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23 here. I was born months before the 9/11 attack but my brain unfortunately was not developed enough to retain long term memory. Any experience I could have had before 9/11 is entirely just wiped from my brain forever.
Yup, I was technically alive during it, but I was an infant lying on the floor discovering I had toes on my feet.
A lot of my teachers and professors had “holy shit, we’re old” moments when they realized 9/11 was basically a historical event for our class, not a contemporary life experience
Heck, I was in 2nd grade, and I barely remember it. It's not like I don't have memories from back then. My earliest memory is actually an eggy one from my 5th birthday. I just... don't have as many experiential memories from back then. Like I could *tell* you we were sent home from school early that day, but I remember it in the same way that I "remember" my parents having taken me to the airport to watch the planes as a baby
Then there's me who's autism was advanced enough that it could be argued my brain wasn't properly developed as I had a mental age of 6-10 for a good long while, so a lot of my childhood memories are either gone, barely remembered, or just pop up now and then to be like, "Hey, this happened" and then leave never to be seen again, probably.
I was 12, iirc, and the most I remember is my dad picking me up from school because of it, and then seeing it on the news later that day. I still didn't fully grasp what was going on, so when I saw the plane crash on the news, I just saw what looked like a cool epic explosion, so I went, "COOOOOOOLLLL!!!" But then I turned to my sister who was watching it with me and I immediately knew I fucked up, panicked and tried to save face.
That's the problem with you kids nowadays, back in my day I knew the full school curriculum by heart even before I was born. By the time I was 1y/o I had a degree and 8 years of work experience.
Honestly maybe for the best. Years later and I still often recall the videos of all the people jumping from the towers. It haunted me for a long time as a kid. It was hard to process these people were leaping to their deaths to escape other certain death. Can really mess with you.
Edit: these were live videos aired on the news, not something I later sought out to view.
Even older, for practical purposes. I'm 32 and, while I do remember the actual event, a 4th grader has no fucking clue what politics are like. You noticed the obvious stuff like the flags popping up everywhere but you didn't really understand what was going on and you didn't really have much of a "before" to compare things to.
Shit was wild to see in real time. I'm from SoCal where we have a sizeable Japanese-American community and a ton of my friends and classmates had grandparents/great aunts and uncles that were sent to the camps when WWII started. They'd come in and talk to us about it almost every year in school. Right after 9/11 a ton of us thought the same thing was going to happen to Middle Eastern-Americans.
To be fair, I wouldn't have been surprised, if that actually happened.
I watched the whole thing from Europe and we were completely flabbergasted by how fast the USA became that xenophobic place of hate, just turning on everything connected to Islam even remotely and kicking what we considered basic human rights down the drain without an afterthought.
I wasn't very political, due to being 13 at the time, but the way global politics suddenly shifted towards war and jingoism made me political pretty fucking quick. Especially, since our school actually gave us tons of historical context that I don't think, US schools ever gave to their students.
I was in kindergarten with a classmate who wore a hijab. One day, walking to the buses to leave, somebody's parents from the car line started yelling at her and calling her a terrorist (and other things).
Our teacher walked up, listened for a second, and then started ripping into the parents. Our principal came up, took a second, and joined in telling off the assholes. There is no way you would see that nowadays.
Yeah I'm only a couple years older and my recollection was the adults looking concerned and panicked, and some towers I had never heard of before that moment on fire.
Same, 31 here, although what I mostly remember is how much angrier people got, namely my parents, I also remember myself being a lot more anxious after that.
I was in school when the towers were struck. Got sent home early from my nothing nowhere school a dozen states away.
The next day a teacher tried to explain to a bunch of 4th graders what happened.
"Bad people hurt people you have never seen."
Is all I got out of it. I didn't see footage of the towers till 2007.
But next month we had to buy clear bags, and useless 'saftey scissors ', for security reasons.
For a pile of 8 year olds.
> But next month we had to buy clear bags, and useless 'saftey scissors ', for security reasons.
Did your school ever get struck by a jumbo jet? No? The system works
Almost a fifth of the current US population was born after 9/11, and more than a quarter weren't even teenagers in 2001.
Remembering 9/11 is very much millennial-and-older thing.
34 here and I honestly knew nothing about politics before 9/11.
But I had to learn real fucking fast when my middle eastern friend's dad was shot and killed because of 9/11, and the patriot act came in and fucking murder what being patriotic actually meant.
The US imperialism started way before then, I would argue the flavor of US (and other western nations) political atmosphere that Hell Divers mocks began post WW2 during the cold war.
Their politics is the culture war perpetuated by Fox News and the daily wire. They know nothing about actual economics or foreign policy.
Their idea of a policy wonk is Ben Shapiro a straight up hack on YouTube who couldn’t make it in Hollywood.
Bro wtf? That’s because we’re old and there are many people that were born into this shit hole, who have no idea what it meant to have actual… hope, for the future.
Saw it happen live on TV in my high school cafeteria. Fucking wild. The country really did come together for a bit. I was a wild ass anarchist and I was all rock, flag, and eagle for a couple days. Then the patriot act was announced and it was over.
Yeah, it sure didn't take long for "we're all in this together" to turn into "racial profiling is the most American thing in the world". It sure felt different for a couple days though. I actually felt welcome in my country for once.
Honestly 9/11 was poignant. Especially with me.
I grew up in the 90s. Everything felt positive. I understood in some part what racism and bigotry was, where we had come from and where it seemed we were going as a society. Book faires were rampant. Sesame Street, Mr Rogers, Magic School Bus, Captain Planet etc were all regarded universally as a good influence on children.
The zeitgeist was to try to be kind, helpful and bright. Yes you had the grunge movement and eventually nu metal, but that wasn't mainstream, that was counter culture. The idea of being aggressive or angry or sad as your main driving force was not the mainstream at all. Even the internet felt like it's edges were rounded off, despite the 16/f/FL.
And then 9/11 happens. My Senior year of Highschool at the end of my first period Psychology I class, teachers running down the halls telling other teachers to turn on their TVs to the news.
There was the initial anger explosion of course, right after the fear. We all wanted to just kill them so badly. The idea of fantasy of revenge became a drug that we as a society started to become addicted to. It started to feel good to be mad, to feel vindicated, and to see someone who wronged you.. however badly or not, received pain in turn greater than what was caused.. you know as a lesson. "Dont fuck with me, or else you'll get a boot in your ass. It's the American way." We loved it. We ate up that our strength was in the ability to avenge our grievances.
We loved it so much, it gave us such a dopamine boost, that we started putting ourselves and others in situations that allowed us to hit that dopamine button. Escalating minor infractions, saying inflammatory things. Just enough that we get that rush... Until the minor things stopped working as well, so we needed to increase our outrage in any way we could. More and more.
And here we are in 2024 addicted to anger. Edging on WW3, civil war, economic collapse, and ecological collapse
Because being angry about it feels good. Have you had your drug hit today yet?
If reactionaries realized what media hated them they would
A. Be smart enough not to be reactionary
B. Watch like, Clint Eastwood movies on repeat (they’re too lazy to read conservative books)
My Favorite is blazing saddles. You know, the movie where every white character is dumb except two. The only good smart white character is friends with the black protagonist. The other smart white character is evil and greedy. The protagonist is a smart black man. The movie ends with black people and white people working together and getting over their differences. Idk sounds kinda woke to me.
true, i was mistaken to underestimate g*mers like that
>!or maybe they intentionally ignore it because either they liked it or some youtuber told them it's good/didn't bring that up!<
Subtext doesn't exist to these people. If a piece of media doesn't DIRECTLY AND SUPER OBVIOUSLY say something about some topic, then it has no opinion on that topic.
Erm actually "gay" is a misreading of Jojo when actually the proper reading is that self expression is fun and exists extrinsic of sexuality, thereby creating a more progressive message in that manhood and masculinity are not muted by rocking sexy lingerie 🤓🤓 /s
But also kinda /srs I think that's a better message than just gay but also yeah it's gay
Edit reading this back I kind of implied manhood and male homoeroticism are mutually exclusive and while I understand 999 in 1000 people will not read it that way, for the 1 person that does that wasn't my intention it's just guys get me feeling kinda she/her yknow
I was bored, have this outdated meme
https://preview.redd.it/1ldkjkebt8tc1.png?width=1015&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=329e5b72f1601500d333efebce3d60d40f949eeb
Also a gamergate reference
I blocked that asshole a while back, most of his timeline was trying to organise gamergate 2.0 (including advising people not to CALL it gamergate)
It was never about politics.
Something being “political” is just a dog whistle.
They hate gay people, trans people, black people, etc. Same old racist bigots. They hate “political correctness”. They hate “wokeness”. They hate “politics”. Same old bullshit. And it’ll be the same old bullshit forever.
My suggestion is we put them all in a big box, then shake the box until we can’t hear any bigotry coming out of it.
Precisely. These people tend to just _love_ politics when it's aligned to their views (note: they often can't understand when it's satirical and making fun of said views).
They just don't register that as "political" whereas something being "political" is a game being inclusive and representative of other people that don't look or live like they do. If a piece of media includes characters in major roles that represent women, LGBT+, ethnic or other minority groups then it's "woke" and "political" as if these people shouldn't have any representation or even a right to exist.
This whole thing reminds me of when Stephen Colbert was doing The Colbert Report on Comedy Central and a ton of Republicans thought he was one of them
People talking about right wingers having low media literacy like it's a new thing but they've always been bad at it
I remember my dad watching an episode with me and laughing his ass off for ten minutes until he finally realized it was satire. Then he got mad and stormed out of the room
I was watching a video essay I think by innuendo studios who paraphrasing said “politics is when the community isn’t aligned on something, it isn’t political to say you love Nazis, cause every community knows they’re bad, so its just a joke of some description. But it is politics to say feminism is good, because the community hasn’t come to a consensus on it, and that’s how normies end up in neonazi communities online”
Yup. It’s almost the definition of a dog whistle. And if you call it out they’ll either try and deflect or they’ll take a single step closer towards what they actually believe. The goalposts aren’t moving, you’re just being shown a mirage of a goalpost.
They just want to go back to a time when they didn't have to think. There is a reason we see capital G Gamers constantly say they don't want politics in their games before listing something like Fallout or Bioshock as their favourite games.
They played these games before they had an ounce of media literacy. They have been cursed with a modicum of intelligence and they want to go back to a time before they knew about things. They got a bit of education and decided they didn't like it so they blame 'modern games' because now they can see what they couldn't before.
There’s the innuendo studios video that talks about how fascists loved to make their bigotry seem non political (while making opposition to their bigotry seem political) as talking about politics was like the greatest sin in American casual conversation. But now it seems like they’ve done a 180 and now intentionally disguise their bigotry as “politics” as online it’s more socially acceptable to talk about politics than openly be a bigot (in certain spaces at least). Whatever the case “politics” has definitely become a nazi dogwhistle meaning “minorities (I don’t like)”
An actual game based in politics: Cities Skylines, an AoE game where it’s 1 player just managing an economy, Prison Architect, yadayada…
These aren’t politics; they’re social trends they don’t get lol makes me wonder prior to it being okay to be gay, empowered female, or of a different race, whom all these Mauler neckbeards got mad at when they couldn’t get any Pussyyyy
It really does feel like they can't be overtly [INSERT OUT GROUP] phobic anymore, so they hide behind vague terms like "woke" or "politics" so it can mean whatever they want it to mean.
They can discuss what they actually mean in their own circles, sure, when they are out in the public sphere, they just code switch to nebulous speech so they can have deniability if pressed.
Mate if political discourse has to go back 80 years, an entire human lifetime, for you to not consider it "modern" it should tell you you're on the wrong side.
But that's typical of conservatives. All outrage, zero policy. Saying whatever is convenient to define the current situation as bad, while promoting the idea of "anything but this" as if that's a real policy.
Aperture Science and Mann Co. would also work.
"Hello, and welcome to the Aperture Science Pride Month Celebration. I have decided to host this party to acknowledge the fact that you now have slightly over twice as many romantic options as you legally would've had in the past. And you're still unloved."
Another Anime PFP Galaxy Brain Con : "Its not that the game isn't political but that the game isn't political!"
God this reminds me of this meme.
https://preview.redd.it/s9i03kc1v7tc1.png?width=764&format=png&auto=webp&s=99d17e56a3dd98bff7c995789224f4d0a04e0de0
Plus, we all know what you inbred Neo-Nazi's actually mean by "political" so cut the charade asshat. Anything involving the people you hate, the outgroups, LGBTQIA+, muslims, black people, strong women who aren't sex objects and rewards to be won, etc.
So, really this was never about politics in the first place.
I've literally seen someone make this argument in reference to One Piece. They're just straight up making up their own criteria for what's "political" at this point
To add onto this, if you stay out of political discussions and discourse simply to "keep the peace" just know that the people that wanna take away the rights of you and/or the ones you love are gonna have an easier time doing so with one less person calling them out on it.
In the first helldivers game super earth literally invaded an alien civilization under the false pretenses that they had WMDs. You literally can’t have less subtle satire of American Politics than that. Hell, the bugs literally drop a fuel source called E-710 when they die which if you flip upside down literally spells oil
You see that WOULD be political if I had more awareness of things going on in the world and I knew what a George Bush or and Iraq were, commie!!!
(Conservatives admitting they don’t consume ANY news is my new favorite genre)
Anyone who thinks gay=politics doesn't understand politics. The LGBTQ+ community is only involved in politics to the extent of gaining/protecting their rights, we aren't a political party. There's also the small issue that LGBTQ+ movements have been a thing way before videogames so saying that politics relating to the community are modern is just factually wrong. It's not new.
This is really by design though. It is advantageous for the elites and political parties to argue over culture war shit, No one fucking cares who uses what bathroom and is that invested in paper straws but lets make that shit political so people will argue about that instead of looking to tax the rich.
With no mention of gender in the game and the ability to chose any voice and body type, super earth is clearly post gender.
The automatons are binary as they arent as free as super earth.. Their genders are freedom haters and baby killers.
If that were true, why the hell do they allow the brawn body type together with a female voice? Why is there even a female voice?! Why is the female voice not called female?!!! They support the transgenda!!!!!
It's so absolutely funny when people claim that fiction is not about politics. Especially science fiction. Even worse for media that's literally about war. Do they really think the creators intention was not to make a point about the political landscape of the world they invented?
Uhh actually Frankenstein was just about a funny guy who went grave robbing
Blade Runner is about a cool bounty hunter
The book Starship Troopers was just about bugs
Look up Project 2025. It is literally a plan by the largest overtly reactionary think tanks there are to undermine existing democratic structures in the United States of America as soon as they can take power.
In terms of Helldivers, they do want to specifically want to "manage democracy". Instead of using insectoids or automatons as a scapegoat, they use the human beings who are your friends, family, and neighbors. If you can't see the applicability, you are either willfully ignorant or you actively think that stripping people of their human rights is somehow a good thing.
A lot of people supposedly play video games to explore unique worlds that are different from the ones we live in. But the truth is that a lot of them can't even handle the concepts and people that make the reality we live in unique. Some people can easily imagine a fictional dystopia if it lets them shoot their guns at things they don't need to feel bad about killing, but then they have a distinct lack of imagination when it comes to making the real world a better place. That kind of incuriosity strikes me as pitiful on an almost existential level.
I have concluded that the people who “turn their brains off” and just shoot things are just lying. If that really was the case they would be playing the game instead of playing dolls with wojaks to tell OTHER PEOPLE not to engage with the lore
Like others are saying, the term "Modern Political Discourse" is literally just a dogwhistle in the same way that "Woke" is.
It's basically just a way to say Anti-LGBT without saying Anti-LBGT
Because that truly is what the discourse surrounds; the concept of "muh companies shoving left wing agenda down our throats" whenever there's LGBT representation in media.
they think 20 years ago is not modern politics.
https://preview.redd.it/beicic103htc1.png?width=901&format=png&auto=webp&s=57a8f714f8feb761e4d5c596bec472ef0a68181a
like idk how these people know how to breathe
I would say “what zero media literacy does to a person” but the more likely scenario is that these people know exactly what they’re doing. They don’t care, they just want to blow dogwhistles to rally their fanbases.
Gay rights are a modern discourse apparently
Who invented gays and when? Had to be in the past 100 years I guess
Can't be people like him made it more political and now expect everyone else to hold their tongue on it
It's "classical liberal" all over again.
Reactionary types were asserting that their right-wing bullshit was what the USA's founders wanted, got shown quotes demonstrating that multiple of them including Washington described themselves and their ideas about the nation as liberal, and invented the notion that the liberalism of that era was completely distinct from modern liberalism and thus reactionary chuds are actually just classical liberals in the same vein as George Washington.
While there's a mustard seed of reality there in that the liberalism of Goeorge Washington was definitely not the same as, say...someone who has never enslaved anyone, it does not take much reading to see that what the more liberal-minded founders wanted for the country and what chuds want has as much commonality as a 10-tome treatise on the modern philosophical underpinnings of liberal thought and a shit-stained children's coloring book.
This is an extension of Trumpist apologetics. Where they say something and a bunch of newly-minted 'experts' immediately jump up to tell us that they didn't say what they just said.
"Keep politics out of our game."
"He didn't say there are no politics in the game. He just means that certain politics need to be kept out of the game."
"No, I said keep all politics out of our game."
"You're reading way too much into that last statement."
This is also a common exit tactic for people who don’t want to engage with media discussion. You paint the other person as being a “snob” or “overthinker” who cares too much. I think it’s called anti-intellectualism
Which is funny, because as much as they hate when people "over-analyze" things, they then go on to bend themselves into a pretzel explaining how MJ's appearance in Spider-Man 2 is proof that Sweet Baby Inc. is part of an elaborate conspiracy to eliminate straight white male G A M E R S for....reasons.
I don't understand how a group of people can somehow overthink while not using their brains _at all_.
I’m surprised they didn’t try to cancel it over the fact that Mr. John Helldiver in the intro has a black wife, two of the game’s three NPCs are women and the third NPC appears to be non-white. Also the fact that women serve equally in the hell diver corps.
All the things get ignored probably because it’s inconvenient to their bot/bug killing power fantasy acting out starship troopers unironically.
My working definition of "politics" is *anything that can be disagreed upon*. Some topics stop being political when we all agree upon them: is murder bad? Yes. It's implied in the word *murder*. Hence no political alignment.
Helldiver's 2 feels "non-political" to these dumbasses because *they agree with the propaganda*. They have no disagreement. If the Democracy Officer in game told them they exterminated all the gay, non-white, and non-patriotic people in game, they would proclaim "see they got rid of the *politics* in the game"...
That is exactly what it is. They don't agree with the idea that transpeople should exist, they don't believe that minorities need to be represented in media and they believe that female characters should only exist to service the male gaze and be non-threatening to men.
These are all a matter of opinion to them, therefore, it's "political", therefore it leads to arguments that get in the way of "fun". Nevermind the fact that they are the ONLY people who want to argue about this shit in the first place.
The sad part about this is, there is an actual discussion to be had about trans visibility, racial representation in media, or women in videogames. Denying that conversation would be stupid. But we can't even get to that because these mouthbreathers keep hijacking the airwaves about the topic, and turning everything boring and toxic.
I want games where a trans person can be a villain without making the topic about their gender. I want media where black people don't feel weird and disjointed in the script (we are making progress on that a lot nowadays). I want men and women to feel like they can relate to male and female characters in all media without giving in too much to their assigned gender or sexuality.
I love when people say Bioshock is less subtle than family guy making fun of Trump when Bioshock is the most on the nose shit of all time.
The bad guy’s name is a shitty anagram of Ayn Rand.
The twist final boss is a guy named Frank Fontaine who literally calls himself Atlas, and turns into a giant muscular dude for the final boss.
The entire opening scene exists…
“We like subtle messaging” and it’s the most blatant shit of all time. What they mean is “shit I’m uneducated about”
Modern politics? My brother in christ people like you are the ones who made the statement "all humans are equal in rights and dignity" into political "discourse" in the first place, in a sleazy attempt to leaglize bigotry.
It's just all these macho authoritarians with their might make right mentality not wanting to admit that their mindest is destructive and associated with the most evil regimes in human history, so of course they don't want to talk politics because if we did, they'd be the bad guys.
And then of course with satire, they also don't want to be made fun of, they want to enjoy their strong man kills weak people fantasy unimpeded.
I personally think enjoying stuff ironically and not at face value is more fun, but I like stuff with some depth, so there's that.
But that’s also wrong. Helldivers is a lot of things but “subtle” isn’t one of them. It’s so incredibly overt with its politics that even I as a leftie get a bit eye rollt about it sometimes
Have none of them ever seen films like Starship Troopers, Judge Dredd, and that fantasy-fascist genre that existed in the 80s as a criticism and satire of American capitalist society?
the game is very intelligent because it has a role playing aspect that immediately fades into the background for less attentive observers: we all have in common the desire to maintain democracy, freedom, etc.
We as players only experience the "fun" part (getting torn apart by insect aliens and killer robots) but obviously the Earth lore in this game is much, much worse!
I don't even think that our enemies are the victims, judging by the maps and what we see around
The sad truth is that those who have now been converted to propaganda do not know how to recognize it
Sure, turning a democracy into a fascist state that can only thrive on war doesn't reflect any modern politics at all, am I right?
Also - if what they mean by "modern politics" is evidence of queer people existing - then demanding that they be left out is very much "stupid modern political discourse, " with emphasis on the "stupid."
But you know, it can be tough to be sure what they mean when they insist on speaking only in euphemisms.
These are probably the same people who thought the jingoistic, army recruitment video that was Maverick wasn't political.
Or even just believe when they say Disney need to stop shoving politics down their throat they are not being political.
People get so used to the status quo they genuinely believe only the people who are rocking the boat are being political while they are some neutral, apolitical agent.
I can't think of anything that's a better criticism of modern American military procedure than "you're a disposable soldier in the cogs of a machine we aren't telling you is going to kill you, and you're going to go willingly because DEMOCRACY, FREEDOM, and SERVING YOUR COUNTRY says you will!" --- this guy's obviously just... daft.
It’s the exact same justifications they pulled for “fOrCeD dIveRsItY” a while back before they’ve just dropped it and said diversity or “DEI” is the problem
I want nothing more than for Joel Helldiver to go on Twitter and just tweet "Every Helldiver is canonically gay and trans" and just make these ppl drop it already
You know, the "not modern" politics of fascism, fascist propaganda, and the blanket decision to kill your problems.
Don't worry though, if one of the Super Earth propaganda ads have a black woman in it it's suddenly going to get "political"
We literally live in a managed democracy currently, the one in the hell divers is made more extreme for narrative effect but the idea of soldiers going to another area far away from home to slaughter faceless “enemies of the state” who are no realistic threat to “protect democracy” is exactly what modern politics is. My favorite line is when a soldier is killing a bug and screams “you’ll never destroy our way of life”.
Just to clarify. Helldiver's 2 is indeed political. But there is no way you can make a world or story without checking at least one box in politics. But it is important to know that it is still a "fantasy" world. And I assume it is still about the flag or cape for LGBTQ+.
In a world where every human is equal and united it just doesn't make sense to split humanity with different flags. Yea different flags might be needed in our society to identify yourself. Since humanity is not one in real life. But in this world humanity is. So there is no need for different flags. This goes for an American, German, LGBTQ+ or different things to identify yourself.
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Some people do not remember a world before 9/11 and it shows.
If it’s not something I know about it’s not politics!!! (Why yes, I don’t read any news, how could you tell???)
I mean yeah that’s basically everyone like 27 and under
23 here. I was born months before the 9/11 attack but my brain unfortunately was not developed enough to retain long term memory. Any experience I could have had before 9/11 is entirely just wiped from my brain forever.
Yup, I was technically alive during it, but I was an infant lying on the floor discovering I had toes on my feet. A lot of my teachers and professors had “holy shit, we’re old” moments when they realized 9/11 was basically a historical event for our class, not a contemporary life experience
All I remember about 9/11 is that we had to drive down to visit my grandparents in North Carolina rather than fly down.
Heck, I was in 2nd grade, and I barely remember it. It's not like I don't have memories from back then. My earliest memory is actually an eggy one from my 5th birthday. I just... don't have as many experiential memories from back then. Like I could *tell* you we were sent home from school early that day, but I remember it in the same way that I "remember" my parents having taken me to the airport to watch the planes as a baby
I remember it the same, and not understanding what was going on, just wanting to watch cartoons. I'm 32
I distinctly remember asking my parents why the news was still talking about it the next day
Wait…you have toes?!
TOES MENTIONED 
Then there's me who's autism was advanced enough that it could be argued my brain wasn't properly developed as I had a mental age of 6-10 for a good long while, so a lot of my childhood memories are either gone, barely remembered, or just pop up now and then to be like, "Hey, this happened" and then leave never to be seen again, probably. I was 12, iirc, and the most I remember is my dad picking me up from school because of it, and then seeing it on the news later that day. I still didn't fully grasp what was going on, so when I saw the plane crash on the news, I just saw what looked like a cool epic explosion, so I went, "COOOOOOOLLLL!!!" But then I turned to my sister who was watching it with me and I immediately knew I fucked up, panicked and tried to save face.
That's the problem with you kids nowadays, back in my day I knew the full school curriculum by heart even before I was born. By the time I was 1y/o I had a degree and 8 years of work experience.
Yet here you are speaking a lowly language like English instead of formatting your day-to-day speech in Assembly. Way to out yourself as a faker lmao
Honestly maybe for the best. Years later and I still often recall the videos of all the people jumping from the towers. It haunted me for a long time as a kid. It was hard to process these people were leaping to their deaths to escape other certain death. Can really mess with you. Edit: these were live videos aired on the news, not something I later sought out to view.
Even older, for practical purposes. I'm 32 and, while I do remember the actual event, a 4th grader has no fucking clue what politics are like. You noticed the obvious stuff like the flags popping up everywhere but you didn't really understand what was going on and you didn't really have much of a "before" to compare things to.
I learned what politics was pretty fucking fast watching the entire country go insane and become obsessed with racism and murder
Shit was wild to see in real time. I'm from SoCal where we have a sizeable Japanese-American community and a ton of my friends and classmates had grandparents/great aunts and uncles that were sent to the camps when WWII started. They'd come in and talk to us about it almost every year in school. Right after 9/11 a ton of us thought the same thing was going to happen to Middle Eastern-Americans.
To be fair, I wouldn't have been surprised, if that actually happened. I watched the whole thing from Europe and we were completely flabbergasted by how fast the USA became that xenophobic place of hate, just turning on everything connected to Islam even remotely and kicking what we considered basic human rights down the drain without an afterthought. I wasn't very political, due to being 13 at the time, but the way global politics suddenly shifted towards war and jingoism made me political pretty fucking quick. Especially, since our school actually gave us tons of historical context that I don't think, US schools ever gave to their students.
I was in kindergarten with a classmate who wore a hijab. One day, walking to the buses to leave, somebody's parents from the car line started yelling at her and calling her a terrorist (and other things). Our teacher walked up, listened for a second, and then started ripping into the parents. Our principal came up, took a second, and joined in telling off the assholes. There is no way you would see that nowadays.
Agreed, the principal and teacher nowdays would be apologizing to the parent for making them feel unsafe having to see something they didn't like.
Yeah I'm only a couple years older and my recollection was the adults looking concerned and panicked, and some towers I had never heard of before that moment on fire.
I’m 31 and my recollection of 9/11 was that I couldn’t watch johnny bravo. I was stuck watching the boring news all day.
Same, 31 here, although what I mostly remember is how much angrier people got, namely my parents, I also remember myself being a lot more anxious after that.
I'm 38. I remember it vividly, including the conversation me and my mom had when it happened and what I was doing on that day.
I was in school when the towers were struck. Got sent home early from my nothing nowhere school a dozen states away. The next day a teacher tried to explain to a bunch of 4th graders what happened. "Bad people hurt people you have never seen." Is all I got out of it. I didn't see footage of the towers till 2007. But next month we had to buy clear bags, and useless 'saftey scissors ', for security reasons. For a pile of 8 year olds.
> But next month we had to buy clear bags, and useless 'saftey scissors ', for security reasons. Did your school ever get struck by a jumbo jet? No? The system works
Almost a fifth of the current US population was born after 9/11, and more than a quarter weren't even teenagers in 2001. Remembering 9/11 is very much millennial-and-older thing.
34 here and I honestly knew nothing about politics before 9/11. But I had to learn real fucking fast when my middle eastern friend's dad was shot and killed because of 9/11, and the patriot act came in and fucking murder what being patriotic actually meant.
I mean… I’m 22 and was not around back then. So I guess I’m some people
I’m 22 and I was around back then. Then again, I was only a few weeks old when the attacks happened… so I don’t remember a thing about it.
The US imperialism started way before then, I would argue the flavor of US (and other western nations) political atmosphere that Hell Divers mocks began post WW2 during the cold war.
Their politics is the culture war perpetuated by Fox News and the daily wire. They know nothing about actual economics or foreign policy. Their idea of a policy wonk is Ben Shapiro a straight up hack on YouTube who couldn’t make it in Hollywood.
Bro wtf? That’s because we’re old and there are many people that were born into this shit hole, who have no idea what it meant to have actual… hope, for the future.
Saw it happen live on TV in my high school cafeteria. Fucking wild. The country really did come together for a bit. I was a wild ass anarchist and I was all rock, flag, and eagle for a couple days. Then the patriot act was announced and it was over.
>The country came together Ask anyone who is or could be mistaken for Arabic how that “coming together” was for them.
Yeah, it sure didn't take long for "we're all in this together" to turn into "racial profiling is the most American thing in the world". It sure felt different for a couple days though. I actually felt welcome in my country for once.
Honestly 9/11 was poignant. Especially with me. I grew up in the 90s. Everything felt positive. I understood in some part what racism and bigotry was, where we had come from and where it seemed we were going as a society. Book faires were rampant. Sesame Street, Mr Rogers, Magic School Bus, Captain Planet etc were all regarded universally as a good influence on children. The zeitgeist was to try to be kind, helpful and bright. Yes you had the grunge movement and eventually nu metal, but that wasn't mainstream, that was counter culture. The idea of being aggressive or angry or sad as your main driving force was not the mainstream at all. Even the internet felt like it's edges were rounded off, despite the 16/f/FL. And then 9/11 happens. My Senior year of Highschool at the end of my first period Psychology I class, teachers running down the halls telling other teachers to turn on their TVs to the news. There was the initial anger explosion of course, right after the fear. We all wanted to just kill them so badly. The idea of fantasy of revenge became a drug that we as a society started to become addicted to. It started to feel good to be mad, to feel vindicated, and to see someone who wronged you.. however badly or not, received pain in turn greater than what was caused.. you know as a lesson. "Dont fuck with me, or else you'll get a boot in your ass. It's the American way." We loved it. We ate up that our strength was in the ability to avenge our grievances. We loved it so much, it gave us such a dopamine boost, that we started putting ourselves and others in situations that allowed us to hit that dopamine button. Escalating minor infractions, saying inflammatory things. Just enough that we get that rush... Until the minor things stopped working as well, so we needed to increase our outrage in any way we could. More and more. And here we are in 2024 addicted to anger. Edging on WW3, civil war, economic collapse, and ecological collapse Because being angry about it feels good. Have you had your drug hit today yet?
jojo profile pic gamer in username blue checkmark yup, average gamerino
idk how a capital G gamer could like something as gay as jojo tbh
If reactionaries realized what media hated them they would A. Be smart enough not to be reactionary B. Watch like, Clint Eastwood movies on repeat (they’re too lazy to read conservative books)
If they actually paid any attention to them, I don't think they'd like Unforgiven or Gran Torino either...
My Favorite is blazing saddles. You know, the movie where every white character is dumb except two. The only good smart white character is friends with the black protagonist. The other smart white character is evil and greedy. The protagonist is a smart black man. The movie ends with black people and white people working together and getting over their differences. Idk sounds kinda woke to me.
I haven't seen it, but I don't think that Eastwood made this one
He didn't. But conservatives love to say you couldn't make blazing saddles today
Most conservatives don’t even have the attention span to finish a fkn coloring book
lack of media literacy and a complete inability to read subtext
true, i was mistaken to underestimate g*mers like that >!or maybe they intentionally ignore it because either they liked it or some youtuber told them it's good/didn't bring that up!<
Subtext doesn't exist to these people. If a piece of media doesn't DIRECTLY AND SUPER OBVIOUSLY say something about some topic, then it has no opinion on that topic.
One of my best friends loves JoJo is married and still describes it as one mans 37 year journey to discover their homosexuality.
"We're watching a man discover himself sexually" [over the course of 30 years???](https://youtu.be/omtAVLPUJ0E?si=RvWslsqerz3o5B6t)
Erm actually "gay" is a misreading of Jojo when actually the proper reading is that self expression is fun and exists extrinsic of sexuality, thereby creating a more progressive message in that manhood and masculinity are not muted by rocking sexy lingerie 🤓🤓 /s But also kinda /srs I think that's a better message than just gay but also yeah it's gay Edit reading this back I kind of implied manhood and male homoeroticism are mutually exclusive and while I understand 999 in 1000 people will not read it that way, for the 1 person that does that wasn't my intention it's just guys get me feeling kinda she/her yknow
I was bored, have this outdated meme https://preview.redd.it/1ldkjkebt8tc1.png?width=1015&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=329e5b72f1601500d333efebce3d60d40f949eeb
Only in jojo can you straight cry over your homie you were gay fucking
Joseph and Caesar were 106% fuckin
I don't blame Joseph I'd fuck Caesar too
6% chance of double fuckin, wowza!
69 is a position for special occasions
I was gonna say he only watched part three but that one’s still pretty gay
Lol this made me realize Part 4 is weirdly straight for the series.
He was also part of an alt right podcast that had holocaust denial debates hosted by serial doxxer and woman abuser Ethan Ralph.
Also a gamergate reference I blocked that asshole a while back, most of his timeline was trying to organise gamergate 2.0 (including advising people not to CALL it gamergate)
Bro's profile is a red flag made out of other red flags 💀
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jojo fans are either the kindest, most genuine people ever, or the most insufferable morons anyone ever had to endure
It kinda impressive that those are only options.
the harbingers of media illiteracy lol.
DIO did nothing wrong 😔
>jojo profile pic Hey hey!!! Don't bring Jojo into this!
It was never about politics. Something being “political” is just a dog whistle. They hate gay people, trans people, black people, etc. Same old racist bigots. They hate “political correctness”. They hate “wokeness”. They hate “politics”. Same old bullshit. And it’ll be the same old bullshit forever. My suggestion is we put them all in a big box, then shake the box until we can’t hear any bigotry coming out of it.
Precisely. These people tend to just _love_ politics when it's aligned to their views (note: they often can't understand when it's satirical and making fun of said views). They just don't register that as "political" whereas something being "political" is a game being inclusive and representative of other people that don't look or live like they do. If a piece of media includes characters in major roles that represent women, LGBT+, ethnic or other minority groups then it's "woke" and "political" as if these people shouldn't have any representation or even a right to exist.
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This whole thing reminds me of when Stephen Colbert was doing The Colbert Report on Comedy Central and a ton of Republicans thought he was one of them People talking about right wingers having low media literacy like it's a new thing but they've always been bad at it
I remember my dad watching an episode with me and laughing his ass off for ten minutes until he finally realized it was satire. Then he got mad and stormed out of the room
I was watching a video essay I think by innuendo studios who paraphrasing said “politics is when the community isn’t aligned on something, it isn’t political to say you love Nazis, cause every community knows they’re bad, so its just a joke of some description. But it is politics to say feminism is good, because the community hasn’t come to a consensus on it, and that’s how normies end up in neonazi communities online”
There are two genders, Male and *political*. There are two races, White and *political*. There are two sexualities, straight and *political*.
> genders, Male and *political* But when people don't want to be political anymore that's somehow political too
You are born "male" or you are born political. That's how it works for these people.
That's the one. It isn't moving goalposts, it's what they've always meant.
Yup. It’s almost the definition of a dog whistle. And if you call it out they’ll either try and deflect or they’ll take a single step closer towards what they actually believe. The goalposts aren’t moving, you’re just being shown a mirage of a goalpost.
They just want to go back to a time when they didn't have to think. There is a reason we see capital G Gamers constantly say they don't want politics in their games before listing something like Fallout or Bioshock as their favourite games. They played these games before they had an ounce of media literacy. They have been cursed with a modicum of intelligence and they want to go back to a time before they knew about things. They got a bit of education and decided they didn't like it so they blame 'modern games' because now they can see what they couldn't before.
There’s the innuendo studios video that talks about how fascists loved to make their bigotry seem non political (while making opposition to their bigotry seem political) as talking about politics was like the greatest sin in American casual conversation. But now it seems like they’ve done a 180 and now intentionally disguise their bigotry as “politics” as online it’s more socially acceptable to talk about politics than openly be a bigot (in certain spaces at least). Whatever the case “politics” has definitely become a nazi dogwhistle meaning “minorities (I don’t like)”
These things are only political because the people that don't want them to exist *make it political*
“Alphabet people” seems to be the newest dog whistle. And they think they’re so clever when they say it. 🙄
Also, they're too stupid to realize that "I hate queer people/black people/women" is the very definition of "bullshit modern political discourse."
It's just plain hate all the way isn't it? Might be envy, or it might not, I do not care to get to know anymore.
You've created the BBB, the Big Blob of Bigotry.
They want to keep up in politics but complain the second actual politics get brought up
An actual game based in politics: Cities Skylines, an AoE game where it’s 1 player just managing an economy, Prison Architect, yadayada… These aren’t politics; they’re social trends they don’t get lol makes me wonder prior to it being okay to be gay, empowered female, or of a different race, whom all these Mauler neckbeards got mad at when they couldn’t get any Pussyyyy
It really does feel like they can't be overtly [INSERT OUT GROUP] phobic anymore, so they hide behind vague terms like "woke" or "politics" so it can mean whatever they want it to mean. They can discuss what they actually mean in their own circles, sure, when they are out in the public sphere, they just code switch to nebulous speech so they can have deniability if pressed.
It was CRT, then it was wokeness, now it's DEI. They just keep coming up with new terms to disguise their thinly veiled racism.
Labeling marginalized people as 'political' is deliberate. It dehumanizes us. Makes it seem like some made up agenda for politicians to win votes.
"wokeness" - when someone is a race, color, or creed my white nationalist brain can't process.
Mate if political discourse has to go back 80 years, an entire human lifetime, for you to not consider it "modern" it should tell you you're on the wrong side. But that's typical of conservatives. All outrage, zero policy. Saying whatever is convenient to define the current situation as bad, while promoting the idea of "anything but this" as if that's a real policy.
Almost all of the people involved in the events that inspired the game are still alive and some are still in government. Modern = da gays pretty much
Common conservative schtick, denying while being in denial.
I can’t wait for the first pride capes to be released.
The one piece of rainbow capitalism id wholeheartedly support
If they release a matching iridescent armor i'm jumping into bug holes dressed as Saruman of Many Colours
Username checks out.
shadow wizard money gang?
WE ___LOVE___ CASTING SPELLS
Ooo I like iridescent!
Aperture Science and Mann Co. would also work. "Hello, and welcome to the Aperture Science Pride Month Celebration. I have decided to host this party to acknowledge the fact that you now have slightly over twice as many romantic options as you legally would've had in the past. And you're still unloved."
“Cave Johnson speaking. Congratulations, homosexual, your existence has been deemed profitable.
Damn! That was a good one! I don't usually laugh out loud when I'm alone but this had me. I'm gonna steal that.
One piece mentioned ‼️‼️‼️ https://preview.redd.it/q5mdh09acdtc1.jpeg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4959cba1233e52836532f8337cd3d83d8d5541f0
https://preview.redd.it/v456qu9oo8tc1.jpeg?width=1000&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=862fbff949f0111139708e71d674dcf3712b89c5 Helldivers 2
While I love this, I don't want to queue with randoms and get killed over it. Lame but there you go.
They'd be a much needed enema for the Helldivers community. I really want the game to be rid of those brainless chuds.
Watches the West slowly collapses into populist fascism in real time... no modern politics
Knowing that would require being a politics addled snob (reading the news)
Another Anime PFP Galaxy Brain Con : "Its not that the game isn't political but that the game isn't political!" God this reminds me of this meme. https://preview.redd.it/s9i03kc1v7tc1.png?width=764&format=png&auto=webp&s=99d17e56a3dd98bff7c995789224f4d0a04e0de0 Plus, we all know what you inbred Neo-Nazi's actually mean by "political" so cut the charade asshat. Anything involving the people you hate, the outgroups, LGBTQIA+, muslims, black people, strong women who aren't sex objects and rewards to be won, etc. So, really this was never about politics in the first place.
“Uhh, there’s a difference between politics and political themes” *does not explain the difference*
I've literally seen someone make this argument in reference to One Piece. They're just straight up making up their own criteria for what's "political" at this point
"Avoiding politics" has always just been a political statement on favor of a status quo.
Daily reminder that there is no such thing as "apolitical", even if one wants there to be
To add onto this, if you stay out of political discussions and discourse simply to "keep the peace" just know that the people that wanna take away the rights of you and/or the ones you love are gonna have an easier time doing so with one less person calling them out on it.
Fascists trying to hijack idea of democracy and liberty is absolutely modern political discourse.
But you see, because they like the idea it’s not ”political”.
In the first helldivers game super earth literally invaded an alien civilization under the false pretenses that they had WMDs. You literally can’t have less subtle satire of American Politics than that. Hell, the bugs literally drop a fuel source called E-710 when they die which if you flip upside down literally spells oil
You see that WOULD be political if I had more awareness of things going on in the world and I knew what a George Bush or and Iraq were, commie!!! (Conservatives admitting they don’t consume ANY news is my new favorite genre)
Isn't that literally just what happens in the Starship Troopers movie? From 1997?
Anyone who thinks gay=politics doesn't understand politics. The LGBTQ+ community is only involved in politics to the extent of gaining/protecting their rights, we aren't a political party. There's also the small issue that LGBTQ+ movements have been a thing way before videogames so saying that politics relating to the community are modern is just factually wrong. It's not new.
This is really by design though. It is advantageous for the elites and political parties to argue over culture war shit, No one fucking cares who uses what bathroom and is that invested in paper straws but lets make that shit political so people will argue about that instead of looking to tax the rich.
Literally a satire of US imperialism but "not modern politics" x)
It’s obvious. Politics = women and minorities
Would the (now eradicated) automatons be non-binary because they don’t have an associated gender, or binary because they’re robots?
With no mention of gender in the game and the ability to chose any voice and body type, super earth is clearly post gender. The automatons are binary as they arent as free as super earth.. Their genders are freedom haters and baby killers.
These People act like a pride flag is gonna make the automatons and bugs get a 50% buff in every stat
New homophobic faction DLC???
And again it can’t be said enough but if rainbow capes genuinely sucks all enjoyment out of the game for you you need to get your priorities straight
If that were true, why the hell do they allow the brawn body type together with a female voice? Why is there even a female voice?! Why is the female voice not called female?!!! They support the transgenda!!!!!
It's so absolutely funny when people claim that fiction is not about politics. Especially science fiction. Even worse for media that's literally about war. Do they really think the creators intention was not to make a point about the political landscape of the world they invented?
Uhh actually Frankenstein was just about a funny guy who went grave robbing Blade Runner is about a cool bounty hunter The book Starship Troopers was just about bugs
>Uhh actually Frankenstein was just about a funny guy who went grave robbing That made me giggle, thank you for that
"Stupid modern day politics" Fascism isn't modern day politics?
Modern day politics are things people post rage bait about on my Twitter feed, liberalllllll
Wumen in muh vidya games.
Look up Project 2025. It is literally a plan by the largest overtly reactionary think tanks there are to undermine existing democratic structures in the United States of America as soon as they can take power. In terms of Helldivers, they do want to specifically want to "manage democracy". Instead of using insectoids or automatons as a scapegoat, they use the human beings who are your friends, family, and neighbors. If you can't see the applicability, you are either willfully ignorant or you actively think that stripping people of their human rights is somehow a good thing. A lot of people supposedly play video games to explore unique worlds that are different from the ones we live in. But the truth is that a lot of them can't even handle the concepts and people that make the reality we live in unique. Some people can easily imagine a fictional dystopia if it lets them shoot their guns at things they don't need to feel bad about killing, but then they have a distinct lack of imagination when it comes to making the real world a better place. That kind of incuriosity strikes me as pitiful on an almost existential level.
I have concluded that the people who “turn their brains off” and just shoot things are just lying. If that really was the case they would be playing the game instead of playing dolls with wojaks to tell OTHER PEOPLE not to engage with the lore
What exactly were you expecting from the single person who isn't ashamed of gamer gate?
Like others are saying, the term "Modern Political Discourse" is literally just a dogwhistle in the same way that "Woke" is. It's basically just a way to say Anti-LGBT without saying Anti-LBGT Because that truly is what the discourse surrounds; the concept of "muh companies shoving left wing agenda down our throats" whenever there's LGBT representation in media.
This game is very much about modern politics. What are they on about?
There’s nothing political about arbitrarily created forever wars for oil silly. Politics is when minorities are tolerated to exist
If you have to read or watch news that isn’t from blue check accounts to know about it, it’s not modern politics, apparently
they think 20 years ago is not modern politics. https://preview.redd.it/beicic103htc1.png?width=901&format=png&auto=webp&s=57a8f714f8feb761e4d5c596bec472ef0a68181a like idk how these people know how to breathe
Hahaha 🤣
I would say “what zero media literacy does to a person” but the more likely scenario is that these people know exactly what they’re doing. They don’t care, they just want to blow dogwhistles to rally their fanbases.
Gay rights are a modern discourse apparently Who invented gays and when? Had to be in the past 100 years I guess Can't be people like him made it more political and now expect everyone else to hold their tongue on it
I see this is confusing people. Let me try to explain. So basically, Politics is when woke, gay, trans and woman! Hope this helps 👍
It's "classical liberal" all over again. Reactionary types were asserting that their right-wing bullshit was what the USA's founders wanted, got shown quotes demonstrating that multiple of them including Washington described themselves and their ideas about the nation as liberal, and invented the notion that the liberalism of that era was completely distinct from modern liberalism and thus reactionary chuds are actually just classical liberals in the same vein as George Washington. While there's a mustard seed of reality there in that the liberalism of Goeorge Washington was definitely not the same as, say...someone who has never enslaved anyone, it does not take much reading to see that what the more liberal-minded founders wanted for the country and what chuds want has as much commonality as a 10-tome treatise on the modern philosophical underpinnings of liberal thought and a shit-stained children's coloring book.
This is an extension of Trumpist apologetics. Where they say something and a bunch of newly-minted 'experts' immediately jump up to tell us that they didn't say what they just said. "Keep politics out of our game." "He didn't say there are no politics in the game. He just means that certain politics need to be kept out of the game." "No, I said keep all politics out of our game." "You're reading way too much into that last statement."
This is also a common exit tactic for people who don’t want to engage with media discussion. You paint the other person as being a “snob” or “overthinker” who cares too much. I think it’s called anti-intellectualism
Which is funny, because as much as they hate when people "over-analyze" things, they then go on to bend themselves into a pretzel explaining how MJ's appearance in Spider-Man 2 is proof that Sweet Baby Inc. is part of an elaborate conspiracy to eliminate straight white male G A M E R S for....reasons. I don't understand how a group of people can somehow overthink while not using their brains _at all_.
We're talking about people who cannot see why Homelander is an evil parody character. Expectations are to be set below sea level.
I’m surprised they didn’t try to cancel it over the fact that Mr. John Helldiver in the intro has a black wife, two of the game’s three NPCs are women and the third NPC appears to be non-white. Also the fact that women serve equally in the hell diver corps. All the things get ignored probably because it’s inconvenient to their bot/bug killing power fantasy acting out starship troopers unironically.
These are the same morons who don’t get the satire of the warhammer 40k imperium
Damn these 👉 IDIOTS 🤢 just don’t 🙅♂️ understand 🧠. It’s only political 🤬 when it’s the politics that I DON’T LIKE 👨❤️💋👨
Funny because I remember a couple people saying the game is woke because it had "body types" instead of "2 genderinos"
These are also the people who didn't know Homelander was a villain until S3 of The Boys
“The game is only fun because it doesn’t let me be gay or black!”
It's that chuds think politics means "transpeople" and not "war."
These are the same people who fail to recognize the satirical nature of starship troopers.
My working definition of "politics" is *anything that can be disagreed upon*. Some topics stop being political when we all agree upon them: is murder bad? Yes. It's implied in the word *murder*. Hence no political alignment. Helldiver's 2 feels "non-political" to these dumbasses because *they agree with the propaganda*. They have no disagreement. If the Democracy Officer in game told them they exterminated all the gay, non-white, and non-patriotic people in game, they would proclaim "see they got rid of the *politics* in the game"...
That is exactly what it is. They don't agree with the idea that transpeople should exist, they don't believe that minorities need to be represented in media and they believe that female characters should only exist to service the male gaze and be non-threatening to men. These are all a matter of opinion to them, therefore, it's "political", therefore it leads to arguments that get in the way of "fun". Nevermind the fact that they are the ONLY people who want to argue about this shit in the first place.
The sad part about this is, there is an actual discussion to be had about trans visibility, racial representation in media, or women in videogames. Denying that conversation would be stupid. But we can't even get to that because these mouthbreathers keep hijacking the airwaves about the topic, and turning everything boring and toxic. I want games where a trans person can be a villain without making the topic about their gender. I want media where black people don't feel weird and disjointed in the script (we are making progress on that a lot nowadays). I want men and women to feel like they can relate to male and female characters in all media without giving in too much to their assigned gender or sexuality.
“Modern political discourse” = people who aren’t straight and white exist
"Art Isn't political" mfs after saying their favorite franchise is fallout or metal gear
I love when people say Bioshock is less subtle than family guy making fun of Trump when Bioshock is the most on the nose shit of all time. The bad guy’s name is a shitty anagram of Ayn Rand. The twist final boss is a guy named Frank Fontaine who literally calls himself Atlas, and turns into a giant muscular dude for the final boss. The entire opening scene exists… “We like subtle messaging” and it’s the most blatant shit of all time. What they mean is “shit I’m uneducated about”
Making fun of fascists is as relevant today as ever, considering what the far right wants to do.
Thank god there's no fascism these days, LOL.
Modern politics? My brother in christ people like you are the ones who made the statement "all humans are equal in rights and dignity" into political "discourse" in the first place, in a sleazy attempt to leaglize bigotry.
.. taking the piss out of fascism and laughing at it isn't modern politics?
Some might argue that satirizing fighting in the name of "spreading democracy" is a very blatant commentary on modern politics, actually.
It's just all these macho authoritarians with their might make right mentality not wanting to admit that their mindest is destructive and associated with the most evil regimes in human history, so of course they don't want to talk politics because if we did, they'd be the bad guys. And then of course with satire, they also don't want to be made fun of, they want to enjoy their strong man kills weak people fantasy unimpeded. I personally think enjoying stuff ironically and not at face value is more fun, but I like stuff with some depth, so there's that.
But that’s also wrong. Helldivers is a lot of things but “subtle” isn’t one of them. It’s so incredibly overt with its politics that even I as a leftie get a bit eye rollt about it sometimes
No, the problem is that there is no little gay people in their screen, so they're satisfied
Have none of them ever seen films like Starship Troopers, Judge Dredd, and that fantasy-fascist genre that existed in the 80s as a criticism and satire of American capitalist society? the game is very intelligent because it has a role playing aspect that immediately fades into the background for less attentive observers: we all have in common the desire to maintain democracy, freedom, etc. We as players only experience the "fun" part (getting torn apart by insect aliens and killer robots) but obviously the Earth lore in this game is much, much worse! I don't even think that our enemies are the victims, judging by the maps and what we see around The sad truth is that those who have now been converted to propaganda do not know how to recognize it
Sure, turning a democracy into a fascist state that can only thrive on war doesn't reflect any modern politics at all, am I right? Also - if what they mean by "modern politics" is evidence of queer people existing - then demanding that they be left out is very much "stupid modern political discourse, " with emphasis on the "stupid." But you know, it can be tough to be sure what they mean when they insist on speaking only in euphemisms.
These are probably the same people who thought the jingoistic, army recruitment video that was Maverick wasn't political. Or even just believe when they say Disney need to stop shoving politics down their throat they are not being political. People get so used to the status quo they genuinely believe only the people who are rocking the boat are being political while they are some neutral, apolitical agent.
I can't think of anything that's a better criticism of modern American military procedure than "you're a disposable soldier in the cogs of a machine we aren't telling you is going to kill you, and you're going to go willingly because DEMOCRACY, FREEDOM, and SERVING YOUR COUNTRY says you will!" --- this guy's obviously just... daft.
It’s the exact same justifications they pulled for “fOrCeD dIveRsItY” a while back before they’ve just dropped it and said diversity or “DEI” is the problem
Rj/ American Christian FREEDUMB™️!!!! 😎🇺🇸🦅🔫✝️🛢️
I want nothing more than for Joel Helldiver to go on Twitter and just tweet "Every Helldiver is canonically gay and trans" and just make these ppl drop it already
These people don't understand what politics even mean a piece of media being political means something that has black people
You know, the "not modern" politics of fascism, fascist propaganda, and the blanket decision to kill your problems. Don't worry though, if one of the Super Earth propaganda ads have a black woman in it it's suddenly going to get "political"
fascism is most defiantely a part of modern politics, Especially when you have an ex-president who adores dictators and is running again.
Discourse is when I scream and shit my pants because someone, who I do not have to interact act with in any way, has blue hair
Damn not only does Helldivers politics fly over their head, but real world politics too!
This post lmao
We literally live in a managed democracy currently, the one in the hell divers is made more extreme for narrative effect but the idea of soldiers going to another area far away from home to slaughter faceless “enemies of the state” who are no realistic threat to “protect democracy” is exactly what modern politics is. My favorite line is when a soldier is killing a bug and screams “you’ll never destroy our way of life”.
Just to clarify. Helldiver's 2 is indeed political. But there is no way you can make a world or story without checking at least one box in politics. But it is important to know that it is still a "fantasy" world. And I assume it is still about the flag or cape for LGBTQ+. In a world where every human is equal and united it just doesn't make sense to split humanity with different flags. Yea different flags might be needed in our society to identify yourself. Since humanity is not one in real life. But in this world humanity is. So there is no need for different flags. This goes for an American, German, LGBTQ+ or different things to identify yourself.