Hermetic posted:I really like your idea about it being a factor of the mindless consumerist aspect of the show. It explains the whole "I hate feminism but love MLP" angle. They want the consume the things, because they want to be part of a culture that lets them wave around totems (see: Davis' skull, whiskey and cigarette), but they loathe aspects of what that culture represents. This is in a similar vein as the sort of right-wingers who eat piles of bacon, watch football, and own a dozen guns that have probably never had a shot fired from them. They're people who obsess over masculinity, but they don't or can't DO things the that they see as masculine activities or professions. So instead they redefine masculinity in a consumerist manner, that being manly is about engaging in the correct media and cultural and consuming the totems that prove that engagement. (also: shortpacked is still awful even when it's trying to make a point I agree with)
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Jun 9, 2016 00:28
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Zerilan posted:This is in a similar vein as the sort of right-wingers who eat piles of bacon, watch football, and own a dozen guns that have probably never had a shot fired from them. They're people who obsess over masculinity, but they don't or can't DO things the that they see as masculine activities or professions. So instead they redefine masculinity in a consumerist manner, that being manly is about engaging in the correct media and cultural and consuming the totems that prove that engagement. And it's what leads to absolute freakouts when people don't engage with those totems, especially the bacon thing. It's not even saying you're veg*n anymore, just saying you don't like bacon, or that you're having a vegetarian meal is enough to challenge some people's sense of masculinity. I tried eating vegetarian for a few months back in, like, 2002, and a redpill-type that I knew back then still raged about it when he ran into me last year. And god-forbid you ever denounce the glorious bacon as not that good on the internet. Hell, as someone who likes fancy shaving stuff, it's amazing how many dudes see THAT as a way to reaffirm their masculinity. I just want to look and smell pretty. 
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Jun 9, 2016 00:45
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Heresiarch posted:This is a very good point. What I wonder is if the same thing would have happened if the show hadn't been a toy commercial? I feel that it being a toy commercial is secondary to it being a new show from an Eighties cartoon franchise (which were, coincidentally, all toy commercials). Franchises like Transformers, GI Joe, Thundercats, and He-Man don't have their nerd lustre because of quality, but because they're what a generation of nerdy guys grew up with, and even if they weren't the target audience, My Little Pony is of that generation as well. It's 'theirs' in a way it can't be for the children it's now aimed at, and so they feel entitled to it. It's the distant childhood friend they grew up alongside, and now they're a decade or two past puberty and it's back in their neighbourhood, they want to gently caress it.
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Jun 9, 2016 00:58
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I've heard a reasonably cogent argument that the initial appeal of MLP to these guys, albeit an appeal they would never admit, is that it was a show that presented emotional content in a way they could parse, i.e. attached to a toyetic-rear end '80's cartoon pitched at a small-child audience. For dudes who have literally never consumed media with anything to say about emotion beyond "my girlfriend died and now I smolder with generic rage," even something as simplistic as My Little Pony struck a chord -- look at the infamous DA comment from some brony talking about how they could never relate to images of the Holocaust until someone photoshopped a fuckin' cartoon horse in there. Of course, "I'm experiencing a feeling" is an unacceptable statement for this sort of nerdy dude without tying it to appropriate "masculine" topics (sex, acquisitiveness), and these guys are still gross as gently caress even if they're experiencing a feeling, so things go pear-shaped from there.
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Jun 9, 2016 01:09
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Darth Walrus posted:I feel that it being a toy commercial is secondary to it being a new show from an Eighties cartoon franchise (which were, coincidentally, all toy commercials). Franchises like Transformers, GI Joe, Thundercats, and He-Man don't have their nerd lustre because of quality, but because they're what a generation of nerdy guys grew up with, and even if they weren't the target audience, My Little Pony is of that generation as well. It's 'theirs' in a way it can't be for the children it's now aimed at, and so they feel entitled to it. It's the distant childhood friend they grew up alongside, and now they're a decade or two past puberty and it's back in their neighbourhood, they want to gently caress it. This is a better theory than mine, actually. I think that the merchandise aspect was still peripherally a part of it, but the fact that it was an 80's franchise was probably a much stronger factor.
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Jun 9, 2016 01:11
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Darth Walrus posted:I feel that it being a toy commercial is secondary to it being a new show from an Eighties cartoon franchise (which were, coincidentally, all toy commercials). Franchises like Transformers, GI Joe, Thundercats, and He-Man don't have their nerd lustre because of quality, but because they're what a generation of nerdy guys grew up with, and even if they weren't the target audience, My Little Pony is of that generation as well. It's 'theirs' in a way it can't be for the children it's now aimed at, and so they feel entitled to it. It's the distant childhood friend they grew up alongside, and now they're a decade or two past puberty and it's back in their neighbourhood, they want to gently caress it. At first I thought you were speaking metaphorically. Then I remembered all the pony porn out there and felt a little nauseous. They're taking other people's childhood entertainment and trying desperately to make it part of their sexual identity. I wonder if that bleeds into the consumerist identity with the idea of consumer culture supplanting of sexual desire with the desire to purchase... Man, somebody is going to get an amazing paper out of all this.
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Jun 9, 2016 01:13
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The Dark Enlightenment probably gives sociology undergrads wood.
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Jun 9, 2016 01:18
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Woolie Wool posted:The Dark Enlightenment probably gives sociology undergrads wood. poo poo, dude, I've got a graduate degree and this is making me chub up a little. If I weren't moving away from critical analysis as a field of research, I'd be sending a proposal off to the Pop Culture Association tonight.
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Jun 9, 2016 01:21
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Hermetic posted:poo poo, dude, I've got a graduate degree and this is making me chub up a little. If I weren't moving away from critical analysis as a field of research, I'd be sending a proposal off to the Pop Culture Association tonight. Please don't talk about boners in this thread, that's what started this mess in the first place
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Jun 9, 2016 01:58
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Zerilan posted:This is in a similar vein as the sort of right-wingers who eat piles of bacon, watch football, and own a dozen guns that have probably never had a shot fired from them. They're people who obsess over masculinity, but they don't or can't DO things the that they see as masculine activities or professions. So instead they redefine masculinity in a consumerist manner, that being manly is about engaging in the correct media and cultural and consuming the totems that prove that engagement. My friend invented / discovered / used in front of me a great term for this sort of thing, "masculinity commodification." He was specifically describing fedoras but it applies to so much more.
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Jun 9, 2016 02:36
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Darth Walrus posted:I feel that it being a toy commercial is secondary to it being a new show from an Eighties cartoon franchise (which were, coincidentally, all toy commercials). Franchises like Transformers, GI Joe, Thundercats, and He-Man don't have their nerd lustre because of quality, but because they're what a generation of nerdy guys grew up with, and even if they weren't the target audience, My Little Pony is of that generation as well. It's 'theirs' in a way it can't be for the children it's now aimed at, and so they feel entitled to it. It's the distant childhood friend they grew up alongside, and now they're a decade or two past puberty and it's back in their neighbourhood, they want to gently caress it. Maybe, though judging by the old brony mock threads they hate hate hate everything older than the most recent series and don't consider any of it, uh, "canon" and get really mad about it in hilariously dumb ways.
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Jun 9, 2016 02:40
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Parallel Paraplegic posted:My friend invented / discovered / used in front of me a great term for this sort of thing, "masculinity commodification." He was specifically describing fedoras but it applies to so much more.   I can't look at one of these things in a store without imagining the words "SHOWER TOOL" being spoken like one of the Brawndo commercials.
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Jun 9, 2016 03:20
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Heresiarch posted:
does anyone ever actually buy this poo poo though?
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Jun 9, 2016 03:23
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Heresiarch posted:
I think peak "masculinity commodification" is when whoever made that MANLY diet soda that had like 10 calories or something because 0 calories is for pussies.
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Jun 9, 2016 03:24
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MizPiz posted:I think peak "masculinity commodification" is when whoever made that MANLY diet soda that had like 10 calories or something because 0 calories is for pussies.
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Jun 9, 2016 03:37
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Frogisis posted:There was that Dr. Pepper campaign a few years ago but I'm 99% sure that was Tim & Eric-style parody attacking this trend and way too many people just took it at face value. I think you're being a bit too generous. Sure, the campaign was meant to be silly and over-the-top, but it's not like they were trying to make a statement. They still wanted men to buy their special manly diet cola. Made the whole thing come across as just obnoxious.
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Jun 9, 2016 04:25
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They did make a soda with some calories added specifically to appeal to men.
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Jun 9, 2016 04:50
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Jack Gladney posted:They did make a soda with some calories added specifically to appeal to men. Yeah, and the over-the-top-but-still-sorta-sincere commercials that wound up being made handled that about as well as I'd expect any marketing firm to handle the assignment of "advertise our diet drink but make sure you emphasize the fact that it's totally not a gay baby drink for girls"
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Jun 9, 2016 05:29
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This thread has been absolutely garbage lately. You all know better than to feed the trolls but you do it anyway, and when asked why it's because "oh they're not really trolls, they're just that dumb". It can be both.
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Jun 9, 2016 07:04
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Deified Data posted:This thread has been absolutely garbage lately. You all know better than to feed the trolls but you do it anyway, and when asked why it's because "oh they're not really trolls, they're just that dumb". It can be both. Well, thank God you came in with some content to get it back on track!
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Jun 9, 2016 14:26
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Puppy Time posted:Well, thank God you came in with some content to get it back on track! I suffer no delusion it'll ever get back on track, don't you worry.
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Jun 9, 2016 14:35
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https://twitter.com/europhile2016/status/738799144454754304 thankfully most of the alt-right haven't decided to copy roof's methods
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Jun 9, 2016 14:40
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Deified Data posted:I suffer no delusion it'll ever get back on track, don't you worry. Maybe we can talk about Fallout some more
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Jun 9, 2016 14:41
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Small Frozen Thing posted:Maybe we can talk about Fallout some more I did find it funny that David Aruni literally wrote Fallout fanfic and sold it as original work.
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Jun 9, 2016 14:42
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Tesseraction posted:I did find it funny that David Aruni literally wrote Fallout fanfic and sold it as original work. Oh, I didn't know he wrote Fallout Equestria.
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Jun 9, 2016 18:19
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Equeen posted:Oh, I didn't know he wrote Fallout Equestria. You know... that would be so loving perfect. Almost as sweet as Owen getting stonewalled by Sierra.
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Jun 9, 2016 18:55
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I have to imagine that his thought process was something like "if a female like Stephanie Meyer can make a fortune off of a Buffy fanfic with the serial numbers filled off, surely I as a superior male specimen can do even better".
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Jun 9, 2016 19:07
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Heresiarch posted:I have to imagine that his thought process was something like "if a female like Stephanie Meyer can make a fortune off of a Buffy fanfic with the serial numbers filled off, surely I as a superior male specimen can do even better".
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Jun 9, 2016 19:44
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Rev solves all the problems of philosophy. Guy who smugly named himself after David Duke likes it
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Jun 9, 2016 20:00
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what loving parenthesis thing
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Jun 9, 2016 20:03
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Grondoth posted:what loving parenthesis thing https://mic.com/articles/145105/coincidence-detector-the-google-extension-white-supremacists-use-to-track-jews#.mkbO35H4E
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Jun 9, 2016 20:06
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Grondoth posted:what loving parenthesis thing nazis are putting names of jewish people in ((())) because they're not picked up by search engines
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Jun 9, 2016 20:15
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Digital payos.
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Jun 9, 2016 20:20
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The Vosgian Beast posted:https://mic.com/articles/145105/coincidence-detector-the-google-extension-white-supremacists-use-to-track-jews#.mkbO35H4E Cool Also that image where someone says [Current Year] isn't someone complaining, it's someone ironically complaining
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Jun 9, 2016 20:34
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pookel posted:A better comparison here is 50 Shades of Grey, which was literally a Twilight fanfiction with the names changed.
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Jun 9, 2016 20:52
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Nessus posted:While that was legitimately a very popular fanfic in its own right, didn't it become a giant publishing thing in large part because the author just happened to be married to a guy who just happened to know someone in charge or heavily involved with a publishing house? Not that I've heard. When people talk about the book's runaway success they usually talk about how the Kindle erotica market was a rich vein just waiting to be tapped and she was just the first one through the gate.
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Jun 9, 2016 21:39
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http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=1662 The neoreactionary turn is completely alien to Less Wrong as an group, and is completely contigent and is by no means necessarily associated with the ideas and beliefs of those at Less Wrong and MIRI. GiveWell posted:Luke studied psychology at the University of Minnesota but left in favor of self-study. He was Executive Director of the Machine Intelligence Research Institute from November 2011 through May 2015. Luke joined GiveWell in June 2015
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Jun 9, 2016 21:41
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Is it just me, or is there an unusually high proportion of autistic people in this thread, even for a nerd forum like this one? I'm wondering if there's something about being on the spectrum that makes people more likely to have interacted with the Dark Enlightenment. Like, I think they also have a high proportion of autistics - maybe it's an intersection of various rationalist-leaning internet forums? Maybe we're particularly interested in obsessively rigid, verbose right-wing thinkers who are prone to overthinking and categorization, because we tend to be obsessively rigid, verbose left-wing thinkers who are prone to overthinking and categorization, is the point I'm trying to make.
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Jun 9, 2016 21:43
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DarklyDreaming posted:Not that I've heard. When people talk about the book's runaway success they usually talk about how the Kindle erotica market was a rich vein just waiting to be tapped and she was just the first one through the gate. There's more to it than that but the gist is that it did huge as selfpub long before a trad publisher picked it up-- basically she 'marketed' it really heavily even in fandom long before it was up for sale and then when she did file the serial numbers off she had enough of a fan base ready to buy that it got kicked up high enough on the charts to stay visible and just went up from there. That's the short version, anyway. pookel posted:Is it just me, or is there an unusually high proportion of autistic people in this thread, even for a nerd forum like this one? I'm wondering if there's something about being on the spectrum that makes people more likely to have interacted with the Dark Enlightenment. Like, I think they also have a high proportion of autistics - maybe it's an intersection of various rationalist-leaning internet forums? Possibly but also consider that a lot of autistic people don't volunteer that fact just because of lovely Internet treatment. When people cop to it and don't catch poo poo for it, it's an encouragement.
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Jun 9, 2016 22:02
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pookel posted:Is it just me, or is there an unusually high proportion of autistic people in this thread, even for a nerd forum like this one? I'm wondering if there's something about being on the spectrum that makes people more likely to have interacted with the Dark Enlightenment. Like, I think they also have a high proportion of autistics - maybe it's an intersection of various rationalist-leaning internet forums? I'm just here to pick up betas.
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