Unfollow’d Geeks

Looking for content to distract me in 2016, I happened upon the youtube channels of some comic book geeks. I think you can see where this is going. I watched them for some months and they mostly succeeded in being non-political and non-shitty about diverse new characters and such. Just an odd hint here and there of banal shitty geek attitudes, I could deal.

But then one that I do not follow posted some video about how “Diversity is Killing Marvel Comics,” some sites apparently had articles about comic book boys being racist, and foolios felt the need to respond / engage. The realities of the situation I don’t care to get into, not in the comments below or anywhere. Suffice it to say Marvel has been doing some brave things with diversity at the same time as they’ve had sales go into a slump. Whatever.

So at first I managed to avoid watching the one guy’s response video. I imagine he might have even had a half decent thing to say on the subject, but I didn’t wanna risk losing something passable to watch over finding the guy is a crudlord. But then I ended up catching some of it, and he’s whining about the journalists saying comic nerds are racist, calling it irresponsible journalism.

Hey, right now, of any time in recent history, calling out racism has become FUCKING VITAL. Call me racist. I don’t care as long as I learn to be a better person at the end of the conversation. Getting defensive? I don’t wanna hear it. Blow me. Unfollow’d.

Then the other banal moderate probably not a nazi comic nerd I follow was commenting about some bit of media news that mentioned triggers and he said, “Make all the trigger jokes you like.” Nuh. Don’t. Fucking unfollow’d.

Lately at work I’m trying to convince people to stop talking about political issues and these geeks I work with are all like, “Well, sure, I don’t even care about politics.” Which I find almost as offensive as saying you voted for Trump. Fuck you, geeks. I wish I had the ability to unfollow IRL, but I’m pathologically incapable of ignoring words spoken around me. Maybe I’m autism spectrum or compulsive or something. I can’t not listen to you fuckos being fuckos, so please, leave everything even vaguely political at home. I’m trying to get through the day without being fired for going off on a fool.


Doing One’s Part

If I missed a day of work I’d be fired at this point, so rather than join the protest, I spent the day’s wages on donations to people. I was going to donate to an org but had trouble making indiegogo work on my computer, and one of the people I was going to donate to I couldn’t figure out how to make a one time donation. So anyhow, my hot 80 bucks got spread around mostly at The Orbit. Now I’m gonna buy a “Make Racists Afraid Again” hat and call it a night. >_< -

Pitfalls of RP: NonAdventurers

In this post I’m going to assume you’re familiar with the terms I’m using.  Ask for clarification in the comments if you like.  I’m also going to address this in part to GMs and in part to players, but I’m coming from the perspective of someone who is almost always the GM.

As GMs, we assume players want to play.  They showed up for a game, right?  But this is not a safe assumption.

There are many reasons why someone who came for a game might end up recalcitrant and useless.  Many roleplaying gamers are children, making them prone to rapid mood swings and erratic behavior.  Some people may feel compelled by social circumstances to show up for something they don’t want to do, and play their characters as inert lumps.  Sometimes a player is being antagonized by a crappy GM or other players, but doesn’t feel bold enough to quit the situation.

Those are all legitimate enough.  It would be nice if people could just admit when they don’t want to be around and have the means and wherewithal to bail, but it’s not always the case.  Still, there are some more cryptic reasons why players don’t play.  I’d like to discuss those a bit…
[Read more…]

Not MLK, but Relevant

Engraved Langston Hughes quote at the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture

“You tell me that hitler
Is a mighty bad man.
I guess he took lessons
from the ku klux klan…
Cause everything that hitler
And mussolini do,
Negroes get the same
Treatment from you…
I ask you this question
Cause I want to know
How long I got to fight
BOTH HITLER-AND JIM CROW.”
-Langston Hughes,
“Beaumont to Detroit: 1943”

Still fighting.

In the Wake of Recent Events

I’m going to stop blogging about political topics. Cheeto Hitler and his merry band of moustache twirling masters of evil are trying to fire everyone decent in government, pack the emptied seats with literal nazi sympathizers and people who won’t be happy until the poor are eating rusted nails and dying at the age of thirty, and putting the most wasteful gas-belching nation’s environment – and therefore the well-being of the entire planet – in the hands of fucking fire demons.

Anyway, the horrifying dracula-esque theft of my household’s healthcare was the last straw. I can pay attention to politics, or I can have a few moments of happiness before I die in a gutter. I doubt I’ll be able to hold to this resolution for long, but for now expect more posts about movies and nonsense.

Incidentally, I’m in this probationary period at my job where if I miss two days they’ll fire me, in defiance of state law no doubt, but that doesn’t matter to them or me at the end of the day. So I’m gonna miss the J20 protests. In honor of the struggle, on that day I’ll be making a rare round of small one time donations to some of my fellow impoverished bloggers, such as Ania & Alyssa, Alex Gabriel, and so on. I’ll spend at least the entire day’s wages on it.

Anyhow, FUCK THE MAN.

fight the power

animated image from The Raid 2

With that, I’m out.


Synonyms for Stupid and Insane

The words ‘stupid’ and ‘insane’, along with their synonyms, are still not cool with me. Don’t use them in my comment section, please do consider whether there’s a way for you to write in your own spaces without using them. I know it isn’t easy, but using those words is ableist. We really ought to be trying harder.

For a brutal reminder of why ableism is bad, read Ania on The Orbit again.


Mysteries With No Payoff

I was eatin’ a sammich in the living room and the series premiere of Taboo was on. Tom Hardy is in there and he’s usually got an interesting presence. I’m kinda inclined to like him, though I haven’t been given a whole lot of cinematic reason to. So I thought, this show has until the end of this sammich to appeal to me. No dice. I’m done.

I spent a lot of years not watching TV shows, just started doing it again within the last five. I’m starting to see the same tropes and writing techniques play out on the scale of seasons, and to appreciate the things I’ve read other people saying on the internet.

That is to say, fuck Lost. TV shows love setting up a mystery but there are too many examples of them leaving you without an answer, or with an answer that strongly suggests they were making shit up as they went along. I find that so annoying that I have serious misgivings about any TV show that relies heavily on mystery.

So Taboo is building up Hardy’s character with rumors and whispers and mysterious behavior and blah blah. There’s the East India Company as villains – legit historical monsters but he’s very much one of them. Hardy’s boy was in the EIC and bounced around the world getting into backstory hijinx whenever he wasn’t mighty whitey-ing his way into indigenous cultures.

It’s like we’re being expected to root for a trust fund cockhole who spent his young adulthood being an asswipe in faraway places, then came home to act like he’s morally superior to the community that spawned him. Then there’s weird shit like the implication from wasted-as-a-whore Franka Potente that he kills women, to which he’s like “You know it, baby!” Who is supposed to like this? Not me.


Reason and Observation are Unnatural

HEY, dudes and dudettes.  I know you think basing your metaphysical beliefs on reason and observation is “healthy” and “cool,” but you gotta know, our ancestors didn’t do that!  On the African Savannah, or maybe caves I guess, we spent what, a million years, getting our facts from pattern association, superstition, arguments from authority and antiquity.  Well listen up, babies.

PALEO THOUGHT.  None of that unnatural processed scientific garbage polluting your brains, just what your body is designed for: metaphysical beliefs that would make your caveman ancestors proud.  It’s a common sense approach to mental fitness.  Get with the program and we’ll send you two coupons for the granola bar at Whole Foods, offer not valid in all locations, some conditions apply.

Namaste.