I have to admit I feel a bit disappointed… The guy had better be very serious about turning over a new leaf, or else this will be a most pathetic action for her.
Well, he was pretty boorish when she stopped being hot and bothered and got confused. “Are you okay? You kinda jumped me” would’ve indicated that he was actually, y’know, paying attention.
Oh, well. Maybe she likes how he cringes when she threatens violence; she can chain him up in the dungeons in the future and make sure that he remembers to be polite. 😉
Except it’s no different than taking advantage of a girl who has been drugged or who is drunk. She wasn’t in control of herself, therefore she couldn’t give consent.
Also, there’s the fact that the guys was a pig and he was clearly somewhat sexist when we first saw him.
Urazz
I personally put much of the blame on the male guard but more onThane/the First Faerie. I’d blame the male guard more if the female guard was acting like she was disoriented and drugged but she wasn’t. She was just acting horny and jumped the male guard. Granted the male guard should’ve questioned why she was acting this way but I think at that point when she was stripping, most of the blood from his brain went ‘elsewhere’ and his thoughts were more on sex at that point.
I think it’s adorable that she feels bad for being mean to him afterward. That male guard BETTER turn over a new leaf or he can be sure he’ll be ripped a new asshole.
If you’re not careful, the faeries are going to end up doing everyone a favor. They’ve already sexed up the ogress, given Marie a night she’ll never forget (shame about the followup) and brought together who knows how many peripheral couples.
????
I remain confused at the attitude about the male guard.
He was on watch with someone he found very attractive whom he was willing to approach DAILY.
Without any knowledge about what was REALLY happening, the woman he has lusted after peels out of her armor and jumps his bones.
She snaps out of the enchantment in the MIDDLE of what’s going on and the WOMEN here thinks he’s a PIG for “Taking advantage” of her when she was “UNDER the Influence”. I checked:
1. He didn’t notice she had the galloping hornies and stepped up to be trampled – she came AFTER HIM.
2. Until she came out of it – she was running the show and he was along for the ride.
3. If he REALLY didn’t have feelings for her, I doubt she could’ve damaged him as much as written.
Yet this guy is all kinds of dirt.
In his place esp after a woman tried to blaim me for her taking off her own panties and jumping on me then trying to beat me into submission for letting her do it,.. I wouldn’t even talk to her, Without an explanation from a reputable source, (Wizard enters, explains the area effect enchantment, leaves.), any attraction I had for her would be gone.
I have to admit, when I wrote that script (a good while ago), I really didn’t expect it to cause THIS much debate. But in hindsight, it was a little naive of me.
At any rate, this webcomic isn’t meant to be too serious or credible or realistic. I’m hoping this story arc is going to bring some karmic justice to the “crime” committed by the male guard, as well as provide some comic relief around what is, in real life, a real and serious tragedy.
At the same time, I’m still intrigued by the moral ramifications of an act that (in the context of what happened in the strip) sits in murky ethical waters. It’s clear the female guard didn’t like him much (or at least that she displayed hostility toward him). It’s also clear he lusted after her (who can blame him — he’s a guy, thus he lusts after all things female). It’s a fact that he did NOT cause the situation. The spell did. A spell carried by Sir Thane. Who, incidentally, is aware of that spell and of the effect he has on women.
My question is: why is no one blaming Thane for this? I don’t mean in the world of the strip, but you, readers, have so far put the blame on everybody BUT him. Is that because he’s a blubbering idiot? That doesn’t seem to me like much of a defense. If we liken his curse to an STI, isn’t he committing a crime any time his “infection” affects someone he comes into “contact” with? Why is the focus so much on whether the male guard is guilty or innocent, instead of on Thane’s part in the “crime?”
Thane does not escape the blame for 100%, but I have to ask: is he constantly aware of the danger he poses to women all around him? I mean, he came riding to the rescue of what he thought was a damsel in distress. Does he have enough brainpower to do something and remember something important like the curse at the same time?
I didn’t blaim Thane for three reasons:
1. The guys an Idiot. Well meaning and chilvarous, polite as royalty could be while still being able to admit when he’s wrong and apologize – but STILL an IDIOT.
2. What is he supposed to do while cursed? live out in the middle of nowhere for the rest of his life? I got the impression that he was casting about for a solution with his horse playing the part of advisor and friend. So while he should do more to try to lessen the effect, (Dunno,.. wear a sign?), He’s got to go “somewhere” to fix this.
3. Thane is a victim,.. Sumbody find that Fairy.
Having read what has been said though,.. I’ll try harder to just read and enjoy and not consume and digest.
(Sigh – And I wanted the ramifications of the young prince and the maid to be resolved too,… Meh.)
Baby? Now thats one Ogress I wanna see more of now that she’s been tweaked.
Hmm .. not sure why we don’t blame Sir. Thane, for my part it’s because I can’t remember reading anywhere that he is aware the females lust for anyone but him seeing as the 2 cook sisters jumped him and not his entire army ..
But then again the horse knows, or must know, so mabye the blame should be put there if anywhere.
But now your here Jaycee, how did you persuade Sir. Thane to enter the city, my guess would be that he is still sore after the earlier unknown visit to the cathouse..
And as such if he wasent a blubbering idiot he would shunt any place with more than 3-5 females ..
He heard Heather scream when she was in the throes of lust with Aidan, and he thought there was a maiden in distress. Idiot he may be, but he thought he was riding to someone’s rescue. Things kind of snowballed from there…
I find this thread fascinating. There’s an implicit association between intelligence/awareness and guilt. The faerie is intelligent and aware of what she’s doing, so she’s guilty. Invertedly, dimness/cluelessness appear to excuse criminal negligence. Thane, who’s not very sharp, is mostly excused because of his natural chivalry and candor.
No one seems to care that Thane was given a way out very early on (to pay the faerie for the affront), and refused to do so (greed at work?). Doesn’t that burden him with SOME of the guilt?
Though on the given a way out by the First Faerie, it was an accident and he did apologize. And how sure are we that the Faerie would have left him alone if he did pay up?
Though maybe not paying does land him some of the guilt, but also, did he have the amount she asked for?
Note that Thane seems to have known **** all about faeries before he first encountered one. If he’d had any inkling of the kind of spiteful inventiveness they’re capable of, not to mention their power, I doubt he would have gone anywhere near the forest, let alone taken off his codpiece while he was there.
He more than likely would have ponied up the cash, too. Instead, he seems to have been completely ignorant and therefore unwilling to pay an outrageous sum for the offense he actually committed. Some stinginess may have been involved, yes. But did he even have such money to spend at the time?
I think it’s plausible to say he had the sum. After all, he was off to wage war against his enemy, and he money was estimated to about one month of wages for his army. Not a negligible sum, for sure, but probably within his means.
–Jaycee
Jake
But that money was for food to feed his men, so you can’t say he was being selfish. Then again, they abandoned him after he got cursed, so maybe he should have payed.
But again, that’s assuming the Faerie would honor the deal.
Urazz
Yeah, I was under the impression that he did have the money to pay that faerie but I was under the imperssion that it was to be used for his army. Not only that but the faerie’s demand in price was pretty high if it’s enough to pay for Thane’s army for a month. So I wouldn’t really say that was a case of greed on Thane’s part because would you have paid the fairy that exhorbant amount of gold she was demanding if you were in his position. I know I wouldn’t have. Of course I would’ve apologized more than he did and ask if there was some other way I could repay the insult than getting cursed.
Not to mention there’s no guarantee that the faerie wouldn’t have started causing havoc amongst Thane’s army afterward. Those faeries are big enough trouble makers to do something like that from my impression of them.
??
Fifty gold crowns (Based on the Horse) is a month’s upkeep for a small army.
He “showered her” by accident. He Apologized IMMEDIATELY, but I don’t blaim him for balking – He didn’t do it on purpose and no harm was done.
For me the equiv would be the Captain of a small cutter with something like 50 to 200 crew making a local social blunder being told to pony up 7,500.00 to 300,000.00 to the injured party.
That’s not cheap,.. It’s criminal – Someone find that Fairy.
We all agree that Thane is not too bright,.. but he is written as a good guy.
(Sigh – his treatment of Baby underlines this – a “bad” person wouldn’t care.)
I still don’t see why the male guard is being vilified so much? He didn’t put a spell on the female guard and no way of knowing she was under a spell. Afterwards, she breaks his arm and people wonder why he didn’t try to find out why her behavior changed. She broke his arm, why would he want to go anywhere near her? And then to have to go back to work with the bipolar woman who from his point of view created the situation?
Also when she stops midcoitus, he doesn’t press the situation. She was on top of him while he was waiting for her.
Problem is that for all we could know, he could’ve thought she was playing hard to get or something. Granted he is a bit of a pig in his manners but he certainly doesn’t deserved to be villified. He would’ve deserved to be villified if he kept on having sex with her when she came back to her senses and freaked out.
The only thing that annoys me about the male guard is his reaction to his partner’s distress once Sir Thane was out of the area of influence. She was clearly upset and confused, and he was like, “So what, let’s finish.”. Very callous.
As for Sir Thane’s role in the matter, yeah, he’s pretty much to blame, but I’m wondering how aware he is of the sex aura he generates. Sure, he knows he can make women pretty, as evidenced by the twins and (probably) the women at the Willing Wench, but at other times I imagine Gus has steered him out of the way many times, like he did in the marketplace.
The blame could rest equally on many shoulders here, but I’m in Gallstone’s camp. If Thane had paid up when the faerie made her demand, a lot of what has transpired would not be. Or, if he’d aimed a little to either side….
The reason Thane isn’t blamed is because your audience doesn’t consider him anything but a plot device of the Fairy’s curse. His only aspect is as a cardboard cutout for jokes.
The audience recognizes this, therefore he isn’t a “real person” and isn’t responsible for anything that happens. The author is, but not the character.
Your audience is casting their own experiences onto the two guards. From a man’s point of view, he’s always trying to land the girl(s) he is interested in, and most of the time, the girl(s) is deflecting and refusing. Then out of nowhere, a girl will change her mind, and will turn the tables (or at least, play along). That’s TRADITIONAL COURTING in most of western culture! If she continues to like him afterward, or has a reason to continue to see him, the “courtship”/relationship continues. Or she goes back to ignoring him or playing hard to get. Depends on the circumstances and people involved.
To the women, they see it as a clear case of asshole and rape by being near an asshole. Western women require men to always read their minds and moods, and for the man to better know the woman’s mind and body than she does. Whenever the man fails to do this, it’s his fault and he’s an asshole. This is what modern western romance teaches— women have no real control of their mind and body because they are all too weak and scared and too complicated to be able for their own selves to figure out, but their “true mate” will always know their mind and body better than they do, so he will NEVER do anything incorrect. Not even have sex with her when she is very very very horny and very very very drunk and begging and teasing him for sex, despite himself being very very very drunk because later she would regret it (ie, it is the height of her fertility and she’d be worried about an unwanted pregnancy for weeks afterward, or she’s so drunk she’s going to pass out in the middle of the passion and be embarassed about that for months to come, or worse, she’s so drunk she’s going to get sick in the middle of the act and won’t be able to even think about them being together without remembering getting sick and embarassing herself so much, etc etc etc).
It is completely unrealistic of course. Men and women veiw the world very differently, process situations differently, and communite very differently. But since modern western romance teaches women it is purely the man’s responsibility for everything in their relationships, whenever something is wrong, it means the man is wrong and that is because he is being stupid and an asshole.
So in this particular case, the women tend to empathize with the female guard as being drugged or just drunk (from the spell/curse effect) and so that automatically makes it those around her responsibility to “be nice” and understand that while she REALLY wants sex right now, it would be inconvenient to socially unacceptable later so only an asshole would agree to sex her or let her sex him (not fight back and run away).
To the men, a woman (who you don’t know is drunk or drugged out of her mind) coming out and wanting sex is just her way of saying “I like you, at least for now.” So they see this as any other experience in their personal life or their friends life. If a man lives long enough, he will see many examples of this exact behavior. He doesn’t know why, other than that’s just how life is.
Again, I will point out— both of these characters should be worried about being flogged or even put to death for having sex while on duty. That is worse than drinking on duty, if you look through the historical punishments for soldiers caught having sex while on guard duty— in all eras of history. Punishment for doing other activities while on guard tend to be harsh, because guard duty is important, and 99.99% of the time, boring.
???
Ah well,.. Agreeing to disagree with all who think that the Male Guard should’ve been able to tell “enchanted” behavior from the “push me-Pull you” behavior that most men seem to encounter in relationships with women.
I still wouldn’t talk to her after she broke my arm. I don’t have a “Magic-Sense” to detect and recognize when a woman I’ve been pursuing for a while suddemly changes her mind, I didn’t take off her clothes, I didn’t jump on her, and I didn’t try to finish what SHE started when she came to her senses.
Meh,.. he needs to quit, find a quiet maid who wants to be the center of his attention and take up farming,…
I have a hypothetical question to pose to anyone who reads this later on. What would the female guard had done if she had not jumped the bones of the male but some other guy?
Would everyone still be pointing the finger and laying the blame on everyone else but the curse’s side effect?
And I think that Thane is aware of the effect he has on women. Look at what happened with Baby before the sexification (we’re making this a word now!) He thought that the spell was broken and went to talk with another woman only to get a nice ‘oil change’.
To be honest Thane baffles me as he seems like an idiot but is well aware. Ah I know, he’s like a less annoying and egocentric Zapp Brannigan during his ‘well meaning’ moments.
I would say, judging by how easily she appears to have beaten him senseless, that she would have woken in the same situation whether he’d been cooperating or not.
add to that that if he had been the active party, he would not have bothered to dick about with the spear, and would have restored things to rights before letting her ‘wake’. so for this antagonism to last apparently for days….and then the above? what a maze that woman’s mind must be. 😛
50 thoughts on “#79: Maybe Just a LITTLE Attention”
Concerned
3 minutes in, and I’ve already spotted your Neil Degrasse Tyson reference.
BronyGirl94
Found a Neil DeGrasse Tyson making his “look out we got a bada$$ over here” face. Day=made.
JSmith
PUB; formally BAR; formally PLACE; formally–ah ya get point.
DiscoStan
Everyone wants to feel wanted.. even her.
Gallstone
I have to admit I feel a bit disappointed… The guy had better be very serious about turning over a new leaf, or else this will be a most pathetic action for her.
fezzam
“He” didn’t do anything to her, from his perspective she got all hot and bothered and jumped him. It’s not his fault he was willing.
B.
Well, he was pretty boorish when she stopped being hot and bothered and got confused. “Are you okay? You kinda jumped me” would’ve indicated that he was actually, y’know, paying attention.
Oh, well. Maybe she likes how he cringes when she threatens violence; she can chain him up in the dungeons in the future and make sure that he remembers to be polite. 😉
Josh
Except it’s no different than taking advantage of a girl who has been drugged or who is drunk. She wasn’t in control of herself, therefore she couldn’t give consent.
Also, there’s the fact that the guys was a pig and he was clearly somewhat sexist when we first saw him.
Urazz
I personally put much of the blame on the male guard but more onThane/the First Faerie. I’d blame the male guard more if the female guard was acting like she was disoriented and drugged but she wasn’t. She was just acting horny and jumped the male guard. Granted the male guard should’ve questioned why she was acting this way but I think at that point when she was stripping, most of the blood from his brain went ‘elsewhere’ and his thoughts were more on sex at that point.
iberios
i read this every week, but i admit im lost! who is she referring to? her previous story was so short….
fezzam
.. in the very last comic, the other guard asked her to go out for a drink with him. its the guy in similar dress in panel 1 she is referring to.
Bee
I think it’s adorable that she feels bad for being mean to him afterward. That male guard BETTER turn over a new leaf or he can be sure he’ll be ripped a new asshole.
Decimetria
Watch out, we’ve got a badass here!
charles81
Probably gonna walk in there and catch him with Nadia or someone else *lol*
Jakob
Except that Nadia is a Lesbian, she said so herself
Jaycee
I am SO annoyed that you called it! 😉
–Jaycee
da Doctah
If you’re not careful, the faeries are going to end up doing everyone a favor. They’ve already sexed up the ogress, given Marie a night she’ll never forget (shame about the followup) and brought together who knows how many peripheral couples.
PinkiePie!0wJahavad!
i laughed inside a little
Neogeo
Wake up, go to work, go home, sleep. Repeat 5 more days. Wake up, go to church, go home, read blooming fairies, go to sleep. LIFE IS GOOD.
Jakob
I hope the guy learned his lesson then and stops acting like a pig. At the very least it seemed he was actually sorry.
That say, if they do become a couple, i see her as the one wearing the pants in that relationship.
Darnel
????
I remain confused at the attitude about the male guard.
He was on watch with someone he found very attractive whom he was willing to approach DAILY.
Without any knowledge about what was REALLY happening, the woman he has lusted after peels out of her armor and jumps his bones.
She snaps out of the enchantment in the MIDDLE of what’s going on and the WOMEN here thinks he’s a PIG for “Taking advantage” of her when she was “UNDER the Influence”. I checked:
1. He didn’t notice she had the galloping hornies and stepped up to be trampled – she came AFTER HIM.
2. Until she came out of it – she was running the show and he was along for the ride.
3. If he REALLY didn’t have feelings for her, I doubt she could’ve damaged him as much as written.
Yet this guy is all kinds of dirt.
In his place esp after a woman tried to blaim me for her taking off her own panties and jumping on me then trying to beat me into submission for letting her do it,.. I wouldn’t even talk to her, Without an explanation from a reputable source, (Wizard enters, explains the area effect enchantment, leaves.), any attraction I had for her would be gone.
All that to ask “What am I missing here?”
Jake
No, she thinks he’s a pig because he was making lewd comments to her and that was before the thing with the spell happened.
She probably thought she did something to her. He probably should have noticed she wasn’t acting normally.
But Jayce is right, the actual blame should go to The Faerie that cursed Thane.
Darnel
Okay.
His less than subtle attempts to get her attention – and his lack of concern for her 180 in her treatment of him is why folk think he’s garbage?
OK.
I understand, but I still don’t agree that he deserves the abuse.
I know it’s fiction,… But I hope enough light is shed on this so she can apologise for roughing him up.
Jake
Except he took advantage of her, so he’s the one that needs to apologize.
Anonymous
Actually if anything, she took advantage of him… Not the other way round.
Zen
That some insane logic.
She was under a spell and he wasn’t, so it was him taking advantage of her, because she was in no position to consent.
Jaycee
I have to admit, when I wrote that script (a good while ago), I really didn’t expect it to cause THIS much debate. But in hindsight, it was a little naive of me.
At any rate, this webcomic isn’t meant to be too serious or credible or realistic. I’m hoping this story arc is going to bring some karmic justice to the “crime” committed by the male guard, as well as provide some comic relief around what is, in real life, a real and serious tragedy.
At the same time, I’m still intrigued by the moral ramifications of an act that (in the context of what happened in the strip) sits in murky ethical waters. It’s clear the female guard didn’t like him much (or at least that she displayed hostility toward him). It’s also clear he lusted after her (who can blame him — he’s a guy, thus he lusts after all things female). It’s a fact that he did NOT cause the situation. The spell did. A spell carried by Sir Thane. Who, incidentally, is aware of that spell and of the effect he has on women.
My question is: why is no one blaming Thane for this? I don’t mean in the world of the strip, but you, readers, have so far put the blame on everybody BUT him. Is that because he’s a blubbering idiot? That doesn’t seem to me like much of a defense. If we liken his curse to an STI, isn’t he committing a crime any time his “infection” affects someone he comes into “contact” with? Why is the focus so much on whether the male guard is guilty or innocent, instead of on Thane’s part in the “crime?”
I’m really curious about that…
Of course, we can ALWAYS blame the faerie…
–Jaycee
Gallstone
Indeed, blame the faerie.
Thane does not escape the blame for 100%, but I have to ask: is he constantly aware of the danger he poses to women all around him? I mean, he came riding to the rescue of what he thought was a damsel in distress. Does he have enough brainpower to do something and remember something important like the curse at the same time?
Darnel
I didn’t blaim Thane for three reasons:
1. The guys an Idiot. Well meaning and chilvarous, polite as royalty could be while still being able to admit when he’s wrong and apologize – but STILL an IDIOT.
2. What is he supposed to do while cursed? live out in the middle of nowhere for the rest of his life? I got the impression that he was casting about for a solution with his horse playing the part of advisor and friend. So while he should do more to try to lessen the effect, (Dunno,.. wear a sign?), He’s got to go “somewhere” to fix this.
3. Thane is a victim,.. Sumbody find that Fairy.
Having read what has been said though,.. I’ll try harder to just read and enjoy and not consume and digest.
(Sigh – And I wanted the ramifications of the young prince and the maid to be resolved too,… Meh.)
Baby? Now thats one Ogress I wanna see more of now that she’s been tweaked.
Dims
Hmm .. not sure why we don’t blame Sir. Thane, for my part it’s because I can’t remember reading anywhere that he is aware the females lust for anyone but him seeing as the 2 cook sisters jumped him and not his entire army ..
But then again the horse knows, or must know, so mabye the blame should be put there if anywhere.
But now your here Jaycee, how did you persuade Sir. Thane to enter the city, my guess would be that he is still sore after the earlier unknown visit to the cathouse..
And as such if he wasent a blubbering idiot he would shunt any place with more than 3-5 females ..
Gallstone
He heard Heather scream when she was in the throes of lust with Aidan, and he thought there was a maiden in distress. Idiot he may be, but he thought he was riding to someone’s rescue. Things kind of snowballed from there…
witchy
the blame should not be put on sir thane but on the first fearie
t5he one thane accidentaly “showered”
it’s allways the fearie’s fault
Jaycee
I find this thread fascinating. There’s an implicit association between intelligence/awareness and guilt. The faerie is intelligent and aware of what she’s doing, so she’s guilty. Invertedly, dimness/cluelessness appear to excuse criminal negligence. Thane, who’s not very sharp, is mostly excused because of his natural chivalry and candor.
No one seems to care that Thane was given a way out very early on (to pay the faerie for the affront), and refused to do so (greed at work?). Doesn’t that burden him with SOME of the guilt?
–Jaycee
Jakob
I don’t think anyone is excusing Thane.
Though on the given a way out by the First Faerie, it was an accident and he did apologize. And how sure are we that the Faerie would have left him alone if he did pay up?
Though maybe not paying does land him some of the guilt, but also, did he have the amount she asked for?
Gallstone
Note that Thane seems to have known **** all about faeries before he first encountered one. If he’d had any inkling of the kind of spiteful inventiveness they’re capable of, not to mention their power, I doubt he would have gone anywhere near the forest, let alone taken off his codpiece while he was there.
He more than likely would have ponied up the cash, too. Instead, he seems to have been completely ignorant and therefore unwilling to pay an outrageous sum for the offense he actually committed. Some stinginess may have been involved, yes. But did he even have such money to spend at the time?
Jaycee
I think it’s plausible to say he had the sum. After all, he was off to wage war against his enemy, and he money was estimated to about one month of wages for his army. Not a negligible sum, for sure, but probably within his means.
–Jaycee
Jake
But that money was for food to feed his men, so you can’t say he was being selfish. Then again, they abandoned him after he got cursed, so maybe he should have payed.
But again, that’s assuming the Faerie would honor the deal.
Urazz
Yeah, I was under the impression that he did have the money to pay that faerie but I was under the imperssion that it was to be used for his army. Not only that but the faerie’s demand in price was pretty high if it’s enough to pay for Thane’s army for a month. So I wouldn’t really say that was a case of greed on Thane’s part because would you have paid the fairy that exhorbant amount of gold she was demanding if you were in his position. I know I wouldn’t have. Of course I would’ve apologized more than he did and ask if there was some other way I could repay the insult than getting cursed.
Not to mention there’s no guarantee that the faerie wouldn’t have started causing havoc amongst Thane’s army afterward. Those faeries are big enough trouble makers to do something like that from my impression of them.
Darnel
??
Fifty gold crowns (Based on the Horse) is a month’s upkeep for a small army.
He “showered her” by accident. He Apologized IMMEDIATELY, but I don’t blaim him for balking – He didn’t do it on purpose and no harm was done.
For me the equiv would be the Captain of a small cutter with something like 50 to 200 crew making a local social blunder being told to pony up 7,500.00 to 300,000.00 to the injured party.
That’s not cheap,.. It’s criminal – Someone find that Fairy.
We all agree that Thane is not too bright,.. but he is written as a good guy.
(Sigh – his treatment of Baby underlines this – a “bad” person wouldn’t care.)
JR
I still don’t see why the male guard is being vilified so much? He didn’t put a spell on the female guard and no way of knowing she was under a spell. Afterwards, she breaks his arm and people wonder why he didn’t try to find out why her behavior changed. She broke his arm, why would he want to go anywhere near her? And then to have to go back to work with the bipolar woman who from his point of view created the situation?
Also when she stops midcoitus, he doesn’t press the situation. She was on top of him while he was waiting for her.
Zen
He’s vilified, because he was making lewd comments towards her even before the spell fell on her.
Also, she was clearly not acting as herself and he probably should have noticed. Instead, he took advantage of her.
She made it clear she wasn’t interested in him before that and afterwards she’s under the impression he did something to her.
Urazz
Problem is that for all we could know, he could’ve thought she was playing hard to get or something. Granted he is a bit of a pig in his manners but he certainly doesn’t deserved to be villified. He would’ve deserved to be villified if he kept on having sex with her when she came back to her senses and freaked out.
FaerieFan
Hmm…
The only thing that annoys me about the male guard is his reaction to his partner’s distress once Sir Thane was out of the area of influence. She was clearly upset and confused, and he was like, “So what, let’s finish.”. Very callous.
As for Sir Thane’s role in the matter, yeah, he’s pretty much to blame, but I’m wondering how aware he is of the sex aura he generates. Sure, he knows he can make women pretty, as evidenced by the twins and (probably) the women at the Willing Wench, but at other times I imagine Gus has steered him out of the way many times, like he did in the marketplace.
The blame could rest equally on many shoulders here, but I’m in Gallstone’s camp. If Thane had paid up when the faerie made her demand, a lot of what has transpired would not be. Or, if he’d aimed a little to either side….
Lord Lurker From Beyond
The reason Thane isn’t blamed is because your audience doesn’t consider him anything but a plot device of the Fairy’s curse. His only aspect is as a cardboard cutout for jokes.
The audience recognizes this, therefore he isn’t a “real person” and isn’t responsible for anything that happens. The author is, but not the character.
Your audience is casting their own experiences onto the two guards. From a man’s point of view, he’s always trying to land the girl(s) he is interested in, and most of the time, the girl(s) is deflecting and refusing. Then out of nowhere, a girl will change her mind, and will turn the tables (or at least, play along). That’s TRADITIONAL COURTING in most of western culture! If she continues to like him afterward, or has a reason to continue to see him, the “courtship”/relationship continues. Or she goes back to ignoring him or playing hard to get. Depends on the circumstances and people involved.
To the women, they see it as a clear case of asshole and rape by being near an asshole. Western women require men to always read their minds and moods, and for the man to better know the woman’s mind and body than she does. Whenever the man fails to do this, it’s his fault and he’s an asshole. This is what modern western romance teaches— women have no real control of their mind and body because they are all too weak and scared and too complicated to be able for their own selves to figure out, but their “true mate” will always know their mind and body better than they do, so he will NEVER do anything incorrect. Not even have sex with her when she is very very very horny and very very very drunk and begging and teasing him for sex, despite himself being very very very drunk because later she would regret it (ie, it is the height of her fertility and she’d be worried about an unwanted pregnancy for weeks afterward, or she’s so drunk she’s going to pass out in the middle of the passion and be embarassed about that for months to come, or worse, she’s so drunk she’s going to get sick in the middle of the act and won’t be able to even think about them being together without remembering getting sick and embarassing herself so much, etc etc etc).
It is completely unrealistic of course. Men and women veiw the world very differently, process situations differently, and communite very differently. But since modern western romance teaches women it is purely the man’s responsibility for everything in their relationships, whenever something is wrong, it means the man is wrong and that is because he is being stupid and an asshole.
So in this particular case, the women tend to empathize with the female guard as being drugged or just drunk (from the spell/curse effect) and so that automatically makes it those around her responsibility to “be nice” and understand that while she REALLY wants sex right now, it would be inconvenient to socially unacceptable later so only an asshole would agree to sex her or let her sex him (not fight back and run away).
To the men, a woman (who you don’t know is drunk or drugged out of her mind) coming out and wanting sex is just her way of saying “I like you, at least for now.” So they see this as any other experience in their personal life or their friends life. If a man lives long enough, he will see many examples of this exact behavior. He doesn’t know why, other than that’s just how life is.
Again, I will point out— both of these characters should be worried about being flogged or even put to death for having sex while on duty. That is worse than drinking on duty, if you look through the historical punishments for soldiers caught having sex while on guard duty— in all eras of history. Punishment for doing other activities while on guard tend to be harsh, because guard duty is important, and 99.99% of the time, boring.
Darnel
???
Ah well,.. Agreeing to disagree with all who think that the Male Guard should’ve been able to tell “enchanted” behavior from the “push me-Pull you” behavior that most men seem to encounter in relationships with women.
I still wouldn’t talk to her after she broke my arm. I don’t have a “Magic-Sense” to detect and recognize when a woman I’ve been pursuing for a while suddemly changes her mind, I didn’t take off her clothes, I didn’t jump on her, and I didn’t try to finish what SHE started when she came to her senses.
Meh,.. he needs to quit, find a quiet maid who wants to be the center of his attention and take up farming,…
the unkown paul
i’ve read it mentioned that the price the faerie asked for was fifty gold crowns, yes?
How, if she was serious about being paid, did she expect to *Carry* fifty chunks of Gold anywhere even if Thane *Did* pay??
Jaycee
Who says she was going to carry all that herself?
–Jaycee
Science!
I just rather like the Neil deGrasse Tyson cameo.
Syn
I have a hypothetical question to pose to anyone who reads this later on. What would the female guard had done if she had not jumped the bones of the male but some other guy?
Would everyone still be pointing the finger and laying the blame on everyone else but the curse’s side effect?
And I think that Thane is aware of the effect he has on women. Look at what happened with Baby before the sexification (we’re making this a word now!) He thought that the spell was broken and went to talk with another woman only to get a nice ‘oil change’.
To be honest Thane baffles me as he seems like an idiot but is well aware. Ah I know, he’s like a less annoying and egocentric Zapp Brannigan during his ‘well meaning’ moments.
Elfseeker
I would say, judging by how easily she appears to have beaten him senseless, that she would have woken in the same situation whether he’d been cooperating or not.
add to that that if he had been the active party, he would not have bothered to dick about with the spear, and would have restored things to rights before letting her ‘wake’. so for this antagonism to last apparently for days….and then the above? what a maze that woman’s mind must be. 😛
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