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Wednesday: It's like that essay where the girl railed about people using big words because "that's not class consciousness."
"In your taxonomy, steak is the logical ancestor of spaghetti?"
![[Intellectualism as defined by Achewood's Ray Smuckles.]](http://www.websnark.com/archives/thebigyaletank.jpg "[Intellectualism as experienced by Achewood's Ray Smuckles.]")
(Excerpted from today's Achewood. Click for the doing of a thing.)
Wait.
What?
Téodor's speaking perfectly normal English.
Mind, I understand perfectly. Onstad nails, through Ray, exactly how it feels to stand there and feel terminally stupid. The sheer force of people being smarter than you is unbeatable. You know they're not just being smarter simply to make you feel dreadful and small, but the effect is there. You get the sense that, really, this is the intended order of things. Perhaps you should do something about it.
Perhaps you should sit on a nozzle. Doesn't matter what's in the tank. That's how it should be.
I get this. This is how I live out most of the days: fighting the encroaching realization that I am, in fact, a bloody moron. Those around me talk of the basic things of life -- perl, quantum physics, eighteenth-century Liechtensteinian sestinas, calculating the tip -- but I am too stupid to understand. Especially the tip. So I sit over there, uneducated. Radiating uneducatedness. I think, "I violate the natural way of the universe by being in this room. These people suffer me only because I, too, am drinking alcohol. I should wander away and read $INANE_ROMANCE_NOVEL, or perhaps $WOMENS_MAGAZINE, as befits those of my station. Perhaps $WOMENS_MAGAZINE will have an article about $PLEASING_MALE_PARTNER with $TECHNIQUE_EVERYBODY_KNOWS."
Yeah, they don't let me into such as the colleges. But I digress.
You can rage against your ridiculously dim light for a while, and it'll distract you. Tell yourself you're special enough times, and maybe you'll believe it. Ray manages through a combination of bluster and obliviousness. Don't tell him he should go do something. It took him several days to discover his nephew's inch-by-inch suicide, despite repeated suggestions that he should maybe watch the news. He was being creative. Writing historical comics. Coming up with drinks. "Not sitting around seeing Honda Civics -- inventing stuff. That's me. That's how I live."
(Granted, this is nothing on Jaime, the Science Friend. Roast Beef gives a sensible, basic explanation of how laser printers work, and Ray balks. Beef brings it down to inanity, and Ray overreacts. Hey! You can explain the mysteries of Science to the common man! You should have a show on cable!)
On the heels of Cartilage Head, you'd think that Ray would start to realize the ways in which his life is not so charmed. He's getting pretty defensive. He's not keeping it together so well anymore. That MENSA renewal can't keep his ego up forever. Chicks don't dig harlequin costumes, Halloween or otherwise. (In fact, the chicks don't dig him, either, and haven't for a long time; how long has it been since his last successful bone?) It's nothing to do with being a man on the go, inventive, creative, artistic; IQ or no IQ, Ray's fearfully dumb and stunningly lucky. Some day soon, it's all going to run out.
Whether we're actually seeing a confession of Ray's shame or another deflection strategy is probably up for debate. It's likely some of both.
Even so. It's perfectly normal English. Man.
Posted by Wednesday White at November 8, 2005 9:38 AM
Comments
Comment from: Paul Gadzikowski posted at November 8, 2005 10:18 AM
What does it mean when people who get Achewood make me feel dumb?
Comment from: Kail Panille posted at November 8, 2005 10:26 AM
Right there with you. Only substitute "read" for "get."
Comment from: Wednesday White posted at November 8, 2005 10:30 AM
And the usual "explaining my own damn title" post here:
Coming To Power is still a vital and important document of lesbian BDSM history, but some portions still cause me to balk. "An Interview with Sharon and Bear" (a working-class lesbian couple) is high on the balk list, chiefly for this bit:
Sharon: We both go, when somebody says a big word, "What the fuck does that mean?" We always know what each other's talking about.
Bear: It's true. I've never had to ask you what you mean.
Sharon: That's a drag, to be talking to somebody and have them say something I don't understand. It's nice not having that, with bear. It's another kind of power trip that people have if they have to explain to me what they're talking about... I'm sort of antagonistic about it -- is that the word? Sometimes it's not worth it to ask what it means; I don't care. But if someone does it a lot I make a point of saying something -- "and what does that mean?" (Laughs.) I say it in a way so I'm not being put down. I don't feel bad about not knowing what something means anymore. Somebody said to me once, "Look it up." I about smacked her. This woman's a feminist, but that's no consciousness, that's no class consciousness. Don't talk to me unless you can talk so I can understand. Because I'm not stupid. Those people who went to college and know all the big words -- they're real naive about life stuff, to me -- the only difference is that they use big words. They use big words to cover up their stupidity. I don't know. . . I don't use big words, and some people don't know what I'm talking about.
The conversation then proceeds into how class differences can interfere with communications inside of a relationship. I'm trying to apply this sort of thinking to Ray and Beef, and I hear this rant in my head whenever Ray freaks out at the limits of his knowledge.
It's kind of falling down, though, because Ray's always had the silver spoon thing going to some extent ("Hey! Your mom sent Orangina!" back when Orangina wasn't so easy to come by in North America) and Beef is obviously about as working-class as it gets. Am I right in remembering, too, that Beef is pretty much self-educated?
Comment from: Allen Shull posted at November 8, 2005 10:32 AM
Still though--"Taxonomy"? "Logical ancestor"? Isn't it possible that Teodor is simply talking over Ray to get his goat? I mean go to his blog and search for "Ray": this man seriously has Ray issues. This comic for me seems more of an issue of Teodor and Ray's already fragile relationship--will Teodor be soon pushed over the edge, and just smack him in the face? Personally, I'm waiting more in the six month range for something like that to happen, but the fact remains, I think, that something is coming.
Comment from: Wednesday White posted at November 8, 2005 10:35 AM
The man has Ray issues, but, at this stage, anyone who interacts closely with Ray has Ray issues. It could break with Teodor, but that's just one of a number of fracture points.
Comment from: Allen Shull posted at November 8, 2005 10:46 AM
True enough. On the list of "Really Won't Freaking Kill Ray" I see Beef (due to the often-mentioned Past), Phillipe (for obvious reasons), Cornelius (because he seems too sedentary to actually act in any way, and Ray finds him too boring to bother), Little Nephew (because he seems more talk than action, a thousand times over--and again, if I'm not wrong, he's already seen the sad results of violence), Nice Pete (simply because of the different social circles). I can see Teodore physically going off on him quite easily. Pat... let's not get started. Molly's got issues as well. I don't know about Lyle--when was the last time he was even in the comic?--because though he's not consciously putting himself above Ray a lot, Ray's showboating might rub him wrong when he's drunk.
All things considered, I think Teodore's our most-likely candidate for Ray-violence. Of course, then, I also heavily believe in Ray's ability to just freaking get out of the way due to sheer luck. You're right in saying it can't last forever, but a time shorter than forever could still be quite a while.
Comment from: Wednesday White posted at November 8, 2005 10:50 AM
I'm not even convinced that it's going to be violence on the part of the other characters. Ray's perfectly capable of getting himself into a mess on his own, and any and all of the above characters (except possibly Philippe) are fully capable of just turning their backs.
Comment from: Sly Wicked Mister Wolf posted at November 8, 2005 11:18 AM
The thing is, I've never noticed Achewood being all that consistent about character development. I mean, there was that sequence where Nice Peet captured Phillipe, long ago, and nothing ever really came of it. Or even Cartelige Head - Ray seems, to me, to have bounced right back from that without a hitch. I don't view this as a flaw, but I do feel like the characters in Achewood exist in little bubbles of oblivious self-absorption, where nothing really gets through to them.
I can't tell if you're right or not. I guess there are what could be construed as cracks in Ray's self-absoption, recently, although I didn't notice it 'til you pointed it out. But Ray just acts so strangely all the damn time...
Comment from: Eric Burns posted at November 8, 2005 11:19 AM
Don't forget -- Ray's good fortune began when he sold his soul to the devil. And of course he got sent to Hell at least once as a result.
The question is, since he's come back from Hell as it is, when does the good luck run out?
On the other hand, whenever T»odor has a thing, Ray's generally willing to fund it. Which is the other side of the whole Ray thing. Ray's a jerk and a showboat, but he's also willing to get on board. Didn't Ray fund the whole cooking show idea, for example?
Comment from: Eric Burns posted at November 8, 2005 11:22 AM
I'm not sure what could have come from Nice Pete's abduction of Phillipe. I mean, he in fact did bring him to the super secret ice cream parlor. Though the parlor itself freaked Phillipe out.
I'm not saying Nice Pete wouldn't have killed Phillipe. But as it works out he didn't lie.
Comment from: Ford Dent posted at November 8, 2005 11:29 AM
The characters of Achewood, for me, are seemingly changeless entities. For the most part, they continue to live the same way despite being sent to hell or dying for the third time or whatever, which is one of the things that endears the comic to me.
If I could keep doing whatever the hell it is I do after driving around hell, I think I'd consider myself to be a pretty awesome dude.
Comment from: Paul Gadzikowski posted at November 8, 2005 12:25 PM
I can totally hear myself saying, "In your taxonomy, steak is the logical ancestor of spaghetti?" I enjoy retaining a large vocabulary for the sake of precision in self-expression. But I'd more likely have said, "No spaghetti, Gracie?" (I've found though that the Burns & Allen allusion confuses people more often than large words do.)
Comment from: Joshua posted at November 8, 2005 1:08 PM
Is it just me or would that sentence make way more sense as either "In your taxonomy, steak is a form of spaghetti?" or "In your phylogeny, steak is a logical ancestor of spaghetti?"
Comment from: Zutto posted at November 8, 2005 1:30 PM
Even if Teodor confused a definition, I think the passage works. It might even work better, if you see Teodor as a guy who overestimates himself.
Teodor, who bought weed from Lil Nephew during the whole Japan Man thing, holds this grudge against Ray for his pot-smoking habits (something Ray confessed in his blog he's been an old lady about lately). Teodor brings it up almost every time he's even a little upset with Ray and uses it to write Ray off. I think the boy doth protest too much, and sometimes goes out of his way to see the weird things in Ray to keep from paying attention to Ray's qualities as a friend.
So while Ray's overall situation may be headed downhill (as Eric noted, the man done sold his soul -- that's gotta have repercussions), I see the story arcs and little plots as devices to flesh out and maintain what we know about the characters' relationships.
As regards what are/were changing relationships, all I can think of is/was Molly and Beef. Where is she these days, anyhow?
Comment from: Wednesday White posted at November 8, 2005 2:02 PM
Molly's around. Not really doing much; we're not sure if she's even working. But she turns up shortly after Cartilage Head, being upset and slightly bitchy at Beef. And she's been to Trader Joe's, as one does in Achewood at one point or another.
Comment from: siwangmu posted at November 8, 2005 5:38 PM
I'm gonna say this again, and to the question, "Dude, why?" I say darnit, I like liking things! I like it better than disliking or not caring, and I like getting it better than not getting it or not caring. So, uh, other than keeping reading Achewood snarks and hoping they get me into the comic, does anyhow know how I can start liking/caring about Achewood? I've made direct assaults on the archives, but it never sticks.
On another note: the big words/class consciousness thing is a really interesting point to me, because I'm still trying to figure out some of the implications of being conscious of class. God knows I'm not going to change my language because of it, but the little things, like accepting that someone with non-standard grammar does not have to equal dumbass; I still struggle with those, and with where I should draw the line. I guess it may be a somewhat simple "loving the evidence of a good education doesn't need to mean looking down on people who didn't have one" thing, but there is definitely a part of me that refuses to surrender on things like spelling and wants to bite off heads in the face of egregious violators.
Comment from: PatMan posted at November 8, 2005 6:13 PM
A woman I know got into an argument with her coworker because said coworker had filled the entire 'T' drawer in the filing cabinet with files for businesses who's names began with "The".
There's a difference between using complicated words and just expecting someone to be able to function in society.
That said, I was in a class with a guy who couldn't speak in anything less than hyper-formal speach. Often times, he really wasn't making any sense.
Comment from: Robert Hutchinson posted at November 8, 2005 6:40 PM
It helps if you can keep the 10% amount stuck in your mind while you figure out the 5% amount, by the way.
Comment from: PatMan posted at November 8, 2005 6:58 PM
"It helps if you can keep the 10% amount stuck in your mind while you figure out the 5% amount, by the way."
It also helps if you don't get completely confused and end up leaving a 70% tip.
Comment from: Wednesday White posted at November 8, 2005 8:45 PM
Robert: It'd help if I could consistently determine what the 10% amount *is*.
Comment from: Zutto posted at November 8, 2005 9:13 PM
You can get the 10% by bumping the decimal place one point place to the left. It's a lot easier than trying to multiply anything out.
Comment from: Zutto posted at November 8, 2005 9:14 PM
Err... rather, "decimal place one point place to the left" should be "decimal point one place to the left." Fingers are malfunctioning.
Comment from: Thomas Blight posted at November 8, 2005 9:31 PM
You know, just today I said, "It doesn't work that way; you can't stoop to his level. Don't reciprocate his cheating with cheating of your own or else you're no better than him," to an acquaintance during an argument about cheating in a card game.
I then had to explain the meaning of reciprocate, then say its equivalent in french.
I feel... over-linguistic.
Comment from: Robert Hutchinson posted at November 8, 2005 9:51 PM
What I need is less tip-calculation ability, and more is-this-tip-appropriate ability.
Comment from: larksilver posted at November 9, 2005 11:10 AM
Our tax here in Houston is 8.25%. Tipping 16.5% is easy, therefore: just double your tax. Tada!
Otherwise, I'd be in the same exact quandary. And sometimes, I still tip more, because even if my meal only cost $6.00, they still did as much work as if I'd ordered the $30.00 steak, didn't they?
Oh, and pet peeve of mine: if you can't afford to leave a decent tip, don't go where there are servers. There are plenty of places where you can eat cheap without stiffing a waiter/waitress. grrrrrrrrrrr
Of course, if the service sucks, the tip it doth reflect. yep!
Comment from: Charles Duffy posted at November 13, 2005 11:10 AM
perl, quantum physics...
That's being hard on yourself: Perl is intended to be confusing -- or, at least, construing it to be so is the best way I can avoid accusing a fellow who is widely regarded as brilliant of sheer and severe incompetance with regard to its design. (The build system is even more of a work of art -- ever tried to get Perl to cross-compile to an embedded platform too small to use to build the interpreter locally? That was my job for a while; it took two weeks and a bunch of severe hackery, while most other ports I did were finished in 1/7 to 1/14 of their initially allotted schedule).
You might consider Python.
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