Ch18 P13
It’s important to remember that this is not the standard way family treats their young ones in this society. There’s just shitty circumstances (and people) in the world sometimes.
It’s important to remember that this is not the standard way family treats their young ones in this society. There’s just shitty circumstances (and people) in the world sometimes.
so … big bro was a skuzz-fart and all around jerk.
That’s an explanation.
I’m still a bit confused though … at what point in the society of this world do people lose personal touch? toddler? older? At what point is touching “icky” and utterly disallowed?
My take has been that there isn’t a strict touch taboo.
Abeille doesn’t find what is missing in the touch club. It is love that was not found in the stimulators, not touch.
Holly offers to touch Ivy and it’s not just that that Ivy wants.
Aster is unusual, by promoting affection and zie comes from a family that seems to have no touch aversion. Zie points out that infants need touch/affection to be healthy.
A reason why I love this story so much is that it seems to reflect the world that I live in. Boys tend to not touch in a way that conveys affection. Aside from male parents, touch is only for sex and violence.
Women do, more often, maybe, convey affection through touch, but it is eroticized if someone makes it into a spectacle.
In analogy: it’s just something that you don’t do. It’s like asking at what point in our society touching your genitals in public or grabbing for other people’s body parts or property is disallowed. It’s discouraged from the start as part of education, but there is high tolerance towards babies and toddlers that cannot yet be expected to have interned such lessons.
Apparently one reason to have fosters is that there is someone taking on the less civil parts of raising a child: getting along without touch at all has not worked well in experiments, so someone has to stoop to the occasion.
So it’s sort of a “can I wear diapers and poop in them” request. Or perhaps a bit less icky, “can I suck on your thumb”.
Big oof
I am noticing how the foster is touching Clove in comfort, so touching wasn’t always an issue for Clove at least. But oh man, that’s sad!
Aaaaaaaaand my heart has broken into a thousand pieces. 🙁
Yeah, was expecting Clove to have a crappy brother based on previous conversations. But why does he only have a brother? What about his parents? Can people just create kids, and then decide “Oop, I want nothing to do with them.” Cause that’s terrible if true.
Also, I hope there’s a way to flag people with “Does not appear to do well with children, psych evaluation must be performed before allowing to reproduce.” Or something to prevent people like his brother from becoming a parent.
But big brother is clearly an adolescent in this memory, and that stage is pretty much known for rudeness, lack of compassion (especially to sibs) and kowtowing to peer pressure. Not that all folks are like this as teenagers, but many are, due to hormones and shifting societal roles. It’s a real pressure cooker! Also not meaning to minimize the impact on Clove at all – I’m hoping that we get a reveal that big bro has since matured and honestly regrets his schoolboyish jerkitude, and goes to great lengths to heal the rift.
It’d be nice, but I’m not expecting brother to improve, as it’s clearly been a while, since Clove is clearly under 10 (much younger, possibly, but I’m never around kids so can’t say how old he is), and as Clove said during Cornucopia, it’s been a long time since he’s felt like part of a family during the holidays.
https://lovenotfound.com/comic/ch16-p60/
Hi! Just wanted to say I enjoy this comic very much! I just caught up with three years’ worth of updates in the last couple hours and it’s helped me feel more like myself, I used to really look forward to each new page. I think Clover is my favourte character, it’s great getting more of his history, even though it’s so sad. Thank you for creating this world and these characters!
My brother and I aren’t particularly close (or distant), but as a Big Brother I hereby officially declare this behavior Not Cool.
aww, poor sweet little Clove *pats*
Geez! I know this is just how their world operates. But he doesn’t have to be such a jerk about it.