Abnormal · 3:11am Oct 7th, 2012
I rent out a room to a housemate. He's a good guy, considerate, sociable, but pretty quiet most of the time. He's here for a job, while his wife and kids are far away, and he's a little lost for what to do with his sudden spare time. So every day, when he gets home around 8, he goes downstairs to my home theater, where he stays until sometime after midnight, watching people kill each other.
He doesn't always watch people kill each other. Sometimes he watches standup comics. But usually he watches people kill each other, with guns, clubs, swords, or lasers. He prefers swords. He watches westerns, medieval and modern war movies, gangster movies, and martial arts films. He turns the volume up, so that when I walk by the top of the stairway I often hear screams, or machine-gun fire, or sounds that I've heard in butcher shops. For four hours, almost every night.
No one finds this unusual. But I have to hide the fact that I like to watch 22 minutes of animated ponies once a week.
I know!
Normalcy is relative and democratic. It depends on both the person in question and the majority opinion. In short, normal is weird.
I have no words for the amount of funny this is.
So true, oh so true.
The world is sick. Ponies help us, but they can't help those we don't think they need that help.
At least we ponyfolk are supporting each other.
I was lost with where you were going with this for a minute. But the ending completely got me. I lol'd.
It's to do with our culture's hero-worship of masculine power fantasies and neo-feudalistic bread and circus acts.
It's backwards isn't it. Violence is so ingrained into our culture that no one bats an eyelash at it. I work with people who regularly watch live footage from war zones and videos have people being mod and brutally murdered.
I understand it from an evolutionary standpoint. Humans have always been hunters as much as farmers. Like all animals we stake out territory to defend. Violence was an necessity of early evolution, but that we haven't moved past it yet is depressing.
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I think it's more about how much gravitas people put into being a fan of pony. I like a long list of cartoons, of which one is FiM. Cartoons are on a long list of things I like. I'm pretty sure this is true for everyone. I neither feel the need to conceal my love of the show, nor broadcast it unless it is actually a relevant topic at the time.
While I wouldn't call watching four hours of any kind of movies every night normal, I can concede your point since watching them once a week would certainly be normal to me, or watching several hours a night of "random group of people hunt down murderers" shows on TV would be normal.
It's a really interesting point, because in thinking about it I think it goes deeper than masculine/feminine. . . it actually seems to be connected to the violence. Seriously, rate the weirdness of this in your head: A grown man who watches classic Warner Bros. cartoons once a week or one who watches classic (non-Princess) Disney movies or shorts once a week. Chances are the WB viewer would be seen as more normal, if a little eccentric. Even if the Disney viewer specified that he mostly watched movies like Aladdin, Robin Hood, and The Lion King, or old Mickey Mouse shorts, he'd still probably be seen as weirder.
(Which is not to say there's not a big gender double standard. My sister is a huge Disney fan- owns most of the movies, goes to Disney world several times a year, carries a Minnie Mouse purse, etc. She doesn't have to hide it from her bosses or coworkers at her government contract job. Like a male Warner Bros. fan it's viewed as a minor eccentricity.)
Awww, sweety...You don't have to hide anything. If my room-mate can put up with me having bloodcurdlingly loud sex every couple months then I think you're fine to watch ponies in public.
-Chessie
You know, action movies I sort of get, actually...there's bigger-then life hypermasculine heroes who clash while around them a thousand-thousand spear carriers get slaughtered in innovative ways.That's as old as the first epics. We can tell those are spear carriers and that they, in some strange way, aren't fully human. Odd, perhaps dangerous, but understandable.
It's the crime shows that get to me. They show you a person, a normal friendly person. They make sure this person has family, friends, a life, hopes, dreams, the complete human package. Then they kill this person in as gruesome way as they can. Roll opening theme.
How does the writer's room look in a show like Criminal Minds. Is there a corkboard with "Eaten While Alive By Rats," "Drowning In Raw Sewage," and so on? Are they going to run out of horrible things to to the human body?
But everyone knows that animated pastel ponies are for freaks.
This makes me want to be able to favourite posts.
I love dumb violence. I have an entire bookcase dedicated to animes, cartoons (JLU FTW!), and movies all featuring massive amounts of gratuitous violence. I also have the Friendship Express DVD, sandwiched between the boxed collection of Batman Beyond and a movie about zombie cowboys.
>But I have to hide the fact that I like to watch 22 minutes of animated ponies once a week
How about not hiding it?
407399 well then again... just hope he hasnt learned anything from those shows
407095 Thank you. Now I feel normal.
By comparison.
407120 Only every couple of months? My dear, you are wasting your youth.
407113 That is a deeply disturbing think to think about human society. So I'll just blame you for it instead.
407424
Be grateful for your abnormality.
It is what saves you.
407580
Stuck the landing.
407845
NAILED IT!
... at 100 miles an hour.
407612 ohh, nothing. just forgewt i said that.
here have some cake... dl.dropbox.com/u/31471793/FiMFiction/emoticons/misc_Octavia_cake.png
errm... and tavi...
408745
Oh fine. She was carrying a crate of ketchup and crashed - what's the harm?
I mean, aside from landing face first.
Now having said that, I find Pinkie carrying a severed head in your avatar spot offensive.
But I'll get over it.
Just keep that in mind.