You know what's something I noticed about The Golden Girls is? So Rose's late husband, Charlie, his face is never seen, and I'm kinda glad they didn't show him because the way he has been described over the years means that no one could hold up to the kind of man he was. Rose really describes a god of a husband. Charlie is not only a god of a husband, but a god in bed who had the equipment to put a bull to shame. He was also the only man who could contain Rose, because she apparently far outpaced Blanche in every way. I also find it funny that Rose used Charlie's godly powers to take some shots at Blanche every now and then.
Recently, I was introduced to a concept that I feel like we're all in some ways aware of, but not entirely acknowledging. It's the idea that the Overton window can snap in a way.
With this current political climate, the right wing, and I mean the far right wing, is trying to enforce the idea that social programs of any kind are "communist". An example of this is any criticism that Fox News has of Mayor Mamdani. When the claim becomes "investing in schools is communist," people are going to eventually stop and say to themselves, "Well, since I want kids to go to school, I guess I'm a communist now."
You know, despite going through all the schooling and conditioning, my writing process is the most chaotic shit ever. Seriously, most days I just word vomit and see what sticks, and then wipe around the bits of oatmeal. I guess I sort of fell into it while writing daily. I guess it helps that I make corrections along the way. The only reason I don't make a conspiracy board is that I don't have one.
You know what word that's been annoying me over the past few months? Slop. It's effective in some use cases, like AI slop, because it just perfectly describes what is happening, but now I just hear it stapled onto whatever the OP doesn't like. Indie animation projects, indie slop. Games that focus on co-op play, friend slop. High quality content, quality slop. It's making the word lose all meaning to the point where it contradicts itself. I've lost all desire to ever use the word slop. Although I will still proudly call my shitty doodles pencil slop. I'm a shit artist, and I'm proud!
So I fell down the rabbit hole of the enhanced games, along with the general zeitgeist around steroid use. It is certainly something I'll tell you that. The mere existence of the event is a scandal in and of itself and incredibly disappointing.
The enhanced games are backed by the usual group of billionaires that you don't trust. Peter Thiel is a top name here. Because of that, I refused to watch the Enhanced Games, but I did see the headlines that came from it. Turns out, yeah, nothing really big happened there. That was the problem because of how these games were advertised.
The idea was to push human limits and break all the world records. There were even former Olympic Athletes, some of whom already had records.
The athletes all lined up and failed to break most records. The only one broken was by a swimmer who was wearing a banned suit. He wasn't even juiced. The winners of the 100-meter dashes not only couldn't qualify for the Olympics, but nothing would have even been recorded because of the steroids. Some of whom were also not on any PEDs. I mean, you gotta have a control group, I guess
Any athlete who would have had a chance wouldn't have even joined because they have better careers in the actual Olympics, and this event would be a permanent black mark. Which is why the athletes that did join are either washed up or just looking for an out. The whole thing kinda put a lampshade on the fact that talent in a given sport is just as important as physical ability and strength.
You know what, tangent time. There are a few big reasons why PED's aren't allowed in sports. There is the unfair advantage, of course, or at least we thought there was, but there is also health. Bodybuilding is largely suffering from a steroid epidemic. It's not acknowledged on stage, but it is well known that the Mr. Universe lineup is largely showing signs of steroid abuse. They call it a roid gut for a reason. Arnold Schwartzenager has taken notice and decided to put a lampshade on it by having the contestants pose in ways that emphasize the roid symptoms. Without saying it, he showed that he is aware of what's happening. Granted, even he did steroids at one point, but he did it in moderation and is still alive because of that.
Something that these steroids have been doing to these bodybuilders is killing them. It is a legitimate concern in the community that someday a contestant is going to drop dead on stage because his heart gave out. It already happened backstage. A lot of these guys actually get winded while moving around, and others get diagnosed with sleep apnea and need a C-Pap machine to help them breathe at night. These are guys in their 20s and 30s; they often even look decades older than they actually are. I remember seeing a picture of one of these bodybuilders and thought he was in his forties, only to find out that he was younger than me. It's so bad that smaller circuits have popped up that do test for PEDs and specifically emphasize the classic physique. On the larger circuits, though. There is that fear of someone dying.
Everything mixed together is why the Enhanced Games were largely a dud. No one wants to blow up their career; the people involved couldn't even qualify for the Olympics, and people know about the health risks. There is another reason too. With steroids associated with cheating, the event kind of ruins the image of the talent that goes into pro sports. There is an admiration for pro athletes, and advertising that they are using drugs that are used to cheat, it just ruins any excitement that people had going into this. The games have been used to advertise supplements, because of course they were. A joke taken literally by billionaires who missed the entire point of it. What else is new?
Luckily, nothing official will ever come out of these games, except for medical bills that will inevitably come because of the steroids. The open use of PEDs has been denounced by the Olympics and associated regulatory bodies, and any attempt to present records that could have been broken would be immediately dismissed.
When I was still in high school, there was a lot of talk about a dying art form. A topic that boomers get passionate about. Cursive writing, no, seriously. Crusive writing being taught in school is a bit like an entry-level calligraphy lesson. In my area, I was in the last class that learned how to do it. I still know how to write it to this day, but I was pushed back in writing print. I'll get into why later. I learned in second grade, and it was a requirement in my district to only use cursive until high school.
Looking back at it, sure, it was nice to be able to write fast, but the technique hasn't been really needed since the 90s. The only reason why it's still being taught is that a lot of people still use it, and you gotta know how to read a cursive Z compared to a print Z. Come to think of it, cursive really looks like its own language at times.
The argument that I hear most when this discussion comes up is that the founding fathers used cursive, and so should we to read the Declaration and Constitution. However, even then, that's its own unique font that James Madison knew. I struggle to read that without squinting really hard, and I learned cursive.
Cursive was really good for quickly writing something down while keeping it organized and nice-looking. That was before email and computers, though. Now I can type at mach Jesus on my ten-dollar ONN brand keyboard. Even faster on a Logitech anything. This is why I was in the last class to learn. Teachers were sort of touch-and-go if they wanted to teach it anyway. A few underclassmen learned because of that, but not everyone.
Now, I continued using cursive until college, and I became the biggest argument against cursive because of how atrocious my handwriting is.
I had teachers and professors beg me to write in print. I've had family look at my notes and ask what the hell I wrote. My own mother calls it serial killer handwriting. The scribbles of a madman eager for his next victim. Meanwhile, my aunt writes in Elvish and doesn't even need a line to keep her writing straight. She has beautiful handwriting.
Today, cursive is just a holdover from long ago. It became outdated when I was in elementary school, and it has been phased out where I live. I imagine that it may make a comeback as part of the education backlash against AI chatbots helping kids cheat. Just as a fun little bonus. I mean, I can see it as an optional thing that just looks pretty. Beyond that, cursive doesn't have many benefits.
With a new Fable game on the horizon, I've been looking back on the ones that I've played (1 and 3). Even been looking at an evil playthrough of Fable 3 because why not, never did that. Then I remembered something about the history of this game series. It was hyped up so much back in the day, only to fall flat.
The marketing around the first game promised the world. When it was in development, Peter Molyneux said that it had its own developing world. For example, you could plant an acorn and get a tree. You can start your own lineage and play as your progeny. The game we eventually got was one in which only the player character aged. Seriously, that's how the level progression worked. By the end of my playthrough, I was a 70-year-old man, while even the children in Bowerstone were the same age all throughout the game. The tree thing never happened, and the moral choice system that was the main selling point felt pretty flat. The story continued on, assuming that with any choice, both can be true. Molyneux would begin a pattern where, when the next game was in development, he would call the previous one disappointing. Always overpromising and underdelivering.
This pattern continued even outside of the Fable games and with games like Goddess. The thing is that if Molyneux didn't hype things up, the games would be largely remembered for what they are. Perfectly serviceable fantasy games. In Fable three I've nearly hundred percented it with the exception of the online stuff, and I have fun with these games. It's just the marketing that hangs over it like the rotting corpse of Mussolini. It just creates awkward conversation when the topic of real-world history comes up. That's why we decorate it with air fresheners. What the hell did I just write?
Thinking about gay pride had me thinking about all the good things that happened over the decades, where people say, "I'm here, I'm queer, get used to it!" It's that attitude of our gay grandparents that allows me to be here today, out, proud, and just living my life. However, there is a contingent who decided that they don't want allies who want the best for them. Queer people who seek allies who would rather them be dead than anything, and openly see them as a convenient mouthpiece who will soon lose their usefulness. With it now being July, these are some gay pick-me's, or as some call them, the assimilationists.
For the assimilationists, you've probably got a couple of examples in your head. Chances are, we're both thinking of the same person. For a holotype specimen, let's turn towards Dave Rubin. He's convenient for two reasons: number 1, he's gay, and number 2, he used to identify with the left on several issues, even being on TYT for years before moving on to the Daily Wire. He was also a failed comedian, thus upholding the failed comedian-to-right-wing-host pipeline. Except, he doesn't seem to actually believe in anything unless it pays his rent. Right now, what pays his rent is being a doormat to conservatives, and it is a lucrative gig too. It also means that he is a complete laughing stock to everyone. Left, right, and center. I don't think his audience even cares about him. I say that because they called him abusive for deciding to be a dad while married to his husband. Something something not Adam and Steve. The public opinion was put into the spotlight when Rubin went onto the Jubilee 20 v. 1 debate show and got his bussy ripped apart with facts and logic. A lot of people don't even think he came prepared. At most, he had one topic card of talking points that didn't even fill it up. It was kinda sad, really. Watching this man sell out everything he had, and all his hopes and dreams, to people that hate him. Luckily for him, they cut him a fat check.
Milo Yiannopoulos is another one of these pick-me's, but he currently identifies as an ex gay. Not actually sure if he believes anything he says, though. He was always a grifter and was involved with GamerGate, because of course he was. Even made a big show of turning straight when he threw his engagement ring off of a boat. Now I wonder a lot about his ex-fiancée, because they went from wedding planning to being roommates. Then again, he did get engaged to a right-wing grifter, so he's already got some issues to work through. I also have to wonder: are they actually exes, because being ex gay is not easy, or even in any way effective to anyone who believes it. This is absolutely what Dave Rubin's audience wants to see more of. Just leave the gay lifestyle behind, and you'll be the perfect gay friend.
One more pick-me, this time from the Stonewall era. Fred Sargent is a police officer who joined the NYPD AFTER Stonewall. He was also ex-gay at that point, switching after the riot. He reportedly told his then-boyfriend to shut up when things were heating up. He has gained fame recently, long after he became ex-ex-gay and gained fame as a "Stonewall veteran". He is very much anti-trans. He started spreading a myth that is damaging the trans community. The idea that Marsha P. Johnson was just a cis male drag queen. The obvious problem is that she stated that she identified as a woman. Sure, she used different words, but she was even planning to medically transition in Switzerland, but had to give that up when the costs were just too much. This man is very much an assimilationist who questions the need for Pride Month and parrots the idea of "drop the T".
Something that all these people struggle with is gaining allies within the queer community, and you can guess why. These are people who actively push people like themselves away. Often being so painfully centrist that it can cause harm. They would rather ally with people who actively wish harm upon them and don't give it a second thought. These are people who look at conversion therapies and think it's a right. They would rather be miserable and forced back into the closet than be out and happy.
My Ratchet and Clank kick continues its out-of-order streak. I can't help it; I blame my local GameStop. This week I got what I feel like is the weakest entry I've seen so far out of the now three of fully played through. I'm talking about the half-reboot, half movie tie-in game of Ratchet and Clank 2016. All while I still haven't watched the movie, and honestly forgot it was a thing until I picked it up.
The game quickly establishes that it has an unreliable narrator hook going on. The whole story is told to us by Captain Qwark. The washed-up Buck Rodgers type, who is incredibly self-centered, and in the last game I played, he often stole all the credit.
In this game, he is not quite washed up yet, but he's still more concerned about his image than anything. He's an active member of the Galactic Rangers, a team of space heroes who keep peace in the galaxy. Ratchet wants to join them.
The story kinda follows the original game. Although it is more of a combination of the first and third games. Drek is building a new planet for the Blarg as part of a get-rich-quick scheme. However, this time he is joined by Dr. Nefarious, who provided the warbots this time around. Clank gets to Ratchet in a similar way to the original. Ratchet is a mechanic on Veldin who is launched into the adventure with a home-built rocket. The only difference now is that Ratchet works for an older, gruff mechanic. A fair change.
Gameplay-wise, it is pretty close to the original. The controls are easy enough to grasp. The variety of weapons is fun. Mr. Zircon is my favorite, surpassing even my beloved Agents of Doom. The upgrading system is like what we see from Going Commando and onwards. There is a secondary upgrading system that involves spending raritarium, but I'm not sure if it actually did anything. There are fewer planets here than in the original. I don't know what happened there; maybe there was a time crunch.
Character-wise, I have a few nitpicks to get out of the way. Qwark's betrayal in the original made sense because it was shown pretty early on that he was working with Drek the whole time. Here, he bails on the Rangers mid-mission to negotiate his betrayal, and then has regrets when the planet-destroying team he joins destroys a planet. Gotta say, Qwark here isn't really gripping me like the old one did. At least he had to assume a fake identity after he was fired.
Another character that gets me is Drek. Good god, they did Drek dirty here. In the original game, Drek was intimidating because he had enough power to do whatever he wanted, and was often the most competent person in the room. Also, with a voice that made him sound at least 15 feet tall. In this game, he's still got the power, but is put lower than Dr. Nafarious, who is squishy for some reason. Drek gets nerfed so hard by one of the joke weapons. Damn Drek, they took your voice and then your dignity. At least the original fell on his own sword -er laser.
A big thing that happens in the story is the destruction of Novalis. In the original, this is all happening around Ratchet and Clank as they are trying to catch up and stop Drek. For some reason, Ratchet blames himself for the planet's destruction for like two minutes before jumping back in. It was presented like his lowest moment, but like, and I'm going to compare it to the original again, the old Ratchet would blame Drek and Qwark, and it would have lit a fire under him to break that laser down piece by piece.
Now we get into the nostalgia bait fan service parts. It's mostly with recurring characters. Two examples are the plumber and Big Al. They did stick with the recurring joke about the plumber knowing about the next games by hinting at the next reboot. When we first see him, the music makes it clear that "hey, it's that one guy, remember him?" Yes, game, I remember him. I still have the original. The plumber is also not sassing Ratchet for being a wise guy, or even as playful banter. Same thing with Big Al. These two characters, and Helga, really like to get sassy with Ratchet, but here they are more jolly than anything. Except for Helga, she's not in this game. Damn, I really liked her, and her romance with Al.
I think my main issue with this game is that it is chained to both the original and the movie. Visually, it is nice seeing Kerwan, Novalis, and Veldin in HD. It's fun seeing the old characters again. The weapons are the usual fun assortment. The story is lacking, and so is the writing. The movie probably makes more sense, so maybe I'll check it out. The game, however, I say it's best to just find a rerelease of the original.
You know what an easy group to represent in the LGBT community? Well, all of them, but especially asexuals, and by extension aromantics.
Asexual and aromantic is often conflated but they are different. Simplest explanation is that asexual means no sexual attraction, and aromantic means no romantic attraction. It is entirely possibly to be the most lustful person in any given room without the desire for anything too romantic, like premarital hand holding.
As far as asexual rep goes, some pretty famous characters can be described as simply vibing.
Going all the way back to ancient Greece, we find the Goddess of the hunt, Artemis. One of the maiden goddesses and part of her story is that she has no interest in romance or sex of any kind. It wasn't until the Renaissance that artists started portraying her with Orion. A giant who would join in on her hunts and overall great archery buddy. However, they were just that, a couple of hunting buddies. Bows before hoes.
Jughead from the Archie franchise is one of the most famous asexual characters. His one and only love is a good burger. He's perfectly content, and later on in the series, the writers finally learned that asexuality was a thing and realized, "Oh heck, that's just Jughead!"
In more recent times, there's Alister from Hazbin Hotel. He doesn't know there's even a word to describe him. Rosie does and even uses it to describe him. Al doesn't really care about romance and much prefers the thrill of the most dangerous game. He's also like Jughead in that he's more interested in a good meal. The main difference being if the meal had a personality or not.
Continuing on with the list, we've got one of the most recognizable characters of the 21st century. Spongebob. He really does emphasize the just vibing part. He just enjoys his job, friends, hobbies, and lives a fulfilling life without a care in the world. He was never shown with a love interest, except for that patty, and he doesn't mind at all.
It's honestly hard to find bad Ace rep. The only example I can think of is that one episode of House I alluded to in the intersex post I did.
I do have to wonder how many aromantic asexuals took celebicy pledges for religious reasons and thought, "damn, this is easy, why is it even a requirement?" I mean, that's how my ace friend felt about chastity when their church encouraged members to take that pledge.
It is nice to know that, despite the words being only recently in use, the idea is something that was nailed down pretty early on. Some people just don't need anything beyond platonic bonds to be happy. Sometimes, someone can find happiness living alone with a good friend on call and a cat to take care of. Even if that cat is a snail.
Looking at the NASA pride flag this year, I started looking at the intersex part of the design and started thinking of intersex in media and history. I also started realizing that, wow, I don't see much intersex rep in any shows or movies. I couldn't even think of a historic example either. With that train of thought, I decided to dedicate a post to the letter "I".
So what does it mean to be intersex? Intersex refers to when someone is born with physical characteristics of both male and female. This comes about because biology and development are messy. Looking at diagrams of genitals, you can see how they are cut from the same cloth. In fact, in development, all embryos start out as female, and if the right genes are activated, they can become male. That is a fact that I learned about from my high school biology teacher. She didn't use the word intersex, but she laid the groundwork for her class to understand it. Something else about being intersex: you can live your whole life being intersex without even knowing. Some traits that one can develop can be so subtle that the person in question won't notice them until a doctor points them out. One way this can happen is if your chromosomes don't line up with your assigned sex. Whether it be a woman with XY chromosomes or a man with XX chromosomes, all while identifying as cis.
There is also, unfortunately, a way that intersex people are oppressed. In some states, the doctor is required to "correct" the genitals of a newborn. Yes, this is genital mutilation, and it does more harm than good. These are often called "sex normalising". Often, doctors pressure the parents into getting them done to avoid being stigmatized. An idea that makes me wonder if these doctors have heard of pants and underwear.
These surgeries also have cases of creating identity issues later down the road, where someone is "corrected" to be one gender, but identifies with another. This is one of those cases where assigned gender at birth has its most literal meaning. There is also the danger of losing feeling in the genitals, as it's part of the risk of the surgery, along with fertility issues. This is why there's a push where, unless medical intervention is absolutely necessary, it needs to be left up to the person in question. There are also times when those same people come out years later as trans and find out that the surgeries they had as infants.
With all that preamble out of the way, let's get into media examples of intersex rep.
One example you might have heard about is Liane Cartman from South Park, who was originally... revealed to be Eric's mom and dad... hmmm...
Next one off the top of my head was Peter Griffin's brister...a gag character...who left Peter sexually confused in a one-off joke...
Looks like I gotta go beyond what I know here. Fandom.com is no help, as it is listing non-binary and transgender characters on the intersex list. There is Ryu Asuka from Devilman Crybaby...a fallen angel...I guess that counts. There's Stevonnie from Steven Universe, a fusion character who I'm reluctant to include on this list because they are two people.
Ok, so I've been going through some lists, and a lot of them are of obscure characters in obscure franchises. Some of them include self-published web comics and novels. I did find a character named Alex from the TV medical drama House. Considering the show's history with subjects like this, *cough cough asexual episode cough*, I'm already skeptical before reading the episode summary. He apparently starts making creepy remarks to the girl in question. It is really uncomfortable.
Well, the media has failed me once more. Couldn't get a full-time job and can't find a good intersex character. How about digging through the historical records? Intersex people have been acknowledged throughout history. In Sumerian and Greek legends, there are intersex people mixed in with the pantheons. In ancient Rome, Pliny even wrote about them and dropped the word androgyni. In Sicily, Diodorus wrote of two intersex people, Diophantus of Abae and Callon of Epidaurus. Callon was even recorded as having the first gender affirming surgery in the 2nd century BC. In the Middle Ages, caliph Ali of the Rashidun Caliphate had to resolve an inheritance dispute between five brothers, where one was intersex. He resolved it by having him take a piss and watching which hole it came out of. According to the Wikipedia page, it came out of both.
The issue of inheritance was a common problem that came up. In the early modern period, inheritance was determined by the way one's genitals leaned. Most records revolve around inheritance cases; it turns out there was a blind spot in old-time misogyny. Then there is Karl Durrge, who made a living as a research subject. Karl also transitioned to male around 1807. Turns out, transitioning was allowed by the Prussian code if the person in question was intersex. I do love the idea of the authorities putting their hands up and declaring, "This is too confusing for me, you figure this out."
Unfortunately, I can't find many examples of intersex characters. If there are any more, they're in media that have flown over my head. The ones that haven't were treated as jokes. The historical records show a plethora of intersex people just existing and living their best lives. I was surprised to see court records only acknowledging them because of inheritance. At the same time, I suppose most things didn't require them to drop their drawers to prove something. Maybe we will get better rep as time goes on, but one thing is for sure. The historical record is clear: intersex has been around for a long, long time.
For this Pride Month, I was thinking about getting a bit more historical with the subject. Talking about people and some myths that have queer elements or are icons in their own right. So let's kick this off by talking about the queen herself, her majesty, Marsha "Pay it no mind" Johnson.
Marsha was a trans woman and a drag queen who lived through the Stonewall era in New York City, and she is remembered very fondly by the gay community.
In the city, she was known for her advocacy in LGBT rights, as it was being debated as to whether or not it should be illegal. This was also at the same time when psychologists were working to declassify it as a mental illness. Marsha was seeing times change and was pushing for it heavily. All while she was living in abject poverty. She was, unfortunately, often homeless and struggled a lot with her own mental health, yet she persisted and managed to charm just about everyone around her. Marsha also worked for STAR House, a shelter for LGBT youth. During the AIDS crisis, she would be there in the hospital with terminally ill patients when they didn't have anyone else.
Her advocacy has been immortalized in her legacy. There is a video of her giving an impassioned speech for gay rights that is so full of emotion that she is gasping for air by the end of it.
Now, about the thing she is most known for. Legend says that she was the first one to throw a brick, kicking off the Stonewall riots that Pride month celebrates. Here's the thing: that's actually a myth, but the truth is stranger than fiction, and honestly, much more iconic.
Marsha came in almost an hour late, but she did have bricks (plural) in her purse. She proceeded to climb a lamp post and drop her purse onto a police cruiser, smashing the windshield. With her bag o' smashers, she brought a tear of pride to Carrie Nation's spirit.
Marsha has had many run-ins with the police. Being black in the 70s meant the police were not friends...same thing today too. However, because of her charm, she usually managed to get out.
She lived her life continuing her advocacy until her death. Marsha's body was found in the Hudson River on July 6, 1992. Her death is subject to conspiracy because while she was loved in her community, authorities saw her as a threat. The original autopsy ruled it a suicide, but Marsha had no history of suicidal thoughts. She had a bruise on the back of her head, so the public suspected homicide, possibly as a hate crime from either a civilian, or more likely an officer. The police force specifically had it out for her to the point where they tried to blockade her funeral procession. It failed, and her ashes were released into the Hudson River. Today, there is a bust of her image with holes intended to be decorated with flowers to recreate her iconic flower crown. It was originally a work of guerrilla art placed at Christopher Park in 2021.
Today, Marsha P. Johnson is one of the many advocates who are honored during Pride. Her advocacy is something that echoes to this day. She was part of the New York Ball culture; she did everything she could to support her community in gay rights and AIDS relief, and her actions are remembered fondly by the community. An icon for the ages is the woman that Marsha "Pay it no mind" Johnson was.
Some time ago, I wanted to write something on the flat-earth community. I ended up giving up on that endeavor because I was trying to figure out what the conspiracy was. As in, who would actually benefit from it? Then I found a video from Extra History on the grandfather of the movement, and now I have a new angle.
Friends, enemies, cousins that I begrudgingly tolerate at family reunions, let's talk about a man called Parallax. Parallax was a fake name for Samuel Birley Rowbotham. Rowbotham was a lot of things: a liar, a manipulator, an adulterer, a con artist, a quack, and worst of all, British.
This was a time when science was more entertainment than anything. A lot of things had yet to be formalized, like medicine, so people could give lectures without any qualifications. You could also make a good buck out of touring the country, giving these lectures. People from all walks of life tended to join these lectures because it was seen as being good for the mind.
Even with all the lack of roadblocks to these lectures, there were still accepted facts. The sky is blue, water is wet, and the Earth is round. That has been known since ancient Greece, and experiments can be done at your local marina by just watching ships sail away. It was just an accepted fact. So imagine everyone's reaction when some weird guy with a fake name rolled into town saying that the world was flat. This weird guy also happens to be a known con artist, so why not go to his lecture? The comedy club is too expensive anyway.
Yeah, the public and the media treated Parallax like a joke. The scientific community treated him more like someone who needed to be debunked. Or at least a few members did, and it resulted in the establishment of a pattern. The rest of the scientific community saw the idea of debunking the Flat Earth as a waste of time.
Now, before going into the experiments, Parallax's origin is pretty unknown. The stories that he recounted sounded like that meme that ends with everyone in the Starbucks clapping. We don't even know if he actually believed what he preached. When I called him a manipulator earlier, it was more in reference to how he would grasp onto any straw he could find in his opponents' arguments and wield them against them. Even if his argument was crumbling, which it often was.
The experiments that he did himself are fuzzy, and the details changed every time he told the story. One group of scientists decided to do an experiment with Parallax in front of a group of reporters and spectators. There was a cliff with a beach nearby. Off in the distance was a lighthouse that was just beyond the curvature of the Earth. The experiment was that if the Earth were curved, they could see most, if not the whole lighthouse, from atop the cliff, but only the lantern from the beach. This experiment took atmospheric refraction into account. Of course, Parallax declared that the whole structure would be visible from both positions. They did the experiment, and the universe was feeling mischievous that day and decided to tone down the refraction. Only half of the lantern was visible that day, and Parallax declared victory for himself, even though the results still meant that he was dead wrong. Yep, manipulative.
The results of this experiment probably sound familiar to anyone who has ever looked at flat-earth experiments. Anytime a flat earther does an experiment that isn't obviously rigged for them, it ends in the flat earth being disproven. It all started with Parallax in the 1800s.
If I were to be a betting man, I'd say he never believed in the flat earth. He was only using it to put butts into seats. That becomes very apparent to me in how he recounts experiments and his own childhood.
Today, the flat earth movement has mutated beyond what it was during Parallax's time. Are there still con men in the movement? Most likely. Do people genuinely believe it? Somehow, yes; however, for the movement to keep going, the belief system picked up on many, many other conspiracies. Things like the moon landing, the existence of Australia, and all the Antarctica stuff. There are also far too many factors involved in the modern movements conspiracy. In this age of information, Occam's Razor is the globe. One theory that cropped up in the flat earth circles to explain how ships disappear over the horizon is water mountains. How does that work? I haven't the slightest clue. I've been splashing some water all day, and my betta fish is just angry with me now.
It is funny to look back and see that the flat earth started the exact way it is seen now. That lighthouse experiment really started a great tradition in the movement. The tradition of humiliation is still going strong to this day.
You know what I really need in my life right now? Hearing the word fuck through the speakers on my Nintendo Switch.
So recently, I've been playing Tomodachi Life: Living The Dream. It's a life sim of sorts, but with Miis. When I say life sim, it is in quotation marks, because Animal Crossing deserves that title more than this game. This is also the first game in the series after thirteen years of radio silence. You may remember that the first game had some controversy when everyone noticed that the "life sim" let you make real-life people, but bars you from making same sex couples. It was a weird decision to make, given the purpose of the Miis. Nintendo later announced that they would rectify that oversight if they ever made a sequel. Now we can say that they followed through.
Half my island is queer, just like my friend group. It even allows for ace and nonbinary options. Which my nonconforming ace friend found very appealing. And I can pair myself up with the man of my dreams and listen to his beautiful text-to-speech voice. All while we share a delicious meal of a dick on a platter.
Oh yeah, the customization. This game allows for an insane amount of customization. You can draw on Mii's faces to get unique marks, or just make a dinosaur man; you can draw new buildings to make cozy little cabins or a penis tower; you can also make random items, like your favorite toy or a phat doobie.
My personal favorite item I've made is the birthday cake. It's just an ass with whipped cream, sprinkles, and a candle stuck between the cheeks. It's a delicacy on my island, which I named Fuck.
You can also make the Miis say whatever you want. Yeah, there are no filters until you share your creations, and that's only allowed through local play. I guess that's the only reason why Nintendo allows anything. That way, they can put their hands up if any parents complain.
Now the downside is that hearing the miis swear gets old after a while. So you'll have to sow the seeds for more unhinged things to just happen, like the queen talking about the heat death of the universe.
I love this game; it has become the favorite shit post of my friend group. Although I regret some of my creative decisions after the first wave of kids was born on my island. No child, you can't have the phat doobie, that's a grown-up treat.
Oh, hey, Star Fox is getting a remake. It's going to be a remake of the N64 version. I remember my dad was obsessed with that one when I was a baby. He'd come home from work, have dinner, play Mario Kart with us, then beat the game in a single sitting. Anyway, there have been designs released, and I gotta say, I both love and hate these designs. On the one hand, they are incredibly detailed in all that 4K Ultra HD goodness. On the other hand, they are a bit too realistic for my taste. That's just an actual fox in a bomber jacket. It doesn't help that they gave him digigrade legs. I'm so used to his plantigrade design that I can't process Fox with those dainty little things. I'll probably get it whenever I finally get a Switch 2, but the designs are something. Doesn't help that I just saw the Mario Galaxy Movie with his traditional design.
I saw something strange the other day. Normally, licensed games are just pumped out and forgotten. Usually, the movie tie-ins are just shovelware. Pushed out as fast as possible to get some sales in. There are a few gems that make it through the process. The SpongeBob Movie game was a genuinely solid experience, Piglet's Big Game has a cult following for its spooky atmosphere, and ET for the Atari 2600 set the stage for Nintendo to clean up all the shit everywhere. Most, however, just get forgotten. Now, imagine my surprise when I saw that old Rugrats games were getting rereleased, and I have one of those games. So, I guess I gotta talk about it now.
Rugrats Scavenger Hunt on the N64 is a game that I have. It was one of those games that I rebought a couple of years ago because the memories of it flooded my head, and it was only a couple of bucks in good condition. Then the memories started flooding back in.
Scavenger Hunt is a board game that came out on the N64. It was definitely one of those things my parents picked up because "hey, the kids like this show."
The game itself has all the original voice actors, with the backdrop of a family game night with the kids. Queue the usual imagination games the babies like to play, and that's how the game is set up.
There are three boards: the Aztec temple, the sunken pirate ship, and the Reptar candy land. Each game involves collecting the full list of items necessary to win, and the board spaces and other players will present obstacles that either hinder progress on the board, allow other players to steal pieces, or give you an advantage. Pretty straightforward; the main differences are the aesthetics and some slight gameplay changes. Beyond those minor differences, the boards work the same.
The first board is the Aztec temple. The task is to gather up all the broken idol pieces before Angelica can gather the pieces for her tattle tale tile. This one is a team effort; everyone has to work together and remember all the spots that have been explored during the sweep of each room. All while avoiding Angelica herself, especially if you have one of her pieces. My brother and I always had trouble with this level, but then again, I just gained self-awareness at the time. We always struggled to avoid Angelica and get all the pieces. I guess I didn't have object permanence either, but neither did the computer players. Often, they would understand that a certain vase has a piece in it, but don't understand that it's a duplicate, and will constantly pick it up and put it back, because you can't have two of the same thing. So that was another factor my brother was working against.
The next board is the sunken ship. The goal here is to find all the treasures needed. This time, however, Susie has jumped in to help the players with a free search around the room. This one was easier for me to understand as a kid, and it had a rock-paper-scissors mechanic for stealing items.
Reptar's Candy Land is the final board and is just a mission to collect a set amount of each candy available. It does get a bit frustrating to get to each zone to collect the candy because it is possible to get warped around the map. The thing that really stands out is the Reptar versions of the babies. They do not translate well with N64 graphics. Good god, these are ugly-ass babies.
Well, that's Rugrats Scavenger Hunt. It's by no means a bad game; it's just a Rugrats brand board game. It's perfectly serviceable for a family game night for keeping the little kids engaged. It doesn't soar above expectations; it just meets them. I came in expecting an easy-to-understand board game, and got exactly that. Not much more to say, so I guess check it out if you're looking for a 90s nostalgia board game without the hassle of many pieces.
