#there's nothing actually wrong with that but its just not at all interesting or a goal of mine

[thetrashthatsmilesback]

Watcher, Capitalism, and the Petite (Petty) Bourgeois

So the whole Watcher controversy has revealed an interesting misunderstanding of what constitutes "the rich" or capitalist beliefs. The major theme that arose during the controversy was the sense that Shane in particular had gone against his previously stated leftist beliefs - that he had, for all these years, taken up a humorous aesthetic of anti-capitalism without actually believing in what he was saying. I believe that this is due to a breakdown in definitions as they become spread to the general public. Dissemination of information is a good thing, and I would never argue against it, but one problem which arises from concepts spreading to large groups without context is that often the actual meanings break down until they are vastly different from their original, academic denotation. This is, I believe, what happened with the phrase “eat the rich” and its current colloquial usage.

I want to preface this with the fact that nothing I am about to say applies exclusively to Watcher, or that the Watcher staff have done anything wrong or misrepresented themselves. I also don’t think that the Watcher fanbase is wrong at all – the situation just happened to spawn arguments both in defense of and critique of the Watcher team which indicated, in my opinion, that an understanding of “the rich” in a capitalist society is not well understood. Disclaimers out of the way, let’s get into this.

During the controversy, two major sides arose – those who had begun to see the Watcher crew (in particular Steven, Ryan, and Shane) as “the rich” or ruling class in a capitalist setting, and those who argued against this by arguing that as Watcher is a small business, and not the upper 1%, they are not included in the definition of “the rich” expressed by leftists. I want to focus in on the counter-argument that Watcher being a small business just trying to survive means that they are not considered “the rich.”

In Marxist theory, there is a small group called the “petite” or “petty bourgeoisie.” This group is defined as those who both own and contribute to the means of production – aka, small business owners. Marx himself wrote little about the petite bourgeoisie, predominantly referencing them in passing in his essays The Class Struggles in France, 1848-1850 and very briefly in The Communist Manifesto. He does happen to criticize this group in the little writing he did on it, “Marx derides what he sees as the petit-bourgeois self-delusion that, because it combines both employment and ownership of the means of production, it somehow represents the solution to the class struggle. This class was progressive in a limited sense, as witnessed by its claims at various times for co-operatives, credit institutions, and progressive taxation, as a consequence of felt oppression at the hands of the bourgeoisie. However, these were (in terms of the Marxist view of history) strictly limited demands, just as the ideological representatives of this class have been constrained by their own problems and solutions” (“Petite Bourgeoisie - Oxford Reference”).

Now, it is very important to note that team “Watcher is a small business” aren’t completely wrong in their positioning of Watcher’s attempt to raise more revenue as Not Evil Capitalism. Marx’s belief was that eventually the Petite Bourgeoisie would be pushed into the proletariat class. I also am not positive that Watcher is a classical small business – they very well could be a worker co-op. A worker co-op is a business where the workers have ownership of the company, and significant representation on the board of directors(“What Is A Worker Cooperative? – U.S. Federation of Worker Cooperatives”). While some criticism of worker co-ops from a communist or socialist view exist, they are generally seen as a more socialist approach to the typical small business model.

I couldn’t find direct confirmation that Watcher is a co-op. One point against them being one is the use of titles such as CEO and Owner, but these designations could simply be for tax and paperwork reasons. Watcher is an objectively small company, they have between 25 and 30 workers, and most people cite them currently having 27 workers, but in the past they have employed interns and I am unsure of if they currently have interns on board so I am going to stick to the range. It would be incredibly easy to have a worker co-op with 25-30 people, you wouldn’t even need voted representatives; everyone could just be on the board and contribute to decisions. I figured the next best approach would be to see what the roles on Watcher’s shows are – if Steven, Shane, and Ryan contribute significantly rather than just showing up and looking pretty on camera, then there is a good chance they might be functioning as a worker co-op more than a traditional business or small business.

To do this, I decided to look at Watcher’s largest show for each co-owner. This means Ghost Files, Mystery Files, Puppet History, and Steven’s food series. These numbers broke down as follows:

Ghost Files: Ryan is listed as a Creator on all Ghost Files videos. Ghost Files Debriefs do not have writers, so that role will not be held against them on those videos. Ryan and Shane were listed as a Host and an Executive Producer on all videos, but neither ever held a Writer, Editor, or Sound Mixing role.

Mystery Files: Ryan and Shane were listed as a Host and an Executive Producer on all videos, but neither ever held a Writer, Editor, or Sound Mixing role.

Puppet History: Shane is listed as a Creator on all Puppet History videos. He is listed as a Host on all videos, an Executive Producer on all videos, Writer on 4 videos, and never held an Editor or Sound Mixing role.

Steven’s Food Series: Steven is listed as a Host and an Executive Producer on all videos, but neither ever held an Editor, or Sound Mixing role. This show does not require a writer so this will not be held against him.

*Do take these numbers with a grain of salt, I wrote this while in class so its possible that I missed something.*

Looking at those numbers, the main three do predominantly just film, but I don’t want to devalue the work that goes into being on camera. They are still generating capital by acting, I simply wanted to clear up confusion I had due to seeing people say they edited every Ghost Files video. From what I can see, they don’t do the editing, but as executive producers they likely have to review every video before it goes out. I also still can’t fully come to a conclusion on if the company can be considered a worker co-op, but I believe it is a standard small business – aka, the petite bourgeoisie.

All of that leads to the final point – the way that people only began to view the three lead Watcher members/founding members as “the rich” after the announcement of the streaming platform shows the way that leftist theory has become divorced from some of its meaning. I saw several people arguing “you guys can’t recognize the rich”/”you guys would attack doctors and lawyers under the guise of eating the rich,” and yes its true that doctors who work in hospitals are proletariat, but if a doctor opens a private practice or a lawyer opens a private firm, does that render them more bourgeoisie or more proletariat? At what point do the petite bourgeoisie become a part of those who we disavow? I don’t actually have answers to these questions, and I’m sure people much smarter than me or better versed in economics have written on this (one source I found that seemed good while I was skimming it despite its age is this one https://www.jstor.org/stable/2083291?seq=3 ). I didn’t make this point to argue one point over the other on whether Watcher counts as “the rich,” but more to focus on the way that term gets used. The argument could be made that we could have started questioning Shane’s anti-capitalist beliefs the moment he helped start a company, but we didn’t. We only started to criticize him on the basis of hypocrisy after the announcement and its out of touch comments. This raises so many questions about how we use the term “the rich” now – does it refer to anyone we dislike who is financially stable? Has the term become completely divorced from its original meaning? Or were we being hypocrites all along? Has Watcher Entertainment always been incongruent with Shane’s implied political beliefs? Is there a certain point at which the petite bourgeoisie become a part of the financial aristocracy? Or is that term only relegated to the industrial bourgeoisie, is it reserved exclusively for those in financial positions that no artisan could ever hope to reach?

Is it possible that both arguments are correct regarding the Watcher boys, and all other members of small business ownership and management positions? That they are both “the rich” but not a part of the proper bourgeoisie?

I don’t know. I find it fascinating though.

[muffinrecord]

I've been pretty positive about Yuu so far, but watching her magical girl story... hmm.

Basically I like everything about Yuu, but man that serial killer bit is the only thing that really sticks out as an overt bad choice. Having Nagisa stand around and watch Yuu kill people is such a weird choice, it feels more like fanfic than actual canon. Like this doesn't feel like something that could happen in Magia Record-- or hell, even in Madoka Magica either.

For example, Sayaka has a scene on a train where some dudes are being sexist assholes and it's left up to the viewer to decide if she kills them or not. It doesn't go: Sayaka killed them and also they were calling out for help the entire time while Madoka watched you know?

That said, this is something I can see in a bunch of the spinoffs (Kazumi, Oriko, Suzune), but I think everyone agrees that the spinoffs are of dubious quality. I love me the spinoffs but they're a hot mess.

I dunno. It's one thing to know that Yuu is a serial killer, it's another thing to have a character watch her go around and kill people and not intervene in any way. Especially in a story that goes out of its way to not do that. Walpy hitting Kamihama is noted to have no causalities at all (which goes a little too far in the other direction imo but it is what it is), Suzune isn't able to kill anyone in Kamihama and is dealt with by kicking her out (and not killing her), the deaths in arc 2 are mostly accidental and have massive consequences, everyone is forgiven in the end-- this isn't a story that really has "watch someone kill people and do nothing" in it's cards, you know?

I actually liked Nagisa's Wish for a lot of things. For example, I like that Nagisa didn't think she could be a magical girl until she saw Yuu, because she assumed that magical girls had to be good people-- aka, Nagisa did not think she was good. But that's not because Nagisa is a bad person. Nagisa is just unloved, and since she's a young kid, she's internalized that to mean that something is wrong with her, not that something is wrong with her mom. It's heartbreaking to see her go from "I can't be a magical girl," to seeing Yuu the murderer, to then going "oh okay if she can be a magical girl then so can I." Like sweet pea, your mother not loving you is not the same as being a killer. You've done nothing wrong. You are not a bad person for having Feelings and Emotions about the neglect you are experiencing.

However the serial killer/organ seller bit just goes too far for me and it kind of overshadows a lot of the better ideas present in Nagisa's Wish. Like how can you focus on the interesting ideas about justice or self worth when there is a serial killer/organ stealer walking around.

I think that the best qualities of Yuu are her design and how creepy she is-- having her actually go all the way and be a serial killer/organ seller actually makes her less creepy in my opinion. Yada yada, less is more, leave it up to the viewer's imagination. If she was just off, if we just knew that something was wrong with her and that people are disappearing but it's not outright stated what she's doing... I dunno. That would make her a lot more scary to me. A lot of fear can be found in apprehension and outright telling all the details will fill in too many gaps.

Like, the things that we all like about Yuu would be her voice direction, her memory issues, the way her Live2D is designed to be slightly off kilter from everyone else, the gap between her attitude and the darkness she engages in, the weird weaponry she uses and how it changes the way she walks/moves-- all of this is effective because it is offputting and different, not because the narrative is telling us "hey she kills people and sells their organs."

Basically I really love Yuu, but I do have some criticisms for her character and I understand why some folks don't like her.

That said, it did lead to this fantastic line from Kyubey so like,

You take some, you lose some.

[buttfishfan]

People aren't completely wrong about Kara's story being really weak, but i also feel like people dont realize the amount of missed opportunity in her section of the game.

Kara's story could've been AMAZING if only David Cage knew what he was trying to write.

Sooo here's some ideas ive been mulling over for a couple weeks about how id fix Kara's story.

1. Making Alice human

Even when i was blind to a lot of the bad writing in Detroit this plot twist made me so agitated and confused because there was no plot twist it was seriously just david cage lying to the player for 12 hours 😭 making Alice human would fix many inconsistencies in Kara's story like how she just chooses to ignore the fact that Alice is an android and acts shocked when she finds out. Having alice be human also opens up the story to a more interesting themes about the bonds that can be formed between humans and androids like holy fuck david did you forget the story you were writing midway through 😭 If Alice was human it could also lead to new game mechanics or plot where kara would need to take care of Alice's human needs like food and water which then leads into Kara being put into situations where she is forced to do the "moral" thing and sacrifice comfort or to fight for Alice's survival.

2. Giving Kara's section of the game an actual overarching choice

The biggest reason i believe people think Kara's story is so boring is because in a game that prides itself on letting its players choose their very own story Kara's story allows for the least amount of choices. Both Connor and Markus have overarching distrinct choices that lead to VERYYY polar outcomes. Connor has the ability to deviate or stay a machine and markus has the ability to lead a peaceful or violent revolution. The only distinct outcomes in Kara's story is if you make it to Canada or not and even that is just if you chose the /right/ choices instead of the choices you consciously made. I wish there was more opportunities for Kara to be really evil and fucked up but all in the name of giving Alice the world. I know you're able to steal and lie in various chapters but it never felt like it had any true weight to how kara or the story progressed.

3. Give Alice an actual personality

Throughout the entire game Alice kinda doesn't do or say anything of value like I've seriously lost count how many times she's said "im cold". It makes no sense to me how you get the relationship status of family with her as Kara when you genuinely know nothing about Alice. She doesn't talk about anything. Even as an android she like must've had some sort of interest programing to act like a child but she just never shares anything even with the people that are supposedly the closest ones to her?? I feel like her personality should've been dependent on the way youd approach Karas story. If kara is willing to do immoral things for Alice's sake I feel like Alice should also be fucked up and evil cuz like, shes a kid and kara is her role model of COURSE she'll try an be similar to her mama. If Kara chooses to sacrifice comfort for morals then Alice takes after Kara in that respect too. So not only would you be responsible for how Kara acts you'd also be responsible for the way Alice acts which gives the player the choice of do they want this little kid to follow in the wrong steps or not?

Some ideas i have for how the story should've gone

Todd brings Kara home after she gets fixed and she meets Alice for the first time. Alice obviously knows Kara but after attempting to make Kara remember her she realizes that Kara's memory has been wiped. Since Kara would've probably been the only person to care for Alice before she was broken this would lead to Alice having a breakdown where she realizes her only protection and source of comfort is gone. Alice would probably resent or be distrustful of Kara a little in the beginning because of this.

I feel like running away should've been a more difficult decision on Kara's part. She's just come home from being fixed and she's already deviated i don't think she fully knows what she wants to do with Alice. Especially when they've started off their relationship with nothing i don't think Kara should've been leaning into the whole mom thing. It would've made more sense if their interactions started off as Kara just making sure Alice stays alive and then over time their relationshio actually has room to develop instead of starting off as mother daughter and ending off as mother daughter.

These are only some ideas. Im obviously not a writer but i just really care about this game and feel like it had too much lost potential 🙏🙏

[sea-buns]

Holy fuck, man. What a trip Fearne has been on, huh?

You tell her how grateful you are to have her in your life, you flatter her, you tell her you need her, that you have to do this together. You have her make a promise that has this woman, born of chaos and fey, agreeing through shaking hands and a trembling voice.

You make her deceive your friends; you make her follow where they cannot know; you make her help you into this contraption; you make her feed this thing into you despite the fact that you both have been warned extensively of the risks. You make her watch you crumble and splinter and shatter and fracture and burst and implode. You make her watch you die, over and over and over and over, for a minute in agonizing bullet time.

You make her do all these things, because when she tries to back out, when she tries to not be the one who let you do this—how could you do this—

you tell her, "YOU PROMISED."

Because if there's one thing you know, it's that the fey do not break a promise.

[perenlop]

speaking of tawnypelt its so funny when people go “mothpool is bad because people reduce mothwings character to just this fanon relationship! why not focus on her relationship with her thunderclan siblings!!!” 

like. girl WHAT relationship?

[arcadekitten]

Since Theo and Zap live together in Cemetery Mary, are they found siblings? I'm just curious can I feed off of these two I love all of your games btw!! ^^

Thank you!!

I personally wouldn't describe the relationship they have as siblings, especially since they were designed with the intention for players to wonder if they were dating haha. If you like found-sibling tropes I'd sooner direct someone to Crowscare, or Pogo & Yoyo in Semiaquatic Circus! But I don't think that's the kind of relationship Theo and Zapara have ^^"

[ashtonisvibing]

i've found my first analog series that i'm very normal about i promise

angel hare has infected my brain it makes me go squish

i wanna draw fanart so bad [shakes my ipad]

[bitchthefuck1]

I will never understand the fanfic impulse to take characters with thee most coo coo bananas codependent/nuanced/toxic/insane relationship and turn them into love interests #1 and #2 in a generic romance novel. like what is even the point anymore

[forevercloudnine]

How do you feel about w/ayne f/amily a/dventures? Its obviously pretty popular in most of the batfam fandom but as someone who seems to enjoy the more complex side of them how do you feel about it?

I almost blocked my father for repeatedly sending my brother and I WFA panels in our family comics server

[heartyearning]

one of the funniest things when you start studying theatre design (at our school anyway) is that u come in and for your first few scenography designs youre like im gonna use screens ,,,,, —and projection.... this is how i’m going to enhance the impact of my performance 🤯🧠💯 & then you go to theatre productions in which they use screens and projection & ur like All My Teachers Were Right This Sucks Severe Ass

[itsamenickname]

Also, just a little heads up for y'all: I will most likely not be very active on Tumblr today due to wanting to avoid any potential spoilers for the Mario movie before I see it later tonight.

[oatbugs]

ok so heres what happened

[silverislander]

have discovered a new enemy while doing research for the honours essay. why are you pretending to understand psychology and BLATANTLY misinterpreting actual terms and concepts in order to tear down a movie aimed at teenage girls, my good bitch. i'm going to start biting

[starboundsingularities]

good lird they did not make a gimmick blog about a real life murder

#someone fucking DIED but whatever who gives a shit it's funny i guess

7 notes

🥚 eggvidenced Follow

honestly with how suspicious and confusing everything on the dl-6 case was i wouldn't be surprised if it came out that it was that prosecutor guy tbh

🌟 rockliker270 Follow

date posted: june 23, 2010

1,834,853 notes

⚖️ courtofpublicopinions Follow

🌟 rockliker270 Follow

ok hear me out. what abt winston payne though

🧊 just--ice Follow

okay now they're just making lawyers up

#also didn't mvk die or something?

28,932 notes

🔥 triedbyfire Follow

why the fuck are you people still posting about the gavinners as if theyre not copaganda. didn't the guitarist get convicted of murder

🎸 guiltiest-lovers837 Follow

so fucking tired of this "um um didn't daryan get convicted of murder" YEAH AND HE'S LITERALLY NOT IN THE FUCKING BAND ANYMORE. dipshit

🔥 triedbyfire Follow

are you gonna address the copaganda thing or

1,092 notes

🌻 attorneybout Follow

he's so. 😳

📂 trialanderror Follow

why is he defending

📂 trialanderror Follow

OP WHY IS HE DEFENDING???

24,374 notes

🦈 giantlakemonsters Follow

i just wanna hear about another gourdy sighting thats all

🥜 liberdeez Follow

op. i'm so sorry op. gourdy isn't real you have to let her go. they had a whole trial about it.

🔐 wrightorwrong Follow

hi!! so this isn't actually the case as while gourdy was briefly mentioned in a trial, said trial had nothing to do with whether or not gourdy was "real" per se as much as. well. murder, actually. while gourdy WAS found out to be an inflatable steel samurai this was not brought up in the case at all as the veracity of gourdy wasn't really as relevant as the fact that the witness was looking for gourdy rather than at the murder she claimed to have seen. plus this was also a relatively small part of a MUCH larger trial which for those interested not only solved the dl-6 case but ALSO marked the end of prosecutor von karma's ~40 year long record and the court records are really a fascinating read through!!

🦀 mad_libz_87 Follow

net 0 information post

#thanks again lawblr

94,834 notes

🍒 cherriescoola Follow

btw i was at the park the other day and klavier gavin (of gavinners fame) was there and obv there was a huge crowd but this guy was there with him and at some point he (the other guy) waved to the crowd and someone still screamed like it was klavier??? who was that guy ive never seen him before in my life

2,284 notes

🩸 has-dl6-been-solved-yet Follow

December 28, 2016

YES!!!

702,947 notes

🪙 tellerlikeitis Follow

guys help i'm a bank teller and this guy just introduced himself as robin banks what do i do

🔪 violencekilling Follow

you gotta let him rob you that's the law

302,948 notes

👻 ghostesswiththemostest Follow

look if i ever get convicted of murder im just hiring the lawyer with the coolest sounding name

💼 courtofwaw Follow

bestie if you already got convicted it is Too Late

62,193 notes

📋 lawandwhoreder Follow

guys i know it's real fun to think people just can predict whatever but if you look at the earliest reblogs of that post that "guessed" the true killer in the dl-6 case it was actually a post about how they didn't want to go to the store. clearly edited

#stg nobody bothers to factcheck anything anymore

7,293 notes

🐺 lawnewolf Follow

i am NOT homophobic or whatever the fuck you guys are saying now i just think its weird to write fanfiction about realass people?? go touch grass ffs

🌈 lawsbian Follow

the fun police (this guy) putting me in yaoi court but the lawyers (phoenix witrght and miles edgeworth) just keep trying to make out (real court is like this too btw)

🐺 lawnewolf Follow

YOU HAVE SOMETHING WRONG WITH YOU.

#look idc what your enemies to lovers fic bullshit says #they're straight. and more importantly REAL PEOPLE. #there's TENSION because they are in COURT and there are LIVES on the LINE. #not because they wanna fuck. god.

12,293 notes

🔮 inhighspirits Follow

why dont they just ask the spirit mediums to ask the victims who killed them this law shit is easy

837,495 notes

💞 lawveyourself Follow

seriously i cant believe they gave this guy a law degree

💞 lawveyourself Follow

what do you mean evidence fraud

503,893 notes

🎧 instrumentalillness Follow

fuck you *unguilties your love*

384,568 notes

🎀 copiicat Follow

perjury isnt illegal btw in fact if youre one of tge witnesses youre legally required to lie on the stand. thats why everyone does it. trust me

[floorpancakes]

i love clamp in a complex beautiful way but sometimes i see certain ships and its like that meme of the guy getting light blasted in his face being knocked back cause these girlies like their shit messy douwata are like that meme that's like oh thank god im the only normal one here but like actually

[arolesbianism]

Rotates swap au Wickerbottom in my head. Gotta love old women trapped in self imposed cycles of pain and regret