#Steven Crowder

[princessbubblegumandjustice]

Gotta love it

[bunnyhugs22]

[silvermoon424]

If you haven't heard, Steven Crowder is getting divorced. In his video on the matter, he strongly implies that if it were up to him he would force his wife to stay married to him but "the state of Texas allows one party to divorce the other for any reason" or whatever. He makes it clear that he disagrees with this position and is pretty anti-divorce in general.

Hasan did a video covering it and I and a lot of other people commented on how fucked up that is. I shit you not, there are a bunch of conservatives coming out of the woodwork to argue with us, saying shit like "but when you get married you make a lifelong promise" and "but what about the kids?" and "it's messed up to vow to stay with someone through thick and thin and then leave them when you're unhappy." I got into an argument with a few people, trying to explain how the "sanctity of marriage" does not override someone's ability to be free of a situation that creates undue suffering and distress, and they basically just kept falling back on "yeah but when you get married you pinky swear to stay together 4ever"

Idk why these guys are so salty, back in the days before divorce there was a good chance they would have died of a mysterious wasting illness after eating their wives' cooking.

[animentality]

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Gideon Taaffe at MMFA:

During the inaugural prayer service, Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde urged President Donald Trump to “have mercy” on undocumented migrants and LGBTQ kids, and right-wing media responded by calling her a “fake bishop” with “deranged political beliefs,” saying her sermon was “heretical” and “satanic,” and claiming she was “forcing left-wing platitudes down everyone’s throat.” 

Budde’s comments about mercy provoked Trump

The bishop leading the inaugural prayer service at Washington National Cathedral made a plea to Trump to “have mercy” on behalf of LGBTQ kids and migrants. “In the name of our God, I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now,” said Budde, the Episcopal bishop of Washington, D.C. “There are gay, lesbian and transgender children in Democratic, Republican and independent families. Some who fear for their lives.” She added, “They may not be citizens or have the proper documentation, but the vast majority of immigrants are not criminals. They pay taxes and are good neighbors. They are faithful members of our churches and mosques, synagogues.” [NBC News, 1/21/25]

Trump attacked Budde the next day and demanded an apology. He wrote on Truth Social: “The so-called Bishop who spoke at the National Prayer Service on Tuesday morning was a Radical Left hard line Trump hater. … She was nasty in tone, and not compelling or smart. She failed to mention the large number of illegal migrants that came into our Country and killed people. Many were deposited from jails and mental institutions. It is a giant crime wave that is taking place in the USA.” [Rolling Stone, 1/22/25]

Appearing on The View, Budde clarified that her responsibility “was to reflect, to pray with the nation for unity” and that her remarks were an attempt to “say we need to treat everyone with dignity, and we need to be merciful.” She stated, “I also realized that unity requires a certain degree of mercy, mercy and compassion and understanding and so knowing that a lot of people, as I said, in our country right now, are really scared, I wanted to take the opportunity in the context of that of service for unity, to say we need to treat everyone with dignity, and we need to be merciful.” She also said she would be open to a one-on-one with Trump, saying, “I could assure him and everyone listening that I would be as respectful as I would with any person, and certainly of his office, for which I have great deal of respect.” [Deadline, 1/22/25]

Faux outrage alert: Right-wing media commentators big angry over Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde asking Trump “have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared” to his face.

[shoujoboy-restart]

Video of Steven Crowder yelling, belittling and being emotionally abusive towards his then pregnant ex-wife.

trigger warning: emotional abuse and manipulation, yelling(from crowder) and crying.

I really wanna know what "basic biology" books crowder is using to attack trans people while he also claims pregnant women should have cigarette smoke blow on their face, go trought stressful situations and as this situation obviously implies to probably do hard manual labour?

The guy must have hit really hard times since he threw away his 50 million dollar contract, he only has enough money to have a back ward with two pools, a balcony with furniture and perfectly mowed meters long grass bed, but not a second car for his wife to not "inconvenience" him

The same man saying "i never loved you because you never showed me any affection" tomhis Pregnant wife he is blowing cigar smoke on, now comes to his million dollar studio to cry on camera "that the state of Texas decided she could divorce him without his input :c"

[dontmean2bepoliticalbut]

[bumble66]

The similarities between closeted right-wingers and Chris Evans

Alternative title: "Dear Mr. future president Evans,"

Recently, I saw how Chris Evans met Joe Biden. For people who don't know. Chris Evans has a political online platform called ASP. This was not the first time he met a famous politican but meeting the president of the United States is something else. It should be clear by now why he does that... Anyway, it reminded me of the gossip I found recently:

As I mentioned in my last big blog post, about Chris' potential boyfriends, I am not really a fan of marvel and didn't know much about him during his time as Captain America. I only got interested after he started the cringeworthy PR relationship in November 2022. In 2018, I was made aware of how many closeted celebrities exist and Mr. Evans being so clumsy with his Portugal bride gave me the perfect opportunity to uncover this Hollywood facade.

As you can see, I have also been asked by a lot of people why I think Chris could be closeted (either gay, bi or a straight guy who doesn't want to commit and just sleeps around). I will answer these questions in relation to today's topics: I. The Portugal PR relationship is mostly done for his future political career (or that was the plan before the backlash) II. The behavior of closeted right-wingers resembles Chris Evans' III. Portugal Bride was not the first PR relationship rumor but why does a rich, attractive and alleged womanizer like Chris need PR relationships all the time? As I always say. Everything on my tumblr is alleged. I merely summarize what people speculate online and give my own opinion on that.

Tim Scott, a failed GOP 2024 candidate and alleged closeted gay man, announced on X that he got engaged to a woman:

As you can see from the screenshot, no one's buying it. It is rumored Tim Scott is doing this because he will be chosen as Trump's vice president. People online claim that Tim Scott being gay has been talked about way before the first "Why doesn't have Tim Scott have a girlfriend" articles:

I heard about Tim Scott being gay and being pressured to have a PR girlfriend around the same time Chris pretended to have gotten married in September and that made me think... I can't find the comment anymore but I remember someone of Chris' fans on the LSA forum suggesting that Chris' "A starting point" political platform isn't just for shits and giggles. Apparently, he wants to go into politics after his acting career. No idea how successful he will be now with that after his latest movie flops and the Portugal relationship having led to lost followers on his social media accounts because it made him appear as a "dollar store Leonardo DiCaprio" but in general..., this idea isn't too far off. Remember the Terminator aka Arnold Schwarzenegger? An action hero became the Governor of California and with Chris Evan's fake Captain America image, pretending online and in interviews to be like Steve Rogers, he could sway a lot of people too!

Remember. The alleged marriage wasn't the first PR relationship of Chris Evans. At least according to his fandom, when they explained how he and Portugal Bride met, he was involved in several other PR relationships before:

According to this person, the relationships with Christina Ricci and Minka Kelly from long ago, were planned by a PR team too and it adds up with a blog post I found years ago about how Minka is allegedly a beard for my back then favorite actor Jake Gyllenhaal. Bearding appears to be a career of its own in Hollywood: https://gaywriter.wordpress.com/2012/06/19/blind-item-jake-gyllenhaal-is-looking-for-a-new-female-beard-to-present-illusion-of-heterosexuality-to-fans/

So his PR team not only allegedly had several options next to the Portugal Bride (like Monica Barbaro) but they were apparently also responsible for his faked relationship with Lily James? It is rumored that Lily wanted more from this PR arrangement from back in 2020. Possibly real love? The social media site Icons+ reports that "Lily James left Chris Evans to be a millionaire's "other woman"". She basically publicly "cheated" on Chris and many gossip sites reported on it. Did Lily do that as revenge because Chris solely wanted PR and rejected her? Kinda like "if you don't give me real love, I ain't giving you positive PR either". It makes me wonder though. Why would a heterosexual man privately reject a pretty woman like Lily James after wanting to be seen with her in paparazzi photographs after all? Odd.

Yes, Chris' alleged personal Paparazzo with the name Jesal basically admitted that he was called to do the pictures with Lily back in 2020 (Nowadays, he seems to be busy with the Portugal PR relationship as you can see from the screenshot, where he was called for a christmas party Portugal Bride and Chris attended). This reminds me of of another failed 2024 GOP candidate who is rumored to be closeted. There is a medium article regarding Ron DeSantis called "Is the GOP gossiping that Ron DeSantis is gay?", how most if not all of the GOP party know about his alleged homosexualty:

As you can see, not just his own party but the general public thinks so too. In fact, they speak about Ron DeSantis' being closeted the same way some people speak about Chris being allegedly closeted:

The replies to this dailymail article about Chris' and Portugal Bride's relationship-reveal, demonstrate that people think that both Chris and Ron overplay the alpha male macho tough guy image, solely to cover their true sexual orientation.

But PR relationships can also have another function. As I pointed out on my blog before: There are many heterosexual men I know who just wanted to sleep around but because of societal pressure, they pretend to be monogamous. The latest political example of that seems to be Gavin Newsom who has been in the news for being an alleged serial cheater. He was already caught cheating back in 2007. On X I found this summary of his latest shenanigans: (TRIGGER WARNING: mention of SA)

Why do I mention Ron DeSantis and Gavin Newsom in relation to Chris Evans? Because they all have one thing in common. A fake stable married man image. Look at the header picture of DeSantis and Newsom on X. Newsom holding his son in his harm. A few weeks ago, DeSantis had a header picture of holding his children's hands and the latest picture, you can see right now, also shows his wife and kids again to portray the family man image while allegedly being someone completely different (a closet case = Ron, a cheater= Gavin). Sorry not sorry but when I saw those header images combined with the rumors I knew about those two guys, I immediately though that Chris is not so different. He also calls the paparazzi, so he can be portrayed for the public as a guy who has a stable relationship and doesn't randomly sleep around in all kids of places.

As someone pointed out on the Lipstick Alley thread called "Chris Evans Relationship Theories 5", he used to go to parties similar to the ones seen in the movie "Eyes Wide Shut" but these rumors were allegedly scrapped by his team when he became Captain America. Why did they worry so much about this specific gossip? Was it true after all? Apparently this goes back as far as 2006:

I have no problems with that because I am pro sexual liberation. I actually point this out so we can normalize this and let people be who they really are, so that they don't have to do these fake relationships anymore.

I mean, remember the screenshot from my "Chris Evans possible boyfriends" post? The user ShellyT20... how she described that a lot of PR relationships in Hollywood exist because the male actors either sleep with each other, have p-word scandals and/or are serial cheaters "but post fake romance stuff on IG and other public platforms. It gives a fake sense of normalcy and stability and shuts fans up for the most part as well as acting as a distraction." When I read this I got reminded of the public "beyond the blinds podcast" episode you can listen to on spotify. The one about the Hemsworth brothers. There it was alleged that Chris Hemsworth is constantly cheating. I wasn't surprised. He isn't my type but I can't deny that he is what most consider super attractive + tall + rich = in no way is this guy monogamous as a famous hollywood actor (LMAO the audactiy to even thinkt hat)... Sadly, when I confront some people with that... for instance Evans fans on LSA or X, most roll their eyes and don't believe that.... They were like: "How can a guy like C. Hemsworth, who posts social media posts about loving being a father and being married for over a decade possibly be such a bad guy"... ... ... ... ... Well and this the reason why Hollywood still fools you with PR relationships because most of you are gullible. You want to see men married with children and as long as the women are age appropriate, you eat it up. And all this goes even beyond these Hollywood celebrities and politicians the general public is aware of. Apparently, even e-celebs are in PR relationships/fake image relationships these days. The youtuber TheQuartering, who said he was partying with right-wing e-celebs said this about them last year: (TRIGGER WARNING: transphobic slur)

Just like how Chris Evan's fans are disappointed that he wasn't the internet boyfriend after all (his fake image for the 2010s) and started to date random young women like Leonardo DiCaprio and Bradley Cooper, TheQuartering was disappointed too with his right-wing colleagues, who pretended to be committed husbands with children while actually being a closeted pride parade. The right-wing commentarors TheQuartering talks about are: Elijah Schaffer, Jack Posobiec and Mike Cernovich. When I found that out I was shocked. I was like "So even these e-celebs are basically "their own Hollywood club" and need PR relationships to function publicly". It really shows how deep gender roles are still ingrained in our society. That even internet-famous people have to have a family man image and portray themselves in a certain way to become "e-celeb-A-list". And if they don't, they will be denied that status.

I know it hurts that your favorite A-list stars are also wife cheaters and that their activism is most likely fake only so that they can continue participating in Hollywood orgies (Which apparently already happen on the e-celeb level). But at one point it had to come out and isn't it better to accept reality than to participate in and support these fake scenarios only to feel better about the world? Cause it is not just TheQuartering who exposed the fake image of the right-wing online community. Blaire White, a right-winger herself, pointed out the same. As people say, where there is smoke, there is fire:

In this video at 55:35 regarding Blaze Media, Blaire White spills tea about closeted e-celebs. It also includes orgies and drugs... like with our favorite super hero (allegedly).

(Blaire is not the only one who knows about the orgy parties)

Lastly, one of the most famous right-wing e-celebs is Steven Crowder. On his channel he had a video where he once admitted that he had a bisexual phase... a phase..

And according to his own logic that means:

He also went so far and basically created beard twins. I remember clearly the video where he announced the pregnancy of his wife. He held up a picture into the camera from an ultrasound. It was like "See, I am hetero after all. Are you happy now?". That's at least my opinion on how the video looked like and it adds up with what peole usually say about him:

Honestly, if someone had told me that this text is about Chris Evans, I'd have believed it and so now we have come full circle. While I only know about Chris Evan's since the pandemic (As I said, I don't watch super hero movies), I am still disappointed. In some interviews, he appeared so adorable, awkward and different from other men in Hollywood (like when he was interviewed about his "Lightyear movie announcement" tweet on Jimmy Kimmel). But in the end he is no better than the closeted republicans. Portraying a conservative image of marriage while behind closed doors it is worse than a sitcom trying to convince you that canned laughter makes everything funnier.

(picture: Is this the awkwardness people talk about? Adorable...)

Yes, there have always been rumors that his real personality is being "weird and awkward" and that he is not just acting in movies but also in most interviews. It goes so far that someone claimed he had been rejected on a date and that's why some people assume it is actually him who initiated the Portugal PR relationship and basically paid for it because he can't get someone himself through normal means. Are some people punished with their good looks?

IMO just like with the married right-wing e-celebs who do orgies all the time, it is also a bad idea of Chris wanting to become a father (at least according to his "sexiest man alive" PR narrative from 2022 which seems to be in the trash can now too).

But let's assume his PR team has that still on their minds: Not only would it be solely for his image (which would make this situation PR either way, even if the marriage were real) but according to all his alleged wild ways, he is also unfit to parent, it would be a disaster actually. Controversial commentator Pearl Davis described it very well. How some people just shouldn't be parents:

I agree with Vale. She would just be in it for the image of being a married woman and in our case... a married, monogamous, non-cheating family man. A user on LSA said that when you switch out "fake nails" with "fake teeth" in Pearl Davis' message, you will have the pefect description of Chris Evans:

(Chris Evans being interviewed at the Lightyear premiere resembling Barry Manilow with too much botox) Sorry but after seeing this picture, I have to agree with her. I love his clothing style but a bi-peacock who is more interested in vanity and fake status will never be a good role model for children. As the saying goes: "You can't have it both ways"

I know this is all a tough pill to swallow but c'mon people. This is the year 2024 and at one point this fakeness just needs to stop. Celebrities, politicians and even social meda e-celebs... you are being fooled. And according to Hollywood insider and daughter of famous TV personality John Walsh, a lot of times, one partner of the arrangement is suffering. Is this really what you support? I don't and that's why I uncover all these PR relationships of the entertainment world because as a true progressive, I don't think that people should be judged based on outdated gender expectations like marriage and monogamy.

The closet kills... your real personality. I mean honestly, what do you gain from being remembered after your death as someone you never were? As Joan Rivers jokes at 0:43 in a short clip from 1966. This so called bearding has been going on forever. I don't think we need a 100th anniversary of this shameful practice. So please help me to expose this so that in the future, celebrities can become famous for truly being themselves.

[renegadecut]

Why Do Conservative Shows All Look the Same?

[animentality]

[thingstrumperssay]

It's weird that Steven Crowder got threatened by a potato of all things, but I think there's instructions on how to cook the potato right underneath the threat which makes it even weirder.

Where did he find this thing anyway? Like, was it just sitting on his porch waiting for him to come home or something?

[wonderingwheretheleopardsare]

We're Only Making Plans For Steven.

A fitting Steven Crowder tribute from The Elephant Graveyard, please subscribe to them.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Payton Armstrong, Jack Winstanley, Noah Dowe, Ben Van Bloem, and Kayla Gogarty at MMFA:

After rolling back its election misinformation policy last year, YouTube allowed right-wing media figures to undermine confidence in the 2024 election results even before any votes were cast, with streamers asserting that “the only way this election can be won from the left is if it's stolen,” suggesting that “illegal ballots” might be “slipped in” in Pennsylvania, and claiming that Democrats are trying “to rig and steal the election” including with an “illegal alien push.”

In December 2020, after states certified their election results, YouTube began removing content with false claims that widespread fraud had changed the outcome of the election, but the platform reversed that policy in June 2023, saying that it would “stop removing content that advances false claims that widespread fraud, errors, or glitches occurred in the 2020 and other past US Presidential elections.” (The decision was cheered by right-wing media.) Over the last year, right-wing creators have exploited YouTube’s policy rollback, especially in the months leading up to the 2024 presidential election. In July, for instance, Media Matters reported that after becoming co-chair of the Republican National Committee in March, Lara Trump repeatedly engaged in election denial on her show that streams on YouTube.  Right-wing podcaster Steven Crowder even acknowledged the policy change during an August stream on the platform, saying, “Here’s another way that they try to steal this election from you. And we’re allowed to say that on YouTube now, which is great.”

New Media Matters study finds hundreds of videos on YouTube with election misinformation

In a new study, Media Matters reviewed YouTube content streamed or uploaded between May 1 and August 31 by 30 right-wing channels or channels that hosted notable right-wing figures. We found 286 videos — totaling at least 44 million views and including at least 93 monetized videos — that contained misinformation about the 2020, 2022, and/or 2024 elections. 

According to our study, former Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani was the most prolific election misinformer, accounting for 77 of the 286 videos, and right-wing streamer Benny Johnson had the most videos that we observed with preroll ads. We found that in the two months after WABC canceled Giuliani’s radio shows (May 10 through July 12), he relentlessly claimed on YouTube that the 2020 election was “stolen” and Democrats were “going to cheat” in the 2024 election. More details on these findings can be found here.

We also found Johnson pushed election misinformation in dozens of monetized YouTube videos from May through August. These videos — which each included preroll ads, paid promotions, and/or Super Chats — have earned millions of views. More details on these findings can be found here.

YouTube permitted numerous right-wing pundits spew out content undermining the confidence of the 2024 election results to push out nonsense about “stolen” and “rigged” elections.

See Also:

MMFA: YouTube is profiting from Benny Johnson’s election misinformation

MMFA: YouTube has provided a home for Rudy Giuliani's election denial after WABC canceled his radio shows

[dalt20]

Tooning In. 20 Greg Bailey part 7 of 10

DL:So, I guess after Cookie Jar got attacked and shanghai-ed by DHX media, you made a little escape boat to 9 Story Entertainment.

GB:I was already gone before DHX took over Cookie Jar. I thought it was just a sale to DHX after some unsuccessful business moves. I never thought that CJ was attacked. It was quite small by the time I left to 9 Story.

DL:So, I learned that DHX media doesn't own the CiNAR/Cookie Jar episodes of Arthur but they own the spinoff series Postcards from Buster. Why was that? Did Cookie Jar sell the distribution rights to WGBH in boston?

GB:I have no idea. They just sold off everything they possibly could over the few years that CJ existed. They did that with everything else. It was a long way from the start of Arthur when Cinar owned a good part of the rights of Arthur and we had the distribution in 110 countries. Cinar had distribution everywhere in the world except the US. They may have sold off the Arthur rights to WGBH just before they gave up the show. That would be in the period after they bought DIC and the Strawberry Shortcake fiasco. So any cash would have been welcome at CJ.Postcards from Buster was a dumb move for Cinar (pre CJ era) to get involved with. It was a good enough series but there was no market for a show that was so specifically about the US . WGBH had the rights for US distribution and Cinar had the rest of the world. But the series was not able to sell anywhere other than the US> It was made in the post 9/11 and Iraq war period. There must have been a dozen scenes in each episode that featured American flags and with the war in Iraq we entered a strong period of anti American sentiment around the world. The show only sold in the US and Israel. All the other customers passed on it. It was referred to as the series that could not be sold by the sales teams that tried pushing it.

DL:So, how was the move to 9 Story?

GB:That was very fast. CJ gave up the show in August and 9 Story was starting production by October. We had been doing the pre-production at Oasis in Montreal the years that Cookie Jar existed. So all the digitized models and files we had were destroyed by Oasis when they found out that the show wouldn't be done at Oasis anymore. They should have turned over those models because CJ owned them, not Oasis. At the same time Cookie Jar had destroyed the well organized vault of the old paper material in Montreal . The storage building was being abandoned and all the material that was catalogued and filed properly by the librarian was lying in a huge jumble of boxes just thrown into the room awaiting the shredding of the paper. The pile of boxes was over 10 feet high and 100 feet long and everything there was a horrible jumble. It was literally heaved up into a big pile of boxes that were spilled open. I had to go through the boxes and try to find some old paper model sheets in order to base our new models at 9 Story on. So we had a lot of work to do at 9Story to get up and running in the short time we had. We also started doing the animation in Flash that year so it was a big conversion job at the same time we were trying to organize the files of reuse. Which is like all the backgrounds designs and the character and prop designs from episode 1 to around 125. 9 Story did a great job and people were enthusiastic about doing the show but it was a big undertaking considering the time we had to do it.

DL:So, how did you adapt to flash? Was it an easy process to adjust

GB:It was really difficult. If it was a new series it wouldn't have been a problem but in this case we had to get something that sort of matched what we had already done as traditional animation for 125 episodes. We had established a style of show that used a lot of dramatic angles and exaggeration of drawings and also we would often break off into new styles of drawing for a fantasy sequence or even a whole show. Like we did on Tale Spins or The Contest. In digital it is really slow to rig a new character and only using it for one sequence is not efficient. There were also some things like the jiggly line broken line style and the thin line that was problematic in Flash. And just so many things that just kept coming as they started rigging that became a problem that I never anticipated. Just small things like they first the pupils in the eyes were too large. So those large pupils got used in a bunch of main models and by the time we started getting animation those big eyes were put into many versions of the character rigs like Muffy in Winter clothes and Muffy in baseball uniform. So we started calling revisions on the first episode for the eyes then we had 5 more episodes already in production with those crazy eyes. That sounds picky and insignificant now but it seemed like it would never end for a while. It was nice that the animation was back in Canada so it was something I could see before the shows were completed and shipped from overseas. It was more hands on.Many of our background designs that we used since episode one were upshot or downshot angles and that isn't very good for digital animation because the rig is only one angle, eye level. So that made for some hard scenes in animation.

DL:Many people have commented on the designs of the animation as they said that it's robotic, stiff and lifeless. As the characters have this floaty like feel to them whenever they walk or run.Your comment on that?

GB:It was my feeling a few years earlier when tested a bunch of companies with the idea of changing to digital. I found that when we did tests one company Animation Services did the test traditionally and even though they weren't the strongest animation company around the characters looked like they breathed or were alive. Digital animation is very still when it stops and the face is exactly the same drawing in every scene. When it is hand drawn there is some mild nuance to the drawing because each scene and each inbetween is a different original drawing. I think it has some subconscious effect on the viewer even if the animators in digital animation would put more bounce in the walk . Even in a walk the traditional walks are all drawing each time they have a walk. So even if it is off model like you said some people thought Akom was like, then at least each walk was new and unique. When you draw you can squash things a little and when a hand turns over there are a bunch of inbetweens that are all different. In digital it basically pops from one hand to another hand when it turns over. A good animator can kind of distort or bend the hand but basically it just pops. There was a lot of the art of animation lost in the sort of digital cutout style of animation . For me the worst thing is that a 3/4 head of Arthur in one scene is exactly the same drawing as a 3/4 head in every other scene. Wgbh was very happy with it because everything was on model all the time. Or at least it was the same model. But they were never able to notice that the animation was stiff or the walk was exactly the same each time.I always felt that 3D animation was the worst for floaty movements though. The feet never seem to actually touch the ground. I think a good 2 D digital animator does a pretty good job with that if they have time and budget.

DL:So, did you move to Toronto to work with 9 story?

GB:No, I commuted once a week and I worked online the rest of the week. I guess I was in training for Covid.

DL:Ha! So, I wanted to talk about the Guest Star designs because I remember someone saying that the designs like Art Garfunkel, Mr. Rogers and Backstreet Boys designs look good but the Matt Damon or John Lewis ones.....

Matt Damon guest stars in the season 11, sixth episode, The Making of Arthur.

John Lewis guests stars in critically acclaimed episode, Arthur Takes a Stand from season 21, episode 4

What was up with those? It's like the character designer gave up and just traced a photo for these people. Compared to these!

Art Garfunkel guests stars as the narrator of the first episode of season 3, the ballad of Buster Bunny which marks the return of Buster Baxter and his voice actor, Daniel Bronchu. Who had took a sabbatical to Australia in 1997 during season two.

Mr Rogers makes an appearance as himself in the epic crossover, Arthur meets Mr.Rogers (season 2, episode 1)

The Backstreet Boys starred as themselves in the Arthur special, It’s Only Rock N’ Roll. Arthur in the center.

GB:I did the initial sketch on Matt during the live recording we did in Florida when he came in in his sweats after coming in off his run. He is even wearing the same shirt with some political message on it with the Congress. I remember him being hard to design because everyone had a different movie in mind for what he should look like. He is also a bit hard to do because he's so handsome. Marc Brown did a nice sketch of Art Garfunkel and Mr. Rogers models. The BSB’s were kind of a mix of a few artists. John was done by a designer in Oasis. It's a little touchy doing visible minorities if you have a room full of white designers and a director. But we had a great character designer who is black so he knew that design would be coming his way. Over time we probably made the characters less like animals and more like human faces. It might be a mistake but political correctness was starting to weigh in over the years. So we had to be more cautious on some characters like John Lewis.

DL:Most of the characters were bears. It's like Bears was your default character model when drawing characters.

GB:I would say that it was actually mostly rabbits. The WGBH people thought it was their duty to ask the guest stars which animal they wanted to be. They would always say rabbit. Who wants to be a dog or a monkey right? I would say most guest stars were rabbits. Yo Yo Ma, Lance Armstrong if I recall correctly were rabbits. One show that featured a music troupe named Bang on a Can there was a woman whose last name is Wolfe. When they were asked which animal they wanted to be she said rabbit. It was the one time I had to convince someone that she should really not be a rabbit. funny that she would have chosen anything other than a wolf. Maybe it isn't her maiden name though. I don't think anyone ever picked monkey.

DL:And when I saw her I thought that she was the only good looking Arthur Guest star in the later seasons.

GB:Ha ha! Yeah, she was more extremely animal looking. She was brave for a woman to imagine herself with a big long nose though. Neil Gamon was the lone cat character that I recall. I wonder if he chose cat when he did that show.

DL:Also Michelle Kwan was a bear even though I was hoping because of her last name she would be a swan.

GB:We didn't have a bird option though. We never did many birds in the series. She was a bear I saw and so was Marc's friend Jack Prelutsky. So maybe you are right that most are bears. It seemed like everyone picked rabbit when we would ask so I was pretty sure they were mostly rabbits. People that wore hats were problematic if they wanted to be a rabbit. Bears are the most generic looking of the choices.

DL:And also my statement on guest stars weirdly goes to pets too because Alan Cumming played a poodle who was Killer's rival in one episode and

Alan Cummings guest stars as Sebastian, Killer’s rival in the first episode of season 17,Show off

Someone got a picture again but then again " they wouldn't know if it was Alan Cumming! We gotta make it look like him!"

GB:That's right I forgot that show with Alan. It was amazing that he went along with us on that. What a strange ideal to make a male character a poodle now that I think about it. Andy Warhol was a warthog but that was because the script writer wanted the name and he was a guest star either. We didn’t do many warthogs or reptiles or birds in the show. Joan Rivers was a monkey but she was related to Francine and she had a brutal sense of humor and would not have protested about being a monkey I'm sure. BJ Novaks was a rabbit.

DL:Also It's a popular accusation in the Black community of people saying characters like Arthur were black even though Brain was confirmed to be black.Comment on that?

GB:That is true. There was always a strong suspicion of that. Which is fine. There is no reason Arthur had to be a white kid. That got played up more in the last special we made where they go to the ancestral farm in Ohio. Arthur's relatives were black in that show. When we started Francine was supposed to be a black character. It changed over the years once they made her Polish in one show and then Jewish on the Christmas special. We were even casting for a black actress for Francine when we did season one . Jodie Resther has been with the show as Francine's voice since she was a kid.Brain didn't start off as being black or not black. It was only the Christmas show that we had to define some nationalities or ethnic qualities on the characters. We added a Martin Luther King poster in his room. In the special Brain would celebrate Kwanzaa and Francine became Jewish. Arthur was some kind of Christian Protestant , George became Swedish, and Buster remained non aligned to any ethnic group or religion.

DL:Also Brain in that special was played by a young right wing commentator Steven Crowder.This guy.

Steven Crowder for those who don’t know was the voice of Brain in the fourth season of Arthur but more baffling, Arthur’s Perfect Christmas

GB:Wow he got bigger. Does he have issues with minorities as a right wing commentator or is he just politically right wing? I haven't heard his commentator stuff.

DL:Yes he has said racist and Homophobic stuff on his YouTube channel.

GB:Ok well that is kind of a nasty thing about S Crowder in that case. I guess the Arthur show didn't have any lasting impression on him.For a while everyone was saying John Legend looks like Arthur but he wouldn't come on the show unfortunately.

DL:Yeah, surprisingly.So back on track. The Arthur show then moved to Oasis Animation back in Montreal in 2016.What was the reason behind that?

GB:The owner at WGBH pulled the show out of 9Story in a dispute. He felt he owned a piece of them because he had a show there, and when 9Story started pitching new series to PBS WGBH thought they should have a say in that since they would be competing with them. 9 Story understandably didn't want to stop producing their own shows that would own rights on, so the contract was cancelled. I would have been happy staying with 9 Story another season because we were starting to make some big headway in the production and they were always nice to me there. I never heard the story from 9Story point of view. 9 Story would have just seen me as part of the enemy in the dispute at that point. WGBH was always doing battle with the partners over the years. It was like that with Ron and Micheline and with Michael Hirsch and then with Vince at 9Story. They were always pushing for more and cutting the money being contributed to the show each season. It wasn't ever a warm and cuddly relationship between the co producers.

DL:So, How was the move to Oasis Animation?

GB:I was able to hire a few of my previous designers from years earlier. Not as many as I had hoped but we had a few people come back. We threw away all the material from 9 Story because they now wanted to do the show in Toon Boom Harmony. So the rigs needed to be rebuilt. They did trace them off or something to save some work but they didn't rig all the extra poses we had made in Flash. So it was again a new learning experience. The animation artists were all doing the show for the first time again so it starts off difficult and gradually improves over time. We set up the crew structure more like I was used to when we did the show at Cinar/Cookie Jar. With regular designing crews for characters and props and designers for background design and color design. So I was more used to that structure than the way 9Story operated.

DL:To tell you the truth I didn't see a difference when Oasis took over.I thought you used the same models!

GB:Since it ended up going on a few years it was probably better by the end than if we had stayed at 9 Story. Toonboom Harmony is just so much better and more versatile than Flash which was being phased out quickly at that time. The design on the shows improved a lot. We went from one designer doing a few rough characters and Background designs to a crew of 3 people doing characters and 3 doing background design.

DL:Also I found out that Glen Kennedy was doing the boards for Arthur while at Oasis! You got him to do boards?

Glen Kennedy infamous for his work on Tiny Toon Adventures was a storyboard artist on the three Arthur Specials, the Rhythm and Roots of Arthur, An Arthur Thanksgiving, and Arthur’s First Day.

GB:Yeah he was in Vancouver freelancing. I had people from Toronto, Ottawa , Vancouver and Montreal doing storyboards. My main people that were doing the storyboards over the years including at Oasis were Gerry Capelle, Al Jefferies and Jeremy O'Neil , Elie Klimos and Cilbur Rocha. Glen came in on the last season or 2.I had some of the same storyboard people since season 1. Specifically Gerry Capelle and Al Jeffries. It was one of the constants of the series. Gerry did most of the opening storyboard even.

DL: I talk about him because he is famous in the Youtube poop community, As his animation is way more off model than AKOM's ! As none of his animation has weight and would squash and stretch all the time! https://youtu.be/KCIFNCO1ic4?si=764AdwiJaViotfyX

Glen Kennedy’s Animation Reel.

GB:I've never seen that. Is that his animation reel or did he storyboard it? It's a lot of animation. Great animation for sure.

DL:His animation Reel.But it caused him a lot of jobs.

GB:Wow! great work.Kennedy Cartoons was an annoying company. It is probably not Glen personally doing all that animation, it would have been his company. He had that company with his brother in Toronto. I remember we tried sending layouts for R. Scarry or maybe even Arthur there at one point. It didn't last long.

DL:Wait, Kennedy Cartoons was going to be doing Richard scarry or Arthur!

GB:Yeah I recall sending out some freelance layouts at one time. I don't think it lasted more than a few shows. Ever since then I keep running into people that tell me they used to work on Arthur doing layouts in Toronto or Ottawa and I don't know them and wonder how they got layouts.

DL:What you just told me was extraordinary!

[comraderaccoon]

I wish Steven Crowder’s wife a very happy life, and Crowder himself a very get wrecked.

[mitchfynde]

So I was watching this video about why being "anti-woke" was sort of a trap that caused many people to take on the attributes that they were anti-woke to protest in the first place. It's a great video with a lot of great points, but a side note in the video really took me off guard and I think it will for you too.

We've all seen this image before. The "TRIGGERED FEMINIST" meme. Of course there are many different people who have been memed similarly, but this is a quite popular one.

Have you seen the material this image is taken from?

She... wasn't even triggered. She was politely debating a topic that she was passionate about. Now... maybe the statistic she's quoting is not correct. The most liberal estimate seems to be 1 in 5, which isn't that far off, but still. Think about how much that one unfortunate screenshot of her has affected her perception.

What about Trigglypuff?

What was she yelling? "Keep your hate speech off of our campus" or something similar? Well what was the event she was protesting?

An event featuring Milo Yiannopoulos, Steven Crowder, and Christina Hoff Sommers. A lineup so terrible, that Sommers is somehow the least problematic, and she is part of a right wing thinktank. Milo Yiannopoulos being the worst of the trio, having worked with far-right outlet Breitbart as well as Nick Fuentes on Kanye West's 2024 presidential campaign. Steven Crowder is a bit more independent than the other 2, and he's a political commentator who thought it was appropriate to do this:

He also put out this... interestingly titled video.

What about Milo's opinions on hate speech? Well, the ADL has an entire page on him. It's not sourced, so here are some sources of some of the hateful things he's done:

He called a black woman an ape.

He harassed a trans person at one of his campus events.

Even Christina Hoff Sommers eventually put this out:

Now granted, not all of this happened before the event that Triggly was attending. But Milo Yiannopoulos had already done enough that calling for his hate speech to be silenced was pretty reasonable.

Was Trigglypuff cringey? Undeniably. Was she right? In my opinion, she certainly was. And we crucified her.

So, what exactly am I even getting at here? In DarkMatter2525's video, the one at the top of this thread which spawned this revelation for me, he talks about the traits he disliked in "woke" people.

Obsessive

Easily-offended

Hypocritical

Lacking self-awareness

Did that not apply to the internet's general reaction to these 2 characters in meme history? After all, these are real people, and I'm not sure they've been viewed as such. We obsessively applied a caricature to them, because we were offended by what we thought they represented. That itself is hypocritical, because the whole reason we were offended was that we felt a caricature of an evil hate speech-loving Nazi was being applied to us. And if we had the self-awareness... perhaps these people would not be memes now.