#like he’s a villain and the racism against the Japanese is being written by Japanese writers in what is clearly a criticism

[timemachineyeah]

damn it lord van zieks I would find your absurdity so hot if you weren’t a fucking racist

[battybiologist]

Despite being my favorite prosecutor of the series in my favorite games of the series, I do have a huge problem with Barok van Zieks' writing, and it's his racism. Not that I mind that character flaw, but rather how it's handled.

In the game, Barok is racist towards Japanese people. Mind you, most of the English characters are too, but Barok is not only openly hostile and contemptuous of Japanese culture, but he's also the only character for whom this is a focus point. Later in the game, he overcomes that racism through his legal battles and budding friendship with Ryunosuke, our Japanese protagonist.

That's not what I have a problem with. That would lie in the origin of this racist behavior.

See, unlike the rest of the racist characters in Great Ace Attorney, Barok is prejudiced against Japanese people because of his tragic backstory (big red flag).

When he was younger, Barok actually liked Japanese people, and was even good friends with one, Genshin Asogi, until Genshin was revealed to be the Professor, a serial killer who murdered several members of the judiciary, including Klint van Zieks, Barok's older brother who he idolized. From that point on, Barok had a deep mistrust and hatred of all Japanese people.

That part sucks ass, because the key to Barok stopping being racist is proving that while Genshin did kill Klint, he did so in an honorable duel which Klint accepted, because he was the real Professor and Genshin knew it was the only way to bring him to justice.

This implies at best that Barok would have never been able to overcome his bigotry without the proof of Genshin's innocence, and at worst that his bigotry would've been justified if Genshin really was the Professor.

But the worst (or best, depending on your relationship with headcanons/mods) is that this is so easily fixed, and in fact, the game almost gives us the answer wholesale:

The reason the Professor's true identity was not found is partly due to the efforts of the villains of the game, but also because the rest of the characters involved in his case, including Barok, put Klint on such a pedestal that they unconsciously rejected any evidence of his guilt.

If we want to highlight that moral (?) by contrasting it with our fix to Barok's racism problem, we can simply answer a question that naturally comes to mind with this set up: Why was the British judiciary, including Barok, so quick to write off Genshin as the Professor? Sure, he killed Klint, but he killed him with a katana, while the rest of the Professor's victims died of bite wounds. The game answers with the same Klint pedestal logic as before, but I think it should be because Barok and the judiciary are racist.

It's such a simple change, and yet it makes Barok's story so much better from a narrative and sociopolitical standpoint. Barok prides himself on seeking the truth, a deeply heroic quality in Ace Attorney. So the fact that his own prejudice, something he didn't even care to question for his great friend Genshin Asogi ("one of the good ones" in this scenario), caused the obfuscation of the truth would be devastating, and that devastation being the end of his bigotry would stay in line with the heavily character-focused writing of Ace Attorney and yield a much better message in addition of "racism is bad": societal biases left unexamined can blind us to reality, leading us to make awful mistakes that go against our core principles.

It also has a bunch of additional perks: Seishiro's anger would become additionally relatable for many POC, it would be a great and honestly ballsy commentary on law enforcement to make for the most popular VN series, it would create a nice parallel with Soseki Natsume's arrest, and it would add an interesting touch to Stronghart's characterization, what with him being racist (and a well-written racist at that) in the games already, but also becoming aware of said racism in others and using that to his benefit in our version.

Anyway, don't let the multiple paragraphs of criticism fool you, I'm making this post because I love these games to death

[volfoss]

MT-001->MT-003: Jungle Emperor/Kimba (1950-1954)

TW: Discussion of racism (specifically anti-black racism)

Before I get into the plot and well. everything bad about this, I want to quickly explain that this is the first out of 400 volumes of Tezuka's that I will be reading/reviewing. This is absolutely the worst of his works by far and I need to very much emphasize that for anyone who wants to read the 5.5 pages of notes I took (that are under the cut, due to length).

Summary of Plot: A white male lion is known for terrorizing an African village, and they make plans to hunt and kill him. These plans end up succeeding, and his mate, who is pregnant with his son, is captured and taken onto a ship. She gives birth on the ship and pleads with her newborn son, Kimba, to escape and become the king of the jungle, like his father was. The story follows Kimba as he tries to follow in his father’s footsteps, but in his own special way.

Characters: Kimba/Jungle Emperor is a mixed bag when it comes to characters. On one hand, Kimba and his family manage to be entertaining without speech. Their motives are very clear and they are written sympathetically. Jacques the rat is a really good addition to the cast and adds a lot to Kimba as a character. The animal characters have a pretty interesting dynamic with each other, and I feel the little screen-time the villain got was pretty decent. I’m not normally a very big fan of stories centered around animals in the specific way that this does it, so the aspects of the charming animals could be better for someone who enjoys that sort of thing more.

On the other hand, the humans are not written in a super in depth manner (at least not compared to his later works that I’ve read). The protagonists quite honestly fall flat most of the time and don’t lend a ton to the story. The worst of the badly written humans are the African characters. They are horrifically reduced to the worst stereotypes possible, given how Tezuka wants to portray them as “tribes-people”. They are portrayed as stupid and are shown as rather backwards. The best example of the latter is early on, when the leader offers “the best hut” to one of the white characters and when he goes to investigate it, all the promised amenities are either broken or just there for props. They are also portrayed as overly violent and also docile towards the white characters. I cannot express enough how this ticks every single anti-black stereotype in media box.

Another horrific part of this is their treatment of Merry. Merry is one of the two children, and in Volume 1, is kidnapped by the “Jungula Tribe” (as that is what this group is referred to) and by Volume 2, has formed an alter ego (or something along those lines, it’s not really made clear but it is handled badly) named, and I kid you not, Conga (or Konga, depending on the translation) and has taken over the tribe as their leader. She does this by creating electricity (which is pretty clearly implied as something that the tribe she now leads had never seen before, and treat it as something mystical and magical) by rubbing her pen against a cheetah pelt. Her taking over the group is seen as a sad thing but only specifically in the way that the other child that was her friend, feels very disconnected to her and cannot relate to her (and not the frustration that Tezuka was leaning into yet another trope of the white person having to lead the black tribe because they just know better. This is handled in that specific manner with her being pretty abusive towards the other characters, and is only really refuted in the manner of now there’s “good” people to lead them (who are white/Japanese) and the only big difference in the leadership is it is less abusive).

There is also ritual sacrifice, regarding the Pygmy (the specific group is not specified (otherwise I would be referring to them as such, as Pygmy is seen as a derogatory term) and this is how they’re referred to in canon) and many jokes about their short stature. They are shown trying to ritually sacrifice one of the white characters, and it is treated as horrific (but also with tones of comedy, as Tezuka constantly uses slapstick to show dumb the Africans in his work are), which from as far as I could find, was not something factual for the actual groups mentioned. Most of the groups mentioned seem to either be slightly made up (Jungula is one that I could not find any proof of anything similarly named existing) or slightly spelled off (but wouldn’t make any sense geographically, such as Gura (literal translation used here, the fan translation I’m using here just refers to this group as Donga, despite the katakana being “グラ”). This detail doesn’t really factor in with the already HEINOUS amount of racism but it is very interesting to me, as I feel it’s just another excuse for him to be using many stereotypes and mash them together, instead of portraying a nuanced version of any of the groups mentioned. Quite literally, they check off every single way to NOT treat African characters and there is no way around this part of Kimba, as these characters appear in pretty much every chapter. They are absent in Chapter 1 and 2, and I state this solely to make it very clear that in 21 chapters, the racism is present in nearly every single one. Genuinely and sincerely, there is no reason to read Jungle Emperor/Kimba for the characters (or really anything other than reading all of his works, like I’m doing) as they are all pretty flat and the very obvious issues are present throughout the entire work.

Art: As always, Tezuka excels at drawing animals in a very specifically stylized way that still lends to how they would appear realistically. Kimba as a character has an instantly charming design and is drawn in such a way that all of his movements exude a lot of character. But unfortunately, the elephant in the room for the entire read through was how he chose to depict Africans. With the setting (and it being written in 1950), I did not expect it to be good but it is unfortunately a topic that is often ignored in mainstream discussions of Kimba/Jungle Emperor (often, I find what is most discussed is using Kimba/Jungle Emperor as a punchline to talk about Disney stealing the Lion King’s concept from this), and is one that I’d like to discuss in the review. They are a very prominent part of the story (given the setting) and to put it very lightly, this is the worst instance of this in his work. It appears again in (given this is the first thing I’m reading in this chronology, I’m sure that there will be more instances, but this is just from what I’ve read going into it) Black Jack and lesser known works such as Hungry Blues, but this is by far the closest to minstrelsy (with how the Black characters are drawn and portrayed, it very much leans into how older media (Hollywood specifically) tended to derive Black characters down to simple and offensive tropes). It absolutely does ruin any enjoyment, as it is VERY glaring vile and present in nearly every chapter.

Ending: The ending is very bad with how Tezuka clearly viewed Africa as a place to be mystified, with how the final words are. I feel that again, a lot of the messaging in this is stuff that appears in his later works but they are a lot more clumsily handled here (for many reasons). It was a very frustrating ending with how most of the Black characters died, and after that, the white and Japanese (implied) characters from different countries realized their differences (with no mourning for the dead, which happened when ANYTHING tragic happened to any of the non-black characters).

Misc: This was the work I was dreading the most, and reading it first has really just been a very frustrating experience due to just HOW blatantly vile it is. To get into the Lion King comparisons (as that is the typical mainstream knowledge of this manga), there are certainly some similarities. Kimba/Jungle Emperor focuses a bit more on the human side of things (in terms of being pretty blatantly anti-zoo (with the second chapter focusing a couple pages on Kimba’s mother telling him how living in a zoo would be no good life for them, and how zoos are discussed on Chapter 3 of Volume 1) and anti-poaching (most clear in the entirety of the first chapter) instead of animal life and drama there, like the Lion King covers. Honestly, a lot of the plot isn’t super similar unless you’re looking at it from a VERY broad lens (I know I see the scene of the stars forming the dead parent’s face cited a lot here, the fact he has an animal companion that watches over him (even a bird for a bit of the plot) a bit is similar (again broadly), there being an evil lion, and the dead parent plot point), as it really does just focus on different subject matter. It is more of a generational tale than Lion King.

Honestly, I think how Kimba discusses the difficulty for him to grow up for a bit in a normal household (with humans feeding and clothing him) and then having to return to the jungle is really interesting. It gets into his struggle with how he wants to be innately kind (and more “human”/domesticated) but he obviously still has those animal urges built in (a scene that really exemplifies this is in Chapter 5 of Volume 1, where the villain taunts him about the fact that Kimba is upset by a gazelle dying and won’t eat from it, like a normal lion would). It tackles a lot of topics related to how humans can be bad (specifically, the way that one of the humans (who is pretty clearly exploiting the African characters) was a guard at a Nazi camp and you are very clearly not supposed to like this character) and even how, in Chapter 5, Kimba bringing “civilization” to the jungle (he gets the animals that listen to him to build paved roads, restaurants and set up farming practices similar to what humans do) is something that makes some of the animals suffer. There is unfortunately also a lot of really poorly handled colonialism (specifically, in chapter 10, where the “good guys” take over the Jungula tribe and dress them in traditionally European clothing and it is seen as a good thing, as they are no longer under control of Conga. The way that it is handled in this is very muddled, and the way that Kimba bringing “civilization” to the jungle animals is a net positive is a very odd thing to me). It does have some of Tezuka’s trademark anti-war messaging but it honestly just really does not work well here given the rest of the topics. There are definitely glimmers of what COULD be a better manga in this but unfortunately it is buried under far far too much racism.

I want to take a small moment to analyze a section of this essay written on Kimba, as I think there is a lot to unpack.

From the section covering The Roles of Africans in Kimba:

“Fans of Kimba may have wondered why there are no Africans to be seen in Kimba’s jungle; or for that matter, why no English version of Jungle Emperor is available. The problem is ironic and must have struck hard at Tezuka: the depiction of the African tribes in Leo can only be viewed by any modern person as racist.

This takes a moment to process and absorb because so much of Tezuka’s work explores (and attacks) the tenants of racism. Indeed, works as early as Astroboy seem to focus on racism-as-an-evil with such a deliberate ferocity that we can (and must) conclude that any such accusations regarding Tezuka are false. Let’s also not forget his own slogan: “Love all creatures! Love everything that has life!”

We might then wonder how it is that Tezuka has produced these images which offend modern sensibilities and which necessitated the replacement of African natives in Kimba with white hunters and ultimately prevented the publication of Jungle Emperor in English. It must first be said that very few of Tezuka’s human caricatures are particularly flattering–even of himself. What we find offensive in these drawings however is their stereotypical nature.

It is my opinion that the resources that Tezuka first drew from for the creation of his native characters are in fact the problem. More than likely Disney is the culprit here; though one might also consider the depiction of natives in the 1933 feature film King Kong. Most telling however are the now deleted sequences involving a black centaur in Fantasia. Other works by Disney from this period along with this sequence were clearly not meant as racist, but we can only judge from the perspective of the 21st century.

One possible source for Jungle Emperor’s Africans: a censored scene from Fantasia 1940. Though this type of depiction of Africans was common in US comics and animation in this period, we know Tezuka was particularly interested in the works of Walt Disney…”

To get into my thoughts on this part of the essay, we first have to discuss the material mentioned as potential inspirations for how badly these characters are drawn, mainly Fantasia. Fantasia was released in 1940, a decade before Jungle Emperor came out, and the racism was about as bad as in Jungle Emperor. It had many racist scenes in the specific Pastoral Symphony scene of the film, that were then removed in 1969 (source). I do also want to cite a slightly lesser known Disney work from 1925 that is nearly exact to how the Africans are drawn in Jungle Emperor: Alice Cans the Cannibals. I am not saying that this is where he got the inspiration from, simply to bring up the point that there was a lot of media that would treat Africans as cannibals and prone to human sacrifice. This essay gets into a lot of the early Disney racism in a very in depth way that might be of interest in regards to this point.

In a similar way to Fantasia, Jungle Emperor also had to be redone, given how the original pages were nearly lost during the making of the anime in 1965. This led Tezuka to have to redraw a lot of it (which you can most certainly tell which parts of it were redrawn, given it was done in 1977 (for the collected Kodansha volumes)) and unfortunately, the racial caricatures are still present in this updated version. (source) I did want to make this comparison solely for media that is viewed somewhat similarly in the mainstream media (with not much discussion around the racism) that got revised later on. This is a thing however, that Tezuka would improve on in some of his works, but that fact does not even remotely begin to erase what he put in the Jungle Emperor. Even if the art was not as blatantly racist as it was, the way these characters are written is still drenched in stereotypes that obviously do still harm Africans now. In comparison to Disney doing all that they can to erase the existence of the material (and how, even in the modern day, they very clearly struggle to hold themselves accountable (specifically referring to Song of the South)), I’m not sure that I prefer the approach here with there being clearly enough fans of Kimba to fan translate it (as the version I’m reading had two different teams) and to praise it while doing so.

I feel that the insistence that it was just caricatures and not blatantly racist really falls flat when you consider how the characters in Kimba are treated. As I mentioned in the personality section, they are really just very flat stereotypes (with no names, as far as I remember, outside of the Chief) and do pretty blatantly fall into what is racist media. The various groups portrayed in Kimba are not done so with much compassion for them as characters and they are quite honestly just used as slapstick or to boost up other characters (whether by being villainous, and driving the heroes to oppose them or by, in a large panel depicting most of them dying (relatively graphically for this manga as well, with one character being shown in the jaws of an animal), which then brings the heroes together (not due to their death but because, seemingly, with them gone, the other characters realized that they (as the characters were from two unnamed countries) are not so different after all)). They are not even remotely given any compassion or depth compared to every other character and it really just falls into the old tropes of refusing to see Black characters as deserving of that depth (which quite honestly does feel like what happened here). They are shown more as a group and never really focused on them as individual people (as EVERY other character is given that).

There isn’t really a good way to handle the presence of very blatantly racist material in media, but I do think the repeated insistence of a lot of fans to insist that it wasn’t intentionally bad (or that it was just of its time) is not the way to go. Even if at that point, he had experienced the war (bringing this point up for a reason, stick with me), there are later examples of his work that deal with depicting Black characters in a caricatured way, most notably Hungry Blues. That was published in 1977 and still used similar caricatures (although the character in question leaned a lot less into stereotypes personality wise, as it was based off a real person he had met during the war). It is a very inexcusable part of his works and is something that is objectively the most prominent in Kimba (which is part of his early works). Even if a lot of his other works DO have very well handled anti-racist messages (Message to Adolf is one I can think of off the top of my head, Astro Boy also handles similar topics), this one objectively does not and I think it’s important to examine this in a critical way, instead of just brushing it under the rug. If you want to read one of his works that handles racism, anti-war, and the other messages he is known for, there are MANY that handle them better and not like this.

As a white person, I’m aware that my viewpoints on this matter may not hold as much weight as someone who would be affected by how these characters are drawn but I do believe with how little discussion of the very very blatant racism in this there is online, it is something that needs to be brought up. For further reading on the topics of stereotypes of Black characters in media, I found Donald Bogle’s book on the matter to be a very interesting read (although it does focus on Hollywood throughout the ages, some of the things in here did also apply to this) (link) and Henry T. Sampson’s book focusing on animated portrayals of Black characters (specifically, Chapter 3: Way Down in the Jungle: The Animated Safari) (link) to be very related to the topic at hand and be very excellent companions to reading about the topic of how anti-black tropes in media can be impactful and were very much part of the time period.

Overall Thoughts: I clearly had a lot to say on this one, as it is a topic that I do sincerely believe should be getting more coverage in regards to discussing this media. As a manga, it truly was one of the worst ones I’ve ever read, as the plot was pretty rough and the very obvious racism was well, obvious. On one hand, I do wish it was better and that when it was revised in the 70’s, that Tezuka took the time to show that he had grown from the mindset he pretty clearly had in 1950. On the other hand, the only value this has (in my opinion) is a very good case study on what not to do when writing African characters, as it truly fits every stereotype in different ways. I would not recommend this to a single person, it is easily by far the weakest of his works that I have read so far. The characters felt pretty flat and a lot of the moments clearly meant to be tragic fell pretty flat for me. The generational aspect was interesting but due to every other weakness of the work, just did not work for me.

[magicalgirlagency]

If we're being honest here, HP's worldbuilding is lazy, generic, not that interesting and mean-spirited all around.

And you know what? You're correct on that description, specially on the "mean-spirited" bit, because that's exactly what Ursula Le Guin has said before.

Like, the Houses system is just some fancy method of segregation and the students are forced into roles that clash with their true personalities and are stuck in stereotypes (specially in the case of Slytherin, as it was often the starting point of many of the series' villains).

And speaking of stereotypes, have you guys forgotten that the Goblins are anti-semistic? With their role as the overseers of the financial affairs of the Wizarding World? With their greediness and comically large noses? With an upcoming game where the player is tasked with stopping their rebellion at all costs?

And what about the House Elves, who are practically slaves? Who refused to leave their lives of servitude because they genuinely find pleasure in being slaves? And when Hermione wanted to fight against the mistreatment of non-human beings, she was quickly slammed down and called "crazy" for it?

And speaking of Hermione, she'd be a much better protagonist than Harry Potter himself. A story of a girl born into a magicless family making history at a magic academy is leagues more interesting than the same ol' boring story about some speshul boy with a pre-programmed destiny to fulfill.

And about Harry, his epilogue is so boring, because he just basically becomes a Wizard Cop. First of all: #ACAB, and second of all: There should be more magical jobs in the Wizarding World. VARIETY, people! Society doesn't solely consist of police forces! Defund that shit!

And still on the subject of Harry, his ship with Draco (Drarry) was also stupid. Like, why in the world would you ship a bully with the bullied?! Not to mention how Draco is just some rude, annoying and whiny brat who always threatens others with the wealth and power of his family when things doesn't go like he wanted instead of taking matters into his own hands and getting a fucking grip. Like, grow up, people; there are much better rivals-to-lovers couples out there, like Lumity (The Owl House) and Dianakko (Little Witch Academia).

And speaking of the fandom, I will never ever ever forgive the fact that the fans have actively contribuited to the Cringe Culture scandal with My Immortal back in the days. With so many other great fanfics out there with loads of potential, and you all went and gave attention to the most subpar and horridly-written one, just so you could bully alt fashion kids for trying to explore their styles?! No wonder why I still see young writers/artists feeling anxious and discouraged about their projects...

And don't get me started on the international magic academies, and how they perpetualize stereotypes (i.e.: african academy Uagadou specializes in animal shapeshifting) and monolith myths (i.e.: japanese academy Mahoutokoro houses all of Asia, and brazilian academy Castelobruxo houses all of Latin America).

And it's just not transphobia or racism, no; what about the Lycantrophy process being used as a metaphor for the HIV/AIDS scandal, and how it prejudiced and killed thousands of people within the queer community? And how Remus Lupin was treated like an outcast because of his ability to transform (also, I feel like an idiot, because I always thought Remus was french due to his surname being "Lupin", and I thought it was a reference to Maurice LeBlanc's Àrsene Lupin, but it turns out the Lupin was based on the scientific name for the wolves: Canis lupus)?

I mean, really! I could list all of that TERFy old hag's transgressions all day! That's not even half of it all!

And you might be asking yourself right now: "But Bunny! If you are so upset at how mean-spirited the Wizarding World is, then why don't you just make WBMRs for some of the characters?"

The answer is simple, my friend: "Because JKR knows".

She knows of the fanfics we write and the OCs that we make. She knows that we're displeased with her behavior, and she keeps doing it anyway. Even if we alert others of her incompetence and maliciousness, we're unknowingly giving traction to her and her work.

Case in Point: Her latest book, The Ink Black Heart, features an artist/animator being doxxed and murdered for being transphobic and disrespectful, and the villain of the story is a disabled Tumblr blogger, and the story even features fake tweets.

Oh, and did I mention that she wrote it under the pen name of Robert Galbraith, naming herself after the father of gay conversion therapies? Because Ms. Joanne doesn't do subtlety.

At least the comforting news is that a plenty of people nowadays are no longer dealing with her bullshit. The latest Fantastic Beasts movie was a flop, losing to Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and The Bad Guys; and Quidditch players have changed the name of their sport (it now goes by Quadball, btw) to divorce themselves of JKR's series.

A lot of people are at least showing to have some sense, and I'm satsified with that.

And to answer your question about the WBMRs: I will only work on them after the TERFy old hag herself is dead and gone. And when she dies, the celebration will certainly be bigger than when Good Ol' Lizzie kicked the bucket!

Peace out, and go find for other better series to consume/get engaged on!

[aikoiya]

Cool Idea for MHA Fanfic

You know what’d be cool? A Villain Izuku fic where Izuku is an absolute mastermind. Like, David Xanatos levels of just... brilliant, but he doesn’t get a quirk so he just trains himself to the brink & ultra analyzes quirks & strategy.

I’m thinking that it’d literally take him being denied by All Might, then being denied admittance to the Hero Course, or possibly even UA entirely. THEN, being denied every other possible course, not just at being a Hero, but at any worthwhile job. I remember seeing a Villain Izuku comic once where Aldera has a job fair & every booth he visits turns him away because he’s quirkless. Like THAT. Then, his mom being injured and either put into a coma or killed in the crossfires of a villain battle and the hero using their influence to cover the whole thing up.

Like, it isn’t just ONE THING that does it. Izuku is too goodhearted for that. It’d literally take his entire world & everything he loves crumbling down around him to turn him into a villain.

Only THEN, do I think he would break & I imagine him taking the role of an anti-hero for most of the series before going full villain. Even still, he’d be convinced that he was doing the right thing. He’d rage at society for deeming him nothing, but he’d do so in a less overtly destructive way than Shigaraki & I see him deciding something drastic.

Let’s be clear, though. Izuku is SMART & he is also CUNNING. He knows how to use the law to his advantage. He realizes that the terms “Hero,” “Villain,” & “Vigilante” are written in the law as being primarily Quirk centered. Meaning that by being Quirkless, he doesn’t technically fall under any of those. At most, he’d be considered a criminal. However, he does things like never being the first to initiate battle. As such, no one can ever get him with things like assault charges. He can always say that he was just defending himself & it’d always be true.

At the same time, he still has a very strong sense of justice & moonlights as a ‘vigilante.’ I don’t know Japanese laws regarding protecting others, so I’m going off America & say that there is no law against it so long as you don’t use your Quirk or kill someone to do so. As such, sense Izuku doesn’t have a quirk, all acts of ‘vigilantism’ is legal on his part. It’s sort of a declaration that the law needs to be refined.

Either way, he becomes part of the League of Villains while not technically being a villain himself, refuses a quirk; having decided “Fuck Quirks, I Will MAKE Society Accept Me As I Am.” He works with the Doctor.

Izuku starts up this movement called “Worthy” that calls attention to, not only Quirklessnes, but quirkist ideals (quirk racism, especially against the quirkless, those with ‘villainous quirks’ & quirks that hurt their users) & the unfairness therein. It’d be something of a background thing, a small thing, but slowly build over time.

He manages to ingratiate himself to Stain in Hosu.

It’d be Dad for One, but All for One doesn’t let it slip. He’d be concerned for Izuku’s seeming heel-face turn in personality (because the idea that he’d genuinely loved & cared for both Inko & Izuku while still being an obviously evil & unhinged man on the side is interesting) & quietly favors him over Shigaraki. Like, I see DFO being conflicted. Like, “who did this to my boy, I murder them” but also “it’s about time he realized the truth.” He never intended to bring his son into his ‘extracurricular activities,’ but he’d rather Izuku be a villain WITH him than out there on his own.

During the Kamino Fight, Izuku betrays the League, stealing their research on quirks. Turns out, Izuku figured out who DFO was a while ago & wasn’t too happy at his dad for not being there for him & his mom because he decided his grudge against All Might was more important than staying with his family. In the end, DFO is torn between betrayal, guilt, & pride. Whatever Izuku’s goals are, DFO now sees that no matter what, no one will be able to stop his son.

Izuku then goes to work for Overhaul, who he helps the heroes to take down. He still hates immorality & can’t abide by what the man was doing to Eri... But he also steals Overhaul’s research.

It turns out Izuku’s goal is to wipe out quirks entirely. He basically pulls a reverse Syndrome & his army is a source of disquiet for the heroes because they are everyone that society has denied a/o failed.

A/N: I know it’s not right, but I can’t help what I want & I want BAMF, mastermind Villain Izuku!

[tcm]

“It’s still hard:” Asian Americans Paving the Way in Hollywood By Jessica Pickens

The 2018 film CRAZY RICH ASIANS was a success in many areas. Based on the best-selling novel by Kevin Kwan, the film became the highest-grossing romantic comedy in 10 years. An August 2018 article in Time Magazine noted that the film would “change Hollywood.” CRAZY RICH ASIANS was the first film since THE JOY LUCK CLUB (’93) to have an all-Asian American cast or an Asian American lead role. Nearly 60 years before, the all Asian American cast of FLOWER DRUM SONG (‘61) also hoped they were changing the way Asians were cast in Hollywood.

Since the silent era of films, Asian American actors have struggled to find quality roles and respect in Hollywood. Some, actors like Sessue Hayakawa and Anna May Wong, were frequently cast as vamps or villains — which in return put them in poor favor with Japanese and Chinese communities of their time. Miscegenation laws kept Asian American actors from having a romantic leading role with a white actor. In turn, Asians lost roles to white actors in yellowface, from Austrian actress Luise Rainer in THE GOOD EARTH (’37) to English actor Alec Guinness in A MAJORITY OF ONE (’61).

These actors helped fight and pave the way for the success of CRAZY RICH ASIANS:

Sessue Hayakawa

Today, actor Sessue Hayakawa is best recognized for his roles in THE BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI (’57) and as the pirate in Walt Disney’s SWISS FAMILY ROBINSON (’60). But from 1915 to the early 1920s, Japan-born Hayakawa was one of the top silver screen idols of the silent era in the United States and Europe. He was as famous and recognizable as Charlie Chaplin or Douglas Fairbanks, according to his biographer Daisuke Miyao in the book Sessue Hayakawa: Silent Cinema and Transnational Stardom.

Fame followed Hayakawa after playing the lead in Cecil B. DeMille’s THE CHEAT (’15), in which he gives a financial loan to a wealthy woman (Fannie Ward). When she tries to back out of their bargain, he won’t take money as payment, but sexual favors. His character also brands Ward to signify that he owns her. THE CHEAT brought Hayakawa success, but it also brought typecasting. His resulting characters were usually dangerous, forbidden lovers or sexy villains. Hayakawa was criticized by the Japanese-American community for his roles. The Los Angeles-based Japanese American newspaper Rafu Shimpo said THE CHEAT “distorted the truth of Japanese people” depicting them as dangerously evil and would cause anti-Japanese movements.

Hayakawa eventually grew tired of the stereotypical roles he was cast in. In 1922, Hayakawa went to Europe where he performed in England and France. He stayed in Europe until after World War II and returned to Hollywood in 1949. Hayakawa was recognized for his role in THE BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI with an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.

Anna May Wong 

She was rejected by China because she was “too American” and rejected in Hollywood because she was “too Chinese.” But Chinese American actress Anna May Wong achieved international fame by the mid-1920s, though she struggled with being stereotyped. Often cast as a vamp, sexual figure, slave or prostitute, the Chinese government said she played roles that demeaned China, and Graham Russell Hodges’ Anna May Wong: From Laundryman's Daughter to Hollywood Legend recalls how the Chinese media and government resented “having their womanhood so represented.”

When Wong campaigned for roles that could potentially change her image, like O-Lan in THE GOOD EARTH, she lost out to a white actor playing yellowface. In fact, the Chinese government worked against Wong being cast in THE GOOD EARTH. Hodges states how General Tu, MGM’s Chinese government advisor, told MGM that her reputation was bad in China and whenever she appeared in a film, newspapers printed that “Anna May loses face in China again.”

When white actor Paul Muni was cast as the male lead of THE GOOD EARTH, Wong knew she had missed her opportunity because of miscegenation laws. Wong supported China during World War II through the Red Cross, USO and China Relief efforts. She also wrote articles in China’s support and created a cookbook of traditional Chinese dishes. On the first anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attacks, she was sworn in as an air raid warden, according to Hodge’s book.

In 1943, the First Lady of the Republic of China, Madame Chiang Kai-shek, visited Hollywood. She gave a speech at the Hollywood Bowl and a luncheon was held. Madame Chiang Kai-shek was flanked by actresses like Marlene Dietrich and Loretta Young, but noticeably not Wong. Madame Chiang had specifically requested for Wong to be excluded from the events. Anna May Wong continued to act sporadically and died just before she was to co-star in the all Asian American cast of THE FLOWER DRUM SONG.

Keye Luke 

Chinese actor Keye Luke started in films in the 1930s, usually playing a mild-mannered, polite and intelligent young adult Asian male. Often, Luke played young physicians, like in THE PAINTED VEIL (’34), MAD LOVE (’35) and the Dr. Kildare and Dr. Gillespie film series. Luke became best known for his role in the 1930s as Lee Chan, the No. 1 son of detective Charlie Chan, who was played by white actor Warner Oland. The film series has since been criticized for perpetuating Asian stereotypes and having a white actor in the lead role, but Luke defended the films.

“How can they be criticized when the character was a hero,” Luke said in a 1986 Los Angeles Times interview. “People respected him. Police departments consulted with him and called on him to help them.” However, despite this, Luke and other Asians faced racism in Hollywood. Luke said in the 1930s that Los Angeles was “segregated, but not formally.” He was only hired when they needed a “Chinaman.”

“One never saw blacks on Wilshire Boulevard. Parts of the city I avoided–all white areas like Beverly Hills. Even after working with somebody like a big Caucasian actor, I’d be ignored if we met on the street. Asians were invisible, you see. We knew our place: One step back. That’s why the Charlie Chan films were so important. They deflated a lot of the current racial myths. But even the Chan films had rules. Charlie never touched a white woman except as a handshake. I’d never have a white girlfriend, not that I wanted one in pictures,” Luke said in an interview published in Conversations with Classic Film Stars: Interviews from Hollywood's Golden Era by James Bawden and Ron Miller.

After World War II, Luke found roles were harder to find, and many of his roles were uncredited. By the 1960s, more Asian actors were on the screen. In his interview with Miller, Luke joked that before the 1960s he and Korean actor Philip Ahn “divided the work.”

Philip Ahn 

Philip Ahn was a Korean American actor who only played a Korean character once on film. In Hye Seung Chung’s Hollywood Asian: Philip Ahn and the Politics of Cross-Ethnic Performance, he details how before World War II, Ahn was promoted as a Chinese actor and often nicknamed the “Oriental Clark Gable.” During World War II, however, Hollywood shifted its publicity and focused on Ahn’s Korean ancestry. The publicity articles discussed Ahn’s father, Ahn Changho, who was an activist against the Japanese government. Ahn was also promoted as “the man we love to hate” and the “leering yellow monster.”

During the war, Ahn was frequently cast as a Japanese soldier in the 1940s, something he later said that he didn’t mind, as he felt he was contributing to his late father's legacy. Despite these characters not reflecting Ahn’s personality, Chung recalls how Ahn received hate mail from audiences who confused his onscreen characters for real life. In the 1953 Korean War film BATTLE CIRCUS, Ahn and his brother Ralph both played North Korean prisoners. Ahn said while he played many nationalities, this was the only time he played a Korean character, according to his 1978 The New York Times obituary.

Miyoshi Umeki

Japan-born Miyoshi Umeki was the first Asian to win an Academy Award for a performance. Umeki won Best Supporting Actress for her first Hollywood film, SAYONARA (’57). Though Umeki was the first Asian to win an Academy Award, this “first” isn’t often discussed. Despite the accolade, Umeki was still stereotyped in Hollywood. Her characters were generally demure, humble, delicate and subservient. Umeki’s characters spoke in broken English with a sweet smile.

Her son Michael Hood later asked her why she agreed to play these characters. “Her answer was very simple: ‘I didn’t like doing it, but when someone pays you to do a job, you do the job, and you do your best,’” Hood said in a 2018 Entertainment Weekly  article. Umeki later threw away her Academy Award statue, according to Hood. As of 2020, Umeki is the only Asian female to win an Academy Award. 

Nancy Kwan 

Hong Kong-born actress Nancy Kwan burst on to the film scene in 1960. She was cast as the lead in THE WORLD OF SUZIE WONG (’60) alongside one of Hollywood’s top actors, William Holden. Kwan was then cast in the all -Asian American cast of the Rodgers and Hammerstein film version of FLOWER DRUM SONG. With a strong start in films, a successful Hollywood career seemed likely for Kwan, but the roles weren’t there. William Holden told her, “You can do a big film and be very successful but in order to sustain a career, you have to have roles written for you,” Kwan shared in a 2018 NBC interview. Kwan was more successful than her predecessors, however, as Asians were starting to be cast rather than white actors in yellowface. Kwan was also cast in roles where she had white romantic leading men, like HONEYMOON HOTEL (’64) and THE WILD AFFAIR (’65). But Hollywood still didn’t know what to do with Kwan. She was cast in “exotic” roles like in the Walt Disney film LT. ROBIN CRUSOE, U.S.N. (’66) as an island girl. Kwan was offered a role in the film THE JOY LUCK CLUB, but she revealed in a 2018 interview at the TCM Classic Film Festival that she declined it because of a line criticizing SUZIE WONG. While she mentioned in a 1990 Los Angeles Times interview that “There are now many, many Asian actresses — but not many roles,” 18 years later she noted that the film industry had changed, but not enough. “There are more leading roles and not just small roles, but it’s still hard.”

[badlydrawnarsenelupin]

Thoughts on Edogawa Ranpo’s Gold Mask

Exactly what it says on the tin: here’s another rambling collection of thoughts on another Lupin-related book, this time it’s for Edogawa Ranpo’s Gold Mask (1930). For those who don’t know, Gold Mask is basically just Edogawa Ranpo’s fanfiction where Arsène Lupin appears in Japan and goes up against Ranpo’s own fictional detective, Akechi Kogoro. 

There will be spoilers for the book and mentions of racism.

General Thoughts: 

The copy of Gold Mask I have here is the ebook version of the translated edition by William Varteresian, published by Kurodahan Press in 2019. It is what I will be showing and quoting from in this post.

The story itself was more of a string of events happening one after the other than a coherent whole. The format is unsurprising seeing how this was originally written and published chapter by chapter. The chapters are quite short and easy to read. I’m not exactly sure what the average word count/page number for the chapters were... as my copy is an ebook edition that is frustratingly lacking in page numbers and a table of contents... The content of the story are definitely a lot more light-hearted than some of Ranpo’s other, more famous works, something that Ranpo himself admits to taking direct inspiration from the original Lupin stories.

Edogawa Ranpo’s commentaries, from the “Afterword” to the Tōgensha Edition of Edogawa Rampo’s Complete Works.

The main mystery throughout all the different occurring incidents is the identity of the person behind the mysterious “Gold Mask”. But as someone who went into the story knowing it’s Lupin, it’s not hard to figure out where he is hidden in the story. 

It definitely doesn’t help when this time, the setting is Japan, where a foreign person like Lupin can’t really just blend in with the crowd unlike back in Europe. This is where the persona of Gold Mask comes in, which is Ranpo’s solution to the problem by hiding Lupin behind a mask and a strangely ✨sparkly✨ gold cape. Keep that cape in mind, because it’s gonna come up again later.

One thing in particular that I found interesting is how Ranpo decided to describe Gold Mask, using words like “monster,” “fiend,” or “some steel machine.” It was especially noticeable in the beginning of the story, giving the impression that Gold Mask is something cold and inhuman, which really stands in contrast of the way we know Lupin from Leblanc’s writing.

Ch 2, “The Great Pearl”

It’s a bit of telling of the kind of tone and message Ranpo wants to portray with Lupin, as this story critiques on the more racist and Eurocentric stuff displayed in The Teeth of the Tiger specifically. Ranpo!Lupin is a grimy and ugly version of the character after the war and in this story, knowingly attempts and succeeds in killing a few people while in Japan; something done despite stating his dislike for blood because he saw the Japanese as lesser. 

As someone who has never read Ranpo’s other works, even though this story is probably way further from his more gruesome books, it’s still a lot more heavy than Leblanc’s own crossovers in Arsène Lupin versus Herlock Sholmes. I think the main thing that is missing here, despite Ranpo’s attempt at writing in a more Lupin-like style is Lupin himself. Since Ranpo!Lupin is framed as a coldhearted villain, it’s lacking Leblanc!Lupin’s usual playful and heroic outlaw-esque energy.

That being said, seeing what Ranpo is specifically referencing in his story, I think it is more fair to compare Gold Mask to something like 813 or Teeth of the Tiger, which are definitely much more similar in tone than Leblanc’s other Lupin works. 

In a way, I felt like Ranpo was expressing his feelings on those books through Akechi’s character calling Lupin out on his prejudice, especially in lines like this:

Ch 24, “‘Moroccan Savages’”

This next section in particular where Akechi retracts his respect for Lupin after he casually boasts about killing Moroccans in the war was what gave me that impression, like Ranpo was disappointed at the turn of Lupin’s character after reading The Teeth of the Tiger:

Ch 33, “The Art of human Dissolution”

Honestly, as someone who also didn’t really like the WW1-period stories, I really can’t blame him for feeling this way.

Thoughts on Characters:

As I’ve already kind of covered Ranpo!Lupin in the last section and I have another section on him later, I’ll focus more on the other characters here.

— Akechi Kogoro 

Since this is my first time reading a story involving Akechi Kogoro, I don’t really have much to say on him other than... Yeah, I liked him lol. Akechi Kogoro is definitely a lot less eccentric than the likes of Holmes or Lupin, which makes him feel more relatable as a protagonist. Ranpo wasn’t afraid to humiliate his detective and let him fail multiple times against Gold Mask, but of course still allows Akechi to gain the upper hand in the end. 

I don’t know if this is a running gag in all Akechi stories or just this one, but he seems to like faking an illness in order to avoid dealing with embarrassing moments. In at least two different scenes where Akechi felt like they got duped by Gold Mask while chasing down a lead, he just ditches ahead of time and leaves his police inspector friend to deal with the realisation.

Ch 16, “The Great Detective’s Stomach Ache”

Thanks Akechi, very cool.

The only other notable male character, aside from Gold Mask, is Inspector Namikoshi, who is isn’t that much different from other similar Inspector-sidekicks from detective stories. He does seems to be pretty good friends with Akechi, but other than that nothing really stood out to me about him.

— Otori Fujiko & minor female characters

One of my major complaints about this story is how the female characters are written. Fujiko, Lupin’s lover in this story, doesn’t really do much other than being madly in love with him.

Ch 21, “The Golden Battle”

Cues the Lupin III music. Did Monkey Punch choose the name “Fujiko” for his series because of Ranpo and Gold Mask? Who knows... Pretty sure the kanji for their names aren’t the same, but it is still interesting to see characters in such similar roles with the same pronunciation.

Otori Fujiko is supposed to be this proper, well-educated, eldest child of an important family, but she apparently completely changed personalities after meeting Lupin for a single week. The only notable thing she did in the story was drugging her caretaker so that she could run away and be with Lupin. What other little bits we see of her consists of being rude and dismissive over her family’s concerns for her, ready to leave the country at the drop of hat or commit suicide with Lupin when they’re cornered. 

It might’ve been just a way to show how ✨alluring✨ Lupin and to be fair here, it isn’t too far off from how romances happen in Leblanc’s canon. It could’ve also been a way to show how unhealthy Fujiko’s infatuation with Lupin is:

Ch 19, “The Magical Power of Love”

Girl... you’ve only met this guy a couple of nights over a week. Granted, this was before Ranpo!Lupin started getting all trigger-happy but she was still willing to stick around even after that.

This whole relationship is just so hard for me to take seriously, and it’s probably not meant to be seen as such. It would’ve been more interesting to see what Ranpo!Lupin thought of her as a Japanese woman but that was just never brought up. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

On a side note, since we’re talking about Lupin and Fujiko, let me I just point out this particular scene where they were alone together in private... but Ranpo!Lupin is still wearing the Gold Mask costume.

Ch 21, “The Golden Battle”

I find this scene more funny than it actually is but like... You two are completely alone, why are you still wearing that get up? I know it was probably because Ranpo wanted to keep hiding the fact that this mysterious man is Not-Japanese and his identity a secret, but it just doesn’t make any sense from the characters’ POV lmao. 

The only other two notable female characters from the beginning of the story were both murdered. I won’t spoil the plot surrounding them, but the way their deaths were described was just… ehhhh. One of them died in the middle of a bath and Ranpo, please, I really didn’t need to know that she had big boobs in this moment.

Easter Eggs in Gold Mask: 

Here’s an entire section dedicated to some of the various references Ranpo shoved into his story because there are just so, so many of them.

— Lupin Canon

Besides the references to The Teeth of the Tiger...

Lupin was shown knowing how to use Judo/Jiu-jitsu, reference from “The Escape of Arsène Lupin”

The deputy-chief of the detective-service, M. Weber, from 813 makes an appearance from France to help arrest Lupin. I forgot that this guy existed lol.

Ch 33, “The Art of Human Dissolution” ( Lupin voice: What! Weber, you old bean, did Ranpo kidnap you as well? )

An identical chapter title as Hollow Needle, “Open! Sesame”

Ch 34, “Open Sesame”

Ganimard is mentioned somewhere along with the balloon trick Lupin used in Lupin vs (S)Holmes. 

In the chapters called “Mystery in the Workshop,” and “Gunshot in the Workshop,” Ranpo basically rewrote part of “The Seven of Hearts” from the first Lupin book by using the same plot points and even directly quoting some of the lines.

Ranpo!Lupin’s hideout in this story is also really similar to Hollow Needle, but instead of the Needle in Étretat, it’s something else in Japan instead. 

— Fantômas 

So in Ranpo-verse, Holmes and Fantômas and Lupin all exist together which is interesting. Fantômas here however, unlike irl, is a predecessor of Lupin along with French author Léon Sazie’s character, Zigomar from 1909. 

Ch35, “Earthshaking”

Basically Ranpo!Lupin took a trick originally from the Fantômas stories and used it to escape here.

— Sherlock Holmes

Speaking of Holmes, he is mentioned a few times here and there, nothing too notable though. 

Akechi himself uses a trick from Holmes in “The Adventure of the Empty House.”

— Edgar Allan Poe 

Much like with “Seven of Hearts”, Ranpo also rewrote and shoved in Poe’s entire “Masque of the Red Death” in several chapters, one of which  with the exact same title.

Except this time, instead of the “Red Death”...

The context for these are that Ranpo!Lupin held a party and took the effort to decorate the place in accordance to Poe’s story because he’s a fan of Poe. Leblanc is known to be a Poe fanboy himself so... it’s not entirely implausible lol. 

And finally, 

The idea of the gold mask itself, admitted by Ranpo himself, is taken from “Le Roi au Masque d’or,” an 1893 French novel by Marcel Schwob

Edogawa Ranpo’s commentaries, from the “Afterword” to the Tōgensha Edition of Edogawa Rampo’s Complete Works.

There’s a whole long-ass footnote at end of the book detailing many of the references, the ones I’ve listed are just the ones I personally caught.

An Analysis of Ranpo!Lupin and the Kaitou trope: 

This is the last section before I shut up I swear. 

This section is less of a review on the book and more of an analysis on the differences between the classic ‘Gentleman Thief’ trope and the Japanese ‘Kaitou‘ trope. I have written a post on this before but I want to revisit the topic a bit after reading Gold Mask because I think some of these differences become even more clear when comparing Ranpo!Lupin to Leblanc!Lupin.

For those who don’t know, Kaitou (怪盗), translates literally to “strange burglar” but it is most commonly localized as ‘phantom thief.’ Some well-known examples are Kaitou Kid from Detective Conan and Joker from Persona 5, both of whom are heavily inspired by Leblanc’s Arsène Lupin.

So one of the key differences between classic Gentlemen Thieves and Kaitous is the ‘costume.’ Kaitous are known for having an extremely flashy but consistent getup, which makes them super easy to recognize. It’s almost like a sort of branding, so to speak. Of course, modern Kaitous have the benefit of having almost... magical abilities of disguise, allowing them to effortlessly disguise themselves – something that Ranpo!Lupin could not do it in 1900s Japan among Japanese people because he was European.

As mentioned before, Ranpo!Lupin wears a gold mask to hide the fact that he is a foreigner in Japan. However, Ranpo goes a bit beyond that and also gives Lupin a ✨sparkly✨ gold cape. I don’t know why exactly he decided to do this but whatever the reason, because of the cape Ranpo!Lupin basically ends up with a phantom thief costume.

This costume becomes a big part of the story, with several people taking advantage of the anonymity behind the mask + cape to do various things under the persona of Gold Mask.

And because of how easy it is to spot him in this sparkly gold getup, it leads several chapters where a whole horde of policemen chases after Gold Mask at the same time. It’s so comically over the top, there was even an attempt dog-pile-on-the-burglar scene, which is a notable running gag in Magic Kaito and Lupin III.

Also this scene:

Ch 4, “The Golden Gecko”

“his beautiful figure...” Ranpo!Lupin’s sparkly rainbow cape was so pretty that everyone paused in the middle of chasing Gold Mask just to admire the view, the comedic effect here is amazing.

I honestly can’t remember a scene like this in Leblanc’s stories, at least not to this scale- in Leblanc’s stories, Lupin is usually:

    a) gone before the police arrives     b) hidden in some disguise     c) escapes quickly with some clever misdirection

or really only confronts a few police officers at a time. 

It is also interesting to note here that Gold Mask is referred to as a “fiend,” since the whole story and character of Gold Mask is essentially a prototype for Ranpo’s own gentleman thief, the Fiend with Twenty Faces. It’s pretty clear where he got that name from now.

Conclusion:

As a story on it’s own, it’s alright. It’s by no means bad but a bit lacking especially in comparison to Ranpo’s other more famous works.

This version of Lupin is definitely quite OOC compared to Leblanc’s canon– but I think it should be seen less as an attempt at a faithful adaptation, and instead, more of an experimental piece with a different perspective on Arsène Lupin and Leblanc’s works.

It is definitely an interesting and unusual take on Arsène Lupin, plus it was rather fun trying to catch all the references sprinkled throughout the story. The story itself did feel like Edogawa Ranpo having a bit of fun and taking a bunch of stuff he liked from Western detective literature, then putting it all together in one story.

I think it’s worth a quick read for anyone who is interested in classic detective pulp, especially for all the references. Fans of Lupin can also consider reading it, however the OOC-ness may be a potential put-off.

[keeperofhounds]

Minority Report (Quirkless)

Hello, I am a college student studying abroad in Japan. I would like to share the similarities and differences between the United States and Japan. This is to expand and teach others about how Japan is like to people from the outside.

This story was inspired by @aconstantstateofbladerunner who wanted a story that expanded on the world of My Hero Academia. Note this story takes from modern day Japan, but as an American it might not be entirely accurate. 

Recently I bore witness to an event that shook me to the core, there was a student. Normally this wouldn’t matter if I were to describe him, I would go so far as to say that he looked like he had a bad attitude. You could see it with the way he carried himself and glared at everything as if it all personally offended him. Yet, I don’t want to focus on him, that student will be mentioned later. What I want to focus on is another student who was at that event on the same day.

At first glance you can tell the other student is nothing special. In fact he’s very plain with nothing special about him. I would even say that he might be shy with how he held himself, trembling, looking at the floor when the heroes were talking to him. Not that I blamed him those talks were actually scolding.

You see dear reader, this boy did something crazy, he went running towards a villain, and from what I heard that same boy was quirkless. Let me give you some context on what was happening before this kid came running into the scene, throwing his backpack and clawing desperately to give a victim breathing air.

Earlier in the day at around 3:30 pm (roughly the time when schools let out) a villain with a sludge like quirk robbed a store. Luckily the occupants at the time were not seriously injured after the villain left, in a stroke of luck All Might, the symbol of peace happened to be in the area and gave chase. At some point All Might lost the villain in the sewer system which can be described as long winded and confusing, which allowed the villain to find a hostage.

After some research after the story broke the hostage's name is Bakugo Katsuki, he is a middle schooler with a quirk that allows explosions to be set off from his hands. When he was caught, the student tried to get away as any reasonable would try to do in this situation, this in turn caused complications. The heroes were unable to find a way to extract with the sludge villains clutches.

I’m not going to focus on them, what I want to focus is on the other boy. Despite all my investigation I could not find the name of the boy in any publications about the incident. There was one thing that stood out however and it was the boys status. He was quirkless.

At first I was surprised, but then I was impressed, not unlike a blind person learning to play the piano, or a deaf person learning to sing. Although these might be poor comparisons given the situation it did answer some questions I had in mind, but also bring some more questions. I finally knew why the heroes were scolding him, but I also noticed they were praising the other boy.

Not to rub salt on a wound or blame the victim, but the boy made things worse not only himself, but the people around him. Not to mention the heroes stood frozen as a child ran into the fray doing only enough to give another time to breathe. It’s a small thing, but it mattered the most.

Knowing this, I would have expected people in the area to talk about what happened. News stations talking about how this kid brought enough time for All Might to swoop in and save the day, but nothing. They talked about the victim, they talked about All Might, they talked about the villain, but they never talked about the other boy. 

What happened? In the United States the local news stations are always about bringing up local heroes, even if it’s as simple as inviting a stranger into their home for thanksgiving after a mistaken phone call (the stranger accepted), but nothing in Japan. It was as if the other boy was erased from the narrative all together.

I was simple to figure out what happened, the people involved were embarrassed. I couldn’t fathom about what made this kid different until I really thought about it. While in Japan I noticed an unusual tell when it came to people introducing themselves, they always said their names, and the types of quirks they had. This was especially true with children when my co-worker brought them to work.

It really started to make me wonder, but I didn’t want to make any assumptions. I knew that Japan had some issues when it came to how they did things. I know the United States still has issues when it comes to descrimination and racism, but when you really look around there is something clearly wrong. In Japan not once have I ever seen or heard of any people without a quirk.

I asked a few of my co-workers in the college what was up with that, and they told me that they didn’t think that quirkless was still even a thing in this country. Which made me wonder even more, I didn’t like how flippant the dismissal was from my friend. Another stated that the hate speech on the internet they have found in chat rooms has increased.

According to NGO reports, incidents of hate speech against minorities and their defenders, in particular, on the internet, grew. The national law on hate speech applies only to discriminatory speech and behavior directed at those who are not of Japanese heritage and is limited to educating and raising public awareness among the general public against hate speech; it does not carry penalties.

Further research shows that “Quirklessness” is a disability in Japan, with similar protections to any other disability by law. The Basic Act for Persons with Disabilities prohibits discrimination against persons with physical, intellectual, mental, or other disabilities affecting body and mind and bars infringement of their rights and interests on the grounds of disability in the public and private sectors. The law requires the public sector to provide reasonable accommodations and the private sector to make best efforts in employment, education, access to health care, or the provision of other services. The laws do not stipulate remedies for persons with disabilities who experience discriminatory acts nor do they establish penalties for noncompliance. Other law mandates that the government and private companies hire minimum proportions (2 percent) of persons with disabilities (including mental disabilities) or be fined. Disability rights advocates claimed that some companies preferred to pay the fine rather than hire persons with disabilities

Nonetheless, persons with disabilities faced limited access to some public-sector services. Abuse of persons with disabilities was a serious concern. Persons with disabilities around the country experienced abuse by family members, care-facility employees, or employers. Private surveys indicated discrimination against and sexual abuse of, women with disabilities. While some schools provided inclusive education, children with disabilities generally attended specialized schools.

Mental health professionals criticized as insufficient the government’s efforts to reduce the stigma of mental illness and inform the public that depression and other mental illnesses are treatable and biologically based.

As I write this article, I am appalled at the complete lack of protections and descrimination faced by the minority. It’s as if they don’t exist in the eyes of the public and the government. There this one article written by a reporter, who covered a murder, but some how they spun it to make it sound like it was the victims fault. The victim was an elderly man who was attacked while on his way home with some groceries. Apparently there were many witnesses, but no one was willing to come forward.

Interviews stated that people assumed that someone else would help, that a hero would come to save the day. Others just didn’t care, assuming that the injuries weren’t as bad they looked. The perpetrators were never found and this murder became a cold case. To me this is clearly a hate crime, but to them it’s nothing, but another statistic in a growing trend.

I feel pity for that boy who ran, but at the same time maybe it’s better if people don’t know he’s quirkless. I bet life is difficult, I just hope that someone else see’s a good kid and sees what he has other than what he doesn’t. We need more people like him, because some people are too busy being full of themselves. 

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Sections of the text is not my own but taken from https://www.state.gov/reports/2018-country-reports-on-human-rights-practices/japan/ (This in regards to italic passages)

If anyone has ideas on what should be brought up next, please leave a message. Not to mention any other reliable sources of information about Japan.

[capricornsicle]

2-2 It’s not a secret that Teen Wolf Season 3B – the Stiles Stilinski centric season entirely focused on Stiles/Void Stiles and with star & breakout star of the show Dylan O’Brien as front and center – is the highest rated and most critically acclaimed season of the show and everyone’s favorite (including Tyler Posey’s.) Personally, I liked Season 4 too, especially the Scira scenes. Nothing against Scott/Malia being canon endgame and true love, but Scira was obviously better imo

I’m going to be burned at the stake for this, but season 4 was better. Seasons 1 and 2 were also better. 3a was meh but Motel California was the best episode of the whole damn show. Scira should have been endgame. Scalia was sloppy and mediocre at best.

If I’m to be executed for this post already, today’s hot take is that not all Stiles fans are racist and you don’t have to be racist to be a Stiles fan but so much of the racism in the fandom has to do with him that people should be careful what exactly they’re defending.

The character of Stiles is okay, I guess. Personally I much preferred Boyd, Erica, Isaac, other such characters, and struggled to like Stiles when he kept pestering them to do huge favors for him. I really didn’t like how the show painted Stiles as the complete good guy we can all relate to and all the characters who disagreed with him or didn’t want to be friends with him as annoying low-level villains and antagonists. If I were Danny or Boyd or Erica or Isaac or Lydia or wow this is a long list I wouldn’t want to be friends with him either. Kid’s kind of annoying. Asks giant favors and never tells anyone why he needs them, doesn’t actually come up with very great plans, does plenty to put himself and his friends into danger, and the amount he pined after Lydia long after it was cute and fun always bugged me. Might just be that I don’t ship them, but still. Stiles has plenty of good jokes and decent character traits, but he’s not the messiah, unlike some tumblr posts raving about how Stiles is literally perfect would have you believe.

I’m glad it’s not very popular to be anti-Scott, but I’m always a little annoyed by the sheer amount of content in this fandom that is Stiles and Derek and Stiles and Derek only. I’ve seen maybe four other blogs that consistently post original content about characters of color from the show and have something to say about the problematic parts of the fandom. Reblogging posts is fine and welcome, but the fact that I’m the only person I’ve seen posting gifs of Deaton or Mason or Boyd in the last month is troubling. Lots of people in this fandom create original content, be it artwork and fanfiction or gifs and textposts. That so many of them are Sterek or Stiles when there are so many other characters and ships on the show bugs me. I’ve read posts where people say that they stopped watching the show when Derek was written off for a season or however long it was. I’ve read posts from people who didn’t watch 6b because Stiles wasn’t main credits. I’ve read posts expressing so much anger that Sterek never became canon, that it was a slap in the face to queer fans or whatever. The amount of queerbaiting about them was, especially because of the very big age gap, the fact that one of them is underage, and the amount of attention that a ship between two white boys that was never canon got, especially in comparison to the complete lack of content about canon queer characters and ships. Caitlin and Emily. Mason and Corey. What’s the difference between Sterek and the canon ships? Sterek is two white male characters, and the others aren’t. Brett, an openly bisexual character with a not insignificant part who was killed off young and never got a romantic interest or exploration of his backstory, is largely forgotten by angry Sterek shippers.

The reason 3b is so popular is that Stiles is the main character of it. I related a lot to him that season, when previously I didn’t like him that much, and the scenes he had with Scott in the hospital and when he was un-possessed, and with a lot of other characters while he was possessed (calling Melissa “mom” hurt that cavern where my heart should be) were emotional and good. That he was possessed by the Japanese fox spirit that was the main villain when he is, in fact, white, not so much. A season that started by being about Kitsune and Japanese mythology ended up being a season about the white boy fans project onto much more than the non-white main character. Kira and the other actual Japanese characters fell by the wayside and the pretty white boy got the spotlight, again. He saved the day, just like he saved the day in the show’s finale, and in the finale before that. Stiles does a lot of day-saving. He’s like Wesley from Star Trek -- you can tell if you look closely that a director or exec. producer was self-inserting a little bit. Always right and always saving the day.

It’s not bad to like Stiles. He’s a fine character. He’s not my type, but I can acknowledge that Dylan O’Brien is attractive, even when they shaved his head and said he was just some loser nerd no one at the high school wanted to hang out with (yeah, sure). He has a lot of flaws, the constant asking for favors definitely one of them, but he grows a lot as a character and he does have redeeming qualities. And the “mom” scene. Oh my GOD. I’m a sucker for the “kids without 1+ parent in the picture calling someone mom or dad” trope. I’m such a sucker. But despite his good qualities, he’s not perfect. Characters who disagree with him are not inherently in the wrong. In fact, a lot of them aren’t in the wrong at all. Why the hell would Boyd trust him with anything? Why would Danny like the annoying kid in his economics class who asks him invasive questions? The racism in this fandom involving pitting Scott against Stiles and painting Boyd to be annoying and unhelpful and ignoring canonically queer ships for non-canon queer ships but white is not the fault of the actor or the character, it’s the fault of the writers who wrote those scenes and the fandom that just cannot get enough of the poor innocent white boy.

TL;DR is that it doesn’t matter who you ship or who you like or what your opinions are, it matters that you acknowledge racism and implicit biases in the narrative we were given, and make an attempt to do better than the show did. Instead of defending Stiles as the messiah and attacking Scott for being a bad friend for literally eight episodes of one long-ass and mediocre season, take criticisms of him and Sterek to heart, and diversify your content and your reblogs to include actual queer characters, characters of color, female characters, female characters of color, female queer characters, and queer characters of color. Teen Wolf has all of those. And if you don’t like one or two of them, that’s okay. But if you don’t like any of them, maybe you should re-evaluate. No one’s going to hold it against you. We’re all too starved for good character development.

[weaselle]

PSA for white cishet men

Okay, so, especially for a lot of you young’uns who are getting the bulk of your social input from the internet (but also for anyone else) If you are white, cishet, and male it can seem... all of society is rallying against you. And I want to address that with you right now. The below post mentions some identities more than others, but is equally relevant in terms of racism, misogyny, ableism, homophobia, transphobia - all the phobias and isms. A large portion of society IS rallying against whiteness, maleness, heterosexuality, etc, ... and it is important that they are. And this does not make you a bad person for being those things. First, my credentials. I am white-passing, cishetman-passing, and have never been treated as anything else in my life. I am also 1/4 Japanese and some kind of nonbinary that, if I could go back 25 or 35 years and help young me understand more, would likely be a trans woman and a lesbian today. And even though I am not 100% white, 100% male, or 100% cishet, I have moved through society as if I am all of these things, even spending decades trying my best to identify as these things. And, importantly, I have experienced a full measure of all the privileges, advantages, social indoctrination and special treatment that come with those things.  I want to reach out to those white cishet men who are pushing back against what they feel is unfair assignment of negativity to parts of their being and identity they have no control over. Especially when I was young, I have felt that terrible self hatred and helpless desperation that can happen when you are a decent person trying to interface with yourself about what it means to be white, straight, cis, male, etc in this society today. Unfair assignment of negativity to parts of people’s being and identity that they have no control over is exactly the issue, and if you feel it is being applied to you, the first thing you have to understand is that this is a natural, normal, and necessary part of correcting a millennia-long imbalance. Unfair assignment of negativity to parts of people’s being and identity that they have no control over has been happening to everyone without our white male cishet attributes for hundreds of years, with much more visceral consequences for them than us. You may feel that white people are cast in a bad light right now, but there were literal lynchings of black people only 10 years before I was born, and black people still die unfairly at the hands of white people only because of the color of their skin. You may feel that cishets are cast in a bad light right now, but a few years ago in my city a young person publicly perceived as male was set on fire on a bus for wearing a skirt. You may feel that men are cast in a bad light simply for being men but U.S. rape rates of women are astoundingly high... as well as things like, my mother was not allowed to get a credit card from a bank without permission simply because she was a woman. Let me be clear. As an adult woman, THE BANK required her to have written permission from her father or husband to apply for a credit card. Men have had and still have unfair access to real social power and advantage. White people have had and still have unfair access to real social power and advantage, cis-hets have had and still have... etc. This “cast in a bad light” thing, the assignment of negativity to whiteness, maleness, heterosexuality, and other identity markers you have no control over? The more sensitive you are about it, the more likely it is that you haven’t experienced the kind of visceral consequences for that negative value that others have. It can be easy to be sensitive about it, but this “cast in a bad light” thing isn’t preventing straight white men from being paid more, being promoted to CEO more, etc etc. And while YOU may feel that men are currently cast in a bad light, that’s not as true in society at large as may seem if you are white and male and NOT a CEO, and face plenty of adversity in your life. So yes. “whiteness” and “manhood” and “heterosexuality” are all concepts that are being assigned negative value right now. What you are feeling is society PUSHING those concepts out of their centralized place to make room for everybody else. When, due only to who you have been born as, you feel that push, it is not the fault of the people doing the pushing, it is the fault of our ancestors that made such pushing necessary. And it is necessary. Your feelings of self worth may well just be a casualty in society’s fight for this change. But they don’t have to be. We don’t have to feel bad, or attacked - sometimes it’s just hard not to. But nobody is specifically setting out to make us personally feel bad; that’s our own issue to deal with. What is happening in American Society (and Modern Western Culture in general) regarding these attributes, is much larger than our personal experience or lifetime. And it is far from over. YOU may feel that you have arrived on the shores of equality for all, but this society has not, and that push NEEDS to continue happening. So, while not everybody is going to be able to parse this in such terms for you, let me re-assure you. We are not trying to tell you whiteness itself is bad. It’s okay to be white. But nobody is going to feel like they have to tell you that it’s okay to be white, because politicians and banks and police in our society already reenforce that it’s okay to be white, in ways that matter more than somebody’s feelings. Similarly, most people are not trying to tell you maleness or heterosexuality is something you need to be ashamed of, but they won’t feel like they have to reassure you of that for the same kind of reasons. And some people WILL tell you that you should be ashamed of those things, and that is because THEY have been made to feel ashamed of THEIR sexuality, gender, or race. Understand that and move on from it. What is being fought against is not your literal skin color or sexual orientation or gender, what is being fought against is the concepts of the “white” “cis/het” and “male” values of these attributes as they currently function in this society. Almost everyone understands that many white/cis/het/men are good people trying their best. And, this is very important, you can be both. You can be both a good person who is worthy of love and admiration and who tries their best and who would never knowingly be a bigot, AND participate in bigoted ideology. In fact we all do. Let me give you an example of how I have been both. Now, I have made it my life’s work to be as good and humane a person as I can be, and I would never KNOWINGLY do racist things. When I was young, in my twenties, I would have told you unequivocally that I was not racist. I would have been wrong. Just one way I was wrong is something I didn’t learn until I was in my young 30′s, and it was startling. See, sometimes in this life, when scared, or in an intense situation, or even as a joke, we act “tough”. And, I forget what it was that prompted me to examine this, but, I discovered that on those occasions, when I was acting “tough”... what I was really acting was “black”. My hand movements, my body language, my vocabulary and pronunciation... when I felt like presenting myself as tough, these all became rough copies of stereotypical black culture. My hands would move like I was in a rap video, my head movements the same, my pronunciation of words like “motherfucker” changed, my use of black vernacular increased. And I was totally unaware that this is what I was doing when I was trying to act tough. When I sat down to unpack that, I realized that I wasn’t acting like black people I knew (which were too few, having grown up in a little white-bread California town) I was acting like black people from movies and TV. The only conclusion I could reach was that through this media, society had taught me that black people are dangerous, so when I wanted to be scary and tough, that’s what I acted like. But before I made myself look into this, I NEVER would have realized that on some level I thought black people were scary, and I had NO IDEA I was doing this clearly racist thing. The fact that I WAS doing it didn’t make me a bad person... just ignorant of my own racism. Especially if you are young, in your teens and twenties, and white, watch the white people around you when they act “tough”. It won’t be every one of them or all the time, but it will be a lot. When you’re looking for it, it’s really obvious. These days, I know my own toughness, and I never have to do any acting about it. These days I know that tough looks like being in a U.S. Air Force interrogation room in Germany and being clearly scared as shit but still repeatedly saying “I would like to continue to be cooperative, but if the questions are about my friends on base, I will not speak without a lawyer”. These days, all my toughness comes from inside. But, I know there are other things I do that I am not yet aware of that are just as racist. And homophobic. And misogynistic. And ableist. And just, informed and nurtured by my bigoted society in general. When you hear “all white people are racist” it does NOT mean the people saying it think you specifically are going around doing evil racist things on purpose. It means that when a white guy is in charge of hiring, he will pass over applications of qualified people if they have black-sounding names. They did a study to prove this. They passed out hundreds of resumés with identical qualifications but 1/2 with white-sounding and 1/2 with black-sounding names at the top. So, same resumé, one says “Cindy” one says “Lakisha”. White names got way more call backs. And most of the people sorting the resumés aren’t doing that on purpose, they’re not some comic book villain chortling “not this black-ass motherfucker” and tossing resumés in the garbage, they are normal white people who don’t think of themselves as racist and don’t realize what they are doing because they don’t understand the way they have been conditioned by our society to make subconscious associations about black names and black people. SUBCONSCIOUS. That’s the crux.  Because we KNOW you’re probably a good person doing your best. But how can you possibly answer the question “tell me the things you do that you don’t know you do”? That’s why it’s so important that you don’t take this all personally, but allow other people to give you insight into the ways you have been indoctrinated into participating in a bigoted society. But when you push back against that then we DON’T know you are a good person doing your best, we have to guess if you are or not. Because some people who push back against that are people who just haven’t matured into the concept yet.... and others are dedicated, purposeful bigots. In my next post about this, I will use a parable to help you get over your white guilt and associated internalized issues.

[thejonzone]

Jon Writes a Year-End List

My favorite songs of 2020, alphabetically by artist

Bedouine (Margo Guryan cover)- The Hum

The original Guryan version is good but Bedouine’s take is cleaner, all the better to emphasize Guryan’s blissful songwriting. I could listen to the chords in the chorus forever.

Bob Dylan- I’ve Made Up My Mind to Give My Heart to You

It’s nice to hear Bob sing a yearning and clear-eyed love song. And the way he stretches out his words gives the whole thing a confidence that’s easy to get lost in. 

Boldy James- Giant Slide

Boldy had a great year, and it’s The Price of Tea in China with Alchemist producing that stood out to me. 

Empty Country- Becca

I don’t go to music festivals anymore, but listening to this album makes me dream of hearing it live, while being dehydrated, sweaty, feet hurting, holding in a p*op, a late afternoon sunburn loading. I want the whole thing!!

fawning, Rui Gabriel ft. Jack Riley- God

Toss it on the cloudy day walking playlist!

Frances Quinlan- Went to LA 

Great cathartic yell in this one. Quinlan builds up a palpable tension here. It rocks.

Judy ft. Jack Dolan, jommis- Say What U Mean

You’ve got to imagine these fellas knew they had put a few catchy melodies down while trying to out-croon each other.

Kurt Vile ft. John Prine (John Prine cover)- How Lucky

A Prine acolyte with a feature from the man himself. RIP.

Lala Lala, Grapetooth- Valentine

Kind of like a slow-dance song at nightmare prom. I love the percussion and Frankel’s villainously-low voice.

Lil Durk- Street Affection

The range of emotions Durk can access and scroll through is impressive.  

Miranda Winters- Little Baby Dead Bird

Scuzzy guitar and violin create a hypnotic effect in this evocative dirge. Miranda Winters is such a good singer. Check out her main band, Melkbelly-- they put out a great album this year!

Nap Eyes- Mark Zuckerberg

Two guitars: one is pointy, the other is chugging. That is the correct way to do two guitars.

Noname- Song 33

This song is 70 seconds. 70! Noname casually negates J. Cole and the song isn’t even about him. She’s so great. 

Ratboys- I Go Out at Night

Julia Steiner is on her The Hours shit in this melancholic fantasy of leaving and not returning. 

Rio da Yung OG, Lil Yachty- 1v1

I like how Yachty comes in on his verse! It’s been fun to see him back in action with his new Michigan friends. Rio is the star here, though. And Enrgy too. 

Soccer Mommy- yellow is the color of her eyes 

Sophia Allison’s delivery of “The tiny lie I told to myself is making me hollow” might be my line of the year. 

Swamp Dogg- Memories

The whole of Sorry You Couldn’t Make It is great, but for Swamp Dogg, who has covered John Prine, to work with the man before he died is a special accomplishment, and we’re better off that it’s recorded. 

Tall Juan- Irene

One of my favorite 2020 releases. And I’ll be a bit vulnerable here folks….when I am walking outside and this song comes on, I push my butt out a little bit and walk like I have rhythm and purpose. 

Tierra Whack- Dora

I’m so excited to see what Tierra Whack does, from her beat selection to how she jumps between flow and cadence. She understands herself so well. 

Non-2020-specific Music I Enjoyed, in Superlative Form

Group Vocal Performance Most Likely to Pierce Your Heartless Facade

Yesu Ka Mkwebaze

Best Song to Listen to if You are an 1850’s-era whaler in Your Feels

Mary Ann

Favorite Duet (Not Blood-Related)

Emmylou Harris and Herb Pedersen (but mostly Emmylou) create such an intricate and gorgeous melody on “If I Could Only Win Your Love”. Pedal steel heads and mandolin freaks, eat up.

Favorite Duet (Blood-related)

The Louvin Brothers- When I Stop Dreaming

Any longtime friends of the show know I’m a big fan of the singing duo The Louvin Brothers. They’ve got that golden country tone but it’s the blood harmony that turns these guys into something else entirely.

And here’s the kicker, folks. Emmylou covered When I Stop Dreaming! How coincidental for all of us reading this End of Year list…. The Louvins are my preferred version, but Emmylou, that you could help me make this connection is enough, dayenu!

Most Surprising Use of a Song in a Network TV Show

"Yama Yama" by the Yamasuki Singers, Fargo Season 2

When I was a dishwasher at St. James Cheese Co., late 2016ish, this CD was in our back of house music rotation. It is a magical album-- a Japanese children's choir with French pop production (think a bunch of bells and shit). I never learned the name of the album while working there and it fell out of my mind until years later when, after remembering how much I loved it, realized I had no idea how to find it. The pain of typing different spellings of “japanese children’s choir” into google for days on end.....I literally yelled when Fargo used this in its Season 2 big boy shootout. *chef’s kiss*

Best Album by a Spiritually Hungry Musical Genius, Lapping Her Contemporaries in Arrangement, Theme, and Songwriting, Gone Before Her Time

Judee Sill’s self-titled debut. 

Best Use of a Second Keyboard in A Keyboard Solo

Fountains of Wayne’s Red Dragon Tattoo

Do I mean to say synthesizer? Not sure. RIP Adam Schlesinger and long live FoW. What a loss.

Best Vibes/ Song I’d Most Want to Show Ezra Koenig so That We’d Bond & Become Friends

Zibote

Best Lyrics Written by a Jew in 1920’s NYC Being Sung by Willie Nelson

Lonely rivers flow to the sea, to the sea / to the open arms of the sea

Favorite TV Shows

Ramy

-Second season shook its focus on the titular character and oh am I thankful. Not that Ramy himself isn’t great, he is, but the entire cast here deserves attention. The Uncle Naseem episode. The Uncle Naseem episode. Ahem. The Uncle Naseem episode.

Joe Pera Talks with You

Lovecraft Country

-Small gripes and complicated plotlines aside, this anthology connecting gothic horror, racism, and American history is phenomenal. 

Small Axe

-The second installment in this series, Lovers Rock, which takes place at a party, is the vicarious shot in the arm you deserve, you little extroverted thing you. 

I May Destroy You

Betty

The Last Dance

-The first Bulls game I ever went to was the first game *without* Michael Jordan, at the beginning of the ‘98-’99 season. Bad timing.

The Chi

Schitt’s Creek

-This show was never about the plot. Am I allowed to say that? I’ve never cared less for a plot and more for a cast. Catherine O’Hara is in her own league above us all.

Jon Writes a Year-End List

In 2019, my roommate June and I took a road trip through the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. I was out of a relationship, happily or unhappily I wasn’t sure yet, but along the way I downloaded Tinder hoping to meet a local who’d be excited to make out with me. There wasn’t much bite on my line, but by the time we reached Marquette, largely due to my good looks and charisma I’d orchestrated some type of group date with June, me, a girl from Tinder, and her friend. 

We met at a dingy karaoke bar and drank for cheap. Nobody wanted to hear me sing, but I got on stage anyway and gave “Willin” by Little Feat a go. Some guy at the bar in a maroon work shirt looked at me, scoffed, and left to smoke outside. The four of us weren’t hitting it off, even with alcohol. I and the friend made a plan to sing “Mommas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow up to Be Cowboys'', but she quickly abandoned the duet after we had begun, citing a lack of vibes.   

But we kept singing and drinking and hours later I was leaning against the bar, waiting to order, standing next to maroon-shirt guy who had so easily shrugged off my existence earlier. What caught my eye as I stood next to him was a Star of David tattoo on his forearm. And sure enough, the name tag stitched onto his shirt identified him as “Isaac”. Well I’ll goddamn be-- this guy was frickin Jewish! I was shocked-- I assumed he was goy in the same way I assumed everyone I ran into up there would be. 

For just one unconscious assumption (I’m the only Jewish person in this Marquette karaoke bar) to be wrong felt great. My assumptions are really awful. I assumed maroon-shirt hated my guts. I assumed these two girls we were drinking with thought I was a loser too. I assume people don’t like me or respect me or have any interest in getting to know me. I tell awful stories about myself to myself, and my assumptions about the world are limiting and boring! With patience, “guy at bar who kinda scowled at me” had all of a sudden turned into “my new friend Isaac” who, after a few minutes of conversation, I “asked to bum a cigarette from.”

One of my favorite shows of 2020 was Joe Pera Talks With You. I still remember watching Joe Pera’s stand-up for the first time, and then rewatching and rewatching, savoring his cadence. He dressed and spoke like a grandpa, replete with pitch-perfect, kinda-gross mouth sounds, stutters, and low-but-driving energy. It’s a good bit, and Joe has morphed it into probably the funniest, sweetest, and least-pandering show of 2020. What I love about this show is its foundational belief that anyone can surprise you, you just need to give yourself time to notice.

I didn’t end up making out with anyone but I did wake up the next morning with the worst hangover of my life. Wake up, barf, whimper. As June drove us out of Marquette, I could barely keep my eyes open. I did notice, however, a massive, wooden structure jutting out into Lake Superior.

It is this same Lake Superior structure that Joe Pera Talks With You fixates on for its first shot of Season 2. Yes, this is an Adult Swim show that takes place in none other than Marquette, Michigan! Which is weird. Think about other movies, shows, or books that take place in the U.P. You can’t! Even zooming out to include the larger Upper-Great Lakes region leaves us with an almost-empty net: The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald by Gordon Lightfoot and titular Gatsby’s origin story on Lake Superior. These are stories of hard living and life and death on the dangerous Great Lakes. But neither of those are specific to the Upper Peninsula.   

Regions are an easy if reductive lens with which to attempt to view and understand people. In 2020, broad and sweeping generalizations about large swaths of people continued to gain power. There was the movie adaptation of JD Vance’s ahistorical Hillbilly Elegy. Woolly-eyed liberals trotted out fake maps of a preferred America that holds only the “good” blue states, not at all engaging in the history of racism and voter suppression that got us here. Besides the fact that Georgia went blue. And Democratic strongholds like California, New York, and Chicago betray any notion of a “better” America. The sins of this nation are not cordoned off into one section or time zone, no region is monolithic, and most importantly, no person can be explained away with a quick sentence.

There is no regional monolith more widely misunderstood than the Midwestern gestalt. Fargo (the show) does a great job of serializing this one type of Midwestern character-- they say “oh sure, happy to help” and they’re murderers. So for Joe Pera to settle his show in the U.P. is a fun choice. Most Americans are probably hard-pressed to conjure an accurate mental picture of who the U.P. is, so Pera creates his own flavor of a seemingly-recognizable small Midwestern town.

In the first episode, Joe walks us through the bean arch he’s growing. Why grow snap beans? “Beans are straightforward.” Straightforwardness, or the appearance of, is central to Pera’s charm. Pera’s shtick is walking the audience through a basic task that can serve as a metaphor for a larger existential question. This conceit isn’t new to Pera, but it has been en vogue recently, with shows like Andy Daly’s Review and the new HBO show How To with John Wilson. These shows present a simple stated goal that obfuscates a larger, more complex grapple. 

Joe Pera Talks With You is incredible and endearing because of the genuine tone Pera gives his tight-knit Marquette. We’re getting deranged lunatics like Conner O’Malley and Dan Licata to write jokes for 70-year old Michigan grandmas at a salon. The show trades in the perceived Midwestern folksiness for a punchline, yet doesn’t lose itself in irony or resentment. 

Every character in the Joe Pera universe has the opportunity to be profound. Pera gives every character the patience they deserve; even O’Malley’s berserk Joe Rogan listening-caricature Mike Melsky gets incredible moments of vulnerability. It’s a rare comedy: self-aware but not self-obsessed, sweet but not gross, and uniquely funny.  

Nowhere else on TV are you going to see such consistently great acting. Some of the best working comedians are in this season. Conner O’Malley has found a way to tap into his unsettling grotesque that is a pleasure to watch, playing characters at the ends of their ropes, shrieking. Jo Firestone is hilarious and essential as Joe’s doom-prepper girlfriend Sarah. We get guest stars like  genius Carmen Christopher. Even one-line role players like Joe’s teacher-coworker, who says Joe and Sarah go together “like desk and chair,” knock it out of the park. 

The questions at the heart of Talks With You feel more pronounced in a year of death and isolation. How do we connect with people? How can we really be there for our loved ones? How can we feel comfortable in our own skin? The show came out pre-pandemic but Pera’s touch and pacing is universal.

It’s difficult not to compare Talks With You to How to with John Wilson. The two shows have a lot in common. Both protagonists are soft-spoken, and speak at an arrhythmic clip. John Wilson’s voice is affected just like Pera’s; both vocal deliveries are meant to engender trust by signaling to us that they’re lacking some social confidence. But I don’t buy Wilson’s shtick as much as Pera’s.

John Wilson’s show is not straightforward in the same way Pera’s is, and the show suffers under the added weight of pretense. Wilson’s tangents lead us to places that barely fit under the established thematic umbrella and feel forced. On memory, Wilson’s adventure with the Mandela Effect turns from fascinating to boring as the truthers devolve into sketch characters, viewing simple spelling errors with magnifying glasses. “How to Cover Your Furniture” spends an upsettingly long amount of time with an anti-circumcision advocate as Wilson works through the question of how much we are allowed to change parts of other people. Meant to appear as if they effortlessly fell into place, these characters feel shoe-horned in.

Both characters and shows are performative authenticity, and Joe Pera and John Wilson’s whole deal is their status as observer. This year, many of us have become observers. I know I have: unemployed, unable to see people, watching death counts climb, sending money to various bail funds and rent relief to people and organizations near and far. There is a responsibility to being an observer. It is not some callous task. Being an effective observer means allowing your subject the space they need to be as they are and not foisting your own nonsense onto them.

In Joe Pera’s America, it’s understood that everyone is weird. By virtue of being human, we are all weird, off, we do confusing things, and say dumb stuff that doesn’t make sense. Even you’re a weird freak. John Wilson’s subjects seem like circus animals, squeezed in front of the camera for their fucked-up little flip. I can’t shake the feeling that John Wilson is making fun of the people he’s observing. Pera’s observations are rooted in the fairness that comes from seeing humanity in people-- every person has an equal chance of surprising you with how weird they are if you just make them comfortable and let them talk. We owe that to each other.

To be fair, these shows are also very different. Wilson’s found-footage, documentary style is ingenious, hilarious, and completely not the vibe that Pera and Co. are going for at all. And region here is everything. Wacky stuff happening in NYC? Eh, isn’t that par for the course over there? Wait, a show set in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula? Ok...now that I’ve never seen. 

Obviously I was wrong about Isaac in Marquette, just as any broad assumption about a region and its people will be. I actually learned that Jews have a significant relationship to the U.P. And I found similarities between my own Jewish history, covering a similarly nebulous area of the Rust Belt/Midwest, and my U.P. cousins. Yes, home was closer than I thought, even across the length of Lake Michigan. Yes, people don’t just hate my guts. Yes, we can overcome lazy assumptions and we can even connect with people. We can make a better world. It just requires patience and listening.

Now, on to my thoughts regarding Fiona Apple’s landmark album Fetch the Bolt Cutters...

[tubbotums]

((What do you think warrants a retelling of RWBY? Is it just a fun world, or is the story actually misguided?))

Oh boy, grab your popcorn and get ready to listen for a while. Gonna put this under a cut so people who don’t feel like reading it can skip.

Do I love RWBY? Yes, I 100%. This show has done so much to change my life and has quite literally changed me as a person. It’s put me on the career path of wanting to make my own animated show, tell stories etc. It’s allowed me to meet new friends, and had it not been for the show I wouldn’t even be here typing this. When the new episodes are coming out, every Saturday I wake up at like 10:50 in the morning and wait on both my laptop and phone app so I can watch the episode at exactly 11 when it drops. Most of the time I have to wait, but regardless you see the point. My drawer has RWBY merch, my desks have figures and plushes, hell even my backpack is a RWBY one and I wear a sweatshirt that’s RWBY related basically everyday.

However, in my opinion, the show is heavily flawed from a production standpoint.

RWBY is a very inventive show, I’ll give it that. It tries to do so much with so little, and I applaud it for that. What Rooster Teeth has created is a unique world with lovable characters that have inspired so many. It’s hard to believe that this company that made this show were making Halo parodies in 2007 and still are. RWBY is probably at this point their most popular show, and the most popular web series as of now (discounting live action stuff like Content Cop or whatever). Hell, Warner Bros. Japan went to RT wanting to dub it  and air it there so people could experience it in Japanese. It’s wonderful to see this show blossom and grow. But it has one thing holding it back from truly being great in my opinion.

It’s being produced by Rooster Teeth.

Like I said before, I applaud Rooster Teeth for doing what they’ve done with this show and for all the hard work they’ve done with it. I love their content and the people responsible for bringing the show to life. But for what it wants to do, Rooster Teeth is far too small of a company to produce it and don’t have the necessary people to make it what it can truly be. It’s a show that has so much untapped potential, and I keep waiting for it to tap into it and show me what it can really be. But I get nothing, and waiting every episode after every episode gets tiresome.

RWBY likes to take from a lot of different things for inspiration, but I feel like it’s too scattered and all over the place from it’s inspiration to make logical sense. I hear Final Fantasy (which I see in the character designs, weapons and dust as a concept), but then I see Game of Thrones, Gurren Lagann, and other things that don’t even remotely cover the genre that RWBY is in. I’ve brought this up to people before and have been told that it’s “Monty’s true vision” and that “I just don’t understand it and shouldn’t question it”. God bless Monty Oum, he was a great animator and a wonderful man who I would love to meet and pick apart at his brain. But the man couldn’t tell a story, which was why he brought on Miles Luna and Kerry Shawcross, the lead writers of the show.

But before I get into M&K (who I both met and are lovely people), I want to touch up on the show’s inspiration. Monty wanted to create a show that revolved around his fight scenes, you know the stuff that you saw in Dead Fantasy or Red vs Blue Seasons 8-10. He didn’t care about the story and wanted to show off his fights and creative, lovable characters. If that’s what the show was going to be, I wouldn’t watch and I wouldn’t care as much as I do to write this. In my unpopular opinion, the show needs to stray away from Monty’s original ideas and gather more from outside sources that are doing the genre right. Shows like Hunter X Hunter, My Hero Academia, Fullmetal Alchemist, Sailor Moon and more that I can’t even list off the top of my head. These shows tackles themes present in RWBY and do it leaps and bounds better than what the show does. It’s frustrating to watch Gon Freeces or Izuku Midoriya get character development and progression that changes them and the path of the story but see Ruby Rose become a side character with no development since the beginning of the show. I’ll also add this in, if you want to take out My Hero from this list you can since RWBY started airing before MHA first published, and it has it beat by a few months I think? But I think the point still stands.

Now for Miles and Kerry, who I both love so much, there’s a lot of controversy around them. A lot of people, especially on this site, hate them and want different writers for the show. I’ve heard names like Lindsay Jones (voice actress for Ruby) and Mica Burton (a RT employee) as people who “should” be writing the show. Here’s the big issue with that:

Neither one has produced a show before and has written a script. Know who has? Miles Luna, who wrote three seasons of Red vs Blue. 

Yes, both are still amateurs and not professionals. They’ve been doing this for about a little more than half a decade, which isn’t a lot of time in the content production world. But this leads to another problem: Amateurs are writing this show. I don’t doubt the effort both of them put into making this show. They have A LOT to deal with, considering what happened with Monty, the show’s sudden boom in popularity, and much much more. But the fact that more experienced script writers aren’t writing a show this big is an issue, and you see it all the time in the show. They like to go with this “tell don’t show” approach, which doesn’t allow us to see the world and make it feel alive. We have to trust everything the characters say instead of actually getting to see it ourselves. We don’t see the racism Blake talks about except for a sign in a background shot that shows up on screen for two seconds. TWO SECONDS of seeing this one “No Faunus” sign is more signs of racism than we ever got from 4 and a half volumes and almost 20 minutes of exposition on it. There’s also just some really bad characters in the show as well, just really poorly written. I think my best examples are almost every villain, especially Adam and Cinder. I think both are just really shitty in every aspect and don’t add anything unique? If Adam wasn’t abusive and crazy, his cause would be more sympathetic and the White Fang would feel more like a Civil Rights group like they should be instead of a terrorist group like they’re portrayed to be. Cinder’s whole deal is just “I want power”, and the big question is why. We have no explanation as to why she sides with Salem and what her motives are. She’s just a puppet for the big baddie and that’s not right considering Cinder was the main antagonist for three volumes and will have just as big of a role going forth. A backstory can really help with this, but until we get one she’s a mediocre, borderline shitty villain in my books.

If the show was handled by, lets say Studio Madhouse, or Studio Bones, and if those don’t really sound familiar lets even throw in Toei, the show would be a lot better handled. Shows like My Hero, Hunter X Hunter, One Punch Man Season 1, Fullmetal Alchemist, Miraculous Ladybug and more have come from them and have done phenomenal. The writing, worlds, characters, all written in this just amazing way that I can see RWBY being written in. I can see RWBY having this expansive, almost unexplored world that we the viewers and the characters are going to explore together. But Rooster Teeth can’t provide that simply because they don’t have the money to. That’s no knock against them either, it’s just a fact. A RWBY fight will never look as good as Midoriya vs Todoroki or Meruem vs Netero, and that’s because the budget and time isn’t there. I just want to see this show thrive and become something special like these other shows, because I know it can be that. I know it can be tightly written with a power system that makes sense and a world that’s rich and vast, with different people having different motives that makes us really question who is right and who is wrong.

Aside from all that, what do I think the show does write? It creates really likable characters that almost everyone can relate to. All of Team RWBY is really likable, same with JNPR. The cast as a whole is colorful, and they’re the main reason I come back to watch the show week after week. The music is also pretty good? But tbh I wish there was more variety in the soundtrack as well. But aside from the characters and music I can’t think of much else.

So, with all that being said, I want to rewrite RWBY to fix these issues and tell my own version of the story, the version I’d like to see. A lot of people in this fandom might not agree with me on the ideas I have and my opinions, but quite frankly I’ve gotten tired of hearing people tell me that my ideas about the show are lesser because it doesn’t align with their views or Monty’s views (which are basically the same thing). I’m doing this because of my immense love for the show and because I want to see it be better. Please don’t take these words as anything harmful and as an endorsement to not watch the show. If you haven’t, I’m actually begging you to go watch RWBY. It’s a fun adventure, but it’s just very flawed and something I as an objective viewer who pays Rooster Teeth for early access to episodes cannot overlook. I’ve done it for far too long thanks to people and I’m sick of it. This retelling also is going to help me as a writer in making a long running story, and while most of the outline is made thanks to the show, there are still going to be a lot of differences from the canon counterpart. 

So please, go watch RWBY if you haven’t so you can see what I’m talking about, and to also let yourself be immersed into a wonderful world with wonderful characters. I love this show with a passion, and this retelling is being done because I want to see it do better is all, like I know it’s capable of.

[gascon-en-exil]

The Top Ten Women of Fire Emblem (As Written by a Gay Man)

#1 - Micaiah

When we were separated during the war, you changed, Sothe. And I changed too. I want to protect Daein more than anything. Our people must be saved, and if I can help in that effort, I will.

Let it not be said that this was an obvious pick simply because Micaiah happens to be a lord, and one from my favorite game in the series moreover. Although I thought it appropriate to end this ranking with a lord I’m well aware that all the women who’ve fulfilled that role in FE (excluding Avatars for obvious reasons) have had to work against writers determined to screw them over in one way or another. There’s not much point therefore in me rehashing the many criticisms, valid or not, that have been leveled against Micaiah over the years. I’m instead going to be breaking down just why I think she works for me as well as she does, and how thoroughly she earns the distinction of being the least narratively compromised female lord in the franchise...for whatever that’s worth.

Revenge of the Jugdral Waifs

Parts of Tellius’s worldbuilding borrow extensively from Jugdral, some in more subtle ways than others. Micaiah is one of its more obvious allusions, as both her look and class design owe much to a group of female light magic users from those games who also exist outside the framework of the traditional clerical classes (some - or all? - of them even share their starting class name with the Japanese name of Micaiah’s third tier class). Deirdre, Julia, Linoan, and Sara are all women of high standing, and three of them are linked by blood to the dark Loptyrian cult not unlike Micaiah’s association with the “dark” goddess Yune. In spite of circumstances that ought to grant them significant plot relevance however all four of these characters are diminished by the narratives of the two games, either kept on the political sidelines in preference to a man or turned into barely-characterized damsels in distress. To paraphrase Markoftheasphodel, Deirdre and Julia in particular encapsulate the whole of Jugdral’s particular brand of misogyny - some of the most important and powerful characters in the setting reduced to tormented plot devices devoid of personality.

It’s probably a stretch to suggest that Micaiah was intentionally written as a means of redeeming these characters after the fact merely because she owes so much of her design to them. Still, that reading is certainly there. Micaiah assumes Julia’s role during Part 4, becoming the human vessel for Yune as Julia is inhabited by the spirit of Naga during the last chapter of FE4. While there’s no arguing that Micaiah drew the short straw when it came to gameplay power-ups from her resident deity, in return she is allowed substantially more screentime and agency even when she’s sharing her body with someone else. Certain characterization threads relative to Micaiah and not Yune, like vengeance against Numida and Lekain and the back story of Micaiah’s relationship with Sothe, are followed through to their conclusions only during Part 4. Also, while it’s Yune calling the shots as the army ascends the Tower of Guidance Micaiah is still an active participant, taking responsibility for awakening Yune before Dheghinsea and saving Lehran among other things. 

It’s a common criticism that Ike takes over the plot of Radiant Dawn from Micaiah, but the truth is that he’s sharing the endgame spotlight with Micaiah and Yune together. Ike is still the saga hero of Tellius - the Seliph equivalent - but Micaiah displays none of Julia’s blankness and passivity at any point. She’s unquestionably closer to being the deuterotagonist of Tellius than any Leif equivalent (Elincia, perhaps?). What’s more, while Linoan must cede her political relevance to Leif and Julia’s epilogue has her being little more than a support to her emperor brother, Micaiah gets to rule the kingdom she’s spent the game trying to save - while not invalidating the rule of her recently-discovered younger sister over her own country, incidentally - whereas Ike leaves the continent to have adventures and gay sex. In Jugdral the best most women can hope to be is support for their ruling husbands; in Tellius all three beorc nations have women ruling them by the end. Indeed, even compared with the other non-Avatar female lords that’s a huge step forward.

Conquest Needs to Take Notes: FE10′s Villain Campaign

This should really be a more controversial statement than it actually is: the Dawn Brigade chapters of FE10, especially those in Part 3, make for a better villain campaign than the entirety of FE14′s Conquest route.

It’s sad how that it isn’t really an exaggeration at all, and even more sad that FE10 doesn’t rely on narrative shortcuts to convey the idea that you’re temporarily playing as the bad guys like Conquest does. Daein isn’t draped entirely in black, and its antagonistic history as a nation saddled with a legacy of racism and Ashnard’s goals of conquest isn’t swept under the rug or left to be inferred only from Path of Radiance. The Daein of Radiant Dawn still displays its anti-laguz prejudice from the previous game, and there’s no indication that that prejudice doesn’t extend to members of the playable cast or that it’s something that will be quickly and cleanly done away with after the credits roll. Micaiah herself plays to the wishes of her racist followers when she has to in Part 3, and though she’s not rabidly bigoted like Jill is in FE9 before her character development she does have a personal interest in not making waves.

I’m not only talking about her ambivalence toward laguz as a Branded, either. One of Micaiah’s most defining traits is her patriotism. It’s a curious element of her character, based in her feelings toward her adopted homeland and willfully unconcerned with Daein’s racism even as it forces her to hide her Brand. It’s rather amusing that probably the most common criticism leveled against Micaiah is that she’s a Mary Sue blindingly adored in-universe, not just because the same could be said for Ike but because that’s exactly what she’s built up to be. If anything the mounting conflict between Ike’s loyal followers - technically the Gallian army and later Crimea and Sanaki’s forces, but they all join together under him - and the cult-ish adherents of “the Maiden of Dawn” deconstructs this accusation. Everyone in Daein may adore her and may have rallied around the Dawn Brigade in a bid to remove the Begnion occupation, but by Part 3 that fervor is shown to be clearly unhealthy and something that Lekain is able to manipulate to his advantage. 

It’s not just the alliance with Begnion that places the Dawn Brigade chapters in villain campaign territory, as Micaiah is forced to resort to increasingly underhanded tactics to satisfy the demands of the senate, from ambushes in the dark to outright war crimes. All the while she’s being ironically proclaimed by her soldiers a symbol of light and divine will, a stark contrast to Nohr’s shadowy branding. It’s a matter of opinion whether Lekain’s blood pact is more or less contrived than the various plot devices that keep Conquest Corrin in line during the invasion of Hoshido, but Micaiah is actually allowed to be genuinely antagonistic toward the armies she’s opposing, in large part because of her pronounced nationalism and the atmosphere of blind worship she’s allowed to grow around her. One of the most important elements of a well-written villain story is that the characters involved shouldn’t think of themselves as the villains unless they’re fully evil and are committed as such (which usually isn’t that interesting anyway). Conquest focuses too much on Corrin’s angst over the ruin of Hoshido and leaves the motivations of the Nohrians vague, whereas Daein in Part 3 carries both its legacy of bigotry and militarism from FE9 and the memory of its glorious uprising against foreign oppression from Part 1. It’s not hard at all to imagine the members of the Dawn Brigade and even the Daein military thinking themselves heroes of their own story, bolstered by a leader determined to do whatever is necessary to save her people.  

The Token(-ish) Het of Tellius

I would be remiss though if I didn’t talk about queer content at some point, because Tellius pretty much runs off the stuff. In that regard Micaiah is admittedly lacking; she has her auto-A support with Sothe and almost nothing else, and while exposition on their early relationship reveals that their bond is a quasi-incestuous one riddled with age issues it’s not in the same league as Nailah/Rafiel totally inverting gender roles, Haar/Jill almost literally robbing the cradle, or Elincia’s complex feelings for her two closest retainers. One can appreciate though that Micaiah/Sothe displays a certain symmetry with Ike/Soren, from parallels in their first meetings to the experiences of one member of each pairing being Branded to their roles at the heads of their respective armies (from a gameplay perspective note that Soren and Sothe stand beside their partners when faced as enemies in 3-13 and 3-E respectively). I might go so far as to say that these symmetries provide additional legitimacy to Ike/Soren as a paired ending, especially since they get their own exposition-laden base conversation in endgame.

Ooh, Shiny!

And ok, my bias in favor of light magic users is on display here too. I was hyped for Micaiah as soon as she appeared in promotional materials as a caster lord, the first and so far only purely magical unit to hold that title. Even notwithstanding the fact that Radiant Dawn is arguably the worst game in the series in which to be a magic user Micaiah has some serious issues as a unit, but at least when she sucks in-game she does so in manner completely distinguishable from the likes of Leif and Roy. She can be a staffbot (she can use Physic as soon as she promotes), she can nuke stuff with Thani and/or Wrath crits thanks to her nonexistent defenses, she can riskily play around her late promotions with Resolve (Easy only, please), and even at the end of the game when she’s probably still frail and will never be fast enough to double everything she’s still the best candidate for Rexaura just because the saints are even worse. I appreciate too that light magic got some much-needed statistical buffs compared to Path of Radiance, and we most likely have Micaiah to thank for that. Even if the game hates her she can make for a fun if challenging unit to use to her greatest potential.

...Now I want to play FE10 again.

[oumakokichi]

Could Korekiyo and Angie being the least popular characters in NDRV3 be purposely set as part of the game show? I feel that this is kind of the case to entertain viewers and give them something to hate.

That’s a really interesting thing to think about! I think it’swithin the realm of possibility, to some degree, though there’s no way to besure. As long as we don’t know exactly how much of what Tsumugi said was trueor not, the line between what she planned for the characters to do and how muchwas their own free will in the matter gets pretty blurry.

For instance, we definitely know that it’s not as if theirpersonalities pulled a 180. Even Ouma, whose in-game self is the most notablydifferent from what we see of his pre-game self, likely had some of thesequalities under the surface.

Other characters who we hear speak in the prologue quite alot, such as Miu and Tenko, act extremely similar to their in-game selves: Miu’slanguage and behavior is just as crass, only lacking her boasts about being agreat inventor, and Tenko’s reactions are just as hilariously over-the-top. Sowe can tell from this that they don’t seem to have been changed much at allfrom their original personalities.

It all comes down to a question of how much influence theremember lights actually had, or how much drastically changing someone’sbackstory could prompt them to act or behave in a certain way. For instance,characters like Kaede who had a relatively normal backstory even in-game andgrew up in a loving family environment, probably weren’t impacted all that muchby the remember lights. Kaede is certainly more go-getting and optimistic as aleader than her pre-game self seems to have been, but her thought processes andbehaviors are largely the same.

Maki, however, might serve as a different example. It’s hardto know what pre-game Maki was like, since she hardly speaks at all in theprologue. But we know that her in-game backstory provided her with quite a hugeinfluencing factor. It’s hard to grow up thinking of yourself as someone who’sbeen trained to be a ruthless killer and had all the emotions stomped out ofyou and say, “oh that’s just fiction though, it’s just a remember light, itdoesn’t impact me much.”

Just as Maki’s actions are heavily influenced by the in-gamebackstory she was provided (including trying to overcome it), I wouldn’t besurprised if other characters were similarly influenced. The remember lightsseem to hold their highest degree of influence when the people they’re used ontrust them blindly and have no idea how they work. Since no one but Ouma seemsto have doubted the credibility of the remember lights prior to Chapter 5, wecan assume that any other characters probably did trust their own backstory andin-game memories pretty thoroughly.

In that case, it’s definitely possible that Korekiyo andAngie being provided their particular kinds of backstories and personalitiescould well have been an attempt on Tsumugi’s part to try and make them into acertain kind of character.

While Tsumugi definitely didn’t have control over all thethings she said she did in the epilogue, I don’t doubt there were developmentsshe wanted to happen in-game. Forexample, she had no influence over Maki and Momota’s feelings for one another,but it’s true that I think she liked the idea of their potential relationshipbecause it was something that would “make the killing game more exciting” (inthe same way that Peeta and Katniss’ relationship made the Hunger Gamesexciting). She even at one point tried to ask Saihara if he was involved in atriangle relationship with the two of them, getting pretty excited at the idea.

Clearly, she liked the idea of dramatic developments orcharacters following a certain “script” that would read right out of a soapopera or cliché story. Any time characters go against these particularscenarios or expectations she has for them, she gets pretty notably displeased.When Himiko begins living much more strongly, excitedly, and getting angry andenergetic about everything, Tsumugi is one of the only characters I can thinkof who doesn’t seem to like it much. Unlike most of the other characters whosupport Himiko in her endeavor to be more open about her feelings, I thinkTsumugi definitely wanted Himiko to remain the “quiet, lazy witch girl” rolethat she had in store for her.

Korekiyo and Angie definitely involve aspects to theirbackstories which I wouldn’t be surprised if Tsumugi had thrown in to try andcaricaturize them or make them into a parody of themselves. It’s entirelypossible that their pre-game selves had aspects vaguely in common with them:for instance, perhaps Korekiyo did have a sister who he cared about, and maybeAngie was openly religious. But I think it’s definitely possible that thesetraits were taken and amped all the way up for the sake of “making the killinggame show more exciting” and taking otherwise normal qualities and trying totwist them into something exaggerated and over-the-top, as is the tendency inDR.

I’ve talked about it before in another post I think, but it’sentirely possible that Angie’s pre-game self might not even be foreign. She waswearing an extremely ordinary school uniform in the prologue, and her one ortwo lines of Japanese didn’t really suggest any reason to guess that it wasn’ther native language.

I wouldn’t be surprised at all if the reason she was writteninto being the “quirky foreign occult girl” trope was specifically because of underlyingracism and gross assumptions heavily associated with otaku like Tsumugi (andlike the rest of the producers at Team Danganronpa, probably). Angie wasprobably written into the kind of character she was, with the speech habits and“weird scary foreign girl” behavior becauseof her darker skin. Throw in the possibility that she might have been openlyreligious and it’s easy to see the ways in which Tsumugi probably felt she couldcaricaturize the scenario.

Just as there were characters who Tsumugi clearly intendedto try and steer the audience into liking right from the start (such as Kaede,arguably even Kiibo), there were probably characters who she wanted to bemassively disliked too. While the role she had in store for Ouma was probablymore of the “villain so horrible and antagonistic he’s actually massivelypopular” sort of trope, not every single character can fill that niche. Justlike on any reality show, she probably felt there needed to be characters whowere more unpopular on purpose, in order to highlight the good points andpopularity of the other characters. So in that sense, it would make sense toassume that some of the characters, like Angie and Korekiyo, got stuck in thissort of role.

Of course, it’s dangerous to assume that everything they didor felt or thought was just as a result of Tsumugi’s scenario. She clearly wanted them to act and behave in acertain way, but doing so was ultimately up to them. Remember lights aredefinitely not infallible like Junko’s brainwashing in dr3, and the amount ofinfluence or control they have seems to vary depending on the individual.

Just the fact that so many characters in ndrv3 seem to havebroken away from the initial “script” prepared for them and changed intosomething else entirely proves that it was definitely possible to avoid fallinginto these pitfalls and “roles” Tsumugi wanted them to fall into. Saihara andHimiko both changed their outlook and behaviors drastically. Even Maki, who was relatively easy for Tsumugi tomanipulate because of how much hold her backstory had over her, eventually cameto develop past that backstory and find her own sense of autonomy and controlover her own life.

If it was possible for so many characters to go against whatTsumugi had planned for them, then the potential was probably there for everycharacter—it then just became a matter of whether the characters in particular wantedto go against those roles or not. But I do like the fact that there’sdefinitely a heavy degree of free will and choice involved in the rememberlights, because it makes trying to analyze each character’s behavior andchoices so much more interesting than it would be if this were dr3 brainwashingall over again.

Anyway, this was a very interesting question! Thank youagain for asking!

[jonboudposts]

Winston Churchill and the British Fear of History

This piece is adapted from a broadcast of All the Rage due to be played on Trax FM on 20 February 2019.  It will then be available for streaming and download; I thought it was worth putting into a readable piece too but please excuse the tone if it sounds like a radio show.

Sometimes when the deadline for a radio show approaches, I can be rather panicked.  It can be a struggle to address interesting subjects in the right detail, or at the right time and I often have weeks wandering around stressing about what we should talk about.

This is not one of those weeks; because often, especially in Britain, anything from a serious issue to a seriously-not one drops into my lap from the wider world and our wonderful media - this week it has been that ghost of British history’s appalling past in the shape of one of Britain’s worst sons, Mr Winston Churchill.

The reason he is back in the news is because a few people recently have mentioned how he was not a wonderful person unlike his historical profile; the one getting the most attention is Labour Shadow Chancellor John MacDonnell, who was asked if Winston Churchill was a hero or villain; he replied villain and qualified this as being based in his actions as part of the Tonypandy riots. It caused the usual bullshit response from the usual people and lots of pathetic apologetic behaviour too.

Personally I wish they ha asked me because my response to Churchill would cause mass pearl-clinching hysteria in these circles no doubt.

Now, this will not be a biography on the bloke; I am not going to note his school life, every position he ever held or what so-and-so said about him. This is about facing some of Britain’s most terrible history and how it affects life in the country today – and what position Churchill takes in all this.

Straight out the gate, he is my position:

I hate Winston Churchill.   I hate the things he believed, the things he did based on those beliefs and how he holds a heroic position in much of British culture.  As a working class political activist and believer in the importance of knowing our history, he is a figure of oppression. As an active anti-racist, he is a figure of evil.  He is class privilege personified and someone who has become a Jesus-like figure to the far right and centre and an example of the cultural inertia we face today.

More importantly, I hate the way it has become taboo to raise any question about him or anything about the Second World War, including setting certain facts straight.

If you are someone who feels saying such things about people like him or feel any criticism of the generation he supposedly represents is not acceptable, we will never agree but I would ask you to listen and hear a totally different view that while perhaps repellent to you, is sincerely held and formed.

Churchill represents so much that I hate about British culture and society and he was a terrible man.  Let’s look at his worst hits:

Racism – Churchill was a white supremacist and is today considered a hero by people who have the same opinions.  He saw Indians, whom he starved and Kurds, who he wanted to gas as ‘beastly people’ of a lesser worth and talked of wiping out the Japanese.

Whites were a stronger race according to him; better than blacks or quote ‘red Indians’ and this justified taking their place an land, mass slaughter, etc.  Ironically for his modern supporters, he had more respect for Islam then they like to admit but one does not cancel out all the others.

He was also not opposed to fascism; he in fact had admiration for Franco in Spain and spoke admiringly of Mussolini in Italy.

Famine – most acts of mass starvation are caused by human action and Churchill was fundamental to the Bengal famine in India where 4 million or more died and it is estimated the Indian population suffered the equivalent of a loss up to 100 million.

Ireland – he suppressed Irish people, their culture and anyone who believed in independence including sending the brutal Black and Tans to subject the population to violent suppression, with thousands killed during the War of Independence.

Miners – during the miner strike of 1910-11, where strikers attempted to improve their terms and conditions that were being kept deliberately low.  Mr Churchill decided to send in the troops and many in the working class community and especially Wales have never forgiven him.

He was a racist, extremist and enemy of the working class – simple as that.  He was totally led by ego and getting his name into the history books just like some of his political decedents, although most of them have not managed to rack up the bodies that Winston has on him.

This of course feeds into the subservient attitude of today’s British (or more specifically English) culture that detests change and difference and while refusing to show decency and respect to so many types of people and viewpoints, demands obedience to the things they hold dear – such as war and dominating other parts of the world.

Every far right group, politician or general gobshite uses the war and ‘respect’ for soldiers as a shield usually for their own racism or similar hatred.  It is a mindset like many religions or cults try to enforce – of not thinking or questioning what you are told.  This foul representative of the ruling order somehow becomes a ‘man of the people’ through the power and privilege bestowed upon him by his class position.

In the modern context, we now see ludicrous comparisons with Brexit to the ‘Blitz spirit’ and a need to believe in Britain to get what you want; this was of course what won World War 2 and nothing to do with the Soviet army smashing the shit out of the Nazis at the expense of around 27 million soldiers and civilians on their part.

Worse, some people seem to like the idea of the Blitz; when bomber planes randomly took out houses and people every night; this is something that can only be thought by the dangerously ignorant and disconnected, not to mention a great insult to those who survived it, not to mention those not so lucky.

Winston Churchill did not win WW2; he did not even fight in it.  He toured the sites of warfare after the bodies were cleared away and after the war, when the British electorate put him out of a job, he spent time writing himself into the history books; in fact many of his quotes are quite useful here – ‘history will be kind to me for I intend to write it’.

What he did is make speeches calling for unity and strength, which he acted on by leading a coalition government.  But this was his job and not the only speeches he made.  He also praised Mussolini, Franco and even seems to have admiration for Hitler.  In fact his view as we noted earlier is that fascism was only a problem if it invaded Britain; it could do what it liked on the continent.

Winston Churchill did not save Britain in the war; everyday people fought, planned, sacrificed and died.  Most importantly, the generation who fought in the war knew this.

Post-WW2: Birth of the Welfare State

The generation that fought in the war, who we lionise more than we ever talked to, had far less delusions about Winston Churchill; so much in fact that upon returning home and perhaps remembering how badly the returnees from WW1 had been treated, they demanded a better country to live in with a welfare state that took care of it’s people rather than privileged the rich.

Churchill was up for none of this – so they voted him out.  A ruling class thug could never bring himself to allow the rabble to have any control over their own lives nor the country they had just fought for.

Fortunately the Labour Party was offering free healthcare via the NHS and all the benefits of a decent welfare system that treated people with decency and respect – and fortunately for all of us, the public voted for it.

Churchill’s Cheerleaders

Boris Johnson – this bell-end has written a book on the man and has nothing but unqualified and uncritical praise.  For those of you not in the know, Boris Johnson is another egotistical upper class prick who has come into politics as his birthright – he is also utterly useless and never takes responsibility for his actions; sound familiar?

During the last week, when it was announced that the budget for a planned garden bridge that was never build during his time as London Mayor ran to £53 million of public funds, you would think the media might have been chasing him over this and a few other gaffs.  But no, he was able to flap about John MacDonnell and the great insult to daddy Winston.  Talk about a snowflake.

Also like Churchill, our Bodger Boris loves to indulge in racism such as against Muslim women and their ‘letterbox’ face vales, or claiming that when President Obama said Britain would not get preferential treatment for trade deals upon leaving the EU, that he was motivated by his ‘Kenyan roots’ to ‘hate Britain’ – so at least Boris has some understanding of British history.

Jacob Rees-Mogg – the living epitome of class privilege and the awful right wing politics that goes with it.  Old Jacko cuts a ludicrous figure and that is probably the most dangerous thing about him; for like Mr Johnson he comes across as someone not to take seriously – but we really should.

Along with his retro-views on women and LGBT rights, he loves the Victorian era and was once exposed attending a dinner hosted by The Traditional Britain Group, who among other things feel no one non-white can be British and advocates other ethno-nationalist themes.  They have advocated for the deportation of non-whites including Doreen Lawrence. They also hosted Simon Heffer and Richard Spencer as speakers.  

His recent hit was to claim that the British invention of concentration camps during the Boar War was for their own safety and all those who died were just part of what happened years ago when more people just died…this was part of his answer to the question of Churchill.

All of which slots nicely into his hard right political position

Sadiq Khan – I don’t like to take a pop at the London Mayor as in a lot of ways I like him; but he is a centrist and on issues like this, he is a little too cautious for my liking; not perhaps a cheerleader but part of those who have equally failed to tackle the true meaning and human weight of the actions that Churchill committed.

While co-hosting a regular phone-in last week on LBC Radio, the question came up and he talked about understanding Churchill ‘in context’. What exactly the context for understanding a mass murderer who hated non-whites and the working class is, Sadiq did not go on to note sadly.

In fact this liberal unease at condemning Winston Churchill is probably more disgusting that the right wing open praise and hero worship; after all, it is their nature to cheer a right wing white supremacist whose actions led to the death of thousands – what’s your excuse liberal boy?

No doubt it relates to the hatred in liberal centrist circles for the left; during the Blair and Brown years they thought the political inevitably of capitalist realism meant we had been cast into history forever.  But that is not the case and they have been having daily breakdowns ever since Corbyn became Labour Party leader.

Perception

Earlier I referred to the perception of Winston Churchill in this country and what I am specifically talking about is how he has become an icon who cannot be criticised; when people do criticise him, responses can range from complete dismissal of you as a person to outright death threats.

But it was not always such because once again we have seen a cultural movement that has taken even more drastic hold in the last thirty years’ class war.

Despite what media and modern discourse might have you believe, it is not uncommon – and was more so for the war generation – to find working class communities and people who have no time for Winston Churchill, my family included. He was seen as the elitist rich boy he was and all the things he did were informed by that and the need to preserve the status quo.  People from Wales to India have no trouble assessing him based on everything he did, not just his hyped-up war record.

So many of the ideals of the far right come from Churchill; his belief in the lesser worth of other nations’ people and religions; his belief in mass slaughter; that ethnicities like Indian people ‘bread like rabbits’ and even closer to home, his contempt for the Irish and working class in general.

Subservience

All of this is also tied into British history in regards Empire and all the evils done there.  Too much of English-dominated society either does not want to face this history, or has no problem with it; this is the reason for racism, xenophobia and the silly idea of English exceptionalism

Now I have my theories about why this is but none of them are complete so I may have to conclude with a question rather than an answer; why are people so subservient to power?  We can look nationally, in which case no doubt it involves the class system but then America is just as bad if not worse.  They of course have a class system that is rarely talked about traditionally but also the overt worship of position in hierarchy, which they probably inherited from the British.  It does not matter how you got power, just that you have it.

So is it a western problem?  Not entirely although that may be a particular type but plenty of countries in Africa, Asia, Latin America, anywhere you choose to mention has a love of ‘strong man’ leaders.

But then again many other parts of the world – from Europe to wider – have also had working class-led revolutions and Britain has not.

Recently Lord Finkelstein – a Tory Lord – published a piece in The Times saying that Churchill was a racist and life-long white supremacist.  Even someone on the political opposite gets this, so what’s the problem?

Conclusion

Winston Churchill was one of the worst people Britain ever produced who cynically wrote himself into history as a more important man than he was.

I feel no affinity to country or nation and I will not surrender my critical faculties for anyone especially a self-serving member of the elite.

This brings us back to the culture war again and links into wider blathering about ‘Western Civilisation’ and how anything foreign (read non-white or Jewish) is degrading the greatness of our beloved culture – that would be the thing whose biggest exports in the last 20/25 years have been a game show about becoming a millionaire and a supposed-talent show about torturing my ears. ‘Western Culture’ is again a concept with roots in colonialism, anti-Semitism and racist assumptions about impurity brought about by mixing.  

As Owen Jones pointed out, our rights and freedoms were not given to us but won by everyday civilians demanding them; suffragettes, trade unionists, political campaigners and today kids striking for the future of the planet.

The hero worship of Winston Churchill is a way of airbrushing out the work done by all these people; real people like you and me who give and gave everything as oppose to Churchill who only ever acted for himself.  Hero worship and patriotism will get you nowhere and require wiping out large swaths of actual fact and history in order to make your side look better – a side to which you have added nothing, merely been born into and taken for granted that you have a right to certain things above others.

Now, for the first time in my life, we have the chance to really change society – to make life better with stronger rules and laws governing working; the opportunity for a foreign policy that does not involve terrorising weaker countries; to make life more equal and demand those with the most pay their way. We also need to get with the programme in regards climate change otherwise we will not be here much longer.

Ditch the worshipping of anyone but especially these appalling establishment toads.  The class war has not managed to destroy us despite throwing everything at the job; now we need to stop doing it for them.

Recommendations

Winston Churchill by Clive Ponting (Sinclair-Stevenson, 1994)

A far more honest and comprehensive study of the man’s career

Contrpoints video on The West was very informative and funny

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyaftqCORT4

[clubofinfo]

Expert: “Racism – Shame of America” – Soviet poster about the civil rights struggle in the United States Are you a western journalist or analyst with an issue you cannot explain? Do your symptoms include an unwillingness to learn anything from history and an unconditional embrace of western exceptionalism? Then we have just the thing for you: RussiaDidIt! Taken in the appropriate dosage, RussiaDidIt can be used for just any issue, small and large, old and new, near and far. Call your local US embassy or EU office and order your RussiaDidIt talking points. Side effects may include total paranoia, loss of credibility and a desire to wear the EU flag as a cape. ***** It seems like all the evils that plague the western world these days have a common cause. Brexit, Catalonia, Trump, racial tensions, the lack of credibility of the EU, all of these have a simple explanation, if we are to believe the mainstream media and pundits: Russia is behind it. And not just Russia, but Putin himself. He must be the busiest villain in history. True journalists like Robert Parry have analysed and exposed the rise of this new McCarthyism, and how uncorroborated, or sometimes outrightly false, allegations gradually become unquestionable facts.1 In this piece we examine three articles that have different angles of this RussiaDidIt approach. They have the paranoia of Russian meddling in US elections as a background, but everything applies just as well to similar stories about the EU. Inevitably it all ties back to an inability, or unwillingness, to learn anything from history, and this disgusting myth that everyone should look up to the West as a beacon of superior values. We start, of course, with the ineffable Guardian. Cheap journalism and cheap meddling One day journalism students will study the spiral of lowering standards that took hold of the Guardian. One can sense the denial taking hold of the newspaper as their liberal centrist paradise crumbles. They yearn for a knight in shining armour who can come and save them from Brexit, even if it is Tony Blair, because, believe it or not, the idea of the EU has been here since the Renaissance!2 As expected, the Guardian has embraced the idea that the Russians “hacked” the 2016 US elections (whatever that means) wholeheartedly. And it recently reported on new, ground-breaking revelations: Russian trolls posing as Americans made payments to genuine activists in the US to help fund protest movements on socially divisive issues […] […] the newspaper RBC published a major investigation into the work of a so-called Russian “troll factory” since 2015, including during the period of the US election campaign, disclosures that are likely to put further spotlight on alleged Russian meddling in the election. So far it sounds very serious. We then learn that the main “socially divisive issue” was race relations. RBC counted 16 groups relating to the Black Lives Matter campaign and other race issues that had a total of 1.2 million subscribers. The biggest group was entitled Blacktivist and reportedly had more than 350,000 likes at its peak. Last month, CNN also reported that US authorities believed the Blacktivist Facebook group and Twitter account were the work of Russian impostors. The liberal media have often thrown these outrageous suggestions that activism like Black Lives Matter is part of a foreign agenda, as opposed to a reaction to the structural racism that exists in the US (more on this later). But the main point that needs to be addressed about this cunning plan is the following: how much did the Russians spend in these devious activities of inflaming tensions in the US? A whopping… 80.000 dollars! The Guardian thinks the activities of some alleged troll factory engaging in social media activity and paying activists a grand total of $80.000 represents unacceptable Russian “meddling”! Billboard accusing Martin Luther King Jr. of being a communist Let us put this number in perspective. Hillary Clinton made $3 million out of 12 speeches to big banks. The entire spending in the US presidential election was almost $2 billion. And the Guardian is worried about these $80.000 worth of meddling. For comparison USAID spent $4.2 million advancing US interests in Venezuela in 2015 alone. Even if these $80.000 had been spent in a single year, it would still be 50 times smaller than what one of the US empire’s foreign policy branches spent only in Venezuela. The Guardian piece closes by mentioning that the evil Russians also bought ads on Google and Facebook for “tens of thousands of dollars” and “$100.000”, respectively. So in essence, the Guardian is reporting that it found suspicious grains of sand in the desert.3 It would seem Putin is not just an evil mastermind, he is also a legendary bargain hunter. It should also be clear that the tech giants are more than happy to play their part in the witch-hunt and the crusade against “fake news”, which is nothing but an attempt by the dominant classes to monopolise their control over information. Trump is a closet Marxist! Next we look at an opinion column which has got to be one of the most ludicrous texts ever written. At first glance it could be mistaken for satire, but it was actually written by Cass Sunstein, a professor at Harvard and former member of the Obama administration, for Bloomberg News. The title is “Russia Is Using Marxist Strategies, and So Is Trump”! While the entire piece should be framed for posterity, we will just quote some of the highlights: Karl Marx and his followers argued that revolutionaries should disrupt capitalist societies by “heightening the contradictions.” Russia used a version of that Marxist idea in its efforts to disrupt the 2016 presidential campaign. […] What is more surprising, and far more important for American politics, is that President Donald Trump is drawn to a similar strategy. Marx contended that as the conditions of workers started to improve, they would cease to be content with their lot, or to regard their alienation as inevitable. Lenin seized on this idea and transformed it into a revolutionary strategy. […] The job of the communist revolutionary was to “heighten” or “accelerate” those contradictions. During the 2016 campaign, Russians did something very much like that, not to produce a revolution, but to deepen and intensify social divisions (and to help elect Donald Trump). In short, the Russians tried to foster a sense of grievance and humiliation on all sides. […] Lenin would have been proud. The Russian actions that Sunstein is talking about are none other than the buying of social media ads and fostering of activism that we described in the previous section. But how about that for a deep understanding of Marx and Lenin? Sunstein does try to shield himself with a footnote that says: I am giving a brisk summary of some famously complex and ambiguous arguments from both Marx and Lenin. (my emphasis) Marx, Engels, Lenin… and Trump? Cass Sunstein of Harvard University and Bloomberg News is on the maximum dosage of RussiaDidIt! There is nothing ambiguous about Marx and Lenin. Sunstein’s argument, on the other hand, is unambiguously idiotic. The fundamental contradiction in capitalist society is that one (large) group, the working-class, sells its labour, while another one, the bourgeoisie, profits from it because it owns the means of production. These two groups have fundamentally different interests and are irrevocably at odds. This is called class struggle. Marx’s work is monumental because it was the first truly scientific analysis of the capitalist system, which meant it also explained how it could be destroyed. The “accelerating of these contradictions” means accelerating this class conflict in order to do a little more than “disrupting” capitalism. The goal is to overthrow capitalism altogether, have the workers seize power and the means of production, and have a society free of exploitation4 and where production is directed to satisfy human need and not the profit of capitalists. In other words, socialism. Lenin’s contributions to Marxism, both in theory and practice, are, of course, way beyond the childish arguments in this piece, from his understanding of capitalism’s inevitable development into imperialism, to his development of the role of the vanguard party. Lenin and the Bolsheviks were responsible for the October Revolution of 1917, the first time that capitalism was overthrown, and the starting point for all the liberation movements that followed. The whole argument, if it were taken seriously, would be about the strategy to “divide and conquer”, which has nothing to do with Marxism. Just like Trump, the real-estate mogul and reality-TV star, has nothing Marxist about him. If anything, Trump is the highest embodiment of western capitalism. Surely among the vast libraries at Harvard there must be a “Marx for dummies” book that Professor Sunstein can read. But, of course, writing these disingenuous pieces is much easier. The goal, of course, is to simultaneously push the RussiaDidIt argument and discredit a true alternative to the (capitalist) system, which has nothing to do with Hillary Clinton and a lot (or everything!) to do with Marx and Lenin. Black Power and Red Baiting The final article we wish to examine appeared in The Atlantic magazine, and it focuses on the long history of Russia’s “involvement in America’s race wars”. First of all, for a country with a history of slavery and segregation of African-Americans, not to mention the internment of Japanese-Americans during WW2, the term “race wars” seems like an awful understatement. One thing that actually has not changed is the red-baiting practices of the mainstream media, accusing anyone who deviates from the approved narrative of being a Soviet/Russian agent. The article explores the history of the Soviet Union taking advantage of racial injustice in the United States for propaganda purposes. How dare those commies bring up the plight of black people in the US? Anyone who knows a bit of history knows that this is not entirely out of place. For example, in the struggle against apartheid, notably in the war in Angola, the US was on the side of apartheid South Africa and the Soviet Union was on the side of the Angolans (and of black South Africans), even if their hand might have been forced by the Cubans. Soviet posters about the struggle against colonialism: Left: “Capitalism is doomed!” (Artsrunyan, 1966); Right: “People of Africa Will Overpower the Colonizers!” (Kukryniksy, 1960) There is plenty to be said about the Soviet Union’s foreign policy, but the fact is that there was not a single liberation struggle in the Third World in which the Soviet Union was on the side of the oppressor/colonist and the US on the side of the liberation movement. In fact, it is the opposite that was true in most cases, if not all. This takes us to the crux of the matter. According to historian Mary Dudziak, quoted in this piece: Early on in the Cold War, there was a recognition that the U.S. couldn’t lead the world if it was seen as repressing people of color. Dudziak and all these analysts and journalists take for granted that the US, and the west in general, are supposed to lead the world. According to them, these issues of treating black people as second class citizens are a problem mainly because they make the US look bad, and its noble mission of spreading freedom and democracy becomes much harder! It would seem that if racism was a little more polite (or if the Soviets did not bring it up!), then the Sandinistas would have been happy with Somoza, the Viet Cong would have had nothing to fight for, etc. This unquestioned embrace of US exceptionalism, coupled to a complete ignorance of history, is what ensures that these analysts completely miss the point. For them, people rejecting and resisting US imperialism, or rejecting the EU after years of austerity policies, is just a misunderstanding, which needs to be explained by nonsense such as RussiaDidIt. Had these people actually read Marx and Lenin, as opposed to spewing these idiocies, they would understand that backlash against neoliberalism, or resistance against US imperialism, is to be expected. And there is no amount of fancy speeches by the likes of Obama, saying “freedom” and “democracy” in every other sentence, that will fix that. The loyal flag-bearers of the imperial establishment are outraged at the idea of someone paying $80.000 to US activists, but the US spending tens of millions funding NGOs and political parties all over the world is more than natural. They are outraged that RT reports on Occupy Wall Street or Ferguson, but Voice of America and Radio Martí are supposed to be welcomed by the rest of the world. Because they stand for the better values… Apart from all the death and misery that is caused by US imperialism, it is this belief in American exceptionalism that makes the US so despised around the world. Finally, we should stress that our argument is not whataboutism. We are not saying that this issue in place X should not be discussed because there is this other issue in the US. Outlets like RT and Sputnik should have their editorial lines and journalism standards analysed and criticised. The same holds true for Russia’s foreign policy. But, paraphrasing someone who was also accused of being a Soviet agent, it cannot be the greatest purveyor of meddling in the world and media outlets with ever lowering standards bringing these charges forward and pretending to be the guardians of truth. * We have also written on the ridiculous report published by the CIA, FBI and NSA on the Russian “hacking” of US elections. * One wonders why the EU is symbolised by the Medici paying Leonardo da Vinci or by Erasmus and Thomas More being friends and not, for example, by the bubonic plague or Lucrezia Borgia’s antics. You know what else was common to all of Europe before the EU? The slave trade. * More recently the Guardian published another bombshell piece, saying that Russia’s Facebook posts reached 126 million Americans. But we are talking about 80.000 posts, only 0.004% of news feed content according to Facebook, during a two year period. The big number is perfect for propaganda, but conveniently it is not made clear whether 126m different users saw the posts, or if, for example, 10m users on average saw 120 of these posts. * We should clarify that exploitation does not mean having a evil boss that pays low salaries and forces workers to work weekends. Workers in capitalism are exploited simply because there is a value difference between what they earn and what they produce. In other words, profit comes from unpaid labour. Exploitation is the foundation of capitalism and should not be framed in moral terms, which imply that the problem is not the system but a matter of finding “good capitalists” http://clubof.info/