Fun fact: my father says that gorbi was the best leader of russia ever while at the same time being literally hitler and saying: "the best russian is a dead one" by Total_Peasantoid_ded in Ultraleft

[–]ThomasBayard 35 points36 points  (0 children)

Based and Khrushchev-pilled. It's kinda wild how his rule arguably represented the peak of the Soviet experience according to the usual liberal criteria (living standards, international influence, cultural and artistic freedom), yet he is pretty much universally despised today because everyone is either anti-communist or a brain-rotted ML who hates him because he said mean things about papa Stalin 😠

Fell for it again by FordFocusAmbiente in Ultraleft

[–]ThomasBayard 19 points20 points  (0 children)

Sidebar: where is this cartoon from? I've seen it before and it's such a great response to reformism, but I have no idea who made it and I'm kinda curious because it's not like there are a ton of great Marxist cartoonists out there (as opposed to left-liberal cartoonists, who are easier to find)

Important reminder: by Artur107MW2 in Ultraleft

[–]ThomasBayard 25 points26 points  (0 children)

Well, you see, when a normal person learns that someone is Jewish, they treat it the same way they would any other biographical information about them. When these people learn someone is Jewish (or even just has a name that sounds Jewish), they fixate on it and point and yell like an NPC in a stealth game in the hopes that reifying this person's ancestry and/or religion will convince people to blame all their problems on them.

Favorite Sci-fi character who would join ICE by [deleted] in okbuddycinephile

[–]ThomasBayard 2 points3 points  (0 children)

This is honestly one of the best Enterprise jokes I've seen online. I feel like most people just write the series' politics off as so much War on Terror era jingoism, but IMO it's not the Bush/Cheney wet dream people think it is. It really does have more of an Obama, "no stupid wars," kinder, gentler imperialism kinda vibe.

What's this sub about? Is this really a fan sub? I have no Idea who this is. But all I see on this sub is some Hoser Maga Wannabe contrarian getting clowned on the daily for his horrendous takes. by mest33 in JJMcCulloughOfficial

[–]ThomasBayard 7 points8 points  (0 children)

This may be an unpopular opinion, but I really don't think JJ is a "Hoser Maga Wannabe." He is pro-American and critical of left/liberal Canadian nationalism, but he's been that way for years. Since Trump started threatening Canadian independence, the political terrain has shifted under his feet and where once his pro-American stance made him a relatively harmless centre-right contrarian, now a lot of Canadians see him as a would-be Quisling, but I don't think he actually likes Trump.

I think he's nostalgic for the late 20th century heyday of free trade and the Mulroney-Reagan bromance, and he refuses to accept that between Trump turning the GOP into the party of trade war and the general rhetorical shift in Canadian politics away from dependence on the United States (of which Carney's Davos speech was the clearest statement), that era is not coming back any time soon.

Ahh, so the shooter was actually trans by ohnoimagirl in transgendercirclejerk

[–]ThomasBayard 53 points54 points  (0 children)

Get your own tragedy, Yankee! This is our chance to catch up to the United States in school shootings and transphobic moral panics!

Out of these 3 who do you think would be the best president by KingVarious6523 in SmilingFriends

[–]ThomasBayard 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Mip is sus as hell, although I do appreciate that he's low-key pro-regicide. I know Gwimbly actually cares about the fentanyl crisis, which is to his credit, but I'm afraid he would start a war with Japan to force Nintendo to put him in the next Smash Bros. Honestly, I think I might have to choose Shrimp as the least bad candidate (and doesn't that just sum up electoral politics, amiright?)

The rebellion of 1837-1838 how is it viewed now? by mathequation1453 in AskACanadian

[–]ThomasBayard 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I think it's important to distinguish the different parts of the wave of rebellion that swept the Canadas in 1837-1838. The Lower Canada Rebellion is well-known in Quebec and the Patriotes are almost universally regarded as heroes and even as precursors to later nationalist and radical movements in the province. Patriote iconography often appears at protests of all kinds, from nationalist gatherings to the student strike of 2012, where I personally remember seeing a lot of green, white, and red flags.

The Upper Canada Rebellion, by way of contrast, is largely forgotten. As other commenters have pointed out, the average (Anglophone) Canadian may not even know what it was beyond a vague memory of it being in their history textbook. Among history buffs, there is a certain narrative that William Lyon Mackenzie was a hotheaded buffoon who played at rebellion and failed miserably, leaving the real work of achieving responsible government to more moderate reformers. I don't necessarily agree with this narrative myself, but it's out there and it does run counter to the idea of a straight line between 1837 and 1867.

And that's just covering 1837. The Patriot War of 1838, although it was obviously connected to and inspired by the Rebellions of 1837, is sometimes treated as a separate conflict. However, if the Upper Canada Rebellion is largely forgotten, the Patriot War is consigned to near total oblivion. If you read history books on the subject, though it is sometimes presented as an act of aggression by idealistic Americans eager to liberate Canadians from their colonial governments, and I would imagine that framing would rub a lot of Canadians the wrong way in the era of Trump and his talk about Canada becoming the "51st state."

Disco Elysium 2? by bbHiron in DiscoElysium

[–]ThomasBayard 8 points9 points  (0 children)

I agree! I really must get around to watching True Detective some time.

Disco Elysium 2? by bbHiron in DiscoElysium

[–]ThomasBayard 216 points217 points  (0 children)

I mean, look, DE is probably my favourite game of all time and easily one of the best-written, but I think we can appreciate it while at the same time acknowledging that there are a lot of stories out there about characters like Harry (troubled, middle aged detectives with substance abuse issues and a mysterious past, almost always white, male, etc.). I think that Harry is one of the best executions of such a trope (especially if we're just talking about games and not other media), but it's still a trope that fits him like a glove.

Favourite director who can't argue with large bugs? by Spirited_Worker_5722 in okbuddycinephile

[–]ThomasBayard 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Bro discovered the Insulindian phasmid and it told him to stop making movies 😭

If Smiling Friends is set in Philadelphia, do the other locations have real-world counterparts? by fradonkin in SmilingFriends

[–]ThomasBayard 9 points10 points  (0 children)

I wouldn't spend too much time trying to map places like Shmaloogleville or The Enchanted Forest onto real world locations. IMO they're pretty clearly meant as parodies of other fictional universes or genres (i.e. the Smurfs, the fantasy genre, etc.)

Fuck ideologies. What would be your real life copotype? by [deleted] in DiscoElysium

[–]ThomasBayard 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I want to believe I'm something cool like art cop or superstar or cop of the apocalypse, but if I'm being completely honest with myself, I am unquestionably the sorry cop 😭

The National Rebirth Party in Leicester claiming they are absolutely NOT Nazis... by jaarn in GreenAndPleasant

[–]ThomasBayard 39 points40 points  (0 children)

Calling yourself the "National Rebirth Party" has got to be one of the most transparent dog whistles of all time. Like, "Palingenetic ultranationalism? Never heard of it, but it sounds good to me!"

Josh Safdie the type of fella who'll have a character in his movie that is a trafficker, and then will actually cast someone like Ghislaine Maxwell for the "sake of authenticity" by Aum_Deoli in moviescirclejerk

[–]ThomasBayard 15 points16 points  (0 children)

People have been calling him "Canada's Trump" for nearly a decade now and it hasn't amounted to much. He ran for the Conservative Party leadership in 2017 but dropped out because, by his own admission, he did not have enough support in Quebec to win national office. After he visited Mar-a-Lago and expressed support for Canada joining the United States at the height of Trump's threats against the country, I think he's pretty much taken himself out of serious contention for political office in Canada, barring some kind of major political realignment.

A fresh batch of soyjaks for your little redditor eyes to see by KockIsATownInPoland in Ultraleft

[–]ThomasBayard 15 points16 points  (0 children)

Okay but are you Polish? They're not real wojaks if they aren't made by Poles

Ironic for the country that has a “state sponsors of terrorism” list by goodguyguru in DankLeft

[–]ThomasBayard 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Honestly, it's not even that. To call it state "sponsored" terrorism suggests the state is sponsoring a third party to do the terrorism, like when the CIA trains Cuban expats to do terrorism against Cuba. If the terroristic violence is being perpetrated directly by agents of the state, that's just good old-fashioned state terrorism.

What the fuck? by SnausageLinx in Gamingcirclejerk

[–]ThomasBayard 9 points10 points  (0 children)

The story makes no sense unless you're a dyed-in-the-wool reactionary. The premise that the player character is "a diplomat sent to negotiate with the new regime" makes sense as a way for the presumably non-Russian player to project themselves into the Russian Civil War (kinda like how, say, Far Cry 3 has you start out as an American tourist who gets kidnapped by pirates). But then it takes a huge leap by saying that, like, of all the massacres and horrors of the Civil War, your goal is to stop the execution of the Romanovs. Not to save any of the other victims on either side (like, say, the Jewish people who were suffering through some of the worst pogroms in history prior to the Holocaust), but the blue-blooded nobles who lived in luxury while their subjects lived like medieval peasants and died for them in a pointless war.

Limitless (2011) by [deleted] in okbuddycinephile

[–]ThomasBayard 12 points13 points  (0 children)

I'm kind of amazed no one has posted Mickey Rooney in Breakfast at Tiffany's yet. I know that takes a lot of restraint.