They started an unprovoked three front war, prioritize citizens differently based on a state defined class system, got the earth blown up on at least one occasion, use their soldiers as disposable cannon fodder, and send everyone who disagree with them to reeducation camps. Other than that its a swell place.
Its tiring how bad general media literacy is that I can’t tell if the 4chan post above is a joke.
The 4chan post probably is a joke.
The problem is, with a lot of their jokes, other users can’t tell, so it becomes reality. See also, basically everything wrong with the US and MAGA idiots today.
I’ve seen one Lemmy bigbrain recently argue that even when artists are showing mafia or army to be terrible for people in them, they romanticize the mafia and army nonetheless, and that in general media glorifies its subject matter regardless of the author’s intent. This schmuck would probably say with a straight face that ‘Helldivers’, or whatever this post is about, actually advocates for its model of utopia even if it pretends not to.
The idea of there being no anti-war films is older than Lemmy. The problem is Poe’s Law related. You can make a movie or a game that shows the horror of war or the tyranny of distopian totalitarian regimes, but regardless of the intended message, your creation is filtered through your audience’s lenses of perception, and some of that audience has been raised to be white supremacists, some have been through schooling that acts more as indoctrination than education, and some of that audience are just seriously fucking stupid.
Yeah, I think I’ve heard of the ‘no anti-war films’ sentiment before, and vaguely heard that army recruiting increased after ‘Full Metal Jacket’, of all films. However, I don’t agree that idiocy of some part of the public is a reason to write off army, mafia, or any such quasi-satire media wholesale, as the aforementioned commenter did. That position essentially says that it’s not allowed to do critique of institutions and practices as part of ‘entertainment’ art (unless one hams it up to eleven, I guess).
The whole point of Poe’s Law is that you can’t get away from it even if you ham it to eleven, or even 38.7 gigahams/second. Unless you explicitly state ‘This is satire. That stuff is bad,’ there is little to no way to tell if it’s satire or extremism, and even if you do make it explicit, there are always the idiots who won’t notice that part and assume it’s sincere, (see naive interpretations of Starship Troopers) and those who willfully block out that part because they sincerely hold an opposing view. (See white nationalists opinions on American History X)
No one is saying it’s ‘not allowed’ for people to make those things. They’re saying it’s literally impossible because of how the media work. The kind of people who are saying ‘you can’t’ would love it to be possible. If we could movie our way to a utopia, it’d be awesome, but it seems we can’t.
You seem to agree with my position in the first paragraph.
No one is saying it’s ‘not allowed’ for people to make those things.
It’s remarkable how you apparently listened in on my comment exchange with the aforementioned unnamed person. Truly impressive capability. Could you please cite the exact argument they presented, since you know it so dearly?
That response is in itself an example of the issue at hand. Are you actually asking or just being sarcasticly snide in a way that doesn’t fully come across in text?
Why are you talking as if their argument is completely nonsensical or novel? It’s kind of a known thing that even if you portray something as “bad” as possible, there will be a number of people that look past/ don’t see the criticism of the subject and take the creation of work as a sign that the subject is to be praised. Look at the music industry with gang violence, misogyny and drug use; lots of more modern artists make music that shows how these things harm society, yet casual listeners will put on a song about alcohol abuse to get drunk at a party.
It isn’t necessarily that the artist is advocating for it, so much as they’ve produced a work that can be misinterpreted (unintentionally or otherwise) to do so.
Why are you talking as if this argument doesn’t generalize an interpretation by some section of the audience to general treatment of any and all such media wholesale? Did you miss the part where it says that the media in question romanticizes the depicted practices regardless of any intent of the author, or interpretation by the generally intelligent audience? You’re saying that the stupidest possible understanding of the media is what all media should aim for, otherwise by that commenter’s argument it shouldn’t exist. I don’t think you seriously realize how deranged this take is. It’s straight up advocating for the ‘Idiocracy’ society.
Good art doesn’t pander to the common denominator, it lifts the audience above it.
I genuinely have zero idea how you came to any of the conclusions you did based on what I said. Maybe there’s more context to the comment you were originally talking about, but nowhere did I ever even imply that artists should “aim for” or pander to the common denominator. I’m saying that, no matter the artists intentions, no matter how obvious or on the nose the messaging is, there are going to be cops with Punisher tattoos, and teenagers with stolen cars and guns listening to Kendrick Lamar. If you make a movie about how the Nazis were psychopathic fascists who eventually get destroyed, there will be people who can’t get over how cool their aesthetic was. None of this is to say that this art should not exist, I’m not detracting from the artists. I’m pointing out a flaw in society. Messaging in art, no matter how well crafted, will never say the same thing to everyone, for better or worse.
Ah, so you’re saying that some portion, perhaps very minuscule, of the audience, would be enamoured with the bad guys as role models.
But, you see, that’s quite different from what I quoted originally as: “[these artists] romanticize the mafia and army nonetheless, and in general media glorifies its subject matter regardless of the author’s intent“.
You seem to agree with me that a small share of especially stupid people would derive their own messaging from the art. This doesn’t change the fact that this media, in general, does the critique quite alright, as opposed to what the above quote says.
People forget that r/thedonald started out as a meme space. And then eventually people started taking it seriously.
Because people are stupid.
Basically flat earth society again huh?
Is this helldivers? The game where half of a planet’s population is forcibly turned into bug fuel every few years?
Theres a reoccuring problem with bigly brained thinkers where they omit all the terrible shit and look at only what the propaganda wants them to. Even in a game this remains true.
Most clips from Starship Troopers on YouTube have filled comments’ sections with people waxing about how based the society is and it’s actually a utopia (to your point).
Well the movie elimanted the entire opening sequence of the book where they are just being terrorists in their super space suits (which the movie also did not include). I think that was necessary to drive the point home.
I’ve heard that the book was sincere jingoism, which the director of the movie didn’t like one bit and turned it into clever satire of fascism instead? Haven’t read it, but the movie is great, even if there’s a bunch if idiots on both sides (fascist and antifascists) thinking that it’s sincere.
Heinlein was…rather directionless on his politics. I think it was Clarke that once remarked that Heinlein’s politics depended on who he was sleeping with - which is why you get weird whiplash from the anti-governance free-love (and incest and racism) in Methuselah’s Children and Farnham’s Freehold to a full throated defense of utopian fascism in Starship Troopers.
Its bad, dude sounded like he wanted this the entire time and it really would be better. But that scene in the beginning stuck with me through the entire reading and I came out with nearly the same interpretation as the movie.
I have a lot of thoughts and feelings related to the book because, while there is a lot of garbage in it, the core thesis spelled out at one point in the last third I think is very worthwhile and came at a time in my life (just turned 21 when I first read it) that it helped shape my political views. As another commenter said Heinlein was never very consistent in the politics portrayed in his stories, which I’ve understood as him exploring various views more than wholeheartedly endorsing any one of them.
First, the garbage. It’s pretty clearly pro military, as the in-book government was established by veterans seizing power and the primary path to having political power (being a voting citizen as opposed to a civilian) is through military service. There’s lip service paid that it’s any kind of civil service (Neil Patrick Harris’s character goes off to a research lab for experimenting in the book), but it’s only a sentence or two. No source on this, but my gut says Heinlein probably wanted to explore the idea more but was hampered by the fact he was writing a space military adventure and needed to focus on that. There’s also a lot of 50’s values espoused for separating genders into different groups and that spanking your kids is good no matter what the “bleeding hearts” might say.
The biggest difference that bothers me between the book and movie is how soldier lives are valued, best displayed through the tactics humanity uses. In the movie humanity uses almost the same strategy as the bugs. Get a lot of troops, equip them about as cheaply as possible, then send swarms of them to deal with bugs. Mass casualties are a given. The book is one of if not the first example of power armor turning a soldier into almost a one man army. It’s stated at one point that a single soldier is about as effective as 1000 bug drones in combat. This, along with statements from multiple officers throughout the book, shows me that individual soldier lives are actually valued in the book, and that while they are spent they are not wasted the way they are in the movie.
But for me, the most important takeaway from the book is a lecture given to Johnny Rico during officer school where the instructor lays out why service is required for citizenship. Essentially the goal is to ensure that the only people making decisions on behalf of society (ie politicians and the people that vote them in) are putting the good of that society over their own personal wellbeing. The service citizens go through is meant to weed out selfish people by putting them through difficult experiences where it would be in their best interest to quit rather than continue. While I doubt the book’s system would actually achieve that, I do think that the value of society-serving rather than self-serving voters and politicians is correct and probably the most important thing that a society could achieve (not that I know how to achieve that). It’s the first thing I ask myself when deciding who to vote for now, “does this person actually care about the people they’ll be representing or are they just interested in having power?”
Having now looked through several comment sections, I found like 10 satire comments jokingly going along with fascist rhetoric and 3 genuinely mask off accounts. I don’t think it’s very common, at least in default sorting. I don’t know or care to learn how to sort by new, on mobile.
That’s fair; could’ve also just been my timing, too, and there was a surge or something, at the moment I was looking, but it’s not consistently the case.
A lot of people I’ve met would honestly happily take a 50% chance to be sacrificed to ensure that those who aren’t chosen live a happy life. I have no doubt that they’d think that right up until they’re actually chosen, then they’d scream bloody murder about how unfair it is.
no racism
white af family is the only visible race
Yeahhhh no fucking thanks.
The helldiver’s two launch cutscene does show an interracial couple in a state propaganda video. Racism is one of the few ways the game doesn’t to my knowledge show the government being fucked up. Everything else is horrible though
The helldivers also have randomized skin colour, so soldiers of all races can become elite troops.
I saw some blog call it woke because of that lamo
Can’t be racism if there’s only one race
If there were only two humans left on Earth, they would find a reason to hate each other.
what? no we wouldn’t. fuck you for suggesting that.
[i meant that as a joke love you dude]
/s works just as well…
yes but it does not express properly. it was not sarcastic, it was facetious.
“amazing quality of life”
Sure, if you’re the right kind of super citizen.
Yea, when choosing a fictional world to aspire for, it’s useful to consider how most citizens are treated.
Our current world is great too, for some.
Anon is probably the kind of person who also thinks Sparta was great, and just disregards that 90% of the population there were slaves.
seems more likely, being it’s 4chan; that they’re 100% aware and in-favor of the slaves, just that they believe they’ll always be in that lucky 10%. Same goes for idolizing Super Earth – it’s never them that’ll be sent to a freedom camp, until it happens, it’s always something that happens to someone else who “probably deserved it”
let’s use the veil of ignorance for this one - when choosing a model society to aspire for pretend you have no idea where you’ll be placed in it. maybe 80% is doing decently, 5% is doing well, and 15% is doing really bad, are you ready to potentially become a part of the 15%? if not, let’s find a different model
Given how many people are willing to bet their money on far worse odds, I think an 85% chance of winning is a bet a lot of people would be willing to take.
This post is approved by the ministry of truth
no racism (no blacks, Asians, jews)
Can’t have racism if there is only one race.
Rollsafe.gif
Isn’t the one character who greets you when you return from a mission black? Or am I misremembering.
Oh, this is from a game?
I thought it was some random channers wet dream
It perfectly captures the parody vibes in the game.
Over the top propaganda is oozing out of every hole of this game. It’s great
Haven’t played in about a year, and the intro really makes me want to fire it up again
Its Helldivers 2 apparrntly, if people don’t want a link.
Helldivers. A game which applies over the top levels of sarcastic propaganda for the managed democracy of Super Earth. In the game, you play as a footsoldier (helldiver) for Super Earth. Hence, the whole culture around the game is soaked with sarcastic propaganda.
You don’t play as A helldiver. You play as as many helldivers as it takes to complete the mission. They literally throw people at the problem until it stops being a problem.
Not if you’re really good at the game. Then you play as the helldiver.
That’s exactly the attitude that makes the Helldivers the best of the best, Son. Have you ever considered signing up to do your part to protect Super Earth?
/s (as is required to really emulate this game’s feel)
More specifically shock soldiers. The SEAF are the actual grunts, Helldivers are more akin to the Trench Raiders or Stormtroopers of WW1.
Coincidentally, that is the cure for Racism that racists prescribe too. Huh, neat.
Ask the IRL Christians how the nuclear family shit is going. No shortage of cheating and drug abuse happening, I bet
wouldnt a superearth have a much higher gravity, which humans cant survive anyways,
they’re talking about Super Earth, a fictional polity, and not a super-Earth, a type of exoplanet
it can be two things. Can you imagine how dense their gyro would be? like, so much beefy lamby tzatzikiy goodness spinning around freely in three axes?
why are they wearing the Orville uniforms
Yikes
They even have a pet son
