Reasonable Comics For Reasonable People

[ImmortalDrifter]

Don't know where you are getting that from. I am certainly not jumping on any any moral bandwagon or attempting to defend any populist agenda. However, I do come from the 'either everything is funny, or nothing is funny' school of thought ie; everything should be available for a lampooning of one type or another. And I still stand by what I said; anyone who identifies with such extremist nonsensical views such as those portrayed in the comic need to be laughed at a little.

And you are perfectly entitled to disagree with me if you want.

Well like I said in my response to Mr, F, it wasn't your motive or anything like that that prompted me to respond. The statement itself just struck me as something very unpleasant. Basically, I agree that everything is fair game. At the same time, I know it wouldn't elicit the same response if it lampooned something other than White, Heterosexual Men. People would cry foul, and like in the ZP episode it would likely be changed. Saying that some deserve it, while others don't, annoys me greatly. And likewise feel free to disagree.

And you are perfectly entitled to pick up on whatever vibe you want to from the comic. That is what is great about art; different people can take different things from the same work. I personally found the comic very original and vastly amusing since I've seen behaviour somewhat like those of the caricatures on forums. I felt that the Alpha , Beta and Gamma personae were used effectively enough to warrant a humorous response from myself anyway, and that is the only person who's opinions I'm talking about.

Like you said, different interpretations.

My point was the Hierarchy presented in the comic has nothing to do with being white. Nor did it have anything to do with a character in a video game. As in my original statement, I got the feeling that it was just flame-bait dressed up with stolen terms. If you found it funny, good on you. It isn't my place to tell anyone what is or isn't funny, and I never called your enjoyment into question.

 

[Shaitan051]

So in other words:
Oh #$%&, people are pointing out I may be wrong! Luckily I have my criticism-proof Parody Armor!

 

[Alex Diniz]

And you believe they all are and are only out to provoke based on what? A desire for an easy solution?

I doubt it'd have much affect at all. Its simply easy, not accurate, to assume people who have sexist or racist opinions are teenagers out to provoke

I believe most are, because well adjusted adults wouldn't do that kind of thing.

It's either people trolling, wanting attention and get a raise out of others, or people who legitimaly believe what they say. On the second case, you're wasting your time with people so dumb and so ironclad on their beliefs you just won't change them, people just so close minded that no amount of conversation will solve.

And isn't one of the things that's being talked so much right now is how people hate these kinds of comments? People talked more about the reaction to the reviews of GTA5 than the game itself, and it's like, why are you giving the comments, which composes such a small portion of your site, so much attention? Having these people see your reaction, read your angry tweet or insulting them through an article or webcomic will only make them hate you more and insult you more and make more enraged, prejudiced comments. It's a cycle and one side will have to stop it, and I'd hope the most reasonable one, that calls for reasonable conversation, would be the one.

 

[Aramis Night]

I'm beginning to realize that the aspect of this content that offends me the most is it's inability to be actually funny in any way that isn't mean spirited. Perhaps spending less time taking advice from comedians about who it's safe to pick on, and more time on learning from comedians how to actually be funny, might be an improvement. But perhaps the answer is in front of us the whole time. It does seem like they couldn't have named this content more appropriately. In relation to comedy, this content really is a critical miss.

 

[chikusho]

So in other words:
Oh #$%&, people are pointing out I may be wrong! Luckily I have my criticism-proof Parody Armor!

More like: Oh #$%&, a comic is pointing out I may be wrong! Luckily I can just join the angry mob that enforces my every belief instead of doing any kind of introspective evaluation!

 

[Dragonbums]

I figured today's comic would be something along these lines considering the massive response to WGDF.

Seriously Grey, when writing the script for last Friday's comic, did you know it would evolve (or perhaps devolve would be a better word ) into the monster it became? I mean good god, last time I saw it it was over 1200 posts. Personally I think that says a lot more about the kinds of people on this forum than anything in that comic that may or may not have been offensive.

Pretty sure he did. Especially considering how the first comment was from a mod, basically stating that he/she was preparing for the inevitable shit storm.

 

[SlashCo]

I do understand that this comic is meant to be a snarky, backhanded "Gee, we're sorry all you idiots got offended by our previous comic! Maybe this is what you'd like better, huh?" But at the same time, I don't get the last panel. Are the comic authors saying that by making this kind of comic, strawmen will no longer be used? That they will no longer be using strawmen like the WGDF? That seems like a good thing...

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I feel these guys are always either offensive or dismissive?

 

[Therumancer]

I do understand that this comic is meant to be a snarky, backhanded "Gee, we're sorry all you idiots got offended by our previous comic! Maybe this is what you'd like better, huh?" But at the same time, I don't get the last panel. Are the comic authors saying that by making this kind of comic, strawmen will no longer be used? That they will no longer be using strawmen like the WGDF? That seems like a good thing...

I haven't been on The Escapist as much as I used to so I had to backup to the previous comic to see what people were talking about. To be honest this comic is perfectly understandable on it's own, and given that it's using the game industry as the subject matter (on a gaming site) I don't think it's meant as a direct response to the commentary on their previous strip.... which to be honest I'd imagine didn't surprise them. Gray and Cory have been at this long enough where they were probably able to predict what was going to happen and that was kind of the punchline to their punchline (so to speak), standing on it's own.


The basic strip is basically showing the "average" gamer who happens to be looked down on by developers for always being bombastically negative (some developers making statements about avoiding their own forums due to the climate being so "toxic"), and the "average" developer who tends to be demonized by gamers for generally not giving a crud about anything, producing garbage, and seeing their products misrepresented. The idea here being that both sides tend to lump each other into a general category in instinctively ignore what the other thinks and has to say (devs not reading their own forums and criticisms for example) based on a stereotype which doesn't apply to all cases.

The message is clear, and self-contained, and it's kind of cute. I don't entirely agree with it though because I do not think you have minorities of people being mistaken for majorities in this case. Especially on the dev side. To try and balance this you have the dev passing the buck onto the publisher (more or less) but really at the end of the day the dev decides to take the publisher's money and let them set policies, as opposed to walking the more difficult path of independent funding. If you choose to sell out to that kind of control, it's hard to have much sympathy IMO. This is why I tend to not bat an eye when I lay the textual smackdown on companies bought out by say Activision or EA. Especially now, there is no reason for a dev to be naïve about what is going to happen, and once they choose to take that money they have no excuse about what the publisher does with their product "Oh, don't blame us, the publisher rushed us! All this DLC gouging it was the publisher...." you can't claim any more ignorance than Judas when he took his 30 pieces of silver.

As far as "White Guy Defense Force" goes, it was cute, but wasn't all that. Honestly though if I was writing it I would have worked in a crack somewhere about how we live in a world where "50 Cent" managed to not get one, but three games made about him (apparently the portable version of his game is different from the full console versions) to balance things out a bit more... but well... I'm not Gray.

 

[stef1987]

I don't get it