For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston for February 12, 2015

I’m glad I’m reading this series over again because when I was younger, I probably wouldn’t have gotten it. John basically devalues his wife. She has her own job (even though she works part-time, it was still her job) but he doesn’t like when she works unless she’s working for him. This series tries to seem perfect, but in the beginning, John is the worst character after Elly. And I say Elly’s the worst because she’ll probably take this job even though she said no

Don’t think it’s only guys who do this. I know a lot of women who use the technique as well, and some who think they are pretty average and normal. Most people demand a reason before getting to the “I’ll let you think about it” part. I bet all of us do it from time to time. I’ve had it done to me, and my response is — “No is a complete sentence.”

Elly will probably work at the clinic for a while to keep peace in the household. Marriages and families work on compromise. John and Elly aren’t bad, they are a couple of very human beings doing the best they can to raise their family, just like the rest of us. Not perfect, not horrid, just human.

He sounds like the guys I knew in high school years ago when a girl said “no”, the guy heard “maybe”.

Elly is being extremely selfish. A good wife shouldn’t even have to think about it. If she can’t manage her VOLUNTEER job and help Jon, she should quit it, or at least put it on hold for a while. Now, if it was a paying job, it would be another story, but even then, a leave of absence would be in order. After all, John’s job supports them.

Of course, if this is your first time through this strip, you don’t see the pattern of abuse that will continue and accelerate. John is a proxy for the cartoonist’s real husband whom she finally got rid of. So John’s bad because he’s drawn that way. He’s supposed to be. In other words, you’re supposed to hate him. .The point of this episode is that he presumes he can bully her into seeing things his way and is so confident of it that he feels free even to tell her he knows she will cave. He needs no logical argument, because he assumes he can make her do as he says. Remember, this whole thing comes about because he doesn’t want to train a woman, because she’ll just do something silly like leave to have a baby. It never occurs to him to train a man. His day wouldn’t be so entertaining. .As I said, he’s supposed to be a self-centered ass, and if you don’t get it, Lynn has failed.

Does Elly have dental hygienist training?

Well said, Lobo, well said.I often wonder why people who say they hate Elly and/or John read the strip. Either they like to suffer, or they like to make others suffer with their comments.

wow some of the comments in here make me very sad…bet their wives are not happy-———That’s assuming those clowns have wives!

Sorry Elly, you have no choice. If you did not want to be bonded into working off your debt-——-When you said about working off your debt, I thought you meant the mortgage, and maybe car payments.But all you see are the home repairs Elly had the contractor do.That is a drop in the bucket, but it’s her drop and that’s all you count.

Couldn’t Elly look after Brittany until Jean finds a daycare place rather than work at the dentist office?

Lynn’s Notes:

When we first arrived in Lynn Lake, we had no front desk person for the clinic and no chair-side assistant. With Aaron in kindergarten and my mom-in-law willing to look after Katie, I thought I might be able to work with Rod part-time while he trained someone else.

I don’t see the abuse here. John has a problem at his work, which benefits the whole family, that he needs to solve. He has come to his partner in life for help which will be inconvenient but temporary. She said no, but he still needs her help and hopes she’ll reconsider as cooler heads prevail. Stuff like this is the nature of owning a small business, it takes the whole family at times to make it work and it’s not always fun. It’s nothing that doesn’t happen in my house, with one exception, my wife is the business owner and I juggle my job/life to help her. Sometimes it’s inconvenient and I’m not thrilled to do it, but we’re in life together, so you suck it up and figure out how to get it all done.

O.M.G.I D.A. with all the comments about “abuse”.Please, read each strip as a stand alone joke. The first panels are the set up and the last panel is the punch line which could be a sardonic observation on a funny joke.

If one reads Lynn’s comments on her own web page, she keeps repeating about her strip being based on many experiences from not only her life, but her family, neighbours and friends.

“Fine, I’ll just go and hire a hot chick and cut your household budget.”

Anyone think Lynn is setting up an “Elly and John get divorced” storyline in FOOB 2.0?

Not only does he assume she’ll spend half her day at the clinic, he also assumes Annie will take care of the kids. His Royal Jerk!

I’d say — only if you sleep on the couch until you get a replacement…

Oh yes, so she should just doing something SHE enjoys doing because her HUSBAND’S needs and wants are more important than hers. Seems legit.

stop* doing

I’m not perfect, I’m far from it but neither is John. I said that Lynn is trying to make this series coincidental and perfect, but its not. I’m sorry if I think John’s a bad character.

I only hear what I want to hear.

Tell he no no no no no no don’t hurt me now. You stole my love away.

The laziest member of the family has been Michael. He never lifts a finger to help around the house, never cleans his own room, and slacks off in school and his uncle’s music lessons. Michael has one interest – ice hockey, and that is seasonal. He has never been taking any interest in any other activity, such as a year-round extracurricular such as Boy Scouts. (I realize Elizabeth has similar problems, but she is still rather young, so much of that attitude can be excused for the time being; Michael knows better at his age).From all of the above, sounds like John cannot go wrong pulling Michael out of school and having him work in his office; maybe that will teach his son the trade!

The comic was a perfect depiction of the way women were treated before that awful “women’s lib” took place. I really don’t care what the artist’s real life looked like — nor do I particularly want to see someone else basically calling her a liar for her description of what her art meant to her.

What part of the word “no” doesn’t he understand?