#not to compare history and minecraft roleplay | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

honkster · 3 years

Text

Why the Dream SMP’s way of storytelling is IMPOSSIBLE to recreate in any other medium.

This has been in the back of my mind for the longest time. I think I finally got it.

People have talked about this before, and they’ve put forward some good points, and good for them – most of them are correct. It’s the way the ccs interact with each other, it’s how plot is mixed in with banter, that’s all good! I wanna put more out there.

So you know how you open a book to read, you start a new show, you sit down to watch a movie – that’s all produced by some sort of company, someone who made it specifically for you to enjoy. You expect a certain dramatic flair to it, certain cinematic choices, certain ways of writing, certain camera angles, certain reactions to things. That’s just ingrained expectations of things now.

The DSMP? Doesn’t have that.

The low expectations work very much in its favor. It’s a Minecraft role-playing server with a bunch of famous youtubers/streamers, who are all good friends and have great dynamics with each other. So when you expect “just another Minecraft video” but in stream form, or you watch the videos because there are certain people in them, you don’t expect to be dropped into extreme lore and sensitive topics, realistic situations proposed in game form, a combination of serious stuff and just fun times with friends goofing around – and you’re pleasantly surprised.

We, the fandom, are used to it a bit more now. How excellently they manage to make a serious story in such a “ridiculous” medium, how much it affects us all and gets our creative juices flowing. But even the ccs can’t predict some of the things that happen. And that’s fun.

The whole election ending the way it has? That was on us. And it made some of the most angsty content there has been in the DSMP. People still theorize about the arc and make connections to now – that’s pog!

Fundy being adopted by Eret – that sparked the whole “Fundy just wants a dad – let’s get him some love” thing that made FundyWasTaken and other Fundy+someone ships happen. I see a different person paired with Fundy every week, and somehow, I agree with all of them. I really got into Fundy because of that stream where Eret “slept through the adoption” and Fundy confronted his real dad and spent time with his granddad. That little stream gave us more insight into Fundy’s whole character (Nevermind Fundy showing off his acting skills – you go you funky little fox), but also justifies some of his actions now. DryWaters? Wanting to kill Technoblade? Fucked up reasons, but we still love him.

Phil being broken out of house arrest ahead of time – still made a great stream and Phil agreeing with Techno’s want for revenge – that made us all very happy. The SBI!!! The AE! And that’s also a thing!

That even if we do know or have predicted what’s going to happen, begged it out of the ccs basically, it is still incredibly fun to watch. Where some books/shows/movies fall short and reveal too much and end up being “too predictable”, they’re not fun anymore. I read this somewhere before, that sometimes holding back EVERYTHING from the reader, and relying on shock value to make a good story is just bad. Whereas if you progress the story naturally and let the reader make some predictions of their own and then they end up being right – that’s a lot of serotonin right there. It’s the re-readability that makes it slightly better the second time.

The DSMP takes this concept and fucking yeets with it. Letting fans engage in the story, letting them theorize and then be right, even acknowledging the fanart that was made, just engaging with the community that their roleplay created – that makes it so much more fun. I bet that even if the whole script was revealed to the fandom we would still watch every plot stream. Even if we knew vaguely what happens in the stream, we would tune in and enjoy every second of it. Because the ccs are just that good, we love them that much, we love this plot that much.

Oh and the unpredictability helps too. Tommy in exile was the vague concept of a lot of the streams – it’s taken that and ran with it in a lot of different directions. All quite enjoyable.

Having said all of that… The fact that this type of telling a story is impossible to recreate in any other medium is… kinda saddening? It is incredibly unique, and I’d say has things that not a lot of the people that produce mainstream media would even consider. “Just friends hanging out” – how would that make the script progress? “Engagement with the fandom, even considering their wishes for the characters” – but we’re telling a story here!

The only thing I can think of that would come close to the vibe, would be just a bunch of writer friends coming together, thinking up a universe and general plot, and then each deciding to write a few of their own characters in that universe. When one author focuses on their main characters, the side ones can feel left in the dust, or not fleshed out. The DSMP is just “every character can write their own story”, which takes a lot of the strain from the “main writers”. But the general thing of “just friends hanging out” would be taken away from it. We’re being serious here, why would we change the tone so quick?

With all of that in mind… I kinda wanna make some predictions? And I don’t know if they’re correct, but it’s fun to theorize. See?

1. L’manburg will die.

And not just because Techno has 54 withers. The country is cursed – it definitely is. There is little sentimental value that can be felt for a few flimsy stilts built on top of a crater. It might go out in a blaze of glory, with the withers (Is history repeating itself an interesting enough plot point to recycle a whole arc?), but it might just be forgotten. Yeah there have been some angsty headcanons about how “no one cares about L’manburg anymore, save for two people” and it just gets abandoned, but how about it just becoming irrelevant?

This all comes back to Dream, it always does! His want, need for the server to be “one happy family again”, it just means one thing. He wants the server to return to the peaceful anarchy that it was before L’manburg. No rulers, no factions, no nothing.

That’s never going to happen.

Try as he might, Dream cannot affect that change that L’manburg did to the server. The introduction of a faction, one that can exist without the interference of a higher power – why do you think so many factions have sprouted up since? And it’s not even serious factions a lot of the time, it’s just a few friends deciding to build their bases on a plot of land that they claim is a nation now. L’manburg has changed the mindset of these people, now an alliance with somebody is a political move. An alliance doesn’t exist if it doesn’t have a faction, and that faction can remain neutral for only so long.

Basically, L’manburg introduced the factions mod into the server.

And the fact that every faction now has enough relevance to hold weight in a war also means that every nation on the server is doomed to follow the downfall of L’manburg. Eventually, they will get into a fight they can’t win, go up against the wrong people, anger someone they shouldn’t have. All factions will either be destroyed, or lose relevance, until their creators, residents and such just… move on.

(And really you can go into meta and talk about real governments and compare them, but it’s far more simple than that. The server isn’t built for peace, it isn’t meant to be a relaxing place where you can just vibe, it may have been made for a few friends to play Minecraft together, but it has turned into An Author’s Curse. The curse that follows any kind of story being told – the fact that peace is boring. People watched the first streams of the DSMP because they liked the ccs, and that’s valid. But how many more people tuned in to watch the war streams because there was PLOT and there was CHAOS and there WASN’T CALM PEACE ANYMORE – that’s the curse of every writer. That you can write about someone just living their life drama-free, you can make interesting peace with characters or circumstances, but it’s always leading to one inevitable conclusion – war, drama, because people read that. And at this point, it’s just a predictable outcome. No matter how much you say that you are retired, that you’re done with violence (Technoblade), something will happen that will prove to you that you believed in people too much. No matter how “neutral” you may be in the matter, no matter how much you claim that you have no allegiance (Philza), you will be forced to pick one, because out of all the bad things, you pick the least worst one, the most appealing to you, the one that can benefit your want of revenge.

And I can go on, but this is far too deep for one simple reason – The Author’s Curse is so prevalent here because THERE ARE ABSOLUTELY NO STAKES. It’s a video game – you die? You respawn. Something gets destroyed? You can just rebuild. Sure, you’ll want to kill the person who did wrong to you, but whatever they did wrong can just be replaced, remade, recreated. So why not have wars? Why not cause massive amounts of destruction “for the plot”?

It’s literally a playground. How all authors have their little playground with their characters that they meticulously plan out, the DSMP is that playground for all of these people.

And it’s fun! Sure! I like it! I’m just really skeptical whenever someone in character says that they “just want peace”, “are retired”, “swear off violence”, “are building just a little city for themselves”. Because you can do that, nothing wrong. But eventually, no matter how much you distance yourself from all of the chaos happening, all of the wars, you will return.

Because it is just much more fun.

It’s the curse. A cursed cycle.

And everyone is in it.)

2. The prison.

I don’t have anything on the prison because I don’t have anything on the book. Yeah I’ve done a whole post where I overanalyze what it could be, but it doesn’t make it any clearer. Whatever it is, it’s made out to be a huge plot point, something that can only be revealed when the prison is finished.

Cursed. The prison’s reason for being constructed is the book, but the book is only relevant when the prison is finished. We can only wait, and theorize, as we do.

(My only theory is that the book is information about another op on the server. Or at least something related to op or creative mode. Dream only fears one thing on this server, and that’s Technoblade, so if his one fear is the most skilled player on the server, what else could give him existential fear?)

3. The SBI.

Again, I don’t have anything! Yeah the reunion seems to be going smoothly, one member at a time, but there is already conflict in their beliefs among each other. And all that’s happened is a vague “maybe one day we’ll strike”.

Is history repeating itself an interesting enough plot point to recycle a whole arc?

Is L’manburg’s destruction AGAIN really necessary to hammer home the idea that no one likes that place anymore?

I don’t know. Whatever happens, no one’s in the right. No one’s in the wrong either. They’re all not good people and that’s that on that.

4. The Clingy Duo.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.

That’s all.

(Okay seriously? All of these arcs are connected. You know what happens when everything seems to be connected to one another?

A giant, dramatic final showdown between the two opposing sides.

Cause it’s just Chaos vs L’manburg. Those are the sides. People that want L’manburg to exist and people that want it gone. There are no other sides, there isn’t someone who’s like “Well maybe it can exist if we do this and this” cause no one wants to put in anymore effort into this cursed country. The only people were the clingy duo and now they’re separated and everyone is just leaving and Tommy is on the Chaos side like at this point he doesn’t care about L’manburg he just cares about Tubbo but he has to convince Tubbo to leave L’manburg but will Tubbo be convinced but will Tommy even consider leaving L’manburg and breaking free from its curse AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.

Goddamit.)

5. The Egg?

Dunno shit about it. Like the prison – it seems important, but we’re just not being given enough information. Is it a coincidence that the moment Dream commissioned the prison the Egg popped up? Or are the two directly related?

I don’t know. But as long as someone is finding ways to fight the Egg, that’s fantastic. Bad juju indeed.

6. Oh the Butcher Army want to kill Dream!

Hah.

Okay I’ve seen people make the case that the Army is just a bunch of people with trauma repeating the cycle of ab*se that they went through and yes.

Just yes.

And the fact that no one is actually looking at it that way and no one is there to like.. help them or even help them understand that what they are doing is just irrational, even though their reason for doing it and the result they hope to achieve is YES and the only thing that a lot of the people of the server who want peace should try to go for as well, they cannot stand up to Dream on their own. They just can’t, they will get punted into exile. They need allies, and they need powerful ones, people that have also been wronged by Dream and want him gone.

But the cycle continues, and no one knows where it ends.

(Okay but from a writing perspective? Getting rid of Dream is the end goal. It is the be all end all of all conflict, well… most of it, at least most that’s related to the supposed “good side”, or “the side that’s been most victimized”. But from the same perspective, that side is just… no longer. It has proven that is just as bad, if not worse than the final boss. I have to agree that Techno has to pay for his crimes, even though I like him a lot, but Techno did in fact cause insane damage. Yeah L’manburg rebuilt, yeah Wilbur probably caused more – still he isn’t completely free.

But that’s a discussion on morality more than laws.

L’manburg is doomed to die. Dream is doomed to be fought, and probably won against (simply because he has won far too many times already, you know how everyone seems to hate OP characters…). But the Butcher Army is doomed to fail against Dream. So how does that work?

Welp.

Is history repeating itself and interesting enough plot point to recycle a whole arc?

The answer is no.

I’ve repeated that question three times now, and the answer to it is no. No it is not. L’manburg can be destroyed again, and it can be rebuilt again, but the sentimentality that people feel for it will not remain. The cycle of history ends somewhere, and it’s not too far a fetch that it ends here.

So what happens when Technoblade, Philza and Tommy roll up to L’manburg with withers and a destruction wish, only to be met with a bunch of traumatized children with axes and a death wish?

Well, I’ll spare the details, but from a purely writing standpoint…

The two sides team up.

Think about it – The Butcher Army doesn’t care about Technoblade anymore. They’ve seen that Dream is the one pulling the strings, they know that even if they do care about trying to eliminate Technoblade again, they have to get rid of his strongest ally – Dream. But through their anger, they’ve lost their fear. You should fear Dream, he’s a fuckin op. Techno is correct in not wanting to go against him.

But after Tommy? After seeing the Butcher Army at their lowest, screeching about Dream being the villain?

Will Techno finally go past his thinking of “government is evil, always government is source of problem” and realize that Dream has the most evil government in mind for his rule?

I’m still kinda sad that Techno isn’t making the conclusions he should about Dream. But he’s starting to – and really, the SBI-Butcher Army team up is the most logical thing that could happen.

Watch me be completely wrong or miss something and I’ve got ALL of it wrong. I would love that.)

(Also it’s very funny to me that Dream is literally simping for Techno while he’s just here like “Listen bud I would stab you on sight if you didn’t have creative mode”. Dream KNOWS that Techno can and will kill him given the opportunity. Techno knows that that opportunity may never arise.

It’s a weird type of stalemate, to be sure. But goddamn is it interesting.)

Anyway... if you read through all of this... I could bake you a cookie? Thank you! I like to ramble.

#dream smp #gooood its just a block game #ITS JUST A BLOCK GAME #...dammit #anyway #debate me #on everything please

153 notes · View notes

lightns881 · 4 years

Text

DTeam Tumblr Demographics Survey Results (Part 2):

What does DTeamblr look like, what does it have to do with MCYT history, and why does it look like a rainbow?

I’ll make an educated guess here and say y'all enjoyed my last post (totally unrelated to the way I gained almost 50 followers overnight). Anyhow, thank you so much for the overwhelming support! I’m so glad a lot of you felt you could relate to my deep-dive into the leading personality type on DTeam Tumblr. It took me so many hours to write and research, and as a math major and honors student, it’s no easy feat, so I’m so grateful for the attention it got!

Today we’re discussing the general demographics of DTeam Tumblr and why they might look the way they do. Number 8 will blow your mind! So make sure to keep reading and hit that little grey heart and arrow at the bottom if you like it, so more people get to see it! Thanks for your support! Now, let’s jump straight into the post!

Your Daily Dose of Data

From the 449 responses we received, these are some pie charts displaying the gender, age, and sexuality of all respondents.

Image Description: Female (52.8%), Non-Binary (37.4%), Male (9.8%)

Image Description: 16-17 (37%), 13-15 (31.4%), 18 and over (29.4%), 12 and under (2.2%)

Image Description: Bisexual/Pansexual (54.1%), Homosexual (16%), Asexual (14.7%), Other (7.8%), Heterosexual (7.3%)

Mmhm, delicious! Y'all ready to dig into these stats? Because I don’t know about you, but they certainly don’t strike me as what the general population looks like!

Welcome to Tumblr, the Only Community Where Straight Men are the Minority

So these statistics certainly didn’t take me by surprise. Mostly because the DNF Shipper Survey I took some time ago revealed a similar trend. Not to mention, Tumblr is probably the QUEEREST internet community on the planet.

Funny enough, the survey revealed a shocking number of ZERO heterosexual males respondents. I’ll say it louder for the people in the back. ZERO straight males were recorded out of 449 respondents for this survey!

Now, this isn’t surprising for the Tumblr community by itself, but I can say I’m somewhat surprised in terms of the MCYT Tumblr community. (Obviously, the survey specified DTeam Tumblr, but there is a big overlap between both communities, so I will be using them interchengably when it seems relevant.)

Let’s break this down. The survey reveals the largest age population is 16-17, though it’s not by a great margin in comparison to 13-15 and 18 and older, which doesn’t surprise me either. Some of the major critics of the DTeam Fandom and other MCYT Fandoms love to claim the fanbase’s majority age range lies with children and pre-teens. While it’s an undeniable fact children are drawn to Minecraft, it’s also a misconception to paint it as solely a community for younger viewers.

In the MCYT Tumblr and DTeam Tumblr communities, specifically, we see this is not the case. Only 1/3 of the respondents of this survey are under the age of 16 (you could attribute part of it to the fact younger people might be less inclined to participate in this survey, but it is still a notable difference). I can’t say these age ranges are similar in other parts of the community like DTeam Twitter, Tik Tok, or Reddit, but if I had to make a guess, I’d say Tumblr lies toward the older of the bunch, with Reddit being the oldest and Tik Tok being the youngest (I do hope to perform this survey on some of the other communities, so please stay until the end if you want to help with that).

One of the likely explanations to why the ages for DTeam Tumblr look this way is the fact a big chunk of the community has likely been watching MCYT for a long time (even with breaks in between). I, myself, used to watch channels like PopularMMOs, Aphmau, and PrestonPlayz as a kid, and I presume many of you are familiar with them as well. With the resurgence of MCYT in the past year, it likely drew a lot of the older viewers in addition to the new ones.

But enough about age. What I really want to highlight on this post is the attraction of queer individuals to DTeam Tumblr and MCYT as a whole.

Why is the current MCYT Fandom so queer in comparison to the previous generations?

This is a huge open-ended question and considering I can only capture so much of the DTeam and MCYT community, the rest of this post should be taken solely as a theoretical analysis as opposed to fact.

With that out of the way, let’s start by discussing the shift MCYT has undergone over the years (I promise this will circle back to the question of queerness in the MCYT fandom, but we need some background before we can come up with a decent theory).

When Minecraft was first released, it proved to be a monumental change in the gaming industry. This simple little indie game took the world by storm. It was so vastly different from what the general population generally viewed gaming as (first-person shooters, story-driven games, action games, etc.) Not to mention, it didn’t exactly solely appeal to only a small margin of gamers, those being white cis males.

The gaming industry has notoriously been known in the past for its heteronormative community and general prejudice toward minorities. Though it has gone through a significant change over the decades, we certainly can’t say it’s fully gone.

Yet for whatever reason, the recent MCYT has taken the interest of so many queer people in comparison to other gaming YouTube communities. Why? Why are queer people so drawn to this community? And, more precisely, why does it feel so different than the old MCYT? Lastly, how does this relate to the conclusion about the leading personalities of this fandom we made in the last post?

The Niche Communities of MCYT Over the Years

MCYT has always been a huge, over-saturated genre of YouTube with content appealing to a variety of audiences. It’s dominated gaming content for years, and I think we can all safely say it’s never been bigger than it is today.

So why is it that just now it feels like the queerness of the fandom is popping off? Why now as opposed to say five years ago when MCYT was at another one of it’s strongest stages?

It seems like the community has made a tremendous shift in relation to breaking gender norms and LGBTQ+ subjects, not only in the fans but within the creators themselves. Was flirting and calling a pretty-boy streamer pet names as normal in the past as it is today? Were straight gamer guys putting on dresses and a full-face of make-up as supported back then? Were “marriages” and “pregnancies” within Minecraft boys an everyday occurrence like they are now? How is it that MCYT has dominated a Twitch dating show where flirting with the gay host and among straight contestants themselves is just another bit of entertainment? Where is this all coming from?

Recently, I watched a 2 hour documentary depicting all of the stages of Minecraft YouTube and how it has changed over the years. If you haven’t seen it and you have some time to spare, I HIGHLY recommend it! It’s very informative, and it honestly gave me such a strong sense of nostalgia that makes me choke up every time I think about it. I’ll link it below.

The documentary does a great job at exploring the different niche communities that dominated MCYT since it first took off. Some of such communities include the basic Let’s Players, the team-based Let’s Play channels like How2Minecraft, the roleplay story-centric ones like Aphmau and Samgladiator, the tutorial, building and technical side like Mumbo and Grian, the PVP-centric Bedwars or Hypixel channels, the Machinima community, the comedy side like ExplosiveTNT, the parody music videos, and so many more. All of the mentioned communities have dominated Minecraft at one point or another, many of them still having a rippling effect and/or a loyal community today. All of these communities have certain aspects that define them, some of which parallel the current overtaking content in the present.

How can we compare MyStreet to the Dream SMP?

Taking Aphmau as an example, her MyStreet series had a TREMENDOUS success a few years ago, racking in millions of views and bringing in a lot of money that eventually allowed her to hire voice actors and increase the production of mentioned episodes. The roleplay series was so successful it ran for six seasons!

Now, let’s compare that to the Dream SMP. It seems like a big comparison to be making considering they appear so different at first glance. For once, Aphmau is just one channel whose audience caters toward girls and younger people who enjoy romance. The series is set-up in an episodic-format that resembles more of a TV series than actual Minecraft videos.

Meanwhile, the Dream SMP is a collection of content creators with a mix of improvised storylines and the occasional regular video that resembles more of a Let’s Play series than a RP series.

You could say the only true comparisons to draw out of these two are the popularity they had/have and the profit they brought to their respective creators.

However, there’s two other key similarities that you’ll find not only within these two specific examples, but many other channels and communities as well. Story and characters.

MyStreet’s story aspect is fairly obvious seeing as it’s a episodic series that focuses on a fictional story. The Dream SMP’s story aspect isn’t as clear, but it’s evident there is a story playing out in the foreground and background, whether intentional or unintentional, or improvised or not.

Character is where some of you might start to question me. It’s obvious MyStreet has characters. I mean, it is a fictional story, after all. But the Dream SMP? Light, they’re obviously people!

Well, my answer to that is yes and no--sort of. The Dream SMP’s story heavily relies on roleplay, bits as you might call them. Events that aren’t necessarily planned out as a fictional plot like the typical MyStreet episode is, but they aren’t exactly real. Schlatt is obviously not a villain in real life, he just likes to impersonate as one for the narrative. Wilbur isn’t crazy, but it’s a way to spice up the heroic story surrounding Tommy and him.

It’s video-game improv. Except the actors behind the content just so happen to be real people playing off the personalities and “brands” they have obtained.

Brands. It all boils down to this. In the entertainment business, without a clear vision of your project and a clear way to brand what your consumer intakes, your project will likely not find a lot of success.

There’s a reason why Tommy plays off his loudness, using an overexaggerated laugh that although may not be completely fake, it is likely not the laugh he uses everyday. Or why BadBoyHalo is this supposed innocent muffin who doesn’t understand the crafting table meme and other references that are fairly easy to google and find the meaning of. Or why Sapnap is this chaotic being who loves starting pet wars and we love to paint as an arsonist in the Dream SMP. While all of these personality traits may be a part of their true selves, they’re played up for the camera--for the story. They act as the personas that define their characters in the narrative.

They have a clear brand and vision that appeals to the audience and makes them tune in on the daily to see how they all come together. It’s like roleplaying a more extreme version of yourself, one that brings home the money.

Story and characters run across every entertainment outlet. They define their brand. Aphmau has her characters and series. Hermitcraft has a set of memorable personalities and episodic videos that formulate its own story that is less like a narrative and more of a history of the server. ExplodingTNT has his recurring cast and comedic sketches. Most of these niche communities have a form of story and character defining them. It’s how they achieve a clear sense of branding and cater to a specific audience.

Queer Theory in MCYT

Having said all that, why does the MCYT of today draw in so many queer viewers?

Let’s think about this. In my last post, I ended by mentioning DTeam Tumblr is a sort of safe haven for INFP and INxx types who might be placed in the “other” category by society. INFPs, specially, are predisposed for escapism--one common form of it being fiction and entertainment. Not to mention, INFPs are feeling types who, as introverts, seek a personable connection. It’s why it’s so easy for them to obsess over book characters or fall in love with content creators.

Now, let’s imagine a whole community of LGBTQ+ INFP and INxx types. Actually, scratch that, we don’t even have to imagine it.

It’s what our community looks like today.

And why are so many so drawn to the DTeam and Dream SMP of all things? It’s a personable storyline that essentially forms a direct tie to the viewer. Unlike pre-recorded fictional TV series you tune into on your device, the Dream SMP is a whole load of chaos that blurs the lines between reality and fiction where fans can directly connect to creators and get to know them as people through a storyline that features sub-textual queer themes and non-conforming behaviors.

The MCYT content creator community of today is more non-conforming than ever before, and knowing this whole fact, knowing that many of them might place themselves in the “other” category or at the very least aren’t afraid to break the norms and be seen in that light, is a comfort in itself for LGBTQ+ INFP types. Once again, it’s a safe space that helps you escape from the troubles of real life, one you relate to.

Okay. So although this does answer why the fans look like they do, what about the creators themselves? Are we really supposed to believe this all came through naturally? That a bunch of straight guys suddenly decided wearing dresses was something they wanted to do?

I don’t mean to sound cynical here, and I’m in no way trying to insinuate creators have solely some sort of corrupt ulterior motive. Things are never as simple as they look. However, the truth is, a part of it lies on the attention it’s gotten.

I’ve talked a lot about DreamNotFound and the way Dream uses it as a marketing ploy. I stand by my point. However, he’s not the only one who does this in the MCYT community. Why did Finn suddenly go from wearing a dress to cross-dressing as a girl for a whole week? Why are so many creators suddenly deciding wearing dresses is fun? Why does every freaking straight MCYT actively want to flirt with George nowadays?

Let’s just let Techno’s favorite word answer this for us: clout.

It gets attention from one of the largest historically underserved minority community in the entertainment business. We might not be able to see gay flirting in every Netflix TV show or guys not minding dresses and getting fake marriages, but you are certainly going to get at least one of those in every Dream SMP stream and video you tune into. It gets attention. It brings home the money. And do I blame them? Not really.

Interestingly enough, there’s a lot of analytical posts on the MCYT Tumblr community that discuss the dangers of these tactics and why gay jokes and the way queer subtext is treated by MCYT creators is harmful. Despite this, it still attracts such a huge community of queers. So why exactly would queer people actively watch something that’s offensive or harmful to us?

I have a lot more to say about this topic and the morality behind Dream’s tactics, but I’m out of breath for today, so I’ll talk about it in my next post. What better way to start the conversation about the DNF and Karlnap questions of the survey than a good ol’ discussion on the morality of queerbaiting and the likes?

If you got this far, I’d appreciate it if you liked and reblogged this post if you enjoyed it and/or learned something new! Also, important news, I would really like to perform a similar study on the DTeam Twitter Community to measure the differences in demographics across platforms. I would REALLY appreciate it if you guys could go like, retweet and share the link I posted on my Twitter about it (tweet will be linked in the reblog below) so it reaches more of the DTeam Twitter community!

However, if you filled out the survey yourself here or you associate more with DTeam Tumblr than DTeam Twitter please DO NOT fill out the survey again! I’m trying to make sure it reaches the audience that mains on Twitter, but I need a little help with that since I don’t have as big of an influence on Twitter than on here for obvious reasons.

Anyhow, thank you so much for all your support! I really appreciate y’all and make sure to hit the follow if you want to lookout for the next demographics post! <3

(Pssst, I’m releasing a MCYT DNF superpower AU longfic next month... You should totally go check out the post on that if you’re interested in it...)

#dteam #dteamblr #dream smp #dttblr #mcyt #dreamwastaken #dnf #mcyttblr #georgenotfound #dreamnotfound #dttwt #dream team #dteamblr demographics survey

103 notes · View notes

anonymous-dentist · 2 years

Text

Truth in the Tales Episode 1: “The Town That Never Was” and the Shot Heard ‘Round the World

Hello, everybody, I’m Anonymous-Dentist, but you can call me A.D. I’m a history student with a focus on modern American and European history. I also have a background in film analysis and general pretentiousness. As such, I saw it fit to apply what little I know to the only piece of actual DSMP canon I will ever consume: Tales from the SMP. So in this series of posts from me, I’ll be applying real world history to a not-quite-historical Minecraft roleplay series. Yes, this is what I’m doing with my life. I’m doing this for myself as sort of a refresher course for some of the topics involved, honestly, but if I can teach a couple people some history, that would be nice, too. So likes/reblogs would be appreciated.

I’m using the Tales from the SMP carrd to get these episodes. The carrd is credited to @discduo on Tumblr, but if that’s not right, I’ll figure out who it actually is and link accordingly. With all the credits and citations I’m fixin’ to use, it’ll be a wonder if this makes it into the tags at all...

(Painting: La Liberté guidant le peuple) So, without further ado, “The Town That Never Was” and revolution. 'Liberté! Egalité! Fraternité!’

First, the episode description as written on the wiki:

The episode follows Karl Jacobs, Awesamdude, BadBoyHalo, GeorgeNotFound, and Fundy as they build Gogtopia, a small settlement in the wilderness of the Dream SMP in one hour. At the end of the hour, Karl blows up parts of the town with TNT and dubs it "The Town That Never Was." He says that they would all forget the town, but the lore behind it would remain. The story of The Town That Never Was mirrors the history of L'Manberg.

Part One: the American Revolution

It’s important for this essay to mention that L’Manberg can pretty easily be compared to the American Revolution. There’s the common fandom joke about the Dream SMP being Hamilton fanfiction, and that’s not entirely inaccurate.

(Can you tell which photo is which?)

A brief explanation of the American Revolution for people who don’t know about it:

A very long time ago, Britain did as Britain does best and colonized someplace that really didn’t need colonizing. This was the beginning of their problems. It took a century or two to get the ball rolling, but after a series of unfair taxes and after the relative success of the Seven Years’ War between France and Britain, several American colonists decided, fuck this, America is going to rule itself. The major argument was over the lack of representation that America got in British parliament, and then over what we Americans call the Intolerable Acts, which were acts established by the British to establish further control over the city of Boston. War broke out in 1775, and Britain was heavily favored to win. They had superior troops and strength, and were, uh, well. The literal goddamn British Empire. American declared its independence in 1776 with the Declaration of Independence. This was over a year into the war, but the Americans had already held these truths:

...in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

...That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness

Despite that, the Americans were at a disadvantage. It wasn’t until the December of 1777 that things began to turn around. The war ended in 1781 with the British surrender at Yorktown, and we all know what happened to America after that.

(Map: Territorial Gains by the U.S. through 1853.)

It is important to mention that America had a couple of cards up its sleeve, including the eternally-spiteful nation of France (this is very important), the slightly-less-spiteful nation of Spain, and the Netherlands, who were kind of just there. France ended up giving the most support. It also ended up bankrupting itself, which is where the bulk of this analysis comes into play.

Part Two: France and Its Eternal Financial Ineptitude

(Note: the majority of this segment comes from my own memory, and from my textbook for this semester: Civilization in the West. It’s a good read if you’re bored and boring.)

As established, France and Britain had just ended the Seven Years’ War. Britain had taken the W on that one with its successes in America in the French Indian War (1754-1763). France, however, came out of that... badly. Wars cost a lot, and between that and the enormous expense of helping America out during its revolution added up. Add in the kings’ incredible spending habits, and France wasn’t doing so hot money-wise. And then, on top of that, add the country’s antique social classification system and the liberation of the oppressed in America as seen by France’s own military class, and you have a pot ready to bubble over.

There were three classes, more or less. They were referred to as Estates. The First Estate was made up of nobility. Specifically, the royal family and the aristocracy. The Second Estate was made up of exclusively clergy. It is important to note that neither the First or Second Estates could be taxed. Is is also important to note that the Second Estate, while being made up of clergy, controlled the court system in France. Anything the king tried establishing as law had to be passed by the court system. And then there is the Third Estate made up of everybody else in France. These people bore the brunt of the taxes.

But at this point in time, the king was running out of peasants to bleed money out of. After hiring an outside consultant from Switzerland, he came to the conclusion that he needed to tax the First and Second Estates. This, of course, did not pass the courts, who ordered a meeting of all three Estates. This meeting, referred to as the Estates-General, hadn’t met since 1641. At the meeting, members of every Estate could come and say their piece and petition for what they wanted. Despite this, only one member of the attending Third Estate was a peasant. The rest was made up of merchants and artisans, later to be referred to as the bourgeoisie. Even still, the Third Estate was almost entirely excluded from proceedings. Unhappy, the Third Estate decided in the Oath of the Tennis Court that they would split off from the others. They became the National Assembly, and that’s where things begin kicking off.

(Painting: Le Serment du Jeu de paume)

Modern depictions of the French Revolution usually harken back to famous images of guillotines and violent uprisings such as the storming of the Bastille prison in 1789. And that’s not entirely wrong, really. There is a specific period from around 1793 to 1794 known as the Reign of Terror. Spearheaded by a complete freak named Maximilien de Robespierre, the Reign of Terror is probably what a lot of people think of regarding the revolution. Led by Robespierre’s Committee of Public Safety (kind of an ironic name tbh), the Reign of Terror was meant to suss out traitors to the cause. It was paranoia and panic, nothing more and nothing less. Approximately 17,000 people were executed, and about 10,000 people died in prison, usually without a trial.

(Engraving left: "Day of 21 January 1793 the death of Louis Capet on the Place de la Révolution". Painting right: Storming of The Bastille.)

It is very important, though, to remember what these people were fighting for. The revolution’s motto was 'Liberté! Egalité! Fraternité!’, French for ‘Liberty! Equality! Brotherhood!’. These people were oppressed, and it isn’t a coincidence that the first nation to have a revolution of this scale was France’s close ally, the recently-minted United States of America.

In the end, though, France didn’t end up completely free. See, some shmuck named Napoleon took over in 1799 and tried making himself an empire twice, and another shmuck named Napoleon did the same. But this isn’t about them, because Fuck Them.

(Map: The French Empire and its satellite states circa 1812)

Part Three: Conclusions?

With all of that boring shit out of the way, it’s time for the very loosely-connected analysis of the actual episode of Tales that this is about.

The episode summary above pretty much describes it well. Gogtopia is an approximation of L’Manberg and meets its end in much the same way. It was always meant to end. One hour. That’s it. The Town That Never Was, right?

I think it’s worth mentioning that this is the first episode of Tales. It isn’t in the past or the future. Rather, it’s the present. Better, it’s canon. Even better, it’s later destroyed even further by some motherfucker named Tommyinnit, who can be seen as a founding member of L’Manberg.

What does that have to do with anything? Nothing really. I honestly could’ve compared the American Revolution with one of the many attempted further revolutions in America after the publishing of its first attempt at a constitution, the Articles of Confederation. That all culminated in the American Civil War, though, and I really don’t think that this has anything to do with Tales at all.

France and America do have a long history of allyship and friendship despite France being, well, France. (Sorry, French people reading this, but like... you’re France.) Have you ever considered the relationship between the people involved in the building of Gogtopia with the citizens of L’Manberg? I mean, one of them is a member of L’Manberg- Fundy. And then there’s George, who ended up running with Quackity in L’Manberg’s presidential elections. There’s Sam and Bad, meanwhile, who just kinda... yeah. Badlands things.

And then, of course, there’s Karl himself, who was a member of Schlatt’s cabinet some-fucking-how and added his little area of Rutabagville to the parts of the SMP under Manberg’s jurisdiction. He wasn’t on L’Manberg’s side of the revolution there until things weren’t going well for the SMP-Manberg side. None of this is to mention El Rapids / “Mexican L’Manberg”. Regarding the original L’Manberg, he was denied entry because he wasn’t British.

So, again, what does this have to do with two violent, bloody revolutions? Not much, honestly. This series is made up of loose connections, threads not really meant to meet. I’m a history student, not a lore watcher. It’s hard to connect the present with the past, but this episode was necessary to get to the actual meat of this series.

Anyway.

Next ‘Week’: The Village That Went Mad and the True History of Torture in the Name of Idiocy

#mcyt #dream smp #dsmp #tales from the smp #tftsmp #Karl Jacobs #dsmp analysis #dream smp analysis #history #truth in the tales

18 notes · View notes