#hes still basically space hitler

[obliviousoracle]

[danthepest]

Videl's inclusion and integration into the Dragon Team is such a missed opportunity for fun interpersonal dynamics and interactions, what with Toriyama seemingly unable to decide where he wanted the story to go until Boo and Majin Vegeta basically derailed the entire thing.

One moment I keep imagining and can't get out of my head is everyone telling her stories of their adventures, how they met, how they were all kind of awful people when they were young and so on. Yet everyone has more than one moment where they displayed immense courage, loyalty, friendship, honor, selflessness etc.

But then they get to Vegeta. Everyone's kind of used to him now but once they try to think of any positives for the guy, they stop dead in their tracks. Pretend Boo and Majin Vegeta don't happen in this scenario yet. Or at all. Whatever floats your boat.

So they try to downplay how much of a scumbag he was or how he never really earned his place with the group or worked off his bad karma like the others did.

So they try to spin a "he helped when needed" tale more for Bulma's sake than anyone else's.

Piccolo ends up being the only one who tells her like it is and forces Gohan and Krilling to tell her the whole truth regarding Vegeta and what he was/is like.

So the three of them tell her everything. All the horrible stuff he did even when fighting on their side. Videl looks horrified at Bulma and Gohan, asking her how she could boink him and how Gohan can tolerate him after what he put him through.

"Eh, he's alright." he says.

Videl goes home and lays awake in bed in a state of a semi mental breakdown and existential crisis, wondering just what kind of insane group of people she's dealing with.

Bandits, would-be assassins, space pirates, alien demons, shapeshifting animals, fearsome castle lords, cyborgs made by a cooky old geezer from a long gone terrorist army, CEO of Capsule Corp who at 16 shot a 12 your old monkey boy in the head with a pistol with no hesitation, bizarre cat deities that live with lazy fat ronin and perverted martial arts hermits who taught math to his students as part of their training.

On top of learning that there was a literal space Hitler zipping around the galaxy, wiping out entire solar systems and was this close to wiping out Earth if not for a time traveling half alien, half human hybrid.

It's a lot to process and she can't even talk to her dad about it because he's still in denial over what he saw in the old tournaments and during the Cell Games.

Then she learns that the Tournament Announcer is a bit in-the-know and goes to him for information only to find that all he knows is what he witnessed at the tournaments and his knowledge of old martial artists. Then he gives her a history lesson on martial artists like King Chappa, Namu, Giran, Bacterian, the Wolf Man and so on. He helps her deal with all the weird and bizarre shit of the world that she was frighteningly ignorant of.

But will forever have a hard time feeling safe with Vegeta around

[innerslumber]

I went to the Marvel: Universe of Super Heroes exhibit and wanted to share for anyone who has not seen it. I am under the impression that the installation changes from location to location so I wanted to show this snapshot in time. I fully admit to being biased in what I will post so if you want to see a particular character, please let me know! Apologies ahead of time for my crappy photo taking skills.

🔵⚪️🔵⚪️🔵

Steve Rogers (Captain America)

The whole tour started off with Steve featuring immediately. You can see Captain America all throughout the exhibit but in the room that was more focused on him, Steve was sharing the space with Sam and Bucky.

The picture above was from a small monitor showing different designs and CGI work. I particularly loved this concept sketch. The extra long eyelashes are on point. 👍

The iconic comic cover of Captain America punching Hitler was one of the first items shown in the exhibit.

I thought it was interesting that half of Steve’s plaque was about Bucky. 🤣🤣🤣

It was honestly a bit intimidating to stand beside the uniform. Chris isn't the tallest of the bunch but still plenty tall! It just felt really impactful. This was worn by him in Age of Ultron.

The urge to smash and grab this was very strong. 😝😝😝 I loved the "As wielded by Chris Evans". This particular shield was used in Endgame.

Steve's various interactions with American presidents. Bush Jr. criticizing Steve for resisting against the Superhuman Registration Act which led to "Civil War", makes me even more glad that I was always Team Cap.

But maybe more importantly:

OBAMA WAS THE ONE WHO PARDONED BUCKY IN THE COMICS?!?! HOW DID I NOT KNOW THIS BEFORE???

The Tesseract. Without the CGI for the glowing blue, it was mostly just clear. But still very cool.

I admit I am not that knowledgeable about the comics and seeing this "Cap's Kooky Quartet" made me go on a Google info hunt. But basically the other Avengers are tired and abandon Steve to go on vacation and without his knowledge, hire the "New" Avengers line up of Clint, Wanda, and Pietro...who are at this point newbies and basically criminals. From what I gather, it was a lot of bickering and shenanigans (Clint calls Steve "Glamor Pants"!!). I found this incredibly helpful post to explain the dynamic and also please look at this adorable picture of Dad Steve and his Misfit Kids.

The exhibit ended with the gift shop and I had to ask myself, "Do I REALLY need a soup bowl shaped like Steve's head?". He was definitely the character the most heavily present in merchandise! I was tempted to buy this Marvel cookbook but I do think it was a missed chance for Steve. I mean, okay, I get it. The beef tongue as a nod to living through the Depression. But I would have made corned beef tongue in an acknowledgment to his Irish roots. Just my two cents. 😘😘😘

This is just a small sample of Steve in the exhibit and this post would have gotten way too long if I tried to fit it all! I had a lot of fun and I'm so glad I had a chance to see it!

[problematicfactive]

i always see shit about problematic alters and then its mcyters or like. video game characters. like bruh thats not problematic thats just controversial. a marilyn manson factive or something like that who is accused of vile things (which are false but my headmate still gets called a rapist regardless) THATS A PROBLEMATIC ALTER or someone like hitler. pls dont be ashamed of ur source if its something that isnt even remotely problematic, dont be ashamed regardless but especially so if its just a jshlatt or wilbur soot alter lol

When I first made this blog I was actually really worried that the blog would just be overrun with the "Kinda controversial" alters you're talking about. I'm really glad to say that hasn't happened.

First and foremost I'd like to say that what happened with Soot is very serious. It is a very real and upsetting feeling to introject someone from before you have a clue what they've done and find out later. I made some false statements regarding him in the past which I have apologized for and retracted, and I don't keep up with the happenings currently. I have not a clue about jshlatt, but having a source who has done things like wilbur has done is worth being ashamed of. From what I understand, the allegations against him were true and he admitted to it himself. He's problematic and that's okay.

With that out of the way, I do agree with you. There are a lot of just controversial factives playing themselves off as if they're problematic. There are a lot of communities that basically draw the line at this type of factive. Dream is allowed, Hitler isn't. I totally understand what you're saying there. It can feel like having spaces taken away and being overlooked. Even worse when these controversial would without a doubt join the witch-hunt against you if they found out you were of the likes of Hitler or Lanza. Which I'm not saying all of them will, but there is a huge community of them that absolutely will. They're as "problematic" as they can handle

I agree with you that the "problematic"-ification of mcyters and other groups like that has to stop. This space will always be a space for members like Marilyn Manson, I hope that can at least be of some help to you.

It's hard to draw lines because "problematic" is open-ended. It depends on your perception of things. Some people think merely being accused of something makes a person problematic and if they have a factive of that person, they will then feel like they have a problematic factive and it isn't really anyone's place to tell them that they don't.

We definitely need more representation for those of us who were/are serious problems though. Then we won't feel so isolated here.

[hieronymus-botch]

Alright, I’m just gonna come out and say it. Philip Wittebane is the definition of wasted potential. Ever since the Belos = Philip reveal, I had been waiting for them to make his motivations actually make sense, and then the show ended and they never did. He wanted to kill all witches because magic is evil, even though he uses way more and more obviously evil magic than any of them, and he thinks he’s better because he’s human, even though 17th century Puritans didn’t conceptualize witches as a separate species that were racially inferior, witches were just people who made pacts with the devil to do evil magic, which is closer to a description of him than anyone else on the Boiling Isles. And no, I am not a namby-pamby Steven Universe fan who thinks every fictional villain should just be a misunderstood outcast and get a redemption arc. Bill Cipher’s motivation wasn’t nuanced or complex at all, he literally just wanted to destroy  the world for fun, but he was still a fucking fantastic villain because he was funny and charismatic. “But OP!” I hear you cry, “Philip isn’t supposed to be tragic and sympathetic OR funny and charming, because he’s a fascist!” Well, see, the thing about that is, if we’re meant to take him as a serious, non-sugarcoated depiction of fascism, he fails at that too! Witches and demons aren’t a marginalized population, they don’t even interact with humans at all under normal circumstances! Humans aren’t an oppressor class, they’re basically space aliens! In fact, I’d say that if we are to read the show as a serious depiction of fascism, it’s a Boy In The Striped Pajamas-level actively harmful one, given how the draining spell was something literally no one but Philip knew about until it was too late, which is a bullshit myth many people believe about the Holocaust! And you can say that just the stuff he was open about like the coven system and the conformatorium is enough to put him in fascist territory even without the attempted genocide, then why are half the coven heads, the whole Emperor’s Coven, and everyone else who knowingly and willingly enforced all of it treated as innocent victims who are immediately forgiven the second they change sides? If giving him any amount of sympathy or charisma or motivations that make sense would be giving good PR to fascists, then the way the show actually played out is basically saying that Himmler and Göring were probably perfectly fine people who simply weren’t aware Hitler was such a bad egg, which I feel like is a hell of a lot fucking worse! It feels like one faction of the crew wanted to make Philip a tragic, complex villain, and another faction wanted to make him a serious political allegory, and a third, larger faction didn’t care about him at all beyond the bare minimum of being a force for Luz and the gang to oppose, so what we got is a villain with a tragic backstory that’s only ever vaguely alluded to and indirectly glimpsed, and the aesthetics of fascism and conservative Christianity (except he can’t ever actually reference Jesus or God or Hell or the Bible because Disney) without any of the inconvenient ramifications.

[badlysummedupmoviestournament]

If you recognize the movies hiding behind the decoy titles, please do not give identifying details about them in the notes.

Movie n°1: Pinecones and frogs

Basically: Young woman gets hired as governess for the children of a catholic aristocrat. Governess sees eldest get their heart broken when their boyfriend joins the nazi party and abandons them because their father is very vocal against Hitler. Governess is no longer governess but still lives in the house and is considered by all metrics a member of the household. When the family leaves the country to escape the forced mobilization of the father, they are betrayed by the butler, who was at odds with the governess since day one. They have to take shelter at the home of the woman who found that governess job for her at the beginning of the movie, and she helps them run away, but they are found by the former boyfriend who betrays them. They manage to escape anyway.

Movie n°2: Purple Furcoat

Professional singer is witness to a murder committed by a mafia boss. Since said mafia boss always managed to get witnesses killed before the trials, the fed they went to sends them into a seclusive place where the mafia boss wouldn't be able to go even if he thought of looking there. The singer gets used to the life in the big, silent place, as otherwordly as it seems to them, but misses the great open spaces and the music, and starts transforming the place and the other people in it. However, this puts them in danger to be found by the mafia boss. Luckily, he has literally no hobbies and even when his wife literally points to the singer who's on TV (but doesn't know it) because of the event they're organizing, the mafia boss doesn't even spare a look. Anyway the fed from the beginning has a mole in his team who rats out the singer, who's then abducted. All their roommates go in full regalia to Las Vegas to save them and cause quite the ruckus. Finally, mafia boss is shot by the fed, singer testifies at trial, and everything's well that ends well.

[philsmeatylegss]

The hardest lesson you will learn if you are interested in learning about Nazi Germany: so may people posting content about it are actual Nazis

No seriously if anyone is starting to get into WWII/Third Reich history, it is so easy to be indoctrinated because the main message a lot of Nazis spit now is that Hitler was bad and the SS were bad, but everyone else was chill.

And it’s hard to realize the narrative they’re spitting is wrong unless you know a lot going into it.

I have been watching a dude called “TIKhistory” the last few days on youtube and something felt off about his takes, but a lot of them had at least some plausible deniability and enough factual information that I thought it was still worthwhile.

I just start watching another video from this dude with the title “The REAL Reason why Hitler HAD to start WW2” which is an insane title and caught my attention. And then my answer was given by the first five mins of his video when I realized this dude was, at the least, a wehraboo, and at most, an actual Nazi.

Pretty much any non-Nazi historian agrees that Hitler started WWII because 1) he wanted to conquer Europe 2) he wanted “Lebensraum,” aka living space for “Aryans.” Where German people, with no Jewish or Roma people present, can have ample space to live.

You know why most non-Nazi historians agree on this? Because Hitler fucking said this. In his literal book. That everyone read.

WWII was declared by the Allies when Germany invaded Poland for LeBeNsRaUm. Yes, Germany never wanted to fight Britain. You know why? 1) they were white enough 2) a fucking ocean kept them apart. They wanted all of Europe + Soviet Union. That is why WWII started.

See how quick it was to get to that point? Fucking TIKhistory’s video is forty five minutes long. That’ll happen when your point is horeshit and also not true.

Hitler started WWII. All of the generals and higher ups at least knew of the Holocaust and most perpetrated their own massacres for shits and giggles. The Nazi army wasn’t really that great, they just knew how to play the cards in the circumstances they were in (they used horses a fuck ton. You don’t see it because a lot of documentaries use footage from Nazi propaganda in which they weren’t recorded). These are all basic facts for non-Nazis. So warning that if anyone you meet challenges those three facts, they probably are a Nazi

[hollywoodandstagebeauties]

John Banner (28 January 1910 – 28 January 1973), born Johann Banner, was born on this date 114 years ago and died 51 years ago today at the age of 63. He is best known for his role as Master Sergeant Schultz in the situation comedy Hogan's Heroes (1965–1971). Schultz, constantly encountering evidence that the inmates of his stalag were planning mayhem, frequently feigned ignorance with the catchphrase, "I know nothing! I see nothing! I hear nothing!" (or, more commonly as the series went on, "I see nothing, nothing!").

In 1942, he enlisted in the United States Army Air Corps, underwent basic training in Atlantic City and became a supply sergeant. He even posed for a recruiting poster. He served until 1945. According to fellow Hogan's Heroes actor Robert Clary, "John lost a lot of his family" to the Holocaust.

Banner appeared in over 40 feature films. His first credited role was a German captain in Once Upon a Honeymoon (1942), starring Cary Grant and Ginger Rogers. He played a Gestapo agent in 20th Century Fox's Chetniks! The Fighting Guerrillas (1943). His typecasting did not please him – he would later learn that his family members who had remained in Vienna all perished in Nazi concentration camps – but it was the only work he was offered. Banner himself was held briefly in a prewar-concentration camp.

Banner made more than 70 television appearances between 1950 and 1970, including the Lone Ranger (episode "Damsels In Distress", 1950), Sky King (premiere episode "Operation Urgent", 1952), The Adventures of Superman (4/5/57, The Man Who Made Dreams Come True.)Mister Ed, Thriller (episode "Portrait Without a Face", 1961), The Untouchables (episode "Takeover", 1962), My Sister Eileen, The Lucy Show, Perry Mason, The Partridge Family, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (episode "Hot Line", 1964), Alias Smith and Jones, The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (episode "The Neptune Affair", 1964), and Hazel (episode "The Investor", 1965).

In the late 1950s, a still slim Banner portrayed Peter Tchaikovsky's supervisor on a Disneyland anthology series about the composer's life. This followed a scene with fellow Hogan's Heroes actor Leon Askin (General Burkhalter) as Nikolai Rubinstein. In 1953, he had a bit part in the Kirk Douglas movie The Juggler as a witness of an attack on an Israeli policeman by a disturbed concentration camp survivor.

In 1954, he had a regular role as Bavarro in the children's series Rocky Jones, Space Ranger. Two years later, he played a train conductor in the episode "Safe Conduct" of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, appearing with future co-star Werner Klemperer, who played a spy. He played Nazi villains in several later films: the German town mayor in The Young Lions {1958}; Rudolf Höss in Operation Eichmann (1961); and Gregor Strasser in Hitler (1962). The year before the premiere of Hogan's Heroes, Banner portrayed a soldier in the World War II German "home guard" in 36 Hours (1964). Although it was a non-comedic role in a war drama, Banner still displayed some of the affable nature that would become the defining trait of the character he would create for television the following year. By coincidence, during the final moments of 36 Hours, John Banner's character meets up with a border guard played by Sig Ruman, who had portrayed another prisoner-of-war camp chief guard named Sergeant Schulz, in the 1953 film Stalag 17, starring William Holden. In 1968, Banner co-starred with Werner Klemperer, Leon Askin and Bob Crane in The Wicked Dreams of Paula Schultz.

According to Banner in a newspaper interview, before he met and married his French wife Christine, he weighed 178 pounds (81 kg); he claimed her good cooking was responsible for his weight gain to 260 pounds (120 kg), as of 1965. This helped gain him the part of the kindly, inept German prisoner-of-war camp guard in Hogan's Heroes. Banner was loved not only by the viewers, but also by the cast, as recalled by cast members on the Hogan's Heroes DVD commentary. The Jewish Banner defended his character, telling TV Guide in 1967, "Schultz is not a Nazi. I see Schultz as the representative of some kind of goodness in any generation."

After Hogan's Heroes was cancelled in 1971, Banner starred as the inept gangster Uncle Latzi in a short-lived television situation comedy, The Chicago Teddy Bears. His last acting appearance was in the March 17, 1972, episode of The Partridge Family. He then retired to France with his Paris-born second wife.

Less than one year after moving back to Europe, while visiting friends in Vienna, John Banner died from an abdominal hemorrhage on his 63rd birthday. He was survived by his wife Christine; they had 8 children

Source: Facebook

Classic Retrovision Milestones

[im-just-a-dumb-gay]

Bayverse timeline: Earth edition Part 1

Basically I summarize the wiki with some additions

4.54 billion years: Earth forms around Unicron

65 million years ago: Quintessa sent her people to activate a Seed leading to the extinction of dinosaurs

17,000 BC: The 7 Primes land on Earth. 6 of the 7 sacrifice themselves to protect Earth from The Fallen.

10,000 BC: Allspark crashes on Earth

2560 BC: Great Pyramid of Giza is built around the Star Harvester

1200 BC: El Deir in Petra built to hide Tomb of the Primes

After 1200 BC: Seekers sent to find the Tomb of Primes. Only a riddle is discovered. 

Before 1000 BC: Sentinel’s ship is shot down and is floatingly endlessly in space. Optimus becomes the new leader of the Autobots

1000 BC: Megatron crash lands on Earth when searching for the Allspark. As he didn’t inform anyone where he went, no one knew where to search for him. Starscream led with his absence. Megatron had left as he believed the war was won and thought it was time to search for the Allspark to help fix their planet. The war, however, continued as the Autobots were not going down. Some Decepticons became disillusioned with the Decepticons and became Autobots. This included Drift, Trench, and Crosshairs. This helped the Autobots get an advantage and this made the war last even longer. 

Before 484 AD: The war killed Cybertron. Near the end of the war, Bumblebee lost his voice to Shockwave.The Knights discovered that Quintessa did not care for them or Cybertron. They took her staff and decided to hide on Earth. They assumed Quintessa would believe they went as far away from Unicron to keep the staff away. They assumed right and Quintessa did not immediately find them. Quintessa sent Lockdown to find the Lower Knights. The Dinobots, who also left Cybertron after being convinced from the Knights, went to other planets. Merlin discovers The Knights. They tell him of their destroyed planet and tell him to keep them a secret.

484 AD: Merlin asks The Knights of assistance against the Saxon hordes. Merlin is given The Staff.

After 484 AD: Merlin dies and most of the Knights protect his tomb. One decides to search for other Cybertronians to give refuge. The Cybertronians brought to Earth get in contact with the Order of the Witwiccans. Some of these Cybertronians include Bulldog, Hound, and Drift. Optimus and his main team, however, did not go to Earth due to them splitting up to try to find the Allspark. Bumblebee was the one who volunteered to go to Earth and search for the Allspark. After losing his voice, Bumblebee became withdrawn and way more violent, barely interacting with the humans on Earth and deciding not to interact with the Order of the Witwiccans unlike Hot Rod. (Hound came to earth around the 1700s. Bulldog and Drift came around the 1800s maybe? Hot Rod and Bumblebee came around the 1900s. Crosshairs might have come around the 1800s too?) 

1897: Captain Archibald Witwicky discovers Megatron

1910s: Bulldog takes part in World War 1

1913: First Seven discover Allspark. The Allspark was dormant at that time so the signature couldn’t be reached to Bumblebee. 

1927: Section Seven formed

1931: Hoover Dam bult around Allspark

After 1931: Megatron was brought over to Hoover Dam. Project Black Knife at some point is dismissed.

1940s: Bumblebee and Hot Rod fight with the Allies in the Devil’s Brigade. Bumblebee is still extremely violent at this time. He barely interacted with humans before this point in time. 

1945: Watch that Killed Hitler…well killed Hitler. 

After 1945: Hot Rod stays in Britain. Bumblebee continues his search for the Allspark. At some point Soundwave makes his way to earth as he learns that some Autobots were there and thought there might be something important there.

1960s: The Ark (Sentinel’s ship) lands on the moon. While this was no Allspark, Soundwave saw an opportunity with this discovery and sent some Decepticons there as well as informing Starscream of the situation. USSR finds Pillars being taken by Decepticons. The US has their astronauts investigate the ship. Starscream and some Decepticons start to make their way to Earth so see if the Pillars can be used to save Cybertron. They realize, however, that Sentinel is needed to make them work and that he was in stasis. They stay on earth to see if there is a way to use the Pillars without him and to make earth a somewhat base as well as kill any Autobots hiding on earth.

1970s: Soundwave and Laserbeak manipulate humans to stop further moon missions. 

1980s: Chernobyl disaster caused by fuel cell extracted from the Ark

2003: Beagle 2 Rover reveals alien activity on Mars. This was most likely a Decepticon.

Before 2007: Soundwave gets some information about Sector Seven(perhaps one of his human companions learned about Sector Seven and it’s potential knowledge)

[jade-kyo]

Red vs. Blue season 15-17 retcon pros and cons:

Season 16

Oh sweet 16…. Yeah I don’t like this season so expect a very long list of pros to this potential retcon as there are a lot of things I’ll be more than happy to say goodbye to

Pros:

No time travel bullshit

No Donut is Jesus

No gods

Everyone is so unnecessarily mean to Doc. I get that they’ve never exactly been nice and Doc did betray them but somehow they managed to push it to the point of feeling ooc

Oh god the absolute butchering of Tuckers character

The absolute butchering of Sarges character

I’m serious I will never forgive what they did to my boy Tucker

Painfully bad sex jokes

Grif straight up tries to kill himself???? Bro I think I blocked this from my memory 💀

The Tucker and Kai stuff is painful

The whole Sarge recruiting historical figures thing

Jax’s entire movie thing

NO FUCKING GODS

That fucking cyclops

Just… the entire cyclops thing.

I feel like animation is overused in this season

I forgot there was a second cyclops

Trying to explain time travel. Just give up, only one series has ever successfully done it and that is Steins;Gate and you’re not Steins;Gate

The way certain jokes would actually be funny if they were said by different characters. The whole bit where Jax is telling Sarge to hide in the closet but Sarge keeps saying his choice out loud would be way funnier if it was Caboose instead of Sarge. That kind of humor just fits way better for Caboose

King Tucker. I refuse to comment further on this.

Gods

Saying the word penis and seeing if people laugh is not comedy

The whole carwash joke. I get it’s poking fun at how the fans reacted to the “take off your suit” line, believe me I know, I was one of them (shhh I was 15 give me a break) but now it’s just awkward. I’m pretty neutral towards the ship now but I just don’t really care for making jokes this directly about any ship that isn’t canon

Again saying the word penis and hoping people laugh is not comedy. There is an art to a good dick joke.

This weird insistence on explaining the jokes

Saying your super powerful gods that can blow up moons, summon swords from nothing, change peoples physical sizes etc, are AI does not change the fact that functionally they are still basically gods with like one or two limitations. If they’re going this route they should’ve made the gods as powerful as Church was in the floaty ball with just a few extra powers since he never fully unlocked everything he could do with it. Or just follow whatever rules Halo canon has for the floaty ball thing.

Like I get it the aliens worship technology but if you didn’t want them to be actual gods then don’t give them god like powers on that scale

However on a funnier note, all of this being Church’s simulation is VERY funny. Especially when you think about how often he either jokes about being god or has actually been worshipped as a god. This makes everything much more entertaining that’s for sure.

The way Tucker basically just completely redoes his Chorus character development. The scene between Tucker and Kai on the space balcony thing is fine on its own until you realize it’s basically just a rehash of a scene between Tucker and Wash in season 12

Time travel bullshit (can you tell I really don’t like time travel)

Cons:

No Tucker wanting to bring Wash a whole pizza

No Donut is Jesus

That one cop voiced by Jeremy Dooley

Tucker being the one who shot Flowers. I actually didn’t mind that one (can you tell I’m desperate for things to put on the cons list)

there’s actually this really good conversation between Tucker and Kai about missing when things were silly and fun and they didn’t have to worry about messing up. That was nice.

Docs whole sad past with his brother like damn okay I can vibe with that. Was not expecting the tragic backstory from Doc.

I forgot Tucker killed Hitler that actually got a good laugh out of me

Wash and Carolina. That is all.

Wash’s disability

You know what? I like Grif and Huggins dynamic.

Caboose not knowing that women have butts (again I’m desperate to find cons and that joke made me laugh)

Caboose beating monkeys with a stick

As much as I despise what this season did with Tucker, Kai calling him out was very girl boss of her

Donut

Everything with Wash

Wash’s entire speech

Carolina telling Wash the truth about his disability. The entire scene is so good.

“My brain is fuzzy and I do good” Caboose says this line and I have always thought it was an absolute crime that we didn’t get some good Wash and Caboose moments about this

Muggins speech at the end. It’s very good.

DONUT

Donut vs Doc is actually a pretty cool fight

Verdict:

If the retcon is real I am truly not sad to see this season go. I really can’t stand it. Tho I do want to say that if this stuff had happened in the Blood Gulch Chronicles I probably wouldn’t mind it. I’ve always said that you can retcon the goofy stuff but once you do you can’t go back and that’s what this feels like. It feels like it’s trying be Blood Gulch again with how ridiculous and absurd the whole thing is and very simply you just can’t go backwards with this stuff. It doesn’t work.

However this all being Church’s simulation is a VERY entertaining thought and it makes this season much easier to watch that’s for sure.

[airborneham]

Fascist Werewolves: Exploring Social Deduction

Dreamland Devlog #1

Great art from Mackenzie Schubert

I’m Hitler. A lot.

No, not the real-life Hitler. Thankfully he’s pretty dead, which is great since he was a fucking Nazi.

No, I’m Hitler a lot in the social deduction game Secret Hitler from Goat, Wolf, & Cabbage, where one player is randomly assigned the hidden role of Hitler, while some players are their Fascist allies hiding amongst the Liberals. Strangely enough, I’m spiritually Hitler pretty often in many other hidden role games, including Dead of Winter, The Thing: Infection at Outpost 31, The Resistance, Unfathomable, etc.

I love this box art so much.

Any game with a betrayer built-in or potential hidden opponent, through random chance I somehow disproportionately end up with that role. I’ve been Hitler so much that it became a problem with my friends. One night I was Hitler three games in a row. Then I was dealt the Hitler role a 4th time and I told everyone so we didn’t have to do it again.

Due to the frequency of being a betrayer, I’ve noticed some common trends in these games that can be problems for some players, as well as lead to stale, repetitive games for those more experienced with the genre.

Today I will explore what makes social deduction games fun for some and not others, why they have so much replayability, and in what ways designers like myself can innovate to create new, more dynamic experiences in the space.

Lying to your friends.

I get a lot of practice pretending to help while lying about details of the game, so I’ve gotten pretty good at it. At first it was novel, but now that it’s become a meme in my group, I don’t really look forward to it. Being a betrayer is more stressful than being a good guy as it takes more effort to keep up the facade, and sometimes it’s just tiring to be the opponent to everyone else at the table.

Conflict, even in a game, can be exhausting. This is especially true in games with longer play times. Honestly, sometimes people can tell when I’m NOT the betrayer because these days I get more engaged in the game when I’m not trying to disrupt things for everyone else.

Don’t get me wrong, I still enjoy a good game of Secret Hitler. It’s a very well-made game that innovates on the structure set up in The Resistance and fixes many perceived flaws of that game in a lot of ways. I just ran into some repetition with the basic social deduction games like Secret Hitler, The Resistance, or your Werewolf Mafia and that ilk:

Most of the game is simply players lying and trying to not get caught.

Sure, there’s other stuff going on, each game bringing their own twist to the mechanics of revealing or hiding information and how to effectively sabotage the goals of the rest of the players while they hunt for the betrayers. But their core, these games are about lying to your friends and getting away with it. Nearly all have only two teams, so even with special roles with unique abilities, you’re either

A good guy trying to spot the liars -or-

A bad guy trying to not get caught in your lie. 

If you have friends who are bad at lying—their face turning red or their giggling giving them away—and they end up a Fascist or Hitler or Spies or Werewolves or pick your bad guy, the game effectively ends there.

Even if you’re experienced and don’t break easily, the game is about sussing out the liars. Once that’s been done, there’s little else to do even if the game doesn’t immediately end.

You know who Hitler is? Don’t elect Hitler to be chancellor.

You caught the werewolf? Kill them.

Game over.

The meat of the game, the deduction part with all the unique mechanics and interactions that each game brings, ends once the roles are uncovered.

Twists and turns.

Now, I don’t want to sound like I’m not giving these games credit. There are many different ways that it can play out after that point:

Sometimes you have to keep playing, avoiding the person you suspect as a betrayer. They can shout all they want but you don’t let them on the team and you are fine. They don’t really get to play the game anymore, but they can keep voting “no” and spewing nonsense. Maybe they have another ally they can protect that can win for them. Or maybe you were wrong and the Cylons were tricking you into thinking your ally was one of them.

Or maybe you just guess right and kill Hitler.

There are actually a lot of interesting paths the games can take, all sorts of dynamic tricks and social maneuvering that players can do to change the way the game plays out, which is why the games are so popular with so many people, why there are so many different variations of the same core experience, and why they keep people coming back to play them over and over. 

Remember, I was dealt Hitler 4 games in one night. We didn’t keep dealing out games because we hated the experience. Coming from LARPs, my friends and I love getting into our roles and getting to push and pull alliances and trust knowing that the lies are part of the game.

For us, they’re great fun, but they rely heavily on that one core factor.

Liars are assholes.

The deep experiences and most exciting moments rely on the social aspect: the deception, the manipulating, the trickery, the interpersonal conflict. These are very much negative social experiences if they were outside the context of a game, and some players struggle with that. There can be a lot of valid reasons to not enjoy being purposefully lied to, tricked, and manipulated, and some people find it difficult to separate the interactions of the game from real life.

We often use games as a way to simulate certain types of situations and emotions in a safe environment, something I plan to write more extensively about in an upcoming post, but for some people, even in a simulated or safe environment, this is not fun.

Some people don’t like being scared, so they don’t watch horror movies. Some people don’t like lying or being lied to, so they don’t play social deduction games. There are lots of different types of people in this world with lots of different tastes and preferences, and that’s okay.

For that reason, most social deduction games are very reliant on specific play-group dynamics in the same way tabletop RPGs are. You can’t really go out of your way to design your game to accommodate people who don’t buy into the premise, however, I do think you can broaden the appeal by shifting the focus while retaining the appeal.

Other viewing.

No Pun Included has a great review of Blood on the Clocktower, another social deduction game that’s made a lot of buzz and seems very cool, and he goes into the topic in impressive depth that I would recommend checking out if you’re interested in learning more of the history of the genre and the way different types of people experience it. It’s a very good video even if you already own and love BotC.

This theme might be a bit too edgy for me, but it does look very pretty.

The YouTuber Shelfside has a great breakdown of the genre’s strengths and weaknesses as well which I will be referencing more next time. In particular, he brings up the more complex game Human Punishment: The Beginning and how adding all that extra weight and complexity makes the hidden role dynamic more interesting, but bogs down the experience. I admittedly haven’t gotten to play it yet, but I really look forward to it despite that very obvious hurdle. It appears to do exactly what I want to see more games in the genre do, albeit burdened by a steep complexity rating on BGG that makes it less accessible to a broader audience.

The title certainly is… something.

Finally, the Think Like a Game Designer Podcast from Justin Gary, a great listen in general, has an episode with one of the designers of Two Rooms and a Boom: Alan Gerding. Listen to the whole episode as it has a lot of fun stories and Alan is great at telling them, but around the 40 minute mark they discuss some of the same issues with social deduction games that I have here and how each of them have tried to solve for them in their own games. Justin is a phenomenal interviewer and you can subscribe to his Think Like a Game Designer Substack to get more insights from tons of more designers.

A game with a player count of 6-30 is something to aspire to.

This is a devlog?

Subscribe Now on Substack

Social deduction games, especially the popular low-complexity ones, are highly dependent on player social behavior above all else and, because of this dependence, can turn off or completely exclude certain types of players.

But there is something we can do to change that and we’ll find inspiration in an unlikely place.

You might be wondering why I’ve written over a thousand words about social deduction games in a post that’s supposed to be a devlog without even discussing my own game.

Firstly, I wanted to set up what the current landscape of social deduction games look like. I also intended to make it clear that I really do love them. It’s my love for the games that make me want to push the boundaries a little bit.

Next time I’m going to change focus to games I’ve made in the past, as well as the social deduction game I am currently working on, titled Dreamland, that looks to solve some of these problems while remaining on the lower end of complexity. I’ll discuss the LARP I used to run, the difference between hidden roles and hidden goals, and how I have made shifting alliances in hidden role games that are dynamic and uneasy even after roles are uncovered.

Keep an eye out for that, and please share this with people you think would be interested. I appreciate it a ton.

Also, feel free to let me know what you think about social deduction games. I’m interested in your thoughts and opening up a conversation.

[pruning-the-minds-garden]

Harry Potter and JK Rowling

Before we get started -

What this post is: a relatively brief run-down with examples of what I have personally dealt with, thought about, and where my ethical/moral compass is regarding this in March 2023.

What this post isn't: a comprehensive discussion of why JK Rowling is considered what she very clearly is.

I'm also going to put a Read More, because a lot of trans people are just fucking tired of talking and reading about this and it's okay if you aren't in the right brain space to deal with this at all.

Introduction

If you still like Harry Potter, if you still get good childhood feels from the world or the fandom, if you like to read fanfiction or post GIFs or quote from the series off the cuff... that's fine. At least, that's fine to me. Your feelings are not inherently an attack on anyone, nor do you need to change them. However, if you materially support the IP - and JK Rowling herself by extension - then you have gone from "I like the way Chick-fil-A tastes" to "I eat at Chick-fil-A" and you need to deal with the ethics of that. If you choose not to care ("no ethical consumption under capitalism, therefore I'll consume what I like without concern for the consequences"), that also is your choice, but I think it's a choice many can and will - and IMO are right to - judge you for. You could make other choices, but you've chosen to make that one, and I think it exists in the realm of things for which a person can be judged.

There are four instructive examples I can think of for this, each illustrating a different part of the basic argument I made above. I'll follow that up with a broader discussion to bring it home.

Example 1: HP Lovecraft / The Cthulhu Mythos

This is an objectively cool mythos and world. Yeah there are parts that are lifted from others, but it is damn neat for those who like subtle, creepy, otherworldly horror and want to inject some hentai-adjacent elements into their fiction.

That said, HP Lovecraft - the author and creator of the whole thing - was a huuuuuuuuuuuuge racist. He wasn't subtle about it, nor ambivalent, nor conflicted - he was just a racist. If you read the source material at all, some of that comes through (the frequency of discussion of "Negroid, Mongoloid and Caucasoid" 'types' just as an easy example, along with the portrayal of native people and non-Christian spiritual practice), but you can create and consume derivative works ("Lovecraft Country," for example) that do not contain or highlight, or that even subvert, those elements. However, some do. You need to be aware of that and watch what you consume, so that you aren't - advertently or inadvertently - supporting white supremacists.

Also HP Lovecraft is, himself, dead. Whenever you consume work in his IP you are not necessarily handing him a few cents of royalties of every dollar legitimately spent.

So, by this point, as long as you aren't consuming the racist parts of the Cthulhu Mythos because they are racist, or doing so blind to their racism, but are choosing instead those derivative works that are better... then I think that's fine.

Example 2: Orson Scott Card / Ender's Game

I think it's safe to say that Orson Scott Card has some, at the very least, controversial views. He voted for Trump in 2016. He thinks Barack Obama is morally equivalent to Adolf Hitler. His writings have been seen as homophobic, and his views as similar to that. He's against same-sex marriage, even now. He grew up in the LDS (Mormon) church and still actively associates with them, meaning that he donates a percentage of his income to the church and a portion of that goes to lobbying efforts for conservative causes and political candidates, as well as supporting a massive and untaxed corporation masking itself as a church. And, as of this writing, he's still alive.

If you buy or consume anything official in that IP, which he still has rights to, you are supporting him and those causes. Utah - largely run by the Mormon church - just outlawed gender-affirming health care for trans youth. Although he did not earn backend profits from ticket sales of "Ender's Game" the success of that movie was still going to determine the marketability of the rest of the IP to movie studios. However, he still makes money from book sales. So, if you buy "Ender's Game" or another of his books new off of Amazon, you are giving him money.

Should you? I don't think you should. Go buy second-hand instead, or something else that won't profit him.

Example 3: Chick-Fil-A

Dan Cathy and Chick-fil-A contribute, and continue to contribute, to social causes that are conservative, anti-LGBT, and dedicated to a theocratic vision of America dominated by Evangelical spiritual practices made manifest as government policy. If you go there to buy a chicken sandwich, you are giving their foundation, and those causes, money.

And, there are other chicken places. Whether you think they are "better" is a matter of taste (I prefer Popeye's), but the undeniable fact is that they exist. However, there are some situations where that is not available. For example -

Back in 2002, when I was in college, the only edible on-campus restaurant at a price I could was Chick-fil-A. At the time I didn't know what I was contributing to, but if I did I still might have eaten there some days because it was the only acceptable option. There are many others who live in analogous situations, whether on a campus or in a food dessert. However, now that I know, I choose other restaurants whenever I am able. Chick-fil-A is a food of last resort.

When others have bought Chick-fil-A for me, I've opted to not eat it. Now that I know their legacy, I cannot contribute to that and the only way to get through to people who'd buy it for you anyway despite knowing the aforementioned is to waste their money by not eating it. If they see that, they'll stop spending it, and although they'll keep eating there you will cease to be a part of the moral math.

Example 4: Proctor & Gamble Corporation

P&G own some of the most recognizable brands in the world - Charmin, Crest (toothpaste), Dawn, Oral-B, Downy, Gain, Pampers, Febreeze, Mr. Clean, etc - and they undoubtedly do some stuff at least some of you will find reprehensible. They are one of the last holdouts manufacturing products in Russia, despite the sanctions. They have used and profited from child and slave labor. They do lots of lobbying for and contributing to both sides of the American political aisle.

But, they are also almost impossible to avoid. The list of brands they own means they have an effective monopoly on many parts (dish soap, laundry detergent, etc) of your grocery basket, no matter what brand you buy. So, what is the moral math on buying those products?

The moral math is necessities are necessary. You can and should contribute to causes you care about, but inasmuch as you can't avoid buying these things, you cannot avoid contributing to that degree to those causes. That's just a part of life, and your unavoidable moral footprint that you leave behind on the world. This is the kind of thing meant by "no ethical consumption under capitalism."

So, go ahead and buy the Pampers if that's what you need. Be aware of what you are contributing to as best you can be, and contribute directly to causes you care about where you can, but below a certain threshold it just isn't worth it to worry about that.

Is this Hogwarts: Legacy? No. First, a video game is not a necessity. Second, even if a video game is a necessity in some circumstance (parents managing their children in specific situations, etc), it needn't be that video game.

Conclusion

JK Rowling is not Proctor & Gamble. She's not even Orson Scott Card, and since she's still alive she definitely isn't Lovecraft. She is directly tied into the backend profits of Hogwarts: Legacy (unlike the game's developers, who have already been paid all they are ever going to - buying this game doesn't support them), in addition to the other licensed Wizarding World merch. She has made it clear that she considers the profitability of that IP to be an endorsement of her views, and a license to keep loudly advocating for them. And, she puts her money where her mouth is.

If you buy that game, you are in essence writing a small check to an anti-trans, anti-Jewish hate group in exchange for your wand-slinging. That is the choice you are making. Now, understanding that ruins the magic of the IP for many, and they choose to avoid Harry Potter entirely. That's a reasonable choice to make. It is also reasonable to say "no, you move" and choose to continue to see favorably the things that framed your childhood, while taking an unambiguous moral stance - through not purchasing the game - against supporting transphobia and antisemitism now. But, if you twist yourself into knots in order to justify purchasing the game, know that no amount of mental gymnastics escapes the basic conclusion that you are supporting those things.

If you didn't know before, you know now. I understand that many say "how can you not know?!?" because JKR has hardly been subtle these past few years... but I'm not one of them. You are allowed to not understand things until you do. But, once you do, you are obligated to act on that newfound understanding. The veil of ignorance is gone, so if you choose that now you know what you're buying, and caveat emptor, because (many of) the trans people in your life care about that.

Why does it matter? I agree that Hogwarts: Legacy is hardly the forefront of the fight for trans rights, but it's a small, easy choice you can make, and that many who claim to care about this issue are nevertheless choosing not to make. I have myself already lost friends and had to leave groups over this. I did that because if you can't make that small choice to protect me or my rights, how the fuck do you expect me to believe you'll stand up for me when it matters more? A minor inconvenience is enough to tip your moral scales, so trans rights might not be nothing to you, but they certainly weigh less than a feather on your conscience. Imagine if David Duke or Fred Phelps became a famous author and people were buying games based on their writings. How would you feel as a Black and/or LGBT person? Yeah.

Anyway, here's a map as of five days ago, of where legislation stands in the United States seeking to ban gender-affirming medical care for trans youth.

But go ahead and enjoy your wizard game.

I don't expect people to stop loving the world, but ceasing support for the author ought to be an easy choice for people to make. Experience suggests otherwise, however.

[jellogram]

Hitler Was Not a Very Good Artist (an essay by me)

Speaking completely objectively here, with no regards to the man's Other Work, Hitler's paintings are not very good.

Are they technically impressive? To some degree. He's clearly got some skills. He's clearly practiced. He's no Michelangelo, but as hobbyist, he's not bad at all. This could hang in a local coffee shop:

But he wanted to go to art school. He wanted to make a career out of this. And while his paintings aren't technically terrible, there's absolutely no personality to them whatsoever. There's no life. There's very little depth, both in the literal sense and the metaphoric sense. He paints idyllic landscapes and beautiful architecture as if they're anatomical diagrams.

While detailed and technically competent, this painting looks like it would be on a textbook page about the building, not in a museum:

If I'm on the board of admissions, deciding who gets into my prestigious art school with limited space, technical skill is not going to be enough. (And Hitler's work shows barely enough skill to even satisfy THAT merit).

But I'd be looking for voice.

Technical skill can be improved, but voice is very hard to develop or teach. I'd be looking for someone with a strong perspective, who only needs a little help to come to their own. Hitler's work shows nothing of the sort. It could have been made by anyone, in any time or place, and has no opinions whatsoever. (And aestheticism can still accomplish this— there are plenty of basic landscapes that feel lively).

And for the time period, his work is also out of date. This was at the start of art movements like cubism and expressionism, and impressionism had already come and morphed into Modern Art™️. There was an especially large emphasis on challenging what art can be and making a statement. Hitler's work is, quite simply, old-fashioned and boring.

For comparison, here are several landscape paintings from 1907 and 1908, the years Hitler was rejected from art school:

Look at the color! The lines! The movement! Even Mondrian's near-abstract landscape in the lower left evokes the feeling of the place.

It's not purely stylistic, either— the more realistic work being done at this time still has life to it:

After looking at all these other works, suddenly Hitler's technically skilled landscapes and buildings seem a lot more flat and lifeless, like a painting that hardly appears interested in being a painting at all:

There's probably a metaphor in here about soullessness. These paintings were not made by a man concerned with emotional expression or pushing boundaries or challenging the status quo. There's an emphasis on traditionalism here, with old architecture and classical landscapes. He wasn't using art as a tool for expression, he was trying to master what he identified as a traditional and therefore valuable practice.

So when his ideals got rejected, he took it personally.

[wow-cool-robot]

THOUGHTS ON 0079

It's a good show! the (partially) bad stuff I'll start with the stuff I didn't like, just to make things easier. Still lots of praise here

The big one is Sleggar Law. Whenever he was on screen I just wanted him to not be. The romance with Mirai felt like it was only added because otherwise everyone would just shrug at his death, but because it was not only incredibly sudden but it came just after he hit her, it left a real bad taste in my mouth. I man, even he had his good moments (the bit where he takes off Cameron's glasses before punching him across the room made me laugh) but the show would definitely have been better without him.

In general I think the pacing was off. Part of that is that the last ~5 episodes feel super rushed because they were expecting to have 7 more than they did, but even accounting for that I think just about everything on Earth should have been shorter. It just didn't feel nearly as consequential as the space stuff, especially when they were dealing with M'quve.

The animation could have been better, but I know they were on a budget and the animation director was hospitalized or something early on, so it's hard to blame them. And even then, they do a lot with what they have. the stuff on side 6 looks really cool, and they managed to make the newtype stuff work really well almost purely through animation and sound design. The writing feels really rushed, but I loved all that stuff anyways

M'quve is a bad villain. I don't know what it is about him, I just do not care about him at all.

The show isn't exactly a feminist masterpiece. I'm not a fan of the fact that all 3 major female characters get seen naked, but if you told me that happened in this show beforehand I'd assume it was way worse about it than it was. The scenes themselves were basically fine. To be honest, I've heard things about the franchises treatment of women and was bracing myself to be way more put off by it

Finally, the overall tone was not as consistent as I would have liked. I'm fine with episodes that are goofier, and I loved the orphans, but the super robot transformations and gundam hammer went a bit too far. As a kids show I knew to expect some of that, but I have to draw a line somewhere, and that line excludes the gundam hammer. The show places fast and loose with physics, but outside the hammer it all falls within the boundary of acceptable to me

the good stuff A lot of stuff I covered in the episode writeups, so I'll only mention things I really liked here

The consistency in which the Zeon rank and file were humanized was really impressive to me. Even in the final episodes I was still noting when their deaths felt particularly poignant or tragic. The fact that it managed to keep that up when their leader was comparing himself to Hitler is really something.

The main villains for the first 20 episodes were all very compelling. Obviously Char makes for a great villain the whole way through, but Garma was a good introduction to the broader Zeon culture and structure, while Ramba Ral made a great rival to Amuro for the episodes he was in. The duel where they destroyed each others cockpits

I liked most of the mobile suits, and I did purchase high grades of the gundam and char's custom zaku, which were pretty fun to make. So as a toy commercial it still works, over 40 years down the line

This died down mostly after the first half or so, but for a long while the show was really amazing at emphasizing how exhausted and constantly on the run the White Base was

As mentioned, I really loved Sayla, and kind of wish we'd just gotten the show about her. But in general the main cast was all really well done. The characters all felt consistent and sympathetic. None of them were amazingly complex, but they all served the story really well, and made the stakes feel real

Speaking of stakes, how about that body count! Ryu was the only member of the main crew to die, but enough side characters on both sides were dying off on a regular basis to make combat feel pretty consistently risky. I was expecting that sort of thing to only start being the case after the franchise was established as a hit, but it's been in there from the start.

The way Amuro's progression as a pilot was shown was very well done. He's shown improving, and it's easy to grasp as a gradual process. It makes the way he chews through every new toy introduced later on a lot easier to swallow, because he's shown to be just that good.

And despite my pacing complaints, the final battle managed to wrap things up well enough. The final confrontation between Amuro and Char as they fought outside their mobile suits was really well done.

Other than that, I think everything can be found in the episode writeups. I'm planning on watching Zeta soon. I'm definitely going to at least watch through Char's Counterattack, and probably some of the OVAs. I've heard basically nothing but praise for War in the Pocket and 08th MS Team especially. After that, we'll see.

[sasshomaru]

.

i wish i could genuinely not be hopeless but i am full of fucking rage and despair. i cut myself yesterday and i will likely cut again today. i have no where to put my emotions and no space to hold them. literally what is the fucking point. the votes in my state haven’t even been COUNTED yet and he still won. i checked that my ballot was counted but he still won even without my state counted in the entire grand scheme of the country. i want to leave so badly i want to die i wish i was never born into this fucking hell where hitler 2.0 wins the world’s most powerful empire and wants to basically destroy the entire world via war and anti climate change policies. i want to transition so badly but idek if i will be able to, or if i’ll be able to renew my passport which expires next year. i’d move to canada or mexico rn if i was able to but i can’t, im just STUCK mentally physically and emotionally and i’d rather scream and fight than be stuck. but where do i scream? where do i fight? where do i go? where do i turn to? nowhere, nothing. i just don’t want to exist anymore i never have and i wish i could cease to exist

[opartnermine]

there seems to be a tendency in progressive spaces, but i see it particularly on tumblr, to allow for ‘this event/person/action/law somewhat resembles [bad thing’ to be conflated into ‘it’s similar to [bad thing] in turn being shortened as ‘it’s basically [bad thing]’ to ‘it is literally just [bad thing]’.

early in Trump’s campaign people were saying he had fascist sympathies, and given information at the time, that was a reasonable conclusion to reach. that claim rapidly developed into ‘trump is basically a fascist,’ and what might have been only days or a few weeks later, ‘trump is literally a fascist’. unfortunately, for both the world but also specifically the future of progressive discourse, they turned out to be right, and i say that’s unfortunate because at that time it was not, actually, a reasonable thing to believe with certainty. and now it seems like that sheer chance prediction has ingrained in a lot of progressives’ minds that someone being sympathetic to bad things, or someone resembling in some ways bad things, means they are literally that bad thing.

Fictional depictions of underage sex are not child abuse. even if there was a one hundred percent chance that people who consume it go on to abuse children, watching loli hentai, or reading underage fanfic, or even ai-generated CSAM is still not abusing children. We can talk about how doing all those things may, at the end of the day, increase CSA rates, or support industries that profit of off CSAM, or any of those things, and I’m happy to have that conversation—maybe it would be best to ban some of those things, I’m not here to make any statements in that regard.

Progressive slippery slope arguments don’t look like conservative ones. They won’t be saying ‘next thing you know, there’ll be kids in kennels pretending to be animals’, they’ll say stuff like—and I want to be clear that I’m speaking as a trans woman who if given the chance would absolutely ruin JK Rowling’s life for all the shit she’s done to turn back global human civilization’s trust in bodily autonomy and psychological science—‘Rowling is literally a Nazi.’

She’s not. She denied a small part of the holocaust. That’s really fucked up of her. That doesn’t make her a Nazi. Is it possible that she secretly holds beliefs of racial hierarchy and social degeneracy and thinks Hitler was right and so on? Yes. It is also, given the evidence available, not anywhere near a reasonable thing to assume.

I see this a lot, and y’all have got to do better.