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PaperclipPerfector  8mo ago (text post)   3361 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for May 17, 2024

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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(I don't have the heart to kick my son out of my home office, all of this is written in jest)

We all know that Paw Patrol is libertarian propaganda for kids, it's even on Wikipedia: the heroes of the day are the privatized emergency services, every single time, while elected officials are not.

But what I've realized is that it's also a different kind of propaganda. Mayor Goodway is a proud woman of color, and she's so profoundly incompetent that she couldn't have won a fair election against literally anyone unless the party nominated her as a token diversity candidate and let her run practically unopposed. Yes, Mayor Humdinger of Foggy Bottom is an evil old white male, but he is at least competent enough to manage his own team of cat minions and come up with underhanded schemes. Goodway in comparison is worse than useless. Is the show teaching the kids that women of color are incompetent figureheads at best?

The problem with a lot of material targeted at kids is how sanitized it all is. Whether it's superheroes or robot-animals or what not, the solution is always some magic or techno-magic, never an actual practical skill that kid-behaving-like-adults would develop.

You'll never learn how to gut a fish or dress a deer by reading an 'adventure in the woods' type of book. You'll never learn how to make bombs or makeshift weapons or how to bribe an official. You can watch 1000s of hours of pirate cartoons and barely learn any strategy or tactics.

This is why Blippi is the best. Actually educational and teaches really good things like industrial processes and heavy engineering, all in a positive learning environment and adult respect for kids. Don't be surprised if the daddy kink of 20 year old girls in 10 years time involved orange glasses and suspenders.

Russian Smeshariki(that were for some reason renamed kikoriki in English release) are mainly story focused in the main series, but I think at least a third of russian-speaking zoomers know what mortgage, string theory or DNA is from one of the spin-offs.

Some of them have also wondered why the penguinball speaks with a German accent and is a talented scientist.

After watching Blippi for 2 minutes I'll never look at the Aged Wheels channel the same again, he's like Blippi's fatter and less flamboyant cousin.

In the two minutes of Paw Patrol footage I watched in response to this comment, it feels more like propaganda for Apple or Tesla than anything. Every single problem no matter how minor was solved by deploying a neat technological gadget.

Its a toy selling cartoon. A lot of the architectural and vehicle design decisions look like they were made to be scaled down into tiny model versions. Main example is the giant outdoor slide on the paw patrol tower.

All right, all right, I'll quit lurking and register lol.

Anyhow, while it's true that Goodway is ineffectual in virtually all her appearances, it's a kid show with kid (dog) heroes; adults being near-universally silly and unable to solve their own problems is a necessary plot element. Consider Captain Turbot and his French cousin, both white males - whenever they're on screen together, it's virtually guaranteed that they'll make a bunch of stupid decisions and end up needing rescue.

The media doesn’t seem to have an issue depicting women of color as incompetent leaders per se. Consider Abbott Elementary, which is probably the most successful network sitcom to come out of the US in recent years, set at an inner-city school in Philadelphia. The principal, a black woman, is depicted as fundamentally incompetent, lazy, poorly educated and self-serving, having obtained her position solely by blackmailing the district superintendent about an affair. The other teachers, white and black, constantly complain about her.

The show is written and created by a black woman. I think a lot of complaints about woke in media are fair, but the claim that PoC are never depicted negatively is not; most minority media creators do not seem to have issues portraying non-white people as venal, stupid, lazy and so on where it serves the story.

An example that immediately came to mind was Mindy Kaling's first role being writing and portraying Kelly Kapoor as a narcissist, egoist idiot mess.

What is this show and where can I buy the boxed set before it gets memory holed?

It is everywhere in kids stores. Small town mayor basically outsourced all civic functions to a kid and his dogs that have a variety of public services available 'on demand'. Child labor, animal exploitation, privatization of public services... all that is missing is guns drugs and prostitution, then it'll be true libertarian paradise.

It's not actually libertarian propaganda, it's a pretty crappy show that was built just to sell toys.

My kid was pretty into it for maybe 6 months and then even he thinks it's pretty lowbrow at this point.

It's probably the most beloved or second most beloved kids show today (running with Bluey).

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