Donald Trump’s appointments to his administration so far suggest that he’s building a “team of racists,” as Jonathan Chait of New York magazine has put it. Naturally, Trump’s many fans on the far right are thrilled.
“It’s like Christmas,” Andrew Anglin of neo-Nazi tip sheet The Daily Stormer declared in a post yesterday (archived here) after Trump announced that he was picking voter-suppression fan Jeff Sessions as attorney general and crackpot ex-army man Michael Flynn as national security advisor.
Honestly, I didn’t even expect this to all come together so beautifully. It’s like we’re going to get absolutely everything we wanted. …
Basically, we are looking at a Daily Stormer Dream Team in the Trump administration
Now tryhard white supremacist poop dog Matt Forney is encouraging less-famous terrible people to flood the Trump transition team with job applications in hopes of filling less-prominent slots in the Trump administration with “nationalists” — that is, white supremacists — like him.
In a post today on the execrable Return of Kings (archived here), Forney urged
all ready and able Return Of Kings readers to submit their applications and take up any job offers.
Filling the Trump White House with “committed nationalists” will help to ensure Trump keeps his racist promises, Forney argues. Even better, it will make leftists sad.
By joining the Trump administration, you’ll have a hand in helping trigger the left into conniption fits and spasms of impotence. Nothing horrifies them more than losing access to the levers of power, which they’ve controlled for decades. Watching leftists squirm and cry is one of the biggest fringe benefits of Trump’s victory, and we need to keep the triggering up for years to come.
What an inspiring agenda these “nationalists” have!
@wwth,
That’s a bloody fantastic idea. My sister does that every year and I should more often. Here’s another possible group, from the UK, to donate to (I know, there are hundreds of worthy ones):
https://www.thecalmzone.net/get-involved/donate/
These guys combat male depression and suicide, partly by focusing on toxic masculinity. I read about them in this excellent piece for International Men’s Day.
Remember Everyone:
Remember Everyone:
That’s what they mean when they say leftists, they mean anyone who isn’t their ultra-nazi sliver.
Yup. That’s basically what’s goin on here.
The Alt-Right in its current incarnation is an outgrowth and, well, let’s say “maturation” (fermentation?) of the Tea Party movement. Republicans and Democrats are the same to them, all corporate sellouts. As for the “decades” they’re going back to, it’s either back to the 1930’s or back to Reagan, depending on who you’re talking to. The unabashed fascists harken back to the days when talking bad about the president would get you run out of town on a rail; the more confused ones seem to think that things were great back at the height of the Cold War.
Either way they aren’t looking back to actual history, they’re looking back into the mythos of the authoritarian ruler. Order and Hierarchy and Glory. Looking back to a dream, not to anything real.
Aww, that picture is just so pathetic. I feel like he needs a hug. I mean he does look cuddly on the outside. But inside he’s a prickly cactus. I would try not to mind. I want to hug and take all the needles I can, and then maybe he’ll be a decent human again. Maybe that’s all anyone needs is a consensual hug like this:
http://i.imgur.com/neLWJ.gif
But then I think it might turn into something awkward like this considering who is involved:
http://i.imgur.com/GJnoHy6.gif
No doubt racists will have no problem getting jobs under Trump. He is one of them, after all. How much damage is his Presidency going to do to racial, religious and sexual minorities? That’s the scary part of this equation.
Don’t know if they’ll land jobs in the administration itself, but “wingnut welfare” has proven quite powerful over the past decades.
Now, Forney ? Yeah, nah. Words fail to describe just how disgusting that particular puddle of slime is. Can’t think of anyone who’d hire him.
OT: I’m reading the 25th anniversary edition of Arkham Asylum.
Fucking Batman threw a wheelchair dude down the stairs. All they were doing was trying to find Clayface so they can be pushed around and Batman just threw the dude down the stairs. The dude dies. Batman kills a bystander in cold blood.
The man who refuses to kill fucking Joker, who is responsible for the deaths of hundreds because Batman doesn’t kill people with mental problems, throws an asylum patient in a wheelchair, who was minding their own business, down a flight of stairs for no discernible reason.
Honestly, unless there’s a brilliant plot twist, this comic–this wheelchair shit and many other even more questionable things I’m not even mentioning–is just…just…
This comic? This comic is critically acclaimed, it’s considered one of the best Batman stories of all time. In the first few pages, Joker grabs Batman’s ass and Batman yells and calls Joker a degenerate.
C r i t i c a l l y a c c l a i m e d c o m i c.
(What I’m saying is that I came in hoping for Harry Potter and I got My Immortal.)
Although, I guess I should mention this came out in 1989, so it was when grimdark in comics was getting its groove on. Gotta upstage The Watchmen somehow. Throwing a dude in a wheelchair down the stairs is one method, I guess.
And I admit, the Amedeus Arkham story is interesting. However, the video game Arkham Asylum did it too (being loosely based on this comic) and from the spoilers I read, the game did it better. Much better.
If Joker didn’t look like he was about to sing Dancing in the Street with Mick Jagger, I’d probably just write the whole thing off.
@Handsome “Punkle Stan” Jack
Arkham Asylum was not meant to interpreted literally.
As the writer said “I wanted to approach Batman from the point of view of the dreamlike, emotional and irrational hemisphere, as a response to the very literal, ‘realistic’, ‘left brain’ treatment of superheroes which was in vogue at the time, in the wake of The Dark Knight Returns, Watchmen, and others.”
He also mentions it was a critique of “The repressed, armored, uncertain and sexually frozen Batman in Arkham Asylum was intended as a critique of the ’80s interpretation of Batman as violent, driven, and borderline psychopathic.
“Morrison goes on to explain that his symbolic conception of the character is for this book alone, and that his other work involving Batman has cast him in a far different light”
As I remember from the annotations, he essentially used the story as Jungian journey to rid himself of the fascist interpretations of Batman that were popular at the time. Once Batman exists the Asylum he is meant to be free of that influence and reconnected with his anima.
The annotated version help A LOT in understanding it.
@Handsome “Punkle Stan” Jack
I wish I could edit my comment again. I made some errors and I have a bit more to say.
The Asylum in the story is really just Batman’s mind. This makes the tale one long dream sequence in which the inmates are his “shadow aspects” and the Joker acts as a trickster guide.
Deep down, when he was a child, Bruce resented his mother for dying and leaving him. This is something he never really dealt with and led him to reject his anima, the feminine aspect of his personality. It left him a psychological mess.
As he journeys through the story, he faces his shadows and, at the end, he triumphs by getting over his pride and calling out for help. A female doctor comes to his aid with a pearl-handled razor (pearls are symbolic of his mother’s death and they appear throughout the story). This is the symbolic moment where he accepts his anima and reemerges as a more complete and healthier individual.
It’s a very interesting story if you’re at all interested in dreamlike imagery, Carl Jung, Jospeh Campbell or Aleister Crowley.
I could tell just a few pages in this comic was going to be pretentious, from the Alice in Wonderland quotes, to the art style, to the tarot motif–I could tell it was trying to be artsy fartsy and say something, and I knew it was going to fail. And it did.
And it’s not like I object to comic books being highbrow, I don’t object to established comic series trying to do deeper meanings and metaphors and yadda yadda. But if you have to have annotations for people to get what you’re trying to say, it’s failed. If you think breaking free from the established “violent, driven and borderline psychopathic” characterization of the day by is having the character be violent, driven and borderline psychopathic with the excuse it’s through a Jungian lens, it’s failed.
Although, who knows, maybe Batman randomly stabbing his hand through with glass and breaking the kneecap of a defenseless patient is subverting the violence of the 80s era comics. Maybe Batman took a whole issue to disemboweled puppies to solve a violent rape case in one of Alan Moore’s works? I wouldn’t know. This is the first 80s Batman comic I’ve read, I admit, but I don’t see how randomly pushing a dude in a wheelchair down the stairs and killing them is critiquing any sort of establish “psychotic” and violent characterization. Showing irrationality, yes, but so is any sort of ultraviolence.
I will say, the art was lovely. I quite liked it. That was what pushed the dream-like quality across. This is also my first time reading through it. It could just be one of those things I need to read at the right time under the right circumstances to “get” why it’s “good”. It could be I’m just use to Batman not killing people and feeling guilty when he gets people killed and seeing some of the criminals actually reform that I just don’t get it.
…
I liked Batman of Arkham better.
I’m a HUGE fan of artsy fartsy everything. Especially when it comes to comics. So this was right up my alley. Sorry it didn’t suit your tastes. The annotations helped understand what he was going for specifically, but just understanding that it was all symbolic was enough to get something out of it for me. They are not really the inmate characters. It’s all in his head.
Would it surprise you that the writer bought a castle with all the money he made from this? Heh. He’s a funny guy.
Did you read my second post yet? What do you think of my interpretation?
@Amanda Fernandez
Like I said, I’m not against artsy fartsy, in fact I do like some artsy fartsy things, even things that people would consider pretentious. It’s just that this was the ultra-pretentious artsy fartsy for the fact that–and I’m sounding like a broken record here–he tried to SUBVERT the characterization of Batman by not changing the characterization at all. It’s just…not. It’s not subversive. You break the establish characterization by breaking the current characterization, not exacerbating it.
Also, Amadeus’ story was good. I quite liked it, but if I liked the comic more for Amadeus than Batman, wouldn’t that mean the comic failed as a Batman comic?
Now I’m just criticizing it to dissent, so I’ll stop that.
Buuut, like, if you haven’t read The Batman of Arkham, I’d suggest it. Is super artsy fartsy? Not in the way Arkham Asylum is. It has beautiful art, like if Jack Kirby made woodcuts, and the paneling is lovely with non-standard frames and shapes. Most of the characters involved get established well and thoroughly–specifically, it has very good characterization of Killer Croc, who I love a lot. It’s not the strongest story and I can’t say it’s told well and it’s definitely not winning any awards, but it’s still good. It’s only one 49 page issue, which probably would explain some of the story problems, but I’d have to say, I’d read it as a series.
I really liked Arkham Asylum; but that might have something to do with the fact that I don’t see Bruce Wayne as a sympathetic character, and therefore I don’t have the same response to it that you did. I think if I had gone in expecting Batman to act like a hero, I would have been as shocked as you.
As Amanda Fernandez points out, it’s beautifully Jungian. I have to confess that I have a… a thing for Jung.
It seems as though Matt Forney is one of those rapists who feels a need to continually remind us that he’s a rapist.
Puke.
@Neveragaine
I’m old enough to remember when Robert F. Kennedy was the attorney general, appointed by his brother President John F. Kennedy.
So this nepotism law confused me at first.
It turns out that it was signed into law in 1967, after JFK had been assassinated and RFK was no longer attorney general.
@Lea
Thank you!
May it be so.
@Mish
Seventy-five lawsuits involving Donald Trump are still open.
USA Today has a very long article about these cases. It looks like a worthwhile article — but I’m not gonna tackle it right now.
How 75 pending lawsuits could distract a Donald Trump presidency
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2016/10/25/pending-lawsuits-donald-trump-presidency/92666382/
@Kat,
Thanks for that. Jebus, I knew there more, but …
Have you guys ever had a president with lawsuits before? I can’t remember. Presumably there are no legal prohibitions on it?
And he just lodged another one this week – against himself (or at least after inauguration).
Here’s the background … http://www.politico.com/story/2016/06/donald-trump-taxes-hotel-224956
The current case is trying to get the building revalued down from $98 million to $28 million. http://therealdeal.com/2016/11/17/trump-fights-washington-d-c-over-hotel-tax-assessment/
He’s responsible for appointing the person with the job of determining how and whether such claims will be pursued/ defended and how much $$$ the govt would be willing to settle for.
Repeat after me, children. Conflict … Of … Interest.
This is an interesting analysis of ”Anti-PC backlash”:
https://twitter.com/JeremyMcLellan/status/799993649782063104
Does anyone else suspect that the Trump administration will introduce a charge for applying for government jobs, or hire people like Forney and not pay them, or find some other way to cheat them?
Interesting article I just read this morning talking about mental health and reactions to the election:
http://thebaffler.com/blog/against-bargaining-penny
@Jack:
If you’ve not played them, then Rocksteady’s Batman games are a bit hit-or-miss narratively. A significant number of the people from The Animated Series worked on the game, but it definitely feels like it’s trying to approach Batman from the grittier Moore/Miller/Nolan-verse interpretations. It’s kinda like they wanted to take the relative darkness from the animated universe and then see what they could do now that they weren’t fettered by the restrictions of “well, it’s a cartoon!”
Asylum itself is, I think, pretty okay, though I’m sure there’s probably some ableism in there, while City has a thing about all of the inmates calling Catwoman “bitch” and makes Batman himself a much more violent character (which is one again exacerbated in Knight, though I know PI has talked about the issues with that game in the past as well).
As far as Batman stories go, I’d say that they’re worth experiencing if you’re a fan of Batman, especially because of the added element of interactivity, but… yeah. They’ve all got some problematic elements.
EDIT: Finally fixed my italic tags. Oops.
@ Margot:
I think you answered your own question.