#i like when bad guys do morally reprehensible shit in media actually

[patheticrafeenjoyer]

barry tries three (maybe 4) times to get rafe to rethink drowning kie; "You flush that pipe, you gonna kill the rat"; "you realize what you're doing if you do that?"; "do you not realize what you are doing if you do that, bro?"; and then i'd argue again with that very pointed look after rafe tells him to get the hell out of the way.

so like... this is the first time barry is witnessing actual maniac, threat to society rafe cameron. (in s1 when they jump jj and kie, barry is dealing with jj so he doesn't see much of what rafe is actually doing [plus i'd argue that what he's doing here has far more explicit intentions of killing someone than a throat grab -- which is obviously still dangerous, but i suppose could be played off as a heat-of-the-moment thing and not a genuine attempt on kie's life]).

and he tries and tries and tries to make rafe realize what the fuck he's about to do here (with a witness no less), but rafe has the kind of single-minded determination of a working dog; once the task is set, he won't stop until its complete. it's fucking scary.

ultimately barry leaves (i guess trying to avoid being implicated in the crime, but like.... baby you unlocked the chain and gave rafe step by step instructions on what to do....) and doesn't see rafe again until he comes to him looking for a piece

to be clear i mean "a piece" as in gun and not "a piece" as in a piece of ass. just y'know because with these freaks it really could be either.

idk i just like the idea of barry seeing rafe at some of his most unhinged moments. and if you've seen the light of rafebarry in the way that i have, this is a very "i couldn't fix him but i could love him exactly as he is" moment.

also i think it's interesting how many times barry tries to talk rafe out of it/make him understand what he's doing (like trying to appeal to the logic behind the mania), despite knowing that he killed the sheriff. something to think about i guess.

(the "talking rafe down saga continues: kelce | topper | ward | barry 2 )

[zeroducks-2]

People hating evil characters is weird to me. I guess the only characters I actually hate are annoying ones cause usually that’s not a point of their character in the story, they just happen to be infuriating. Like Slade being a bad guy is cause he’s a bad guy, that’s like his whole point as a character. Yeah he can be nuanced and worse at times but he exists to be an antagonist. It completely makes sense to me that the Tara thing makes people uncomfortable but he’s still a fictional antagonist, it’s not really a moral failing on the part of the creators.

Tbh if you've experienced these characters in any way (read TJC or watched the more recent animated movie or read Deathstroke 2016 or watched Teen Titans 2003, or whatever else features their interaction) and you don't like Slade, that's fair enough.

Loving and hating characters (and every other emotion) happens all the time and it's part of the experience. HOWEVER, I do take issues when it's people who do not know the character, who have barely ever seen them and just heard "stuff" from other fandom people, who go on crusades against said character because "they did bad stuff".

You see it in people who hate Tarantula "because she raped Dick" and they have not read one single comic in which she appears - they have no idea what she even looks like or what's her real name, but they "hate her" because they read a post in which the sexual assault was mentioned and since she "did a bad thing" they "hate her now". This has to be the most shallow fucking thing, but it's convenient because if you hate on the "bad guy" it must mean you're morally pure and upstanding and you're one of the good ones.

Back to your point, hating on a character without any kind of reasoning or nuance only because they did "bad things" is the death of critical thinking. But people out there act like characters who do shit that's even vaguely considered unethical or morally reprehensible irl need to be hated, and like their existence is some sort of moral failing from the writer's part, and it's so fucking annoying and childish.

Which leads me to my second point which is a tad more controversial, but hey I'm a bitch with insufferable opinions so here we go I guess.

I'm bothered by people who pick a character and use them as their scapegoat, and I mean collectively as a fandom. It kind of is the case with Slade but he isn't the perfect example, however the principle is the same: hating on the villain, especially when the villain is very human and makes very human mistakes, using them as the only person who is capable of doing evil and therefore acquitting every other character of anything they ever did.

With Slade it becomes that Slade is the only bad guy of his story, who hurt Grant and hurt Adeline and hurt Joseph and raped Tara and killed and maimed and tortured, and therefore Grant has no blame in what he did to himself, and Adeline is just a poor innocent woman who was hurt by her unfaithful husband, and Joey did nothing wrong and everything that happened to him is solely Slade's fault, and Tara wasn't already a mercenary hitwoman for hire who lied and cheated and killed - rather she was just a poor innocent girl who was manipulated and corrupted by the Big Bad Guy.

I don't know if you see what I mean with this, but it's very much a thing in a lot of fandoms, especially when it comes to horror media where there is a cast of controversial, "imperfect" characters. One example of this is Mouthwashing, in which (spoilers ahead of course) there is a cast composed of people who range from being downright horrible to having very human but very noticeable flaws - every single one of them is "guilty" of something, and the protagonist in particular is also the one with the most prominent antisocial behaviors. But he's not benefiting from them - Jimmy isn't someone whose life is made better by his piece of shit behavior, rather this is a person with issues and who struggles with mental health (he's suicidal and has very strong delusions), giving him a very hard time keeping his life in order. Which of course doesn't make any of the horrible shit he does less horrible, but I think it's interesting how he's (mostly) not acting out of convenience, rather he's acting out his own demons. And what the fandom did was deciding that this guy is the only one to blame, and that his shitty behavior absolves everyone else of their sins. He's effectively the scapegoat and everyone else - it doesn't matter if they act selfishly, childishly, violently, cowardly or anything really - is guileless and has never done anything wrong in their lives. Jimmy is the only one who's to blame, and the rest of the cast is made of pure perfect angels.

I've seen this happen in many many cases. And it sort of turns into a mob of people whose only fandom personality is to hate on this one guy and gather Upstanding Morality Points, and of course the natural consequence of this is bothering or even outright harassing people who instead are fans of such flawed characters.

I hate it. I'm not saying anyone should have to like a character in particular, but the way people hate on the "easy to hate" guy instead of trying to understand them, especially when it's a complex character whose action make them suffer as much as the people they're hurting, distances me from fandom spaces. People will see a feral beast of a character with their leg caught in a bear trap hissing and growling while in the process of chewing their own limb off, and will toss stones at them and call them disgusting and weird. It's so unkind and I hate it so much.

[ginger-snap-talkin-nonsense]

Glad someone acknowledges that what Mabel did is morally reprehensible, and what bothers me is people defend it by saying "she's 12". I mean idk about ya'll but when I was 12 I wasn't risking my family's lives to a nightmare demon for a dude, I was doing my fuckin homework lmfao.

I love Gravity Falls to death but the way they turned Mabel from a silly kid to an actual horrible person speaks to how badly the writers can't write female characters to save their pissholes, and fans defending that shit annoy me to no end. They do the exact same thing when the fucked up shit Princess Bubblegum did is brought up

I’m gonna co-opt this ask because this lets me talk about two things regarding criticism that I find really interesting in the internet world-that being “perception of wrongness” and “heart moments”.

Perception of Wrongness:

I can actually understand why people had a hard time calling Mabel poorly written by the end of series, because this is a trend that happens a lot when talking about media criticism as a whole, and it is the subconscious concern that one is going to be perceived as morally wrong for taking umbrage with a character or product that concerns a well poisoned topic.

Mabel is a girl. And because Mabel is a girl, there was no shortage of bad faith arguments regarding Mabel from episode 1 on as being anything from obnoxious to a Mary Sue to an actively bad person (before doing anything that one could call actually wrong).

So, when a fandom space is poisoned by arguments that boil down to “Mabel is a girl and I hate women”, people have a tendency to overcorrect in the other direction and decide that the character is without flaw.

You actually see this a lot with the infamous movie “Fight Club”, which garnered a fanbase of pathetic Andrew Tate wannabes slobbering on Tyler Durden’s knob. So now if someone (especially a guy) says they like the movie most peoples reaction is immediate disgust even though the movie itself is a blatant critique on toxic masculinity based on a book written by a gay man inspired by a hate crime he was a victim of. Well poisoned arguments made the thing poison, so anyone who touches it must be a poisoner. You don’t want to be perceived as condoning the the former-perceived as morally wrong.

I myself had issues with this actually, leading up to Nathan and I watching through the MCU I had an instinctive reaction to be disdainful of his opinion that Captain Marvel was a bad film even though I know Nathan is one of the most “girl movie” positive people on the planet. When we talked about the movie as we watched it it became clear that the problem was that Carol didn’t get to be a cool superhero because they spent so much of the movie proving she “deserved” a spot in the MCU when none of the other heroes needing such proof. Which I agreed with!

It’s hard to untrained yourself from internet discourse brain, but you’ll be better for the trouble if you do so.

On the other side of the creator/consumer spectrum!

Heart Moments:

Creators love the things they make. That is an obvious and redundant statement. But the love of that creation goes through a lot of changes. We’ve talked before about how creators will often insert characters from early drafts of projects into the final product even if the product doesn’t fit with them anymore (see Hunter from TOH), but we don’t talk as much about a similar phenomenon wherein a creator has a burst of inspiration and they can see so perfectly a moment in time for their art that rests heavy on their heart.

This moment could be a cool shot, an impressive piece of cinematography or animation, an actor giving a specific delivery, or a line you want more than anything. But as you write that moment is no longer viable. It doesn’t fit with the greater piece or writes a character out of character.

This is what happened with Mabel in Sock Opera. Alex saw the ability to have Bill say a line about siblings and sacrifice, which would allow one of the twins to say a big line that when the Stan twist was revealed everyone would go “OHHHHH SHIT SO WHEN HE ASKED WHY SOMEONE WOULD SACRIFICE EVERYTHING FOR A SIBLING AND SHE SAID DIPPER WOULD IT WAS ACTUALLY A PARALLEL AND-“. Mabel and the ramifications of the scene to make that heart moment realized were disregarded in its addition.

I actually noticed this for the first time in a Rooster Teeth show I’m fond of called “Camp Camp”. In the 4th season, fan darling David has a solo adventure in “The Forest” where he’s lost in the woods and struggles to survive leading to a nervous breakdown wherein he near kills a wolf, decides against it, and learns a lesson about the importance of kindness in the face of misery.

Problem being that if you know the show at all, David is literally the worst person to do this episode with. David is not only a skilled and experienced outdoorsman who made it his life goal to become a camp counselor as a child and loves the woods, but he’s also the only character who’s primary trait in unrepentant kindness to anyone no matter the cost. To the point that it’s actually his largest vice as it gets him and his loved ones in dangerous situations.

But nobody cared because David has a breakdown was something that looked good in gif sets. It was an episode built around a “Heart Moment”-this one being everyone’s favorite blorbo screaming and crying while emotionally collapsing. And that was a Rooster Teeth cartoon that’s messy as hell-Gravity Falls is groundbreaking shit! But both still suffered at the same root issue.

It’s hard to let go of the scenes on your heart. When the thing you’re creating means so much to you, and that part of it rests on your heart so heavy, it’s hard to bring yourself to remove the latter. But you have to ask if the character you worked so hard to bring to life is worth potentially sacrificing to get that one moment off your heart.

[zwoelffarben]

Mr. Beingmocked, I'm not really that interested in arguing with you, and honestly, if I'd noticed you were the OP rather than just a guy in the middle of the reblog chain, I'da left the post unremarked upon scrolling through my because I've seen what arguing with you looks like, and it looks like a waste of everyone's damned time, your's included.

But, since you asked and I've got a spare day off this week because my boss ain't giving me all 40 hours I need to be entitled to workplace healthcare, I'll nibble on the bait. First, a rebuttal of your argument against InnuendoStudios, then an explaination of why that particular video felt relevant enough to be linked here.

Rebuttal of objection to Innuendo Studios

1. I've physically met every single one of the so-called strawmen induendo talks about in his playbook series. My late grandfather was several; my mother, father, and living aunt are several more; and I've got a Engelbert coworker who regularly chatters with a Charlemagne customer. He's not constructing strawmen so much as observing that there are real, actual people standing in that field 'over there' acting like scarecrows.

2. The appeal to fallacy is itself a fallacy. Even if Innuendo were making strawmen up, and see point the first again if you need reminded that I don't believe he is, the (in dispute) fact that his argument might contain a strawman would not itself prove that his conclusions are untrue; it merely proves that sed conclusions were not arrived at through a valid logical argument.

3. Being a creator who produces works of media for an audience is inherently pandersome. If you as a creative make stuff you do so with the mindset that the stuff you make will be liked by the people you make it for, and you make creative decision based upon that. So, to say that Induendo 'panders' to the left isn't a valid critique of him by itself, nor would saying shapiro panders to the right; there has to be something more specific for the critique to land. bennyboi says a whole lot of fucked up and/or wrong shit in the act of pandering to the right, and it's the fucked up and/or wrong shit he says in the process of pandering which presents a moral-social problem, rather than the pandering into and of itself. Innuendo doesn't have that same problem. The things he be saying while "pander[ing] to the left" ain't morally reprehensible and so neither is he so-called pandering.

4. "Don’t rely on someone who seems persuasive to you, because it rarely will be to the folks you disagree with." This is actually a fair point which I have to cede to you. Yes. If I'd been trying to argue with you when I posted the video link, that would have been a bad strategy with next-to zero chance of success. That is something I have to give to you because you are about this point, assuming the anticedent, correct. I remind you, however, that I wasn't actually trying to argue with you; I was trying to link a video that people who agree with the person I reblogged from might want to watch because the rhetorical strategy it points out was present in the post. I didn't realize at the time, that you were the OP, or I'da left well enough alone and kept scrolling. And now, with that out of the way,

why the video fits here

A thing you said:

"You mean that guy [trump] who’s been out of office for 2 and a half years? Who many conservatives criticize?"

A partial transcript from the video:

"Okay, now that he's not president, are you gonna acknowledge all the stuff he did? The stuff he said he was gonna do? That we warned you he was gonna do, and you said we were delusional for thinking he was gonna do, that he did. and theyr like, Oh my god, Heather, he's not even president anymore. How are you still talking about this?"

Mr. Beingmocked, I hope you can able to see the parallel here, between your statement and the rhetorical strategy pointed out in the video. (You best start believing in strawmen Laddy, 'cause you are one) Theyr the same picture.

The 'shut up about trump he s not even president anymore' sentiment that you demonstrated here is part of a larger observed pattern of behavior which happened regarding both bushes, is still currently happening with trump, (remarkably at two different and seemingly contradictary points in the cycle simultaniously), and beginning to spin up around desantis.

The shape of your words fit into the pattern: if you don't think yourself an active contributor to sed pattern, you should consider yourself a passive observer merely echoing what he's told to think.

Oh, and just to head this off at the pass, I'm not arguing with you in an exchange of ideas hoping to convince you of anything. I'm typing all this out for my, and perhaps my follower's benefit. Whether you agree with me after reading that is immaterial to the fact I decided it'd be fun and worthwhile to write this one response for a giggle before immediately blocking you, putting on some youtube videos, playing some roguelites, and minding my own business, because again; I've seen what arguing with you looks like and I don't want to waste my valuable time, let alone your much more valuable time Mr. Beingmocked.

[attackfish]

While Jet had his place in the narrative along with Hama, and there are absolutely people like him who would kill innocent people for jack shit reasons, how would the Gaang deal with a version of him that's still utterly ruthless, but not as foolishly so? Like, instead of the village him targeting being a small colonist outpost with little strategic value, it's a major military supply centre that he has deemed valuable enough to target in spite of civilian casualties (so more Dresden-esque). Still not exactly a good person, but at least a shade more ambiguous.

This is a good question, and while we never get this exact scenario, we do get some similar scenarios that I think we can extrapilate from. The three I want to examine most closely are 1) Aang's actions at the North Pole when melded with the Ocean Spirit, 2) his experience with General Fong, and 3) the war meeting that wound up getting Zuko burned and banished.

It's the last of these that is the least complicated, in that while the specifics of the war meeting itself have thematic implications, those specifics are not quite essential to a long running character arc that is going that is going to culminate two seasons later, the way two of the examples I mentioned are.

Zuko responds with horror and outrage at the suggestion that the Fire Nation army should sacrifice a unit of new recruits in order to lure Earth Kingdom military forces into a trap. This scene is of course great development for Zuko, because it shows that underneath his anger and trauma, he has this strong sense of compassion, but it's also really great characterization for the Fire Nation as a whole. The war is about conquest, and imperialism, and certainly citizens of the Fire Nation benefit from this, but ultimately the war is about not caring about people. The Fire Nation war machine doesn't care about people, not even Fire Nation people. This is a characterization reinforced by the embodiment of the Fire Nation war machine, Ozai himself, who is an abusive shitbag to his own children, abuse that explicitly includes sending his children off to war, and seeing them only as tools to be used. Deliberately sacrificing lives for military advantage is shown to be the kind of thing that makes the Fire Nation's military leadership so reprehensible. And these are soldiers' lives, not even civilian ones.

(Also "The Storm" is just a masterclass of characterization and theming but we're not talking about that right now.)

So we can be pretty certain that the morality of the show itself would show itself would not be on the side of somebody willing to sacrifice civilian lives in the service of achieving a millitary objective.

We are likewise shown that the Gaang, especially Aang and Katara, but Sokka definitely has his moments too, are deeply concerned with protecting civilians, even when it puts them at a disadvantage. So it's not hard to conclude that both the show and the main characters would not be willing to go along with a character willing to sacrifice civilians.

But we actually have a practical example of what Aang does one confronted with similar situations. There's this thing that happens in a lot of media, where the main character will just mow down unnamed enemies, but then suddenly the can't kill the main bad guy, because this guy has a name, and that would make it really killing, unlike all the faceless enemies, who in universe would have been just as human as the main baddie. And this actually gets pointed out as something that Aang does, that lots of people died at the North Pole, but he won't kill Ozai. This accusation is of course a little bit mind boggling to me, because the show itself addresses this, in that the reason Aang really doesn't want to kill Ozai, and is so sure of this, is because he hated what happened at the North Pole while the Ocean was in control of him, and he never wants anything like that's happen again. And he especially never wants kill another person, the way the Ocean Spirit used him to kill at the North Pole. This fuels his fear of the Avatar State, helping to block him from entering it willingly. This is a major plot point and a huge part of his character arc, so I really don't get how people miss it.

But anyway, right after the North Pole, in the first episode of the second season of the show, Aang meets an Earth kingdom general named General Fong, who wants to use him as a weapon. He successfully guilts Aang into going along with this, and trying to enter the Avatar State, but after some soul searching, he decides that it isn't worth the horrible destruction he would cause, and he refuses to help General Fong. Fong then tries to force the issue, and it goes badly for him.

So while Aang and his friends might sympathize with the motivations of our theoretical morally gray but tactically sound character, they would not go along with this theoretical character's plans, and more than that, would do their best to prevent this person from harming civilians. And because Avatar: the Last Airbender is a generally optomistic children's show, they would succeed.

[liquidstar]

I feel as if many people, myself included, have been having problems with the way “critical thinking” is conducted in fandom circles more and more. Which I’d say is a good thing, because it means we’re thinking critically. But still the issues with the faux-critical mentality and with the way we consume media through that fandom group mentality are incredibly widespread at this point, despite being very flawed, and there are still plenty of people who follow it blindly, ironically.

I sort of felt like I had to examine my personal feelings on it and I ended up writing a whole novel, which I’ll put under the cut, and I do welcome other people’s voices in the matter, because while I’m being as nuanced as I can here I obviously am still writing from personal experience and may overlook some things from my limited perspective. But by and large I think I’ve dissected the phenomena as best I can from what I’ve been seeing going on in fandom circles from a safe but observable distance.

Right off the bat I want to say, I think it's incredibly good and necessary to be critical of media and understand when you should stop consuming it, but that line can be a bit circumstantial sometimes for different people. There are a lot of anime that I used to watch as a teenager that I can’t enjoy anymore, because I got more and more uncomfortable overtime with the sexualization of young characters, partly because as I was getting older I was really starting to realize how big of an issue it was, and I certainly think more critically now than I did when I was 14. Of course I don’t assume everyone who still watches certain series is a pedophile, and I do think there are plenty of fans that understand this. However I still stay away from those circles and that’s a personal choice.

I don’t think a person is morally superior based on where they draw the line and their own boundaries with this type of stuff, what’s more important is your understanding of the problem and response to it. There are series I watch that have a lot of the same issues around sexualization of the young characters in the cast, but they’re relatively toned down and I can still enjoy the aspects of the series I actually like without it feeling as uncomfortable and extreme. Others will not be able to, and their issues with it are legitimate and ones that I still ultimately agree with, but they’re still free to dislike the series for it, after all our stance on the issue itself is the same so why would I resent them for it?

Different people are bound to have different lines they draw for how far certain things can go in media before they’re uncomfortable watching it and it doesn’t make it a moral failing of the person who can put up with more if they’re still capable of understanding why it’s bad to begin with and able to not let it effect them. But I don’t think that sentiment necessarily contradicts the idea that some things really are too far gone for this to apply, the above examples aren’t the same thing as a series centered solely around lolicon ecchi and it doesn’t take a lot of deep analysis to understand why. It’s not about a personal line anymore when it comes to things that are outright propaganda or predatory with harmful ideals woven into the message of the story itself. Critical thinking means knowing the difference between these, and no one can hold your hand through it. And simply slapping “I’m critical of my interests” on your bio isn’t a get out of jail free card, it’s always evident when someone isn’t truly thinking about the impact of the media they consume through the way they consume it.

I think the issue is that when people apply “Critical thinking” they don’t actually analyze the story and its intent, messages, themes, morals, and all that. Instead they approach it completely diegetically, it’s basically the thermian argument, the issue stems from thinking about the story and characters as if they’re real people and judging their actions through that perspective, rather than something from a writer trying to deliver a narrative by using the story and characters as tools. Like how people get upset about characters behaving “problematically” without realizing that it’s an intentional aspect of the story, that the character needs to cause problems for there to be conflict. What they should be looking at instead is what their behavior represents in the real world.

You do not need to apply real-world morals to fictional characters, you need to apply them to the narrative. The story exists in the real world, the characters and events within it do not. Fictional murderers themselves do not hurt anyone, no one is actually dying at their hands, but their actions hold weight in the narrative which itself can harm real people. If the character only murders gay people then it reflects on whatever the themes and messages of the story are, and it’s a major issue if it's framed as if they’re morally justified, or as if this is a noble action. And it’s a huge red flag if people stan this character, even if the story itself actually presents their actions as reprehensible. Or cases where the murderers themselves are some kind of awful stereotype, like Buffalo Bill who presents a violent and dangerous stereotype of trans women, making the character a transmisogynistic caricature (Intentional or otherwise) that has caused a lot of harm to the perception of trans women. When people say “Fiction affects reality” this is what they mean. They do not mean “People will see a pretend bad guy and become bad” they mean “Ideals represented in fiction will be pulled from the real world and reflected back onto it.”

However, stories shouldn’t have to spoon-feed you the lesson as if you’re watching a children’s cartoon, stories often have nuances and you have to actively analyze the themes of it all to understand it’s core messages. Oftentimes it can be intentionally murky and hard to parse especially if the subject matter itself is complicated. But you can’t simply read things on the surface and think you understand everything about them, without understanding the symbolism or subtext you can leave a series like Revolutionary Girl Utena thinking the titular Utena is heterosexual and was only ever in love with her prince. Things won’t always be face-value or clear-cut and you will be forced to come to your own conclusions sometimes too.

That’s why the whole fandom-based groupthink mentality about “critical thinking” doesn’t work, because it’s not critical. It’s simply looking into the crowd, seeing people say a show is problematic, and then dropping it without truly understanding why. It’s performative, consuming the best media isn’t activism and it doesn’t make you a better person. Listening to the voices of people whom the issues directly concerns will help you form an opinion, and to understand the issues from a more knowledgeable perspective beyond your own. All that means nothing if you just sweep it under the rug because you want to look infallible in your morality. That’s not being critical, it’s just being scared to analyze yourself, as well as what you engage with. You just don’t want to think about those things and you’re afraid of being less than perfect so you pretend it never happened.

And though I’m making this post, it’s not mine or anyone else’s job to hold your hand through all this and tell you “Oh this show is okay, but this show isn't, and this book is bad etc etc etc”. Because you actually have to think for yourself, you know, critically. Examples I’ve listed aren’t rules of thumb, they’re just examples and things will vary depending on the story and circumstance. You have to look at shit on a case-by-case basis instead of relying on spotting tropes without thinking about how they’re implemented and what they mean. That’s why it’s analysis, you have to use it to understand what the narrative is communicating to its audience, explicitly or implicitly, intentionally or incidentally, and understand how this reflects the real world and what kind of impact it can have on it. 

A big problem with fandom is it has made interests synonymous with personality traits, as if every series we consume is a core part of our being, and everything we see in it reflects our viewpoints as well. So when people are told that a show they watched is problematic, they react very extremely, because they see it as basically the same thing as saying they themselves are problematic (It’s not). Everyone sees themselves as good people, they don’t want to be bad people, so this scares them and they either start hiding any evidence that they ever liked it, or they double down and start defending it despite all its flaws, often providing those aforementioned thermian arguments (“She dresses that way because of her powers!”).

That’s how you get people who call children’s cartoons “irredeemable media” and people who plaster “fiction=/= reality!” all over their blogs, both are basically trying to save face either by denying that they could ever consume anything problematic or denying that the problematic aspects exist all together. And absolutely no one is actually addressing the core issues anymore, save for those affected by them who pointed them out to begin with, only for their original point to become muffled in the discourse. No one is thinking critically because they’re more concerned with us-vs-them group mentality, both sides try to out-perform the other while the actual issue gets ignored or is used as nothing more than a gacha with no true understanding or sympathy behind it.

One of the other issues that comes from this is the fact that pretty much everyone thinks they’re the only person capable of being critical of their interests. That’s how you get those interactions where one person goes “OK [Media] fan” and another person replies “Bro you literally like [Other Media]”, because both parties think they’re the only ones capable of consuming a problematic piece of media and not becoming problematic themselves, anyone else who enjoys it is clearly incapable of being as big brained as them. It’s understandable because we know ourselves and trust ourselves more than strangers, and I’m not saying there can’t be certain fandoms who’s fans you don’t wanna interact with, but when we presume that we know better than everyone else we stop listening to other people all together. It’s good to trust your own judgement, it’s bad to assume no one else has the capacity to think for themselves either though.

The insistence that all media that you personally like is without moral failing and completely pure comes with the belief that all media that you personally dislike has to be morally bad in some way. As if you can’t just dislike a series because you find it annoying or it just doesn’t appeal to you, it has to be problematic, and you have to justify your dislike of it through that perspective. You have to believe that your view on whatever media it is is the objectively correct one, so you’ll likely pick apart all it’s flaws to prove you’re on the right side, but there’s no analysis of context or intent. Keep in mind this doesn’t necessarily mean those critiques are unfounded or invalid, but in cases like this they’re often skewed in one direction based on personal opinion. It’s just as flawed as ignoring all the faults in the stuff you like, it’s biased and subjective analysis that misses a lot of context in both cases, it’s not a good mindset to have about consuming media. It’s just another result of tying media consumption with identity and personal morals. The faux-critical mentality is an attempt to separate the two in a way that implies they’re a packaged deal to begin with, making it sort of impossible to truly do so in any meaningful way.

As far as I know this whole phenomena started with “Steven Universe Critical” in, like, 2016, and that’s where this mentality around “critical thinking” originated. It started out with just a few people correctly pointing out very legitimate issues with the series, but over time it grew into just a trend where people would make cutesy kin blogs with urls like critical-[character] or [character]crit to go with the fad as it divulged into Nostalgia Critic level critique. Of course there was backlash to this and criticism of the criticism, but no actual conversation to be had. Just people trying to out-do each other by acting as the most virtuous one in the room, and soon enough the fad became a huge echo-chamber that encouraged more and more outrageous takes for every little thing. The series itself was a children’s cartoon so it stands to reason that a lot of the fans were young teens, so this behavior isn’t too surprising and I do believe a lot of them did think they were doing the right thing, especially since it was encouraged. But that doesn’t erase the fact that there were actual real issues and concerns brought up about the series that got treated with very little sympathy and were instead drowning out people’s voices. Though those from a few years back may have grown up since and know better (Hopefully), the mentality stuck around and influenced the norm for how fandoms and fandom people conduct any sort of critique on media. 

That’s a shame to me, because the pedestal people place fandom onto has completely disrupted our perception on how to engage with media in a normal way. Not everything should be consumed with fandom in mind, not everything is a coffee-shop au with no conflict, not everything is a children’s cartoon with the morals spoon-fed to you. Fandom has grown past the years of uncritical praise of a series, it’s much more mainstream now with a lot more voices in it beyond your small community on some forum, and people are allowed to use those voices. Just because it may not be as pleasant for you now because you don’t get to just turn your brain off and ignore all the flaws doesn’t mean you can put on your rose-tinted nostalgia goggles and pretend that fandom is actually all that is good in the world, to the point where you place it above the comfort and safety of others (Oftentimes children). Being uncritical of fandom itself is just as bad as being uncritical of what you consume to begin with. 

At the end of the day it all just boils down to the ability to truly think for yourself but with sympathy and compassion for other people in mind, while also understanding that not everyone will come to the same conclusion as you and people are allowed to resent your interests. That doesn’t necessarily mean they hate you personally, you should be acknowledging the same issues after all. You can’t ignore aspects of it that aren’t convenient to your conclusion, you have to actually be critical and understand the issues to be able to form it. 

I think that all we need is to not rely on fandom to tell us what to do, but still listen to the voices of others, take them into account to form our opinion too, boost their voices instead of drowning them out in the minutiae of internet discourse about which character is too much of an asshole to like. Think about what the characters and story represent non-diegetically instead of treating them like real people and events, rather a story with an intent and message to share through its story and characters, and whatever those reflect from the real world. That’s how fiction affects reality, because it exists in reality and reflects reality through its own lens. The story itself is real, with a real impact on you and many others, so think about the impact and why it all matters. Just… Think. Listen to others but think for yourself, that’s all.

[thanksjro]

More Than Meets the Eye #7- Just in Case You Forgot Decepticons Were a Thing

While the Lost Light gets all of Rung’s appointments in order, our narrative is going to take a little shift, so we can get to know some pretty neat dudes.

And by “neat dudes” I mean completely morally and ethically reprehensible bastards.

But first, here’s a brief history of the Phase-Sixer known as Black Shadow.

Very limber, Mr. Shadow. Also, note the abstract sort of Decepticon insignia shape going on with the panel. That’s just neat.

Now, Black Shadow’s kicked a lot of keister in his long, storied career as a ‘Con, which makes his current situation all the more bleak, as he’s in the final throes of a visit with the Decepticon Justice Division.

The guy with the arm-mounted cannon that’s clearly compensating for something is Tarn, the leader of the DJD. His main character trait is he’s sapiosexual, but only for Megatron. He’s so devoted to the Decepticause and its rhetoric, he wears a mask of the insignia at all times.

Behind him are Helex and Tesaurus, who turn into a fondue pot and industrial-sized blender, respectively, and Vos, who turns into a sniper rifle, and was once fired by Megatron himself. I assume he’s only part of the DJD for the clout.

And then there’s Kaon, who turns into a wheelie chair.

Black Shadow’s looking pretty rough, but the boys haven’t killed him yet, and there’s a reason for that; the DJD’s sole reason for existing is to punish any Decepticon who stalls the glory of Megatron’s vision of a better tomorrow coming to fruition, no matter how slight the infraction, and simply killing their victims doesn’t exactly drive the point home, now does it? They’ve got to make an example, you know?

But really it’s so Tarn can pontificate. See, he considers himself a bit of an intellectual, as shown in his quoting of Megatron’s autobiography, Towards Peace.

Ugh, He’s a fanboy. It’s enough to make you want to puke. Which Black Shadow does. It’s mostly blood. Or is it? Hard to tell, energon is everything for these guys.

The DJD have had their fun, so now it’s time for them to say goodbye to Black Shadow. This is where Tarn’s special talent comes into play, and it’s a nasty one.

Tarn has a unique voice, one that, when matching the timbre and frequency of another ‘bot’s spark, can be used to affect said spark, even making it give up the ghost. This is exactly what he does to Black Shadow, but not before making him apologize for selling out the Decepticons for a butt-ton of money.

Speaking of unique voices, Tarn’s characterization is almost completely in his. It makes sense, given his power, that he have a way of speaking that stands out from everyone else. It’s smooth, and cool, and seems well-rehearsed; this is not a guy who stumbles on his words. He sounds like a Bond villain.

Roberts has admitted that he wrote these characters with English accents, and while I can’t say that I buy it for everyone in MTMTE, I certainly do for Tarn.

But maybe that’s just because I’m American, and a lot of the media I consumed growing up had the whole “the villain sounds British/camp gay” thing going on.

Anyway.

Black Shadow explodes, because we haven’t had one of those in a while.

With another tick put on their List, the DJD get ready to move on to their next target. We don’t get any names, but whoever they are, they’re about to have a very bad day.

Then we take a quick jump back to the Lost Light, since things were kind of a massive mess when we last saw everyone.

Rung’s not dead, by the way. I guess Swerve really is just that bad of a shot. Still, he’s not much more than a brain on a rope, and that means that Rung’ll be out of commission for a good while.

Poor Swerve. He feels so awful about this whole thing, even brought Rung one of his little ships to keep him company. The worst part is, now that Swerve’s shot the therapist, who will he talk to so he can work through having shot the therapist?

Speaking of guys who need therapy, Red Alert comes visiting in the dead of night, after visiting hours and in cover of darkness. He tells Rung about the little surprise he found in the basement, and bids him farewell, as he will surely be killed now that he knows about Overlord.

Who the hell programmed that drone to be so menacing?

Red Alert, again showing that this ain’t his first paranoia rodeo, slips a data slug full of Overlord bondage footage into the hole where Rung’s thumb should be- guess it got lost in the helter-skelter when he got shot- then walks out of the medibay, presumably to die.

Anywho, that’s enough of the Autobots for a little while. Let’s see what the Decepticons are up to.

On a planet far from wherever the Lost Light is faffing about, a Decepticon wakes up to a bunch of dudes hovering over him, insulting his looks, and stealing his organs. He reacts accordingly.

This is Fulcrum. No, not the Decepticon medic from Eugenesis, different guy. This Fulcrum’s primary function is probably about as removed from healing as it gets.

The guys trying to harvest him are the Scavengers, and they’re pretty surprised that he’s not dead, because, well…

Yeah.

Misfire- the dude who got kicked in the face a second ago- does both Fulcrum and the reader a solid by introducing all the members of this merry band of assholes, starting with the surliest of their ranks.

Crankcase was first introduced into the IDW run in Stormbringer #3, where he shot at Thunderwing and spouted off a couple lines ripped straight from a porno.

Stormbringer is really just… something else.

Spinister, who can and will shoot anything that meets his unpredictable criteria of being a threat, is the only other Scavenger who isn’t debuting in the comics with this issue. He was in Stormbringer #4, not that he really did anything of note there.

There’s Flywheels, who can’t tell a lie without transforming, and is a born-again evangelical. His character is a removal from his previous iterations, as he’s a triple-changer instead of a Duocon, a robot that only exists if two separate sentient vehicles combine. So, in his case, tank + plane = giant robot. Transformers is weird.

Then there’s the leader of this group, the ever-stressed, glorified babysitter, Krok.

Krok takes the opportunity to save Fulcrum from the verbal barrage, explaining that the Scavengers are expropriation specialists, meaning that they take people’s shit for their own benefit, and that includes bodily fluids. Misfire was supposed to be siphoning energon from the corpses in the area, but accidentally got high on another dude’s supply in the process. Misfire may be hopped up on drugs at the moment, but he’s only a bit more put-together sober, so this really is roughly par for the course with him.

Back on the Lost Light, Chromedome pays a visit to Brainstorm, who is currently hanging from the ceiling. Not in a suicidey way, mind you, just in a Brainstorm way.

He wants to be noticed so badly.

Chromedome’s here because he managed to steal Skid’s weirdly forgettable gun back in issue #4, while Skids was busy harassing that bar drone. He handed it off to Brainstorm to try and figure out what the deal was. Problem is, the gun blew up the moment Brainstorm cracked it open, only allowing him to get a quick look at the internals thanks to his super-futuristic robot eyes. All he can really say is that it looks like something that came from The Institute. Back at it again with the ominous proper nouns.

Getting back to the Scavengers, it looks like the boys have set up a little campfire for the evening. It’s a gorgeous night.

In love with the colors this issue.

We get a very brief history lesson that shows us why reducing your workforce to a spreadsheet instead of living, free-thinking creatures isn’t a super great idea, and then Krok drops the bomb on Fulcrum about the war being over. This is pretty wild to Fulcrum, probably because after 4 million years of that nonsense, you don’t really expect it to ever actually end.

Of course, when the impossible turns out to be possible after all, there’s only one question to really ask: who won?

Now, none of the guys really know how everything ended, only going off of the pulse wave that Vector Sigma shot off during the reformatting of Cybertron. They figure it was probably the Autobots, because they’re at least a little genre savvy. Bummer for them, considering they’re technically part of the bad guys. Just ask the campfire.

You know, I don’t think this is what President Roosevelt had in mind when he started doing fireside chats.

And so our location is finally revealed to us- this is the planet known as Clemency. Hey, wasn’t that the place Tarn said their next target was? Man, that really sucks for these guys. Hope they’ve got their wills in order.

Meanwhile, in the medibay of the Lost Light, Rung has another late-night visitor. This guy takes the data slug from inside his thumb hole, thus removing any hope of Red Alert’s fate being found out. Well dang.

Back on Clemency, the boys have made it through the night, and are using the light of daybreak to start scrounging up parts for their super sweet ship, the Weak Anthropic Principle.

Hold on to your butts, because this one’s a doozy.

The Anthropic Principle is based in the school of philosophy, and states that any and all observations about the universe- or any universe, really- have to be fed through the filter of realizing that said universe is only observable because it allows for sapient life to exist and observe it. There are two flavors of this principle; the strong anthropic principle states that the universe has some sort of compelling force which dictates it be able to house life which can observe it, while the weak anthropic principle basically says that the only reason we’re even considering the strong anthropic principle is because we live in a universe where we can.

Now, why exactly Roberts decided to bring this philosophical idea into the fold completely escapes me, unless he decided to, in a roundabout way, poke fun at the fact that we are currently observing a universe we don’t exist in through the magic of fiction- that theory doesn’t hold water, though, because there are still sapient creatures populating the universe of the IDW comics, and even humans at that. I’m curious where he even learned about this. What an odd, confounding tidbit of information this is.

But enough about that, because Misfire’s just seen a cryptid.

He transforms and blasts past Fulcrum and Krok, interrupting Krok’s explanation of what the device he keeps hidden in his fist is for, trying to catch up to the Necrobot.

The very same, Fulcrum, thank you.

Misfire is a firm believer in the Necrobot, while Krok is firmly not. Misfire’s tried chasing down this guy several times now, but he’s not caught him. The Necrobot is kind of like Bigfoot, if he were also a Catholic priest. This go doesn’t prove any different for poor Misfire, though it’s not all bad.

Flywheels’ only purpose as a character is so that Roberts had a stand-in for the word “fuck” for this issue.

Misfire’s found something very exciting, and he immediately calls Krok to bring everyone over.

Everyone’s super jazzed about finding this thing, and they break out the flashlights and break in to see all the fun stuff that’s inside this obnoxiously large ship.

Of course, this is a Roberts story, and we haven’t yet had any sort of scientifically experimental horrors yet, so we’re honestly a little overdue at this point.

But wait, there’s more!

Aww, it’s nice that Fulcrum and Krok already have each other’s contact info.

Everyone regroups and they weigh their options. Misfire fucking hates this ship, and wants nothing to do with it. Fulcrum however, isn’t so quick to throw this entire nightmare bus off the cliff. Fulcrum’s a little weird, and not just because he looks like he’s got a military pack on and no shirt.

Oh honey, you got a storm coming.

As if on cue, Krok starts hearing music, and asks around for a phone. He picks up a transmission from a familiar masked face. Tarn lets the fellas know that one of them has done a big no-no, and if the others hand the transgressor over, he’ll let them watch, because Tarn assumes that that’s something other people are into. Tarn is bad at people. The transmission ends, leaving the boys to panic, and also wonder where the leader of the DJD learned to count, until they find a very special friend deep within the bowels of the ship. The extra life signal, and the only other living thing on the Worldsweeper- Grimlock.

[quakerjoe]

Biden, #MeToo, and why I can’t support him.

Anyone who supports Biden, by my reckoning, is fine with putting their name to yet another sexual predator in the White House

Where’s the outrage, people? All you #MeToo supporters out there are fantastically quiet about the accusation leveled against Biden. Where are all of you who were appalled at the recording of trump bragging how the rich and powerful can just walk up and grab a woman by the pussy? That’s what Biden actually DID (allegedly). If you’re fine with Biden, hand in your #MeToo card and strike the word ‘feminist’ or ‘humanist’ from your personal bios. 

If you don’t know a woman who’s a survivor, then you don’t know women. That means that none of them have trusted you enough to tell you their stories. I’ve heard many. Once upon a time, I was in a relationship with one and I heard her horror story. She felt that her freaking out when we tried to get intimate with me was unfair so she left. Then she killed herself.

Is Biden REALLY better than trump? Really? Really? Of trump, whom I loathe more than anyone else on Earth, I can say, with all honesty, this much: I KNOW where I stand with him and his band of fuckwits. ALL of his fuckery has been mostly done out in the open. While everyone’s freaking out over it, they’re all huddling behind Biden; many out of such sheer desperation to remove trump that they’ve literally allowed the Democratic party to compromise them and their morals and core beliefs. IF you’re supporting Biden, you’re not compromising, YOU’VE BEEN COMPROMISED. You ALLOWED the Democratic party to lower their own standards SO low they’re practically as filthy as the GOP only there’s one sad, horrible difference between them and just one- While the GOP is openly vile, reprehensible, and are more than willing to fuck you all to your face; fuck you and fuck yours and go fuck yourself... Democrats smile, say nice things, then stab you in the back. Democrats now only pay lip service, make half-baked and half ass attempts to try to convince you that they’re Left in some way, all while being far right of where they were years ago. There IS no Left anymore, and you’ve been dragged along with them. When is enough, enough, people?

There’s clearly only ONE person the Democrats hated more than trump- Bernie Sanders. Between mainstream media ignoring him and Dems ganging up to defeat him, clearly the party doesn’t give a flying fuck about YOU. They’re just not into you, baby; it’d interrupt the cash flow from their donors, most of them being the same rich twats buying GOPers. Look how fast Bloomberg bought Dems!

Now you’re all acting like trump supporters for the BlueMAGA. Seriously? Really? The rapist? The guy whose motto is essentially “Don’t worry, I won’t change shit; I’ll just bring us back to normal (meaning back to the era that brought us trump in the fucking FIRST place).

How many of you BOTHERED reviewing Biden’s super-shitty policies and actions over his career? (crickets) How many of you have any spine enough to see just how fucking useless he is at this stage? Fuck me, man; this asshole can’t even speak! We already have that. He’s already got various degrees of sexual assault on the books. We already have that. He’s all to eager to work with the GOP and cater to the rich. We already have that! He’s boring as fuck, abrasive and he does NOT inspire voters to come charging out this November.

Trump does, though. His fanatics are breaking down the gates during a pandemic; you can bet your privileged asses that they’ll be out come November assuming they did’t keel over dead from COVID-19. That may be the only edge that Biden gets as he does and says fuck-all nothing except hope that trump screws up enough to get his base to stay home and enough of his own Biden Bros to show up. That’s his big plan, kids.

Kiss your $15/hr good-bye. You don’t seriously thing team biden will really pull that off, do you? For fuck sake, according to Liz Warren, if the min. wage  kept up with cost of living and inflation, it should be at $23/hr NOW. According to Robert Reich, it’s even higher. $15/hr was what we needed well over a decade ago. If biden does pull it off, it’s a token fist in your ass at best, you puppet.

Kiss M4A good-bye. It’s evident that you’d rather dump your cash into the overpriced, empty promises of insurance companies, big pharma, and stoke the fires of endless war with financing the Military Industrial Complex than live a safe, healthy life.

Kiss any sort of Green New Deal good-bye while Pelosi and the others sneer at it and look down their noses at you.

I certainly don’t WANT more of trump...

...but thinking biden will make things better is foolish. Trump will happily stab you through the chest, but the likes of biden prefer to smile while they stab you through the back using the blade forged out of empty promises and lip service. Fuck, if you’re keeping track of the Dem. pundits, they’re already lining up to blame biden’s apparent loss on Sanders and people like me. They’re ALREADY gearing up for him to LOSE. What does THAT tell you? His popularity is utter shit compared to HRC back in 2016.

Let’s not forget that most of Bernie’s supporters backed HRC in 2016 and voted for her. Before that, let’s not forget HER followers’ loyalty when MOST of them bailed on Obama to support McCain. 

I won’t put my name to a vote for Biden. I won’t. I’ve heard too many tales of horror from Survivors and given that Al Franken’s career was burned for much less, I don’t appreciate the HYPOCRISY of the #MeTooExceptBiden rhetoric. MY moral compass, my values, my principles will no longer be something I give the DNC permission to shit on and compromise. If the US needs another 4 of trump burning the house down to wake the fuck up and LEARN that the Dems are a band of feckless twats on the take and actually start voting for PROGRESSIVES and those who are actually LEFT, then so be it. Let the children learn by touching the hot fucking stove; I’ve warned them enough, for years and years now. It’s time to grow a pair of whatever inspires you and wake the fuck up and stop fronting rich, white guys who are all for helping the rich scam us into tax breaks and socialism for them and their corporations while fucking us all in the ass without a kiss first, a grease up, or so much as a reach-around.

Year after year we do this shit and it’s getting worse. Yay, we won the House. So fucking what? What have they ACHIEVED? Pelosi scoffs at saving lives with M4A and we, as a party and a nation failed to get the Senate. The GOP is still cock-blocking everything, good or bad, passed by the House, so really, no big “blue wave” there to brag about.

These people are not stupid. They know the general population is complicit and disinterested in change. Look at all the anti-gun protest after every school shooting? Has much been done since? Technically, trump’s been more hard-ass over gun control than Obama! Holy shit, guys! The “Pussy Hat” march. What’s changed? Meh. Not much. To the GOP and corporate/establishment Dems, women are cheap and nobody cares. Point gone like a fart in the wind. The GOP and the Dems alike know that they can keep you all punching DOWN instead of taking a moment to glance up and see who’d really punching YOU. So long as they let you march, protest, bitch and scream now and then, you’ll get it all out of your system and then it’ll settle down and go back to “normal”.

“Normal” didn’t used to be finding it acceptable to have a documented sexual predator in the White House.

IF you have no problem with Biden, then you must also have no problem with Weinstein, right? Cosby? Judge Kavenaugh?

Uh huh.

I don’t want trump. I want him gone. I refuse to do it with biden taking his place because seriously, the guy wanted to shitcan SS and Medicare/Medicaid. He was gung-ho for Iraq and Afghanistan. He’s a bucket of charred turds.

Look all the women you love, if you have the courage to do so, and you tell them “Hey, I’m fine with electing another rapist for president!” because that’s literally what you’ll be doing. Why don’t you beat and slap her around for a bit before you go out to vote while you’re at it. Backing biden only continues giving permission to the Dems to offer you the worst possible candidate so they can keep their cash flow going.

Have some courage. Have some dignity. Have some fucking empathy and compassion, for fuck sake. Then, maybe, a woman might trust you enough to tell you HER horror story of survival.

[sketching-shark]

Absolutely Baffled By Many Current Takes on Star Wars

So question, but like...does anyone GENUINELY think that the Star Wars sequel as it currently stands is progressive?

 I know I’m just saying stuff here that a lot of other people have said before, but it seemed to have started off pretty strong (if unoriginal in terms of basic plot) with The Force Awakens in which we had the main characters of Rey, Finn, and Poe, who were, given everything else, pretty fresh. Rey was a young woman who was allowed her anger and her competence without being written as a sex object and who also seemed perfectly placed to be put into the role of inheriting the light side of the Skywalker legacy, Finn was the Black co-protagonist who was given a lot of good screen time and also written, as a defecting Stormtrooper kidnapped from his family and raised as a soldier, as genuinely brave, intelligent, and good (I say this while also being fully aware that there are a number of scenes that play more into the “funny black man” stereotype, which the movie does deserve criticism for), and Poe, a Latino man, was a caring and capable leader in the Resistance who had respect for ALL of his compatriots, women and men alike, and who was actually allowed to make it to the end of the film a hero without dying. Their identities as a white woman, a Black man, and a Latino man were subversions from who is usually allowed to be the heroes in big blockbusters (something that stirred a lot of anger, especially towards Finn to the point where there was a petition to have John Boyega removed from the role), but their statuses as such a subversion weren’t shoved in the audiences faces, which honestly managed to avoid the problem of tokenization. The relationships they formed felt genuine and meaningful, and at least I was really rooting to see how they would develop in the next part of their adventure. Not to mention the guy presented as the main villain, Kylo Ren, who was also the only young-ish white guy in the cast of new Star Wars characters, was clearly written as an entitled, creepy space fascist driven solely by the desire to get more power for himself at the cost of everyone else, including his own family. 

And then The Last Jedi shows up, and just considering everything it did and everything that followed, including now, I think it’s pretty hard to deny that in its obsession with undoing like literally everything that The Force Awakens set up, the grand result was just “subverting” everything back to an honestly pretty shitty status quo. Like...just think about the difference between how the personalities and the presentations of the characters initially set up as the new trio changed from one movie to the next!

Finn: Now bumbling black man caricature number 3,000,000,000,000 who can’t do anything right and who has to have a fierce woman tell him in the simplest terms possible why bad things are bad. 

Rey: Now all-forgiving woman of infinite patience and understanding type B version 5 billion whose main goal in the story is to try and save Broody McMurdersALot (the new version of Kylo Ren) from himself while she cries and looks pretty. 

Poe: Now hothead Latino stereotype version C subcategory iii who doesn’t care about those under his command and who is uncomfortable with FEMININITY and who needs to be slapped and shot by his superiors in the name of (white) feminism. 

And now, when it comes to Kylo Ren...it’s like, suddenly for some mysterious reason that we at Lucasfilms pinky promise has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that he’s the only young-ish white dude among the new characters (lol), now he’s the character that deserves to be at the center of everyone’s sympathy and attention, now he’s the person who we will suggest is actually supposed to be the hero (despite him having committed a shit ton of war crimes literally one movie ago) , now he’s the person who we now need to focus on in a lot of our marketing and extra media and who we will constantly suggest may be definitely redeemable, despite the fact that he’s now LITERALLY the new leader of the space fascists, has rejected an easy redemption twice, and has never shown even the slightest hint of remorse for any one of his many atrocities! 

It’s like...on all fronts this “subversive,” supposedly “progressive” characterization just doesn’t add up at all to being actually subversive OR progressive, and the underlying goal just reads now as having been to return everything to the damaging yet familiar stereotypes that we all encounter every goddam day from a wide variety of sources both past and present. 

And I know a lot of people don’t like The Last Jedi for a variety of reasons, but all these things considered it was incredibly gross and honestly astonishingly hypocritical in how much Lucasfilms and Disney started to push this narrative that racist, sexist, manbabies are the only people who had problems with this film, when the film itself is chock full of racist and sexist tropes and stereotypes. Heck, I think you could easily argue that the film went out of its way to...ha...force a lot of racist and sexist tropes into the overarching story, even more so than past Star Wars movies did. Like...just for example, Lando and Mace Windu weren’t main characters, but as black men in Star Wars they weren’t treated with even HALF the disrespect by the narrative that Finn is suffering through. And now, instead of addressing any of this, we’re all just supposed to pretend that everything is okay and that the sequel trilogy as it currently exists is actually super duper progressive even while the story so far, the marketing, and the complementary material routinely treat Finn like shit, portray Rey as second fiddle to Kylo Ren, and puts attention on Poe only when they need a male character who has the lightest skin and who also isn’t morally reprehensible. So with all of this in mind,  I really have to ask one thing: WHY do so many people keep insisting that the Star Wars sequel is progressive? Because from what I’ve seen, there’s absolutely nothing that currently makes it so.  

[quarktrinity]

hey so remember that post i made talking about how connor murphy is an abusive shithole? id like to make some adjustments to that.

in that post, i said that people are still allowes to like/relate to connor murphy and/or evan hansen. i only said that because if i didnt constantly cater to the opinions of deh stans, id be burned at the stake for it, and even when i did cater to them, i got people saying that connor actually isnt abusive, and that i should "let people enjoy things, karen".

well you know what? i literally dont give a shit right now.

dear evan hansen is a shitty garbage musical and anyone who tries to defend it needs to read the fuck out of this post.

lets address the elephant in the room. connor murphy abuses his sister. this shouldnt be up for debate, its literally part of his character, and basically stated in the script, which i own. if you "disagree" with this, i think you need to watch that show again.

so now that thats out of the way, i can go further into detail about this.

deh portrays connor murphy as a ~complicated~ individual, and says that even though he did bad things, the world shouldve been more welcoming and kind to him, and his parents shouldve tried harder to help him.

and sure, okay, his parents definitely sucked at trying to give their son the help he needed, but are we actually just going to skim over the fact that hes abusive? he threatened his sister and treated her like shit daily, thats not ~complicated~, thats called abuse, and the writers of this show cant fucking put this kid on the pedestal they put him on without giving the impression that they think abuse is justifiable.

you cant have it both ways. you cant have a character be irredeemable, then try to portray them in a sympathetic light. it makes you look like an asshole.

so if connors such a shithole, why do so many people like him?

well, lets just say that if sincerely me wasnt a song, people wouldnt give a shit about him. this is a classic case of "piece of media has a character say theyre gay, then pass it off as a joke to appeal to the straights, and lgbt+ fans eat it up." once fans had that impression of him, they couldnt let it go.

but that isnt who connor is. thats literally the point of sincerely me. connor isnt the cutesy sad baby you think he is, hes an abusive piece of shit who doesnt deserve the attention he got.

you might say: "but he was depressed!" "but his parents were neglectful!" "but he was ostracized!" and to that i say:

okay. that sucks. so?

how would any of that make him a sympathetic character? how would any of that justify giving the positive attention connor got? short answer: it wouldnt. long answer: you guys love saying "that doesnt make it okay, but..." but what you really mean is "i dont apply critical thinking to the characters i like because im stubborn about holding onto the first impression i had of them, so i dont care how objectively horrible they are, as long as i can tangentially relate to them via pride flags and neurodivergency, im good."

to portray connor the way he was portrayed is unacceptable. i literally cannot express how disgusted i am at this show and its fans.

moving on to the other huge asshole of this show, evan hansen himself.

where do i even start with evan hansen? well, lets make a list of all the reprehensible things hes done in the musical:

gaslighted an abuse victim into thinking her abuser loved her as a method to pursue her romantically

lied to said abusers entire family, painting a picture of a perfect child that definitely was nowhere close to who he actually was

antagonized his mother, claiming she saw him as "broken" when she was just trying to help him with his anxiety

hurt literally every single person in the musical and didnt hesitate to go straight for the jugular on every one of them

defended connor by saying "life is messy, people are complicated, blah blah blah blah false morality"

but sure hes adorable because anxiety.

evan hansen does not come anywhere close to what people call "morally gray" or "a good person doing bad things." i seriously cant think of a single thing he did in the musical that was solely for someone elses benefit. hes a selfish person. thats his whole thing. he wants attention so bad that he was willing to do outrageously bad things to get it. this isnt a matter of anxiety and getting caught up in a lie that got too big to let go, its a matter of being selfish. thats it. he isnt a good person. stop acting like he is.

the final thing id like to say is to those who identify as connorkin or evankin, or just relate to either of them as characters. to those people, i can say either 1) you dont know these characters as well as you think you do, and youre mistaken, OR, 2) you literally identify with one of these piles of human garbage, go away. im not going to waste my time arguing with people who relate to abusers/people who defend abusers

and if you think ive said "abuse/abuser" too much, and that i should find more creative ways to criticize connors character, i hate to break it to you, but theres not much else to say about him. the majority of whats said about him in dear evan hansen is a lie, so all i know about him is: 1) abuser, 2) some incident with a printer, so hes evidently a violent person, 3) weed, 4) depression? i guess? and 5) just a general asshole

thats kind of it

dear evan hansen spits in the face of abuse victims. it spits in the face of those who have depression or anxiety. it spits in the face of suicidal teenagers. it spits in the face of everything it pretends it cares about.

its a disgusting and damaging show, and id greatly appreciate it if i never had to see anyone sing its praises ever again.

bye.

[primrose-path-of-dalliance]

Lotor’s end (?) in s6

i gave in to my terrible impulses and wrote a three-part essay about lotor. it's literally >9k and i ignored all of my other projects for this for over a week. rip.

in these three posts, i talk a lot about lotor from a sympathetic pov. so if that's something that makes your fandom experience uncomfortable, go ahead and ignore this post because it's not for you. stay healthy, and i can only promise you that i hold lotor accountable for every shitty thing he's done (especially when it comes to withholding info from allura because seriously, what bullshit). on the other hand, if you are a person who hates lotor as a piece of evil garbage because ???? fandom and purity culture thought it would be a great idea to hate him without looking very hard at the work the writers put in to make him more complex than the actual pure evil bastard zarkon himself that we already have... i challenge you to read on. do it. i dare you. (at the very least so you might hate him with a better understanding of why.)

so tl;dr: this is the "in this essay i will" meme followed through, if i started talking about how lotor's not a pure evil bastard and is instead the perfect example of a protagonist gone sour through 10,000 years of poor coping choices, oppression, and a lot of actual resentment, as well as a neat talk at the end where i break down lotor's breakdown.

toc 1: i shake out some salt and talk about the altean colony | 2: i question why people keep insisting lotor was "evil all along" | 3: i talk about my favorite parts of lotor’s breakdown

i take a lot of my knowledge and inspiration from @radioactivesupersonic, who writes some awesome meta. (seriously, thank you clockie. you are amazing.) so while i might specifically cite posts of his throughout these three posts, expect his ideas to be everywhere lol. please check him out if you have the time, he's much better at this meta thing than me. (for safety purposes, i'm gonna disclaim: i did not consult with him on anything. so while i synthesize with a lot of his stuff, my thoughts are not necessarily his and i take full responsibility for that shit.)

anyway, i don't make meta posts a lot nor have any good idea of what a good structure for one would be. so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

"even after season 6, you still like lotor?"

fuck yeah my pal.

"but why? he's clearly terrible and evil! he killed thousands of alteans and said he was going to conquer the universe, destroy voltron forever, etc.!"

i mean, yeah. but i'm gonna soapbox for a second.

number one: nothing precludes me or anyone else from loving the shit out of an evil character. we're not personally invested in the story in the sense that we have real stakes involved. they're fictional characters, and we are the audience. nothing they've done has any bearing on our reality (barring general patterns that can be established by media as a whole) and therefore it's not our moral responsibility to throw down terrible judgment on a person who isn't real, even if they've done horrible shit.

i'm not saying one can't acknowledge or dislike a character who's a bad person. lotor himself has done terrible things, and if you could not give less of a fuck about him, that's highkey your prerogative and i champion your freedom to have your personal preferences.

but we're not the characters who live in that world. we're spectators to a fictional story, and one thing that means is that we have no obligation to anyone to personally hate a villain, no matter what they've done because put simply, nothing they've done is real. no one has ever been harmed by a singular fictional villain.

the purpose of the villain and their actions is not to be hated by the audience, but to help tell a story. hopefully, they're also helping to paint a picture of the variety of people, perspective, and experience in a respectful manner.

there's a strong trend in fandom now toward purity culture, where we're expected to hate anything that isn't perfect, and that's such a goddamn lie. nothing is perfect. nothing ever will be. we can't reasonably expect that level of performance from content creators.

and what does "perfect" even mean? social justice is an extremely nuanced topic, colored by individual perspective on what's right or good. there's never going to be an ideal piece of media that hits every spot perfectly because there are an infinite number of spots, and what they are changes in importance with every person.

so when it comes to storytelling, we need to focus more on what's practically possible. what's practically admirable. for me, ideally, that's "what have they accomplished? is this story illustrating the richness of human (or alien) experience? and how?"

this includes villains.

number two: i don't believe lotor is a villain in the sense that he's Evil or even necessarily irredeemable. from a personal perspective, i'll direct you to this post (link), which basically sums up my view on forgiving people who've done bad things. but from the third-party perspective as well, lotor isn't someone to find reprehensible or evil—at least, not to the level a lot of other people seem to be compelled to. let's break this down into more questions.

"lotor has killed people for his own personal gain! abused countless alteans, who already experienced a genocide!"

(allura is right there with you guys.)

yes, he did. i don't deny his crimes a single bit. the personal gain point may be arguable, but it still doesn't really make it better.

firstly: this is also addressed to those people who are stalwartly defending lotor's goodness by saying that romelle must have been lying. i haven't read any of the posts myself and only heard some of the points secondhand, and that is because the theory sounds like a load of bollocks (link).

this isn't something out of character for lotor, as much as i might want to believe so. it's really, really not, and i fully acknowledge that. we already know that lotor will do anything to survive if he finds himself caught between a rock and a hard place. that was what happened to narti.

lotor does have good morals. he has an absolute shit ton of them that, honestly, i don't know how to explain in detail without making this post twice as long as it's already going to be. he cares about individual life. he campaigns for conservation. he values people's cultures and would much rather work alongside them than dominate them. he's not cruel or sadistic like many of his peers in the galra empire, and he favors those who are discriminated against. and no, i don't believe any of these were an act. i can point to word of god for the most supportive proof—that "part of Lotor, a portion of Lotor, maybe all of Lotor, is coming from a very genuine place" (link).

(if you want deeper explanations about why these conclusions are accurate, please check out my #voltron meta tag and @radioactivesupersonic. especially him.)

but as it's been established, lotor is willing to break his morals if he feels he's faced with an ultimatum: survive, or die. victory or death.

"but that's a galra chant! he said it during the trials at oriande, and he was unworthy because of it. doesn't that prove he's really selfish at heart and will destroy anything if it means he gets what he wants?"

no. and also another no.

those two links go to really good arguments against that line of thinking. but let me sum it up: lotor has lived 10,000 years with an abusive father in an empire that considers his half-galra status lesser and despises his altean blood especially, and spent much of that in disgraced exile.

"victory or death," to him, doesn't mean that it would be better to die than to accept a loss, as when it's used by his galra peers; it means that he has to win, or else he is left to the mercies of his foes. and none of his foes have ever been merciful. he can never trust that one will ever be.

survival is lotor's most important victory in an empire that has been either apathetic to his existence or outright antagonistic. it represents his entire struggle of living—that he has to stay alive in order to win, and to a lesser extent, that staying alive in his universe is winning.

of course, lotor has larger motivations than merely surviving that he will protect just as ruthlessly. from a general perspective, one can hardly blame him for that. surviving isn't exactly living and being happy, especially in a universe that oppresses people like him, and he wants an escape from the corner he always seems to find himself boxed in. to a slightly lesser extent, he wants to create an escape for the countless societies oppressed under the empire as well. that's where his desire for infinite quintessence comes from.

"so you're telling me that he felt trapped in a corner and forced to break his supposed morals to use countless numbers of his own people as a fuel source. how the hell does that make sense? what trapped him? didn't he have other options? and how does this justify what he did?"

i'm not claiming that lotor was justified in any way. that is a fair grievance for people to have, and frankly, what he did was horrible and ugly and made victims of an already fragile colony, including romelle and her family. understanding the 'why' of what someone did is, shockingly, not the same as justifying them. (and i don't believe people look for the 'why' enough, when understanding the 'why' is an important step toward preventing the 'what'.)

maybe lotor had other options. there's not a lot of exposition that happens in this show, in-story or in interviews or otherwise. there isn't enough information about the canonical process of quintessence collection, or about quintessence in general, to say for certain if lotor could have done something less egregious in his treatment of the altean colony.

either way, he had to harvest quintessence. the likely possibility as to why? the galra empire was limiting his resources, both because he was an exile and because he knew they (particularly haggar) might be watching, and he couldn't let them piece together his plans to usurp power. he needed quintessence in which he controlled every part of the creation process, and he needed to hide as much of how he was using it as possible. the easiest way to do that was for him to get his own source.

contrary to that assertion, i don't believe lotor first created the altean colony with the intention to use them as a quintessence farm. i believe he genuinely cared about preserving what was left of altea, similar to how he cares about preserving culture in general. this would be consistent with his previous characterization as well as lm and jds's assurances that he was coming from a genuine place. most importantly, even according to romelle's story, the second colony is never depicted as an idea lotor conceived from the start. it came much later, after the first colony was well-established.

it's likely that lotor originally had other sources of quintessence, since throk mentioned his possession of multiple colonies in s3e1, or that he hadn't yet come up with his plans in their entirety. maybe haggar or zarkon caught wind of certain plots and thwarted them, destroying his sources in the process. (we certainly get the impression in s3 and s4 that lotor coming up with rebellious plots isn't a new thing to either of them.) maybe his ambitions and travels gradually revealed themselves to need more quintessence than he'd expected. purchasing quintessence from any suppliers would have required an income, a relatively time-consuming and unreliable endeavor that might not have gotten him much in exchange. any quintessence supplies he might have acquired using his identity, if he could acquire any, would almost certainly have been monitored—how much he took, where he received them—to the point where use of them would be incredibly risky. he might have also morally disliked using empire-produced quintessence, since they would've been harvested using empire methods (i.e. "caring about colonies whomst?"). at least with his methods, he would know he wasn't destroying them without regard. either way, whatever previous sources of quintessence he had became too limited an amount for his operations. he needed more.

i get a strong impression that people don't understand what he could be using quintessence for. but we see it everywhere in the empire, in voltron, and in the castle of lions—it's the primary energy source of vld's world that powers machines, fuels ships, assists in experimentation, heals injuries, even prolongs life. nothing else compares. lotor wouldn't have needed it personally for the latter purpose, but one can't exactly travel the universe on an empty tank. without quintessence, he would've essentially been dead in the water. additionally, considering that the quintessence shows up in places not explicitly related to lotor, the fact that we see galra soldiers accompanying lotor on the altean colony when we know he was in exile, and the amount of resources he must have been supplying to the colony in secret, it's also possible he was using it to bribe people into doing things for him and staying silent. it probably would've been effective; it's described as an especially powerful form of quintessence, and he was the only source.

anyway, lotor needed quintessence he could control entirely without having to fear discovery and subsequent destruction. the altean colony was his only colony that he could be reasonably certain the empire would never find. and in true lotor fashion, the first defense he asserted was that he saved what was left of altea from the empire, despite the horrendous crimes he was committing, and could now stop his quintessence farming with his access to the quintessence field. technically, we don't even know whether all of the alteans taken to the second colony are dead (link). the man romelle saw there was still in the tank, as many others must have been.

lotor might have been planning to eventually heal them by using the quintessence field. of course, even if that's true, lotor still took away years of their lives, lied to them and their families, and drained them to near-death. the experience must have been traumatizing. and who knows how well they would be able to recover, if at all. it's little comfort.

(editing, i feel compelled to plug this analysis by @radioactivesupersonic of lotor's arc and relationship with allura as a vampire story because it's interesting as hell, pounds out what i've just said further, and is something i read prior to writing this up so i may have unconsciously stolen from it. (i can only promise that i completely forgot about it until i went looking for all my links rip.))

nevertheless, lotor's first priority for the altean colony was always to preserve them—even if he eventually, essentially started treating them as a renewable resource with his farming's effects on the survival of his people and culture as environmental impacts. make of that what you will.

"if lotor is such a decent person who loves altea and wants to end the galra empire, why didn't he team up with voltron from the beginning? he was around before season 3! why didn't he show up earlier?"

that, my friend, is a good question i've puzzled over too. i have an answer.

number one: lotor has been in the habit of effectively working on his lonesome for about the past 10,000 years and canonically displays a wealth of paranoia and trust issues. teamwork isn't usually the first idea that comes to mind to someone like lotor.

number two: we get a very dramatic hint toward this in the climax of s6 (can't wait until we reach that part!), as well as during his invasion of puig in s3, but i believe lotor didn't have much confidence in voltron's capabilities during the period of s1 and s2 or for some time afterwards. he's a very cautious and careful player, learned from millennia of working against the interests and conventions of an extremely powerful empire.

and if we all remember correctly, voltron lost 10,000 years ago. granted, alfor sent the lions away rather than risk zarkon gaining control of the black lion, but it was still him and the other paladins against zarkon. victory should've been within reach, and yet they lost. so 10,000 years later, voltron appears to have returned, and none of those fears have been assuaged. who are these random newcomers to pilot the lions, and how could they possibly succeed where the original paladins didn't, when they don't even have the might of armies behind them? zarkon could still retake control of the black lion. additionally, lotor's own feelings towards voltron (and symbolically, king alfor) as a savior are extremely complicated. (you cannot believe how excited i am to talk about that. just wait.) he's not going to risk everything he's worked for on a wild card he's incredibly unsure will manage to make a dent. it would even make zarkon stronger if they lost, and therefore his father, one of the people he most wants to avoid the attention of, would be coming after them in a frenzy.

even after the s2 finale where voltron critically injured zarkon, he finds them insufficient. they create the coalition, yet he can essentially retake puig in the span of an hour with a team of five attackers.

clearly, they still weren’t well-equipped enough to stand against the galra empire. it would be in lotor's best interests to avoid voltron like the plague unless he was certain they wouldn't be crushed. so he did just that.

i suspect that before the voltron coalition grew into its own, lotor was planning to independently start a coup of some kind. it would've been pretty easy with unlimited quintessence. but after he was declared an enemy of the empire to be killed on sight, when voltron had gained significant strength and organized rebellion against the empire alongside liberated planets became a genuine and effective possibility, he joins them—right after their surprise attack liberates a full third of the empire and shocks the galra off his trail. the coalition was finally a basket he felt secure putting some of his eggs into.

(part 2)

[wetrumpfeed]

Afternoon MAGAthread: YOUR WEEKLY PRESIDENTIAL RECAP!

GOOOOD AFTERNOON DEPLORABLES!

Welcome to your weekly recap of all this spicy and dank from the past week! If you happened to miss any past recaps you can catch those here!

Sunday, June 16th:

🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:

Congratulations to great guy Pete Hegseth and wonderful Jenny Cunningham on their engagement. They will have a fantastic life together! @foxandfriends

Yesterday was the Radical Left Democrats big Impeachment day. They worked so hard to make it something really big and special but had one problem - almost nobody showed up. “The Media admits low turnout for anti-Trump rallies.” @FoxNews “All around the Country people are....... ... .....saying enough. Democrat voters want to hear the politicians talking about issues. This is a huge distraction and will only help Donald Trump get elected.” @JedediahBila “Greatest President since Ronald Reagan” said a counter-protester. LehighValleyLive

A poll should be done on which is the more dishonest and deceitful newspaper, the Failing New York Times or the Amazon (lobbyist) Washington Post! They are both a disgrace to our Country, the Enemy of the People, but I just can’t seem to figure out which is worse? The good..... ... .....news is that at the end of 6 years, after America has been made GREAT again and I leave the beautiful White House (do you think the people would demand that I stay longer? KEEP AMERICA GREAT), both of these horrible papers will quickly go out of business & be forever gone!

Happy Father’s Day to all, including my worst and most vicious critics, of which there are fewer and fewer. This is a FANTASTIC time to be an American! KEEP AMERICA GREAT!

Video

Thank you PM @Netanyahu and the State of Israel for this great honor!🇺🇸🇮🇱

When will the Fake News Media start asking Democrats if they are OK with the hiring of Christopher Steele, a foreign agent, paid for by Crooked Hillary and the DNC, to dig up “dirt” and write a phony Dossier against the Presidential Candidate of the opposing party......... ... ......If Republicans ever did that to the Democrats, there would be all hell to pay. It would be a scandal like no other!

Almost 70% in new Poll say don’t impeach. So ridiculous to even be talking about this subject when all of the crimes were committed by the other side. They can’t win the election fairly!

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. “I think we have a very real risk of losing the Presidency to Donald Trump.” I agree, and that is the only reason they play the impeach card, which cannot be legally used!

Congratulations to Gary Woodland in winning the United States Open Golf Championship. Fantastic playing, great heart - there will be more in Gary’s future!

Thank you Mr. Prime Minister, a great honor!

SIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:

Let's not forget what this piece of shit did, with the corrupted assistance of Kim Foxx and Kamala Harris.

Holy shit, boys, Hercules is on our side.

Happy Father’s Day!

This post is for the fathers who can't be with their families today.

🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:

Dad’s are the best!!!

You must be a Republican

I have no words

You son of a bitch

Monday, June 17th:

TODAY'S ACTION:

President Donald J. Trump Announces Intent to Nominate and Appoint Individuals to Key Administration Posts

🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:

Big Rally tomorrow night in Orlando, Florida, looks to be setting records. We are building large movie screens outside to take care of everybody. Over 100,000 requests. Our Country is doing great, far beyond what the haters & losers thought possible - and it will only get better!

Only Fake Polls show us behind the Motley Crew. We are looking really good, but it is far too early to be focused on that. Much work to do! MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!

"Iran to defy Uranium Stockpile Limits”

One size doesn’t fit all - I support West Virginia Schools. Keep up the great work, @WVGovernor Big Jim Justice - I am with you!

.@FoxNews Polls are always bad for me. They were against Crooked Hillary also. Something weird going on at Fox. Our polls show us leading in all 17 Swing States. For the record, I didn’t spend 30 hours with @abcnews, but rather a tiny fraction of that. More Fake News @BretBaier

Next week ICE will begin the process of removing the millions of illegal aliens who have illicitly found their way into the United States. They will be removed as fast as they come in. Mexico, using their strong immigration laws, is doing a very good job of stopping people....... ... ....long before they get to our Southern Border. Guatemala is getting ready to sign a Safe-Third Agreement. The only ones who won’t do anything are the Democrats in Congress. They must vote to get rid of the loopholes, and fix asylum! If so, Border Crisis will end quickly!

Thousands of people are already lined up in Orlando, some two days before tomorrow nights big Rally. Large Screens and food trucks will be there for those that can’t get into the 25,000 capacity arena. It will be a very exciting evening! Make America Great Again!

The story in the @nytimes about the U.S. escalating attacks on Russia’s power grid is Fake News, and the Failing New York Times knows it. They should immediately release their sources which, if they exist at all, which I doubt, are phony. Times must be held fully accountable!

Wow! The State Department said it has identified 30 Security Incidents involving current or former employees and their handling of Crooked Hillary Clinton’s Emails. @FoxNews This is really big. Never admitted before. Highly Classified Material. Will the Dems investigate this?

Only a few people showed up for the so-called Impeachment rallies over the weekend. The numbers were anemic, no spirit, no hope. More importantly, No Collusion, No Obstruction!

SIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:

Thug shoots someone 5 times over a car, steals car, goes on Facebook bragging about how cops aren't going to do shit about it, US Marshals get a federal warrant, he rams their cars, pulls a gun, gets shot and killed…yet liberal morons in his home town defend him, riot and injure cops.

State Department identifies 23 violations, 'multiple security incidents' concerning Clinton emails as a part of ongoing investigation

Three months after being admitted to Harvard Class of 2023, Harvard has decided to rescind Kyle Kashuv’s admission over texts and comments made nearly two years ago, months prior to the shooting.

It's going to be crazy once it's all declassified along with Hillary's frazzledrip

🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:

Kevin Sorbo is one of us

WHAT IS THEIR PROBLEM LADS?

I actually have this fetish where I'm the only one in bed with a dick and/or beard.

The official summer hat came today, and it's brighter than the sun reflecting off 5,000,000 liberal tears!

Tuesday, June 18th:

TODAY'S ACTION:

Seven Nominations Sent to the Senate

President Donald J. Trump Announces Intent to Nominate and Appoint Personnel to Key Administration Posts

President Trump Delivers Remarks Upon Departure

🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:

Mario Draghi just announced more stimulus could come, which immediately dropped the Euro against the Dollar, making it unfairly easier for them to compete against the USA. They have been getting away with this for years, along with China and others.

European Markets rose on comments (unfair to U.S.) made today by Mario D!

The Fake News doesn’t report it, but Republican enthusiasm is at an all time high. Look what is going on in Orlando, Florida, right now! People have never seen anything like it (unless you play a guitar). Going to be wild - See you later!

Had a very good telephone conversation with President Xi of China. We will be having an extended meeting next week at the G-20 in Japan. Our respective teams will begin talks prior to our meeting.

“ECB officials see Rate Cut as primary tool for any new stimulus.” @business

German DAX way up due to stimulus remarks from Mario Draghi. Very unfair to the United States!

Acting Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan, who has done a wonderful job, has decided not to go forward with his confirmation process so that he can devote more time to his family.... ... ....I thank Pat for his outstanding service and will be naming Secretary of the Army, Mark Esper, to be the new Acting Secretary of Defense. I know Mark, and have no doubt he will do a fantastic job!

Departing for Orlando, Florida with @FLOTUS Melania!

Join me LIVE tonight in Orlando, Florida at 8:00 P.M. Eastern as we kickoff #Trump2020. Enjoy!

THANK YOU ORLANDO, FLORIDA!

Together, we are breaking the most sacred rule in Washington Politics: we are KEEPING our promises to the American People. Because my only special interest is YOU! #Trump2020

On no issue are Democrats more extreme – and more depraved – than when it comes to Border Security. The Democrat Agenda of open borders is morally reprehensible. It is the great betrayal of the American Middle Class and our Country as a whole! #Trump2020

In the ultimate act of moral cowardice, not one Democrat Candidate for president - not a single one - has stood up to defend the incredible men and women of ICE and Border Patrol. They don’t have the character, the virtue, or the spine! #Trump2020

Don’t ever forget - this election is about YOU. It is about YOUR family, YOUR future, & the fate of YOUR COUNTRY. We begin our campaign with the best record, the best results, the best agenda, & the only positive VISION for our Country’s future! #Trump2020

SIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:

POTUS is here!!!

Based Japanese

I couldn't agree more Matt. Rules for thee and not for me

This is going to be epic! Trump may live-tweet first 2020 Democratic debates

Astonished: CNN cut the President's 2020 reelection rally speech after the crowd started saying CNN sucks. I have never seen anything like this in my life.

PRESS BRIEFINGS, INTERVIEWS, RALLIES:

MAGA Rally Watch Party: 2020 Campaign Launch. Orlando, FL 6/18/2019

🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:

Man... if only...

When that 2020 vision kicks in.

"You're just a FUCKING WHITE MALE !!!" REEEEEEEEE

831am. Orland Trump Rally. They moved our line closer to front of venue. Thank goodness for our shade structure.

ah yes, the "racists", let's show these folks our love !

Wednesday, June 19th:

TODAY'S ACTION:

President Donald J. Trump Announces Judicial Nominees and United States Attorney Nominee

Vice President Pence Visits the USNS Comfort

President Trump Presents the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Arthur Laffer

🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:

THANK YOU! #Trump2020🇺🇸

The Dems are very unhappy with the Mueller Report, so after almost 3 years, they want a Redo, or Do Over. This is extreme Presidential Harassment. They gave Crooked Hillary’s people complete Immunity, yet now they bring back Hope Hicks. Why aren’t the Dems looking at the..... ... ....33,000 Emails that Hillary and her lawyer deleted and acid washed AFTER GETTING A SUBPOENA FROM CONGRESS? That is real Obstruction that the Dems want no part of because their hearings are RIGGED and a disgrace to our Country!

DEMOCRAT CONGRESSIONAL HEARINGS ARE #RIGGED!

If I didn’t have the Phony Witch Hunt going on for 3 years, and if the Fake News Media and their partner in Crime, the Democrats, would have played it straight, I would be way up in the Polls right now - with our Economy, winning by 20 points. But I’m winning anyway!

So sad that the Democrats are putting wonderful Hope Hicks through hell, for 3 years now, after total exoneration by Robert Mueller & the Mueller Report. They were unhappy with result so they want a Do Over. Very unfair & costly to her. Will it ever end? Why aren’t they....... ... ....asking Hillary Clinton why she deleted and acid washed her Emails AFTER getting a subpoena from Congress? Anybody else would be in jail for that, yet the Dems refuse to even bring it up. Rigged House Committee

I will be interviewed LIVE tonight by @seanhannity on @FoxNews 9 P.M. Enjoy!

Just returning from Orlando and Doral (Miami), Florida, and heading to the Oval Office, where I will present the great Economist, Dr. Arthur Laffer, with the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Congratulations to President Lopez Obrador — Mexico voted to ratify the USMCA today by a huge margin. Time for Congress to do the same here!

Since Election Day 2016, Stocks up almost 50%, Stocks gained 9.2 Trillion Dollars in value, and more than 5,000,000 new jobs added to the Economy. @LouDobbs If our opponent had won, there would have been a market crash, plain and simple! @TuckerCarlson @seanhannity @IngrahamAngle

SIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:

IN HONOR OF 1 YEAR WOMPIVERSARY WOMP! WOMP!

Must watch video. Democrats BTFO by Burgess Owens. “I used to be a Democrat until I did my history and found out the misery that that party brought to my race... Let's pay restitution. How about the Democratic Party pay for all the misery brought to my race".

Trump campaign rakes in stunning $25M in single day for re-election launch

I Haven't Seen POTUS This Emotional With Any Other Person in His Administration. THANK YOU FOR EVERYTHING, SARAH!

I hope alex jones bankrupts every single one of these media Arseholes! Link in comments

🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:

lol

🤦 "America's Border Is Just Like A Concentration Camp!" 🤦

No brakes on this train (2020 version)

This is MAGA country

Exhibit “A” from the Trump rally last night.

Thursday, June 20th:

TODAY'S ACTION:

Ivanka Trump Visits North Carolina with the American Workforce Policy Advisory Committee

President Trump Participates in a Bilateral Meeting with the Prime Minister of Canada

President Trump Welcomes Prime Minister Trudeau of Canada to the White House

🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:

S&P opens at Record High!

“The President has a really good story to tell. We have unemployment lower than we’ve seen in decades. We have people who stopped looking for work coming back into the labor force. We are in a record growth period.” Michael Steel @MSNBC (do you believe?)

Iran made a very big mistake!

It was my great honor to host Canadian Prime Minister @JustinTrudeau at the @WhiteHouse today!🇺🇸🇨🇦

S&P closes at Record High!

SIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:

SHOCK: TIME Magazine finally did a normal cover of Trump.

-Jussie Smollett fabricated a story about white guys assaulting him with bad words and the Media made it the biggest story in America. -White college girl is violently raped and beaten to the point of unconsciousness in a racially motivated attack and the Media ignores it.

Letter from a Polish parliament member to ocasional Cortex

Never listen to the polls, follow the $! Vegas odds are Trump even $, Biden +425.

New York County Clerk Is Refusing To Give Driver’s Licenses To Illegals, Despite New Law

🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:

I don’t care who you are that’s funny

The kid makes a good point 🤔🤔

Answer: NO

SO BRAVE: Speaker Pelosi just announced that "she's going in!" and is about to read the unredacted Mueller Report, WHICH SHE HAS HAS ACCESS TO IN A CONGRESSIONAL 'SCIF' FOR THE PAST TWO MONTHS—SO BRAVE, Nancy! You fraud!

If Trump debates Biden, I hope he invites all the girls Creepy Joe has sniffed to attend

Friday, June 21st:

TODAY'S ACTION:

President Trump and The First Lady Participate in the Congressional Picnic

🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:

Just revealed that the Failing and Desperate New York Times was feeding false stories about me, & those associated with me, to the FBI. This shows the kind of unprecedented hatred I have been putting up with for years with this Crooked newspaper. Is what they have done legal?... ... ....”This Russia Collusion Hoax was perpetrated in part by people inside the government, and in part by a compliant (Fake News) media.” Mollie Hemingway. @TuckerCarlson @foxandfriends The facts are starting to pour out. Stay tuned!

President Obama made a desperate and terrible deal with Iran - Gave them 150 Billion Dollars plus I.8 Billion Dollars in CASH! Iran was in big trouble and he bailed them out. Gave them a free path to Nuclear Weapons, and SOON. Instead of saying thank you, Iran yelled..... ... ....Death to America. I terminated deal, which was not even ratified by Congress, and imposed strong sanctions. They are a much weakened nation today than at the beginning of my Presidency, when they were causing major problems throughout the Middle East. Now they are Bust!.... ... ....On Monday they shot down an unmanned drone flying in International Waters. We were cocked & loaded to retaliate last night on 3 different sights when I asked, how many will die. 150 people, sir, was the answer from a General. 10 minutes before the strike I stopped it, not.... ... ....proportionate to shooting down an unmanned drone. I am in no hurry, our Military is rebuilt, new, and ready to go, by far the best in the world. Sanctions are biting & more added last night. Iran can NEVER have Nuclear Weapons, not against the USA, and not against the WORLD!

Video

SIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:

GOP chairwoman: If Obama called off Iran strikes he would get Nobel Peace Prize

Trump Hits Highest Approval Ever in USA Today Poll, But USA Today Doesn't Report It

IT'S HAPPENING!

Feminist HBO Writer Says It’s OK to Call Black Columnist a ‘Coon’ Because He’s Against Reparations. Daily reminder that Big Entertainment is part of the larger Culture War and hates your guts if you stand against their complete dominance over culture

BREAKING: Special Prosecutor Assigned to Investigate Entire Jussie Smollett Case

🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:

Just wait till they read the Qura'an. If they can read at all.

That girl is extremely sexist and misogynistic

Two GOATs

💲 $25 Million In One Day! 💲

Saturday, June 22nd:

🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:

The people that Ice will apprehend have already been ordered to be deported. This means that they have run from the law and run from the courts. These are people that are supposed to go back to their home country. They broke the law by coming into the country, & now by staying.

When people come into our Country illegally, they will be DEPORTED!

Stock Market is on track to have the best June in over 50 years! Thank you Mr. President! @WSJ

SIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:

Study Finds 92% of left-wing activists live with their parents

President Trump Nominates Army Secretary Mark Esper as Defense Secretary

Waking up and seeing this as the first story on my FB.....Damn, what a wonderful start to Summer

President Trump delivers remarks before departing for Camp David

🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:

“Inform the Senate that Daddy’s battlestation is fully operational.”

Found this on 9GAG

Worst Hitler ever

Damn white people are their.... shuffles deck... eating healthy!

WEEW LAD!

Without further ado, some tunes to get you jamming through all this winning:

Lone Digger

My Boy

It's Strange

you should see me in a crown

Drop The Game

MAGA ON PATRIOTS!

submitted by /u/Ivaginaryfriend [link] [comments]

[robgrayofficial]

GOOOOD AFTERNOON DEPLORABLES!Welcome to your weekly recap of all this spicy and dank from the past week! If you happened to miss any past recaps you can catch those here!Sunday, June 16th:🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:Congratulations to great guy Pete Hegseth and wonderful Jenny Cunningham on their engagement. They will have a fantastic life together! @foxandfriendsYesterday was the Radical Left Democrats big Impeachment day. They worked so hard to make it something really big and special but had one problem - almost nobody showed up. “The Media admits low turnout for anti-Trump rallies.” @FoxNews “All around the Country people are....... ... .....saying enough. Democrat voters want to hear the politicians talking about issues. This is a huge distraction and will only help Donald Trump get elected.” @JedediahBila “Greatest President since Ronald Reagan” said a counter-protester. LehighValleyLiveA poll should be done on which is the more dishonest and deceitful newspaper, the Failing New York Times or the Amazon (lobbyist) Washington Post! They are both a disgrace to our Country, the Enemy of the People, but I just can’t seem to figure out which is worse? The good..... ... .....news is that at the end of 6 years, after America has been made GREAT again and I leave the beautiful White House (do you think the people would demand that I stay longer? KEEP AMERICA GREAT), both of these horrible papers will quickly go out of business & be forever gone!Happy Father’s Day to all, including my worst and most vicious critics, of which there are fewer and fewer. This is a FANTASTIC time to be an American! KEEP AMERICA GREAT!VideoThank you PM @Netanyahu and the State of Israel for this great honor!🇺🇸🇮🇱When will the Fake News Media start asking Democrats if they are OK with the hiring of Christopher Steele, a foreign agent, paid for by Crooked Hillary and the DNC, to dig up “dirt” and write a phony Dossier against the Presidential Candidate of the opposing party......... ... ......If Republicans ever did that to the Democrats, there would be all hell to pay. It would be a scandal like no other!Almost 70% in new Poll say don’t impeach. So ridiculous to even be talking about this subject when all of the crimes were committed by the other side. They can’t win the election fairly!Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. “I think we have a very real risk of losing the Presidency to Donald Trump.” I agree, and that is the only reason they play the impeach card, which cannot be legally used!Congratulations to Gary Woodland in winning the United States Open Golf Championship. Fantastic playing, great heart - there will be more in Gary’s future!Thank you Mr. Prime Minister, a great honor!SIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:Let's not forget what this piece of shit did, with the corrupted assistance of Kim Foxx and Kamala Harris.Holy shit, boys, Hercules is on our side.Happy Father’s Day!This post is for the fathers who can't be with their families today.🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:Dad’s are the best!!!You must be a RepublicanI have no wordsYou son of a bitchMonday, June 17th:TODAY'S ACTION:President Donald J. Trump Announces Intent to Nominate and Appoint Individuals to Key Administration Posts🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:Big Rally tomorrow night in Orlando, Florida, looks to be setting records. We are building large movie screens outside to take care of everybody. Over 100,000 requests. Our Country is doing great, far beyond what the haters & losers thought possible - and it will only get better!Only Fake Polls show us behind the Motley Crew. We are looking really good, but it is far too early to be focused on that. Much work to do! MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!"Iran to defy Uranium Stockpile Limits”One size doesn’t fit all - I support West Virginia Schools. Keep up the great work, @WVGovernor Big Jim Justice - I am with you!.@FoxNews Polls are always bad for me. They were against Crooked Hillary also. Something weird going on at Fox. Our polls show us leading in all 17 Swing States. For the record, I didn’t spend 30 hours with @abcnews, but rather a tiny fraction of that. More Fake News @BretBaierNext week ICE will begin the process of removing the millions of illegal aliens who have illicitly found their way into the United States. They will be removed as fast as they come in. Mexico, using their strong immigration laws, is doing a very good job of stopping people....... ... ....long before they get to our Southern Border. Guatemala is getting ready to sign a Safe-Third Agreement. The only ones who won’t do anything are the Democrats in Congress. They must vote to get rid of the loopholes, and fix asylum! If so, Border Crisis will end quickly!Thousands of people are already lined up in Orlando, some two days before tomorrow nights big Rally. Large Screens and food trucks will be there for those that can’t get into the 25,000 capacity arena. It will be a very exciting evening! Make America Great Again!The story in the @nytimes about the U.S. escalating attacks on Russia’s power grid is Fake News, and the Failing New York Times knows it. They should immediately release their sources which, if they exist at all, which I doubt, are phony. Times must be held fully accountable!Wow! The State Department said it has identified 30 Security Incidents involving current or former employees and their handling of Crooked Hillary Clinton’s Emails. @FoxNews This is really big. Never admitted before. Highly Classified Material. Will the Dems investigate this?Only a few people showed up for the so-called Impeachment rallies over the weekend. The numbers were anemic, no spirit, no hope. More importantly, No Collusion, No Obstruction!SIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:Thug shoots someone 5 times over a car, steals car, goes on Facebook bragging about how cops aren't going to do shit about it, US Marshals get a federal warrant, he rams their cars, pulls a gun, gets shot and killed…yet liberal morons in his home town defend him, riot and injure cops.State Department identifies 23 violations, 'multiple security incidents' concerning Clinton emails as a part of ongoing investigationThree months after being admitted to Harvard Class of 2023, Harvard has decided to rescind Kyle Kashuv’s admission over texts and comments made nearly two years ago, months prior to the shooting.It's going to be crazy once it's all declassified along with Hillary's frazzledrip🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:Kevin Sorbo is one of usWHAT IS THEIR PROBLEM LADS?I actually have this fetish where I'm the only one in bed with a dick and/or beard.The official summer hat came today, and it's brighter than the sun reflecting off 5,000,000 liberal tears!Tuesday, June 18th:TODAY'S ACTION:Seven Nominations Sent to the SenatePresident Donald J. Trump Announces Intent to Nominate and Appoint Personnel to Key Administration PostsPresident Trump Delivers Remarks Upon Departure🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:Mario Draghi just announced more stimulus could come, which immediately dropped the Euro against the Dollar, making it unfairly easier for them to compete against the USA. They have been getting away with this for years, along with China and others.European Markets rose on comments (unfair to U.S.) made today by Mario D!The Fake News doesn’t report it, but Republican enthusiasm is at an all time high. Look what is going on in Orlando, Florida, right now! People have never seen anything like it (unless you play a guitar). Going to be wild - See you later!Had a very good telephone conversation with President Xi of China. We will be having an extended meeting next week at the G-20 in Japan. Our respective teams will begin talks prior to our meeting.“ECB officials see Rate Cut as primary tool for any new stimulus.” @businessGerman DAX way up due to stimulus remarks from Mario Draghi. Very unfair to the United States!Acting Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan, who has done a wonderful job, has decided not to go forward with his confirmation process so that he can devote more time to his family.... ... ....I thank Pat for his outstanding service and will be naming Secretary of the Army, Mark Esper, to be the new Acting Secretary of Defense. I know Mark, and have no doubt he will do a fantastic job!Departing for Orlando, Florida with @FLOTUS Melania!Join me LIVE tonight in Orlando, Florida at 8:00 P.M. Eastern as we kickoff #Trump2020. Enjoy!THANK YOU ORLANDO, FLORIDA!Together, we are breaking the most sacred rule in Washington Politics: we are KEEPING our promises to the American People. Because my only special interest is YOU! #Trump2020On no issue are Democrats more extreme – and more depraved – than when it comes to Border Security. The Democrat Agenda of open borders is morally reprehensible. It is the great betrayal of the American Middle Class and our Country as a whole! #Trump2020In the ultimate act of moral cowardice, not one Democrat Candidate for president - not a single one - has stood up to defend the incredible men and women of ICE and Border Patrol. They don’t have the character, the virtue, or the spine! #Trump2020Don’t ever forget - this election is about YOU. It is about YOUR family, YOUR future, & the fate of YOUR COUNTRY. We begin our campaign with the best record, the best results, the best agenda, & the only positive VISION for our Country’s future! #Trump2020SIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:POTUS is here!!!Based JapaneseI couldn't agree more Matt. Rules for thee and not for meThis is going to be epic! Trump may live-tweet first 2020 Democratic debatesAstonished: CNN cut the President's 2020 reelection rally speech after the crowd started saying CNN sucks. I have never seen anything like this in my life.PRESS BRIEFINGS, INTERVIEWS, RALLIES:MAGA Rally Watch Party: 2020 Campaign Launch. Orlando, FL 6/18/2019🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:Man... if only...When that 2020 vision kicks in."You're just a FUCKING WHITE MALE !!!" REEEEEEEEE831am. Orland Trump Rally. They moved our line closer to front of venue. Thank goodness for our shade structure.ah yes, the "racists", let's show these folks our love !Wednesday, June 19th:TODAY'S ACTION:President Donald J. Trump Announces Judicial Nominees and United States Attorney NomineeVice President Pence Visits the USNS ComfortPresident Trump Presents the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Arthur Laffer🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:THANK YOU! #Trump2020🇺🇸The Dems are very unhappy with the Mueller Report, so after almost 3 years, they want a Redo, or Do Over. This is extreme Presidential Harassment. They gave Crooked Hillary’s people complete Immunity, yet now they bring back Hope Hicks. Why aren’t the Dems looking at the..... ... ....33,000 Emails that Hillary and her lawyer deleted and acid washed AFTER GETTING A SUBPOENA FROM CONGRESS? That is real Obstruction that the Dems want no part of because their hearings are RIGGED and a disgrace to our Country!DEMOCRAT CONGRESSIONAL HEARINGS ARE #RIGGED!If I didn’t have the Phony Witch Hunt going on for 3 years, and if the Fake News Media and their partner in Crime, the Democrats, would have played it straight, I would be way up in the Polls right now - with our Economy, winning by 20 points. But I’m winning anyway!So sad that the Democrats are putting wonderful Hope Hicks through hell, for 3 years now, after total exoneration by Robert Mueller & the Mueller Report. They were unhappy with result so they want a Do Over. Very unfair & costly to her. Will it ever end? Why aren’t they....... ... ....asking Hillary Clinton why she deleted and acid washed her Emails AFTER getting a subpoena from Congress? Anybody else would be in jail for that, yet the Dems refuse to even bring it up. Rigged House CommitteeI will be interviewed LIVE tonight by @seanhannity on @FoxNews 9 P.M. Enjoy!Just returning from Orlando and Doral (Miami), Florida, and heading to the Oval Office, where I will present the great Economist, Dr. Arthur Laffer, with the Presidential Medal of Freedom.Congratulations to President Lopez Obrador — Mexico voted to ratify the USMCA today by a huge margin. Time for Congress to do the same here!Since Election Day 2016, Stocks up almost 50%, Stocks gained 9.2 Trillion Dollars in value, and more than 5,000,000 new jobs added to the Economy. @LouDobbs If our opponent had won, there would have been a market crash, plain and simple! @TuckerCarlson @seanhannity @IngrahamAngleSIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:IN HONOR OF 1 YEAR WOMPIVERSARY WOMP! WOMP!Must watch video. Democrats BTFO by Burgess Owens. “I used to be a Democrat until I did my history and found out the misery that that party brought to my race... Let's pay restitution. How about the Democratic Party pay for all the misery brought to my race".Trump campaign rakes in stunning $25M in single day for re-election launchI Haven't Seen POTUS This Emotional With Any Other Person in His Administration. THANK YOU FOR EVERYTHING, SARAH!I hope alex jones bankrupts every single one of these media Arseholes! Link in comments🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:lol🤦 "America's Border Is Just Like A Concentration Camp!" 🤦No brakes on this train (2020 version)This is MAGA countryExhibit “A” from the Trump rally last night.Thursday, June 20th:TODAY'S ACTION:Ivanka Trump Visits North Carolina with the American Workforce Policy Advisory CommitteePresident Trump Participates in a Bilateral Meeting with the Prime Minister of CanadaPresident Trump Welcomes Prime Minister Trudeau of Canada to the White House🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:S&P opens at Record High!“The President has a really good story to tell. We have unemployment lower than we’ve seen in decades. We have people who stopped looking for work coming back into the labor force. We are in a record growth period.” Michael Steel @MSNBC (do you believe?)Iran made a very big mistake!It was my great honor to host Canadian Prime Minister @JustinTrudeau at the @WhiteHouse today!🇺🇸🇨🇦S&P closes at Record High!SIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:SHOCK: TIME Magazine finally did a normal cover of Trump.-Jussie Smollett fabricated a story about white guys assaulting him with bad words and the Media made it the biggest story in America. -White college girl is violently raped and beaten to the point of unconsciousness in a racially motivated attack and the Media ignores it.Letter from a Polish parliament member to ocasional CortexNever listen to the polls, follow the $! Vegas odds are Trump even $, Biden +425.New York County Clerk Is Refusing To Give Driver’s Licenses To Illegals, Despite New Law🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:I don’t care who you are that’s funnyThe kid makes a good point 🤔🤔Answer: NOSO BRAVE: Speaker Pelosi just announced that "she's going in!" and is about to read the unredacted Mueller Report, WHICH SHE HAS HAS ACCESS TO IN A CONGRESSIONAL 'SCIF' FOR THE PAST TWO MONTHS—SO BRAVE, Nancy! You fraud!If Trump debates Biden, I hope he invites all the girls Creepy Joe has sniffed to attendFriday, June 21st:TODAY'S ACTION:President Trump and The First Lady Participate in the Congressional Picnic🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:Just revealed that the Failing and Desperate New York Times was feeding false stories about me, & those associated with me, to the FBI. This shows the kind of unprecedented hatred I have been putting up with for years with this Crooked newspaper. Is what they have done legal?... ... ....”This Russia Collusion Hoax was perpetrated in part by people inside the government, and in part by a compliant (Fake News) media.” Mollie Hemingway. @TuckerCarlson @foxandfriends The facts are starting to pour out. Stay tuned!President Obama made a desperate and terrible deal with Iran - Gave them 150 Billion Dollars plus I.8 Billion Dollars in CASH! Iran was in big trouble and he bailed them out. Gave them a free path to Nuclear Weapons, and SOON. Instead of saying thank you, Iran yelled..... ... ....Death to America. I terminated deal, which was not even ratified by Congress, and imposed strong sanctions. They are a much weakened nation today than at the beginning of my Presidency, when they were causing major problems throughout the Middle East. Now they are Bust!.... ... ....On Monday they shot down an unmanned drone flying in International Waters. We were cocked & loaded to retaliate last night on 3 different sights when I asked, how many will die. 150 people, sir, was the answer from a General. 10 minutes before the strike I stopped it, not.... ... ....proportionate to shooting down an unmanned drone. I am in no hurry, our Military is rebuilt, new, and ready to go, by far the best in the world. Sanctions are biting & more added last night. Iran can NEVER have Nuclear Weapons, not against the USA, and not against the WORLD!VideoSIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:GOP chairwoman: If Obama called off Iran strikes he would get Nobel Peace PrizeTrump Hits Highest Approval Ever in USA Today Poll, But USA Today Doesn't Report ItIT'S HAPPENING!Feminist HBO Writer Says It’s OK to Call Black Columnist a ‘Coon’ Because He’s Against Reparations. Daily reminder that Big Entertainment is part of the larger Culture War and hates your guts if you stand against their complete dominance over cultureBREAKING: Special Prosecutor Assigned to Investigate Entire Jussie Smollett Case🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:Just wait till they read the Qura'an. If they can read at all.That girl is extremely sexist and misogynisticTwo GOATs💲 $25 Million In One Day! 💲Saturday, June 22nd:🔥🔥TRUMP TWEETS🔥🔥:The people that Ice will apprehend have already been ordered to be deported. This means that they have run from the law and run from the courts. These are people that are supposed to go back to their home country. They broke the law by coming into the country, & now by staying.When people come into our Country illegally, they will be DEPORTED!Stock Market is on track to have the best June in over 50 years! Thank you Mr. President! @WSJSIGNIFICANT TWEETS AND NEWS:Study Finds 92% of left-wing activists live with their parentsPresident Trump Nominates Army Secretary Mark Esper as Defense SecretaryWaking up and seeing this as the first story on my FB.....Damn, what a wonderful start to SummerPresident Trump delivers remarks before departing for Camp David🐸 TOP SPICE OF THE DAY 🐸:“Inform the Senate that Daddy’s battlestation is fully operational.”Found this on 9GAGWorst Hitler everDamn white people are their.... shuffles deck... eating healthy!WEEW LAD!Without further ado, some tunes to get you jamming through all this winning:Lone DiggerMy BoyIt's Strangeyou should see me in a crownDrop The GameMAGA ON PATRIOTS! #robgray