Journal of Other Forum Analysis (Volume II, Issue 1)

[Boredfrom]

So you're saying they should have just let Trump have whatever he wanted in business deals because he could have potentially in 30 years become President?

Nah, I’m saying they should destroyed the dude financially, like for real. Most grifters don’t get that far unless supported by a bunch of assholes. I know the dude got partially lucky, but there is something wrong with the world when a dude as stupid and incompetent like that can attain power because people think they can deal with him.

Trump, in a deep subconscious level, understands that everyone considers him a dumb clown to be taken advantage from (even if himself was extremely privileged).

[Boredfrom]

1743836753[/url]']
Well, I mean, Trump didn't really get a lot of business deals, his business has been terrible. He's wasted all kinds of money on stupidity. BUT the Trump real estate empire was quite large when he started. A footprint like that matters in NYC but Trump was mostly devested of that power by everyone else treating him that way. That's why he spent this century selling his name to put on other people's stuff.

You are right… I totally forgot about that. 

Man, im just like ERA trying to explain how a dude like that got elected with conspiracy thinking.

I still stand by this part of my post:

Trump, in a deep subconscious level, understands that everyone considers him a dumb clown to be taken advantage from (even if himself was extremely privileged).

[Boredfrom]

In happier threads:

So, uh, let's say it does collide with the moon... what exactly will happen to Earth?

Nothing, unfortunately

https://www.resetera.com/threads/rising-odds-asteroid-that-briefly-threatened-earth-will-hit-moon.1155810/

A big asteroid impact on earth not instant death. Quite contrary, the stuff it does is scary as hell.

[benji]

Honestly - a fitting end to our species if that were to happen.

We don't deserve this planet.

Wild how every extreme radical on that site is a complete misanthrope. But surely this is an irrelevant variable in their chosen philosophy.

If given the choice of hitting the earth or hitting the moon, wouldn't hitting the moon indirectly cause more destruction for us than hitting the earth?

[Gameboy Nostalgia]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/ohio-senator-bernie-moreno-called-the-senate-minority-leader-fuhrer-schumer.1155723/

Such an antisemitic piece of shit to say that, much less in claiming the Democrats are the sheep and Republicans are independently minded.

Wow, so calling Jews nazis is bad now?

[Gameboy Nostalgia]

why should I care about literal demons from hell?

Christ is King

According to DMC Netflix… they are just differently evolved humans from a different dimension. It sounds like there is no heaven in that universe, as JD Pence (discount Cecil) believes in God while killing demon children. 

Dude… I just want to see Dante killing monsters.

What the fuck 

[Polident]

In happier threads:

So, uh, let's say it does collide with the moon... what exactly will happen to Earth?

Nothing, unfortunately

https://www.resetera.com/threads/rising-odds-asteroid-that-briefly-threatened-earth-will-hit-moon.1155810/

A big asteroid impact on earth not instant death. Quite contrary, the stuff it does is scary as hell.

…they think our moon doesn’t impact the Earth? They taught this basic stuff in elementary school.

[Polident]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/finasteride-and-its-possible-side-effects-suicidal-thoughts-depression-impotence.1155132/

The biggest side effect for me would be that I couldn't donate blood, so I never took it.

Forgot to make a care post earlier. But guys should really try biotin and dietary changes before resorting to this type. When the side effects are limp dick, man boobs, and suicide, maybe exhaust other options first. Worst case, flights to Turkey cost less than a Switch 2.

[benji]

STAFF COMMUNICATION SPOTLIGHTING BLACK EXCELLENCE:
Some chick at USC does what Nepenthe don't:

Kai Unearthed is a meditation on an unpoliced future healing from climate change. In this interactive 3D world, you can become a Wildtender, someone who heals the relationship between humans and more-than-human beings. Reflect on the choices you make, the artifacts you leave behind, and the worlds that will grow out of them, through a journal, an interactive story, and a psychedelic scavenger hunt.

Jump into a psychedelic Afrofuturist world as you take on the role of Kai, an aspiring Wildtender! Nurture relationships through an interactive dialogue system. Choose what you want to say, and how you relate to your crush and your elders.

Nurture relationships as you tend the wildness of a regrowing planet! Connect with your ancestors and the artifacts they left behind during the volatile final decades of the Capitalist Era.

OLIVIA PEACE (she / they) is a queer black interdisciplinary artist from Detroit, Michigan living in Los Angeles. Their artistic style has been referred tolovingly as “a hat on a hat… but like in a good way, you know?” They are heavily informed by hip hop, B-movies, and a family history of bipolar disorder. They believe that style helps to facilitate agency in people and so they set out to create work that’s replete with style. After garnering critical and institutional praise for their 2017 short film Pangaea, Olivia landed a fellowship with the Sundance Institute in the year-long Ignite Fellowship Program. They spent 2019 working on their feature film debut, Tahara while still a full time MFA student at USC. Tahara premiered in January at the 2020 Slamdance Film Festival to rave reviews. Currently, Olivia is hard at work putting together their next feature film. Olivia remains committed todiscussing and exploring critical imagination and radical optimism in the face of loss and change. They believe that in order to discuss the turmoil of what’s going on outward, one must look inward. And so their work looks inward, often in some mashup form of animation and always with subtitles.

[Nintex]

The communist revolution was prepared for everything, except Mario Kart World.

[Daffy Duck]

we’re +/- 2 years out from transwomen claiming they have naturally occurring ovaries and wombs.

Who says that women weren’t actually meant to have penis’ in the first place?

[Gameboy Nostalgia]

When will these children understand that under communism there would be no Nintendo, Sony, or Microsoft? Who would have time to play video games when we will be busy working toward the betterment of everyone

Playing video games is selfish and a self centered waste of time. 

[Eric Cartman]

I bet you he was totally on a gang, but he is too dumb to realize his family was lying their asses off to try to save him.

“He wasn’t in gang, he just murdered 2 people on prison and got 20 year (more?) on prison.”

Dude's body count is 3. One murder, two more in prison.

 

I didn’t realize this, I thought loco just repeated words to express the same idea (killed 2 people in prison).

That makes his rant worse and more stupid.

Oh, what, so you get arrested and convicted for murdering someone from a gang, and then while in prison you end up murdering 2 more people also in gangs, and suddenly they're saying you're a gang member despite not having absolute substantial evidence, and that you might not be the kind of immigrant people particularly want to stay in the country anymore?

thanks, trumpbama

[Eric Cartman]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/liberal-currents-the-new-gender-synthesis.1155897/

This is the vision I offer you. Not the dreamscape of reactionary camp. But a real human being, looking back at you with the same admiration you give to them. To be admired and respected for your unique take on what it means to be human. Grace for your failings and esteem for your virtues. This is what we queers call "partnership." You should give it a try sometime.

[Eric Cartman]

OLIVIA PEACE (she / they) is a queer black interdisciplinary artist from Detroit, Michigan living in Los Angeles. Their artistic style has been referred tolovingly as “a hat on a hat… but like in a good way, you know?” They are heavily informed by hip hop, B-movies, and a family history of bipolar disorder.

[Gameboy Nostalgia]

STAFF COMMUNICATION SPOTLIGHTING BLACK EXCELLENCE:
Some chick at USC does what Nepenthe don't:

Kai Unearthed is a meditation on an unpoliced future healing from climate change. In this interactive 3D world, you can become a Wildtender, someone who heals the relationship between humans and more-than-human beings. Reflect on the choices you make, the artifacts you leave behind, and the worlds that will grow out of them, through a journal, an interactive story, and a psychedelic scavenger hunt.

Jump into a psychedelic Afrofuturist world as you take on the role of Kai, an aspiring Wildtender! Nurture relationships through an interactive dialogue system. Choose what you want to say, and how you relate to your crush and your elders.

Nurture relationships as you tend the wildness of a regrowing planet! Connect with your ancestors and the artifacts they left behind during the volatile final decades of the Capitalist Era.

OLIVIA PEACE (she / they) is a queer black interdisciplinary artist from Detroit, Michigan living in Los Angeles. Their artistic style has been referred tolovingly as “a hat on a hat… but like in a good way, you know?” They are heavily informed by hip hop, B-movies, and a family history of bipolar disorder. They believe that style helps to facilitate agency in people and so they set out to create work that’s replete with style. After garnering critical and institutional praise for their 2017 short film Pangaea, Olivia landed a fellowship with the Sundance Institute in the year-long Ignite Fellowship Program. They spent 2019 working on their feature film debut, Tahara while still a full time MFA student at USC. Tahara premiered in January at the 2020 Slamdance Film Festival to rave reviews. Currently, Olivia is hard at work putting together their next feature film. Olivia remains committed todiscussing and exploring critical imagination and radical optimism in the face of loss and change. They believe that in order to discuss the turmoil of what’s going on outward, one must look inward. And so their work looks inward, often in some mashup form of animation and always with subtitles.

BASED

[benji]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/liberal-currents-the-new-gender-synthesis.1155897/

This is the vision I offer you. Not the dreamscape of reactionary camp. But a real human being, looking back at you with the same admiration you give to them. To be admired and respected for your unique take on what it means to be human. Grace for your failings and esteem for your virtues. This is what we queers call "partnership." You should give it a try sometime.

40ish year old trans woman PhD (no employment known) who argues for the state to eliminate biology:

I have argued that biopolitics is at the heart of the illiberal project. Illiberal societies work to create the conditions that justify them: to artificially impose hierarchy and give it the appearance of naturalness. Anti-trans sport policies are merely one aspect of this larger program. Biopolitics is an essential lens for any liberal analysis of the illiberal project: for understanding why they pursue the ends they do and the larger political project their interventions serve.

But biopolitics is not—should not be—solely the domain of illiberal regimes. Too often, liberal theorists approach political questions in which the “mere materiality” of bodies and interests is taken as given, or worse simply not examined at all. But we are biological beings, and our biologies must necessarily impact politics. A liberal biopolitics begins from the recognition that a liberal society must aim to create liberal citizens—must aim, in other words, to liberate humanity from the tyranny of biology. In other words, to bring biology and its inbuilt hierarchies under the rule of liberal politics. This means reproductive autonomy—access to birth control and abortion its familiar aspects—but more deeply, it means biological autonomy: the capacity to become who we are. Instead of taking “natural classes” of human beings as given—instead of taking men and women as given—we must work towards material conditions in which biological embodiment is as much a matter of choice as religion, speech, and association.

And that natural biology is violence:

Imagine you are a cis girl, maybe nine or ten, and one day the men from the government come to your parents' house and explain that from now on you'll be receiving weekly testosterone shots. Over the next several years, your voice will drop, you will grow a beard, develop a thicker brow and jaw, and in these and so many other ways experience a typical male puberty. All the while the men from the government will be there, watching you, and explaining that this is for your own good, and you'll soon grow out of the childish delusion that you ever were a girl. Afterwards, they'll cite your severe mental distress as evidence that you were never competent to make such decisions in the first place. If you still claim you really are a woman, they'll cite your male features as proof that you aren't—male features you can never completely mitigate, given the state of our science. This is the biopolitical feedback loop in action.

We rightly recognize this as a program of torture and mutilation practiced on a child. This is what conservatives want for trans girls: this same program of torture and mutilation. And all the while they will be insisting "this is just natural." But eyeglasses are not natural. Vaccines are not natural. Hormonal birth control is not natural. Electric lights in the darkness, jet aircraft dancing between continents, glass bricks with all the libraries of the world inside: none of these are natural. The natural is no good guide to what is good for a free and equal citizen, the bleating of reactionaries be damned. We human beings have escaped our natural environment, and that is our self-liberation from the prison biology built for us.

But if the "natural" does not exist, it must be created, by violence if necessary. It is not an accident that these anti-transition laws always include special carveouts for "gender conformity" surgeries on intersex infants and gender-affirming care for cis children (such as breast reduction for boys with gynecomastia). The point is not to prevent anyone from doing anything related to gender to children; the point is to enforce a particular vision of gender on children—and on their bodies. You might call this an artificial telos: the man-made "natural" that both explains and justifies itself. The unruly flesh of humanity hacked at until it fits their obsessions, and that mutilated body held up as the reason such mutilation is necessary, natural, and normal.

Here's 48 pages of some shit regarding the meaning of woman: https://www.sjshancoxli.com/_files/ugd/0e06b4_0f83ffe899d04145bfb1d2d71d2a6f6e.pdf

Here's an article about how transphobia proves that philosophy departments are controlled by the right-wing: https://contingentmagazine.org/2019/10/01/transphobia-philosophy/

Here he is meeting another well known unemployed trans Twitter scholar by a dumpster:

Spoiler:  (click to show)(click to hide)

Give trans people money:

I work primarily on novels, such as my After the Fall and my in-progress Lovecraft Spacenavy Witch, as well as tabletop roleplaying games, such as my contemporary occult-horror game Marvels and Prodigies.

[Snoopy]

This is why you should never ever game on a PC -

PC gamers openly say they going pirate games they want to "fix woke games" by modding naked lady's

Naughty Dog's development team -



https://www.resetera.com/threads/i-feel-like-i-have-been-gaslit-into-thinking-that-pc-gaming-is-such-a-superior-experience.1155630/page-9#post-138088434

[Jansen]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/liberal-currents-the-new-gender-synthesis.1155897/

This is the vision I offer you. Not the dreamscape of reactionary camp. But a real human being, looking back at you with the same admiration you give to them. To be admired and respected for your unique take on what it means to be human. Grace for your failings and esteem for your virtues. This is what we queers call "partnership." You should give it a try sometime.

40ish year old trans woman PhD (no employment known) who argues for the state to eliminate biology:

I have argued that biopolitics is at the heart of the illiberal project. Illiberal societies work to create the conditions that justify them: to artificially impose hierarchy and give it the appearance of naturalness. Anti-trans sport policies are merely one aspect of this larger program. Biopolitics is an essential lens for any liberal analysis of the illiberal project: for understanding why they pursue the ends they do and the larger political project their interventions serve.

But biopolitics is not—should not be—solely the domain of illiberal regimes. Too often, liberal theorists approach political questions in which the “mere materiality” of bodies and interests is taken as given, or worse simply not examined at all. But we are biological beings, and our biologies must necessarily impact politics. A liberal biopolitics begins from the recognition that a liberal society must aim to create liberal citizens—must aim, in other words, to liberate humanity from the tyranny of biology. In other words, to bring biology and its inbuilt hierarchies under the rule of liberal politics. This means reproductive autonomy—access to birth control and abortion its familiar aspects—but more deeply, it means biological autonomy: the capacity to become who we are. Instead of taking “natural classes” of human beings as given—instead of taking men and women as given—we must work towards material conditions in which biological embodiment is as much a matter of choice as religion, speech, and association.

And that natural biology is violence:

Imagine you are a cis girl, maybe nine or ten, and one day the men from the government come to your parents' house and explain that from now on you'll be receiving weekly testosterone shots. Over the next several years, your voice will drop, you will grow a beard, develop a thicker brow and jaw, and in these and so many other ways experience a typical male puberty. All the while the men from the government will be there, watching you, and explaining that this is for your own good, and you'll soon grow out of the childish delusion that you ever were a girl. Afterwards, they'll cite your severe mental distress as evidence that you were never competent to make such decisions in the first place. If you still claim you really are a woman, they'll cite your male features as proof that you aren't—male features you can never completely mitigate, given the state of our science. This is the biopolitical feedback loop in action.

We rightly recognize this as a program of torture and mutilation practiced on a child. This is what conservatives want for trans girls: this same program of torture and mutilation. And all the while they will be insisting "this is just natural." But eyeglasses are not natural. Vaccines are not natural. Hormonal birth control is not natural. Electric lights in the darkness, jet aircraft dancing between continents, glass bricks with all the libraries of the world inside: none of these are natural. The natural is no good guide to what is good for a free and equal citizen, the bleating of reactionaries be damned. We human beings have escaped our natural environment, and that is our self-liberation from the prison biology built for us.

But if the "natural" does not exist, it must be created, by violence if necessary. It is not an accident that these anti-transition laws always include special carveouts for "gender conformity" surgeries on intersex infants and gender-affirming care for cis children (such as breast reduction for boys with gynecomastia). The point is not to prevent anyone from doing anything related to gender to children; the point is to enforce a particular vision of gender on children—and on their bodies. You might call this an artificial telos: the man-made "natural" that both explains and justifies itself. The unruly flesh of humanity hacked at until it fits their obsessions, and that mutilated body held up as the reason such mutilation is necessary, natural, and normal.

Here's 48 pages of some shit regarding the meaning of woman: https://www.sjshancoxli.com/_files/ugd/0e06b4_0f83ffe899d04145bfb1d2d71d2a6f6e.pdf

Here's an article about how transphobia proves that philosophy departments are controlled by the right-wing: https://contingentmagazine.org/2019/10/01/transphobia-philosophy/

Here he is meeting another well known unemployed trans Twitter scholar by a dumpster:

Spoiler:  (click to show)(click to hide)

Give trans people money:

I work primarily on novels, such as my After the Fall and my in-progress Lovecraft Spacenavy Witch, as well as tabletop roleplaying games, such as my contemporary occult-horror game Marvels and Prodigies.

Encino Man?

[Boredfrom]

why should I care about literal demons from hell?

Christ is King

According to DMC Netflix… they are just differently evolved humans from a different dimension. It sounds like there is no heaven in that universe, as JD Pence (discount Cecil) believes in God while killing demon children. 

Dude… I just want to see Dante killing monsters.

What the fuck 

Is still a good show, but take itself hyper seriously when Dante is not on screen.

[Jansen]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/%E2%80%98it%E2%80%99s-a-golden-ticket%E2%80%99-u-s-doctors-explain-the-urge-to-come-to-canada.1155924/#post-138071661

I'm disabled. I suffer from chronic pain. I suffer from depression. I'm terrified of losing my GP and therapist.

I don't know what's going to happen to me.

https://www.resetera.com/threads/%E2%80%98it%E2%80%99s-a-golden-ticket%E2%80%99-u-s-doctors-explain-the-urge-to-come-to-canada.1155924/#post-138072972

No seriously, what does this mean for those of us that rely on medical health experts for a general quality of life to a greater degree than most?

I'm legitimately scared. I know it's selfish, but it feels like physicians gleefully abandoning people in need. I know that's wrong. I know it's cruel to think that way. But the sick, dark part of my brain that tells me I hate myself is what's making me think it and I hate myself even stronger for having thought it.

I'm spiraling since I read this and I don't know what to do.

Wylder's era account?

[Nintex]

You have to hand it to the writers. They timed the tariffs perfectly with the Switch 2 launch.

[Nintex]

but it feels like physicians gleefully abandoning people in need

I like this line the most. He doesn't blame Trump, Fauci, RFK Jr. or the GOP, he doesn't blame the people that didn't vote for the fun wine mom.
Instead he blames physicians for 'gleefully abandoning' their patients. 

I say to the doctors, take the bag and go to Canada.

[books]

With all the nerds complaining about the Switch 2 price, hopefully I can get one without pre-ordering.

[Nintex]

Not only do the doctors get a better deal, they can also more cheaply purchase the Nintendo Switch 2 and exports are not allowed by the Japanese honor code  

In the US it could be 30% - 50% more expensive.

I wasn't going to buy it yet but I might just for funsies 

[DavidCroquet]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/american-women-are-giving-up-on-marriage-wsj.1156059/#post-138089244

Krazen, keeper of the PoliEra thread, with this incisive and urgent cultural commentary:

Marriage had become tied to capitalism; even as a man why would you take on a partner that can possibly be a financial or labor burden (which is sad btw). Then you get into the issue about how there's an obvious regression on how men value their SO's. I have heard anecdotally from my single female friends out there they talk the usual basic incompatibilities that always existed but also a darker undercurrent when dating. Dudes that will curse you out on text to save face after a few dates where its obvious on both sides there really isn't a spark. Which makes them less active in dating because its effectively more work labor and trauma.

But even skipping our social views on feminism going south, end of the day it does require money time and effort to get to the walk down the aisle point and we don't have that. It's tied to a bunch of things; lost of third spaces to meet people, lots of interactions happening on dating apps that only care about engagement not success, general exhaustion in the extra effort it feels to date after trying to make food on the table for just yourself or worse if you have kids on both sides

Who can forget those halcyon days when marriage was completely independent from capital or labor concerns...If only we could return the those good old days of Never A.D.

[DavidCroquet]

Never say that Nepenthe isn't one for class solidarity.

https://www.resetera.com/threads/american-women-are-giving-up-on-marriage-wsj.1156059/page-2#post-138093084

The guy I've got a crush on right now is literally a gas station attendant. But you know what? I don't care. Because he treats me with kindness, humor, and respect. Meanwhile, the richest guys I've dealt with in my life have just been fucking assholes, hopped up on their own self-importance and self-entitlement to not bother with not being dehumanizing.

[HaughtyFrank]

https://www.resetera.com/threads/american-women-are-giving-up-on-marriage-wsj.1156059/#post-138089244

Krazen, keeper of the PoliEra thread, with this incisive and urgent cultural commentary:

Marriage had become tied to capitalism; even as a man why would you take on a partner that can possibly be a financial or labor burden (which is sad btw). Then you get into the issue about how there's an obvious regression on how men value their SO's. I have heard anecdotally from my single female friends out there they talk the usual basic incompatibilities that always existed but also a darker undercurrent when dating. Dudes that will curse you out on text to save face after a few dates where its obvious on both sides there really isn't a spark. Which makes them less active in dating because its effectively more work labor and trauma.

But even skipping our social views on feminism going south, end of the day it does require money time and effort to get to the walk down the aisle point and we don't have that. It's tied to a bunch of things; lost of third spaces to meet people, lots of interactions happening on dating apps that only care about engagement not success, general exhaustion in the extra effort it feels to date after trying to make food on the table for just yourself or worse if you have kids on both sides

Who can forget those halcyon days when marriage was completely independent from capital or labor concerns...If only we could return the those good old days of Never A.D.

Is he familiar with the concept of dowry? 
You had to fucking pay to get your daughter married off. 

 Some countries still do it

[BIONIC]

I'm just gonna say my peace. This is coming from a place of wanting my engagement here to work, but noting regular points of frustration that I'm baffled get overlooked while I get actioned for much less. Or maybe I'm the problem.

It's long. When I tried to edit down from 3 pages, it became 5, when I rewrote the whole thing it became 7.

You can't control how people react to your words. You can mean one thing, something takes it as something else. You can try to clarify and contextualize it, but they either see it your way or they don't. It sucks when that happens, but it is what it is. That said, I can notice when people add intent and malice to my words that isn't there to make themselves feel attacked. At which point, my intent seems completely irrelevant to how my words are perceived.

It's a forum, people are here because they're passionate about video games, movies, TV, manga, comics, books and other forms of media and hobbies and they want to hang around likeminded people. With that comes with preferences and attachments, this could be to creators, authors, directors, companies, but also brands. If I like this brand, I want to hang out with other people that like this brand, but I may not like it when people criticize the brand I like so I might get defensive and pushback on any criticism I read about that brand. How and why they criticize it doesn't seem to matter, I just don't want to read anything "negative".

The above can take shape in a lot of ways.

Era has members that practically command and demand positive echo chambers for their favorite brands. People pick fights with anyone that criticizes that brand whether it's coming from a fan who wants to see that brand be better or someone they just perceive to be a hater trying to stir the pot. No matter how much it's explained or clarified that not everyone criticism has to be read as an attack, some people have a compulsive need to maintain the status quo of, my brand is doing everything fine and anyone that says otherwise is a "vocal minority" that can be ignored. "Sales are high, therefore everyone is happy and they don't need to change anything." "That movie made a billion, everyone still loves the brand."

No discussion, no personal opinions, it made money therefore it's objectively good, therefore if you don't like it, it's a you a problem, not a problem with the product. Opinion via analytics. Just robots always needing to be "objectively" right and control the narrative for their favs. You can't even speculate without someone trying to correct you. Every criticism has to be spun into this intentional strategy that the poster would have no knowledge of and clearly just made up on the spot.

I legitimately do not understand why we watch that go down everyday and go "that's fine".

Textbook example. A person says "One of the reason why I didn't like this Pokémon game is because it was too easy." The rebuttal, "It's a game for kids, all Pokémon games are easy, what do you want, Dark Souls?" This is a nearly 30-year-old franchise. Each generation has had varying degrees of difficulty, there are specific entries you can point to and go "that one was kind of hard". The series, until recently, has had a least one difficultly option from jump. One generation actually added Easy and Hard difficulty options in a bafflingly convoluted way. And yet, that obtuse ass, disingenuous ass, made in poor faith ass argument is allowed thread after thread after thread, yes, I understand what hyperbole is, but no, "too easy" doesn't mean "I need it to be super difficult". So why suggest that? Just to push back on someone criticizing something you like by making their complaint seem irrational despite everyone knowing better. That's what people do over and over and over and what I'm supposed to be nice about it?

And the problem is, while it starts small, that kind of behavior seeps into other site issues. The way people are to each other when people don't like their thing. Criticism being read as an attack gives people a pass to retaliate. If can justify you criticizing what I like as an attack, I can return the favor with my own nastiness. Do you have concerns about the console I'm looking forward to? Is your speculation about something I'm looking forward to less than positive? I can just say you're concern trolling and dooming. Did you not like the game that has a 95+ Metacritic that sold 10s of millions of copies, well, you're objectively incorrect and likely means you have bad taste. Or maybe you just hate the brand and are mad that another brand doesn't the attention of the one that I like, maybe you're console warring.

The sales aren't enough, the reviews aren't enough, it has to be 100% universal acclaim in front view at ALL times.

And if no one goes for any of that there's always "Era doesn't like XYZ or XYZ fans". Suddenly the criticism doesn't matter. The site just collectively hates the brand and their fanbase for reasons, any and all nuance goes out the window and now that fanbase gets to act personally aggrieved, which seems grossly manipulative to me. I can point to games, movies, TV and anime people do this with, so don't even with the "he's obviously going on about X fans".

Other manipulations, if I don't like what you're saying, I can go after it in different ways. I can attack your tone. If I can paint you as overly angry, I don't really have to address your point, but can still claim superiority. I can even paint how you post as an act of aggression. "You barged in here and said this", "You're demanding everyone agrees with you", no, they clicked the thread and posted, just like you did. Why are you adding additional anger and malice just because you don't like what they said. Which brings us back to "if can justify you criticizing what I like as an attack, I get to return the favor."

So that's me speaking conceptually. Now let's go into the personal examples.

______________________________________________________________________________

My last argument in this thread started because people in another thread dogpiled someone that expressed a dislike of a popular game in the first post, the game was mentioned in the OP so it was actually relevant to the thread topic somewhat. I point to that as people taking something too personally, others defended it as a natural reaction to bait.

One person calls me argumentative and mostly ignores my point and others jump on. So maybe I'm the problem and need to change my behavior, but then why I can go into another thread and read that same person telling others they can't read in response to other not speculating positively on the subject they like. I get called argumentative for telling someone they're using words incorrectly, this person gets to call multiple people illiterate. I've made it a point to note when people clearly didn't bother to read the OP. But I'm hostile.

Maybe I'm overthinking it, maybe it's as easy as all of us just being nice to each other. Be nice and you'll never be actioned. Then why can I watch a dozen members walk on egg shells to politely argue around a popular site owner who gets a free pass to insult anyone who criticizes his favorite IP is ways he doesn't approve of all in the name of "curbing misinformation". I think I've been moderated more for pointing out the pattern of how that person operates, with the worst thing I've ever called them being a "martyr", than they've been on shutting down every take they don't agree with while spinning it as this altruistic act despite painting everyone they disagree with as uninformed liars.

So what's considered hostile?

I've been actioned for "attacking other members". I try to make it a point to explain the faults in people's arguments rather than say anything about them directly. Hostility from me is saying "people's parasocial relationships with companies can cloud how they see things to the point where they'll defend anything", this was said in a thread where people were literally defending a company for not crediting people who worked on a game.

That same day I watched people get mad at others for having critiques on things they were excited about, literally insulting people for not liking a game trailer or having doubts about the introduced concept. I literally shared a list of posts from that the same day with moderation to make the point, "you're telling me all these posts from today were okay, but just mine was over the line?" Did I directly insult anyone, no, but these people did? Another difference to me was criticizing a company that people like vs criticizing people that were criticizing a company that people like. What's more likely to get reported and why? Was a rule actually broken or is someone just bothered by my take and wants to get one over on me. Call it paranoid, but when I see people get away with calling others idiots for not liking a game trailer, tell me, what is my takeaway supposed to be?

A couple years ago there was a Street Fighter VI thread about the Cammy reveal and her redesign. Someone criticized her larger forehead in a rude way, even though I liked the design, I sort of got where he was coming from and tried to make their point better in a less rude way. That poster and I were both banned for sexism. I wasn't trying to be critical, but it was still shallow jab at a female character finally being less overtly sexualized which rubbed people the wrong the way, so I got it. Even though I know what I was trying to say, I understand why it wasn't liked and regardless I was still backing a shitty post. There was a clear, you did this, don't do it again lesson there.

Telling someone you're trying to be nice by referencing an alternative way you could've made your argument for the sake of proving that you're actually trying to argue in good faith with them isn't hostility.

Telling adults that they're overreacting to Switch 2 op-eds that aren't as positive as they want to hear for the purpose of satiating and validating their hype isn't console warring, which is especially insulting when it feels like I feel like 50% of gaming content here borders on that. I can watch people prop up their favorite companies' successes in threads about their competitors' layoffs. I can watch people derail sales threads about one company's successes and say they could do better by being more like another company. I can watch a company reach a successful milestone and then someone will just credit another company's example for the topic company's success. But I need to chill on the console warring.

I can be called dumb for making a light thread about how I thought Kevin Butler was a real person for an extended period of time as a teenager. I can be called a gross animal because I didn't feel like washing a couple dishes one day. Other posters can shit talk me to others right in front of me. But I need to be nicer to all of this. I can watch verified users tell people who piss them off to "fuck off into the sun", but telling people getting mad at op-eds to relax is over the line.

I watch people lie, misrepresent things, have selective memory, play dumb, and that's all okay for the sake of defending something they like, but calling it out seems like a thankless task that only gets you in trouble.

If I'm hostile, it's in response to people's unprompted condescension. I've walked away from many threads that went south / put plenty of people on ignore or if I run into someone I've but heads with before, I've even given them the "can we not do this for no reason" right before they went ahead and did it for no reason. I give people chances, I can get along fine with people who disagree with me, even people who've pissed me off, I can think "ah, they're normally cool, maybe that was just a bad interaction, I can let that one go". But when you're blatantly antagonistic, over someone not liking what you like …

I'm just asking for some consistency. It shouldn't be about liking or disliking people or communities or carrying a grudge. Call things for what they are. I've agreed with and backed people I've placed on ignore (site makes it too easy to see their posts) when I thought they've made good points. I can note when people I'm friendly with are arguing in a disingenuous way. I don't have to be a fan of a company to when I feel like they're being unfairly maligned. I CAN CRITICIZE THINGS AND STILL LIKE THEM. It's about calling something for what it is, not carrying a grudge from thread to thread. It feels like people's reports are often based on grudges or people being made about something they like being criticized.

I can note someone's parasocial attachment to a company, brand or IP, but I'm never going to play to people that demand this positive echo chamber where anything that isn't positive has to be dismissed. Sorry, you don't like seeing people criticize what you like, but you're 30, you're 30, you're 30, you're 30, you're 30, you're 30, you're 30, you're 30, you're 30, YOU'RE 30 and should recognize someone not liking something you like isn't a personal attack on you. But like I already suggested, that's not a misunderstanding, that's deliberate. If I constantly reiterate the hardships of being a fan, it makes it easier to lash out, sometimes preemptively.

People are not nice about things on this site, they're just selective about the digs they take offense to. If I can read "Hideo Kojima is an overrated hack 1000" times with rarely any pushback, where does anyone get off acting persecuted because someone is disappointed by an inanimate box or because someone suggests people's interest in a cinematic universe peaked 6 years ago. It's not about lazy drive bys or empty criticisms, you could write a nuanced 6-page essay and it's still getting the same treatment from people who don't want to hear it.

I get why this stuff isn't always called out. Pick your battles. Not everything gets the same response or treatment. Certain communities are going to be certain communities. Fandoms are going to be fandoms. We all have our preferences and baggage we bring into these conversations. Certain companies get passes for things others don't because the former has a more passionate fanbase willing to overlook things. That's fine, but then don't take offense when those inconsistencies are pointed out and then default to "Era hates XYZ".

There's a reason I'm constantly trying to spell out "those haters might actually be fans who want to see the thing they like improve" and that all criticism isn't negativity, people just want better for something they like, but it feels like there's no winning unless you play along with people's "you better like my thing, everyone better like it and say nice things about my thing or it means you hate it, everyone who likes it, and more specifically me" nonsense.

And then you get the bizarre instances where fans and detractors of something can co-exist with minimal fighting in something they're less personally invested in and suddenly there's nuance and understanding of different thoughts and criticisms, and it's the same people in both threads, so don't tell me it's not intentional or personal. For games, this is usually threads about third party games, unless it's Final Fantasy.

There's a reason, I'm always beating the drum of, "it's not what you say, it's who you say it about" and I'd love to play a game of "let's line up these posts and guess which one was reported and actioned" to prove that.

And if that seems whiny, I've never complained about or referenced anything I couldn't give you at least six examples of so I invite you to ask me for those receipts because that allowed me to get really specific. And it's not like other people don't point these things out in these threads. I don't have to go back further than a week to read someone saying "it's always concern trolling when it's something less than positive being said about this company" and I know you all see these trends, don't just play along just because it's in favor for something you like.

Otherwise, the takeaway is, it's okay to crash out when certain movies / brands / IP / companies you like get criticized because that poster attacked you first with their criticism, I'm just calling bullshit on the spin. And honestly, it doesn't even require actual criticism for someone to feel attacked.

Read this OP

https://www.resetera.com/threads/final-fantasy-is-going-to-get-the-lord-of-the-rings-treatment-im-trying-to-make-sense-of-this-narrative.1083252/

and tell me how we got here

https://www.resetera.com/threads/final-fantasy-is-going-to-get-the-lord-of-the-rings-treatment-im-trying-to-make-sense-of-this-narrative.1083252/page-2#post-134343951

https://www.resetera.com/threads/final-fantasy-is-going-to-get-the-lord-of-the-rings-treatment-im-trying-to-make-sense-of-this-narrative.1083252/page-2#post-134344497

https://www.resetera.com/threads/final-fantasy-is-going-to-get-the-lord-of-the-rings-treatment-im-trying-to-make-sense-of-this-narrative.1083252/page-2#post-134344599

and then tell me I'm making this stuff up. Apparently not knowing what an OP is referring to is reason enough to act like an ass. Hell, call me hostile in that thread (though I'd prefer sarcastic, tired and defeated by the cycle), but also note what brought it about. You get to troll people, rile them up until they snap and then you get to report them because they seemingly attacked your thing. Which is why I attack what people say, not them personally. Show them how their point doesn't make sense, let them know that I know that they're bullshitting.

But at the same time, people know what they're doing when trying to get under your skin. "You didn't like my thing so I'll say it's weird how you keep mentioning them and assume you have a grudge against a character I like."

https://www.resetera.com/threads/my-hero-academia-season-6-ot-all-war-no-recap.638601/page-12#post-103194886

You could say I could've been nicer (the post before this one was the nice one and they still doubled down), but when they've already been having a go at you for a while over nothing, what kindness is owed or can I just call it for what it is (without insulting them). Because that certainly ended the conversation when I gave them no room to spin anything. That's why I have to be direct because people are often full of it. Not trying to antagonize people, just saying cut the shit.

Is there a another solution besides, be nice to the communities that are best at acting personally aggrieved when not showered with constant praise while constantly attacking people they don't agree with. Fall in line and just eat it?

Hell, maybe the people I'm saying this to don't see this as a problem and I should just get with the program or leave because all it takes to dismiss everything I just said is a patronizing non-response like - "Wow … all this anger and aggression toward people for simply liking products, who hurt you?" or "Didn't know simply being a fan of something and wanting to talk about it with people positively was such a bad thing that caused you so much mental anguish." We've seen these posts.

I'm here because I actually like games, movies and other media, not because I have a personal vested interest in the profit gains of companies to use to win console war / east vs west debates. I want to learn and gain perspective and share stories and experiences, the good and the bad from fans with opinions, not PR volunteers damage controlling every criticism they see with some narrative they made up on the spot that'll age like milk in less than week and never be acknowledged. Forgive me for not being kind to that when it's often insisted upon me unprompted.

As maligned as the WWE is here, the reason I like that Hangout is because people are general fans of the product and can acknowledge the good and the bad without the constant need for damage controlling for the company and everyone's opinions. We're critical of the people who run it, we say what we like and say what we don't. We also get really frustrated at each other sometimes, but can reasonably hash it out without too much drama and then get back to celebrating the highs or the lows. A bad episode can be followed by a good one and a great event can be followed a terrible one. It's not about shutting down every opinion I don't like unless someone is going really over the top. A lot of Hangouts are like that and it's nice and people are less likely to have a compulsive need to control the way people talk about things.

[killamajig]

Plum and Saucycarpdog getting into a slap fight.

https://www.resetera.com/threads/i-feel-like-i-have-been-gaslit-into-thinking-that-pc-gaming-is-such-a-superior-experience.1155630/page-11#post-138097431

If none of you want to genuinely engage with anything I say, repeatedly misconstruing it and simplifying it to fit your black-and-white thinking, then that's on you.

Not me.

It seems like the only way that my posts wouldn't be "exhausting" to people is if I declared that PC gaming is, by far, the best value in gaming with no clarifiers and no equal. That cheaper games practically prints people money, and that there has been absolutely no change in overall hardware or software costs since 2014. Which I'm not going to do because it simply is not true.