Looking at the strip itself, it’s pretty weird. The sea lion’s words are polite, but being in someone’s house uninvited is a violation of their property rights. How did he even get in—breaking and entering? Meanwhile, the person’s reaction is not to say “oh my god, how did he get in?” or “get out of here or I will call the police”, but to be unsurprised and annoyed.
In other panels where they’re having tea or breakfast, it’s unclear whether it’s in their house—in which case the same stuff as above applies—or in some third-party restaurant place, in which case they would at least have the recourse of complaining to the owner and trying to persuade him that this sea lion is bothering his patrons and driving away business. Even in public, if such behavior were persistent enough, I imagine it could rise to the level of “stalking” and be punishable by law; though this is probably a grey area, and let’s assume the sea lion is doing his best to remain technically within the law.
The strip could have had the sea lion follow them around while they’re outside in public, and maybe had them sigh in relief when they close the door to their house. It could have shown them arguing with an unsympathetic proprietor about his behavior. But no, they’re not even looking for any recourse against him. Instead, it showed the sea lion following them inside, everywhere, into their bedroom while they’re trying to sleep, and this is presented as just a fact of life. Why?
I won’t assume the worst motives—it’s possible that the author made the situation more extreme for absurdity and humor—but whatever the intent, clearly “he follows you into your bedroom when you’re trying to sleep” would intensely strengthen the elements of annoyance and of “oh god I can’t escape him” for a real person. If all the scenes with the sea lion were in public, the emotional point wouldn’t land as heavily… for those who don’t think about the assumptions. (The fact that it’s a talking sea lion generally encourages suspension of disbelief. It’s also a key part of the comic: a man following a woman into her bedroom uninvited would be interpreted very differently.)
The strip embodies an acute lack of distinction between “criminal trespass and stalking” and “annoying but maybe-permissible public behavior”. Blurring these together seems to be a key part of how it gives emotional weight to its point, which perhaps made it resonate with many more people than it otherwise would have.
The strip embodies the exact mindset that leads to “complaining that random strangers are engaging you when you’re literally on the Engage Random Strangers Platform”. I don’t think there’s a way it could make sense outside the context of social media platforms like that; the specific thing of “communications from randos appearing in your bedroom at night, and this being unsurprising” perfectly fits internet tech and not much else. (Getting phone calls all night would be similar, and actually worse if it prevented you sleeping, but you could unplug the phone—which is kind of the issue in a nutshell. I suspect the type of person with this mindset has their phone set to give audible notifications on all kinds of social media messages, keeps their phone nearby, and might not even set it to do-not-disturb mode at night.) The same applies to how the sea lion magically overhears the conversation and appears from nowhere in the first place, and no one is surprised at this, nor at how he keeps magically appearing in all subsequent places.
You could look at the strip and say “the point is that the sea lions are annoying, persistent, and their words are polite, and you’re supposed to abstract away everything else”. I think that would be wrong; I think that would mean abstracting away most of the logic (and the appeal) of the comic, and, among other things, when choosing a name for bad behavior I want far better epistemics than that.
I submit that “the point is that the people complaining about the sea lions have an immature attitude towards social media, plus they see nothing wrong with disparaging groups of people in public and are mad when called on it, and generally they are massive hypocrites”. (I know it’s not what they intend to say, but it is the meaning I take from their speech.) That being the case, it makes me uneasy when I see someone I respect use the term from the comic unironically.
I submit that “the point is that the people complaining about the sea lions have an immature attitude towards social media, plus they see nothing wrong with disparaging groups of people in public and are mad when called on it, and generally they are massive hypocrites”. (I know it’s not what they intend to say, but it is the meaning I take from their speech.) That being the case, it makes me uneasy when I see someone I respect use the term from the comic unironically.
Yeah, honestly that’s my take from it as well. But I think it’s true that in certain settings you can use the “polite questions” approach as obstructionism, and it might work. For example, any kind of work meeting, an assembly, a council of any sort. “Asking polite questions” as a sort of DDoS attack on the bandwidth of any discussion is a possible dirty tactic that gives you plausible deniability. However knowing the context, the actual complaint here is probably: “I made a sweeping statement on social media about people, who should not be offended by because obviously I wasn’t talking about all of them, just the bad ones, they know who they are, and then those people kept nagging me on the internet which then compelled me to answer and read their answers”. To which the sane answer is “then don’t make stupid sweeping statements on social media about people, or if you do and then are nagged for it, shut down your goddamn phone”. So I think the concept itself of sealioning isn’t completely out there, but the specific meaning the strip was originated from is actually a pretty self-centred perspective.
I see it as a case of a potentially useful term that just happened to be used badly on its very first occurrence.
Looking at the strip itself, it’s pretty weird. The sea lion’s words are polite, but being in someone’s house uninvited is a violation of their property rights. How did he even get in—breaking and entering? Meanwhile, the person’s reaction is not to say “oh my god, how did he get in?” or “get out of here or I will call the police”, but to be unsurprised and annoyed.
In other panels where they’re having tea or breakfast, it’s unclear whether it’s in their house—in which case the same stuff as above applies—or in some third-party restaurant place, in which case they would at least have the recourse of complaining to the owner and trying to persuade him that this sea lion is bothering his patrons and driving away business. Even in public, if such behavior were persistent enough, I imagine it could rise to the level of “stalking” and be punishable by law; though this is probably a grey area, and let’s assume the sea lion is doing his best to remain technically within the law.
The strip could have had the sea lion follow them around while they’re outside in public, and maybe had them sigh in relief when they close the door to their house. It could have shown them arguing with an unsympathetic proprietor about his behavior. But no, they’re not even looking for any recourse against him. Instead, it showed the sea lion following them inside, everywhere, into their bedroom while they’re trying to sleep, and this is presented as just a fact of life. Why?
I won’t assume the worst motives—it’s possible that the author made the situation more extreme for absurdity and humor—but whatever the intent, clearly “he follows you into your bedroom when you’re trying to sleep” would intensely strengthen the elements of annoyance and of “oh god I can’t escape him” for a real person. If all the scenes with the sea lion were in public, the emotional point wouldn’t land as heavily… for those who don’t think about the assumptions. (The fact that it’s a talking sea lion generally encourages suspension of disbelief. It’s also a key part of the comic: a man following a woman into her bedroom uninvited would be interpreted very differently.)
The strip embodies an acute lack of distinction between “criminal trespass and stalking” and “annoying but maybe-permissible public behavior”. Blurring these together seems to be a key part of how it gives emotional weight to its point, which perhaps made it resonate with many more people than it otherwise would have.
The strip embodies the exact mindset that leads to “complaining that random strangers are engaging you when you’re literally on the Engage Random Strangers Platform”. I don’t think there’s a way it could make sense outside the context of social media platforms like that; the specific thing of “communications from randos appearing in your bedroom at night, and this being unsurprising” perfectly fits internet tech and not much else. (Getting phone calls all night would be similar, and actually worse if it prevented you sleeping, but you could unplug the phone—which is kind of the issue in a nutshell. I suspect the type of person with this mindset has their phone set to give audible notifications on all kinds of social media messages, keeps their phone nearby, and might not even set it to do-not-disturb mode at night.) The same applies to how the sea lion magically overhears the conversation and appears from nowhere in the first place, and no one is surprised at this, nor at how he keeps magically appearing in all subsequent places.
You could look at the strip and say “the point is that the sea lions are annoying, persistent, and their words are polite, and you’re supposed to abstract away everything else”. I think that would be wrong; I think that would mean abstracting away most of the logic (and the appeal) of the comic, and, among other things, when choosing a name for bad behavior I want far better epistemics than that.
I submit that “the point is that the people complaining about the sea lions have an immature attitude towards social media, plus they see nothing wrong with disparaging groups of people in public and are mad when called on it, and generally they are massive hypocrites”. (I know it’s not what they intend to say, but it is the meaning I take from their speech.) That being the case, it makes me uneasy when I see someone I respect use the term from the comic unironically.
Yeah, honestly that’s my take from it as well. But I think it’s true that in certain settings you can use the “polite questions” approach as obstructionism, and it might work. For example, any kind of work meeting, an assembly, a council of any sort. “Asking polite questions” as a sort of DDoS attack on the bandwidth of any discussion is a possible dirty tactic that gives you plausible deniability. However knowing the context, the actual complaint here is probably: “I made a sweeping statement on social media about people, who should not be offended by because obviously I wasn’t talking about all of them, just the bad ones, they know who they are, and then those people kept nagging me on the internet which then compelled me to answer and read their answers”. To which the sane answer is “then don’t make stupid sweeping statements on social media about people, or if you do and then are nagged for it, shut down your goddamn phone”. So I think the concept itself of sealioning isn’t completely out there, but the specific meaning the strip was originated from is actually a pretty self-centred perspective.
I see it as a case of a potentially useful term that just happened to be used badly on its very first occurrence.