Connie and Elly: A Love Story?
We had begun, in the latter days of the modern For Better or For Worse strip, to regularly see sequences where Connie and Elly spent so much time together walking arm-in-arm and the like, that the question of the nature of their relationship was raised. This was especially considering that at the same time Elly was rarely seen with her husband John, and Connie’s husband had not been seen in years.
In today’s new-run strip of For Better or For Worse, we see the first indication of this same situation set back in 1980. When I read the strip, I had a hard time making sense of what was being said. After Connie pretended she was not really interested in Elly’s brother Phil, Connie says, “The fact that I’m ALSO single is really a moot point!” Elly then, puts her arm in Connie’s and says, “That’s debatable.” The joke is extremely obscure and based on two different definitions of the phrase “moot point.” I quote now from this website:
[A] Moot point is one of those phrases that once had a firm and well-understood meaning, but no longer does. It was just as you say: a matter that was uncertain or undecided, so open to debate.
It comes from the same source as meet and originally had the same meaning. In England in medieval times it referred specifically to an assembly of people, in particular one that had some sort of judicial function, and was often spelled mot or mote. So you find references to the witenagemot (the assembly of the witan, the national council of Anglo-Saxon times), hundred-mote (where a hundred was an Anglo-Saxon administrative area, part of a county or shire), and many others. So something that was mooted was put up for discussion and decision at a meeting — by definition something not yet decided.
In today’s new-run strip of For Better or For Worse, we see the first indication of this same situation set back in 1980. When I read the strip, I had a hard time making sense of what was being said. After Connie pretended she was not really interested in Elly’s brother Phil, Connie says, “The fact that I’m ALSO single is really a moot point!” Elly then, puts her arm in Connie’s and says, “That’s debatable.” The joke is extremely obscure and based on two different definitions of the phrase “moot point.” I quote now from this website:
[A] Moot point is one of those phrases that once had a firm and well-understood meaning, but no longer does. It was just as you say: a matter that was uncertain or undecided, so open to debate.
It comes from the same source as meet and originally had the same meaning. In England in medieval times it referred specifically to an assembly of people, in particular one that had some sort of judicial function, and was often spelled mot or mote. So you find references to the witenagemot (the assembly of the witan, the national council of Anglo-Saxon times), hundred-mote (where a hundred was an Anglo-Saxon administrative area, part of a county or shire), and many others. So something that was mooted was put up for discussion and decision at a meeting — by definition something not yet decided.
The confusion over the meaning of moot point is modern. It is a misunderstanding of another sense of moot for a discussion forum in which hypothetical cases are argued by law students for practice. Since there is no practical outcome of these sessions, and the cases are invented anyway, people seem to have assumed that a moot point means one of no importance. So we’ve seen a curious shift in which the sense of “open to debate” has become “not worth debating”.
Using the 2 different definitions then in Connie’s dialogue from today's new-run from panel 3 of For Better or For Worse, she either means that (not debatable definition of moot point) her singleness is not relevant to her questions about Phil, or that (debatable definition of moot point) the relevance of her singleness in her questions is undecided or up for debate. My guess is that Connie means the not debatable definition, based on her dialogue in panels 1 and 2.
If Connie means (debatable definition of moot point), then Elly is just agreeing with her and there is no joke. However, if Connie means (not debatable definition of moot point), then Elly disagrees with her and thinks her singleness does apply to the questions she was asking about Phil; and there is still no joke. Where’s the joke coming from?
The joke comes because Elly takes Connie’s Panel 3 response to stand alone without relating it to anything she said in the prior 2 panels. In other words, Elly is reinterpreting Connie’s sentence as if she said whether or not she is single is not debatable (Connie is definitely single). Then Elly puts her arm in Connie’s to show Connie that Elly considers her single status to be debatable. In other words Elly is saying that she and Connie may be together, so Connie may not be single after all.
I think Lynn Johnston may have been going after a heart-warming “You are not alone, Connie;” but it comes off as Elly hitting on Connie. The net effect is that Elly tells Connie to not get any ideas about her brother Phil, because Elly has her own ideas about Connie.
To take it one step further, note that Elly is putting Lizzie to bed and yesterday’s strip implies that Connie was over when Elly is making supper. So they have eaten together; it’s bedtime; and Michael, Lawrence, and John are nowhere in sight. Maybe John has taken Lawrence and Michael to a Leafs game as a boys' night out. This gives Elly’s statement a little more intimacy. After all, it would not come out the same way, if she were doing this in front of John or the boys.
Using the 2 different definitions then in Connie’s dialogue from today's new-run from panel 3 of For Better or For Worse, she either means that (not debatable definition of moot point) her singleness is not relevant to her questions about Phil, or that (debatable definition of moot point) the relevance of her singleness in her questions is undecided or up for debate. My guess is that Connie means the not debatable definition, based on her dialogue in panels 1 and 2.
If Connie means (debatable definition of moot point), then Elly is just agreeing with her and there is no joke. However, if Connie means (not debatable definition of moot point), then Elly disagrees with her and thinks her singleness does apply to the questions she was asking about Phil; and there is still no joke. Where’s the joke coming from?
The joke comes because Elly takes Connie’s Panel 3 response to stand alone without relating it to anything she said in the prior 2 panels. In other words, Elly is reinterpreting Connie’s sentence as if she said whether or not she is single is not debatable (Connie is definitely single). Then Elly puts her arm in Connie’s to show Connie that Elly considers her single status to be debatable. In other words Elly is saying that she and Connie may be together, so Connie may not be single after all.
I think Lynn Johnston may have been going after a heart-warming “You are not alone, Connie;” but it comes off as Elly hitting on Connie. The net effect is that Elly tells Connie to not get any ideas about her brother Phil, because Elly has her own ideas about Connie.
To take it one step further, note that Elly is putting Lizzie to bed and yesterday’s strip implies that Connie was over when Elly is making supper. So they have eaten together; it’s bedtime; and Michael, Lawrence, and John are nowhere in sight. Maybe John has taken Lawrence and Michael to a Leafs game as a boys' night out. This gives Elly’s statement a little more intimacy. After all, it would not come out the same way, if she were doing this in front of John or the boys.
posted by howard at 10:50 PM
8 Comments:
howard,
I think Lynn Johnston may have been going after a heart-warming “You are not alone, Connie;” but it comes off as Elly hitting on Connie.
That's what working backwards from the punchline gets you: a subtext you didn't want. Too bad Lynn doesn't quite see that it does like as if Elly has designs on Connie because she took a shortcut in writing the story. If she did, she'd have to write from beginning to end like she did in the real Early Years.
That's what working backwards from the punchline gets you: a subtext you didn't want.
Normally this does cause Lynn problems and it is obvious that the last 2 panels of the strip were written first. On the other hand, if I just had those last 2 panels by themselves, I would come to the same conclusion. The physical drawing has Elly putting herself arm-in-arm with Connie. Where I come from, this motion is traditionally a motion used to travel with someone as your designated protector, or your significant other. I don’t know if Canadian tradition is different in this respect. Personally, I have only walked like that with women who had very strong beliefs about the traditional roles of men and women, or in weddings or dramas where the traditional roles of men and women were on display. When I have seen women walking together and touching, it was hand-in-hand or arms around the shoulder, and it was almost always young girls who walked that way. This motion provides more subtext to me than the dialogue, which is, as I have written, difficult to interpret.
In fact, this is one of the cases where working back from the punch line helps Lynn’s case, because the first 2 panels show that Connie has heterosexual designs on brother Phil. Of course the same 2 panels show that Elly is warning Connie away from Phil, so her motivation with Connie is inconclusive.
The problem at the heart of the matter is that I don’t know what Lynn’s intent is. During the years when she would praise her husband in interviews, but then disparage him in her strip; it seemed like she had issues with her husband. As it turned out, she did. Now she has been divorced twice over, her comment in interviews was that she has been spending time with girlfriends doing things, and it sounds like the sort of thing a just-divorced woman might do. But then in the strip, she draws Elly and Connie being all touchy, over and over again. If I were to use the experience with her husband as an example, I could draw the conclusion that the subtext being shown her may be the real thing.
There is no way of knowing for sure. Unlike Lawrence Poirier, Lynn Johnston does not strike me as the kind of woman who would publicly announce coming out of the closet.
howard,
There is no way of knowing for sure. Unlike Lawrence Poirier, Lynn Johnston does not strike me as the kind of woman who would publicly announce coming out of the closet.
No, she does not. She seems to me the sort of person who has difficulty admitting to the phenomenon of lesbianism. Gay men are okay but gay women alarm her because of the need to deny that tendency within herself.
dreadedcandiru2,
She seems to me the sort of person who has difficulty admitting to the phenomenon of lesbianism.
Now that you mention it, we have seen or heard of a number of gay men in For Better or For Worse, but I can't think of any lesbian characters. The AMU reprints search on the term "lesbian" shows no hits in For Better or For Worse. Of course, when I search for "lesbian" across all searchable features with AMU reprints only Doonesbury and political cartoons show up. Needless to say, Jane's World is not one of the AMU searchable features. In contrast, the term "gay" got 387 hits across the board. I guess in the comic strip world, it's OK to be gay, but it's not cool to be a lesbian. It's not limited to just Lynn Johnston. Today's strip may actually be her subtle way of pushing the envelope.
I think it's not that Lynn is afraid she's a lesbian. I think it's that Lynn is afraid other people will think that she's one. She is such a manhater that the accusation is pretty much inevitable.
I'm not convinced that Lynn likes women any more than she likes men. Is there even one likeable woman character in the whole of FOOB?
I thought Lizzie was going down for an afternoon nap. Although that begs the question, how can Connie be at the house in the middle of a workday?
qnjones,
Is there even one likeable woman character in the whole of FOOB?
Sure. Connie Poirier is pretty likeable, especially when she calls Elly on her baloney. I like Lovey Salzman, Aunt Ruby, Iris Richards, and of course, Fiona Brass.
I thought Lizzie was going down for an afternoon nap. Although that begs the question, how can Connie be at the house in the middle of a workday?
Connie has arranged her schedule so that she and Elly can have their special time alone with no boys in the house, so they can...knit together.
Well, I don't think Connie the Hypocrite Manhuntress is especially likeable. I think the way she treated her son and stepdaughters is despicable.
Lovey and Aunt Ruby are all right, but they are very minor characters. Also, Lovey's slumlording, know-it-all, poor-mouthing tendencies would be pretty tiresome if she were around more often. Iris is pretty good but annoys me with her martyr act.
I am easily annoyed.
Despite annoyance, I think we can agree Lynn likes women more than men. After all, when you think about it, she did employ a staff of almost all women for years.
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