#also hes just... incredibly racist

[ducktracy]

The Ducktators is a fascinating little cartoon, though not a particularly enjoyable one. It’s very hard to watch nowadays but your review makes its strengths as animated propaganda very clear. As always, a very nice review. Also, sorry to bring him up, but I always thought the racist stereotype Japanese duck was supposed to be Hideki Tojo (Hi-duck-i Tojo?).

THANK YOU FOR THE KIND WORDS!!! that really means a lot! absolutely, it's not a short i revisit for obvious reasons, but i'm almost glad for that "fresh pair of eyes" point of view because it definitely allowed me to view its directorial strengths much more clearly. in terms of pure cinematography and directing alone, it really shows that Norm McCabe had a lot of potential to be a great director if he wasn't bogged down so much by shoehorning topical references (ie propaganda) into his cartoons! like, this is a crazy shot

it is an extremely fascinating watch to see how they play on the psyche and psychology of the audience. cartoons are manipulative! i know this from working in them! i don't mean that in a bad way, but objectively: cartoons manipulate emotions of the audience and inspire them to laugh, to cry, to be scared, to be triumphant, they manipulate where you're supposed to look or how you're supposed to ingest--or NOT ingest--the information. it's almost comparable to a magic trick. even the most inconsequential, silly, stupid, "nothing" cartoon you can imagine has some sort of subliminality in it dictating how you are interpreting the information on screen. i'm being hyperbolic with my wording and i swear i don't mean this in a Dale Gribble conspiracy theory way LOL. it's just a fact! and it's so fascinating to me! and propaganda cartoons are really at the zenith of seeing how these subliminalities and playing on the psychology of the audience works. obviously, not always (and really, seldom) for the better, but it's very neat to study and see how that is accomplished. it makes for a very fascinating deep dive

I HAD ASSUMED FOR THE LONGEST TIME IT WAS A TOJO CARICATURE TOO.. i've gotten some conflicting information. cartoon wise, i plucked the voice credits from Keith Scott's book, who bills him as a Hirohito caricature, Jerry Beck and Will Friedwald's book just labels him as "a Japanese duck"--i've been getting a bunch of conflicting research, and it evidently seems that historians themselves are in conflict as to the extent of Hirohito's role in the war. i assumed that for the purposes of the cartoon, the duck was Hirohito since it seems he was considered one of the leaders of the Axis Powers, which is of course what the short hinges on. that, and that he was Emperor, whereas Tojo just reported to him. the general consensus seems to be that Tojo took the majority of the blame (obviously, given that he was hanged)--the website of the National WWII Museum points out that Douglas McArthur and Harry Truman seemed hesitant to charge Hirohito with war crimes since they were scared of a retaliatory uprising, given that he was the Emperor, and so publicity instead fell on Tojo.

I TYPED ALL OF THIS OUT BUT I SEEM TO BE PROVING YOUR POINT LOL Tojo seemed to be much more active on the militant side and received more publicity, so i guess that technically would make him a candidate... but given that Hirohito was at the very tip top and considered the reigning Axis leader for Japan, my assumption was that it was him for the purposes served by the cartoon. it'd probably make more sense for it to be Tojo though if he was more directly involved on the military side... that, and it's clear there's a little bit of a divide in power between the Tojo/Hirohito duck and the Hitler and Mussolini duck, but i also assumed that was a byproduct of the clear resentment directed towards Japan, and was just them jumping at any chance they could to belittle and humiliate them. riding on the catharsis of making such a big figurehead seem small and weak and easy to pummel and all that. (it also doesn’t help that the extent of caricaturing is “uhhhhh Japanese people have squinted eyes and big teeth right?”, both Tojo and Hirohito wore glasses and so that’s really the only visual clue… but i guess the duck also has a military cap that probably would be most associated with Tojo)

any historians who are obviously much more equipped to answer this, i welcome any corrections! it's obviously been a bit since my last World History class and i am genuinely embarrassed i can't give a more concise answer :')

[lipstickhotchocolate]

Based and right

[navree]

"it's always hating on rhaegar for rhaenys and aegon's deaths never tywin" because rhaegar was their father and had a responsibility towards them that tywin did not, stay in school

[widevibratobitch]

Since we're both as unwell about him as we are I consider you to be someone who knows a fair amount and what do you genuinely think the real James Fitzjames would feel if he saw the Terror's depiction of him? (As in watching the whole show)

HUH good question. first of all i think he'd be a little discombobulated by the very experience of watching a tv show but personally i choose to believe he'd at least be happy he was made into one of the main characters?? and that so many cool and sexy insane people are obsessed with him now <3

having said that. as much as i love show!fitzjames they did nerf him down A LOT. they robbed him of the joyous whimsy that was such a characteristic trait of the real jokester supreme fitzjames (show!fitzjames also has little to no relationship with his irl lieutenant buddies which. sad.)

we also know now that. most probably. he was actually fully english so i can only imagine he'd be Not Pleased about the cairn scene to say it lightly lmao imagine you and your adoptive family making significant efforts throughout your whole life to disguise the fact of your illegitimate birth and then 150 years later some people make a high rating show where they babygirlify you not only spill your secret to the millions of people watching (or secrets, plural, and make you call yourself a fake as a cherry on top lol) but they also get it wrong and make it Even Worse (from a victorian englishman's perspective) like stop guys he's already dead lmfao

having said that. he would have loved the britannia costume and the your nails are a terror line. i know he would.

[strawberrysapphocake]

Is now a good time to remind everyone about that bit of the house meeting after the L*ke fiasco where Hisam straight-up pretended he didn’t hear that shit and essentially threw Cory under the bus when we all know full well he was fucking Shook™ at the time, ‘cause… 👀

(I know it’s weird to be bringing this up again months after it happened, but given L*ke’s recent livestream it seems relevant to me).

[guideaus]

not to still talk about this, but its kinda nuts how bad the dunmeshi fandom got after the anime aired. i still see comments about kabru like this:

and it is just soo fucking lame. the "literally a war crime" bit reminds me of witnessing the steven universe or dragon age fandom on tumblr for the first time in like 2016 or so.

regardless of if the people he killed were bad, or how he killed them, or reversing the scenario and making kabru sound like a serial killer going after innocents, it's just like... who cares if a fictional character in a story does a bad thing or has a flaw? after the anime came out, i regularly saw people fight to justify that their hated characters are bad people for doing a bad thing, when i think every character in the series might be shitty or have flaws in some way. and its very obvious which characters get hated more, despite the entire cast being well rounded with flaws.

it's just nuts how the fanbase seemed mature enough to handle that the fictional characters in a world where people fight and see monsters, might do immoral things and conflict with each other, but now the discussion for this series on average seemed to drop to just fighting over who is bad or not, when in universe characters didn't even care as much, and aren't even permanently affected by the conflicts in the series:

dungeon meshi in general honestly could have had way more conflicts and upset characters in the end, but its very close to a nice happily ever after for everyone, with little lasting animosity, but you wouldn't think so the way the new fandom argues. with the way the fandom talks about kabru and shuro, i almost wish they both team up and beat up laios for fun, or kabru does murders those corpse retrievers.

i was personally cheering when he did this! i think its fun to see characters conflict and do immoral things! i genuinely dont even know what i'd say you should watch if u hate seeing characters do "bad" things. why watch view a story if u just wanna focus on who is "right"

[cluescorner]

Me, during Al Haitham’s world quest: *Sigh*. I miss my wife, Al Haitham. I miss her a lot. 

Al Haitham: *Laughs* 

Me, going back to the Tanit camp halfway through his quest to stand next to Jeht and pretend that I’m her girlfriend now: I’ll be back. 

[bluastro-yellow]

Harry and Kim are like Annette and Plaisance, like Cuno and Cunoesse, like René/Gaston and Gaston/René, like Steban and Ulixes, like Fuck the World and Pissf%%t, like-

[tariah23]

Well, I’m still glad that Gojo was always a character who was growing and learning at least. He’s literally one of my favorite characters of all time now. Like, he’s never been as perfect as how the fans would make him out to be despite canonically being viewed as an absolute nuisance to everyone around him (I don’t think his peers necessarily hate him but a lot of them probably hate to see him coming and the ones who’ve dealt with him long enough to consider him a friend, tolerate him and groan whenever he opens his mouth, too 😭… out of love. He’s extremely childish so there is only sm the other adults around him can take and to an extent, his students. I think the only characters in canon who adore him and their eye’s sparkle whenever he’s around, and being a silly teacher was Yuuji and Miwa (she asked him for his autograph (he’s the most famous sorcerer in the jjk world) and when she was alone, she did a little dance in the empty hallway 🥺…) from what we’ve seen even though the others still care about him, too. They just find him rather annoying, which he most definitely is. And he does it on purpose. He plays too much.)

[dandyshucks]

waking up to see someone left a semi-self-demeaning reply on a post of mine and i go to their blog just to make sure they're not someone nasty before i reply encouragingly to them, only to see theyre very into the racist white man youtuber profiting off of Algonquian culture that obviously doesnt belong to him 😵‍💫😵‍💫

[bijoumikhawal]

sometimes I think about the one Copt I met who said he thought communal embrace of Indigenity as a political framework was bad because it "feeds our victim complex" basically and man.

[naemors]

every time i peek into the namor tag on twitter, i regret every decision that led to this moment

[piplupod]

people defending their precious white man of the week and ignoring BIPOC pointing out his racism Yet Again. i'm so tired. i'm so tired. i'm so tired!!!!!!

[montanabohemian]

i honestly don't know how many times i have to repeat myself that the u.s. is not a two-party system but is already a multiparty system. you're just being deliberately obtuse ignoring other legitimate parties that are not republican or democrat. you're just mad that the republican and democrat parties have spent literal decades building foundations to have a platform and raise a ton of money to run candidates across the country. if you want other parties to do that, then you have to actually put in the fucking work.

if any of you actually took two seconds to study comparative politics (or just looked at a multiparty system in action), you'd recognize that every single one operates the same fucking way: through coalitions. there are usually two major opposing parties and if one can't win a majority, they work with other parties to create a fucking coalition party. you fucking dumbasses are so thick that you can't be bothered to see that that is exactly how it works in congress in the united states (and in all state legislatures). most independent politicians are gonna lean towards the left and libertarians are gonna lean to the right (until the republicans piss them off).

it isn't fucking rocket science. politics is pretty similar across the world. but every single country is just a little different. and it has to be. because every nation is unique. their way of government cannot be cookie cutter same.

the real problem facing the united states elections is two-fold: money in elections and voter suppression.

stop getting your fucking information from idiotic memes about european countries that are wildly racist and xenophobic.

[doppelnatur]

.

[viulus]

Games that I like and how they handle racism

Virgin Great Ace Attorney Chronicles vs CHAD Disco Elysium