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It would be QUITE amusing for Diane to encounter girl-mode Tedd before boy-mode Tedd . . .

Sure, that is the most likely reality. But where's the fun in that? If it wasn't for the ban on time travel, I'd be working up a rationale for Greg being Grace's son.

I can't believe you're still talking about this. I think it's extremely safe to assume that Noriko's younger children are with her in Europe training to follow in her footsteps. Noah's parents are dead and Raven probably knew them because he has been a teacher for a long time and he has had many other magic apprentices than just Tedd's parents.

And now i feel REALLY weird because i'm not used to arguing against viewing things from a detached perspective... This is... strange...

http://www.egscomics.com/sketchbook.php?id=880 Very cute. And yet, I'm sadden that there isn't a 3 character pinup category on Dan's patreon.

The man has lived for a long time next to a river full of very large crocodiles. He is well aware that giant lizards are dangerous. Breathing fire is gilding the lily.

No I'm not saying that, I'm saying that if Tedd wasn't bullied about his appearance, he probably wouldn't have felt he needed a reason to escape by transforming himself, so it could have been years before he started to show signs of being genderfluid, despite the fact that he got the TFG at the age he did, he may have been more responsible in it's use if he wasn't motivated to use it on himself. He'd likely use it occasionally for fun, but it would be a more gradual buildup to the realization of being genderfluid. Like Elliot for example, he was originally annoyed by the idea of being transformed and for a while felt it was an inconvenience to have to routinely transform to keep his energy buildup in check, but as of his date with Ashley we know that it's grown on him to the point where we've even wondered if he's genderfluid as well. If Elliot is genderfluid then it took longer for that aspect to surface in him than it did Tedd. Heck, if Tedd wasn't genderfluid, and yet still bullied about his appearance, it would have been more likely that Tedd would have used the TFG to make himself look more masculine. So the bullies are the cause of Tedd's genderfluidity surfacing when it did, but it is by no means the cause of Tedd being genderfluid.

You misunderstand me. I am not saying that Edward will necessarily fail to understand if confronted directly. I am saying that at this point Tedd has a great deal of justifications for his doubts that his father will understand. Tedd has been harmed, and once burned twice shy.

Given the circumstances, if Edward were to find out about Tedd's Mark, it might help him to understand the gravity of the situation. It is well-known to Edward that such Marks reflect the Marked person in some way--either an innate talent or a strong desire that the person holds. Knowing that Tedd was marked with a gender-altering spell that resets Tedd's unenchanted base form rather than itself being an enchantment would do a lot to convince Edward that yes, the issue does reach down to the core of Tedd's self-image.

I've often thought Diane and Tedd might get along. They aren't perfect matches for each other, but have some common ground. If she could get him away from being a science nerd Diane might've been a bad influence on Tedd. With the character growth they've had since, I still think they might get along well. As long as no one kicks the bomb.

I'm going to go with neither of them are really at fault here, both of them lacked the information needed to make the best course of action clear and did what they thought was best at the time. I think Tedd was under more pressure, and had less of a chance of properly understanding the situation. You can't really expect a kid going through puberty with longstanding bullying and self esteem issues, and feelings he has no context to understand to react logically to the situation can you?

While there is a certain logic to what your saying, you're trying to apply logic to emotions. If that kind of thinking actually worked, Hack and I wouldn't have been getting mad at eachother over clashing views when drinking came up in another thread a while back. Looking back on those events after the fact the people aren't going to see the logical sequence the events took, or the psychology behind how the different responses lead to each-other, they're just going to remember how it felt.

Excuse me? A genderfluid teenager with NO reference for what it is they are experiencing, and it is THEIR fault that they cannot explain what is happening to them? I am sorry. I could not possibly disagree more strongly.

Certainly so. But while I agree with you in principle that one should not judge oneself solely in order to punish oneself, that is not what I have been doing. I have been taking a long hard look at my life and realised that the very culture I grew up in is immensely racist and that this has had its inevitable effect on me. I am now fighting this and I refuse to employ weasel words while doing so. And in fact, it has been an immensely powerful tool for me to make progress. I take pride in this progress rather than allowing guilt to bog me down. And in fact, I found that once I admitted to myself how wrong my old behaviors were -- why, then guilt disappeared altogether, replaced by an intense desire to do better. The opposite is more often the case, I am sad to say. I have met any number of people online who say "I am not really racist" while continuing to be so, the excuse being used to assuage the guilt they feel. Of course the man isn't aware that what he is doing is wrong! He loves his son and has time and again demonstrated the lengths he will go to to aid and defend his loved ones. He got himself fired through the intensity of his feelings when Nanase and Ellen were endangered by Abraham. He would never dream of deliberately hurting Tedd -- which makes it just that much more tragic when you think about the pain he is unwittingly piling on the son he loves more than anything else in this world. But he is nonetheless doing it. In this world, it is the results that ultimately count the most and good intentions in and of themselves are worth little when improperly guided. That is of course your privilege. I disagree strenuously with it, however. I have a long history of calling a shovel for a shovel and there are times for diplomacy and times for presenting hard facts. We are not dealing directly with Mr. Verres in person and even if we were, different people respond in different ways to information. Here and now, I stand by my choice of words. Mr. Verres is transphobic. That he cannot help himself is irrelevant when it comes to his actions and their consequences -- the pain inflicted on Tedd is not lessened by his lack of knowledge of the harm he is doing. When one is speaking of an injury, the intent behind inflicting it does not reduce the damage when it comes to the injury's effects and consequences. Tedd knows that his father is acting in a transphobic manner and as a consequence has lost trust in him. And this is truly tragic, but arguing about guilt or lack thereof will not in any way change Tedd's position and problems in this.

Elliot has a much better cat costume that does not require tights. Ashley's mouse costume is, on the other paw, very cute. But more than a little cheesy. I am thinking this might be a dream sequence. Possibly from Justin's point of view. He is the only one who knows of Susan's list and would therefore be the only one (other than Susan) who would be wondering "what if Elliot was attending a costume party and Susan showed up ACCIDENTALLY dressed as Counselor Troi?"

I didn't see this after I made my previous post, but I feel I need to clarify a bit more because I don't want to appear to be defending Edward in this, but I have to wonder if Edward if even aware that what he says is wrong. Like you said yourself, you grew up surrounded by those behaviours and prejudices and it was later that you came to realized that they were wrong, Edward may not have reached that point yet because either he hasn't realized he's perpetrating these things or simply hasn't been told he's wrong, I don't believe that makes what he'd doing easier to forgive, but I wholeheartedly believe he needs to be made aware of his behaviour towards Tedd, either by Tedd or by someone close to Tedd that Edward couldn't ignore. Edward would still perceive her as child. Adrian Raven might be better, but I'm not sure if he would really consider it important enough to talk with Edward about it - remember, they don't have best relationship, and it could easily sound like him trying to educate Edward about how to educate Tedd. Edward also knows that Grace thinks of him as a father and he made a promise to take care of her, as naive as Grace seems, she's shown to have a way with talking to people about tough subjects. If she can convince Adrian that the world could never be better if people didn't at least try for better outcomes, she should have a good chance of convincing Edward that Tedd needs his father's support.

I find harsh judgments on myself or others to be an impediment to fixing the less-than-perfect attitudes I've picked up. We all do the best we can today. We make amends for yesterdays when we were less than today as long as those amends makes the situation better. My own judgments against myself have added much unneeded misery to my life.

It still doesn't make any sense. With the amount of information we have the blond 12 year old with the baseball cap who frequents the comic shop is just as likely as Noah. ...gets about as much screen time too... I like this speculation. See, this is how you should do it. The age would certainly fit better.

I understand your reluctance and sympathise with your desire to establish a demarcation. I simply do not agree with it. In part it is due to the way I judge myself: when I look back at my life, I can see clear patterns of how I have acted in ways variously racist, misogynistic, homophobic and ableist. And these behaviors were not due to ignorance alone. Much of them came from taught cultural behaviors and prejudices. I am working hard on them these days but simply knowing that they are wrong is not enough. Not only do I still slip up, I also have to constantly and actively watch for patterns of behavior I have never recognised before and sometimes only discover are harmful when someone victimised by them so informs me. Was I racist, back then? In fact, was I all of these things? To my mind, yes. Without question. Trying to soothe myself into thinking that it was 'just ignorance' becomes a mere justification for my own actions, a palliative for my conscience that tells me that what I did wasn't so bad. The problem is that my actions were that bad. Keeping that in mind gives me motivation to work hard on improving and always be on the lookout for backsliding. Therefore, yes. I judge Mr. Verres to be transphobic. This is not the same as saying that he is irredeemable. He is not, but it will take work from his side to overcome it and a lot of it. Trying to explain his behavior away as 'ignorance' is not enough: it assumes that simply informing him that what he is doing is wrong, and him understanding this, will be enough to set everything right. And it won't be. He has a lifetime of learned behavior to overcome, and he can't do that in a day or a week or even a year. It will be an ongoing process and it may take him the rest of his life. I certainly expect this to be the case as far as my own learned behaviors go.

I'm not really comfortable with calling Mr. Verres "transphobic." What he's doing is not cool and hurtful, but I'm pretty sure he just doesn't understand what he's seeing. Like Tedd, he probably didn't even realize gender identity, gender fluid, and transexual are things, especially since he probably grew up with fairly rigid gender roles. From his perspective, it probably looks like Tedd is trying to run away from himself, and he's just not handling it very well. Transphobic is a very strong word, and I don't like using it for what may be just ignorance. (On the other hand, I'm of the opinion that actions can be transphobic/racist/sexist separately from the people doing them) Tedd is definitely justified in not wanting to talk to his dad about recent events.

And there is a theory that Greg is dating Vladia. There's no evidence either for or against this theory.