mitziholder

[mitziholder]

"you know how we’re supposed to treat characters in fiction? we PUNISH THEM for their flaws until they have to OVERCOME THEM" incedibly shitty and kid coded writing advice. you have steven universe level of understanding fiction. too bad since you actually draw well and have a neat style, if only it wasn't combined with an attitude like this.

where does the issue arise, exactly? should characters have no flaws, should they not struggle with problems that are a result of their flaws, or should they never change? I am not in the habit of watching cartoons for children, so I don’t intuitively understand your comparison beyond serving as the basis for a very backhanded compliment.

[mitziholder]

the only solution to the supposed “irony epidemic” is to take yourself seriously. complaining about other people being incapable of taking things seriously is stupid and annoying. I’m finished with it. no more. you have to do the work. you’re only going to attract like-minded individuals by doing the work. you have to be content with the work for its own sake and learn to cope with the fact that people might never take you seriously no matter what you do. and that’s all there is to it

[mitziholder]

i remember you mentioning you didn't like stone butch blues at one point. or have i remembered wrong? what points of criticism did you have exactly?

it’s ass. I don’t know how much more I have to say. I haven’t read it in, like, 5 years, and my original post about it is long gone. from my recollection, it’s a thoughtlessly sympathetic and celebratory portrayal of heterosexual role-playing, grooming, and rape by deception as central and unassailable aspects of “Lesbian Culture” (or at least that is what it’s become over time). the protagonist calls a dildo her cock, and her partner fellates it. of course I think it’s ass. have you read it? it’s bad. it’s a poorly written exercise in misery mixed with erotica on par with mid-century lesbian pulp and with about as much literary merit. you could not pay me to read it again.

[mitziholder]

Thoughts on Roberta Gregory? Was shocked to find out she wasn’t even a lesbian and is straight married. Her bitchy butch series is so true to my life.

“shocked”? you mean the author self-insert arguing with her own raging strawman about the beauty of boundless, amorphous Community didn’t tip you off?

bitchy butch read as a pathetically desperate hit piece imo. feigned sympathy for its subject matter, but at the end of the day the message was “please ignore my ugly boyfriend and GET LAID you annoying delusional bitch. you’ve probably wanted to fuck a man at some point, too, so get off your high horse.”

full of contempt, which is fine, but don’t pretend to be any better than the haters that you’re hating.

I don’t like hothead either btw.

[mitziholder]

Where did you learn how to draw? Did you went to an art school? Or are you self-taught? I love how you draw women so if you have some tips it'd be much appreciated!

hi, thank you for the message :) I am self-taught. no formal training ever. the driving force behind my art is making the things that I want to see in the world - almost an obligation, or maybe an albatross around the neck.... but visual art, unlike writing, is definitely not something I do for pleasure. I am only drawing this art because I don’t have the money to pay anyone else to do it for me. constant frustration aside, I find this is a solid and reliable source of motivation by my standards

still, as with writing, I would suggest a diversity of influences and a genuine passion for whatever it is you intend to portray. style and subject matter are determined by personal preference. for me, the most important things in drawing women are A) exaggeration (but not idealization) and B) the potential for deformation/cartooning without losing the essence of an individual human face.

by that I mean to say I generally want to include (and sometimes emphasize) the rough edges and imperfections - no smoothing them out. so, I incorporate elements of caricature, or at least I try to. I want to capture a person, a character, someone not interchangeable with another. I do not write with symbols, so I don’t want to draw with them, either... which is difficult, and I’m often tempted to take shortcuts - but at that point, I would no longer be representing the very characters whose portrayal represents my sole drive for drawing in the first place.

yes, practice is important. blah blah figure drawing, read loomis, study from life and doodle often etc etc. anything like that causes me much pain, but it is a pain I was at one point willing to endure, because I had to... for Them. for my women. I want what I draw to be “good” for their sake.

basically, find or invent women that you love and draw them, and you will naturally get better because your desire to do them justice will be the kick in the ass that you need in order to do so... ideally

[mitziholder]

all right, here is my government-mandated leather dyke for pride, also serving as a reminder that I am not dead and can still pick up a pen. 50 billion notes please.

just kidding. I drew this with my mouse

[mitziholder]

I read the whole of DTWOF and found the early years charming and the latter years slightly bland but overall a cool capsule of the evolving time period. Haven’t been able to finish her other works though, I find they start of strong and kind of just fade but now that you mention her father I remember feeling off about that entire thing. Like I get wanting to better understand your parents but compared to what she wrote about her mother…hm.

yeah that is pretty much all I have to say about dtwof LOL... I haven’t read all of it, but I have a copy of “Women’s Glib,” which featured several of her strips, and I simply was not impressed, given the fact that it was you know a comedy anthology where I would have expected her to submit her best/funniest work. all it basically came down to was this: things are so FUCKED. how can I live through the overwhelmingly oppressive weight of how FUCKED everything is? oh, we have to have a punchline. silly me. it is not that serious. I still have to buy groceries and live in the real world (repeat ad infinitum). I mean, there is definitely value to me there in terms of a historical record, but that is true of a lot of things, including cartoons from Playboy, so whatever

I have not read her memoir about her mother. I did try, but I found it intolerably self-indulgent (by her own admission) and purple and um turgid. so, I don’t have anything to say about that, although I am curious about the apparent contrast between it and her writings about her father. nona come back...

anyway, while we’re on the subject, I remember reading this interview with her in Deneuve (had to do a search thru their online archive) where she said this, which amused me

like, how are you going to make a comic strip about how up your own ass you are, making fun of yourself constantly, and then... continue to act like that in real life? is it catharsis? let’s write about ourselves at our worst to work out all our shame and insecurities without actually improving ourselves or changing the behavior that led to them

you know how we’re supposed to treat characters in fiction? we PUNISH THEM for their flaws until they have to OVERCOME THEM - we punish them so they DON’T continue to do the same things over and over again until they die. sure, some characters never suffer, and some never change, but that should be in service of a point. if your point is “it’s okay for me to be like this forever because it’s funny” you are cooked and you’re going to run out of jokes very quickly.

and it seems like she did. I guess

[mitziholder]

I do think it’s nice to put a damper on every celebration of DTWOF with a reminder that Bechdel’s seminal Masterwork was just 240 pages of boohooing about and trying to sanitize/reclaim/rehabilitate the image of her beloved pedophile father, but at the end of the day the worst crime she’s guilty of is simply not being very funny

[mitziholder]

I was catching the perfectionism vibes, it's shame if it hinders your progress. Your characters and style seem so cool so I wanted to probe. Comics really are a marathon to create. Losing steam is natural and maybe switching up your conception of your project can help. Not trying to pressure you in any way, just hoping to provide some food for thought.

How do you feel about comics as a medium? You mentioned you mostly "skim" comics for inspiration and love Wimmen's Comix but is it a medium you feel very connected to in general and for your story idea?

I've seen multiple webcomic artists unfortunately struggle with the labor needed for drawing panels and incorporating prose along with art and regular comic panels to maintain progress. If you are more into writing than drawing, maybe incorporating prose along with comics/art is an option you'd be interested in. Don't have the best examples but thinking of Homestuck's long script-format convos that follow panels. And for a comic that later incorporated prose, the webcomic Paranatural went from all comic panels to mixing prose and art. I'll be honest that I stopped reading Paranatural as a teen before the shift so I can't speak to its writing/art quality.

“skimming” was a little disingenuous. I have read a lot of comics, but very rarely have I felt that they fully utilized the affordances of the medium. the reasons for this vary; comics are plagued by many issues deriving from the fact that they were, at one point, both extremely popular and cheap (low-brow) - kneecapped by the CCA and warped into something stupid and trivial for children. even today, that perception remains. I would say the majority of people aren’t capable of recognizing comics as a mature medium. lots of comic writers have a chip on their shoulder about this… particularly Alan Moore.

I bring him up because Watchmen was one of the first pieces of media that really opened my eyes as to what comics were capable of as a graphic medium; people regularly recognize the visual artistry of film, the (often) invisible work done in blocking, cinematography, effects, and editing that makes movies feel like art. comics should be art. every frame should be a painting. panels should fit together into a larger picture composed with thought and care. Dan Gibbons did so - with regard not only for how panels fit next to each other but also for how they fit within the page and the page within the chapter and so on… rich with detail, of equal weight to the dialogue in conveying narrative and thematic meaning. it amazed me because of how little the art actually matters in so many comics, only there by obligation (because without art it would no longer be a comic). why is this? I don’t know. profit? but you see it in indie comics, too. that part confuses me. why would you make something if you don’t want it to be good? what’s the point?

anyway, I found that the story I wanted to tell would not fit within the bounds of a stage play. it has continually resisted (with some notoriety on this blog) my attempts to fit it into prose. the dialogue is what moves it, and with my sort of shaky aptitude for art and love of the medium’s potential, I felt that making it a comic was the natural choice. I don’t particularly enjoy the process of drawing, but without art I felt something was missing - a void that couldn’t be filled by anything else. I never wanted it to give the impression that the art was done by rote, incidental/inconsequential, a pure and thoughtless representation of the dialogue… but that is sort of what it has to be at this point. I wish that integrating the visual half came more naturally to me, but I’ve accepted that it’s a skill I’m going to have to hone with much practice. it’s something I’ve struggled with quite a bit as someone who is borderline aphantasic. very little of the art that I make comes directly from my brain. it is not intuitive to me at all. I am so reliant on references, have no imagination, am very rarely struck with the idea for a bit of visual humor or detail that adds meaning rather than merely visualizing the existing script - the words. I am obsessed with words, clearly. meaning and rhythm and punctuation. I’m a word person. I want to be an art person. I want so baaaadly for my work to be good. I try so hard.

I’m often tempted to throw in the towel and admit that my brain doesn’t work that way - that I’m aiming too high, stubbornly set on something I can never really have - not to an extent that I’m satisfied with. but if I gave in to that feeling, I would never finish anything. I feel like once I am done with my classes and my living situation is more stable, I’ll be sort of okay - or at least more consistent - when it comes to the art stuff... worst-case scenario, I cave and go the homestuck route (which is not something I thought I’d ever say). I don’t know. we’ll have to see. once this semester is over...😮‍💨

[mitziholder]

haven't followed for long but seen posts about your comic occasionally. do you think you've made it your baby (like in this quote “Finishing a book is just like you took a child out in the backyard and shot it) and been putting off just starting it, or is it your preference to want the whole thing written?

it’s my baby, sure, but I’m not unwilling to destroy parts of it that aren’t working, to tear it into pieces and start anew. the truth is that I’m crippled by perfectionism. I came at this project with the conviction that I had to be the best at everything: writing, pacing, plotting, dialogue, lettering, formatting, composition, anatomy, perspective, inking, values, rendering/color for the cover illustrations... and, for a long time, I was afraid to touch the art for fear that I’d lose the momentum of writing. but I’ve already lost the momentum, so at this point I am getting acquainted with just doing what I can.... drawing and sending it... no matter how much it hurts :-)

[mitziholder]

what media would you actually recommend? you seem to have very discerning taste

geeeeee... I don’t know. there are multiple metrics by which a piece of media can have value to me... but maybe not to you.

1) sheer entertainment value (personal, subjective - in my case usually humor-oriented, less focused on action and explosions and violence and gore and hacking and slashing and sex meant to titillate ... but humor is subjective in its own right)

2) rhetorical value (based on the presence and effectiveness of conveying intent - a thesis, a point to make, something new and interesting to say unique to the creator’s perspective. also, prose/dialogue/text that sounds good, hits right, says exactly what it wants to say with brevity and precision)

2a) IMO, “objective” judgments of a piece of media’s quality should rest most strongly on this point. 2b) sometimes the meat of my analysis is based in an interpretation of how a creator failed to say something or what they unintentionally revealed about themselves and their views in the process. and that can be interesting, but it doesn’t necessarily make the work any less shit

3) informational value (for research purposes, which may not be relevant to anyone else. definitely a step down in importance because I can read something and find it informative without enjoying it or thinking it’s “good”)

it’s impossible for everything I consume to meet all of those standards all the time... and I like to have a diverse media diet. I enjoy plenty of things which don’t really affect me or make me think too deeply. but it’s hard to recommend anything because people’s priorities and tastes vary so much.

as far as what I’ve enjoyed and found value in? I’ve already gone over books, so let’s do movies. I love Bob Roberts; had a point to make and made it with aplomb. it was very funny - and useful as a point of reference for my own work(!) Dr. Strangelove was also great. I’m a big fan of satirical dark comedies that leave you with this sense of gruesome hilarity... beyond the funnies, I like things that are sort of distant from their subjects, inhuman and quirky, using them as tools to move us along on a painterly backdrop - A Zed & Two Noughts and other Greenaway fare + and arguably Kubrick as well - but I also enjoy studies that lavish attention on their subjects, like Girl, Interrupted. I still love that one. in spite of it all. and I liked One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s nest despite its treatment of Ratched/the vile protagonist lol. Network was “good” no matter how badly they fumbled Dunaway and how much that fucking pissed me off. oh and anything about Watergate... I love a good documentary

but anyway, I know saying any of this invites speculation about the Problematic or questionable elements present therein. why not more lesbian media? why not more woman directors? how could you enjoy x knowing what y did to z? I don’t know. I respect an auteur, a clear and defined vision. I have had fun with many things that are not that. but at the end of the day, regardless of content, it all serves to entertain me, to shape and inform my artistic endeavors writing about what I want to read and saying what I want to say. so, you know, your mileage may vary. also I like musicals

[mitziholder]

people will be like ohhhh there is so much good lesbian media what are you complaining about? and the lesbian media is like Prostitution x GL or some French director abusing actresses for 40 straight hours or actual cartoons for children. Yeah thanks. no you get it. that is exactly what I wanted. now if you will excuse me I’m going to go read Sita and torture myself with visions of a world I’ll never know

[mitziholder]

IMO there is a significant difference between being a “pickme” and being an “NLOG.” in the common parlance they are basically the same, but when I say Pickmeeeeeeee I am specifically referring to women who sell out, degrade, devalue, abuse, exploit, or facilitate the abuse/exploitation of other women for male attention/approval. NLOGs are simply girls/women who, for whatever reason (usually gender nonconformity), struggle to connect with the “normal” (stereotypically feminine) mode of female behavior and social connection. they may be spiky because of autism. I am spiky for other reasons. and that is fine

I hold absolutely no contempt for women, autistic or otherwise, who struggle to make connections with/understand other women. I am one of them. that is probably why I made this post. it’s only when they start to venerate males/maleness and talk about how much better men are as friends or in general that I begin to hate them lol. I truly don’t understand how that happens. as difficult as I have often found it to place my trust in other women, to not be ashamed of how much we apparently love to fuck each other over... I have never used that as an excuse to uplift moids and talk about how amazing it is that they can stand while pissing

someone needs to study the phenomenon that is the breed of self-professed “lesbians” who are nevertheless obsessed with men (Jordan Peterson in particular) and also incapable of commitment/forming long-lasting, emotionally deep connections with women. there’s just something about the macho manlarp without being stupid enough to attempt to transition but also simultaneously believing themselves to be above other women while possessing the same pickmeeeeee tendencies... pretending to be sexually attracted to women to feel like One of the Guys... “other women are stupid and frivolous and I hate them but they have to be that way. not me though. I am built different” like the only reason they’re not sucking cock is because it would remind them of what they really are. I wanted to call it the Paglia Complex. which is a little bland but nothing else is jumping out at me rn

[mitziholder]

someone needs to study the phenomenon that is the breed of self-professed “lesbians” who are nevertheless obsessed with men (Jordan Peterson in particular) and also incapable of commitment/forming long-lasting, emotionally deep connections with women. there’s just something about the macho manlarp without being stupid enough to attempt to transition but also simultaneously believing themselves to be above other women while possessing the same pickmeeeeee tendencies... pretending to be sexually attracted to women to feel like One of the Guys... “other women are stupid and frivolous and I hate them but they have to be that way. not me though. I am built different” like the only reason they’re not sucking cock is because it would remind them of what they really are. I wanted to call it the Paglia Complex. which is a little bland but nothing else is jumping out at me rn

[mitziholder]

reading your blog feels like when you're slouching and someone yells at you to sit upright. i'm not a good writer at all and i unfortunately love romance and tropes (i don't read fanfiction though) but i used to want to write, and you inspired me to at least give it a try, maybe one day i will be able to write something interesting. i hope i remember to check back when the day comes that you publish your comic

I appreciate you taking the time to write in :) I don’t mean to be like a drill sergeant or anything. don’t get it twisted - I am not anti-fun (self-indulgence). in fact, I would be flattered if someone found my characters entertaining enough to fuck around and write about them whenever I do publish. I also don’t think anyone has a responsibility to focus on becoming a better writer...

but I think it is a good idea for reasons I’ve outlined before. it’s the basic essence of communication, of having a deeper understanding of the world that we live in and the people who populate it. in my experience, writing helps me organize and articulate my thoughts/feelings. if I did not do that, I would go insane. and the communication of those thoughts and feelings tends to demand a response... so I’m not just screaming into the void. more than that, I consider critiques/reviews - as a response - a way of helping me sharpen my points and my ability to express them (whether I agree with those critiques or not)

better at writing = better at communicating = better at thinking = win (we are a social species)

I don’t think romance or tropes or what have you are inherently bad; as with any element of writing, it is simply a matter of how you use them. it bothers me when people fully rely on them for every aspect of a story; that sort of “shorthand” can be useful for conveying relatively minor story beats which do not need as much time to be developed, but if your entire story is shorthand - shit that has already been written a million times by a million different people in a million identical ways - then what is the point? it can be fun, and that’s okay, but it’s not really communicating. it doesn’t tell you anything you didn’t already know. like benching the bar unto infinity etc etc

THAT ASIDE

it’s coming along. lettering is driving me nuts. but we are making progress.

yay :)

I wish you the best in your future writing endeavors!

[mitziholder]

for the record, everything I said in the last post cuts both ways. yes, telling me “you should read this because it has lesbians/women/feminists in it :)” is an indication that your judgment is probably compromised. at the same time, if anyone told me they liked my work “because it has lesbians in it,” I would not put any stock in their opinion either

[mitziholder]

doing my God Blessed Duty to avoid and ignore all deadlines in favor of finally laying out chapter 1 version 2.0. why did the urge have to hit me only now instead of back when I had time? a question for the ages. in any case, doodle enjoyers enjoy your doodles