#identarianism

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Matt Johnson

Published: Jan 27, 2023

“Christopher Hitchens: From socialist to neocon.” It was an irresistible headline because it’s a story that has been told over and over again. The novelist Julian Barnes called this phenomenon the “ritual shuffle to the right.” Richard Seymour, who wrote a book-length attack on Hitchens, says his subject belongs to a “recognisable type: a left-wing defector with a soft spot for empire.” By presenting Hitchens as a tedious archetype, hobbling away from radicalism and toward some inevitable reactionary terminus, his opponents didn’t have to contend with his arguments or confront the potentially destabilizing fact that some of his principles called their own into question.

Hitchens, who died in 2011, didn’t make it easy on the apostate hunters. To many, he was a “coarser version of [conservative commentator] Norman Podhoretz” when he talked about Iraq, and a radical humanist truth-teller when he went on Fox News to lambaste the Christian right: “If you gave Falwell an enema,” he told Sean Hannity the day after Jerry Falwell’s death, “he could be buried in a matchbox.” Then he gave Islam the same treatment, and he was suddenly a drooling neocon again. He defied easy categorization: a socialist who spurned ideology, an internationalist who became a patriot, a man of the left who was reviled by the left.

The left isn’t a single amorphous entity—it’s a vast constellation of (often conflicting) ideas and principles. Hitchens’s style of left-wing radicalism is now out of fashion, but it has a long and venerable history: George Orwell’s unwavering opposition to totalitarianism and censorship, Bayard Rustin’s advocacy for universal civil rights without appealing to tribalism and identity politics, the post-communist anti-totalitarianism that emerged on the European left in the second half of the twentieth century.

Hitchens described himself as a “First Amendment absolutist,” an echo of historic left-wing struggles for free expression—from Eugene V. Debs’s assertion of his right to dissent during World War I to the Berkeley Free Speech Movement. Hitchens argued that unfettered free speech and inquiry would always make civil society stronger. When he wrote the introduction to his collection of essays For the Sake of Argument in 1993, he had a specific left-wing tradition in mind: the left of Orwell and Victor Serge and C.L.R. James, which simultaneously opposed Stalinism, fascism, and imperialism in the twentieth century, and which stood for “individual and collective emancipation, self-determination and internationalism.”

Hitchens’ most fundamental political and moral conviction was universalism. He loathed nationalism and argued that the international system should be built around a “common standard for justice and ethics”—a standard that should apply to Henry Kissinger just as it should apply to Slobodan Milošević and Saddam Hussein. He believed in the concept of global citizenship, which is why he firmly supported international institutions like the European Union. He didn’t just despise religion because he regarded it as a form of totalitarianism—he also recognized that it’s an infinitely replenishable wellspring of tribal hatred.

He also opposed identity politics, because he didn’t think our social and civic lives should be reduced to rigid categories based on melanin, X chromosomes, and sexuality. He recognized that the Enlightenment values of individual rights, freedom of expression and conscience, humanism, pluralism, and democracy are universal—they provide the most stable, just, and rational foundation for any civil society, whether they’re observed in America or Europe or Iraq.

And yes, he argued that these values are for export. Hitchens believed in universal human rights. This is why, at a time when his comrades were still manning the barricades against the “imperial” West after the Cold War, he argued that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization should intervene to stop a genocidal assault on Bosnia. It’s why he argued that American power could be used to defend human rights and promote democracy. As many on the Western left built their politics around incessant condemnations of their own societies as racist, exploitative, oligarchic, and imperialistic, Hitchens recognized the difference between self-criticism and self-flagellation.

-

One of the reasons Orwell accumulated many left-wing enemies in his time was the fact that his criticisms of his own “side” were grounded in authentic left-wing principles. When he argued that many socialists had no connection to or understanding of the actual working class in Britain, the observation stung because it was true. Orwell’s arguments continue to sting today. In his 1945 essay “Notes on Nationalism,” he criticized the left-wing intellectuals who enjoy “seeing their own country humiliated” and “follow the principle that any faction backed by Britain must be in the wrong.” Among some of these intellectuals, Orwell wrote: “One finds that they do not by any means express impartial disapproval but are directed almost entirely against Britain and the United States. Moreover they do not as a rule condemn violence as such, but only violence used in defense of the Western countries.”

Hitchens observed that many on today’s left are motivated by the same principle: “Nothing will make us fight against an evil if that fight forces us to go to the same corner as our own government.” This is a predictable manifestation of what the American political theorist Michael Walzer calls the “default position” of the left: a purportedly “anti-imperialist and anti-militarist” position inclined toward the view that “everything that goes wrong in the world is America’s fault.”

Indeed, the tendency to ignore and rationalize even the most egregious violence and authoritarianism abroad in favor of an obsessive emphasis on the crimes and blunders of Western governments has become a reflex. Much of the left has been captured by a strange mix of sectarian and authoritarian impulses: a myopic emphasis on identitarianism and group rights over the individual; an orientation toward subjectivity and tribalism over objectivity and universalism; and demands for political orthodoxy enforced by repressive tactics like the suppression of speech.

These left-wing pathologies are particularly corrosive today because they give right-wing nationalists and populists on both sides of the Atlantic—whose rise over the past several years has been characterized by hostility to democratic norms and institutions, rampant xenophobia, and other forms of illiberalism—an opportunity to claim that those who oppose them are the true authoritarians. Hitchens was prescient about the ascendance of right-wing populism in the West, from the emergence of demagogues who exploit cultural grievances and racial resentments to the bitter parochialism of “America First” nationalism. He understood that the left could only defeat these noxious political forces by rediscovering its best traditions: support for free expression, pluralism, and universalism—the values of the Enlightenment.

Hitchens closes his book Why Orwell Matters with the following observation: “What he [Orwell] illustrates, by his commitment to language as the partner of truth, is that ‘views’ do not really count; that it matters not what you think, but how you think; and that politics are relatively unimportant, while principles have a way of enduring, as do the few irreducible individuals who maintain allegiance to them.” Despite the pervasive idea that Hitchens exchanged one set of convictions for another by the end of his life, his commitment to his core principles never wavered. They are principles that today’s left must rediscover.

Matt Johnson is a journalist and the author of the forthcoming book, How Hitchens Can Save the Left: Rediscovering Fearless Liberalism in an Age of Counter-Enlightenment, from which this piece is excerpted.

#Matt Johnson #How Hitchens Can Save the Left #liberalism #liberal ethics #universalism #pluralism #freedom of speech #freedom of expression #free speech #first amendment #identity politics #identarianism #woke authoritarianism #authoritarianism #tribalism #religion is a mental illness

[inqilabi]

Apparently Tumblr was also possibly a CIA project. If true, then it was a successful one. Because much of the social justice stuff that came out of here that wasn't rooted in materialism, ie was rooted in identarianism, is specifically what causes strife in much of the left and leftist organizing spaces. Which eventually led to the twitter activism. Leaving the left fully ineffectual. Because they were squabling over words and offences and "words are violence".

#like no.. violence is violence #words can form propoganda etc etc #remember the time when jt was like... WORDS ARE LITERAL VIOLENCE lol

[wehavecomeforyourprivateschools]

The details of this are horrendous. And obviously it's not just Asian people doing it, it's men in general.

Working class girls have been abandoned by services, parts of society and the gov. This stereotype of slutty council estate chav with fake eyelashes is powerful, and contributes a lot. They're not seen as worthy victims.

Police, services & council need some training on this, on working class stereotypes, it'd be clunky to bolt it on to the mandatory LGBTQ training but their internal class prejudices need challenging - cos some of them, like the police, thought these slutty chavs were asking for it - 'it's just what they do'

It's fucking mad

And of course the left don't want anything to do with it cos they removed and abandoned working class people a long time ago, and the media always bill it as Asians so they hide from the racial element. They're not up for nuance other than the odd tweet. Identarians have no answer cos to them only white men can do anything wrong so this bends their head.

So it's manor from heaven for the far right - who themselves are basically grooming gangs for young men to become fascist and to sexually exploit young women and nonce children ffs - to give it the big un, defend our communities etc

It's just a fucking state. And it's being replicated all over the country.

[yuri-alexseygaybitch]

I promise USAmerican communist organizers no amount of cringe identarian liberal-influenced idpol bullshit will be half as damaging as deliberately excluding and silencing marginalized workers because you're so fucking concerned about what the Platonic ideal of a midwestern white factory worker that you think stands in for the entire working class will think

[beardedmrbean]

Germany’s right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party was met with massive crowds of protesters Saturday, after a report revealed it had discussed deporting millions of immigrants, including German citizens, late last year. 

Investigative journalism group Correctiv published a report Wednesday on the meeting between AfD and the Identitarian Movement (IM) in November, claiming IM member Martin Sellner presented a plan for "re-migration" of immigrants out of Germany, including those who already have citizenship, but have failed to integrate.

AfD has confirmed the meeting, which was allegedly captured on hidden cameras, took place but rejected assertions that it reflects their party policy.

"The AfD won't change its position on immigration policy because of a single opinion at a non-AfD meeting," a spokesperson told Reuters.

Protesters across Germany held signs on Saturday that read "Never Again is Now," "Defend Democracy" and "Against Hate" as the meeting garners comparisons with the Nazis. 

A protest in Frankfurt on Saturday had around 35,000 people and one in Hamburg had around 50,000, police said. Others took place in cities like Stuttgart, Nuremberg and Hannover. 

Hamburg’s demonstration ended early over crowd size safety concerns. 

Large protests in cities like Berlin and Munich are also planned for Sunday. 

The report and subsequent protests have also renewed calls for a ban on the AfD in the country. 

The AfD was founded in 2013 and polling suggests it has around 23% support in the country. 

AfD was the first right-wing party since the Nazis to win a mayoral and district council election when it did last year. It has also made significant gains in state elections in Bavaria and Hesse. 

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz condemned the AfD and Identarian Movement in a statement on social media last week, comparing them to the Third Reich.

"We protect everyone — regardless of origin, skin color or how uncomfortable someone is for fanatics with assimilation fantasies," said Scholz. 

Although immigration is a top issue in the country, Scholz himself previously admitted "too many are coming." 

#nunyas news #hmmmmmm

[jambeast]

I mean, fair enough I guess. It just seems like a bit of an unfair jump that's based more on annoying Tumblr users than radical feminist scholarship- I don't think many scholars like McKinnon or Dworkin (though her writings were bad for other reasons) *hate* men. Again, this is coming from someone who disagrees with many aspects of their writing, especially these groups' shameless tendencies to align with right-wing "pro-family" parties in opposition to sex work. But the notion that the label "radical feminist" must in every circumstance always denote a hatred for men feels neither charitable nor accurate. My worry is badly opposing these groups, when there are real, concrete reasons steeped in historical fact to oppose how they operate in practice, only strengthens their rhetoric. At the same time I get that it was an offhanded comment and I don't mean to hound you too much about it

I dunno, it feels like a lot of the time the only defence is that they throw in a token "not that I hate men or anything" line (or indeed, "anyone who says we hate men is committing X which is what Super Misogynists do"), and every other thing they say lines up perfectly with the motive of hating men and thinking they're evil.

It's like, y'know. The whole "I'm not a racist, I'm a racial identarian. I don't HATE lesser other races, I just... acknowledge we're different! And better off separate!"

Like come off it, we both know you're just saying that because the your real opinion is naughty and someone might tattle on the teacher.

[vitruvianmanbara]

as cathartic as the "straight man in a lesbian bar" tiktok discourse was for like 5 minutes, it's been amusing and bizarre to see so many people feigning familiarity with a bar they have zero personal connection to in order to make clear that if they actually bothered to be an active participant in the queer cultural institutions they hold such reverence for, they would be staunchly on one side of a hypothetical identarian etiquette war...for the record and btw if you even care

#because why were people acting like a bouncer is going to be checking your gay card at the door...as if that's something #that actually happens and that we should actually want 😭 idk some people were losing the plot a bit!

[dhaaruni]

Like much else in our politics, the shift comes down to Trump. A familiar figure to New Yorkers, his election inspired a mass migration away from the GOP in upscale suburban areas where the party was once strong, while the Democratic Party was seized by a youthful newfound urgency. Democrats regathered as an unwieldy coalition of economic elites and fervent liberals, forging a tighter bond through the chaos of the Trump years. But as Trump’s time in office faded, those ties frayed. Covid shut down much of New York City, the region was roiled by the George Floyd protests, and the state government followed Democratic primary voters to the left. That turned out to be a problem for the party: Despite the city’s national image as home to a bunch of far-left Democratic Socialists run amok, New York has a long history of stubbornly moderate Democratic voters. After all, Rudy Giuliani and Mike Bloomberg reigned as broadly popular mayors, and despite Bill de Blasio winning two terms, the progressive left Gracie Mansion with an abysmal approval rating. But rather than take the rebuke of de Blasio to heart and capitalizing on general revulsion to Trump to broaden the party’s coalition, the state Democrats have spent the past several years becoming more identarian, imposing progressive purity tests that ended up alienating people otherwise inclined to support the party in the edges of the city and its suburbs. [...] But Trump gave people license, and Covid frayed the social bonds that held together neighborhoods where people literally live on top of one another. Regularly now, when he is out in the district, constituents will come up to Brannan — not to ask for something, or to complain, but to yell at him as if he were Joe Biden, Bill de Blasio and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez all in one, just another Democrat who stepped out of the little boxes on Newsmax or Fox News, but now is here on their corner. “Trump made people feel like it was OK to be an asshole,” he said.

#links #politics

[artbyblastweave]

Have you paid any attention to modern X-Men/the “Krakoan” age stuff in Marvel?

I read.... like the first House of X maxiseries about a year ago? I had a lot of respect for the project in the abstract because it seemed like it was taking a coordinated, considered look at the logistics, realpolitik, and troubling philosophical implications of actually establishing a mutant nation; I’ve always had this sense that getting the X-men meaningfully off of their permanent back foot would probably engender some decidedly non-heroic behaviors because that’s what happens when reach the point of organizing as an identarian state, never mind an identarian state where everyone is a superpowered immortal. And Hickman’s love of map-and-chart based supplemental storytelling (put to great effect in East of West, to my recollection) I thought was a good fit; if you did a Worm comic, I feel like you’d want to use a similar technique to deliver supplemental materials about the setting. Now I just need to read all. All of the tie ins. All of em. Hm.

#asks #ask #thoughts #meta

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Andrew Doyle

Published: Sep 3, 2022

We are living through a time in which unproven accusations are once again enough to see a person damned.

Charges of ‘racism’, ‘homophobia’, ‘transphobia’ and even ‘fascism’ are commonplace and no evidence is required to secure a ‘cancellation’. People have had their careers destroyed and personal relationships ruined simply for expressing unfashionable opinions.

It will be oddly familiar to anyone who has seen Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible. In the 1953 dramatisation of the 17th Century Salem witch trials, our tragic hero John Proctor cries out: ‘Is the accuser always holy now?’

The trials of Salem, a Puritan community in Massachusetts, lasted a little over a year, from February 1692 to May 1693. In that time, more than 200 people were accused, 19 hanged, five others had perished in jail and one, farmer Giles Corey, had been pressed to death with boulders for refusing to enter a guilty/not-guilty plea.

And their tormentors? A group of children who had stumbled upon the means to become the most powerful members of the community. Their histrionic accusations could see fellow citizens executed on the basis of ‘spectral evidence’ alone – what we might today refer to as ‘lived experience’, the phrase used by the likes of Meghan and Harry.

And today, just like in Salem, those who attempt to apply reason and logic, who dare to stand up for the accused, make themselves vulnerable by doing so.

As Miller’s anti-hero says, ‘the little crazy children are jangling the keys of the kingdom’ safe in the knowledge that those who cross them are the next to be condemned.

For those of us who have found ourselves caught in the culture wars of the present – and I have often been vilified for having created a satirical character, Titania McGrath, the ‘radical intersectionalist poet and Twitter activist’ – the parallels are obvious.

Such patterns recur wherever reason is abandoned and fear prevails, be that during the 1950s McCarthyism that inspired Miller, or the ideological capture of today’s institutions and the trickle-down orthodoxies that followed.

THE new religion of ‘wokeness’ now dominates all of our major cultural, educational, political and corporate bodies.

Its high priests make grand claims of moral purity and brook no dissent, a mindset which has led to the development of today’s ‘cancel culture’.

They seek to control public discourse by deeming certain terms ‘problematic’ or supporting legislation against ‘hate speech’. They require no concrete evidence of sin in order to detect and denounce the sinners in our midst.

Phrases such as ‘social justice’, ‘anti-racism’ and ‘equity’ mislead people into believing that those who utter them are on the right side of history. What we are witnessing is the march of online zealots destroying people’s livelihoods and reputations, all the while proclaiming their own virtue, using hashtags such as #BeKind.

Like the Salem Trials, they inflict their punishments while claiming to be on the side of the angels.

Although today’s ‘heretics’ are unlikely to be burned at the stake, their inquisitors are convinced they must convert for their own good. It is the legitimisation of bullying on a grand scale.

Significantly, many are troubled by the rise of the movement – a recent import from the US – that would see us deny the biological reality of sex differences, confess to ‘white privilege’, or to perpetuating ‘systemic oppression’.

They are rightly concerned about the relentless attacks on free speech and how anyone who dares question the new orthodoxy is mercilessly subdued.

These culture war revolutionaries, whose existence is often denied by its chief antagonists, must be challenged. For they are determined to dismantle Western ideals, to return us to a pre-Enlightenment state of ignorance.

Theirs is a world in which private feelings are allowed to trump evidence and reason. A world in which right and wrong are reduced to a battle of wills. This is a battle that, ultimately, the mob will win unless we stand up and resist it.

The impact is felt in all walks of life. For instance, after the seismic events of the summer of 2020 following the killing by a white policeman of George Floyd, a black man in Minneapolis, an actor friend of mine was contacted by her agency because she had not posted anything on social media in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. She was told she must do so immediately if she wanted casting directors to consider her for roles.

I have heard many such anecdotes, but invariably they are communicated privately. There is a strong general feeling that to publicly object to the prevailing dogma is to jeopardise one’s career and social standing.

I have lost count of the number of emails from academics, artists and media figures who have contacted me to express solidarity for my criticism of this new ideology, but admit they could never endorse my sentiments in public for fear of being targeted. It is a circular problem that can only be resolved if sufficient numbers speak out.

This is the sad reality of most present-day working environments, where to utter a forbidden opinion, to misspeak, or even to fail to show due fealty to received wisdom can be an impediment to future prospects.

As a former teacher, I am still in contact with ex-colleagues who are troubled by the sudden revisions made to curriculums and pastoral policies. Many are being forced to undergo ‘unconscious bias’ training, even though there is overwhelming evidence such schemes are unreliable and ineffective.

To raise a complaint is taken as proof of the kind of prejudice that the tests seek to expose. After all, surely only a witch would deny the existence of witchcraft...

Sometimes the obsessions of these cultural revolutionaries are extreme. Last year, the body in charge of elementary and secondary schools in Ontario authorised the ritualistic burning of books for ‘educational purposes’.

In what they described as a ‘flame purification’ ceremony, almost 5,000 books were destroyed or recycled if they were judged to contain outdated racial stereotypes. In this new religion, some words are deemed harmful, even if written many years ago.

This is why the estate of Dr Seuss will no longer publish six of the author’s books that they now consider ‘hurtful and wrong’.

It’s why Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn was republished with all the racial epithets removed, even though the book is explicitly critical of the slave trade.

It’s why school libraries have removed Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird (1960) and Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale (1985), following complaints about ‘racist, homophobic or misogynistic language and themes’.

The attack on The Handmaid’s Tale is especially odd, given that it is well known as a mainstay of contemporary feminist literature.

The novel depicts a dystopian future in which women are reduced to broodmares for the ruling class. They are forced to live according to the perverted ideology of those in power, and have no freedom to speak the truth.

It is no accident that it is set in New England – Atwood described The Handmaid’s Tale as her ‘take on American Puritanism’. But not even its feminist credentials have saved The Handmaid’s Tale from the all-consuming lunacy of this new purity culture. Atwood’s interest in the era comes from a family connection. Her novel is dedicated to Mary Webster, an ancestor who was hanged for being a witch in 1683 but survived the execution.

The New Puritans of today may not be hanging people who fail to conform, but they certainly embody the ideological fervour The Handmaid’s Tale explores.

The Puritans of the 17th Century sought to refashion society in accordance with their own beliefs, but they were deep thinkers who were aware of their fallibility.

By contrast, the New Puritans seem to go about their business with a narcissistic lack of self-doubt. They have simplistically divided the world into sinners and saints, and presumed they ought to be grouped among the latter.

Then, as now, bad ideas are propped up by elites. We are living through a frenzy of conformity, in which the opinions of a minority of activists are falsely presented by parts of the media, political and corporate classes as though they reflect an established consensus. Some politicians and academics may struggle to define the word ‘woman’, but who among us does not understand the differences between males and females?

Worse still, these modern witchhunts blind us to an obvious truth: that economic inequality is the most glaring social injustice.

This used to be a priority for those claiming to be on the Left, but the movement has become infected with identity politics. ‘Social justice’ is a game played by the affluent, just the latest way to maintain their power in society.

To uphold liberal values in this climate has become a risky endeavour, but it is only the silence of the majority that makes it so.

Even after his experiences in the Soviet gulags, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was able to reflect on the possibility that, had more people spoken out, the atrocities might have been avoided. ‘Every man always has handy a dozen glib little reasons why he is right not to sacrifice himself,’ he wrote.

This was also a key concern of Arthur Miller during the McCarthy years – that powerful people remained silent so as not to be themselves accused. When bad ideas spread unchecked, they take on an illusion of incontrovertibility, and when figures of authority are captured by dangerous ideologies, resistance becomes a feat of courage few attempt.

The first to be hanged at Salem was Bridget Bishop. As she stood in court, the girls accusing her writhed and screamed as if possessed, claiming Bishop ‘did oftentimes very grievously Pinch them, Choak them, Bite them, and Afflict them’.

One girl, Susanna Sheldon, insisted she had witnessed Bishop suckling a snake. Other villagers testified that she had urged them to sign the Devil’s book. Ridiculous claims, even to a God-fearing community like the Puritans of New England. Yet few dared to challenge them. The New Puritans are the clergy for the digital age – an elite class that claims to know what is best for unlettered plebians.

They scour social media for prey, such as the author J.K. Rowling.

And as the New Puritans gain momentum, and as their power increases, it has become apparent that to ignore them will allow their dominance. They will deny biological reality and threaten anyone who doesn’t acquiesce.

They will bully people in the name of compassion, promote division and call it progressive, and rehabilitate a new form of racism under the guise of tolerance. They will insist on fabricating realities that correspond with their own emotional states and couch their nebulous theories in obfuscation.

They will use inflammatory language to misrepresent others’ concerns, accuse them of ‘erasing’ people’s existence, or committing acts of ‘violence’ through speech.

They will claim there is no objective truth, but demand we all acknowledge the truth of their ‘lived experience’.

They will carry on feeding the far Right by elevating identity politics and claim to be opposing fascism through authoritarian methods. And if anyone suggests their demands should be subject to discussion or debate, they will not hesitate to brand them a bigot.

When this happens, it is our responsibility to restate the case for liberal values. It will be a long, uncomfortable, but necessary process, like setting a broken bone. Along the way, we should defend those targets of bullying, whether they are attacked for what they have said or what they refuse to say. We should never be intimidated.

The desire for a quiet life is understandable, but surely we have reached the point where the keys of the kingdom must be wrenched back.

© Andrew Doyle, 2022

#Andrew Doyle #The New Puritans #puritans #puritanism #Salem Witch Trials #witch trials #cancel culture #witch burning #liberalism #liberal ethics #free speech #liberal values #freedom of speech #identity politics #identarianism #lived experience #spectral evidence #wokeness as religion #cult of woke #woke activism #wokeism #woke #religion is a mental illness

[gamer2002]

The Sandman (2022) – Review2002

The Sandman is a TV adaptation of a comic book series written by Neil Gaiman. The story focuses on the titular Sandman, also known as Morpheus, also known as Dream of the Endless – a supernatural being that rules over the dominion of dreams. The first season covers two first arcs of the series. The first one is about Dream being imprisoned by a wizard, and having to escape and reclaim his stolen magical tools, and the second is about a dangerous phenomenon known as a dream vortex.

The adaptation does make some bigger and smaller changes to the story. Some are really good, like the expanded role of the Corinthian – a homicidal rogue Nightmare, that originally was just a second arc only minor villain with an incredibly cool design, and not much else. Here, the Corinthian is the season’s overarching villain, that intelligently and proactively tries to sabotage his own creator, who can easily undo him in a direct confrontation. Other changes I like is making Rose Walker, arguably the protagonist of the second arc, a much more competent and aware of her situation. I also like changing comics Lucien into Lucienne. Lucien was a magical spin on Alfred Pennyworth type of character – an intelligent and loyal servant, which Lucienne is as well. But he was just only that, and pretty much just existed in the background. Lucienne is a more emotionally compelling character, as she is more conflicted over Dream’s flaws, and hopes for him to change, which is tied to the themes of the main story. All those changes add to the story, make it more focused, and allow you to care more about the characters.

Some other changes are understandable. DC comics characters got removed, due to legal reasons, and similarly Constantine got replaced by a female version of him. Lucifer is now a woman, played by Gwendoline Christie, who perfectly delivers a scary angelic being. Still, she is not the charismatic and guile comics Lucifer, that can get out of any situation, if he only can open his mouth. That characterization was more present later on in the series, and actually most of it was in Lucifer’s own, but it’s something Gwendoline will have to compete with. John Dee, a villain from the first arc, is also changed. His backstory had to be altered, due to him no longer being an Justice League villain that was locked in Arkham Asylum. This version of him is more sane and sympathetic, even if he is still a dangerous mad man that has to be stopped. I say he was a pretty good take on the character, with more expanded relationship with his mother - up until the episode that adapted his most iconic story from the comics. Adaptation of 24 Hour Diner is the most disappointing episode in the series, it’s outright bad. I will expand on this in the spoiler section, but for now I’ll tell just two things. TV John Dee is unable to be comics John Dee at his most unhinged, which turns original twisted horror into a snore fest. Second, the episode is a pinnacle of nasty, hypocritical, self-indulgent writing of petty LGBT-obsessed identarian hacks. A YouTube fan adaptation did that story much better.

And here we reach to the most controversial changes. Comparing to the original, a lot of race swaps have occurred. The most notable one is Death of the Endless being a Black woman, instead of a goth girl. One side of the camp calls this unnecessary pandering. The one, including Neil Gaiman himself, sums up the other side as bigoted white guys, that insist on the Sandman not needing properly sizable PoC representation. What about me? Well, I’m here to mock the original bigoted white guy that have insisted on the Sandman not needing properly sizable PoC representation – Neil Gaiman himself.

In the original comics, the most important recuring Black character was Nada, and the first season does cover one of hers about four-five appearances in the whole 75 issues spanning story, that has also spanned for 8 years, from 88 to 96. During and before that period, we had numerous films and comics that had PoC representation in prominent roles. X-men, Blade, Lethal Weapon, Police Academy, Texas Ranger, Captain Planet, A Team, Dungeons & Dragons cartoon (from 83!), Luke Cage (debuting in 72!), Jonny Quest (64!), and so forth. Various titles, that have ranged from more comedic to more serious, from more entertaining to more political, had at least one PoC character in a prominent role. But the left-wing darling known from being progressive in his writing, for 8 whole years, didn’t bother with anything more prominent than a one-shot wonder with couple of appearances here and there. Quite ironic. And while I understand Gaimain compensating now for his own past disregard of PoC representation, he should come clean about his reasons behind it, before bashing his fans for not seeing the importance of change. Speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye, plank in your own, and all that jazz.

Now, do those race changes are a big deal? They only affect the visually otherworldly design of the Endless, with them originally having colorless skin. Among all the Endless, only one of the two most human ones had a human skin*, and you could wonder if the other one wasn’t just wearing goth makeup. It’s a detail with significance, but a one I can live without. I would gladly have all the Endless be Black, if they just haven’t messed up with Dream’s characterization so much.

* And you can tell he is going to be Black in adaptation, because originally he was a ginger. Brits like Gaiman need their Irish erasure, nowadays they just call it woke. This is why Lucienne is Black.

Morpheus, played by Tom Sturridge, who does his best Twilight vampire impression, does not just lack his otherworldly star-eyed design. He not only lacks the original grim visage of a pale mysterious black haired man in black robes, that was contrasting with his status as a Lord of Dreams - it got replaced by an appearance of an emo graduate of Slytherin. But we’ve lost something even more crucial. The original story is also about Dream’s issue with being detached from humanity, despite his own role being so important for the human nature, and his inability to change that. Original Morpheus could be cruel, just like cruel and backward barbarian tribes of the past have imagined their gods to be. Here, his disproportional punishment of his captor’s son is toned down, his other cruel deed is undone later on (to show his character development), and he is overall nicer in the adaptation. If TV series is going to go same direction as the original, and it does set things up towards it, I’m not seeing how they’re going to sell the necessity of the original, drastic resolution. Original Dream was unable to change, that was his tragedy. Netflix Dream is just sometimes a petty stuck-up prick that learns his lesson, not tragically trapped in his own scary nature.

More than that, Netflix Morpheus is also dumbed down. As much I like the idea of Lucienne being a loyal servant that wants her master to change for better, as much I see that the more emphatic chancellor could better gain the trust of subjects of their scary and cold king, Dream has his competence reduced to make Lucienne needed to figure out the dream vortex related stuff for him. Again, Netflix turns a being that is older than humanity, that originally had the situation with the vortex under his control (excluding things that happened due to a third party’s meddling), into an arrogant, reckless fool. Comics Morpheus is not a fool, far from it, and this is strongly related to the conclusion of the story. Netflix Morpheus needs to eat a humble pie and see Lucienne as better at organizing things in his own kingdom.

Again, if Morpheus was more cruel, like the original, this could work due to Lucienne not horrifying his subjects. I could get behind his lack of empathy causing problems with Rose, which would’ve required an aid of Lucienne. And if Dream had trapped Alex Burgess in an endless nightmare, like he did in the comics, the Corinthian could’ve been able to call him out for this – for all the big talk about Nightmares having a duty towards their beneficial role for the mankind, Morpheus has used them for the sake of his own, personal revenge. That’s how the main issue of the story could be properly established as a serious deal, not as a material for a He-Man like moral we already have covered.

Overall, the show is a mixed bag. I really like some changes. I like more active and sympathetic Rose, I like the Corinthian being the cool villain his design deserves to be used for, I like the idea behind Lucienne being tied to the theme of change. But this Dream cannot sell his own original tragedy. His original tragic flaws were replaced with ones that are lame, and exist for the sake of giving Lucienne prominence - when the original ones could’ve allowed for that as well, without turning him into a moron. And the 24 Hours adaptation turned a great nightmarish horror into a boring wet dream of people that are clearly insecure with their own gayness. I say that, while overall the comics is an 9/10 story, the covered portion is 8/10, but the adaptation only gets 7/10 – it can be fun and engaging, it has its moments and good ideas, but it misses important points of the original. And, in case of 24 Hours, it drops the ball hard, for the most petty and awful reasons. In the spoiler section I will expand on this subject. Waring, I will be more explicit there with spoilers for the whole original story.

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Spoiler section warning

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Making a nightmare nightmarishly boring

The original 24 Hours is a horror story about a DC supervillain from Arkham Asylum becoming even more powerful and unhinged than he ever has been, so he uses his power to make the world go crazy, while personally terrorizing a bunch of civilians in a local 24/7 restaurant. Because he can, and nobody can save his victims. So, even when the world is saved, everybody in the restaurant ends up being murdered.

Original John Dee spends first couple of hours slowly using his power in more and more unsetting way. First, he just observes his prays. Then, he manipulates them into remaining in the restaurant. Then, he manipulates a children TV show, to tell kids to kill themselves. Then, he starts playing with the guests. During each hour, he changes the cruel madness he affects them with, doing more and more horrible stuff with each change. While trapped with him random civilians suffer torture, the world outside goes mad and starts collapsing. It was a truly scary display of damage that a mad supervillain can cause, both on a macro and micro scale. A true nightmare scenario.

But Netflix John Dee, while mad in his own way, is not a murderous and sadistic supervillain. Instead of causing creative tortures, he just stick to keeping civilians with him, while forcing them to be honest about their thoughts and feelings. Instead of creative and sick horror, where we jump from one mad scenario to another, we are stuck with a boring relationship drama of a throwaway horror characters, that are meant to die anyway. And sure, John at the end does finally force everyone to do horrifying stuff, so they all die (and nobody cares). But John doesn’t kill them in a cruel way because of being sadistically mad, but because he is senile and autistic, in the most uncharismatic way, about the point he wants to make. It felt to me like the writers just rolled with the original outline, where all the civilians die, despite not really building well towards it. Like the conclusion was afterthought, for the sake of obligation towards the original, without even showing much of the damage to the world that John has caused. In result, the world crisis story, that focuses on the people that will die horribly regardless of the crisis being averted, does not have much of the crisis, and just ends with Morpheus and Matthew doing their recreation of the SpongeBob has saved the city meme.

It really shows that the writers didn’t understand what made the original story so impactful. Can this be blamed on their decision to humanize John Dee? I don’t think it’s impossible to have 24 Hours be true to the original, while having more sympathetic John. He is unstable, under influence of a dangerous artifact, and has obsession with improving the world. Instead of having him torture civilians, he could’ve tried to help them in various ways, but have that all go wrong. A human with a power he is not meant to have, trying to use it for good, but that all getting corrupted due to his limits and the dangerous nature of the Rubin’s power. With time, John could grow more and more angry, making his actions more and more horrifying. He finally lashes out, kills the civilians, causes great damage, and becomes horrified of what he has done. Dream enters in, John lashes out at him, and blames him for how everything has turned out. Which is why John shatters the Rubin, in an attempt to destroy the power of dreams, that has brought suffering to him and his mother.

It could’ve been tied to Morpheus’ dilemma about being too cruel to be the Dream that humanity needs. A well meaning John Dee, that only ends up causing disasters with Dream’s power, would serve as the other side of the coin for Morpheus. Morpheus lacks empathy, but he is disciplined, and doesn’t lose his hold over the power of dreams. John is nicer, but his fragile human mind cannot be trusted with such enormous power. This is why Morpheus’ successor must be Damian, born human and turned immortal, to have both empathy and discipline. That’s how 24 Hours could’ve contributed to the main point of the story.

But writers weren’t interested in making this point. They wanted to make another one, and it was completely a hypocritical one.

Don’t write straight people wanting gay sex, if the lesbian won’t blow a guy

Netflix have taken two straight characters from the original, and decided to turn a nightmare story into their dream of gay conversion. Sure, the writers will say that gay conversion isn’t real, and Netflix versions of those characters always had gay in them – alongside other phrases of gaslighting. The truth is, had that those writers read a story about women, straight and lesbian alike, discovering their desire to have sex with an self-insert of the male writer, they would be repulsed. And they would lecture us that fictional women are robbed out of their agency, for the sake of a male fantasy of them being slutty. The reason why those characters became secretly gay, was because the story was turned into a fantasy of the people that are challenged about loving those that are fundamentally different due to having an opposing sex. So, alike to the Joker, they dream that straight people are one bad straight relationship away from becoming gay. But doesn’t that make gay people incels with more desperation to get laid? Go figure.

Anyway. Supposedly, questioning one’s sexuality is, at best, ignorant and insensitive, at worst, cruel and abusive. This is how the Netflix writers have presented it, when their lesbian got their sexuality questioned. This is how Gaiman has presented it, when that has happened in the original version of the story. Is it hypocritical to question straight sexuality, claim they are secretly gay but dishonest about it, without having your lesbian character being revealed to be dishonest about her not wanting to have sex with a man? Yes, but Netflix writers and Gaiman don’t care, apparently. Perhaps, they know their nasty and abusive audience will eat this up.

Perhaps, the reason why Gaiman didn’t originally think of making prominent PoC representation for Sandman, is that he was too wrapped up in his “change or die” progressive message, to think of PoC people. Perhaps, it never was about liberal values, empathy, and valuing other people. Perhaps, “change or die” was always just as abusive and hateful as it does sound. I do not change, I’m gay, there is nothing wrong with me, you are just dishonest about your own sexuality, and this is not abusive when I say it. So, kill yourself, if you cannot change to suit me. Oh crap, I’ve underrepresented PoCs I’m supposed to care about. Gotta have an adaptation where the white guy kills himself to be replaced by a brown guy, and also acknowledges a Black woman as better at his job, and has another Black woman lecturing him about it. That will make up for it.

I’m willing to take Gaiman for his word, if he explains why he has originally handled representation so badly, that he had to change it so drastically. Insisting that times were different back then is nonsense, plenty of titles from 60s and 70s were more progressive about their representation of PoCs than the Sandman. Gaiman did not even bother with a single prominent token, which is an abysmally low bar for an outspoken progressive. If he wants to say that the fans that criticize the change are wrong, he has to say why he was wrong himself first. It’s human to err, and that can be forgiven. What cannot be forgiven is judging others harsher for the same mistakes you have committed.

That won’t change the awfulness of the 24 Hours adaptation he has greenlighted. It’s an 3/10 episode. It’s boring, wastes time on throwaway characters, treats their deaths more like an forced occasion for a lecture than a tragedy, ruins the original concept, removes its creativity, has adapted moments that translate laughably bad on the television, and makes all its changes to push hypocritical and abusive message.

And that hypocritical and abusive message also includes telling people that have killed in self-defense that they did it only because they wanted to kill somebody. I wish all writers that preach such a set of values an occasion to live up to it.

#the sandman #sandman #netflix #netflix adaptation #review #neil gaiman #review2002 #tv review

[wehavecomeforyourprivateschools]

25% of Tumblr users have an annual income of $80K to $100K, and 15% have less than $30K in the United States. 

Less than $30K- 15%

$30K to $60K- 22%

$60K to $70K- 15%

$70K to $80K- 24%

$80K to $100K- 25%

More than $100K- 27%

So it still seems to be attracting well off / middle income types which in the UK are powerful socially, politically, and dominate everything. It's been this way since tumblrs inception - the middle class / aloof alternative to the proles on twitter and your mam & grandma on Facebook

Tumblr doesn't seem as unbearable now though. 10 years ago it was a window into a right bunch of wrong uns the like of which I would never come into contact on my estate, cleaning bogs for a living.

Some of it is probably down cultural changes in the last decade or so. A lot of the political blogs have left, or people have left politics - probably cos the identity stuff that was the law here has been absorbed into the capitalist state and bolstered racism, homophobia and bigotry.

No doubt others just went on and got jobs, had kids, and can't find time to post. I don't really scroll much anymore, too busy, I just post, shit stir then fuck off lol

And let's be honest, Tumblr fucked a lot of people up like tiktok is doing now. Identarians, wokescold, loads of toxic behaviour, cutting people out, stating their own experiences as discourse, as well as just peddling pure shite. A lot of this came from hugely empowered middle class shitblokes which were fascinating to observe in their own environment, running wild & free through the fields of wheat.

Interesting though. Tumblr won't die. As I've always said, if these stats are right, these demographics have a lot of coin and clout so companies are always gonna be chasing them.

[yuri-alexseygaybitch]

Honestly kind of doomered at this point regarding the chance for living in a world not so fucking awful for LGBTQ people. Every political group and org at the end of the day just seems to deep down fucking hate us and will kick us to the curb at the earliest chance. I know this is unscientific and identarian thinking but I just feel tired. Even the communists and other degenerates turn on you eventually. I wish things could just be better and I didn't feel so scared and paranoid all the time.

[andrewtverylegitimateblog]

Go (2001)

I'd only ever heard sparingly about the Zainichi Korean population at times, mostly in passing. I knew a bit about the North Korean transplant population throughout certain areas of Japan. It's also not uncommon for me to see discussions surrounding xenophobia in Japan and I know a bit about the legacy of empire. Isao Yukisada's GO explores each of these topics intimately. What really invested me in this film though was the bare knuckle smack downs and the explorations of self and masculinity.

One of the most compelling aspects of this film was its main character. Sugihara is the child of Chosen-Jin (North Korean) parents, wherever he goes and and whoever he interacts with attempts to define him on whatever terms are convenient to him: criminal, traitor, impure. It's Sugihara's constant personal revolution to defy definition that characterizes his struggle. When his name gains notoriety and delinquents from nearby schools come to challenge him he swiftly defeats each in succession but ultimately remains disinterested in any acclaim attributed to violence and sees it purely as self-defense. When he choses to transfer from a North Korean transplant school to a Japanese school its not some larger formation in what others might contend as some betrayal or transformation of his ethnic identity but simply what he sees as an opportunity to explore a larger world.

In a society that seems at times obsessed with typifying and categorizing identity Sugihara's commitment to fluidity is an act of major rebellion. This isn't to say that's all he is. Sugihara is still a teenage boy and the film frequently reminds us of that. He spends time embarrassing his friend in front of a waitress. He lies to a cute girl because he doesn't want to admit that he was listening to Rakugo so he tells her it was rap.

One of the integral aspects of GO is the constant barrage of punches and generally the absurd amount of ass kicking. Sugihara's relationship with violence however is as multifaceted as he is. Japanese stories of male adolescence and alienation embroiled in violence at some point feels as if they take a path where the characters sets down a path towards self-destruction from where they can never return, in fact I feel this is also a trend in many American films surrounding the experience of immigrant men. I waited with baited breath throughout the entire film waiting for Sugihara to set down that road. He never did.

Even when his dearest compatriot and fellow rebel of fluidity Song Il was murdered by a Japanese individual he refused to participate in the revenge drawn across such identarian lines which they both so profusely despised. When he exposes himself in front of the girl he loves at a place of extreme fragility after the death of his nearest friend and laying out his trust in the name of their intimacy is ultimately rejected he simply walks away. He never is what others have already decided he was.

The absurd brawls that take place between Sugihara and his father in their own way aren't even necessarily about violence. Boxing is one of the things that are integral to Sugihara's relationship with his father and for them seems to be the most effective means of communication. Sugihara's paternal punch outs are less about who gets the most hits in and are more the conflict between a generation in which identity and regional and ethnic boundaries were all consuming and another in which individual self was prized above all things. After each encounter Sugihara's feelings seem to reach his father more and more and with time he seems just a touch more receptive to them.

I loved GO. Throughout the early 2000s Japan seemed to be revisiting the delinquent genre in manga, anime, and film. GO in a lot of ways especially in its fight scene reminded me Clover, one of my favorite delinquent manga from this period of time. I will likely be watching this many more times.

[jambeast]

One thing I realised recently is that the main problem with sexists and racists - including the woke ones is that they are insane.

Like they do this thing where they blob people together basing on some arbitrary characteristics and then create some delusional worldview from it.

And often for example expecting this blob to make some kind of decision.

For example the Charlestone church shooter (diagnosed with schizophrenia) considering all people with dark skin colour responsible for violence committed by violent criminals with dark skin colour and expecting people with dark skin colour to somehow stop these crimes from happening - including somehow stopping being victims of these crimes I guess?

That's not just prejudice or anything like that, it's absolute insanity.

Or femi-nazis saying stuff like "men doing conscription to themselves". Yeah one person enslaving another person is somehow that person doing it to themselves. Complete insane.

The worst thing about this kind of views being propagated is that they are basically spreading insanity.

Yeah there's just a very *fundamental* kind of moral reasoning that's just so deeply ingrained into people in every culture despite being, in of itself, complete nonsense; where Identity Groups are first-class entities that carry moral weight.

It's the same logic that says that a decline in white birthrates and an increase in mixed-race marriages is a kind of genocide, a harm inflicted against The White Race. And the logic is completely unchallenged; nobody actually has any issue with the logic, they just think that in this particular case they deserve it (and therefore that it isn't happening, the same way people doubt any genocide that they think is justified).

Which is really fucking annoying, because the logic is completely bananas! Like there really -isn't- a genocide, because the definition being used is pure identarian nonsense.

It feels like there are some really important baseline... liberal values, that everyone has flown right past. Shit that I thought we already figured out and was drilled into people as kids. Y'know, 'Just because they're different to us doesn't mean you should be mean to them', 'Just because they share x trait with someone who was mean to you don't mean you should be mean to people with x trait". Really really basic shit, that it turns out nobody actually believed when they were being taught it, and the people teaching it never believed it in the first place either. None of the people telling me that racism was bad *actually* though racism was bad. They were just saying that because it scored them points.

Which sucks! Because racism really IS bad! Everyone around me was lying through their teeth by saying something completely true that they didn't believe for a second.

Well I do! I actually *do* believe it.

#A tad dramatic #but it makes for a good post #racialism

[yourtoradorasextendedwarranty]

People will convince themselves that the only solution to past oppression is present and future oppression. This is the notion pushed by a CRT proponent, Ibram X. Kendi. My frustrations with this comes from the insane notion that discrimination is perfectly fine based on Immutable traits. What made me make this post? This video.

Now I'm sure several different types of people will comment on this post assuming it makes the rounds. So let me break down some points.

The video that prompted this one to be made is pretty disgusting, and shows that whites are probably the MOST self hating group in history. So much so they'd bow down and (literally) kiss the jack boots of black men just to prove how much of an "ally" they are. (Yes that is a real video floating around.)

The bearded man in the snow, attempts to make a valid point, but literally shoots himself in the foot claiming white people have never been oppressed or seen as less of a person. I'd like to introduce you to every single war in Europe; slavery and peasantry, and what's happened to the Armenians, Jews, Irish, and other countries during British conquest.

The trans woman in the video goes on a tangent about how easy and comfortable it was being a "hetero cis strait male". Because no white men are homeless. No white men are poor. No white men are abused. No men are harassed. No white men are passed up for jobs because of affirmative action.

To make a point towards the last point here is another video that goes over it a little bit.

Now if you want an interesting conclusion to that video, this experience actually led in part to her in committing suicide. As the experience itself caused her to become depressed. Though don't take my word for it. Watch the video.

My point is this. If you tell me that discrimination based on immutable traits is ever ok, I'm going to pick a fight. If you tell me that white people, or white men, have never suffered, I will pick a fight. History of the human race is long. We love to hate so much that we have regional hate. People from Texas hate California. People from Dallas hate people from Ft Worth. People from Shanghai hate people from Hong Kong. People from Osaka hate people from Tokyo. This phenomenon is more often referred to as Xenophobia. Though that's kind of a overplayed term. And I also partly disagree with use of most words with "Phobia" at the end because the word phobia is, "An irrational fear of". And I'm sure that most people don't have an irrational fear of other cultures so much as sometimes they misunderstand them.

Last thing I will say is this though. I try to be as fair as I can to everyone. Contrary to how people might try to portray me, I try to be fair to everyone. I either love everyone or hate everyone equally. My biggest issue with videos like this is it proves that Westerners, and specifically often White Americans, are the MOST self hating group on earth. You will not find this kind of self hate in almost any other country on earth. With is insane because there is slavery alive and well in our world. There are groups suffering and dying, or being sexually assaulted daily. There are countries with a history significantly longer than that of the US whom have hands DRENCHED in blood, conquest, and oppression. It's every country on earth. Asian nations. African nations. South American nations, Even Australia. It's insane to me how this is a thing that we even have to discuss. We need to end the demonization and end the hate. For everyone. Because this is why:

Want to know what happened between 2013 and 2015? The Radical feminism movements, followed by the Racial identarian movement, followed by the Social Justice movement. and has been slowly but surely going down more and more. If that's not enough for you to realize we are all going about this wrong, we will get to a point where these percentages are low enough we are waging war on one another based on race (And certainly there have been plenty of race based attacks/killings by all ethnicities on other groups more and more for the last 7-8 years). We did not need to end up here. We just needed to NOT hyper fixate on race the way we started to in 2015. And sure as hell not like we do now. So this new trend of "White", "Cis" or "Males" as slurs, or acceptable targetable groups for demonization needs to stop. Lest you find out what happens when people have had enough. And that's not a threat. That's a, "This group outnumbers you and when it gets to the point they are tired of sucking your dick and licking your boot, they will retaliate, and you WILL end up in a worse position then you want to. And it WILL be ugly. After which point race relations will not recover for decades or centuries. And it's probable there will be a lot of death.

I don't want that. I think Neo liberals do want that though. Because a lot of their views tend to align with racist stereotypes, and they NEED non whites to win votes. Basically? The worse race relations are (which they and their Marxist view points are the cause of) the more they get to cosplay as "allies" and keep you voting for them. The term "Democrat Plantation" is not a saying for nothing.

Last thing. (For real this time). If you are white and reading this and you disagree, kindly tell me why you have not deleted yourself if you are so evil. And before you hit me with the, "Oh well I'm one of the good ones" or "Because I need to be a white savior to all these poor stupid non whites", maybe move to a country in which you are the minority. Hell, move to china. Try to talk about the Tiananmen Square massacre. Ask them why they don't hate themselves. Assuming you live long enough to ask. Hell they might even let you be a TV star. You can scream at the TV talking about how bad an entire skin color is. I'm sure Russians, Brits, Spaniards, Irish, and some Portuguese will be thrilled to see you pushing that rhetoric.

#Youtube