No Love, Me: Two Drops of Wrong Verison

Dear Roosh the Rapist Doosh,

No.

Though Techno-Matriarchy would make a kick as band name.

No Love,

Me


Dear Abusive and Clueless Redditor,

NO!

No Love and High Five to this Cockbite’s Ex and a Kick in the Face to Him,

Me

No Love, Me: Two Drops of Wrong Verison
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No Love, Me: A Cavalcade of Ain’t Shit

(If you are not black, tread very carefully in your comments.  Don’t go looking for cookies, I’m all out)

Continue reading “No Love, Me: A Cavalcade of Ain’t Shit”

No Love, Me: A Cavalcade of Ain’t Shit

Today in “Old Man Yells at Cloud”

A fine, sophisticated gent across the pond has declared that “No Self Respecting Adult Should Buy Comic Books or Watch Superhero Movies“.

Yes, that’s a clickbaity as fuck title, and it is his opinion, but I’ll take the bait and share MY opinion on HIS opinion.

And his opinion can go into the fucking sea.  And stay there.

A little background: I’m a geek.  I like RPGs, in video games and pen and paper. I go to conventions. I’ve been even known to cosplay…a little.

 

Those sleeve were such a pain in the ass.
Those sleeves were such a pain in the ass.

While I’m anxious in theatre spaces and don’t get out much, I do like the superhero movies I have seen (and frankly, I’m waiting for Deadpool to be available on streaming). And I really fucking LOVED The Force Awakens. I’m 35 years old.

My partner is in his 50s and currently playing the remaster of Final Fantasy X, has a bunch of TFA figures (including two different Reys, much to my delight), and a crapton of Disney Infinity figures.  And that’s only the tip of the geeky iceberg that is him.

So yeah, Mr. Sophisticated would find us childish.  Which is weird, because said partner has a mortgage and works 40 hours a week and all that “grown up” shit so he can afford all this geeky stuff (and helps me afford that damned fabric for that fucking cosplay). When I could work, I paid rent and had bills and all that shit – and purchased games.

This article is filled with delightful snobbishness and so much “getting it wrong” that I can’t even get mad.  I just laugh at the odd analogies like this:

Let’s use a food analogy. It’s like making hamburger out of Wagu beef mixed with foie gras and then serving it in a toasted brioche bun and topping it with artisan cheddar, oak-cured bacon and hand-brined pickles. Sure, the end result will be good but it will be kind of “stupid-good,” the ultimate expression of something quite dumb. A cassoulet made with far cheaper ingredients would be a better, more sophisticated and more satisfying dish by almost any yardstick.

First of all, I would fight a motherfucker for that burger. I have no idea why he would call it “stupid-good” and compare it to what amounts to fancy French pork and beans (which also sounds damn delicious, but I can be a condescending food snob too).

Secondly, maybe I just can’t achieve the level of smart this guy has, but I don’t get the point of this analogy. The burger sounds good, the cassoulet sounds good. Hell, the burger sounds like something you’d find in one of those white tablecloth, nothing under $30 except for teensy appetizers, too rich for my blood restaurants. Maybe, just maybe, different strokes for different strokes and all that?

Got it? Good. Now back to mocking this bullshit.

Way back in 1989, I quite liked the first modern Batman film – and yet now I curse it. When it was released, it was genuinely interesting and different. A superhero film with highbrow-ish director, a dark feel and adult themes. It was a huge success and I don’t begrudge it that. The trouble is it spawned the superhero-filled-multiplex-hell we currently live in.

You are talking about Tim Burton, who did Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure and Bettlejuice before this, right? I’m not saying he’s not a good director (pre-“let’s throw Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter in everything” stage). Those were great films, but let’s face it, they’re not exactly deep and ‘sophisticated’.

Does this really matter? The answer is that it doesn’t if your dumbed-up burger is just another dish on the menu. But it does matter if your local French and Italian joints have been shut down and replaced by an entire street of huge dumbed-up burger restaurants. It matters if you live in a town where the only dish on the menu is dumbed-up burgers. Now, ask yourself how many superhero films your local cinema is currently playing.

Um, here’s the listing at the theatre I enjoy going to (it has a VIP section with booze and no kids!):

  • Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice
  • Deadpool
  • Zootopia
  • The Divergent Series: Allegiant
  • My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2
  • Miracles from Heaven
  • 10 Cloverfield Lane
  • London Has Fallen
  • Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
  • The Perfect Match
  • In Their Own Words: The Tuskegee Airmen

So that’s two superhero movies, one children’s movie, one based on a book movie, one Christian drama, one psychological thriller, one action thriller, two comedies, one romantic film, and one documentary.

Not exactly a deluge of superheroes.  Hell, there’s even a documentary for the “highbrow” types. (And seriously, just because BvS tanked doesn’t mean we’ve reached the bottom of the barrel.  It just means DC really REALLY need to do fucking better).

Of course, I know there’s a business case for it. I understand that big franchise films come with built in branding. I get that, if you went to see Iron Man, you may well go and see Iron Man 2 all the way through to Iron Man 47. I know these films do well in increasingly important markets like China because they’re easy to dub (a total lack of nuance helps).

Iron Man?  The series that includes Iron Man 3, which deals with the aftermath and trauma of a near death experience? That has a ‘total lack of nuance’? Whut, I say, whut?

There’s more misunderstanding of these movies and their source material that pretty much screams “Either I have never read a comic book in my life” or “I may have read a few, but I’ve not bothered to think of them too much”.

See, these movies are popcorn summer (most of the time) blockbusters. Most have made mad bank. But they also deal with some pretty serious themes. Alienation, bigotry, “with great power comes great responsibility”, the aforementioned PSTD, betrayal, I could go on.  He mentions two “better” movies whose plots and themes aren’t all that different from at least two of these “dumbed up” movies.

Sicario – Fish out of water must join a big ol’ conflict

Captain America: Winter Solider – Fish out of water must join a big’ conflict.  And if we’re talking about Bucky, it’s fish out of water brainwashed into BEING the big conflict.

A Most Wanted Man – An outsider forced to join or finds themselves in a big conflict

X-Men – An outsider finds themselves in a huge ass conflict (that would be Wolverine, for those who’d forgotten that plot)

Just because there’s tight costumes and action sequences (and I’m assuming both of those mentioned movies have them in there too) and CGI and are big and loud, doesn’t mean there’s a lack of meaning in them.

Don’t get me wrong, there are some big and loud movies that are just big and loud, the Expendables series and Pacific Rim immediately come to mind, but they have something else that draws fans.

Fun.

Dude, don’t you remember fun? Yeah, comic books stopped doing it for you when you were a teenager, but don’t you remember enjoying them? Why do we have to give up that same sense of ‘fun’ when we’re adults? Why shrug off hobbies that we enjoy? Because that’s what “grown ups” do?

And yes, I know Persepolis started as a graphic novel – and very good it is too. But it’s an exception to the general rule that if you need to shave, you should be reading books where you have to make the pictures in your own head.

General rule, since when? Who made this rule, other than your dad? Because I and far too many other adults have been flipping the bird to that and other “rules” adults must follow be considered an adult for ages. So I should just delete my games, close my Steam and GOG accounts and crack open a thick book (spoiler: I somehow manage to do both in this reality) just because I’m in my 30s and some “intellectual snob” says so?

Because you know I couldn't finish a post without a gif somewhere.
Because you know I couldn’t finish a post without a gif somewhere.

And then he mentions Netflix, because you can read all the time haha. You want superhero shows with meaning and themes and artistic whatevers? Jessica Jones and Daredevil will knock your socks off if you bother to get past the ‘superhero’ part.

You don’t have to, of course, but damn, quit trying to harsh our squee.

(oh and by the way, you include South Park in the grouping of acceptable forms of entertainment.  South Park. Fucking SOUTH PARK. Have you seen the movie? If you happen to find a show that involves a black kid named Token, a pot smoking towel, and a fucking talking bit of poop proper entertainment for ‘self-respecting’ adults, then you really have no business telling anyone else to grow up. Honey, please)

Today in “Old Man Yells at Cloud”

No, Hoteps, I Do Not “Overstand” Your Nonsense

I’d thought I’d start off the party with something light and cute, just to lure new readers into a sense of peace and calm, thinking “This Niki person is rather delightful” and then SLAM BAM right into the dropping of the f bombs and creative uses of the word “douche”.

Then I was introduced to YADA this week.

Yadaperiodshit
Yadaperiodshit
Yadaperiodshit

And that was the point where I decided to say “Fuck it, give ’em a full blast in the face of some serious Seriously?!?”

Well, yes, YADA, if you starve yourself enough, your periods will indeed stop.  But we call that anorexia, and that’s a disorder.

Then I discovered more people, mostly cismen, who seem to believe that having a menstrual period is unnatural.

Yep, that would be another dude telling a woman that periods are unnatural. It’s even in a book, so you know it’s facts!

Oh wait! There’s some words of wisdom for cismen about proper ejaculations and their heartrate. Auuuum, come with the earth, fellas!

Just another day in Hotep Land, where Ashy Ankh Negros romp and play.

(EDITED TO ADD: Now don’t get Hotepery mixed up with Afrocentrism.  One can celebrate and honor our ancestry without going all the way to the extreme “White People are the Devil, cleanse your third eye, brother” side.  Hat tip to Negrodamus for pointing that out in the comments)

What’s a Hotep, you may ask? Take the sheer fuckery from white supremacists, mix a bunch of Egyptian symbols that are poorly misunderstood, add spoonfuls of misguided black pride, throw in cups and cups of misogyny and homophobia, a dash of fucked understanding of science and medicine and the English language, and then drop it off a cliff. The resulting mess is Hotep.

These folks (because there are women who subscribe to this shit) claim to know about the roots of our African ancestry and must inform us all of how brainwashed they are by the white man. They take #StayWoke to extreme levels, trying to wake us all up with nonsense.  They hide their hatred of women and the celebration of toxic masculinity behind the concept of “getting back to our roots”.  It’s pretty sad and infuriating as fuck.

Misogyny (or specifically misogynoir)

Hoteps claim to looooove black women.  We are queens (or Kweens?). Our wombs are where nations can be built. We are the rock the “blakk” man can rely on in this struggle.

As long as we don’t speak up for ourselves. Or dress sexy for ourselves. Or refuse to put up with their shit. Or expect more out of men. Or are lesbians or bisexual but unwilling to do threesomes with them and another woman (cause that’s hawt). Or claim that a black man raped them.

Then we’re at best, brainwashed and at worst, agents working for the white man to bring the blakk man down.  It’s fucked.

And they do engage in basic misogyny too. By bedding women of other races, it’s like poking the “whyte” man in the eye. But heaven forbid a black woman date someone of another race, that’s bringing the downfall of the black race.

If you haven’t noticed, Hotep is all about uplifting the black man at the expense of everyone else.

Toxic Masculinity

Are you a trans woman? Then you’re unnatural, feminized, affected by the society that tries to feminize black men.

Are you a trans man? Then you’re trying to suppress the black man by “trying to be a man”.

Are you gay? Are you a cisman who cares for his kids or enjoys things that are tagged ‘feminine’? Then you can see where I’m going here.

For people who claim that being stereotyped is terrible, they cling to the image of a roughnecked oversexed manly man.  A man who engages in “nation building” aka sleep with a lot of women to make babies for them to care for while the man continues to, well, build nations. A man who is tough, not in touch with his emotions, answers insults with violence. Toxic all around.

If you haven’t noticed, Hotep is also about allowing black men to be irresponsible asshats.

Misunderstanding of Science and History

You really want to get a good hard look at Hotepery? Watch the series Hidden Colors. Well, first, get really, really drunk (or high, if you’re able) first and then watch this ahistorical piece of garbage.  I’m aware that we’re not exactly represented in history classes, but making up shit like “black people never lived in caves, like white people did” isn’t the way.  According to the first two videos in this series, nearly everything good in the world was made by black or mixed people.  EVERYTHING.

Oh right, and they dip their brains into Egyptian religion and artistry and claim it’s our heritage.  It’s like they either forgot or have no idea that the slave trade of our ancestors came from west Africa.  Egypt isn’t in west Africa, but telling them that would prove my brainwashing.  It’s already bad enough that I’m partnered with a white man.

As for medicine? It drips with pseudoscience, as you can see from the top image. Periods are unnatural, cauliflower doesn’t contain carbon, relaxers get into your brain, single mothers make their sons gay, and so on.  Essential oils can cure everything, white science developed AIDS to depopulate black people…

…hold on, that shit is one of the reasons why there is so much AIDS denialism in Africa.  Fuck these guys.

You name a psuedoscience, and you can find a Hotep promoting it in the name of healing ‘our’ people from white man’s medicine.

If you haven’t noticed, Hotep is about twisting what we’ve learned to suit their fucked up agenda.

In Conclusion

Fuck these guys.  Again. Fuck their disrespect of black women, fuck their support of the toxic masculinity that is killing themselves and trans women of color, fuck their lack of understanding of science, fuck their lack of understanding of ANYTHING.

Fuck their abuse of English, with substituting “EYE” for “I” and “overstand” for “understand”. Fuck their insistence on calling other people ‘brothers’ and ‘sisters’ like attempting to establish a kinship would make their bullshit go down easier – also, we’re not at church.

The best way to combat this shit is to laugh at them. As frustrating and condescending as they can be, they don’t have nearly as much power as they claim to be.

 

 

 

No, Hoteps, I Do Not “Overstand” Your Nonsense

No Love, Me: Papal Edition

(sorry about the sporadic posts, folks.  Still recovering from The Fucking Flu)

Dear Pope,

The proper response to words you don’t like is more words: rebuking words, counter-argument words, dismissive words, insulting words.

Not a punch.

Yes, even if it’s your mom or your religion they’re talking about.

We’ve learned this as children. You’re the leader of a major religion and a small city-state.

Act like it.

No Love,
Me

No Love, Me: Papal Edition

New Segment! “No Love, Me”

So, this year I’m starting a little segment here called “No Love, Me”, a set of little notes to things, people, situations, places, whatever that annoy me, but not enough to go into full blown rant mode.

And I’m starting big.  Real big.

Dear Oprah,

Welcome to the current movement.
We don’t have one or two leaders.
We have many.
We have none.
We learned the lessons, especially: “Our Leaders tend to get shot” and “We don’t need one spokesman”.

Can you try to promote what I hope is a very good movie with some of this shit in mind?

No Love,
Me

New Segment! “No Love, Me”