7821284
Feels like it really should.

7821287
Not really. I mean, does it matter if the "deep state" is domestic or international? Does it matter if the "deep state" is involved in this at all or even exists? What matters is that politicians use courts, entertainment, and news media as weapons. And if it comes to the point when you can be arrested just by being pointed out as a "general bad guy" without a solid case while your supporters are just banned on social networks on a whim, how you can say that your country is a Democracy?

7821288
I’m under the assumption that it matters to a lot of people on grounds that generally everyone who has something to say about it seems to believe that it is absolutely the biggest threat to the United States, and that the real champions of the people are trying to take it down and that Christian God has hand picked the aforementioned champions to do just that.
Unless of course the Deep State is just a meme and everyone taking it seriously is actually only speaking ironically because ‘Lulz’ and if that’s the case then I’m disappointed that nobody has credited it with having raped Big Brother while forcing Skynet to watch.

7821299
Just like many people, you understood it all backwards. What matters to people the most is the world turning to sh!t - economy crumbling, moral standards being all over the place, news media lying and getting away with it, and common people punished for even a single word of criticism. And the government that was supposed to be elected by the people from the people and for the people fails to do anything to change the situation.

And, of course, people (especially the ones who believe in Democracy in general and the US being the a beacon of Democracy specifically) now wondering how everything could come to this. In past centuries, the explanation would probably be along the lines of God's will and Satan messing with mortals. But since the religion and supernatural are no longer mainstream belief, theories about "deep state" and other types of conspiracies took that place.

7821307
Hold up; if religion is no longer mainstream, then why are the people who have most to say about the Deep State primarily Christians, or trying to specifically appeal to Christian faith?

7821338

people who have most to say about the Deep State primarily Christians, or trying to specifically appeal to Christian faith?

Are you sure about that? I never saw any corellation between belief in Deep State and belief in Christianity.

7821341

I never saw any corellation between belief in Deep State and belief in Christianity

I don't see the correlation either; which is why I find it both strange and fascinating that there isn't a short supply of people in the United States who identify as Christian while believing that the Deep State is very real and very interested in taking away their rights, kids, jobs, ect.

My question stands: if religion is no longer mainstream, then why are the people who have most to say about the Deep State primarily Christians, or trying to specifically appeal to Christian faith?

7821363

people who have most to say about the Deep State primarily Christians, or trying to specifically appeal to Christian faith
I don't see the correlation

You either don't understand what corellation means or trying to say something that I don't quite follow.

there isn't a short supply of people in the United States who identify as Christian

Well, maybe "not mainstream" was a bit of an exaggeration on my part but still - people who actually make their decisions based on what their God (or Church) tells them to do are not as prevalent in the US (and around the world in general) as a few decades ago.

Correlation meaning a mutual relationship or connection between two or more things. I do not myself understand how Christianity is compatible with the concept of a Deep State successfully gaining ground on behalf of Anti-Christian forces on grounds that Christianity teaches that Christian God is Perfect and therefore does not lose ground.
And yet you have a lot of Christians in America who believe that Donald Trump was handpicked by Christian God to lead the Christian United States of America, but was defeated by the Deep State in 2020.

Christianity is in decline in the US, but Christianity hasn't lost relevance in the US. Politicians continue to court Christians for their votes, and will continue to do so as long as Christianity has a significant chunk of the voting public.

7821503

Correlation meaning a mutual relationship or connection between two or more things.

Actually, not necessarily. There is even a saying "Correlation doesn't mean causation", that points how correlating things aren't necessarily connected.

I do not myself understand how Christianity is compatible with the concept of a Deep State successfully gaining ground on behalf of Anti-Christian forces on grounds that Christianity teaches that Christian God is Perfect and therefore does not lose ground.

You do know there is a difference between God and Church, right?

Christianity is in decline in the US, but Christianity hasn't lost relevance in the US.

In the 90-s people were afraid that spells in D&D can teach kids to summon actual demons. Today Satanism is officially recognized and protected religion. What relevance are you talking about?

Politicians continue to court Christians for their votes, and will continue to do so as long as Christianity has a significant chunk of the voting public.

And brony fandom is a significant chunk of creators online. Are you going to say that it's still as relevant as it was during G4?

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11956199/Harry-Potter-fans-vow-boycott-HBO-TV-series-JK-Rowlings-views-trans-debate.html

First off, me posting a link to the Daily Mail is not a reflection of my own political beliefs or positions, just what I could find that’s most related to what I’m about to talk about. There are people freaking out that a TV show based on the Harry Potter books is probably getting made.

I’m getting real sick and tired of this! Did people not learn anything from the Hogwarts Legacy boycott?! It didn’t work, in fact, it completely backfired with the game selling at least 12 million copies and it's not even out yet on the Switch or previous gen consoles. I would hope people will be able to learn from their mistakes, but nope, as per usual, they double down. Now granted it’ll be harder to track if someone watches the show compared to who played the game, but still. Harry Potter was on a downward spiral for awhile with The Cursed Child not being well received and the Fantastic Beasts movies getting progressively worse, so much so that they canceled the 4^th and 5^th movies. Hogwarts Legacy effectively gave the franchise a second wind and personally got me out of my Harry Potter “retirement” as I was pretty much done with it after the 8^th movie.

How is this rage helping transgender people? Yes, I’m aware of Rowling’s views and her trying to make changes in the law regarding transgender people. I’m not for that. But, it doesn’t excuse everything people do to try to stop this. I’m a transwoman myself, yet, I get treated like a pick me or a traitor for not agreeing with the transgender community, which is in part why I’m just done with the community. I say in part because for years the wokeness and far left mentality has been a complete turn off for me because it does lead to drama with no room for any differences of opinion at all. The bullying and harassment of people over a video game was my last straw, especially when these people didn’t put nearly as much focus on say, targeting the books, movies, or toys that Rowling profits from. They straight up want her broke which is just not going to happen. They tried and failed often to cancel her.

If anything this Hogwarts Legacy boycott just made things even worse for transgender people. It reinforces the idea they’re mentally ill crybullies, aka acting like cry babies while also bullying people. It’s usually the toxic activists who are not even trans themselves, being some of the worst allies I never wanted trying to speak on my behalf. I'm beyond sick of these people because they can even be worse than actual transphobes.

I know I talked about this before in this very thread and I’m back ranting and venting again about it. I’ll stop talking about this when people stop trying to “help” transgender people like me by trying to boycott and cancel a billionaire when that has failed numerous times before. Please, focus on other ways of trying to actually help transgender people, because boycotting Rowling isn’t working and doing so actually makes her even more popular. Please stop trying to do the same things that didn’t work before and trying to get people to boycott the likely upcoming TV show isn’t going to magically work this time.

7822981
This is kind of how I feel about Butch Heartman. I like the man but I stopped supporting him because he was a scam artist. I am pretty sure he’s bipolar too so anyway I felt the movement against him was way more rational than the HP boycott. I slowly took my time and began to support that. I even unsubscribed to his channel. Sometimes it takes a while for me to get on board when I a, attached to something. Now Butch no longer has the rights to Danny Phantom. Apparently, the people who actively called for the HP boycott are also the ones who called to boycott Bud Light because they were for trans people and had a trans influencer on their beer cans.

7823490
Can't say I really know him. Is this related to a plagiarism case? That is a pretty grave sin to commit in a creative field. As for the Bud Light situation, it's complex and one I don't know much about it. I do know there was a backlash against it. I don't know if it was because of a trans influence in general or because of the specific one that chose. It's really frustrating for me these days because it seems like misconceptions and hatred of transgender people is at an all time high. I feel hated by both the left and the right, stuck between a rock and a hard place. There's too many terrible activists and allies who made the situation way worse trying to do boycott Rowling, which failed multiple times prior and they seemingly haven't learned their lesson at all.

7823510
Yeah and other stuff too but for me it was the streaming service he promised that did it for me. I was pretty much kept in the dark waiting for it.

7823490 I lost respect for Butch Hartman because he made all these promises, yet hasn't kept them. He kept talking about this streaming service of family entertainment, which is a good idea actually, but I have heard almost nothing about it ever since. Aside from his reputation going down the toilet in part over it and walking away with that money from the GoFundme it is almost like it never even happened.

7823599
That is why I no longer support him.

7823600 I don't either, I feel like he betrayed my trust and the trust of all of his fans with that. I will admit I am not familiar with the plagiarism allegations against him, but I am unfortunately not surprised.

7823601
I have not heard of the plagiarism but I did hear he was a scam artist. I am glad Butch Heartman has no involvement in the new Danny Phantom graphic novel. Looking forward to it.

Aside from underestimating libertarians and incorrect analysis on "conspiracy theories" (which may as well be called spoiler alerts at this point) he is pretty on point. A backlash against the insanity of the current left is understandable, though there is indeed a real danger of it going way too far and I am already seeing potential warning signs of that. I indeed want the pendulum to swing, but not swing so far as it did in Europe from the 1930s throughout much of the Cold War. Out of the factions of the right mentioned I of course want the libertarians to win out, but the "lobsters" would be the best outcome aside from that with the a religious far right being the worst possible outcome.

Since the powers that be are mostly spouting bullshit about him, I thought I would just post a link to the actual speech announcing RFK Jr.'s presidential run. Since he is running as a Democrat he is challenging Biden to a primary battle. While RFK Jr. might possibly get epsteined and probably won't win I don't believe this campaign will be a waste. RFK Jr. has brought attention to important issues over the years with the most important one he has addressed being the corruption of big pharma.

He's been on YouTube for pretty much forever at this point. I'm legit surprised he's chosen to make a video on this subject matter that's actually in support of transgender people. Perhaps I notice it so much because I'm a transwoman myself, but it does seem like the backlash against transgender people in the past couple of years has gotten far worse. Now yes, I have on this very website called out what I've seen as bad behavior by transgender people and allies. I still stand by those criticisms, but at the same time, I don't want to in any way promote hatred of transgender people for simply being transgender. That was never my point. On Twitter, you'll find the worst examples of all kinds of people, although the terrible transgender people and allies are not limited to just Twitter. This video does heavily call out the right for their part in quite frankly, the transphobia that's been rampant lately. I'm not sure if I would go as far as comparing them to Nazis, I don't want to become woke in a far left way. Even the left get some criticism in the video.

In my own experiences of being transgender, it is extremely frustration how everyone online acts like an expect on the subject matter. Their "advice" boils down to "just don't be trans lmao" or "do this process or take these meds". Its always so damn easy sounding. Now look, there have been people who regretted transitioning, detransitioning does happen. However, the anti-side acts like *everyone* who attempts to transition will regret it. It's just yet another part of how mental health conditions are highly misunderstood. Naturally these people don't have gender dysphoria themselves, so they couldn't possibly understand what it's like to have it. We still have people who deny that depression is a real thing. I even dealt with doctors and therapists even as late as 2018 who basically dismissed me being transgender.

I'm truly stuck between a rock and a hard place. On one hand, there's the woke far left transgender community and activists who just make things worse for themselves and other transgender people with radical extremist behavior. You know, going after people for playing a damn wizard game, claiming that will enable the murder of transgender people or something. You know, hyperbole except with zero self awareness. I want nothing to do with them. And then you got the other side that will hate you for being transgender ("we're just hating you for being stupid!") and won't shut up about how you're trans and confused and brainwashed mentally ill and all that stuff. It doesn't matter what you do in your life, they'll be so hung up on you being transgender because they think you're weak for not simply walking away from it. There is of course a middle ground, but that seems harder to find these days.

As I said multiple times before, I wish I was never transgender because that would make my life a lot easier, although still with other problems like being autistic. But as a result, it means pretty much all of my stories here will very heavily focus on female characters unless writing about crossovers with male leads. And it's why any romance I write is going to be lesbian focused. I'll acknowledge straight relationships, but kissing and such isn't written "on screen". I guess you can argue a high degree of love for women.

Happy Mother's Day.

https://nypost.com/2023/05/16/taco-bell-fighting-to-free-taco-tuesday-trademark/

This is so stupid, how does the concept of Taco Tuesday of all things have a trademark on it? Our copyright/patent/trademark system is broken.

7836564
If you think 'Taco Tuesday' being a trademarked phrase is fucking stupid then I don't advise looking into who holds copyright over religious texts.

Just my two cents:
I feel that 'Taco Tuesday' being a trademarked phrase is a fucking farce; and any religious denomination that respects privatized human ownership of a text they credit to divinity instead of being content with it being within the Public Domain, is a fucking scam.

7836587

7836634
I'm not a Christian, but I am totally behind what the pastor is saying. A 10-year-old doesn't need to learn about this stuff. Save that to later high school or something. This book being for younger people is just reinforcing the idea that the left are coming for your kids. That we've become so "progressive" that we're just straight up trying to threat young children as adults. There's a difference with being accepting of LGBT stuff and teaching young kids about sexual acts. The people who can't tell the difference have no business being around kids. Seriously, why would a 10-year-old need to know about different sexual positions?

I did a Jeffrey Epstein deepfake, in this one he is speculating about whether or not RFK Jr will get suicided.

This is why I don't support causes and movements. Because they're infested with despicable people like this perpetrator.

7837869 Supporting causes is good as long as they are just, there does need to be some caution with supporting movements due to bad actors being common in large scale movements. I wish I had an easy answer for how to minimize the amount of and damage caused by bad actors, but one thing I have noticed is that bad actors in social movements is becoming more commonplace as the degree of government involvement in our lives grows and I don't think this is a mere coincidence. As a general rule I regard myself as a thinking rational individual first and go from there, too many people make the mistake of treating causes like religious cults and letting them override their sense of reason and decency. Much of this is due to a crisis in meaning where people do this because they need meaning in their lives and feel on a subconscious level that it is the only way they can maintain this. The breakdown of apolitical associations and institutions has caused a lot of social damage that is continuing to get worse.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/courts/scotus-give-irs-ok-to-seek-bank-records-without-notice

This is one of the worst rulings the Supreme Court has made in a long time, some justices may be a tad better than others but none of these people are our friends. This ruling is a huge blow for the 4th Amendment and financial liberty.

I did a deepfake of my governor, Newsolini.

I think celestia falls under that kind of leadership by not telling anyone.

Plus Luna is best

https://babylonbee.com/news/jabba-the-hutt-complains-of-discrimination-after-airline-charges-him-for-multiple-seats

Affirmative Action is a backward, racist policy that relies on the lie that minorities can't get ahead unless they are diversity admission/hire. If a university wants to do this than they can do it without taking a dime of taxpayer dollars.

https://news.yahoo.com/supreme-court-rules-colleges-must-141059648.html

I'll just mention that beyond the limits the video is about, you can no longer read tweets at all if you aren't logged into twitter.

(And there sure are a lot of people on mastodon right now...)

--Sweetie Belle

The only people declaring Sound of Freedom a "conspiracy" are either paedophiles, or have some extremely ugly secrets to hide:

If being against child trafficking makes you "far-right", somebody get me a MAGA hat.

Having to make this video is as heartbreaking as it is infuriating to me.

Meanwhile, on Twitter.

I'm noticing a lot of culture war stuff posted in the forums, of which even includes me. Take the word woke and how loaded it is. Doesn't help people can't even come to an agreement on exactly what it means. I'm kinda wondering just how long this can keep going before it really gets to a breaking point. And who knows how much people are getting right or wrong about each other. Now given what website we're on, I'll imagine at the very least, people are okay with female led franchises. So I don't think it's a case of sexism, at least not as much as usual, of the arguments that happens around here.

I'm having a hard time imagining someone that doesn't like women as a whole would be on a website focused on a franchise with majority female characters, especially with some of the most powerful characters being female like every alicorn we've seen in the show, G5 included, being female. And far as I know, FiM never gets into a "boys vs. girls" thing that other cartoons might, of which girls have to win or the cartoon will slammed for what they'll call sexism.

So, I don't suppose there is a way even with disagreements on these things that we don't make judgments on entire people's characters? As in members on this site. Rarely are things so black and white like they're made out to be. And it'll also be something I need to be aware of in my own writings as well, although it has been some time since I posted a thread like that. It's usually been about MLP and some other things here and there.

7861186

Now given what website we're on, I'll imagine at the very least, people are okay with female-led franchises. So I don't think it's a case of sexism, at least not as much as usual, of the arguments that happens around here.

Dude! What are you even talking about? No one ever had a problem with female characters, black characters, or LGBT+characters. Well, maybe someone had but those people never existed in any significant capacity. As long as the characters are well-written and don't try to push some "social justice" agenda on the audience, the audience is fine with them, whoever they may be. Heck, even when a character does try to push some weird ideas but those ideas are depicted simply as a character's point of view and not some universal self-evident truth the audience must embrace - that's still fine for most people.

It's when the movie (series, comic, game, etc) tries to push some ideological crap at the expense of the story or characters (especially characters who are well-established and beloved by many) - that's when people start to push back. And then immediately all those feminists, BLM activists, LGBT+activists, and other SJW types jump out and screech - You just hate female leads! You just hate PoC leads! You just hate LGBTQ12345+ YoU jUsT cAnT aCcEpT dIvErSiTy!

I can accept diversity. I can't accept bullshit.

7861186 You can count the number of people that have an actual problem with female characters on one hand, even back in the 80s when it was revealed at the end of the first Metroid game that Samus was a woman the reaction was largely positive. One thing woke "entertainment" does that I and many others find annoying is engaging in tokenism by focusing on "diversity" by arbitrarily changing the race, gender of sexual orientation of established characters, or worse yet try to do this with historical figures (someone needs to tell Netflix that Cleopatra was ethnically Greek, not black). There are a lot of already established characters that fit those parameters, and there is always room for more characters that fit those parameters. I am currently reading a comic series from the independent comic book called Rippaverse called Isom, company founder Eric July started his company in response to the woke trends in American comic books and to set up an alternative to that. The majority of the major characters in Isom are black, but there is zero tokenism or race baiting, it is just a good comic series so far (only issue 1 has been released so far and number 2 is coming soon). One of the main justifications given for tokenism is this ridiculous idea that characters have to look like their audience for their audience to relate to them when that is a complete and utter load of crap. I am not Japanese, but I read a lot of manga and watch a lot of anime and like many of those characters just fine. I am not black either, but am enjoying Isom so far. I am not a woman, but got into MLP at the recommendation of a friend (also male).

7861256
Whoa, whoa! Hey there, I'm not saying what you're saying I am saying. I was not making my post based on me thinking like I'm the one who's far left leaning saying that people have a problem with minority characters. I swear, I can never explain things clearly enough to make sure people get the right context of what I'm saying. What I am saying is that I don't think people here are against female characters and such. So we are in agreement when it comes to that. Honestly, we're probably in agreement with a bunch of things. Please don't mistake me for someone that's woke. I bring this up because I still see posts here regarding things like the Barbie movie being "men just hate female leads" and such. We both know that isn't true and I'm saying that is especially true for people on this website given how heavily female led MLP is. I'm even praising MLP for not getting into that woke agenda crap. You can have any minority of characters in a work and that won't make it woke, just how they handle them. If MLP were about "girls rule boys drool", I might not be here.

7861284
The woke people sure don't believe that. People have legit criticisms of things like this and they're all like "you just hate minorities!". Now sure, the actual alt right might, but they're far and few in-between compared to most other people. I'm saying that just about anyone on this website probably doesn't hate female led franchises mainly marketed toward young girls. Okay, so maybe nowadays MLP markets outside of that demographic as well, but certainly not when the Brony fandom first became a thing.

I generally don't like lazy race swaps, among other ones. Yet I'll get woke people calling me racist for not wanting sloppy seconds. I am black and given everything else is equal, I do find other black characters and people more appealing than other races. It is a racial bias toward what I also am. Which isn't to say I wouldn't date women of other races, but her being black does make her more favorable to me. Now white people can't say stuff like this without being called racist, although every other way can without the same backlash. I'm also not one of those woke people who believe that races should be separated for their own good, much like what happened not all that long ago in America history.

With that said, anime is very popular among black people, including me, and you'll be hard pressed to find black anime characters. Which isn't me saying they shouldn't exist, I'll welcome more, but I won't be demanding it or race swapping anime characters to fit my views. I say that and I've written and plan to write the majority of female MLP characters as lesbians. Sexuality changes are by far the most common changes in fan fic since... probably forever. Still, I won't be going around acting like headcanon is canon. I know Twilight in canon isn't looking to hook up with mares. I know Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy in the final episode of MLP have a male partner. Could say they're bisexual or ignore the canon ship entirely.

I'm aware of Isom and how much backlash Eric July got for it. Mainstream websites won't even acknowledge his comic exists because it would break the narrative. They should be so happy that a black man has found success in the industry that is rapidly falling to manga. Yet I totally believe it when he said he got some of the most racist backlash over this from the far left which just further reinforces my beliefs that they're pretty racist despite claiming not to be. I know I've seen him called a monkey. I even saw people try to call Isom woke because it features largely black characters, not understanding that wokeness isn't simply having minority characters.

It's funny how woke started off with black people several decades ago as a sign of being aware of social issues. Even for the past decade when it came back to use, the far left loved using the word, then it got hijacked by their opponents and now you can't even say woke without being accused of being far right.

I do wish people wouldn't call all the backlash against the Barbie movie as butthurt men who can't stand to see leading women because that is mostly not true. Yet they've been doing this since at least Ghostbusters 2016, maybe even sooner. And people think girl power must also mean male bashing or talking about how special and powerful women are as if they'll fall apart if not surrounded by positive reinforcement. Which to me actually sounds like belittling women. I'm personally already beyond annoyed with how much transgender people like me have the woke crowd acting like I need to be told over and over again I'm really a woman to not fall apart. And yes, I'm fully, painfully aware that I can't biologically become a woman no matter how much money is spent. But then I'll get called transphobic for not pretending I'm no different than women.

Wow, that sure went off much differently than I intended to.

7861355
Welcome to the internet: where every opinion slightly different than yours came from someone who will burn your house down, kick your dog, eat your children, stab your grandma, and all while making you watch if you’re too much of a pussy to argue with them.

7861355

What I am saying is that I don't think people here are against female characters and such. So we are in agreement when it comes to that.

Yes, I understand. And I'm glad you haven't bought into that woke nonsense. But I was trying to say that yes - here, on this site, it's most obvious that people who dislike woke media don't hate women and aren't against female leads. However, what I was also saying - even in places that are less obvious, dislike for female leads barely ever existed. It was all fake claims that some clout chasers, like Anita Sarkeesian, made up.

https://nypost.com/2023/07/28/facebook-removed-covid-19-posts-under-white-house-pressure-report/

But "it is a private company" right? This is an obvious 1st Amendment violation and impeachment worthy.

7861440
And it's only gotten a lot worse. People will claim to be on your side, but turn on you in an instant if you disagree with them on seemingly anything. I swear I'm very living proof of this, far from the only example of course. It's like shut up and be happy with what we do for you. Well I never asked certain people to "help" me while doing a completely awful job of it. For example, me being a transwoman. I'm expected to ignore biology and act like I'm no different than women. I'm expected to think and act a certain way and since I don't, I'm a pick me.

I get accused of trying to win favor with the right when I'm really not since I know they're not very fond of transgender people. It's mostly due to wokeness. So it puts me in a really terrible position. By the right, I'm brainwashed into believing I can change my sex when they don't understand I know I can't. The left will like me till I disagree with them and state that transwomen are not the same as women and that self-identifying shouldn't be so easy, especially for being allowed in private gendered spaces. That's not me saying transwomen are predators, that's me saying society doesn't work like that, a man who has no intentions to transition, saying he's a woman and therefore must be allowed into women's shelters. In fact, most men are not predators, but we still bar them from female spaces anyway. I'll still respect and acknowledge transwomen as women, but that doesn't mean I'm going to ignore the ways they are different from biological women.

7861520
And yet the woke mob will still hang onto the idea that anyone against wokeness "must" hate women or other minorities. This website is very pro female. For some reason, you can't dislike characters like Rey without being accused of hating strong female characters in general. Compared to other leads like Luke Skywalker, they try to make it seem like sexism is the reason people don't like Rey. And no matter how false the narrative is, they'll push it over and over again. I'm sure once The Marvels comes out (for however much longer that takes), the movie probably won't preform well and they'll blame men for not seeing it, while ignoring all the women who also won't go see it. It's really quite tiring, almost makes me think they're winning.

Yet, this year alone so many movies flopped. Although Barbie was a runaway success so no doubt Disney and others will try chasing that and failing. It's amusing how for pretty much forever till like a decade ago, companies were hyper focused on making profit. Wokeness is so strong now they're trying their hardest to send the "right" messages even if it costs billions of dollars.

7241220
But then the question is? Is it 'who they are'? Since you claim to be Christian, I feel that to truly love someone, you call out their sinful behavior. Christ did NOT affirm people in their sin. Gods love is transformational, not affirmational.