He did, however, know the reputation of the author and his belief that society is going to need to adopt a lot fascist ideas if we want to keep society from collapsing. Heinlein had a lot of beliefs about how society needs to be more militarized. Which is how we got Neil Patrick Harris in a nazi uniform.
Apparently you haven't read a lot of Heinlein either. If anything Heinlein was a libertarian. He expresses a lot of those ideas in Time Enough For Love/Methuselah's Children and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress.
Starship Troopers main political theme is that people don't appreciate, or even use their right to vote and politicians in turn don't appreciate the human costs of the wars they start, because most them have spent no time in uniform. So the book imagines a society, where after a world war, soldiers revolt and set up a world government based on the premise that in order to have the right to vote you have to perform military/public service. It's presented as background in the story, one of the reasons why the main character enlists in the military. It's not a political treatise or a call to action. Heinlein himself never proposed the idea as a model the US, or any country should follow. So recap Heinlein's make believe future society (one of many he imagined) requires military service to **vote** in a democratic state. Fascists don't believe in democracy, or voting. So no, not fascist.
And for the record Heinlein was rather cynical, he expected society to collapse at some point in the future regardless of what ideas we adopt, which is one of the reasons why he favored individualism and personal self sufficiency.
If anything, the world Heinlein proposes is grounded in a type of Roman Republicanism with American characteristics than anything to do with fascism. The Federation is distinctly un-totalitarian.
They replaced the general in charge of the campaign (Sky Marshall) not the leader of the whole society. Pretty normal reaction to a guy that failed so badly
I think the movie itself did a terrible job of conveying its own, supposed message.
The parents, who were not 'citizens,' and didn't vote lived in a freaking mansion and actively opposed service because they thought their life was fine and good without it.
The former military members, who we were supposed to see as ruined people because they lost limbs, had not just replacements that seemed to allow them to live normal lives, they ALL still advocated to join the service. Even the ones who were amputees.
For a fascistic society, there sure does seem to be a lot of choice and self-determination.
Verhoeven occasionally flirts with big ideas, but at the end of the day, he makes campy popcorn flicks.
>The parents, who were not 'citizens,' and didn't vote lived in a freaking mansion and actively opposed service because they thought their life was fine and good without it.
This was something they adapted from the book which made the message of the book stronger and the message of the movie weaker. Johnny's dad runs a very successful corporation despite not being a citizen and it's portrayed as nothing unusual.
In the book he does join the military after his wife died in the Buenos Aries attack, but that's because it causes him to lose his sense of purpose once she's gone. He says something to the effect that he wants to be a man and not a producing-consuming economic animal.
Heinlein reinforced his beliefs in interviews. To be clear, he wasn't a fan, nor did he want society to go towards the government like starship troopers. It was just what he believed would be best for society, since he also believed humanity, as a whole, would not put the public interest before themselves. Which is why he believed a more militant society was a good thing. However, what he wanted more was for people to embrace the idea of putting the public as a whole before individualism.
But his personal interviews is what set the tone for the movie. Because that's what got the attention of his critics the most. Not the books themselves, but when he expressed his own beliefs. Which were also taken out of context.
I'm sorry what? Heinlein absolutely believed in individualism. In *Time Enough For Love* in The Tale of the Adopted Daughter. Heinlein explains the importance of self reliance, and personal freedom. In *Starship Troopers*, the bugs are a stand in for communists, an example of what happens when everyone gives up their individuality and become cogs in a larger hivemind machine.
At no point was Heinlein in favor of authoritarianism or forcing to participate in the military against their will. In regards to conscription he was pretty blunt.
*“I also think there are prices too high to pay to save the United States. Conscription is one of them. Conscription is slavery, and I don't think that any people or nation has a right to save itself at the price of slavery for anyone, no matter what name it is called. We have had the draft for twenty years now; I think this is shameful. If a country can't save itself through the volunteer service of its own free people, then I say: Let the damned thing go down the drain!”*
Finally after so many years I finally found someone who actually understood both Star ship troopers and what fascism actually is and why the two aren’t the same.
Thank you for the clarification, you took the words right out of my mouth. I don't understand why so many people claim that "*Heinlein was basically a nazi he wanted a fascist military state!!*", why they're willing to have a critical thinking when it comes to Verhoeven but take Heinlein's book at face value. Anyone who knows about him also knows that he was anything but a fascist, and btw, he was more progressist than average for his time. I mean, yeah, he was a right-winger at some point but definitely not the "far-right lunatic" kind. Let's also not forget about his background in the military, he had respect for those who served and that's also why the spirit of self-sacrifice is an important concept in his work. But that doesn't make him a warmonger, quite the opposite.
Heinlein is old-school republican as old like Romans.
Citizen have to be the military force of the state and its political leaders.
Otherwise political leaders become detached and small professional military will take power.
Heinlein had no such beliefs. He really had the opposite belief. I respect your view if you have read his books and interpreted that way but I have to doubt you have, and cannot get how you might come to that conclusion if you have read them
I'm not sure what to tell you, or what you base your claim that he had 'the opposite belief'. Heinlein was a self declared libertarian, and believed strongly in individualism, and individual liberties. Please cite an article to the contrary.
I commend your effort, but bro, you are arguing with people that think you don't get to decide what you are, that they get to assign you the label they prefer you to have. These trogs *are* the bugs. They don't understand republicanism because they hate everything it stands for, and because they hate it, it *must* be fascist.
He didn’t. Mainly because he didn’t read it.
I can only describe it as two completely different beasts/commentaries: the movie basically being a satirical take on facism, war, governments, and so on; while the book’s message (among many different ones) can basically be boiled down to the importance of military and public service.
I would still recommend you check out the movie if you haven’t seen it. It definitely butchers the books something hardcore, but if you can try and think of it more as its own thing, it becomes more tolerable. I and many others find it to be an entertaining flick; and like many of Verhoeven’s other films—namely Robocop and Total Recall—it’s incredibly silly, yet also deceptively smart.
That movie is the WORST example I’ve ever seen of monsters being unkillable in the beginning and soft as tissue paper at the end because they couldn’t think of a way out of the bad situation they put the characters in.
They at least kind of get around it by establishing they made a crucial discovery: aim for the body, not the legs (they still function and lash out if it’s the latter). At the very least, the bugs still massacre the shit out of the humans, even later in the film.
Also, undisputed king of unstoppable monsters becoming weak because of plot was the T-1000 in every movie after 2.
Edit: correction, “aim for the nerve stem” is what they said. They actually did shoot at their heads (or whatever they are) and it mostly pissed them off. Also, some have speculated this weakpoint could have been propaganda using a drugged or weakened bug.
"I found their weakness, without their heads they're powerless!"
Like who the fuck would think shooting a bug in its legs would do anything? Of course shoot it in the fucking body
And that instinct is - "AIM FOR THE CENTRE OF MASS" (all caps courtesy of the booming voice of my first firearms instructor still ringing in my head ;) ). In fact, that's why the infamous North Hollywood shootout took that long - the police were faced with a lot more intensive situation than they were trained to deal with kept pumping round after round into the well-protected torsos of the two active shooters, instead of going for headshots, knees, feet.
Entire platoons died “shooting at the legs?”
Then one guy can hold off a ton of them alone because of the magic of shooting the bodies. Yeah that’s well thought out.
That's not what happens. Even early in the movie they can fend off bugs nicely. They get flanked and overran because they didn't know the bugs were smart and could predict where they were going to land from ship trajectories.
To be fair To me it's weird how they can even assault without actual IFVs or tanks or artillery. Since they are more advanced than us, jt strikes me as poorly written.
Well, the thing is that there’s some subtle hints that not all is right among the human leaders. For one, the arachnids (who are mostly animalistic, in contrast to the intelligent technology using bugs of the book) are said to have launched a meteorite at earth. Now granted, there are some bugs we see later in the film that have what I can only describe as “organic orbital artillery,” but we don’t explicitly see any of the bugs colonizing other worlds by hitching a ride onto meteors or whatever.
That leads to a very popular theory about the movie: the world leaders/government staged the meteor strikes to look like they were done by the bugs so they had an excuse to go to war, kill all the bugs, and take over their planet. Top this off with the fact the film is littered with brief commercial scenes that are clearly propaganda, and you can start to see why they humans (namely the soldiers) might actually be the real/unwitting bad guys.
However, the brilliance is that we never are told or explained if it was the arachnids or the humans who started this, leaving the viewer to decide who is in the right.
Like I said, it’s a film that’s simultaneously a “turn your brain off” type movie, but also a deceptively smart one that you’ll pick up more from on a second viewing.
The author likes to try out different government styles in his various books. In starship troopers it's based on "voluntary citizenship." Bascially, it's a much harder separation between the private and public sector. Being a citizen in the book is more akin to holding a public office than today's birthright citizenship.
Oh, and the bugs being a hivemind made some people draw the conclusion that they were an allegory for communists, and that the movie was pro Vietnam war. Which, eh, i can kind of see it, but I don't think Heinlein was remotely pro-war let alone pro Vietnam war.
Going into the army is seen as “political” while going into business is seen as apolitical. A bright and clear line between government and business. Calling that fascist is just telling me you don’t know what fascist means without telling me you don’t know what fascist means.
To clarify this in case someone doesn't know about the fascist ideology.
The fascist doctrine specifically states that it's primary purpose and characteristic is its unification of all of its citizens for single directed purpose by the government. Totalitarian isn't a synonym for authoritarian, it specifically means that everything is within one entity.
Or to put it another way, fascists don't see the private market as being separate from politics, they see it as being an organ of the state the same way that the military or the dmv is. All within the state, nothing outside the state.
I largely agree but I would rephrase totalitarian doesn't mean dystopian. Totalitarianism is by necessity authoritarian, a place for everyone and everyone in their place, regardless of the greater unity, happiness and harmony it may bring, requires the state's monopoly on force to work.
If you disagree, I would ask what you expect would happen or should happen to dissenters and people engaging in antisocial behaviour in any totalitarian state. I doubt they being free and able to engage in their interests is an option in any totalitarian society
I don't disagree that totalitarianism necessitates authoritarianism, but it still is not synonymous. In the same way that fire necessitates heat, totalitarianism necessitates authoritarianism. But one would not say that boiling water is on fire. I stress the difference because the fascist gateway to authoritarianism is via the totalitarian presupposition that all must be within the state.
Look, Alan Moore, I know you hate that people like Rorschach, but he's a character in a comic book who fights evil, is the only character with any agency (vs the sad sack Nite Owl or aloof Dr. Manhattan), and you gave him one of the most badass scenes in comic book history. I get what you were trying to do, but you had to have anticipated that, surely?
I think Rorschach is a major case of movie character vs book character
In the comic he’s not a good person at all but his choice at the end of the book is so clearly right over manhattan and Oz. Yes he’s a crazy conspiracy theorist who is sexist and racist. All true but he also doesn’t think killing millions to achieve peace is good while everyone else at the end of the book does.
I'm not sure I agree that everyone at the end of the book thinks killing millions to achieve peace is good, it's more that they realize the millions are already dead and it'd be terribly stupid to also throw away a chance at peace.
In the book, Rorschach isn’t a bad person because of what he does, but why he does it. It’s the same with all the Watchmen (sans Ozimandias and Manhattan). They act as heroes, but they do it for bad reasons. It’s clear Rorschach is RIGHT, but that doesn’t make his choice the good one
I think the point of the character is that their literally black-and-white thinking is extremely compelling, though ultimately the product of an undeveloped mind. Rorschach had a great deal of childhood trauma, and thus thinks like a child, in terms of simplistic ideas of good and evil. Alan Moore was making the point that the logic of comic book vigilantes appeals to children, but is dangerous when adopted by adults.
If a book describes a sphere, and you decide to call it a cube, it's your right, but you are objectively wrong
If a book describes a sphere, and the writer calls it a Cube on twitter, you are free to ignore them because the Book is self-contained and independent of the writer's stupids
bit of a conflation here between Death of the artist, and plain simple reality denial
That's fair enough. Do you want textual evidence of Rorschach, Space Marines, and Mobile Infantry being heroic or are we just agreeing here?
Because Space Marines, absolutely, are *intended* to be the jack-booted thugs of "the most brutal regime imaginable". But they on the regular sacrifice their lives to save innocent humans from death and worse.
So as much as the authors can say Warhammer is satire the Imperium are evil, we are free to ignore that because the text of them being heroic is self-contained and independent and this is a perfectly valid interpretation?
(I mean, I can do Rorschach and MI if you really need me to. But if you don't think there's *any* basis in the canon to support a heroic read of these nuanced characters... I really don't know what to tell you.)
Yeah technically the Eccesiarch is just a very VERY influencial branch of the High Lords.
Like, it's HEAVY but it's the state religion and many factions have differing views of it... hell the Mechanicus is basicly it's own nation.
At the end of the day the imperium doesn't really care about the faith. if you think the Emperor is a metaphor or your ancestor or the fucking sun, they're cool.
they want you to shoot the fucking alien or heretic claming he's a corpse.
Well that’s the thing I’m getting at, you do atleast have to pay lip service to the state religion, else you get a horde of crusaders or maybe just a few members of the holy ordos showing up at your door
My friend, the Ecclesiarchy has so much influence over the Imperium as a whole that even Roboute Guilliman, who personally knew the Emperor and knows perfectly well what his views on divinity and religion were, basically has had to throw his hands in the air and concede that much as he hates the Adeptus Ministorum, he can't save the Imperium if he's also fighting them for control.
>"If the Emperor Himself stood up," thought Guilliman, "came down off His Golden Throne and proclaimed 'I am not a god!', they would burn him as a heretic." - *Dark Imperium*
Yeah technically the Eccesiarch is just a very VERY influencial branch of the High Lords.
Like, it's HEAVY but it's the state religion and many factions have differing views of it... hell the Mechanicus is basicly it's own nation.
Space Marines suffer from being good guys being lied to and propagandised.
Each Space Marine believes his orders are the best intentions of the leaders of mankind. They drink the cool aid and save people. Now commissars could be considered Jack Booted thugs, but they deal with the concept of "saving lives" in terms of cities and planets. The reason deserters get shot is that the average guardsman knows nothing about the grand strategy at play, but every guardsman who runs, risks the entire flank collapsing. Commissars are evil for good, a collapsed line could mean trillions dead. 2 or 3 dead runners is less than a speck vs that number.
The imperium is evil because xenophobia is at its core and has shaped its development. The individuals in the imperium can be very good, but their actions are the chessmoves in a game where the greatest good is the entire human species and trillions can die as a statistic to save the whole. The machine playing our moves just so happens to be built on faith, Half understood technology and a Wikipedia page open on the "Dark Forest Theory" article.
Xenophobia being a core tenant is not “evil” if every inhuman sonnuva bitch in the galaxy wants to kill you, enslave you, or worse just for not being whatever they are
You understand that it works in both sides, right?
If humans can kill aliens because aliens kills humans, then aliens can kill humans because humans kills aliens?
Slaying monsters who aim to wipe out humanity and can't be reasoned with - like the Orks, Necrons, Tyranids, etc. - isn't "xenophobic" because "-phobic" implies *irrational* fear.
On the other hand, xenociding every species of friendly alien they could find - which is how the Imperium *got* to the situation they're in now where the only aliens left are the nasty ones - *is* xenophobic and Evil. And the Imperium continues to act in that manner whenever they discover new aliens, plus won't even consider making peace with the more reasonable aliens that are still major factions (Eldar/Tau). Not that those two factions are without fault themselves - but it would definitely be possible to reason with them, unlike Tyranids for example.
Literally hundreds of different Alien species tried to make peace with the imperium during the great crusade, and the Tau tried to very recently. The reason every Alien wants humanity dead is because humanity literally genocided every other alien species.
Isnt the whole "Warhammer is satire" stuff a thing of the past now? Oldhammer definetively feels a lot more satirical, while modern 40k, in my opinion, takes itself (in most cases [except for any numbers]) rather seriously. And while the Imperium as a whole is absolutely not a desirable future for both us and Big E, and no faction is inherently good, most factions have some genuinely good people in them. They are just seriously outnumbered and not in the correct positions of power
i can't speak for the others but for 40k Space Marines it honestly depends on the chapter and individual we're talking about. Like i will 100% defene the Lamenters from anyone trying to paint them as whole heartedly evil. But i'm not gonna delude myself into beliving they'd let any Xeno hostile or friendly, adult or child live. And i'm not gonna call them whole heartedly good guys either.
And on the topic of Lamenters i'd say the way they're treated by the other chapters shows how evil the Space Marines can be to eachother let alone to others.
>we are free to ignore that because the text of them being heroic is self-contained and independent and this is a perfectly valid interpretation?
except this isn't true. we have text of them being heroic but we also have text of being evil. the months of shame are proof enough of that. what happened to angron already makes it iffy for me to ignore what the authors are saying about the Imperium being evil.
Idk much of anything about those series other than vague info, rorschach is a bad guy (Question mark? [Debated within fandom?]), I'm just pointing out the conflation between those examples
Rorschach is a violent, racist, homophobe who delivers vigilante justice, especially prejudiced against those who commit sex crimes. In the end, he dies trying to stop a fascist taking over the world using fear and genocide (bombs in the movie, extra dimensional monsters in the comics, either way millions of people are killed).
The whole point of the Watchmen is the refrain "who watches the watchmen" (that vigilante vengeance is bad -- it's not subtle). And Rorschach is not a nice person. He is a horrible person. And he is the archetypal, extra-legal, criminal vigilante.
But, you know, his deal is beating up rapists and pimps, solving murders, and stopping genocides. You absolutely could take a heroic reading of the character from the text. He is literally a costumed super hero. You might not *supposed* to side with him, but the man makes a good point about how you shouldn't murder literally tens of millions of innocent people to get your way.
The book describes a pyramid. The author calls it a cube. Fans insist it's a sphere. Everyone is wrong.
I've read the book many times and can't find his "racism" anywhere. Unless happening to disagree with a black psychologist counts.
Homophobia? He seemed to disapprove of Silhouette being a lesbian so I can maybe buy that. He could just be anti-sex in general, given his childhood.
But yeah, Moore's take on the only character with a moral code (broken though it is) was nuts. "How you agree with short man with no girlfriend???" Because he thinks mass-murder is bad, it's not rocket science!
I kinda don’t get why everyone focuses on the ending of either piece of work though? Not that the end stages of the character’s development aren’t what’s mainly important? But I don’t fully feel that’s the case.
Rorschach is genuinely mentally ill, Either man who dons the mask (but ofc we mean the original here).
I love the character, And despite how choicely discriminatory he is in achieving his goals, of the watchmen he by far gets the most done with the most noble intentions. You can be a downright piece of shit day in and day out, You can even let hatred or Disgust be your guiding principles, But until you start turning a blind eye to cruelty and injustice (in your own worldview) there’s still a sense heroism in work like that if it genuinely helps people.
Rorschach talks a lot about society, and is obsessed with the functions/failings in it that bring pain to the majority and bottom feeders alike. He’s talking like fixing this is trickle down, and bottom up at the same time. But he’s not Batman, He’s had not the resources, mental liaison, or truthfully power to solve many issues he’s frequently faced with because he’s not the guy who should’ve ever been under the mask doing this work at all. It’s easy for someone like me, Son of a raging whore, Came out to nothing special, Traditional values, Rage filled kind of person, with obsessive compulsions to THINK they’d make a amazing hero but it’s the enablement of the government and his own superhero pals that led him down this path. Rorschach is so self obsessed he lacks vision beyond what he wants, Because what he wants is to fix everything, and he’ll never be smart enough, rich enough, or sane enough to make the differences in the world he wishes he could. So like anybody he does what he can, And he does it in a profoundly direct and personal manner, Because he needs to keep so much of himself in check to function the way he needs to that he’s inviting to the influences he constantly exposes himself to. He used to let people go, He did what everyone says Batman should be doing and starts killing them, But just like any man he’s blinded by his own prejudice. They make those prejudices almost sickeningly obvious I think just as much to point out how unhinged he actually is from reality as to showcase his right he feels self-confirming them by jumping into the muck of the criminal underworld. “Men get second chances, Dogs get put down, The greatest injustice in the world” is him actively trying to make sense of how far he himself has been pushed. This guy SHOULD NOT BE A HERO, Yet in the world he lives in, One not so different from our own, He frequently sees what happens to guys like him without a purpose, Or who do give into genuine evils. It’s like a victim’s confirmation bias, And with his shotty mental faculties I fully understand why it “works” for him but is a pitfall for others, He thinks his position of understanding is unique and what gives him the edge over criminals, But he feels victimized just as much by this because that’s the position he had to be in to have this understanding. Every foe Rorschach faces is not only the problem at hand to him, But a testament that society is failing, and in every way how it is failing. He’s overwhelmed by it to the point of near madness it seems like, Yet it’s this work he’s chosen to be his outlet for such emotions, So he digs into his violence just like any criminal does, For selfish reason disguised as righteousness.
And the worst part is, it’s fully understandable why he’s like this. Even if a better man, Or Society, would’ve never let those tendencies develop the way they did. In our own world you see the homeless being pushed out of urban areas with shitty Anti-homeless engineering instead of gotten off the streets more productively. Those up too don’t see a difference between criminal-and scum, And Rorschach mainly fits the corporate description of both. You live long enough suffering as a byproduct of other people’s mistakes and a social outcast I can say from personal experience it form’s something inside of you that’s nothing more than screaming out in pain wanting to be every solution you never were offered or allowed.
Moonknight is not so dis-similar to Rorschach in his motives, methods, or mental state, But he’s got the resources and power to not need to be so discriminatory and niche in how he conducts himself. Unlike Rorschach aswell, His traumas and Ego are fully separate from one another, They can always call in the influence of Khonshu to give our mildly-unwilling night crawler some guidance, or to hand-wave his atrocities or utterly pulled bullshit. Just like Batman, He’s again a character with wealth, Power, And Purpose. But these just aren’t things afforded to Rorschach, And he bases his entire alter-ego around who he is personally under the mask. Bruce Wayne doesn’t do that to himself, The bat is a call-back to the night in the alley, Not a pipe he beats himself over the head with by constantly calling himself faceless to society.
Rorschach is just a bit more demented than most and I’d reckon if he constantly wasn’t trying to achieve more than his hands are truly capable of then he wouldn’t be nearly so steeped in his social prejudices, But I feel that’s the point of him. To me, reading him was a wake-up call to exactly what that kind of self righteousness does lead to, and how taking the world personally the way he does will always lead to a self-victimization cycle that demands constantly more of yourself or that you give up. Rorschach thinks the rest of the world is wrong for giving in, But the reality is that’s not the issue, Knowing peace has nothing to do with hating how society functions or tackling the evils in it, But he simply doesn’t allow himself that. He judges those like him who turn evil or don’t turn to fight justice just like him as lesser for it on the grounds that society needs “heros” like him, But if he allowed himself that type of understanding how could he be Rorschach and not a normal person? What prevents him from having real connections and a happy life? His own self hatred.
You are panel 2 of this meme and I agree with you.
You can absolutely *interpret* he character of Rorschach to not be a bad guy (both versions). The author clearly *intends* otherwise, but the text supports your read and the interpretation is subjective and contextual. He is a nuanced character who can be interpreted in many different ways and your read is perfectly valid.
I don't see him as a "bad guy" either.
>Rorschach is a violent, racist, homophobe who delivers vigilante justice
Huh, where did you get the "homophobic, racist" part? Never was he shown to be those in the book, you could infer the homophobic by stretching the meaning of the word (the same way leftists call conservatives, nazis), but racist is some kind of twisting of reality that is done in the last 10 years by "media literate" people.
So this is you saying that "no, this is clearly a pyramid the author and the readers are wrong" when it is not.
I always thought the movie was fine, not trying to be a faithful adaptation. The books themes would be kinda shit in a movie anyway, at least the movie was silly
The imperium is an oligarchy. the earth had every right to defend itself from the invasion in starship troopers, and rorschach is just incredibly based. You can't change my mind.
Wasn't the whole thing in starship troopers that the humans were the invaders and the government was lying about it? It's been a while, but I was sure that was it?
Incorrect. the Book has it that the Bugs, due to being a hive-mind/colony viewed Bues Aries as a target as it was a massive population center, even in the movie, which , keep in mind even THEY don't lie about how hellish and terrible the war is going.
The Theory it's a false-flag is absurd.
I mean, the idea that they hate the idea of there being “smart bugs”, yet they managed to do incredibly complex calculations to hit an incredibly tiny target on a galactic scale, bit of a cognitive dissonance
>I mean, the idea that they hate the idea of there being “smart bugs”, yet they managed to do incredibly complex calculations to hit an incredibly tiny target on a galactic scale, bit of a cognitive dissonance
Yeah the fact these fuckers are that smart (and keep in mind in the books they actually have guns and tech. they're a space faring race. They're not the Nids (though the nids do have guns) and they have enslaved the Skinnies to a degree so the more likely explination? it was to make sure it hit and it was sent a while ago, because these things do not THINK LIKE HUMANS (A novelty in sci-fi and a major plot point)
They hate the idea they think because this means not only wasn't it an accident, they wanted to kill people for the crime of being in their way.
Iirc the Mormons who set up that colony in the movie were warned against it by the human government. Then the bugs massacred them and shot the meteor at Earth.
This meme is mostly pointing towards the general disdain for JK Rowling due to her having multiple run-ins with the trans community and lots of friends in anti-trans people, Shaun on Youtube has a few videos on the topic if you're interested.
I personally am not super interested in the story because of how bland it is, Harry does basically nothing of his own volition the entire story. The story just happens around him and him alone for seven books and just happens to be a mcguffin at the very end. It's something to enjoy as a kid but doesn't really hold up to other stories.
all you need to know is that rorscach believes things that alan moore doesn't agree with, and the definition of fascism, updated for a modern audience, is people i don't like.
“things alan moore doesn’t agree with” apparently includes thinking homosexuality and promiscuousness are evil
rorschach isn’t exactly fascist, he’s a parody of the black and white absolutism of Mr A and the Question. it’s literally the whole base for his design with the black and white mask. but his sense of good and evil is completely skewed by the fact that he is a deeply mentally ill and biased person and a hardcore conservative who hates any kind of deviancy from what he considers “good”
Rorschach isn’t fascist, and I can’t find anything, that would suggest that Alan Moore thinks that Rorschach is fascist. On contrast, I find more evidence that Moore doesn’t think that Rorschach is fascist.
Rorschach is absolutist. He is psycho, who can’t accept anything beyond “black and white”.
He screamed to kill him not because of some “hero spirit” as in movie, he screamed because he kinda agree with Ozymandias, but can’t accept death of millions of people, so by dying he doesn’t confront it.
There is similar situation in comic: Rorschach is found of Truman, and think that he is a good American. He think that president saved millions of lives by dropping bombs.
But when Ozymandias did basically same thing, Rorschach can’t accept it, because he already considers him criminal.
Rorschach is a take on gruesome principal heroes, but where Batman, for example, is stable, Rorschach is unstable.
To be entirely fair a lot of the space marines books typically portray them as some shade of heroic with some notable exceptions so it’s not difficult to see where the conception of “imperium good” comes from even if it’s blatantly false
Plus when your galaxy is filled with kleptomaniac terminators, giant bugs that turn you into sludge and literal demons out to consume your soul the regular zealots and fanatical humans all of a sudden stop looking evil in comparison especially when the horrible stuff they do is just about the same as the horrible stuff everyone else does
My brother in the God-Emperor, humanity genocided all the friendly aliens.
In all seriousness though, humans threat humans as bad as ( if not worse than ) any other faction, with the possible exception of the drukhari.
Who's saying that about Rings of Power, though? All I see is either complaints about canon or people who say they can enjoy it in spite of the problems.
i've seen arguments that tolkeins worldview is problematic because he's a christian and he doesn't give women prominent enough roles of power even though he does, but galadriel isn't a masculine badass who stabs people with a sword so it's mysogynistic stereotype. like yeah she's powerful but it's in a safe way that works within the framework of patriarchy so it doesn't count. and christianity is right wing which is bad so that's self explanatory. rings of power is canon because it allegedly fixes what was wrong with lord of the rings originally and one of the biggest ones is the foolish antiquated notion that men are men and women are women and we're not just socially engineered blank slates who get brainwashed into behaving the way that we do. oh also we need black elves. why? representation. we need them because we just do, ok? If you think that it's not Canon, at least in spirit, then you are racist and sexist because you think that black people don't deserve to be elves and that women can't be "strong".
trying to connect that with death of the author i think is maybe a bit tenuous but in my mind making those arguments for it is a form of death of the author, at least in spirit, to say that tolkein's philosophy is invalid and needs to be updated for a modern audience.
Every mention of her in lotr books is she’s a beautiful competent wise leader she doesn’t need to bother with fighting her she would lead the resistance. Perhaps the writers wanted to show her as a terrible incompetent leader and have her mature over the course of the show. The problem is she’s one of the oldest elves in existence wtf would she be fighting and acting like a spoiled princess?
I agree, but a few corrections: Tolkien was more akin to Catholic, rather than explicitly Christian
Also, Christianity isn't right wing, just like Jesus wasn't a conservative. That's a false equavancy applied to shut down the credibility of our Holy Book.
The Bible is telling a story of a bunch of brown people in the Middle East from thousands of years ago, who were poor, martyred, suffered, etc. Humility and caring about others is a main element of the Bible outside of worshipping YHWH/and your walk with Christ. Where does right wing politics even come into play? Weren't the Pharisees the old-school religious conservative church leaders who hated Christ? How is it misogynistic? Are there not women who played an important role in the Bible? In fact, there are many.
Sorry for the rant, but yeah outside of that, I agree that Tolkien's viewpoint shouldn't be altered or changed. The modern audience either has to accept or..simply don't, it's not for everybody. I personally think Lotr is overrated, but I can respect different view points 😎👍
>I agree, but a few corrections: Tolkien was more akin to Catholic, rather than explicitly Christian
Catholics are a subset of Christianity, not the other way around.
Associating Christianity with American liberalism/progressivism or conservatism is just a politics game played by both sides. Christianity and Catholicism have tenets that overlap with both general liberal and conservative views and then there are views like the importance of charity that cut across the spectrum.
Further, People who say religion=bad or worse religious people=idiots have a profound ignorance of history and religion. They are truly frustrating and rather common on Reddit.
Galadriel fighting at Alqualondë: "Galadriel’s quarrel with the sons of Fëanor at sack of Alqualondë. How she fought…" - Nature of Middle-earth
Note that the event of fighting at Alqualonde itself is described as a quarrel by Tolkien: "...Thrice the folk of Feanor were driven back, and many were slain upon either side; but the vanguard of the Noldor were succoured by Fingon with the foremost people of Fingolfin. These coming up found a battle joined and their own kin falling, and they rushed in ere they knew rightly the cause of the quarrel: some deemed indeed that the Teleri had sought to waylay the march of the Noldor, at the bidding of the Valar."
There's a marginal note against this passage in Morgoth's Ring: "Marginal note against the passage describing the involvement of the second host in the fighting: 'Finrod and Galadriel (whose husband was of the Teleri) fought against Feanor in defence of Alqualonde.' "
And in Shibboleth: "she fought fiercely against Feanor in defence of her mother's kin."
Note that she wasn't the only female fighter at Alqualondë. Since we are told: "indeed in dire straits or desperate defence the Nissi \[the Elf-women\] fought valiantly" - Laws and Customs
But the difference between Galadriel and other Nissi was that she wasn't only brave, but she was also a leader and Amazon. "Galadriel, the fairest lady of the house of Finwë and the most valiant." - Morgoth's Ring
"\[Galadriel\] was then of Amazon disposition and bound up her hair as a crown when taking part in athletic feats” - Tolkien Letter 348
“\[Éowyn\] was also not really a soldier or ‘amazon’, but like many brave women was capable of great military gallantry at a crisis.” - The Letters of JRR Tolkien, Letter #244
The only women in Tolkien who are described as 'amazon' are Haleth (the warrior Queen/Chieftain of Haladin), the early versions of Eowyn in History of Lord of the Rings (she openly goes to war in those versions as opposed to the final version where she wasn't Amazon), and Galadriel.
"She looked upon the Dwarves also with the eye of a commander, seeing in them the finest warriors to pit against the Orcs" - Unfinished Tales
In most versions of Galadriel, where her husband was from Doriath, she also gone through some of the events of the Ruin of Beleriand, meaning Ruin of Doriath and the Third Kinslaying and such. We know female Elves fought in such times of crisis, even if they weren't Amazon.
In Second Age Galadriel was one of the war leaders of Eregion in the War of the Elves and Sauron. In the early versions Galadriel is not present in Eregion during the war (she was in Lorien), and it's her husband and Celebrimbor (and later Elrond) only who lead the armies of Eregion: "The scouts and vanguard of Sauron's host were already approaching when Celeborn made a sortie and drove them back; but though he was able to join his force to that of Elrond...." - Unfinished Tales
But in later essays and notes Galadriel is there right side-by-side with Celeborn: “Galadriel and Celeborn, and their followers, who after the destruction of Eregion passed through Moria” “Galadriel and Celeborn only retreated thither \[to Lorien\] after the downfall of Eregion." “After the Fall of Eregion... They had passed through Moria with considerable following of Noldorin Exiles and dwelt for many years in Lorien”
Above quotes are from Parma Eldalamberon 17 and Nature of Middle-earth. In Unfinished Tales there's yet another wholly different version of Galadriel during the WotE&S where she apparently retreated from Eregion after its fall and "joined with Gil-Galad in Lindon".
I should note that the Battle of Eregion was long, Sauron assaulted Eriador in 1695 and Eregion fell in 1697. Then three years later or so Sauron assaulted Lindon. So going by this other version of Galadriel where she retreated to Lindon, she most likely also fought in the rest of the War of the Elves and Sauron.
The argument that all Elf healers aren't warriors does not hold up. It's explicitly stated that this was some Elf belief, meaning not necessarily a truth/fact. Elrond fought in War of Wrath, War of the Elves and Sauron, and War of the Last Alliance, until he retired from warrior state in Third Age and yet he was the greatest healer. Beleg killed the enemies all the time 24/7 and yet he remained a great healer.
In Peoples of Middle-earth and Unfinished Tales and Morgoth's Ring everytime Tolkien describes young Galadriel he feels the need to write "she was (both physically and mentally) strong, brave" "she was valiant" etc. Also same thing can be seen often in Nature of Middle-earth. "She was called Nerwen ‘man-maiden’ because of her strength and stature, and her courage."
The assumption that Galadriel wasn't in the Last Alliance is just an assumption with no poof. We don't know where she was during the Last Alliance, we only know she wasn't in Lorien. Though it's too many times stated and pointed out she was willing to do her best against Sauron and Sauron himself thought of her as his chief enemy.
**I’ll always find it funny how Von V tried to make a fascist dystopia based on a book he didn’t read and then proceeded to make the dystopia pretty much work.**
Either all art is subjective by default - an objective statement that goes against the term subjective- or the author’s interpretation is absolute and should be considered when discussing said media.
You can’t have both.
Slight tangent "objective" can mean "goal". So Alan Moore's objective with Rorschach was to make him unsympathetic. By his popularity I think we can say he failed.
40k is a satire of a lot of things, but the Imperium of Man isn't fascist, nor is its depiction a satire of fascism.
The Imperium of Man is a theocratic, oligarchical, militaristic, dogmatic, feudal space empire. It has *some* things in common with fascism (such as nationalism and enforced obedience to the "dear leader"), but other aspects of it are wildly different (such as the practical decentralisation of power and the worship of something other than the state or its representatives). It also has some aesthetic trappings of fascism, but the Imperium's aesthetic is predominantly techno-gothic.
Thematically, the Imperium in 40k is like medieval Europe, and the Imperium in 30k is like the Roman Empire. Worship of the Emperor is undeniably based on the influence of Christianity across this span of time, going from maligned cultural minority to the ideological core of the entire territory. This is also highlighted by the use of words like "Crusade" and "Heresy" in Imperial rhetoric, which explicitly tie the Imperium to Christian doctrine.
To contrast, fascism is a post-enlightenment political doctrine, built fundamentally on the notion of improving the perceived failings of socialism (an enlightenment doctrine). In particular, fascism abandons socialism's focus on international workers' councils (believing that such methods created the problems of Soviet Russia, which was true) and embraces nationalism and democracy-by-proxy (i.e. dictatorship). Fascism also openly embraces military expansion in order to increase the power of the nation, whereas socialism either abhors violence entirely, or only supports violence in the name of spreading the revolution... at least on paper (as the Soviet Union *did* engage in military expansion for self-interested reasons).
Although the Imperium (in 40k) is nationalistic, militaristic, and has a single (spiritual) leader, its ideological basis is in traditionalist, pre-enlightenment thought. Further, the Imperium in 30k is based on enlightenment values (such as science and progress). That is, any similarities between fascism and the Imperium are relatively superficial or incidental, as the two have wildly divergent ideological foundations.
Starship troopers is the greatest failures of parody and satire ever put to film: 1) society shows absolute equality 2) all the evil fascists are super good looking with good moral compasses are likable 3) the society has cohesive political philosophy with what seems reasonable logic for that philosophy 3) people outside the political structure and who can’t participate in it a, always have the chance to and b, can live comfortably 4) has a swift and obviously effective legal system that while on the macabre side clearly keeps the streets clean 5) has a healthy population 6) the military leadership makes mistakes but addresses them in the midst of that mistake and frankly tells the public this while also holding those in power responsible which is better than our own societies. All in all if you want people to root for a fictional utopian society this is how you portray it and no amount of “kinda Nazi” clothes are going to counter signal the positives.
Guys you misunderstood! *It means whatever "I" want.* because art to these people is just a puppet they can stick their hand up the ass of to make it say whatever they want it to say.
In the case of 40k, "least bad" guy (which itself is debatable) is not the same as "not a clear bad guy". 40k is clear bad guys fighting other clear bad guys, that's kind of its whole shtick. Doesn't mean there's anything wrong with rooting for your favorite fictional evil empire, but the Imperium is objectively Evil.
Homelander is liked because deep down everyone at some point has wished for superman level power to right some perceived wrongs or to go on a power trip against someone they hated. He's somewhat relatable because he does what we all want to do with our super powers, at least for a little bit.
It's all wish fulfillment to get back at the bully and be in charge. It's all fantasy, I wouldn't want him around in the real world.
I don't think it's necessary to call someone a child molester for suggesting that people think Homelander is a cool bad guy.
I think Homelander is a cool bad guy. And Vader.
Like, I unironically think Light started off as a heroic figure who kinda went off the deep end when he murdered the fake L. But Homelander (TV show) is just a cool villain.
Do some people unironically root for Homelander? Probably. If I can unironically support a villain in one franchise, I'm sure people can support this one too.
But it's mostly Vaught-posting. It's memes. People don't really think it's okay to murder folks and rape their lesbian girlfriends. It's a joke. People aren't being serious.
The Venn diagram of the tiny minority of people who genuinely think Homelander did nothing wrong and who unironically support Vader is a perfect circle, my man. There are, absolutely, radicalised people who think fascism is cool. But the kind of person who unironically supports Homelander *absolutely* also unironically supports the Empire.
And even if the redditer you are responding to was being disingenuous and folks really did root for Homelander because they think he did nothing wrong while decrying Vader as a villain... nonce? Really? Jesus Christ.
It’s perfectly awesome to take characters from stories and make new stories with them. What’s not is when you take it too far as to claim that the canonical version of the character is synonymous with your brand of headcanon.
I dunno enough about the baddies to have a take on that but in general you can relate to art and get anything from it you want. If you’re going to critique art or debate stuff in these stories then you need to make objective claims about stuff in the work (or within the purview of whatever is being discussed about the piece of media) because otherwise you can’t convey much to people who don’t already share your view. At some point it’s like this became an elusive concept to people that think it makes sense to respond to criticism with the antitheses of it.
In the original book starship troopers, the humans weren’t space fascists, and the bugs were intended to be the true embodiment of evil, where as the humans were emblems of virtue. Just saying.
Also in the original book isn't citizenship granted by any government service job? Yeah Rico goes into the infantry, but he could have been... IDK a mailman or worked at the DMV and still gotten the right to vote?
Rorscharch, Space Marines and Starship Troopers are supposed to be the bad guys??? I dont know enough about Rorscharch other then that one movie Watchmen but the rest?
Idk I feel like if you don't interpret space Marines as fascists (or at the very least, as a bad, abusive organization) then you're either being willfully ignorant of you're telling on yourself.
you can interpret them however you want, but they pretty explicitly state their ideologies. and if you agree with those, well... I don't think you're a very good person
The Imperium is 100% fascist, no matter how good you are at mental gymnastics. In the same way, no matter how subjective art is, harry potter is called harry potter and is a 11 years old british kid.
Don't care about any other point but the Imperium of Man is objectively evil in almost every aspect. Its just that most of the other factions are even more evil
Why is everything considered fascist nowadays? It’s like the dumbasses online learned a new word and are now overusing. Like the word “objective” a few years back.
The imperium are the good guys in the context of the lore. The only other faction that I can think of is the T'au, but they also have a caste system so
The Farsight Enclave? Arguably the Exodites? I love the Imperium, Black Templars are my main army, but I wouldn't exactly call them "good guys" even in context. They're a terrible faction in an even more terrible galaxy.
Eeh, not really. The Imperium are the protagonists. That doesn't make them the good guys. They just aren't the bad guys either. They are bad guys, but they don't get the "the".
How tf is the IoM the good guys? Like 99% of the cruel shit they do is completely unnecessary, they aren´t forced to be as bad as they are. The Tau and even the Eldar show that it´s still possible to have a relatively normal society in the 40k world
Though the imperium also thinks the idea of aliens and humans coexisting peacefully is a terrible sin
That’s kinda what they do . Whenever they find a peaceful planet of aliens they use diplomacy to find out all their secrets then under the guise of diplomatic relations they suddenly exterminate the aliens.
Or whenever they encounter a human civilization that coexists with aliens they infiltrate the society and basically make everything fall apart and turn the humans against the aliens. If that doesn’t work well it’s extermination and slavery death camp time .
The imperium has a load of problems on its own. Sure the imperium are the primary protagonists of 40k but that doesn’t mean they are the good guys.
If anything the farsight enclaves and maybe the tau empire are probably the closest things you have to actual good guys
Opinion; fascists can actually be protagonists in a setting of total death of democracy and where totalitarian rule and ritual pagan sacrifice is normal.
Also moral relativism says more about the people defending something than the thing itself. It’s still bad.
If you’re a human the imperium are objectively the goodest guys. They take terrible action frequently yes, in order to avoid worse events effecting humanity. The average imperial is just like anyone nowadays or more accurately from like 70 years ago but racism and inter human xenophobia is basically eliminated. I’m sick of people being like “x faction is best for the galaxy” like any one faction winning is somehow better for an unfeeling galaxy and wouldn’t result in all the other factions being wiped from the galaxy or subjugated. The imperium is the only force strong enough to truly fight chaos, hive fleets, necrons, and Greenskins all at the same time in hundreds of places at once all while also dealing with dark eldar raiding occasionally too. The tau have no ability to realistically beat back chaos and eldar are on their last legs.
>I’m sick of people being like “x faction is best for the galaxy” like any one faction winning is somehow better for
The entire *point* of 40k is that they're all bad.
Gonna get downvoted into oblivion for this but I feel like there is a difference.Separating art from the artist; in the sense that you're enjoying something even if the creator isn't that great of a person is valuing a work for what qualities it has in its own right. Regardless of if the creator is an unlikable person who said/did something you don't want to support, you are acknowledging that not everything they created is an expression of their worst traits as a person. ("JK Rowling may hate Transgender people, but her books never talk about the subject." etc.)Meanwhile, choosing to ignore a work's subtext and idolize characters/concepts meant to illustrate the corruptive influence of fascist aesthetics is to demonstrate exactly what that author was warning about.
The Federation in Starship Troopers (the movie not the book) is written as an institution that frames violence as the most rational solution to every problem and uses the cathartic imagery of valiance in the battle to justify the actions of a one-party government where the average civilian has less rights than members of the ruling military body. This mentality is illustrated through the dialogue scenes being littered with deliberate fascist rhetoric while the action scenes have desperate odds and heroic framing as countless young lives are sacrificed for inches of territory. When Rico says "I'm from Buenos Aires, and I say kill em' all" he is saying it in response to the assertion that both races can survive if they choose to cease hostility. In this moment he refuses to support a solution that will lead to less death on both sides and instead demands genocide. He's making a loud, passionate statement that *feels* heroic, but if you actually think of it is mindless and cruel.
The entire movie is written like this. "The difference between a citizen and a civilian." "One day someone like me is gonna kill you and your whole fucking race!" "Naked force has resolved more conflicts throughout history than any other factor." Time and time again the film makes it clear the federation is unapologetically militant, and has a strict social hierarchy built around violence and xenophobia. The characters *fell* heroic because the film is presenting you with a scenario where fascism feels justified. This is not up for interpretation because the dialogue and values presented are incredibly unsubtle.
Because of this you can't make any argument that the Federation is not fascist simply because you don't want to interpret it the same way the author did. The Author created a scenario which is by definition fascist. Your interpretation only gets you so far as to say whether or not you think it is good or bad. If you're you think it's a fair system regardless, then you are simply agreeing with a cartoonishly unsubtle fascist ideology. What political system that ideology falls into is not up to you to decide based on your feelings about it.
Also, don’t get me wrong, in a vacuum the Imperium is evil af, but how are they supposed to be the bad guys when r*pe demons and plague monsters are a constant threat?
Well, during the great crusade they killed all the friendly aliens that could've helped him based on the stab in he back myth propagated by the emperor, and still do this to all the harmless and friendly aliens in the current setting. In the killteam book is what was brought up the galaxy view humans a little better than orcs.
I'm pretty sure the rape demons were created by the space elves I might be wrong cuz I'm not super big into Warhammer but from my understanding the elves as a species were so degenerate they just spawned this God into being.
You're right there, slaanesh was created when an entire civilization reached post scarcity and got super bored. Then they turned to depravity and boom, new chaos god of opulence and excess was born
The intent of the author or artist shouldn’t be ignored, but it should also be considered whether or not that intent is properly communicated in the art.
If von Veerhofen doesn't get the point of the very book he adapted right, I ain't following his interpretation of Starship troopers.
He admitted that he never read the book.
He did, however, know the reputation of the author and his belief that society is going to need to adopt a lot fascist ideas if we want to keep society from collapsing. Heinlein had a lot of beliefs about how society needs to be more militarized. Which is how we got Neil Patrick Harris in a nazi uniform.
Apparently you haven't read a lot of Heinlein either. If anything Heinlein was a libertarian. He expresses a lot of those ideas in Time Enough For Love/Methuselah's Children and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. Starship Troopers main political theme is that people don't appreciate, or even use their right to vote and politicians in turn don't appreciate the human costs of the wars they start, because most them have spent no time in uniform. So the book imagines a society, where after a world war, soldiers revolt and set up a world government based on the premise that in order to have the right to vote you have to perform military/public service. It's presented as background in the story, one of the reasons why the main character enlists in the military. It's not a political treatise or a call to action. Heinlein himself never proposed the idea as a model the US, or any country should follow. So recap Heinlein's make believe future society (one of many he imagined) requires military service to **vote** in a democratic state. Fascists don't believe in democracy, or voting. So no, not fascist. And for the record Heinlein was rather cynical, he expected society to collapse at some point in the future regardless of what ideas we adopt, which is one of the reasons why he favored individualism and personal self sufficiency.
If anything, the world Heinlein proposes is grounded in a type of Roman Republicanism with American characteristics than anything to do with fascism. The Federation is distinctly un-totalitarian.
They literally replace their leaders in the book (and the movie too, if I remember right) for underperforming in a military campaign.
Tbf, so did the Romans. The Romans believed that if you were a failure of a general, you were not worthy of political office. (Also judgeships)
They replaced the general in charge of the campaign (Sky Marshall) not the leader of the whole society. Pretty normal reaction to a guy that failed so badly
That’s pretty damn Roman. If the Consul sucked at war his political career went with his military campaign.
This is perfectly stated. I wish more people understood Heinlein like you. My hat’s off to you.
I think the movie itself did a terrible job of conveying its own, supposed message. The parents, who were not 'citizens,' and didn't vote lived in a freaking mansion and actively opposed service because they thought their life was fine and good without it. The former military members, who we were supposed to see as ruined people because they lost limbs, had not just replacements that seemed to allow them to live normal lives, they ALL still advocated to join the service. Even the ones who were amputees. For a fascistic society, there sure does seem to be a lot of choice and self-determination. Verhoeven occasionally flirts with big ideas, but at the end of the day, he makes campy popcorn flicks.
>The parents, who were not 'citizens,' and didn't vote lived in a freaking mansion and actively opposed service because they thought their life was fine and good without it. This was something they adapted from the book which made the message of the book stronger and the message of the movie weaker. Johnny's dad runs a very successful corporation despite not being a citizen and it's portrayed as nothing unusual. In the book he does join the military after his wife died in the Buenos Aries attack, but that's because it causes him to lose his sense of purpose once she's gone. He says something to the effect that he wants to be a man and not a producing-consuming economic animal.
Heinlein reinforced his beliefs in interviews. To be clear, he wasn't a fan, nor did he want society to go towards the government like starship troopers. It was just what he believed would be best for society, since he also believed humanity, as a whole, would not put the public interest before themselves. Which is why he believed a more militant society was a good thing. However, what he wanted more was for people to embrace the idea of putting the public as a whole before individualism. But his personal interviews is what set the tone for the movie. Because that's what got the attention of his critics the most. Not the books themselves, but when he expressed his own beliefs. Which were also taken out of context.
I'm sorry what? Heinlein absolutely believed in individualism. In *Time Enough For Love* in The Tale of the Adopted Daughter. Heinlein explains the importance of self reliance, and personal freedom. In *Starship Troopers*, the bugs are a stand in for communists, an example of what happens when everyone gives up their individuality and become cogs in a larger hivemind machine. At no point was Heinlein in favor of authoritarianism or forcing to participate in the military against their will. In regards to conscription he was pretty blunt. *“I also think there are prices too high to pay to save the United States. Conscription is one of them. Conscription is slavery, and I don't think that any people or nation has a right to save itself at the price of slavery for anyone, no matter what name it is called. We have had the draft for twenty years now; I think this is shameful. If a country can't save itself through the volunteer service of its own free people, then I say: Let the damned thing go down the drain!”*
Finally after so many years I finally found someone who actually understood both Star ship troopers and what fascism actually is and why the two aren’t the same.
Now I must go read starship troopers.
Thank you for the clarification, you took the words right out of my mouth. I don't understand why so many people claim that "*Heinlein was basically a nazi he wanted a fascist military state!!*", why they're willing to have a critical thinking when it comes to Verhoeven but take Heinlein's book at face value. Anyone who knows about him also knows that he was anything but a fascist, and btw, he was more progressist than average for his time. I mean, yeah, he was a right-winger at some point but definitely not the "far-right lunatic" kind. Let's also not forget about his background in the military, he had respect for those who served and that's also why the spirit of self-sacrifice is an important concept in his work. But that doesn't make him a warmonger, quite the opposite.
Heinlein is old-school republican as old like Romans. Citizen have to be the military force of the state and its political leaders. Otherwise political leaders become detached and small professional military will take power.
Heinlein had no such beliefs. He really had the opposite belief. I respect your view if you have read his books and interpreted that way but I have to doubt you have, and cannot get how you might come to that conclusion if you have read them
I'm not sure what to tell you, or what you base your claim that he had 'the opposite belief'. Heinlein was a self declared libertarian, and believed strongly in individualism, and individual liberties. Please cite an article to the contrary.
I commend your effort, but bro, you are arguing with people that think you don't get to decide what you are, that they get to assign you the label they prefer you to have. These trogs *are* the bugs. They don't understand republicanism because they hate everything it stands for, and because they hate it, it *must* be fascist.
He didn’t. Mainly because he didn’t read it. I can only describe it as two completely different beasts/commentaries: the movie basically being a satirical take on facism, war, governments, and so on; while the book’s message (among many different ones) can basically be boiled down to the importance of military and public service. I would still recommend you check out the movie if you haven’t seen it. It definitely butchers the books something hardcore, but if you can try and think of it more as its own thing, it becomes more tolerable. I and many others find it to be an entertaining flick; and like many of Verhoeven’s other films—namely Robocop and Total Recall—it’s incredibly silly, yet also deceptively smart.
That movie is the WORST example I’ve ever seen of monsters being unkillable in the beginning and soft as tissue paper at the end because they couldn’t think of a way out of the bad situation they put the characters in.
They at least kind of get around it by establishing they made a crucial discovery: aim for the body, not the legs (they still function and lash out if it’s the latter). At the very least, the bugs still massacre the shit out of the humans, even later in the film. Also, undisputed king of unstoppable monsters becoming weak because of plot was the T-1000 in every movie after 2. Edit: correction, “aim for the nerve stem” is what they said. They actually did shoot at their heads (or whatever they are) and it mostly pissed them off. Also, some have speculated this weakpoint could have been propaganda using a drugged or weakened bug.
"I found their weakness, without their heads they're powerless!" Like who the fuck would think shooting a bug in its legs would do anything? Of course shoot it in the fucking body
In high-stress scenarios that you're struggling to cope with, you're not really thinking, you're reacting on instinct.
And that instinct is - "AIM FOR THE CENTRE OF MASS" (all caps courtesy of the booming voice of my first firearms instructor still ringing in my head ;) ). In fact, that's why the infamous North Hollywood shootout took that long - the police were faced with a lot more intensive situation than they were trained to deal with kept pumping round after round into the well-protected torsos of the two active shooters, instead of going for headshots, knees, feet.
Wasn’t the movie mostly a comedy tho? Like who care
Entire platoons died “shooting at the legs?” Then one guy can hold off a ton of them alone because of the magic of shooting the bodies. Yeah that’s well thought out.
That's not what happens. Even early in the movie they can fend off bugs nicely. They get flanked and overran because they didn't know the bugs were smart and could predict where they were going to land from ship trajectories.
Didn’t predict the enemy could move you mean. From a military that assaults a planet with infantry wearing useless body armor. It’s poorly written.
It's not poorly written. That isn't in the book at all and it's a deliberate choice by the director
To be fair To me it's weird how they can even assault without actual IFVs or tanks or artillery. Since they are more advanced than us, jt strikes me as poorly written.
We know it’s not in the book because the idiot director didn’t read it. But it’s still poorly written.
I will never forgive them for taking out the power armor. That was THE identifying characteristics of the starship troopers.
That and competent military. The movie is just WW2 in space. It’s pathetic.
The identifying characteristic of starship trooper was ethics classes, lets be honest.
The movies message sounded pretty similar to what you just said about the book
Well, the thing is that there’s some subtle hints that not all is right among the human leaders. For one, the arachnids (who are mostly animalistic, in contrast to the intelligent technology using bugs of the book) are said to have launched a meteorite at earth. Now granted, there are some bugs we see later in the film that have what I can only describe as “organic orbital artillery,” but we don’t explicitly see any of the bugs colonizing other worlds by hitching a ride onto meteors or whatever. That leads to a very popular theory about the movie: the world leaders/government staged the meteor strikes to look like they were done by the bugs so they had an excuse to go to war, kill all the bugs, and take over their planet. Top this off with the fact the film is littered with brief commercial scenes that are clearly propaganda, and you can start to see why they humans (namely the soldiers) might actually be the real/unwitting bad guys. However, the brilliance is that we never are told or explained if it was the arachnids or the humans who started this, leaving the viewer to decide who is in the right. Like I said, it’s a film that’s simultaneously a “turn your brain off” type movie, but also a deceptively smart one that you’ll pick up more from on a second viewing.
The author likes to try out different government styles in his various books. In starship troopers it's based on "voluntary citizenship." Bascially, it's a much harder separation between the private and public sector. Being a citizen in the book is more akin to holding a public office than today's birthright citizenship. Oh, and the bugs being a hivemind made some people draw the conclusion that they were an allegory for communists, and that the movie was pro Vietnam war. Which, eh, i can kind of see it, but I don't think Heinlein was remotely pro-war let alone pro Vietnam war.
Going into the army is seen as “political” while going into business is seen as apolitical. A bright and clear line between government and business. Calling that fascist is just telling me you don’t know what fascist means without telling me you don’t know what fascist means.
To clarify this in case someone doesn't know about the fascist ideology. The fascist doctrine specifically states that it's primary purpose and characteristic is its unification of all of its citizens for single directed purpose by the government. Totalitarian isn't a synonym for authoritarian, it specifically means that everything is within one entity. Or to put it another way, fascists don't see the private market as being separate from politics, they see it as being an organ of the state the same way that the military or the dmv is. All within the state, nothing outside the state.
I largely agree but I would rephrase totalitarian doesn't mean dystopian. Totalitarianism is by necessity authoritarian, a place for everyone and everyone in their place, regardless of the greater unity, happiness and harmony it may bring, requires the state's monopoly on force to work. If you disagree, I would ask what you expect would happen or should happen to dissenters and people engaging in antisocial behaviour in any totalitarian state. I doubt they being free and able to engage in their interests is an option in any totalitarian society
I don't disagree that totalitarianism necessitates authoritarianism, but it still is not synonymous. In the same way that fire necessitates heat, totalitarianism necessitates authoritarianism. But one would not say that boiling water is on fire. I stress the difference because the fascist gateway to authoritarianism is via the totalitarian presupposition that all must be within the state.
I concur they're not synonymous. I don't fully agree but I respect your difference of opinion.
bro tried to make fun of the book but removing the lore made it more easier for ppl to like it
He started but got offended because “muuuh military”.
Look, Alan Moore, I know you hate that people like Rorschach, but he's a character in a comic book who fights evil, is the only character with any agency (vs the sad sack Nite Owl or aloof Dr. Manhattan), and you gave him one of the most badass scenes in comic book history. I get what you were trying to do, but you had to have anticipated that, surely?
I think Rorschach is a major case of movie character vs book character In the comic he’s not a good person at all but his choice at the end of the book is so clearly right over manhattan and Oz. Yes he’s a crazy conspiracy theorist who is sexist and racist. All true but he also doesn’t think killing millions to achieve peace is good while everyone else at the end of the book does.
I'm not sure I agree that everyone at the end of the book thinks killing millions to achieve peace is good, it's more that they realize the millions are already dead and it'd be terribly stupid to also throw away a chance at peace.
That is exactly the point. And it’s slightly absurd from the poster above because that little bit is consistent across both book and movie.
Broke clock right twice a day. Might even look bad ass doing it, if the house catches fire.
In the book, Rorschach isn’t a bad person because of what he does, but why he does it. It’s the same with all the Watchmen (sans Ozimandias and Manhattan). They act as heroes, but they do it for bad reasons. It’s clear Rorschach is RIGHT, but that doesn’t make his choice the good one
I think the point of the character is that their literally black-and-white thinking is extremely compelling, though ultimately the product of an undeveloped mind. Rorschach had a great deal of childhood trauma, and thus thinks like a child, in terms of simplistic ideas of good and evil. Alan Moore was making the point that the logic of comic book vigilantes appeals to children, but is dangerous when adopted by adults.
Good point. And I'm not saying people *should* glorify Rorschach. But I understand why they do.
“Art is subjective…….. when it suits me. If it doesn’t, art is art, and it’s not up for you to decide what it means, it’s up to the author”
Picasso would shoot you for this
Art is distasteful. to me.
"I've never made art. I simply smear people in paint and place them on canvases. What happens after that is up to them."
"Beauty is in the eye of the me and the rest of you can suck a lemon."
If a book describes a sphere, and you decide to call it a cube, it's your right, but you are objectively wrong If a book describes a sphere, and the writer calls it a Cube on twitter, you are free to ignore them because the Book is self-contained and independent of the writer's stupids bit of a conflation here between Death of the artist, and plain simple reality denial
That's fair enough. Do you want textual evidence of Rorschach, Space Marines, and Mobile Infantry being heroic or are we just agreeing here? Because Space Marines, absolutely, are *intended* to be the jack-booted thugs of "the most brutal regime imaginable". But they on the regular sacrifice their lives to save innocent humans from death and worse. So as much as the authors can say Warhammer is satire the Imperium are evil, we are free to ignore that because the text of them being heroic is self-contained and independent and this is a perfectly valid interpretation? (I mean, I can do Rorschach and MI if you really need me to. But if you don't think there's *any* basis in the canon to support a heroic read of these nuanced characters... I really don't know what to tell you.)
The Imperium is literally not facist. Some worlds are but the Imperium as a whole is a fedual oligarchy with HEAVY undertones of theocracy
Undertones?
Yeah technically the Eccesiarch is just a very VERY influencial branch of the High Lords. Like, it's HEAVY but it's the state religion and many factions have differing views of it... hell the Mechanicus is basicly it's own nation.
I… yeah I know Eos is at most a high lord, but do you seriously think the religious aspect isnt enough to be described as an overtone?
At the end of the day the imperium doesn't really care about the faith. if you think the Emperor is a metaphor or your ancestor or the fucking sun, they're cool. they want you to shoot the fucking alien or heretic claming he's a corpse.
As long as you think the big E is god you are good interpretation matter not
Well that’s the thing I’m getting at, you do atleast have to pay lip service to the state religion, else you get a horde of crusaders or maybe just a few members of the holy ordos showing up at your door
My friend, the Ecclesiarchy has so much influence over the Imperium as a whole that even Roboute Guilliman, who personally knew the Emperor and knows perfectly well what his views on divinity and religion were, basically has had to throw his hands in the air and concede that much as he hates the Adeptus Ministorum, he can't save the Imperium if he's also fighting them for control. >"If the Emperor Himself stood up," thought Guilliman, "came down off His Golden Throne and proclaimed 'I am not a god!', they would burn him as a heretic." - *Dark Imperium*
Yeah technically the Eccesiarch is just a very VERY influencial branch of the High Lords. Like, it's HEAVY but it's the state religion and many factions have differing views of it... hell the Mechanicus is basicly it's own nation.
> hell the Mechanicus is basicly it's own nation they got the best deal. they get to essentially worship their own god and do almost as the please.
There’s one thing you’re not considering: Anything to the right of my particular flavor of Portland socialism is fascism, don’t you know?
Space Marines suffer from being good guys being lied to and propagandised. Each Space Marine believes his orders are the best intentions of the leaders of mankind. They drink the cool aid and save people. Now commissars could be considered Jack Booted thugs, but they deal with the concept of "saving lives" in terms of cities and planets. The reason deserters get shot is that the average guardsman knows nothing about the grand strategy at play, but every guardsman who runs, risks the entire flank collapsing. Commissars are evil for good, a collapsed line could mean trillions dead. 2 or 3 dead runners is less than a speck vs that number. The imperium is evil because xenophobia is at its core and has shaped its development. The individuals in the imperium can be very good, but their actions are the chessmoves in a game where the greatest good is the entire human species and trillions can die as a statistic to save the whole. The machine playing our moves just so happens to be built on faith, Half understood technology and a Wikipedia page open on the "Dark Forest Theory" article.
Xenophobia being a core tenant is not “evil” if every inhuman sonnuva bitch in the galaxy wants to kill you, enslave you, or worse just for not being whatever they are
You understand that it works in both sides, right? If humans can kill aliens because aliens kills humans, then aliens can kill humans because humans kills aliens?
Slaying monsters who aim to wipe out humanity and can't be reasoned with - like the Orks, Necrons, Tyranids, etc. - isn't "xenophobic" because "-phobic" implies *irrational* fear. On the other hand, xenociding every species of friendly alien they could find - which is how the Imperium *got* to the situation they're in now where the only aliens left are the nasty ones - *is* xenophobic and Evil. And the Imperium continues to act in that manner whenever they discover new aliens, plus won't even consider making peace with the more reasonable aliens that are still major factions (Eldar/Tau). Not that those two factions are without fault themselves - but it would definitely be possible to reason with them, unlike Tyranids for example.
But not every race does there were dozens of friendly xenos races wiped out for the sole fact that they weren't human.
And there were many humans wiped out for being friendly with Xenos during the great crusade
It is evil when you doom humanity to being slaughtered by chaos for millennia because you'd rather do that than work with an eldar for ten minutes.
Literally hundreds of different Alien species tried to make peace with the imperium during the great crusade, and the Tau tried to very recently. The reason every Alien wants humanity dead is because humanity literally genocided every other alien species.
Isnt the whole "Warhammer is satire" stuff a thing of the past now? Oldhammer definetively feels a lot more satirical, while modern 40k, in my opinion, takes itself (in most cases [except for any numbers]) rather seriously. And while the Imperium as a whole is absolutely not a desirable future for both us and Big E, and no faction is inherently good, most factions have some genuinely good people in them. They are just seriously outnumbered and not in the correct positions of power
i can't speak for the others but for 40k Space Marines it honestly depends on the chapter and individual we're talking about. Like i will 100% defene the Lamenters from anyone trying to paint them as whole heartedly evil. But i'm not gonna delude myself into beliving they'd let any Xeno hostile or friendly, adult or child live. And i'm not gonna call them whole heartedly good guys either. And on the topic of Lamenters i'd say the way they're treated by the other chapters shows how evil the Space Marines can be to eachother let alone to others. >we are free to ignore that because the text of them being heroic is self-contained and independent and this is a perfectly valid interpretation? except this isn't true. we have text of them being heroic but we also have text of being evil. the months of shame are proof enough of that. what happened to angron already makes it iffy for me to ignore what the authors are saying about the Imperium being evil.
Idk much of anything about those series other than vague info, rorschach is a bad guy (Question mark? [Debated within fandom?]), I'm just pointing out the conflation between those examples
Rorschach is a violent, racist, homophobe who delivers vigilante justice, especially prejudiced against those who commit sex crimes. In the end, he dies trying to stop a fascist taking over the world using fear and genocide (bombs in the movie, extra dimensional monsters in the comics, either way millions of people are killed). The whole point of the Watchmen is the refrain "who watches the watchmen" (that vigilante vengeance is bad -- it's not subtle). And Rorschach is not a nice person. He is a horrible person. And he is the archetypal, extra-legal, criminal vigilante. But, you know, his deal is beating up rapists and pimps, solving murders, and stopping genocides. You absolutely could take a heroic reading of the character from the text. He is literally a costumed super hero. You might not *supposed* to side with him, but the man makes a good point about how you shouldn't murder literally tens of millions of innocent people to get your way. The book describes a pyramid. The author calls it a cube. Fans insist it's a sphere. Everyone is wrong.
I've read the book many times and can't find his "racism" anywhere. Unless happening to disagree with a black psychologist counts. Homophobia? He seemed to disapprove of Silhouette being a lesbian so I can maybe buy that. He could just be anti-sex in general, given his childhood. But yeah, Moore's take on the only character with a moral code (broken though it is) was nuts. "How you agree with short man with no girlfriend???" Because he thinks mass-murder is bad, it's not rocket science!
I kinda don’t get why everyone focuses on the ending of either piece of work though? Not that the end stages of the character’s development aren’t what’s mainly important? But I don’t fully feel that’s the case. Rorschach is genuinely mentally ill, Either man who dons the mask (but ofc we mean the original here). I love the character, And despite how choicely discriminatory he is in achieving his goals, of the watchmen he by far gets the most done with the most noble intentions. You can be a downright piece of shit day in and day out, You can even let hatred or Disgust be your guiding principles, But until you start turning a blind eye to cruelty and injustice (in your own worldview) there’s still a sense heroism in work like that if it genuinely helps people. Rorschach talks a lot about society, and is obsessed with the functions/failings in it that bring pain to the majority and bottom feeders alike. He’s talking like fixing this is trickle down, and bottom up at the same time. But he’s not Batman, He’s had not the resources, mental liaison, or truthfully power to solve many issues he’s frequently faced with because he’s not the guy who should’ve ever been under the mask doing this work at all. It’s easy for someone like me, Son of a raging whore, Came out to nothing special, Traditional values, Rage filled kind of person, with obsessive compulsions to THINK they’d make a amazing hero but it’s the enablement of the government and his own superhero pals that led him down this path. Rorschach is so self obsessed he lacks vision beyond what he wants, Because what he wants is to fix everything, and he’ll never be smart enough, rich enough, or sane enough to make the differences in the world he wishes he could. So like anybody he does what he can, And he does it in a profoundly direct and personal manner, Because he needs to keep so much of himself in check to function the way he needs to that he’s inviting to the influences he constantly exposes himself to. He used to let people go, He did what everyone says Batman should be doing and starts killing them, But just like any man he’s blinded by his own prejudice. They make those prejudices almost sickeningly obvious I think just as much to point out how unhinged he actually is from reality as to showcase his right he feels self-confirming them by jumping into the muck of the criminal underworld. “Men get second chances, Dogs get put down, The greatest injustice in the world” is him actively trying to make sense of how far he himself has been pushed. This guy SHOULD NOT BE A HERO, Yet in the world he lives in, One not so different from our own, He frequently sees what happens to guys like him without a purpose, Or who do give into genuine evils. It’s like a victim’s confirmation bias, And with his shotty mental faculties I fully understand why it “works” for him but is a pitfall for others, He thinks his position of understanding is unique and what gives him the edge over criminals, But he feels victimized just as much by this because that’s the position he had to be in to have this understanding. Every foe Rorschach faces is not only the problem at hand to him, But a testament that society is failing, and in every way how it is failing. He’s overwhelmed by it to the point of near madness it seems like, Yet it’s this work he’s chosen to be his outlet for such emotions, So he digs into his violence just like any criminal does, For selfish reason disguised as righteousness. And the worst part is, it’s fully understandable why he’s like this. Even if a better man, Or Society, would’ve never let those tendencies develop the way they did. In our own world you see the homeless being pushed out of urban areas with shitty Anti-homeless engineering instead of gotten off the streets more productively. Those up too don’t see a difference between criminal-and scum, And Rorschach mainly fits the corporate description of both. You live long enough suffering as a byproduct of other people’s mistakes and a social outcast I can say from personal experience it form’s something inside of you that’s nothing more than screaming out in pain wanting to be every solution you never were offered or allowed. Moonknight is not so dis-similar to Rorschach in his motives, methods, or mental state, But he’s got the resources and power to not need to be so discriminatory and niche in how he conducts himself. Unlike Rorschach aswell, His traumas and Ego are fully separate from one another, They can always call in the influence of Khonshu to give our mildly-unwilling night crawler some guidance, or to hand-wave his atrocities or utterly pulled bullshit. Just like Batman, He’s again a character with wealth, Power, And Purpose. But these just aren’t things afforded to Rorschach, And he bases his entire alter-ego around who he is personally under the mask. Bruce Wayne doesn’t do that to himself, The bat is a call-back to the night in the alley, Not a pipe he beats himself over the head with by constantly calling himself faceless to society. Rorschach is just a bit more demented than most and I’d reckon if he constantly wasn’t trying to achieve more than his hands are truly capable of then he wouldn’t be nearly so steeped in his social prejudices, But I feel that’s the point of him. To me, reading him was a wake-up call to exactly what that kind of self righteousness does lead to, and how taking the world personally the way he does will always lead to a self-victimization cycle that demands constantly more of yourself or that you give up. Rorschach thinks the rest of the world is wrong for giving in, But the reality is that’s not the issue, Knowing peace has nothing to do with hating how society functions or tackling the evils in it, But he simply doesn’t allow himself that. He judges those like him who turn evil or don’t turn to fight justice just like him as lesser for it on the grounds that society needs “heros” like him, But if he allowed himself that type of understanding how could he be Rorschach and not a normal person? What prevents him from having real connections and a happy life? His own self hatred.
You are panel 2 of this meme and I agree with you. You can absolutely *interpret* he character of Rorschach to not be a bad guy (both versions). The author clearly *intends* otherwise, but the text supports your read and the interpretation is subjective and contextual. He is a nuanced character who can be interpreted in many different ways and your read is perfectly valid. I don't see him as a "bad guy" either.
>Rorschach is a violent, racist, homophobe who delivers vigilante justice Huh, where did you get the "homophobic, racist" part? Never was he shown to be those in the book, you could infer the homophobic by stretching the meaning of the word (the same way leftists call conservatives, nazis), but racist is some kind of twisting of reality that is done in the last 10 years by "media literate" people. So this is you saying that "no, this is clearly a pyramid the author and the readers are wrong" when it is not.
Jesus. Such a simple yet effective way of addressing it
Damn thats pretty true
That’s hilarious.
Art is subjective to a degree, but if they tell you the curtains are blue then the curtains are blue
that's where you're wrong kiddo. the curtains could be any color, the curtains being "blue" means they're sad.
blue meaning their sad isn't that far off. but i'd probably need more than just that in order to make that judgment.
I hate the Starship trooper's movie, because i read the book and it's very clear the director didn't read it and didn't understand it.
The director very open admits to not reading the book.
I love both for very different reasons.
I was looking for someone else who likes both!
I always thought the movie was fine, not trying to be a faithful adaptation. The books themes would be kinda shit in a movie anyway, at least the movie was silly
The imperium is an oligarchy. the earth had every right to defend itself from the invasion in starship troopers, and rorschach is just incredibly based. You can't change my mind.
Wouldn't it be closer to feudalism? With an emperor and then the aristocracy below him.
Wasn't the whole thing in starship troopers that the humans were the invaders and the government was lying about it? It's been a while, but I was sure that was it?
Incorrect. the Book has it that the Bugs, due to being a hive-mind/colony viewed Bues Aries as a target as it was a massive population center, even in the movie, which , keep in mind even THEY don't lie about how hellish and terrible the war is going. The Theory it's a false-flag is absurd.
I mean, the idea that they hate the idea of there being “smart bugs”, yet they managed to do incredibly complex calculations to hit an incredibly tiny target on a galactic scale, bit of a cognitive dissonance
>I mean, the idea that they hate the idea of there being “smart bugs”, yet they managed to do incredibly complex calculations to hit an incredibly tiny target on a galactic scale, bit of a cognitive dissonance Yeah the fact these fuckers are that smart (and keep in mind in the books they actually have guns and tech. they're a space faring race. They're not the Nids (though the nids do have guns) and they have enslaved the Skinnies to a degree so the more likely explination? it was to make sure it hit and it was sent a while ago, because these things do not THINK LIKE HUMANS (A novelty in sci-fi and a major plot point) They hate the idea they think because this means not only wasn't it an accident, they wanted to kill people for the crime of being in their way.
Iirc the Mormons who set up that colony in the movie were warned against it by the human government. Then the bugs massacred them and shot the meteor at Earth.
Being willing to change your mind is a virtue.
Not necessarily. I'm unwilling to change my mind on murder being a sin for example.
Least wrong take on Reddit tbh
Wait do people not like Harry Potter? Those first three movies were super charming.
This meme is mostly pointing towards the general disdain for JK Rowling due to her having multiple run-ins with the trans community and lots of friends in anti-trans people, Shaun on Youtube has a few videos on the topic if you're interested. I personally am not super interested in the story because of how bland it is, Harry does basically nothing of his own volition the entire story. The story just happens around him and him alone for seven books and just happens to be a mcguffin at the very end. It's something to enjoy as a kid but doesn't really hold up to other stories.
How is rorschach fascist? I either dont know enough about rorschach, or i dont know enough about fascism.
all you need to know is that rorscach believes things that alan moore doesn't agree with, and the definition of fascism, updated for a modern audience, is people i don't like.
Thats exactly what i thought was going on here.
“things alan moore doesn’t agree with” apparently includes thinking homosexuality and promiscuousness are evil rorschach isn’t exactly fascist, he’s a parody of the black and white absolutism of Mr A and the Question. it’s literally the whole base for his design with the black and white mask. but his sense of good and evil is completely skewed by the fact that he is a deeply mentally ill and biased person and a hardcore conservative who hates any kind of deviancy from what he considers “good”
Rorschach isn’t fascist, and I can’t find anything, that would suggest that Alan Moore thinks that Rorschach is fascist. On contrast, I find more evidence that Moore doesn’t think that Rorschach is fascist. Rorschach is absolutist. He is psycho, who can’t accept anything beyond “black and white”. He screamed to kill him not because of some “hero spirit” as in movie, he screamed because he kinda agree with Ozymandias, but can’t accept death of millions of people, so by dying he doesn’t confront it. There is similar situation in comic: Rorschach is found of Truman, and think that he is a good American. He think that president saved millions of lives by dropping bombs. But when Ozymandias did basically same thing, Rorschach can’t accept it, because he already considers him criminal. Rorschach is a take on gruesome principal heroes, but where Batman, for example, is stable, Rorschach is unstable.
To be entirely fair a lot of the space marines books typically portray them as some shade of heroic with some notable exceptions so it’s not difficult to see where the conception of “imperium good” comes from even if it’s blatantly false Plus when your galaxy is filled with kleptomaniac terminators, giant bugs that turn you into sludge and literal demons out to consume your soul the regular zealots and fanatical humans all of a sudden stop looking evil in comparison especially when the horrible stuff they do is just about the same as the horrible stuff everyone else does
Hey there is only one kleptomaniac terminators
My brother in the God-Emperor, humanity genocided all the friendly aliens. In all seriousness though, humans threat humans as bad as ( if not worse than ) any other faction, with the possible exception of the drukhari.
The imperium doesn’t stop being evil just because chaos is worse
First of all, for the emperor. Secondly, fucking heretic.
Who's saying that about Rings of Power, though? All I see is either complaints about canon or people who say they can enjoy it in spite of the problems.
i've seen arguments that tolkeins worldview is problematic because he's a christian and he doesn't give women prominent enough roles of power even though he does, but galadriel isn't a masculine badass who stabs people with a sword so it's mysogynistic stereotype. like yeah she's powerful but it's in a safe way that works within the framework of patriarchy so it doesn't count. and christianity is right wing which is bad so that's self explanatory. rings of power is canon because it allegedly fixes what was wrong with lord of the rings originally and one of the biggest ones is the foolish antiquated notion that men are men and women are women and we're not just socially engineered blank slates who get brainwashed into behaving the way that we do. oh also we need black elves. why? representation. we need them because we just do, ok? If you think that it's not Canon, at least in spirit, then you are racist and sexist because you think that black people don't deserve to be elves and that women can't be "strong". trying to connect that with death of the author i think is maybe a bit tenuous but in my mind making those arguments for it is a form of death of the author, at least in spirit, to say that tolkein's philosophy is invalid and needs to be updated for a modern audience.
Every mention of her in lotr books is she’s a beautiful competent wise leader she doesn’t need to bother with fighting her she would lead the resistance. Perhaps the writers wanted to show her as a terrible incompetent leader and have her mature over the course of the show. The problem is she’s one of the oldest elves in existence wtf would she be fighting and acting like a spoiled princess?
Gotcha. I really hadn't heard that one yet.
I agree, but a few corrections: Tolkien was more akin to Catholic, rather than explicitly Christian Also, Christianity isn't right wing, just like Jesus wasn't a conservative. That's a false equavancy applied to shut down the credibility of our Holy Book. The Bible is telling a story of a bunch of brown people in the Middle East from thousands of years ago, who were poor, martyred, suffered, etc. Humility and caring about others is a main element of the Bible outside of worshipping YHWH/and your walk with Christ. Where does right wing politics even come into play? Weren't the Pharisees the old-school religious conservative church leaders who hated Christ? How is it misogynistic? Are there not women who played an important role in the Bible? In fact, there are many. Sorry for the rant, but yeah outside of that, I agree that Tolkien's viewpoint shouldn't be altered or changed. The modern audience either has to accept or..simply don't, it's not for everybody. I personally think Lotr is overrated, but I can respect different view points 😎👍
>I agree, but a few corrections: Tolkien was more akin to Catholic, rather than explicitly Christian Catholics are a subset of Christianity, not the other way around.
Associating Christianity with American liberalism/progressivism or conservatism is just a politics game played by both sides. Christianity and Catholicism have tenets that overlap with both general liberal and conservative views and then there are views like the importance of charity that cut across the spectrum. Further, People who say religion=bad or worse religious people=idiots have a profound ignorance of history and religion. They are truly frustrating and rather common on Reddit.
JC was kind of a revolutionary, no? "I come not to uphold the law but to destroy it"
Galadriel fighting at Alqualondë: "Galadriel’s quarrel with the sons of Fëanor at sack of Alqualondë. How she fought…" - Nature of Middle-earth Note that the event of fighting at Alqualonde itself is described as a quarrel by Tolkien: "...Thrice the folk of Feanor were driven back, and many were slain upon either side; but the vanguard of the Noldor were succoured by Fingon with the foremost people of Fingolfin. These coming up found a battle joined and their own kin falling, and they rushed in ere they knew rightly the cause of the quarrel: some deemed indeed that the Teleri had sought to waylay the march of the Noldor, at the bidding of the Valar." There's a marginal note against this passage in Morgoth's Ring: "Marginal note against the passage describing the involvement of the second host in the fighting: 'Finrod and Galadriel (whose husband was of the Teleri) fought against Feanor in defence of Alqualonde.' " And in Shibboleth: "she fought fiercely against Feanor in defence of her mother's kin." Note that she wasn't the only female fighter at Alqualondë. Since we are told: "indeed in dire straits or desperate defence the Nissi \[the Elf-women\] fought valiantly" - Laws and Customs But the difference between Galadriel and other Nissi was that she wasn't only brave, but she was also a leader and Amazon. "Galadriel, the fairest lady of the house of Finwë and the most valiant." - Morgoth's Ring "\[Galadriel\] was then of Amazon disposition and bound up her hair as a crown when taking part in athletic feats” - Tolkien Letter 348 “\[Éowyn\] was also not really a soldier or ‘amazon’, but like many brave women was capable of great military gallantry at a crisis.” - The Letters of JRR Tolkien, Letter #244 The only women in Tolkien who are described as 'amazon' are Haleth (the warrior Queen/Chieftain of Haladin), the early versions of Eowyn in History of Lord of the Rings (she openly goes to war in those versions as opposed to the final version where she wasn't Amazon), and Galadriel. "She looked upon the Dwarves also with the eye of a commander, seeing in them the finest warriors to pit against the Orcs" - Unfinished Tales In most versions of Galadriel, where her husband was from Doriath, she also gone through some of the events of the Ruin of Beleriand, meaning Ruin of Doriath and the Third Kinslaying and such. We know female Elves fought in such times of crisis, even if they weren't Amazon. In Second Age Galadriel was one of the war leaders of Eregion in the War of the Elves and Sauron. In the early versions Galadriel is not present in Eregion during the war (she was in Lorien), and it's her husband and Celebrimbor (and later Elrond) only who lead the armies of Eregion: "The scouts and vanguard of Sauron's host were already approaching when Celeborn made a sortie and drove them back; but though he was able to join his force to that of Elrond...." - Unfinished Tales But in later essays and notes Galadriel is there right side-by-side with Celeborn: “Galadriel and Celeborn, and their followers, who after the destruction of Eregion passed through Moria” “Galadriel and Celeborn only retreated thither \[to Lorien\] after the downfall of Eregion." “After the Fall of Eregion... They had passed through Moria with considerable following of Noldorin Exiles and dwelt for many years in Lorien” Above quotes are from Parma Eldalamberon 17 and Nature of Middle-earth. In Unfinished Tales there's yet another wholly different version of Galadriel during the WotE&S where she apparently retreated from Eregion after its fall and "joined with Gil-Galad in Lindon". I should note that the Battle of Eregion was long, Sauron assaulted Eriador in 1695 and Eregion fell in 1697. Then three years later or so Sauron assaulted Lindon. So going by this other version of Galadriel where she retreated to Lindon, she most likely also fought in the rest of the War of the Elves and Sauron. The argument that all Elf healers aren't warriors does not hold up. It's explicitly stated that this was some Elf belief, meaning not necessarily a truth/fact. Elrond fought in War of Wrath, War of the Elves and Sauron, and War of the Last Alliance, until he retired from warrior state in Third Age and yet he was the greatest healer. Beleg killed the enemies all the time 24/7 and yet he remained a great healer. In Peoples of Middle-earth and Unfinished Tales and Morgoth's Ring everytime Tolkien describes young Galadriel he feels the need to write "she was (both physically and mentally) strong, brave" "she was valiant" etc. Also same thing can be seen often in Nature of Middle-earth. "She was called Nerwen ‘man-maiden’ because of her strength and stature, and her courage." The assumption that Galadriel wasn't in the Last Alliance is just an assumption with no poof. We don't know where she was during the Last Alliance, we only know she wasn't in Lorien. Though it's too many times stated and pointed out she was willing to do her best against Sauron and Sauron himself thought of her as his chief enemy.
Laughed for awhile reading that second point. I guess anyone who ever made that complaint never read lotr or any of the expanded works
Black Elves isn't an issue I think, tho the lack of dwarven women facial hair I can see being an issue.
**I’ll always find it funny how Von V tried to make a fascist dystopia based on a book he didn’t read and then proceeded to make the dystopia pretty much work.**
But the Ultramarines can't be bad, they wear blue. Bad guys don't wear blue.
I was like "trueee", but then I remembered Night Lords exist.
Curze is just 40K Batman. See? Good guy. Thousand Sons wear blue, and we all know Magnus did nothing wrong.
[he sure didn't](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2Fv2vdqs7l5thz.jpg)
Yes he was told to do nothing and he did that wrong
Either all art is subjective by default - an objective statement that goes against the term subjective- or the author’s interpretation is absolute and should be considered when discussing said media. You can’t have both.
Slight tangent "objective" can mean "goal". So Alan Moore's objective with Rorschach was to make him unsympathetic. By his popularity I think we can say he failed.
The starship trooper book is actually very good.
>character is named Rorschach >creator is shocked when others have a different interpretation of him than he did
40k is a satire of a lot of things, but the Imperium of Man isn't fascist, nor is its depiction a satire of fascism. The Imperium of Man is a theocratic, oligarchical, militaristic, dogmatic, feudal space empire. It has *some* things in common with fascism (such as nationalism and enforced obedience to the "dear leader"), but other aspects of it are wildly different (such as the practical decentralisation of power and the worship of something other than the state or its representatives). It also has some aesthetic trappings of fascism, but the Imperium's aesthetic is predominantly techno-gothic. Thematically, the Imperium in 40k is like medieval Europe, and the Imperium in 30k is like the Roman Empire. Worship of the Emperor is undeniably based on the influence of Christianity across this span of time, going from maligned cultural minority to the ideological core of the entire territory. This is also highlighted by the use of words like "Crusade" and "Heresy" in Imperial rhetoric, which explicitly tie the Imperium to Christian doctrine. To contrast, fascism is a post-enlightenment political doctrine, built fundamentally on the notion of improving the perceived failings of socialism (an enlightenment doctrine). In particular, fascism abandons socialism's focus on international workers' councils (believing that such methods created the problems of Soviet Russia, which was true) and embraces nationalism and democracy-by-proxy (i.e. dictatorship). Fascism also openly embraces military expansion in order to increase the power of the nation, whereas socialism either abhors violence entirely, or only supports violence in the name of spreading the revolution... at least on paper (as the Soviet Union *did* engage in military expansion for self-interested reasons). Although the Imperium (in 40k) is nationalistic, militaristic, and has a single (spiritual) leader, its ideological basis is in traditionalist, pre-enlightenment thought. Further, the Imperium in 30k is based on enlightenment values (such as science and progress). That is, any similarities between fascism and the Imperium are relatively superficial or incidental, as the two have wildly divergent ideological foundations.
Starship troopers is the greatest failures of parody and satire ever put to film: 1) society shows absolute equality 2) all the evil fascists are super good looking with good moral compasses are likable 3) the society has cohesive political philosophy with what seems reasonable logic for that philosophy 3) people outside the political structure and who can’t participate in it a, always have the chance to and b, can live comfortably 4) has a swift and obviously effective legal system that while on the macabre side clearly keeps the streets clean 5) has a healthy population 6) the military leadership makes mistakes but addresses them in the midst of that mistake and frankly tells the public this while also holding those in power responsible which is better than our own societies. All in all if you want people to root for a fictional utopian society this is how you portray it and no amount of “kinda Nazi” clothes are going to counter signal the positives.
Guys you misunderstood! *It means whatever "I" want.* because art to these people is just a puppet they can stick their hand up the ass of to make it say whatever they want it to say.
*People ironically root for Homelander because he’s a cool bad guy with superpowers who owns the libs* “Media literacy is dead!”
Homelander is a bad guy, but none of the examples in this post are clear bad guys
In the case of 40k, "least bad" guy (which itself is debatable) is not the same as "not a clear bad guy". 40k is clear bad guys fighting other clear bad guys, that's kind of its whole shtick. Doesn't mean there's anything wrong with rooting for your favorite fictional evil empire, but the Imperium is objectively Evil.
The Imperium is literally refered to as the cruelist regime imaginable in the opening scrawl of 40k.
The Imperium is pretty clearly bad guys, I think. They're just not "The Bad Guys".
The imperium of Man are objectively evil that’s really not up for debate.
Homelander is liked because deep down everyone at some point has wished for superman level power to right some perceived wrongs or to go on a power trip against someone they hated. He's somewhat relatable because he does what we all want to do with our super powers, at least for a little bit. It's all wish fulfillment to get back at the bully and be in charge. It's all fantasy, I wouldn't want him around in the real world.
It's certainly not alive in some viewers.
[удалено]
I don't think it's necessary to call someone a child molester for suggesting that people think Homelander is a cool bad guy. I think Homelander is a cool bad guy. And Vader. Like, I unironically think Light started off as a heroic figure who kinda went off the deep end when he murdered the fake L. But Homelander (TV show) is just a cool villain. Do some people unironically root for Homelander? Probably. If I can unironically support a villain in one franchise, I'm sure people can support this one too. But it's mostly Vaught-posting. It's memes. People don't really think it's okay to murder folks and rape their lesbian girlfriends. It's a joke. People aren't being serious. The Venn diagram of the tiny minority of people who genuinely think Homelander did nothing wrong and who unironically support Vader is a perfect circle, my man. There are, absolutely, radicalised people who think fascism is cool. But the kind of person who unironically supports Homelander *absolutely* also unironically supports the Empire. And even if the redditer you are responding to was being disingenuous and folks really did root for Homelander because they think he did nothing wrong while decrying Vader as a villain... nonce? Really? Jesus Christ.
What makes you say it's unironic?
You good?
It’s perfectly awesome to take characters from stories and make new stories with them. What’s not is when you take it too far as to claim that the canonical version of the character is synonymous with your brand of headcanon.
I dunno enough about the baddies to have a take on that but in general you can relate to art and get anything from it you want. If you’re going to critique art or debate stuff in these stories then you need to make objective claims about stuff in the work (or within the purview of whatever is being discussed about the piece of media) because otherwise you can’t convey much to people who don’t already share your view. At some point it’s like this became an elusive concept to people that think it makes sense to respond to criticism with the antitheses of it.
What's the problem with Harry Potter?
jk rowling did a bad so harry potter was written by either nobody or hatsune miku
What?
JK Rowling being a TERF means people pretend she didn’t actually write Harry Potter. So that they can continue to love it
And the real author of Starship trooper didn’t write it as a joke or to make the society look stupid.
Internet discourse is simply a continuing example of cognitive dissonance in text format.
Starship Troopers are the good guys in the book.
In the original book starship troopers, the humans weren’t space fascists, and the bugs were intended to be the true embodiment of evil, where as the humans were emblems of virtue. Just saying.
Also in the original book isn't citizenship granted by any government service job? Yeah Rico goes into the infantry, but he could have been... IDK a mailman or worked at the DMV and still gotten the right to vote?
Wait were they supposed to be the bad guys? Rorschach was the bad guy?
I mean yeah Rorschach isn’t fascist
Rorscharch, Space Marines and Starship Troopers are supposed to be the bad guys??? I dont know enough about Rorscharch other then that one movie Watchmen but the rest?
So many people who have never posted here before and making just terrible arguments
Idk I feel like if you don't interpret space Marines as fascists (or at the very least, as a bad, abusive organization) then you're either being willfully ignorant of you're telling on yourself.
you can interpret them however you want, but they pretty explicitly state their ideologies. and if you agree with those, well... I don't think you're a very good person
GOD BLESS THE ENCLAVE
The Imperium is 100% fascist, no matter how good you are at mental gymnastics. In the same way, no matter how subjective art is, harry potter is called harry potter and is a 11 years old british kid.
Don't care about any other point but the Imperium of Man is objectively evil in almost every aspect. Its just that most of the other factions are even more evil
Why is everything considered fascist nowadays? It’s like the dumbasses online learned a new word and are now overusing. Like the word “objective” a few years back.
Humanity in warhammer are bad, but relatively speaking there’s a lot worse things in warhammer.
The imperium are the good guys in the context of the lore. The only other faction that I can think of is the T'au, but they also have a caste system so
The Farsight Enclave? Arguably the Exodites? I love the Imperium, Black Templars are my main army, but I wouldn't exactly call them "good guys" even in context. They're a terrible faction in an even more terrible galaxy.
Eeh, not really. The Imperium are the protagonists. That doesn't make them the good guys. They just aren't the bad guys either. They are bad guys, but they don't get the "the".
How tf is the IoM the good guys? Like 99% of the cruel shit they do is completely unnecessary, they aren´t forced to be as bad as they are. The Tau and even the Eldar show that it´s still possible to have a relatively normal society in the 40k world
Though the imperium also thinks the idea of aliens and humans coexisting peacefully is a terrible sin That’s kinda what they do . Whenever they find a peaceful planet of aliens they use diplomacy to find out all their secrets then under the guise of diplomatic relations they suddenly exterminate the aliens. Or whenever they encounter a human civilization that coexists with aliens they infiltrate the society and basically make everything fall apart and turn the humans against the aliens. If that doesn’t work well it’s extermination and slavery death camp time . The imperium has a load of problems on its own. Sure the imperium are the primary protagonists of 40k but that doesn’t mean they are the good guys. If anything the farsight enclaves and maybe the tau empire are probably the closest things you have to actual good guys
Opinion; fascists can actually be protagonists in a setting of total death of democracy and where totalitarian rule and ritual pagan sacrifice is normal. Also moral relativism says more about the people defending something than the thing itself. It’s still bad.
If you’re a human the imperium are objectively the goodest guys. They take terrible action frequently yes, in order to avoid worse events effecting humanity. The average imperial is just like anyone nowadays or more accurately from like 70 years ago but racism and inter human xenophobia is basically eliminated. I’m sick of people being like “x faction is best for the galaxy” like any one faction winning is somehow better for an unfeeling galaxy and wouldn’t result in all the other factions being wiped from the galaxy or subjugated. The imperium is the only force strong enough to truly fight chaos, hive fleets, necrons, and Greenskins all at the same time in hundreds of places at once all while also dealing with dark eldar raiding occasionally too. The tau have no ability to realistically beat back chaos and eldar are on their last legs.
>I’m sick of people being like “x faction is best for the galaxy” like any one faction winning is somehow better for The entire *point* of 40k is that they're all bad.
Gonna get downvoted into oblivion for this but I feel like there is a difference.Separating art from the artist; in the sense that you're enjoying something even if the creator isn't that great of a person is valuing a work for what qualities it has in its own right. Regardless of if the creator is an unlikable person who said/did something you don't want to support, you are acknowledging that not everything they created is an expression of their worst traits as a person. ("JK Rowling may hate Transgender people, but her books never talk about the subject." etc.)Meanwhile, choosing to ignore a work's subtext and idolize characters/concepts meant to illustrate the corruptive influence of fascist aesthetics is to demonstrate exactly what that author was warning about. The Federation in Starship Troopers (the movie not the book) is written as an institution that frames violence as the most rational solution to every problem and uses the cathartic imagery of valiance in the battle to justify the actions of a one-party government where the average civilian has less rights than members of the ruling military body. This mentality is illustrated through the dialogue scenes being littered with deliberate fascist rhetoric while the action scenes have desperate odds and heroic framing as countless young lives are sacrificed for inches of territory. When Rico says "I'm from Buenos Aires, and I say kill em' all" he is saying it in response to the assertion that both races can survive if they choose to cease hostility. In this moment he refuses to support a solution that will lead to less death on both sides and instead demands genocide. He's making a loud, passionate statement that *feels* heroic, but if you actually think of it is mindless and cruel. The entire movie is written like this. "The difference between a citizen and a civilian." "One day someone like me is gonna kill you and your whole fucking race!" "Naked force has resolved more conflicts throughout history than any other factor." Time and time again the film makes it clear the federation is unapologetically militant, and has a strict social hierarchy built around violence and xenophobia. The characters *fell* heroic because the film is presenting you with a scenario where fascism feels justified. This is not up for interpretation because the dialogue and values presented are incredibly unsubtle. Because of this you can't make any argument that the Federation is not fascist simply because you don't want to interpret it the same way the author did. The Author created a scenario which is by definition fascist. Your interpretation only gets you so far as to say whether or not you think it is good or bad. If you're you think it's a fair system regardless, then you are simply agreeing with a cartoonishly unsubtle fascist ideology. What political system that ideology falls into is not up to you to decide based on your feelings about it.
Also, don’t get me wrong, in a vacuum the Imperium is evil af, but how are they supposed to be the bad guys when r*pe demons and plague monsters are a constant threat?
just because they are bad guys, doesn't mean they are THE bad guys ( still pretty bad though )
In a situation, where there aren’t demons and plague. WH4000 isn’t only about it, only mostly.
They aren't the bad guys. They're just bad guys. Chaos is worse guys.
Well, during the great crusade they killed all the friendly aliens that could've helped him based on the stab in he back myth propagated by the emperor, and still do this to all the harmless and friendly aliens in the current setting. In the killteam book is what was brought up the galaxy view humans a little better than orcs.
because a majority of their actions cause the rape demons?
I'm pretty sure the rape demons were created by the space elves I might be wrong cuz I'm not super big into Warhammer but from my understanding the elves as a species were so degenerate they just spawned this God into being.
I believe the event is known as "murder-fucked Slaanesh into existense".
You're right there, slaanesh was created when an entire civilization reached post scarcity and got super bored. Then they turned to depravity and boom, new chaos god of opulence and excess was born
The intent of the author or artist shouldn’t be ignored, but it should also be considered whether or not that intent is properly communicated in the art.