#even if you think calls to facism are too common

[lotusofhope]

I swear to god if a cis person ever brings up trans in sports again I'm just gonna deck them in a video game

[lunammoon]

The Problem With Hetalia (As told by someone who actually in the fandom until like, 2016)

I'm hoping this post will explain to people who are still into Hetalia why a lot of people have an issue with from the perspective of someone who knows a lot about the show. 

TL;DR: By making the WW2 axis powers come across as a lovable idiot, his serious friend, and the stoic voice of reason, it downplays the serious nature of what the Axis did and seeing as the real-life Axis harmed real-life people, many people have a justifiable huge issue with this. 

I will go more into depth about this under the cut.

A lot of people are talking about how Hetalia is coming back after 5 years and a lot of people are rightfully annoyed at the show. But what I'm seeing is that a lot of the people who are upset are people who clearly haven't watched the show and therefore are unable to explain to people who have watched it why it’s bad. The most that you hear is:

"it glorifies the Axis Powers" (which isn't 100% accurate although the assessment that they are portrayed in a way that makes them seem less bad is accurate) 

"Hetalia Cosplayers wore Nazi uniforms in front of a Holocaust memorial" (which I'd say is more of an issue with fans than the show). 

That is not to say that there isn't an issue with the show, because there really is. But these observations are unlikely to mean much to someone who watches Hetalia. So, in this thread, I'm going to explain why Hetalia is Problematic with the added context perspective of someone who was into the show during most of middle school and until Freshman year of high school. 

I knew the human names, used to jam to "Always With You" and "Pub and Go" and “It’ll Settle Itself Somehow” and “Light my Heart” and “Absolute British Gentleman” and “Mein Gott” and “World Rondo” and “Excuse Me, I’m Sorry” and so, so many more. 

I lost my shit with everyone else when the season 6 ep dropped and Italy danced like he was possessed by a demon. When I hear “ACE” family, I don’t think of Youtubers. I actually took a side on the FruUK vs UsUk debate and if you look in my archive, you can probably find some Hetalia posts that I’m too lazy to delete.

The point here being, I’ve actually seen the show so I know what I’m talking about. This isn’t an outsiders perspective is what I’m saying.

So, let’s get right into it. While technically only seasons 1-2 are officially actually called "Axis Powers" (Seasons 3-4 are called "World Series" Season 5 is "Beautiful World" and Season 6 is called "World Twinkle") WW2 and things relating to the Axis Powers are an important part of every season and appear prominently.

While Hetalia has covered many things from all different time periods, the two most common periods covered are the modern-day and of course, the second World War. The show is Japanese and (I assume) because Japan was on the Axis side, these portions focus more on the Axis Powers of Italy, Japan, and Germany. The Allies do come into play. And while the Allies aren't directly like, evil, which would've been FAR WORSE they've got a kind of Team Rocket-esque thing going on? They're not exactly mustache-twirling villains but they're clear antagonists. Make no mistakes.

I think the deserted Island arc is the best example of the problems many people have with the show.

Take for example, that beach fight. If you've watched Hetalia, you'll know the one I'm talking about. The one that they reused like, 50 times. The Allies are clearly shown as the antagonists/aggressors while the Axis are literally just vibing on a (kinda) deserted island and defending themselves. 

Now, if this was three dudes chilling on the beach and they suddenly got attacked by another five dudes also on the beach who they then fought off until the five attackers ran away that’s be one thing.

The issue is that this is supposed to be a representation of WW2. It's basically saying "oh, Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, and Fascist Italy were literally just vibing, not bothering anyone when suddenly, the Allies attacked for no reason. Luckily, they (the Allies) retreated because the Allies are Cowardly but they keep coming back and bothering them,". Do you see the issue there? Most of the beach arc seems to be the writer forgetting that these are supposed to be Nations, not a random Italian dude, a German dude, and a Japanese dude.

“Oh, but they don’t glorify Nazi Germany. They don’t really even talk about what Germany was doing! Look at this pic of Germany in a lab coat holding a dandelion :)“

That’s not the defense that you think it is and it’s actually a main part of the issue that I, and many other people have with Hetalia.

I think the scene where this issue is the most obvious is the one where they are gathering around a campfire and talking and one of them comes up with the name "the Axis". The whole scene has the same energy characters in a moe anime coming up with a band name.

They’re sitting on a beach at night. I think there might’ve been a campfire, the stars are out, and the three of them talk about their dream of making a world that revolved around them. One of them comes up with the name “the axis” and then they all talk about how you would translate "axis" in their language. It’s all very found family-esque. The way the scene is framed is to encourage you to route for them to reach their goal. It’s the same kind of tone you’d see in a shoujo with a girl telling her friends about how she wants to win the singing competition no matter what or in Sword Art Online when Kirito talks about saving Asuna.

The issue is that their goal isn’t to win some competition or to save someone they care about. It’s to spread facism, imperialism, and bring about genocide.

There of course don’t SAY that that’s their goal, and outside of a one off line in the English dub that’s been since censored, they don’t really bring up what Germany was up to during WW2 vis-a-vie the Holocaust and if they did bring it up, I either wasn’t paying attention, it was in the manga, or it was in one of Germany’s character songs.

The issue is that during WW2 the show seems to at best forget and at worst, gloss over it that the main trio that they're focusing on are the villains. And not like, fantasy villains. Actual real-life villains that hurt real people in the real world. Imagine if instead of Ludwig Beilschmidt and Feliciano Vargas, it was Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini. 

Are you seeing the problem yet?

I get why people like to watch the show. Ignoring the WW2 bits, it’s actually pretty good. I, as an American, really like Alfred F. Jones and the way he’s portrayed.

If Hetalia had stuck to non-WW2 related things such as that episode where the nations all talk about how horror movies differ in their nations, or they talked about their Christmas traditions. Or the ones where America and Japan are roommates. Or when they showed that time when America airdropped XL condoms on Russia labeling them as "small" for intimidation reasons. Or that series of episodes where they talked about Micronations. Or that time they all had to come together to fight aliens. Or the bit where they talked about the WW1 Christmas Armistice. Then it would be fine.

The issue is that they didn’t.

If they kept WW2 stuff for SOME reason. They had two options. 

Make the axis as proper villains

 Be explicit in showing that the nations will doesn't reflect what their leader wants. 

The first option wouldn’t be ideal if they wanted to cover any time period other than World War 2. The axis would be too unlikable and I doubt that an anime where Japan is the villain would appeal much to Japanese audiences.

But what about the second option. Have a bit where Ludwig is passing out White Rose pamphlets or smuggling people to safety.

Have Kiku (Japan for people who don’t watch Hetalia) purposefully looking the other way as Sugihara writes visas to get people to safety and covering for him against his boss. SOMETHING!

But instead of doing either of those, they took the bad third option which was, their choice to instead make the axis seem like likable individuals who are a group of three good friends who work together will in contrast with the “bumbling Allies” who are barely cohesive and constantly fight and argue. At best, makes it seem like both sides had a point and at worst, makes it seem like the Axis was a better than the Allies.

All of this is to say that liking Hetalia does not make you inherently a bad person, but you need to be more critical of what you watch and understand that there is a reason that some people have a genuine issue with it and they have a very good reason for that. You can still watch it the show, but do keep this information in the back of your brain as you do

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8Chan - Moving the Goalposts and the Streisand Effect

The objective is "division,"deflection, distraction. Know this. Moving the goalposts: A common metaphor for moving the focus of an argument to another position (usually after being found out). I contend that MSM and their digital arms are no longer reporters, are not sources of truth, neither are they impartial observers. Those who use media channels to beat them to "real" information" are an existential threat to them. The Streisand Effect: "The Streisand effect is a phenomenon whereby an attempt to hide, remove, or censor a piece of information has the unintended consequence of publicizing the information more widely, usually facilitated by the Internet. It is an example of psychological reactance, wherein once people are aware that some information is being kept from them, their motivation to access and spread it is increased."https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect Reactance is an unpleasant motivational arousal (reaction) to offers, persons, rules, or regulations that threaten or eliminate specific behavioral freedoms. Reactance occurs when a person feels that someone or something is taking away their choices or limiting the range of alternatives.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reactance_(psychology) They want to control the outcomes. They need time to "setup" their bullshit. That is their key vulnerability. They are slow and cannot react to events as they occur. that is why they have talking points (to regroup around).  That is why you see the mismatch in what they say and what is actually occurring in real time. The only way to stop this is to ban "free speech"or close access to those you want to hide.  This has happened and is happening, ...deplatforming, censorship, shadowbanning, check Project Veritas for more ...https://twitter.com/JamesOKeefeIII

A couple of important things, MSM wants to keep the charade moving along: paper of record, "reporter,"source, editor, publisher, story, news, etc., are all important terms.  Ever heard of operation mockingbird? What is it, why does it exist? In recent days they started with the idea that Orange Man (a person of color) was "responsible" for the two public mass shootings through his "racist" speech. Without proof these entities labelled this Orange Man a "white" supremacist moving the goalpost into the KKK zone (and we all know who they are, you clowns). No proof of anything, just rollin along with their nonsense. Take a look Mr. Lemon giving a stellar rendition below... Or Mr. Best here in high falsetto... Let's begin a short walk through recent events. I published this a few days ago: "Every media outlet jumping up and down pointing the finger at one man. Orange man bad." I alleged that if we dug deeper than the headline we'd find out things are quite different to the headline. 180° different, but that when this information would come to light, they'd hide it and shift focus. They did, moving away as quickly as possible from the people killed in Dayton, keeping it political and divisive, constantly shape-shifting, blaming and labeling. Initial post - http://www.ad360.co/we-knew Topics covered: more than 3-4 shooters (El Paso) - still to be effectively denied? Antifa meetup to be held in El Paso - they flip flopped on this one Shooter's social media pages changed - nobody interested Shooter's father, therapy and C_A mind control - nobody interested 8Chan as the source of the "manifesto" - the first platform to be de-platformed! Was this what they were actually after? Kill innocents to stop the flow of information. D politicians all on message, Twitter shills on message, all marching in lockstep too early. Now you can't walk it back. Time is up. The ruse has been uncovered. Remember the clock is running down.  Too many people know, they simply don't have the ability to keep covering their tracks. This one will be links to other people's work... This one is excellent, it efficiently digs into the "alleged" mind control angle - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3BzCcXWBQs

You'll see how Bryan Crusius (father of "alleged shooter") is connected to Colin Ross (Spook) via Timberlawn, both interested in "therapy." Ross also appears to be able to skip out court appearances in both Canada and the US. "My previous post: A guy travels 600 miles to shoot up a Walmart.  Odd wouldn't you think? Wears ear defenders and changes his pants half way through? Has all the classic false flag attributes; father a therapist (check) with CIA connections, white loner who suddenly goes online an builds a weak presence (check), drops a "manifesto" note beforehand (very a la mode), changing his social media profiles and political affiliation while in the act of committing murder or while in police custody? witness say three to four people dressed in black? Does anybody fact check these people? Is anything held up to scrutiny?"  

when I say alleged shooter above please not that the MO in most of these false flags is to have the "shooter" as a patsy. If you think about it, the ony use for this person is to be so out of it they cannot produce a coherent recollection of what happened. If, as stated by multiple witnesses, there were more shooters involved then the patsy (in El Paso) is a deflection device. These guys are pawns too (that makes it a bit sick). There is also the fact that this shooter was not adept with firearms and managed to kill 20 people with a 30 round mag in an AK 47. Not the most easy thing to do, as some have noted. https://nypost.com/2019/08/05/el-paso-shooter-went-to-walmart-because-he-was-hungry-authorities   This one by the same producer develops more background on the Dayton shooter - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkH4D0ltwg0

We know already that the Dayton shooter was left leaning, a bit sick and twisted and had nothing to do with Trump (strange he picked the same weekend as the El Paso shooter to do his work - coincidence, surely, surely). We know already that the Dayton shooter was left leaning, a bit sick and twisted and had nothing to do with Trump (strange he picked the same weekend as the El Paso shooter to do his work - coincidence, surely, surely). Gilroy shooter -  https://twitter.com/MrAndyNgo/status/1158823322454331392 Further push for violence in Portland on 17th -  https://twitter.com/MrAndyNgo/status/1158590052374462464 This happened in Springfield (Aug 8th): https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2019/08/exclusive-photos-armed-man-with-rifle-handgun-100-rounds-of-ammo-and-body-armor-stopped-and-arrested-by-firefighter-outside-springfield-mo-walmart

Note the clothing choices, note the location, note the timing; lot's of coincidences? Why is Walmart important? https://www.dhs.gov/blog/2010/12/06/dhs-and-walmart-partners-promoting-if-you-see-something-say-something-campaign

"Earlier this month (2011), DHS unveiled a new terror alert system that will hijack social networking sites as one way of informing people of terrorist threat updates. “The new, two-tiered system will provide alerts that are more specific to the threat and even recommend certain actions or suggest that people look for specific suspicious behavior, she said. They also may be limited to a particular audience — such as law enforcement — rather than broadcast to the general public, and also will have a specified end date,” reported Information Week Government. In December, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano  announced the expansion of the Department’s national “If You See Something, Say Something” campaign to hundreds of Walmart stores across the country — launching a new partnership between DHS and Walmart to help the American public play an active role in informing on each other. Thousands of Wamart stores will have telescreens pumping out government propaganda." https://www.globalresearch.ca/obama-launches-total-takeover-of-media-system/23150 How were police so quick to the scene in Dayton and in such numbers?   This quote is interesting: "Think about what connecting Alex Jones to the Lt. Gov means and add "baselessly" in terms of propaganda (minus plus minus equals plus) Toxic conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick both attempted to baselessly connect a mass shooting that targeted Latinos to upcoming anti-facism protests. " https://www.mediamatters.org/alex-jones/tx-lt-gov-dan-patrick-nearly-indistinguishable-alex-jones-el-paso-white-nationalist-mass You might note that other outlets went on the offensive against what the called "right wing fake news" (links in my previous post). Washington Post, Bezos and the C_A, all full speed ahead against something which "doesn't exist?"

Add that post to these posts...

And this (https://twitter.com/JuliansRum/status/1158919312779952130)

Thirteen thousand people respond? C'mon. I know you're not that stupid. Orange Man Good (OMG). They're in panic. Why are they in panic... This week there were plenty of reasons to change the news cycle; Epstein ( Wexner creating distance), Franklin Square FD wanting to reopen 911, Nunes being full given access, Coates dropping out as NSI Director, declass coming, Mueller, Cummings and Baltimore under the spotlight (caught in a sting, reportedly), Congresswoman Omar (my brother's keeper), Nadler (Lord Farquuad), Schiff (c'mon, this guy?), Pelosi (district in ruins, homeless issues, water, etc.) talking about continuing to go after Trump https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1155315616171155456, Wiener's laptop and those dead NY cops, Uranium , Wikileaks gets right to publish, Bruce Ohr , Capital One and Amazon, Tulsi Gabbard getting the "treatment," Democratic Debate Debacle, Demicrap Booker wants to shut Trump rallies down :), Big Tech EO   https://twitter.com/katierogers/status/1159192574650998794, and there is more ...it gets so much worse. Wouldn't you be squealing like a trapped rat too? Read the full article