i hope rissa comes to understand her more as she gets older

I hope Rissa can learn without being hurt (again). The fact that her own fucking father did all that to her and her family and she can still wave it away as just being one man…hope the dick is worth it, Rissa. (it won’t be) Poor Meriam. Rissa callously telling her to get therapy…honey YOU need to quit being delusional and defending men. Your dad raped your mom (maybe she doesn’t know this part). I can understand Meriam has a stronger bond with Shanzey than her other daughters but doesn’t want to play favorites… Stick to your guns, Mama. Grow a brain, dear Rissa.

Not Rissa “Not All Men”ing Meriam. 😭 And don’t you just love it when male-centering women tell the rest of us straight/bi women we need therapy because we’re happier single/febfem? Yes, that happened to me, and yes, I still consider that betrayal the worst thing that came about from my breakup with my final boyfriend. I want to give Meriam a megaphone so she can shout all her best points from the rooftop, especially “Nice men are the best liars.”

If Rissa is only 21 and her boyfriend is currently a practising doctor, he must be a fair bit older than her. Like 25/26 minimum?

You’ll have my axe if someone see this page and blame Rusty for being “heterophobic” (?). Rissa is right, not all men are abuser like the moss of Chris, but even I’m straight and I know most of the Relationship violence is caused by men. And other commenters said it better, Rissa is staring at her boyfriend with pink shades, ignoring that Meriam had to endure violence from two men, of course she knows what she’s talking about.

This hits seriously close to home. I’ve semi-accidentally had my couch become the local friend-circle’s emergency shelter for a bit, and I’ve had enough of those conversations for a lifetime to be honest. The thing that breaks my heart the most, I think, is when women, freshly out of a really bad relationship or even still in it and just escaped for a night, respond to the very gentle suggestion to not date men, even for a while at least, with some sort of accusation of you not wanting them to be happy or wanting them to be alone or anything like that.
 

No! I would love nothing more than for you to be happily partnered with a guy in theory but men are not doing their part in allowing that and I am simply not in a position to do anything about that for you! I can’t fix them any more than you can, and until it’s not a risk anymore I cannot in good conscience tell you, my friend or my friend’s friend or really any woman, that you should continue spinning that wheel hoping to land on the unicorn Good Man(tm).

Ugh, sorry. Got emotional. I wish Rizza the best, I really do. But I’m also a little angry with her – not for dating men, but for how she treats her mum here. Dismissing her trauma like that, dismissing her advice like that, making it all about herself. I get it, she’s young and hurt and in love, but I hope some day she’ll look back on that, think “man, I was an ass to my mum there,” and pick up the phone to reconnect. Hopefully without/before getting hurt by that or any other man.
 

And now that I got that out of my system: beautiful work as always, Rusty. I love the way the writing changes to convey tone, and the last bit, with the interrupted “be safe” is devastating.

Uuuuurgh. I feel really bad for them both and can see where both are coming from.
 

I might get hate for this, but I think the lesser of two evils here would be Meriam meeting the guy so she could at least give Rissa an informed opinion (it’s very worth noting that he’s SIGNIFICANTLY older than Rissa and in a position of power over her.) about his shittiness as an individual as opposed to saying “It’s normal for all men to be shitty”.

99% of women aren’t ever going to completely avoid men and Rissa is clearly one of them, so IMO Meriam’s best bet at protecting her daughter would be being in the picture instead of by making Rissa feel pushed away, judged and unloved. “Why does my Mum hate men more than she loves me”
 

It’s messy though… I appreciate you treating Rissa’s feelings with respect, even though hers is a position most here obviously don’t agree with.

FAMILY DYNAMICS THAT WERE SET AGES AGO BEING SO HARD TO ESCAPE FROM. THE ABUSER IS GONE BUT HIS PRESENCE LINGERS. It’s so realistic. I know people who spend their whole lives trying to escape a Set Family Dynamic that was made up in childhood.
 
See the thing is I look at this page and go WHAT ABOUT ROCKY?! it’s not a Meriam&Shez vs all her other daughters. I think. One could arguably say ROCKY would be hurt the worst by a man in the house. Of course I don’t know for sure we haven’t been shown. But I would suspect Rocky is more scared of men then Meriam and Shez are. Shez and Meriam are down to fight. I can imagine Rocky just feeling sick and paralyzed and unsafe and not wanting to burden anyone and feeling like a prey animal in her own home. I remember that feeling so clear haha. Housemates bringing men who don’t feel safe to me in our space. Though I KNOW my feelings of discomfort are nowhere near Rocky’s. I’m just like “ugh i don’t like him i’ll hide in my room” but Rocky I bet feels much more blind terror. That Panic Attack Feeling.
 
But again, those family dynamics that remain the same. I think Meriam and Shez are more willing to have this MAN fight. They’re more willing to be the MEAN BAD GUYS. They’re more willing to be told “GO TO THERAPY” right to their faces. I don’t think Rocky wants to be part of these fights. She just wants to live her peaceful life. So there you go again, Meriam and Shez being the family fighters family shields, still after all this time. Neither one of them ever bringing Rocky or her feelings up because they don’t want to throw Rocky into this fire. They don’t want to make Rocky more alienated from her other sisters who are taking offense at all of this. Meriam and Shez are down to take the bullets, to be Mean And Bad And Rude by saying No Men….
 
So anyway. Time for TenBelow’s MEAN MOMENT in the comments. Watch out everyone! MEAN MOMENT. I’m not among those who has sympathy for Rissa. Not every woman in this story deserves what I’d call… empathetic coddling from me HA. They are grown adults who should be smart enough to know better, and even if they aren’t smart enough they should be KIND to the women who love them rather then yell in their faces and defend some crappy man. Though I do tend to be more understanding to women, I know these women have social pressures that pushed them here, I can still think of them as dumb and annoying, especially in the context of them being fictional. Maria and the horrible stuff she put her daughter through because of BLAH BLAH TRADITIONAL MALE VALUES? WRETCHED. Whatever the heck Blair is gonna do? EVIL. Already giving Riley traumatic episodes here. Rissa? Come The Heck On Girl. Alex, Riley and Meriam have been nothing but kind and sacrificing to these women who are spitting in their faces. They don’t deserve it, and I just don’t see how Rissa deserves a bunch of sympathy. Meriam is here trying to explain herself gently and reasonably, and Rissa is pretty quick to start using disrespectful tones and screaming. I also can’t help but wonder how much of this dialog is Rissa’s own words vs stuff Beau has told her. Wouldn’t be surprised if the rancid doctor man is making things much worse, if he’s being an angry entitled man who’s soooo mad his gf’s family is MEAN to him. Wouldn’t be surprised at all if this guy was riling up Rissa way more. Wouldn’t be surprised if this man is the one who’s emphasizing that Meriam and Shez are CRAZY from trauma. It’s just my imagination and nothing we’ve been shown, but I believe in a version of Rissa who could see Meriam and Shez’s responses to men as being logical and rational once. But now that she Likes A Special Man, she loathes it. Like if Beau was really cool, he could be like “Listen, Rissa. When you explain what your family has been through, it makes sense. Maybe someday they can grow to trust me. Until then, I respect the rules.” but we know COOL MEN don’t exist in LeaseBound. If they do they die (rip jaden dad)
 
I guess to some extent it shocks me to see so many people being like “oh my gosh… they’re both right…” Nope. Not Me. Rissa, chill the heck out. You could have handled this conversation with more compassion instead of disrespecting your mom and screaming. Meriam isn’t being a complete raging jerk going “What? You’re dating a man? That’s against the rules. I’m kicking you out of the house.” She is protecting herself and her other daughters who have trauma. How would Rocky handle this guy being integrated into the family? I’m sure that would make everything easier. Rissa would stop screaming. Rocky would suffer in silence. But you know, Meriam doesn’t choose what’s easy. She always chooses what’s best for her family, even when it’s hard.
 
I step off my soap box and walk away

Ah, gotta love the separatism discourse. Interesting to see you tackle it this way when the rest of your comic is so mature and nuanced (minus the spicy straight gang lol). Though this could be me unfairly deciding the bits of nuance I could find as being accidental. With how wonderful the rest of your work is, I think I should hand it to you instead!

If at any point in reading my comment you think “Hey! That’s not a fair representation of my side, you’re making us out to be heartless, stupid, bull-headed assholes!” welcome to how it feels to be me and the other women you aren’t willing to listen to! 🙂

*cracks knuckles* SO

Nuance Point 1: Rissa is only 21 and this is (presumably?) her first boyfriend. She is not a fully mature adult yet and she’s overwhelmed by that powerful first-love (“”love””) emotional wave. The thing that combined with male supremacy’s downplaying of men’s faults and abuse convinces countless women and girls to start relationships with awful men as well as stay in them. I know, I was one of those girls for a full year of my life.

It fucking sucks because no matter how many times I came home from class crying my eyes kut because of him, I still wanted to be with him and was convinced he actually cared about me deep down but didn’t know how to express it. Only after I was forced apart from him because I graduated did I get the clarity to see how wrong I was, that the idea of him in my head wasn’t who he actually was, that I was emotionally starved and he was just unfortunately the first guy to ever show any romantic interest in me. It’s so obvious and it was back then but no matter how many times my mom tried to help I would always go back to him. I genuinely think there are just some things the human mind can’t be convinced of until it’s willing to accept them. Which gets exacerbated by male abuse and violence towards women being normalized. It’s a problem as big and complex as the universe itself.

But what the lesson needs to be for women is to learn from their and other women’s experiences. Don’t let this stay the norm, understand it’s wrong and hurtful and to avoid it by looking for red flags. The problem is almost all men and women have misogynistic apologism for men baked into their brains, so the only things normalized as red flags are literal criminal offences… and even then THOSE are usually explained away.

It’s not a case of women being stupid (like Rissa’s mother says) or the abuse being their fault because they didn’t avoid it. (Nuance Point 2: You did a great job here, as you did with Jaiden’s mom, in showing how many entangled issues come with trying to leave an abusive relationship!) We’ve just told everyone including ourselves that men treating us like shit in varying ways and degrees is normal. Ideally, listening to and believing women’s experiences as well as understanding you yourself deserve to be treated better and have higher (aka normal but “”abnormal”” in this world) standards would be enough, but unfortunately 1) for a lot of women it’s still not enough and 2) most women will never even reach this not-good-enough starting point in the first place.

But that doesn’t mean it’s impossible for a straight or bi woman to truly understand herself, what she needs and deserves in a relationship, and be willing to cut a man off immediately upon breaking her boundaries or trust. It’s not impossible for mutually beneficial, mutually loving straight relationships to exist, even if they’re rarer than they should be. Even if it takes a lot of work to find them.

I really don’t disagree that the vast majority of men are selfish misogynists who suck the life and joy out of women via one-way relationships. The amount of effort and mental training it takes to find a man who won’t treat you this way is very likely more effort than it may be worth having a relationship with him. If that’s true, or if it’s just not possible for some straight and bi women to truly believe they deserve a better relationship dynamic than what they are told is possible, then I honestly do believe most straight women would be better off being celibate and bi women choosing that or dating women only.

But when pro-separatist women talk about separatism in such a black-or-white, un-nuanced, “you don’t have to date who you’re attracted to, just give up on a neutral, fundamental need of humanity or you’re a bad person who hates women and want us to stay oppressed” way, to be so gung-ho and inflexible about such a deeply important issue that you, frankly, objectively have an extremist opinion on (compared to what’s normal, which is unhealthy, but still it’s normal) when most women aren’t even willing to accept mild criticism of their optional, clearly sexist, money-and-time-sinkhole hobbies like makeup and nails… yeah it’s not gonna go over well is it!

If your goal is to actually convince straight and bi women to become separatists and/or celibate/febfems, and your target audience is outright telling you “hey, this isn’t working for me!” maybe it’s a sign you need to change tactics?

Like an example in the comic (beautiful palette btw!): Rissa correctly points out an objectively unfair difference in the way her relationship gets treated compared to her sister’s, just like the women you’re trying to convince, and her mom just.. doesn’t have a response to it. (Nuance Point 3: this is how it always goes with pro-separatists I’ve noticed, so if that was an intentional demonstration of the faults of your side, then very well done!) If you can’t find a good answer to a point brought up by the people you want to convince, how and why do you expect them to change their minds? (This lack-of-any-answer-to-a-prominent-question behavior was literally the reason I started to peak on trans ideology btw, so it’s pretty important to address I’d say!)

You can’t just throw statistics at us and call it a day. How many of you drive a car despite how absurdly likely it is for you to get seriously injured or die in a car accident? Look up the stats now if you aren’t aware how prevalent it is. Did they alone change your mind? Are you now going to sell or destroy your car? Do you now believe that any job that requires you to have a car isn’t a job worth having, that you should restructure your entire life around not using what society has forcibly made a basic need? Let’s keep in mind that cars are not a fundamental human need that exists in us regardless of what type of society we develop. (Back to the comic, let’s also keep in mind tha this specific argument is, from Rissa’s POV, not even about statistical male violence she likely isn’t even aware of but ONE single guy who behaved in an obviously abusive way she doesn’t see replicated in her boyfriend. This may be intentional and another Nuance Point but this one feels the least likely to me, it’s pretty clear you want one instance of abuse to be enough to change minds. I agree, ideally it SHOULD be enough to make women fed up! Unfortunately, we know that’s not how this works, that’s not how any combatting of internalized misogyny works.)

It’s so so so easy to say and believe that cutting off all men is the only path forward, just look at the statistics, any relationship that’s unequal is one not worth having when you’re already convinced of it all. Most women aren’t even on level 1 of feminism, many are even on a negative level! Misogyny is so prevalent it even manifests in most women, it’s what you talk about all the time, I literally beg my friend’s mom repeatedly every day to try to help her with chores when she’s exhausted and overworked and ill and she always rejects me because she doesn’t know what else to do with herself and probably thinks this is the only way she can prove she’s worth something as a human being… but yeah the only reason women wouldn’t go turbo-separatist-mode immediately after 1 conversation with you is because they’re selfish and stupid and think heterophobia is real.

Nuance Point 4: Rissa’s mom’s responses here, as many separatists’ arguments do, literally help cause the problem she’s (you’re) trying to solve. (Especially ironic too, when you’re the ones proclaiming male-partnered women are the strongest perpetuators of misogyny if not the cause of it via birthing more men lol.) Instead of teaching other women what to look out for, giving them a template for what a good relationship should look like, guiding them to realize they deserve to have boundaries and standards and discover them, it’s just “fine fuck you, see what happens and don’t come crawling back when I’m proven right, it’s your own fault for not listening to me.”

It’s such a huge contrast to how Shanzey (fav character btw!) decides to address her trauma: let’s teach other women how to become strong and keep themselves safe! Yes!! Imagine if she had the same backstory but grew up to say “With how clear and obvious it is to women that men are dangerous, they obviously need to learn self-defense, but they don’t choose to teach themselves how like I did because they’re stupid dick-panderers who care more about men than their own selves, let alone the rest of us.” (Nuance Point 5: she’s a very nice contrast to her mother in this way, and it’s very understandable and realistic how both of them would develop their respective mentalities about their pasts!) She realizes this is a massive blind spot for a lot of women and that she can help fix it by working with them and teaching them how to help themselves. Again, such a huge difference between her panels have detailed, illustrated instructions on how to destroy a guy’s nuts (can’t express how much I love you did this to teach the viewers at home btw) and this argument which is almost entirely text on a black background where one side is completely unreasonable and immature and the other isat worst, not phrasing her point of view very well but it’s understandable because she’s reliving her trauma. (Ignore the fact that Rissa is also traumatized, she’s repeating the cycle of abuse by choosing to date a guy we LITERALLY KNOW NOTHING ABOUT and we’re supposed to just assume he’s abusive and bad because he’s male. And Rissa is naive and/or stupid for wanting to act on her innate attraction like so many lesbian and bi women in the comic get to do. Ok.)

I’ve rambled long enough honestly but I want to close out by making this comparison: let’s pretend we live in an even worse hell world than we already do, where literally every single person on earth believes trans-identified men are women. Their brainwashing worked, not a single person alive is taught actual biology and truly believes privately recognizing someone’s sex is the same mental process that white supremacists do when drawing exaggerated racist caricatures. Objective reality would still exist. Biological sex would still exist. We would just be trained out of learning about it and having terminology to refer to it.

This is the state of opposite-sex relationships to me and so many women: there is a way for them to exist free of misogyny, as an objective, neutral concept. We can experience mutual love, it’s possible for it to be real, even if it’s buried under 1000 layers and centuries of misogyny. Even if everyone else believes it’s impossible.

Maybe it actually isn’t. But don’t tell me I don’t get to try to search for it for myself just because you told me you already looked. Don’t tell me I’m stupid and selfish for wanting to have hope. Maybe my hope needs to be crushed, like it did back in school like before. But if I don’t learn that lesson myself, and if you can’t give a good answer or even acknowledge my point to an important question about my fundamental state of existence, I’m not going to be convinced until after I try.

I know I’m very late but if you wouldn’t mind throwing my a reply I’d really appreciate it. Or any hardline separatism-or-bust commenter here! Even if you just take my comment to heart privately though, that’s enough for me. <3