Hello friends, there’s a dogwhistle I’ve seen used a couple times on tumblr that I want to discuss.
Fellow neurodivergents especially, please listen– towards the end of this post I describe how some in our community have been using it without knowing what it means.
A fairly common antisemitic dogwhistle used amongst alt-right circles on the internet is being a “noticer,” “noticing patterns,” “pattern noticer,” etc. I’ve seen this from a couple Tumblr blogs I follow reblogging memes and such that use this term but don’t provide any context about what sorts of “things” they may be noticing.
Here’s the meme that I saw a blog I’m following reblog last night.
Seems pretty harmless, right? It’s a meme with a cute cat.
In alt-right circles, what they are referring to “noticing” is the conspiracy theory that Jews control the world/“noticing” evidence of an imagined globalist (read: Jewish) world order/etc. If you see a meme that uses terms like “noticing patterns” that doesn’t elaborate what those supposed patterns are– just leaves you to fill in the blank yourself– take a look at the types of things OP might be posting. The alt-right has an idea that it’s forbidden to talk about who might be behind the “conspiracies” they talk about (again, the target is frequently Jewish people) so lack of context is often a red flag.
I sent the blog who reblogged this an ask informing them that the meme was a dogwhistle. If you see someone reblog something like this, check what they’ve been posting. If this seems like an isolated incident, the person probably reblogged it not knowing what the term actually meant. That’s why dogwhistles are so effective– to the average person they look harmless if you don’t know what to watch out for!
Let’s take a look at how alt-righters use this term.
Here’s an alt-right definition of it from Urban Dictionary.
Oh boy, this one gets a bigotry bingo for all the dogwhistles used here. If I miss any, feel free to comment. Here are the ones I found:
-Noseticing: Noticing plus nose, based on the stereotype for Jewish people to have large noses.
-“those who cannot be named”/skirting around saying Jew: again the idea that it’s forbidden to talk about who they think is behind their conspiracy theories.
-“world events and agendas”: idea that Jewish people have a Globalist agenda etc etc
-Degeneracy: Nazi term to describe the behaviors/people they find undesirable.
-Early life: refers to the section in a person’s Wikipedia page. If a person was brought up Jewish, it’ll usually say so there.
-Oy vey: a Jewish exclamation of exasperation that Nazis have unfortunately co-opted when talking about Jewish people.
Here’s probably the most obviously antisemitic meme I found.
The title and first bullet point include the “noticer” term. This meme also talks about a “group” who controls wealth. Who might the poster be referring to here?
Here’s a Twitter account with many similar alt-right terms. Explicitly identifies as a Nazi and ethno-nationalist, etc etc.
A couple other pages. I clicked on them to see if I could find any more examples but the first seemed pretty blank and the second… Well, I don’t have a twitter so I couldn’t view.
Let’s unpack these a little. The first one has “13 outta 52,” a statistic used among white supremacists to depict Black people (especially African-Americans) as “savage”: 13 referring to the percentage of America that is Black and 52 referring to the alleged percentage of murders in the U.S. that are committed by Black people. “109 countries” refers to the idea that Jewish people have been expelled from 109 countries during history. (Which isn’t entirely true. Some “countries” in this count are actually cities, regions, etc.) Some white supremacists may use the number 110 instead to suggest that it should happen again.
The second one has a blurb alleging a global sterilization effort and concerns of fertility. This is likely in connection to pro-natalism for white people. If Nazis want a so-called “Aryan nation,” they’re going to want white people to populate it, and so they encourage white people to have babies for their cause. Nazi Germany employed this tactic as well, even awarding “Aryan” German women who had four or more children for their contributions to the Nazi cause.
The reason why I’m emphasizing that context matters is that some neurodivergent people have seen this and co-opted it into neurodivergent circles. As a person who is Jewish and autistic, this is pretty alarming to me. I’ll show a couple examples from Tumblr:
And
I’ve left out the URLs of the OPs because I want to give the benefit of the doubt– they both explicitly refer to being a “pattern noticer” in terms of neurodivergence. And it’s easy to see why introducing this term to ND folks would be an easy way to get a dogwhistle passed off as harmless! Since autistic people often have analytical minds, we often make connections that others might not be able to see. But unfortunately, using terms like this only makes it much easier for antisemites to fly under the radar.
Stay safe and let’s keep Tumblr free of this shit.
honestly we gotta get rid of the “chad vs. virgin” and blonde wojack meme shit entirely
Hello friends, there’s a dogwhistle I’ve seen used a couple times on tumblr that I want to discuss.
Fellow neurodivergents especially, please listen– towards the end of this post I describe how some in our community have been using it without knowing what it means.
A fairly common antisemitic dogwhistle used amongst alt-right circles on the internet is being a “noticer,” “noticing patterns,” “pattern noticer,” etc. I’ve seen this from a couple Tumblr blogs I follow reblogging memes and such that use this term but don’t provide any context about what sorts of “things” they may be noticing.
Here’s the meme that I saw a blog I’m following reblog last night.
Seems pretty harmless, right? It’s a meme with a cute cat.
In alt-right circles, what they are referring to “noticing” is the conspiracy theory that Jews control the world/“noticing” evidence of an imagined globalist (read: Jewish) world order/etc. If you see a meme that uses terms like “noticing patterns” that doesn’t elaborate what those supposed patterns are– just leaves you to fill in the blank yourself– take a look at the types of things OP might be posting. The alt-right has an idea that it’s forbidden to talk about who might be behind the “conspiracies” they talk about (again, the target is frequently Jewish people) so lack of context is often a red flag.
I sent the blog who reblogged this an ask informing them that the meme was a dogwhistle. If you see someone reblog something like this, check what they’ve been posting. If this seems like an isolated incident, the person probably reblogged it not knowing what the term actually meant. That’s why dogwhistles are so effective– to the average person they look harmless if you don’t know what to watch out for!
Let’s take a look at how alt-righters use this term.
Here’s an alt-right definition of it from Urban Dictionary.
Oh boy, this one gets a bigotry bingo for all the dogwhistles used here. If I miss any, feel free to comment. Here are the ones I found:
-Noseticing: Noticing plus nose, based on the stereotype for Jewish people to have large noses.
-“those who cannot be named”/skirting around saying Jew: again the idea that it’s forbidden to talk about who they think is behind their conspiracy theories.
-“world events and agendas”: idea that Jewish people have a Globalist agenda etc etc
-Degeneracy: Nazi term to describe the behaviors/people they find undesirable.
-Early life: refers to the section in a person’s Wikipedia page. If a person was brought up Jewish, it’ll usually say so there.
-Oy vey: a Jewish exclamation of exasperation that Nazis have unfortunately co-opted when talking about Jewish people.
Here’s probably the most obviously antisemitic meme I found.
The title and first bullet point include the “noticer” term. This meme also talks about a “group” who controls wealth. Who might the poster be referring to here?
Here’s a Twitter account with many similar alt-right terms. Explicitly identifies as a Nazi and ethno-nationalist, etc etc.
A couple other pages. I clicked on them to see if I could find any more examples but the first seemed pretty blank and the second… Well, I don’t have a twitter so I couldn’t view.
Let’s unpack these a little. The first one has “13 outta 52,” a statistic used among white supremacists to depict Black people (especially African-Americans) as “savage”: 13 referring to the percentage of America that is Black and 52 referring to the alleged percentage of murders in the U.S. that are committed by Black people. “109 countries” refers to the idea that Jewish people have been expelled from 109 countries during history. (Which isn’t entirely true. Some “countries” in this count are actually cities, regions, etc.) Some white supremacists may use the number 110 instead to suggest that it should happen again.
The second one has a blurb alleging a global sterilization effort and concerns of fertility. This is likely in connection to pro-natalism for white people. If Nazis want a so-called “Aryan nation,” they’re going to want white people to populate it, and so they encourage white people to have babies for their cause. Nazi Germany employed this tactic as well, even awarding “Aryan” German women who had four or more children for their contributions to the Nazi cause.
The reason why I’m emphasizing that context matters is that some neurodivergent people have seen this and co-opted it into neurodivergent circles. As a person who is Jewish and autistic, this is pretty alarming to me. I’ll show a couple examples from Tumblr:
And
I’ve left out the URLs of the OPs because I want to give the benefit of the doubt– they both explicitly refer to being a “pattern noticer” in terms of neurodivergence. And it’s easy to see why introducing this term to ND folks would be an easy way to get a dogwhistle passed off as harmless! Since autistic people often have analytical minds, we often make connections that others might not be able to see. But unfortunately, using terms like this only makes it much easier for antisemites to fly under the radar.
Stay safe and let’s keep Tumblr free of this shit.
honestly we gotta get rid of the “chad vs. virgin” and blonde wojack meme shit entirely
i didn’t have “i’m broken” teenage asexual angst i had “i’m literally being the only reasonable one about this concept and the rest of you are behaving like fucking freaks” perception issues
My toxic trait is that despite knowing better I still believe that we asexuals are the only ones who are right about sex and everyone else has it all wrong actually
Translation is always tricky, but I remember this slightly different:
Figs were an imported delicacy at the time, and the donkey just managed to eat them (without being given any on purpose). Seeing a donkey eating several times their own value in figs, the philosopher looked to his servant who might have been standing there either in shock, despair, or both, and said something along the lines of “Oh don’t just stand there. Get him some (undiluted) wine to wash the figs down with”. With (undiluted) wine also being an expensive drink.
I feel like that context makes it funnier. Basically like standing in front of your burning mansion with a butler, meeting their eyes, and telling them that you still feel a little chilly and ask them if they could put on an extra log or two.
idk what’s funnier, the burning house situation, or being the butler as you watch your master laugh so hard at his own joke that he fully fucking dies.
ITS TWO AMONGUS CHARACTERS FUCKING. THERE IS NO DEEPER MEANING
It’s a metaphor for capitalism. The blue amogus is the working class and the red one is the 1%.
they would never do that to each other. they are girlfriends and they are in love, thank you
No, I agree. It’s a metaphor for capitalism.
Capitalism is a very flawed system. The privileged 1% leeches off of the working class, while most of the working class has to dedicate their life just to survive. In a way, this system makes the two dependent on each other. The privileged 1% profits off of the working class, while the working class relies on the 1% for major businesses and production.
If you investigate the GIF specifically, you’ll notice a couple of things. First of all, the among us characters seem to never stop or slow down. They’re going consistently at a fast pace, which is bound to tire one of them out eventually. This is representative of how capitalism relies on the continuous work the working class puts in, which can make the average person’s life (especially the lower working class) very repetitive and exhausting. And yet the cycle continues, both unable to stop.
Another thing important to note is specific attributes of the among us characters. Blue is forced to the ground while Red takes the lead, which yet again ties into our theory. The working class is often forced to bow down to the 1%, whether it be by working for them or paying for their products. It also shows the visual differences in power between the two.
However, beyond that, there’s even more things to note. If you look at the gif and examine how their bodies are actually constructed, one thing will stand out:
Blue doesn’t have any arms. However, Red does.
Going by our theory that Blue represents the working class and Red represents the privileged 1%, arms can be seen as a metaphorical representation of rights and freedom. Especially in such a movement-heavy activity such as sex, arms are quite important. By giving Red arms and not Blue, the gif is touching on the idea that those higher in society are given more rights than the lower classes. In fact, this is specifically talking about rights that everyone should have, yet are only given to the privileged. I’m sure it is incredibly difficult for Blue to participate in the act without any arms, yet Red shows no regard for this. Red continues to use a position that forces Blue to hold themselves up, despite being well aware of their lack of arms. It really shows that the privileged class works to uphold capitalism despite knowing of how it favors the naturally wealthy and puts down those struggling.
In conclusion: This GIF is a solid representation of the negative affects of capitalism and how the working class and the privileged 1% interact.
ADREZ.ADREZ PLEAASE LEAVE THIS POST ALONE IM.not sorry actually IT WAS LIKE 3AM PLEASEEE ADREZ I REGRET MY ACTIONS I HAVE CHANGED AND GROWN AS A PERSON
I must not explain the joke. Explaining the joke is the joke-killer. I will face my followers who did not get the joke. I will permit them to pass over me and through me
“In Russian, Baba Yaga’s name is not capitalized. Indeed, it is not a name
at all, but a description—“old lady yaga” or perhaps “scary old woman.” There
is often more than one Baba Yaga in a story, and thus we should really say
“a Baba Yaga,” “the Baba Yaga.” We do so in these tales when a story would
otherwise be confusing. We have continued the western tradition of capitalizing Baba Yaga, since the words cannot be translated and have no other
meaning in English (aside perhaps from the pleasant associations of a rum
baba). There is no graceful way to put the name in the plural in English, and
in Russian tales multiple iterations of Baba Yaga never appear at the same
time, only in sequence: Baba Yaga sisters or cousins talk about one another,
or send travelers along to one another, but they do not live together. The
first-person pronoun “I” in Russian, ‘ia,’ is also uncapitalized. In some tales
our witch is called only “Yaga.” A few tales refer to her as “Yagishna,” a patronymic form suggesting that she is Yaga’s daughter rather than Yaga herself. (That in turn suggests that Baba Yaga reproduces parthenogenetically, and
some scholars agree that she does.) The lack of capitalization in every published Russian folktale also hints at Baba Yaga’s status as a type rather than
an individual, a paradigmatic mean or frightening old woman. This description in place of a name, too, could suggest that it was once a euphemism for
another name or term, too holy or frightening to be spoken, and therefore
now long forgotten.”
— Sibelan Forrester, from her introduction to Baba Yaga: The Wild Witch of the East in Russian Fairy Tales
I feel like this suggests that - with much dedication and study - you, too, could go out into the woods and be a baba yaga.
Video games will stick a vaguely posh human name on the big scary monster’s health bar to let you know they were once human, but isn’t that a bit limiting? I think walking blasphemies against the natural order should be allowed to be fancy lads if they want to be. That hundred-foot pillar of screaming teeth is called Dr. Throckmorton Pomberley. What are you going to do, argue with it?
still believe that one of the greatest bits of all time was on January 6th, 2021 when. well. you know. and twitter was understandably an echo chamber of panic and fear and Justin McElroy just tweeted a selfie with a filter that was like “have a delicious national spaghetti day” followed by 3 tweets that were like “fuck. i’m sorry. i don’t know how to delete scheduled posts” and as i type this two years later i’m laughing
a belated delicious national spaghetti day to you all
I wish Americans fucked with more foreign music. You don’t have to know the language to appreciate a good record. Folks in other countries listen to our music and don’t speak a lick of english. Music needs no translator
you’ll get an endless streaming of songs (ad free!).
I personally found myself loving 1970s Ghana, Senegal and Cote d’Ivoire!
Also 1920s and 1970s Japan for sure! Cambodian music:
spectacular. Love Armenia and Mali as well. I’ve been told 70s Germany is weird and 30s
Algeria is cool but I haven’t gotten around to those yet.
Italy’s 1960s is bomb ofc but I’m biased ;)
“My childhood was so awesome. Kids today don’t even know!”
Isn’t a flex.
It’s a lament.
More people should understand that.
Cereal boxes had toys inside.
Yes, it was a crass marketing for a sugar cereal made of chintzy plastic
Today you’re just expected to eat Capn Crunch because that’s what you do as a child, that’s what breakfast looks like. Which is… fine, I guess. Sugar still tastes good. That’s still a pleasure you’re otherwise asked to disavow by the protein shake nutribottles advertised on podcasts.
But it also means the idle minor joy of getting a random toy present, as a reward for nothing, just because you exist, is stripped. That random spark of joy is gone, replaced with nothing.
Where did the public pool go? the neighborhood park? the atrium food court public place to gather?
Same thing. All of them were just replaced with nothing.
Kids today have many good things. But it shouldn’t be a trade off. They should get to have instant messages with friends and go skating at the park. They should get to play amazing modern video games at home and go trick or treating for halloween. They should be able to have stickers and markers and macaroni art as well as youtube and streaming libraries and fortnite dances.
Fun should be allowed at every level.
Also. Kids now are just used to people constantly trying to sell them stuff.
When I was a kid, we had advertising on TV, radio, magazines, and billboards. It was easy to recognize and you could work around it. There were certain types of TV, like PBS or cable, that did not have commercials.
Now, kids are inundated with advertising constantly. YouTube and social media have replaced TV and radio for a lot of families, where in addition to ads every 1-3 minutes, many YT stars have sponsored bits in their videos. Social media constantly tries to sell you things. They have found a way to put advertising into the pumps at gas stations. There are so many things, like access to TV shows and Disney movies, that are locked behind a paywall. They can’t even read a newspaper if they wanted to.
I did a school visit a while back to a group of about 100 fourth graders to tell them about the library’s upcoming Summer Reading Program. They were totally unimpressed by me telling them cheerfully that if they met their reading goals, we would give them books for free. I thought they were just tired because it was close to the end of the day, and then one kid raised his hand to resignedly ask the question they were all thinking:
Kid: How much does this cost? Me: Nothing. It’s a free library program. Kid: Uh huh, like you are going to give us books for free. How much does it really cost? Me, confused: … nothing. You don’t have to give us any money at all. You just have to do the reading and fill out your reading log, and you will have earned the books to take home and keep forever. Kid, in disbelief: Oh come on. If you don’t charge us, how are you gonna make money? Me, taken aback: We don’t make money, we’re a library. Kid, exasperated: What do you mean you don’t make money? Me: We’re a public service, like the fire department or schools. You don’t have to pay to use those either. There is a ripple in the crowd as 100 disbelieving 9 year olds take this in. Other kid: How do you afford to do anything if you don’t make money? Like where do you get the money to do stuff if we don’t have to pay you? Me: Through things like government grants and taxes. Third kid: So let me get this straight. That means that if some people don’t pay their taxes – Teacher: Friend, this is a great conversation for Social Studies and not during library time! Ms. Intrepidheroine, would you like to show us the LEGOs you brought?
And that’s the story of how I realized that children absolutely expect you to try to sell them something if you come in to do a “special talk” even if it’s for a library.
Which is tragic.
Kids are aware from a shockingly early age that youtubers make money by getting people to watch their videos, and that their (the viewer’s) attention is a commodity. First graders have told me this (obviously not in those words but yeah).
Kids today are subjected, essentially, to the advertising standards of the 1950s because the FCC hasn’t enforced the advertising restrictions for TV on youtube.
I have a lot of posts on this, as I believe some degree of commercialization is good for kidvid (action figures and action cartoons were better when they were selling each other, fight me) and it is the source of a lot of the kind of ‘simple pleasure freebies" I feel kids are robbed.
But I think the 1980s kidvid rules were just about the right level of strict. No characters shilling directly to the kids. No promises of happiness or popularity. Ask for parents permission, not their money. No ads for the thing, in the show that is also an ad for the thing.*
But still with the kind of profit incentives that make the products about what kids would enjoy rather than whatever adults think they need.
Pictured: What Kids Want, What Adults Think they Need
Cuz I’m with Sid & Marty Kroft. Kids are in school all week, their entertainment should be fun.
Youtube kids are getting the kind of entertainment diet that my dad did, where the character you’re watching turns to camera to tell you that Captain Video wants you to have this cardboard space helmet. The thing Krusty the Clown is a parody of.
Only instead of selling cereal and plastic space guns, they’re selling crypto scams and energy drinks that can hospitalize their target audience.
And sometimes that pitch man is a kid their own age.
Is much more effective when its actually a fellow kid.
“My childhood was so awesome. Kids today don’t even know!”
Isn’t a flex.
It’s a lament.
More people should understand that.
Cereal boxes had toys inside.
Yes, it was a crass marketing for a sugar cereal made of chintzy plastic
Today you’re just expected to eat Capn Crunch because that’s what you do as a child, that’s what breakfast looks like. Which is… fine, I guess. Sugar still tastes good. That’s still a pleasure you’re otherwise asked to disavow by the protein shake nutribottles advertised on podcasts.
But it also means the idle minor joy of getting a random toy present, as a reward for nothing, just because you exist, is stripped. That random spark of joy is gone, replaced with nothing.
Where did the public pool go? the neighborhood park? the atrium food court public place to gather?
Same thing. All of them were just replaced with nothing.
Kids today have many good things. But it shouldn’t be a trade off. They should get to have instant messages with friends and go skating at the park. They should get to play amazing modern video games at home and go trick or treating for halloween. They should be able to have stickers and markers and macaroni art as well as youtube and streaming libraries and fortnite dances.
Fun should be allowed at every level.
Also. Kids now are just used to people constantly trying to sell them stuff.
When I was a kid, we had advertising on TV, radio, magazines, and billboards. It was easy to recognize and you could work around it. There were certain types of TV, like PBS or cable, that did not have commercials.
Now, kids are inundated with advertising constantly. YouTube and social media have replaced TV and radio for a lot of families, where in addition to ads every 1-3 minutes, many YT stars have sponsored bits in their videos. Social media constantly tries to sell you things. They have found a way to put advertising into the pumps at gas stations. There are so many things, like access to TV shows and Disney movies, that are locked behind a paywall. They can’t even read a newspaper if they wanted to.
I did a school visit a while back to a group of about 100 fourth graders to tell them about the library’s upcoming Summer Reading Program. They were totally unimpressed by me telling them cheerfully that if they met their reading goals, we would give them books for free. I thought they were just tired because it was close to the end of the day, and then one kid raised his hand to resignedly ask the question they were all thinking:
Kid: How much does this cost? Me: Nothing. It’s a free library program. Kid: Uh huh, like you are going to give us books for free. How much does it really cost? Me, confused: … nothing. You don’t have to give us any money at all. You just have to do the reading and fill out your reading log, and you will have earned the books to take home and keep forever. Kid, in disbelief: Oh come on. If you don’t charge us, how are you gonna make money? Me, taken aback: We don’t make money, we’re a library. Kid, exasperated: What do you mean you don’t make money? Me: We’re a public service, like the fire department or schools. You don’t have to pay to use those either. There is a ripple in the crowd as 100 disbelieving 9 year olds take this in. Other kid: How do you afford to do anything if you don’t make money? Like where do you get the money to do stuff if we don’t have to pay you? Me: Through things like government grants and taxes. Third kid: So let me get this straight. That means that if some people don’t pay their taxes – Teacher: Friend, this is a great conversation for Social Studies and not during library time! Ms. Intrepidheroine, would you like to show us the LEGOs you brought?
And that’s the story of how I realized that children absolutely expect you to try to sell them something if you come in to do a “special talk” even if it’s for a library.
Which is tragic.
Kids are aware from a shockingly early age that youtubers make money by getting people to watch their videos, and that their (the viewer’s) attention is a commodity. First graders have told me this (obviously not in those words but yeah).
Kids today are subjected, essentially, to the advertising standards of the 1950s because the FCC hasn’t enforced the advertising restrictions for TV on youtube.
I have a lot of posts on this, as I believe some degree of commercialization is good for kidvid (action figures and action cartoons were better when they were selling each other, fight me) and it is the source of a lot of the kind of ‘simple pleasure freebies" I feel kids are robbed.
But I think the 1980s kidvid rules were just about the right level of strict. No characters shilling directly to the kids. No promises of happiness or popularity. Ask for parents permission, not their money. No ads for the thing, in the show that is also an ad for the thing.*
But still with the kind of profit incentives that make the products about what kids would enjoy rather than whatever adults think they need.
Pictured: What Kids Want, What Adults Think they Need
Cuz I’m with Sid & Marty Kroft. Kids are in school all week, their entertainment should be fun.
Youtube kids are getting the kind of entertainment diet that my dad did, where the character you’re watching turns to camera to tell you that Captain Video wants you to have this cardboard space helmet. The thing Krusty the Clown is a parody of.
Only instead of selling cereal and plastic space guns, they’re selling crypto scams and energy drinks that can hospitalize their target audience.
And sometimes that pitch man is a kid their own age.
Is much more effective when its actually a fellow kid.
“My childhood was so awesome. Kids today don’t even know!”
Isn’t a flex.
It’s a lament.
More people should understand that.
Cereal boxes had toys inside.
Yes, it was a crass marketing for a sugar cereal made of chintzy plastic
Today you’re just expected to eat Capn Crunch because that’s what you do as a child, that’s what breakfast looks like. Which is… fine, I guess. Sugar still tastes good. That’s still a pleasure you’re otherwise asked to disavow by the protein shake nutribottles advertised on podcasts.
But it also means the idle minor joy of getting a random toy present, as a reward for nothing, just because you exist, is stripped. That random spark of joy is gone, replaced with nothing.
Where did the public pool go? the neighborhood park? the atrium food court public place to gather?
Same thing. All of them were just replaced with nothing.
Kids today have many good things. But it shouldn’t be a trade off. They should get to have instant messages with friends and go skating at the park. They should get to play amazing modern video games at home and go trick or treating for halloween. They should be able to have stickers and markers and macaroni art as well as youtube and streaming libraries and fortnite dances.
Fun should be allowed at every level.
Also. Kids now are just used to people constantly trying to sell them stuff.
When I was a kid, we had advertising on TV, radio, magazines, and billboards. It was easy to recognize and you could work around it. There were certain types of TV, like PBS or cable, that did not have commercials.
Now, kids are inundated with advertising constantly. YouTube and social media have replaced TV and radio for a lot of families, where in addition to ads every 1-3 minutes, many YT stars have sponsored bits in their videos. Social media constantly tries to sell you things. They have found a way to put advertising into the pumps at gas stations. There are so many things, like access to TV shows and Disney movies, that are locked behind a paywall. They can’t even read a newspaper if they wanted to.
I did a school visit a while back to a group of about 100 fourth graders to tell them about the library’s upcoming Summer Reading Program. They were totally unimpressed by me telling them cheerfully that if they met their reading goals, we would give them books for free. I thought they were just tired because it was close to the end of the day, and then one kid raised his hand to resignedly ask the question they were all thinking:
Kid: How much does this cost? Me: Nothing. It’s a free library program. Kid: Uh huh, like you are going to give us books for free. How much does it really cost? Me, confused: … nothing. You don’t have to give us any money at all. You just have to do the reading and fill out your reading log, and you will have earned the books to take home and keep forever. Kid, in disbelief: Oh come on. If you don’t charge us, how are you gonna make money? Me, taken aback: We don’t make money, we’re a library. Kid, exasperated: What do you mean you don’t make money? Me: We’re a public service, like the fire department or schools. You don’t have to pay to use those either. There is a ripple in the crowd as 100 disbelieving 9 year olds take this in. Other kid: How do you afford to do anything if you don’t make money? Like where do you get the money to do stuff if we don’t have to pay you? Me: Through things like government grants and taxes. Third kid: So let me get this straight. That means that if some people don’t pay their taxes – Teacher: Friend, this is a great conversation for Social Studies and not during library time! Ms. Intrepidheroine, would you like to show us the LEGOs you brought?
And that’s the story of how I realized that children absolutely expect you to try to sell them something if you come in to do a “special talk” even if it’s for a library.
Which is tragic.
Kids are aware from a shockingly early age that youtubers make money by getting people to watch their videos, and that their (the viewer’s) attention is a commodity. First graders have told me this (obviously not in those words but yeah).
Kids today are subjected, essentially, to the advertising standards of the 1950s because the FCC hasn’t enforced the advertising restrictions for TV on youtube.
I have a lot of posts on this, as I believe some degree of commercialization is good for kidvid (action figures and action cartoons were better when they were selling each other, fight me) and it is the source of a lot of the kind of ‘simple pleasure freebies" I feel kids are robbed.
But I think the 1980s kidvid rules were just about the right level of strict. No characters shilling directly to the kids. No promises of happiness or popularity. Ask for parents permission, not their money. No ads for the thing, in the show that is also an ad for the thing.*
But still with the kind of profit incentives that make the products about what kids would enjoy rather than whatever adults think they need.
Pictured: What Kids Want, What Adults Think they Need
Cuz I’m with Sid & Marty Kroft. Kids are in school all week, their entertainment should be fun.
Youtube kids are getting the kind of entertainment diet that my dad did, where the character you’re watching turns to camera to tell you that Captain Video wants you to have this cardboard space helmet. The thing Krusty the Clown is a parody of.
Only instead of selling cereal and plastic space guns, they’re selling crypto scams and energy drinks that can hospitalize their target audience.
And sometimes that pitch man is a kid their own age.
Is much more effective when its actually a fellow kid.
if the satanic panic was happening now a lot of you guys would be like “DNI if you don’t believe survivors of satanic ritual abuse at daycare”
have already been accused of being a fascist for making this post
I dare you to explain what “satanic panic” is supposed to symbolize here. Did you refrain from saying “red scare” or especially “war of drugs” cause you knew if you said that people would stop for a minute and consider before rebloging this nonsense post mindlessly? Or is this about survivor of violence or rape? Or just what tf is this about?
have you considered googling “satanic panic.” sometimes if you look up words you don’t know you can find out what they mean
war of drugs
Lol. Lmao even
Hey, OP, I genuinely do want to know what you’re using the satanic panic as a metaphor for. Specifically because I do think that it’s vague enough that it can refer to anything from people who say “DNI proship” or “DNI antiship” to “DNI trans rights activists” (a transphobic dog whistle) or “DNI Transphobes”
it’s not a fucking metaphor
hey op what set of people is “a lot of you guys” meant to be
hey dumbass, it refers to the audience reading this post. hope this fucking helps
hmm but as you can see I have read this post. and I have no DNI in any venue, it being unlikely I would break this habit for any one historical period. So it would seem there is some subset of “the audience” implied
she knocked that smug look off my face but luckily i was wearing a second, smaller smug look underneath
This post is so incredibly dumb and everytime I come across it I just can’t help but laugh. This site is just magical. Where else will you get this nonsense?
she knocked that smug look off my face but luckily i was wearing a second, smaller smug look underneath
This post is so incredibly dumb and everytime I come across it I just can’t help but laugh. This site is just magical. Where else will you get this nonsense?
okay but “the symbolism is Real and Trying to Kill You” is my favorite kind of symbolism
like yeah the monster is a representation of your unresolved trauma and guilt and a manifestation of the sins of your past but it’s also a real creature and it’s going to fucking Get you
The funniest version of this is when you work in a haunted house
I was super bored one night bc we were really slow, and the animatronic that served as my cue had broken without my knowing, so I didn’t get an alert that someone was coming.
I was in the hallway singing “Peanut Butter Jelly Time” at the top of my lungs and jumping up and down in the hallway. The guy in the next hallway over was singing it with me. I don’t know what he was doing but knowing him, it was equally goofy.
So imagine being a teenager girl and her teenage boyfriend, coming down a dark and spooky hallway filled with fog, and finding a small demonic-looking thing jumping like a madman, shouting “PEANUT BUTTER JELLY TIME” at the top of its lungs with the voice of a twelve year old boy, and hearing a deep, booming voice repeating it back.
That sounds scarier than most things I’ve experienced in a haunted house to be totally honest
The fact that artists can spawn memes that people keep using and it doesn’t really increase awareness of them at all is kinda sad, I see people regularly mindblown that these and around a dozen other memes are all just from the webcomic Gunshow
