Funny events in anti-woke world
- Thread starter Agema
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If you have complete control over the outcome, it also doesn't qualify as a game.
To counter your reductive explanation with an even more reductive one, a game is a tool for exploiting the reward systems of the human brain. One of the most important mechanisms of this reward system is habituation. Over-rewarding the player is far more destructive to a game than under-rewarding them because it induces habituation and makes the reward feel actively disappointing. A good game builds anticipation for its rewards by making them scarce or difficult, which requires the active limitation of the player's agency. In this sense, if we're going to define the player as the "protagonist" then a game is "about" the constraints placed on the protagonist as much, if not more than, it is about the power of the protagonist.
The way you describe conservatism is nonsensical for one incredibly obvious reason. The "power of the individual" is not actually compatible with the idea of a status quo. If the status quo is only maintained by individual consent, then it doesn't actually exist.
Of course, if we read a little deeper into what you actually seem to mean by the power of the individual, it becomes more obvious what you mean, but also a lot darker. Because "the power of the individual" does not mean all individuals being blessed with intrinsic power or self-determination, does it? It means one special, chosen individual (the "protagonist", although I guess "leader" might also be fitting) who unilaterally determines the status quo on behalf of everyone else.
You're arguing that games intrinsically conservative because they simulate the power to dominate others.
Which I guess in many cases is probably valid, albeit not the praise you seem to think it is.
All of them are rebelling against the status quo.
I think the point you're trying to make is that all of them could be read as reactionary, or otherwise depict the status quo as illegitimate. But that is a function of perspective and not as politically meaningful as you might think. In all of these games the protagonist(s) are opposed to the existing state of the world they are in and are actively seeking to change things.
That is such a vague and meaningless "device" that it doesn't really say anything. What is "the world" and what counts as "destroying" it?
Again, vague and meaningless. "Equality" and "solidarity" are very much a part of our status quo and have been for hundreds of years. It's built into the legal and ideological fabric of every democracy. Equality does not mean everyone having the same power or abilities, it means everyone having the same worth. The denial of this is almost universally associated with evil in our media.
The Combine in half life 2 are colonizers. They view the inhabitants of earth not as equals or people, but as literal resources to be exploited. That is why they are bad, and why we oppose them. It's not because they personally offended the honour of Gordon Freeman, the annointed king of Earth, by having cops detain him at the game's start. Gordon's solidarity with the people of City 17 is assumed because both he and they are human. Gordon is shown to be unusually powerful because he's non-diegetically controlled by a being with access to the quicksave key, but that power doesn't place him above the people he fights for except as a symbol.
And that's assuming a relatively uncomplicated relationship to power. Dark Souls depicts a world that is unequal, but in a way that is extremely uncomfortable. Power is a diegetic property that comes from a kind of spiritual cannibalism. Through this cannibalistic process, the entire world is shown to be in inexorable motion towards an extreme concentration of power within a single individual who must sacrifice themselves to begin the cycle anew. Power is intrinsically corrupt, and those who hold it transform physically or spiritually into monsters until they are killed and their power taken by someone else. The player is often given the option to reject this cycle, but with uncertain or uncomfortable consequences. It's a game that resists any kind of easy political allegory, but it is profoundly, profoundly uncomfortable with power.
Did Greta Thunberg and a pizza box lead Andrew Tate to Romanian police? Authorities deny it
There is speculation online that a Twitter war led to the right-wing provocateur's arrest, but authorities say it was the result of a months-long investigation.
www.sbs.com.au
I mean...duh? Honestly this seemed pretty obvious to me. If the cops are after you for something as major as this and you're in their jurisdiction and you're actively posting shit on social media, they know where you are. The timing was purely coincidental here. Assuming he wasn't in Romania illegally, immigration knew he was in nation. And the dude wasn't exactly keeping a low profile with apparently a dozen high end cars in a luxury villa with sex slaves. That's something the locals consider conversation worthy.
Tate's been a resident of Romania for years now, if not a fully naturalized citizen. However, he and his brother are also apparently quite mobile in their lifestyles. The only real questions about finding him and arresting him were A) was he home at the time? and B) were the officer's sent to arrest him not corrupt and being bribed by the Tates? (Romania seems to have a real problem with corruption and the Tate brothers have allegedly avoided legal entanglements in the past through bribery).Did Greta Thunberg and a pizza box lead Andrew Tate to Romanian police? Authorities deny it
There is speculation online that a Twitter war led to the right-wing provocateur's arrest, but authorities say it was the result of a months-long investigation.
I mean...duh? Honestly this seemed pretty obvious to me. If the cops are after you for something as major as this and you're in their jurisdiction and you're actively posting shit on social media, they know where you are. The timing was purely coincidental here. Assuming he wasn't in Romania illegally, immigration knew he was in nation. And the dude wasn't exactly keeping a low profile with apparently a dozen high end cars in a luxury villa with sex slaves. That's something the locals consider conversation worthy.
I think its corruption. Romania is the sex-trafficking capitol of Europe. Its considered a Tier 2 country, meaning they don't comply with the minimum standards of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, and its gotten even worse since those rules were codified in 2000.
Bribes and corruption and probably more than a few "parties" for local law enforcement.
I kind of wonder if the tempest in a twitter post pushed the authorities over the edge. "This guy's so fucking blatant, he's really making us look bad. Let's make an example of him."
I think its absolutely part of it. From the reports I've read, one of the people arrested at the villa was a local policewoman. Ten bucks says she wasn't there to check on a noise complaint.
There's probably been a lot of international pressure, plus anger/embarrassment from the legit good cops. Someone probably said the second he shows he's in Romania, and we can't dismiss it, we have to go. And the pizza was that trigger pull, but they knew where he was/would be.
You're conception of conservatism is all but a stand in for evil. Being at odds with your conception of conservatism is a good thing. See that last section below.
You do get that the premise of Bioshock is that a man tried to create a city unbound from the rules of society and it went completely to hell, right? The premise of the Half-Life 2 is humanity is being conquered by aliens and you fight back. Even if you want to argue those are stories of heroes fighting their relative status quo, which is a stretch, their end goal is the attainment of our real world status quo.
Why do you think that contradicts what I'm saying? Do you actually consider "corporate greed" to be a part of conservatism?
It's good for people. That's the explanation.
The environmental movement that began in the Progressive Era was actually split between two very distinct ideologies. Conservationists were the people who wanted to conserve the Earth and its resources so that those things were still there for the benefit of future generations. It is a human-centric perspective. Preservationists were those who saw the environment as an inherent good, independent from humanity, which needed to be preserved indefinitely. It is a nature-centric perspective. In broad society, the conservationists won that debate, and went on to create things like the parks and forestry service, and put into effect all the environmental regulations we know and love, all efforts to allow future generations to experience the same sort of world we have now. Current environmental activists fall strongly into the preservationist mindset, of trying to freeze nature in time for its own sake. People who say things like Stop Oil Now are not conservationists.
That's not my description of conservatism. Individualism is not inherently conservative, it does not have to be the status quo, it just is within the current circumstances of western society.
It's not, though. What I pointed out-- that conservative politicians and parties have never simply stood for continuation of existing policy-- is directly to the point and true.
He created the city according to libertarian, hyper-individualist ideals, and it went to hell.... all before the game begins. His city is the status quo in the environment you arrive in, from the very start, and the protagonist acts to bring down its government, as well as its most notable business owner.
No, it's not. Humanity has long been conquered. When you arrive, the Combine rules earth, and you fight to bring down the existing government.
The "status quo", in both cases from the very start of the game, is what you fight to destroy.
No, not "corporate greed"-- I don't doubt that in principle, conservatism opposes corporate excess and greed (although conservative parties the world over enable and encourage it).
But the right-wing is undoubtedly seen as more business-friendly and amenable to unregulated capitalism.
Kill Ayn Rand is a conservative narrative now?
Lmao, we've gone from "lol, you think everything is political, even Mario" to "Mario is arch-conservative and that's why it's jarring that Vivian was trans"
Funny argument to spectate, sure, but completely unserious, especially when the impetus was Japanese video games, a huge number of which fight against the status quo so hard the the stereotypical final boss is the literal Christian analogue God
Funny argument to spectate, sure, but completely unserious, especially when the impetus was Japanese video games, a huge number of which fight against the status quo so hard the the stereotypical final boss is the literal Christian analogue God
Good to see that everyone's still going strong, even in 2023.
The idea that the US or even the US plus allies could conquer the rest of the world is insane. Yet every neocon channel I watch is full of this nonsense on Tik Tok. There are literally scenarios where the US could lose to China in Taiwan since the military you have is the military you get when you go to war in the modern era.
If the US defends Taiwan it cannot just rush its forces into China's missile kill zones. What would likely happen is the US would build up its forces, scramble jets to Taiwan from wherever is near, and not rush its navy in. If we rush we lose because China's forces are mainly in China, and the US has forces everywhere.
If the US defends Taiwan it cannot just rush its forces into China's missile kill zones. What would likely happen is the US would build up its forces, scramble jets to Taiwan from wherever is near, and not rush its navy in. If we rush we lose because China's forces are mainly in China, and the US has forces everywhere.
Careless exploitation of resources in a harmful way for the sake of expediency is the exact opposite of conservationism.
And conservatism, long as you're using the non-political, little-c definition. Like, I'm hilariously conservative, but to a Conservative I'm apparently Radical Left
In what way is using matured technology to extract a resource that will almost certainly be made obsolete within the next century careless?
The thing is, the politicians you identify as conservative may not stand for those things, but you identify "conservatives" based on an entirely different conception of the word. If you spend your whole life thinking conservative simply means something like pro-business and pro-military, and you identify people who are those things as "conservatives", that set of people isn't going to line up cleanly with any other definition of conservatism.
You are skipping my actual rebuttals every time. I understand not every game has a conservative premise, and you're ignoring that. I made the point that the world trying to be regained in both those games is the real world status quo, and now you've ignored that.
Maybe.
It certainly would have been at the time Rand wrote Atlas shrugged. She was not a conservative, she was hated by conservatives.
(eyes all the pipeline leaks and other disasters related to the fossil fuels industry cutting corners)