I Spent Six Years in Wizard College To Learn Magic, But There Aren’t Any Wizarding Jobs, So Now I’m Trapped In Eternal Dept And I Flip Burgers at Burger King
There are 47 comments if this is another Freiren thread istg I’m putting you all on time out
No no it’s pretty close to a struggle about I Was Kidnapped And Taken To The Demon King’s Castle And Now I Can’t Get A Good Night’s Sleep
We’ve had a struggle about the goat of sleepy-core anime? Smdh
Maduro is the princess.
Ah, thought i missed something problematic in the anime, tried to search for it, found nothing
Nah my jokes are just bad and don’t land
Nono, it makes perfect sense, probably would have been clearer (for me) without a link or light paraphrasing
It’s about Venezuela idk if that’s better or worst than Freiren debates.
i was level 100 and challenged the demon lord to a duel but everybody laughed at me and refused to take me seriously because i had no social capital and then i died a second time when i drank poisoned tea
Tbf don’t the games usually have you going through henchmen and henchwomen before reaching final boss?
In the story telling of the big baddie games you implicitly (and explicitly) wrecking the (demon) society while getting good at game, i assume same is true of gamer anime
In games you have to kill all the demon generals before you get to fight the big bad! Each one unlocks a new region.
But don’t the isekais follow that plot structure, broadly speaking? Leveling up by killing demon generals or whatever? And not go immediately after big baddie
Depends on the show tbh. I see a lot where they only go after the generals because they have no idea where the demon king actually is.
I yearn for isekai that isn’t power fantasies mixed with imperialism, let be a multi coalition power of friendship deal that saves the day.
Try the OG isekai - Aura Battler Dunbine. It’s a Yoshiyuki Tomino joint, so there’s imperialism and a spiraling arms race but the author is trying to tell folks that’s a bad thing.
Edit:
let be a multi coalition power of friendship deal that saves the day
Lord of the Rings without the questionable bits lol
Digimon
What about the isekai doctor manga where it’s just a doctor teaching people medicine and the only people who have a problem with it are human supremacists who wish to monopolize (flawed, not omnipotent) healing magic to do imperialism on others
I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but SAO:Alicization actually sort of did that, with a driving theme of “the artificial human souls in this simulated world are still ultimately human and deserve their own liberation and safety, while the imperialist warmongers fucking with them to make automated weapons are ontologically evil”. It even made the point that the “evil” races of the world were also still literally just people who were being forced into a role they didn’t want and in fact actively rebelled against.
It’s just that it’s still SAO and has more of the other kind of SA than ever before too. But on the other hand it does have Kirito depowered and/or in a coma for like 95% of it.
It’s not good by any measure, but it’s the least bad that mainline SAO ever was. It’s an enjoyable hate-watch that somehow ends up with sort of ok major themes to it.
Too bad i have no fucking clue how it relates to the original sword art online or it might have been interesting
It has a bunch of returning characters and hinges on the same full dive VR tech as its core, and that’s pretty much it. It has the JSDF funding some research program into AI in a secret lab on I think it was an oil rig, where the scientists literally discovered the material form of the human soul and how to create artificial vessels for these, discover that they can copy their own literal souls into these machines except when powered on they immediately implode from the trauma of being locked in a void with no sensory feedback, and construct an elaborate virtual world to try to grow blank copies of literal human souls into sapient and complete artificial human consciousnesses, to use as disposable and infinitely replicable drone pilots.
That’s the premise, at least: in practice it’s a high fantasy adventure with a depowered amnesiac Kirito growing up and adventuring in a time-dilated artificial world while spy shit happens in the real world and an American PMC unit tries to steal the supposedly one complete artificial human soul (except the entire premise is flawed and tons of them pass the “Alicization” threshold without anyone noticing over the course of the story).
It’s not a well written story and its core concept is not well thought out, it’s just surprising in how decidedly it comes down on the “the residents of that artificial world are real people who should be treated with respect and accorded rights and self-determination instead of being tortured and exploited” theme.
You’re kinda selling it to me ngl, I been watching some other slop that my standards are getting low enough I’ll prob give it a look or at least read some synopsis to see how the pacing is
It’s fun if you’ve got a high tolerance for gross bullshit and can enjoy laughing at the show. SAO is weird because in its later arcs it’s like the author is earnestly trying to not be awful, but he still fundamentally doesn’t understand technology, video games, people, or cause and effect, so it ends up in this weird space where it can be wildly problematic but then have better themes than most anime and center its female characters as the ones with agency who are driving all of the plot, while still being an absolutely nonsensical story that hinges on plot points that fundamentally just do not make sense or work at all.
That’s the problem with SAO author that keeps turning me off to be honest. Besides from the dry and uninspiring proses, the execution of most concepts and premises is just half-assed and lack any deep understanding of the subjects. None of the technology, politics, or social structures make sense if you zoom in and scrutinized it. But it does sound cool when you just took a quick look.
Another awful thing about the series is it still fall back to the big man theory trope where the good guys can only win with MC woke up and became literally god. And of course, tons and tons of near miss SA
i got reincarnated as a slime
that first one is kind of the plot of frieren
I mean not really, the plot goes to some lengths to point out all kinds of background heroes did alot of the heavy lifting tackling the bulk of the demon army
In fact there are hints that the disillusionment over the lack of recognition for these acts may be behind a certain character’s motivation to commit homicidal actions against mages
The idea that decapitation strikes don’t work because of systemic forces has been totally disproved by Maduro.
Decapitation strikes work, when they can tip the balance in struggle between two or more relatively equal factions, and fail, when one faction is absolutely dominant.
I don’t think “do decapitation strikes work” was ever the right angle to approach it. The conditions in Venezuela took time to work to the point where a decap worked. That process happened slowly, the decap happened suddenly. A materialist approach would be to analyze how venezuela got to this point, where a country like Iran was so much more resilient.
In other words, decapitation strikes work. We cannot dismiss them as a useless gesture. Because you can set them up, and they can accomplish the goals you wish.
decapitation strikes work
Decapitation strikes can work.
A distinction that doesn’t matter. All tools that work have conditions under which they work and under which they do not.
Guns can work, provided they are loaded, the safety is off, and the gun is functional. In other words, guns work.
the mode is the default. decapitation strikes have worked once and not worked about 50 times so while they can work, they don’t usually work and if something doesn’t usually work we often simplify that to it doesn’t work.
A semantic distinction that implies something completely different.
Did you think what I was saying was “Decapitation strikes are always a valid option and should become the immediate standard tactic in all situations”?
Did you think my response was meant to litigate this question to begin with? Because it was meant to examine the conditions that lead to an effective decap so that we could form a better understanding rather than to focus on pat solutions like “they work” and "they don’t work ⸻ terminating thoughts that give us zero insight.
They work on weak states with fundamental flaws, yes.
They clearly do not work on strong states.
I believe that to be an incorrect framing. The issue is not the strength of the state. Decapitation strikes have most famously failed against relatively weakly organised states. ISIS was not a very well organised system with robust infrastructure, biweekly assassination of their leadership did not change much in that regard. If not having a strong state was what mattered, then ISIS would have collapsed as soon as Baghdadi died, and all the various successor organisations would likewise have collapsed rather than now running Syria.
What matters is the incentive structures and the motivations of potential successors.
Removing Lincoln (Even if his assassination could not really be called a decapitation strike, he is nevertheless instructive) changed the trajectory of reconstruction and therefore American history, it did so not because the US was a particularly weak state, but because of who was put in charge and who was removed.Venezuela has flaws, but it has a strong socialist tradition and believers in the Bolivaran revolution in various positions of local government. It has systems that were deliberately set up to act independently of a potential reactionary government. The idea that Venezuela is uniquely unable to withstand the US is just not a premise I accept. The leadership is choosing to go along with an American agenda. It may either be doing so because leaders of the government don’t really believe in the socialist project, it may be doing so out of fear of more kidnappings or other American reprisals. I can’t read thoughts.
Edit: Changed the wording to make it clear that you I don’t think you are incorrect on a factual basis, I just disagree.
It’s the same issue as we’ve seen in the past no? The revolutionaries at the time of the revolution are hardcore and would literally die for the cause but the following waves post-revolution are not fully committed on that level. When they’re faced with a situation where their life is at stake they capitulate.
Iran hasn’t crumbled to this because the religion has created subsequent generations of leadership that are still just as fully committed and willing to die for it.
Socialist states are failing to properly pass on that commitment. They failed in the soviet union, they failed in several african projects, they’ve failed in venezuela. They almost failed in China too, if it had been anyone other than Xi in charge we could have seen less drive for anti-corruption and a liberalisation of the country. Fortunately Xi is a true believer.
Venezuelan socialists will have to find those who have that true belief and decide whether they can be pushed through the existing system or whether they need to do something drastic.
If socialism fails unless our leadership forever consist of true believers, then I fear for our future. But yes, we have a problem with passing on a revolutionary fervor. I would think the hope is that we can build incentive structures that result in everyone having motivation to continue building socialism. But on that I have no answers.
And as harsh as I am being on Rodriguez, I do not believe we can confidently say that Venezuelan socialism is yet a totally failed project (And if what you meant is that Venezuela has only failed in passing on the revolutionary fervor, I would say that there does seem to be some people committed to the cause, it just doesn’t seem to me to be their head of state). I can only say that removing Maduro has greatly been to the US’ benefit.
That was lesson that (some) people took from stalin tbf, that purges don’t work by themselves, you have to rapidly divest power to the workers (not voters, workers, after you cleaned the bourgeoisie) (which in venezuela case would have been not having state deal with oil revenue, but rather people, but they didn’t even clean bourgeoisie so whatever, socdemery)
Removing Maduro didn’t do anything beyond appeasing the egos of American politicians. He was open to a lot of the stuff the current government is doing, but the US wouldn’t negotiate with him at all.
I don’t think Maduro would be deporting people he received in prisoner exchanges with the US back to the US like the current gov is doing.
Honestly? I think he would have if they pressured it at the negotiating table. Once they started bombing Venezuelan civilians with no international response, it was over. That’s speculation on my part though
Not true, the kidnapping of Maduro also made a bunch of online armchair leftists immediately abandon dialectical materialist thinking in favour of an entirely vibes based approach where they read every western statement about Venezuela completely uncritically and get mad that Venezuela isn’t fighting the US down to every man, woman and child in the country.
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All oil revenues go through a US controlled fund in Qatar, US writes checks and disburses oil money to Venezuela.
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Venezuela released thousands of “political prisoners” aka comprador Gusano violent right-wingers and they deported Alex Saab back to the USA, who Maduro’s government negotiated to bring back to Venezuela
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The government has begun instituting neoliberal policies and working with US government and US capitalists
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Oil has been redirected, Venezuela no longer attempts to send anything to Cuba but instead sends it to the USA where it even has been seen to be immediately redirected to Israel
This isn’t vibes. You are projecting. We are the ones describing materialist things.
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“If you’re openly taking meetings with the CIA where you plan to help them with clandestine ops and handing over Maduro’s cabinet members to the US in return for nothing, then you may be collaborating with the US” is not a"Vibes based approach" and if it is then I’ll take my “Vibes” over your “Actually collaborating with the US is good” based approach.
Why are you even a communist if you think every setback and issue a communist country has is proof of the US’s undying might? Seriously, why are you even here if you clearly think the US is eternal and undefeatable and every communist movement so fragile that any assault on them is just proof of their revolutionary movement collapsing? Communism clearly doesn’t work in your worldview, so why the fuck are you even here?
You should build Communism — precisely because it’s impossible.
I’m literally the person arguing that you can and should resist the hegemon and acquiescence isn’t inevitable.
Do you read posts before you respond, or do you just go off your inherent belief that you’re the one true communist?
And how do you even square your belief that you’re the one true communist with your seeming belief that actually revisionism isn’t worth criticising?
Was Maduro proposing letting the US set up a CIA “partnership” with Venezuela?
His opening offer was to essentially cut off trade with other nations and tie Venezuela’s economy entirely to the US, and this was after they were already terror bombing random fishing boats. I doubt some kind of token anti-drug cooperation would’ve been off the table, which is exactly the kind of thing Trump loves.
Perhaps “do execution strikes work” is the wrong question compared to “in which situations and by which metrics do execution strikes work”… Hmmmm, yes, quite…
If there are circumstances under which decapitation strikes work, and those circumstances are capable of being set up by the Trump white house, then decapitation strikes cannot be dismissed as unworkable because of systemic factors.
The abduction was less than 6 months ago. Way too early to declare victory for the US.
Beyond saying “Maduro is still president” has Delcy Rodríguez done literally anything to oppose the US in any capacity since becoming acting president? Has she said “No” even once?
Has she said “No” even once?
lol. Hegemons hate this one simple trick
Realistically, what would you want her to do? She doesn’t have many options. I’m not saying she’s a great leader. Maybe she really is a rat, and in some years we’ll get reporting to confirm that. But for now, I;'m just seeing a leader/country in an impossible situation.
it’s possible the bolivarian revolution even comes out stronger because of this. The kidnapping hurt the legitimacy of the opposition, and if she’s able to get sanctions lifted while oil prices go back to Chavez-era prices, then the economy might recover.
lol. Hegemons hate this one simple trick
This is just a facile thing to say in the context of the US floundering in Iran. It is also just generally facile. “Yes sir mr. great satan sir” isn’t an inevitable and incontrovertible axiom to which all politics are subject. The idea that no resistance is possible and that we must all bow before the great hegemon is… I mean it’s pathetic? Beyond being pathetic it’s also just totally dismissive of all the resistance that is actually happening all across the world.
Realistically, what would you want her to do?
Not hand over people the US just released to your custody, not allow the US to tell Venezuela where the oil goes, not meet up with the leader of the CIA to set up strategic partnerships. You know, basic shit.
This is just a facile thing to say in the context of the US floundering in Iran.
Iran has a much bigger, more experienced military, more territory, more people, and is significantly farther from the US than venezuela. The US is floundering because of rockets and drones, not words.
Not hand over people the US just released to your custody, not allow the US to tell Venezuela where the oil goes, not meet up with the leader of the CIA to set up strategic partnerships. You know, basic shit.
Again, it’s been less than 6 months. if they’re still doing all these concessions the rest of the year, then I might join you in declaring US victory.
And of course there is absolutely no middle ground between open collaboration with the CIA, handing over control of your country’s oil exports and delivering prisoners to the US on one hand and defeating the US militarily on the other. Those are your only options.
Also no one except Iran has done any resistance, there are no smaller groups that have resisted US imperalism under much worse conditions to draw upon for the types of resistance you could do except shoot at them, no one except Iran has ever told Trump no. And hey, the DPRK isn’t real, and the Houthis are imaginary while we’re at it.oh ok
