150
Protagonist (lemmy.dbzer0.com)
submitted 4 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[-] [email protected] 216 points 4 months ago
[-] [email protected] 76 points 4 months ago

This post is about student loans

[-] [email protected] 36 points 4 months ago

And video game piracy. Also free housing. Pretty much anywhere where finances are involved, some people want to fuck the next generation instead of helping them.

[-] [email protected] 17 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Wait why piracy all of a sudden. Didn’t we agree that people who don’t buy games won’t buy them anyway even if piracy didn’t exist? Thus the denuvo lack of purpose because it doesn’t raise sales. Yet many of those same folks are willing to pay to indie devs even if their games are often laughably easy to pirate. It’s about the principles.

For example Hollywood is such rotten hive of misogynist assholes that one may not want to fund them. Or not get royalty to Rowling for the potter game.

By starving bad companies we have a personal freedom to leave generations with only the best devs and brands such as Larian-motherfuking-Studios.

Hell if it wasn’t so risky IRL I’d probably steal Nestle food by tons and share it too. Let’s leave generations without that company.

[-] [email protected] 18 points 4 months ago

"You guys should install denuvo into your game because console players have to pay to play it but on PC you can just pirate it. It's not fair for them to get to play it for free while we had to buy it"

[-] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

That's why we should decriminalize pirating because it's unfair for those who did it and didn't get caught (which is the majority) or rather the companies who suffered from that.

You wouldn't criminalize drinking clear water

[-] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

How about slowing the trolley down then, instead of stopping it. Would that be a deal?

[-] [email protected] 23 points 4 months ago

... I hate how accurate this is. Very impressive.

[-] [email protected] 69 points 4 months ago

Goddammit this is brilliant in so many ways, and no we are not the ones pulling the lever, in real life trolley problem.

[-] [email protected] 7 points 4 months ago

I wanted to come into the comments to gush the same thing! Enthusiastic agree/upvote!

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[-] [email protected] 48 points 4 months ago
[-] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago

That one deserves a repost in leftymemes!

[-] [email protected] 35 points 4 months ago

Them being red and blue is a nice touch

[-] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago
[-] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

Google greenwashing

[-] [email protected] 26 points 4 months ago

Somehow I don't think choosing between money and lives is a problem for that guy in any way whatsoever. The fact that the money would probably be salvageable even if the trolley hit it makes it even worse.

[-] [email protected] 14 points 4 months ago

Yeah but it would be all scattered around and stuff. Some horrible poor person might try to pick some of it up. We certainly wouldn't want that.

[-] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago

A lot of capitalists regularly make that choice, and they choose money.

Be it warmonger sharks, heads of private militaries and military manufacturers, or, idk, Nestle executives.

[-] [email protected] 19 points 4 months ago

Needs a punchline. That last panel is completely pointless and wastes a good setup imo.

[-] [email protected] 27 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

The punchline is that the protagonist, in this desperate, confusing moment of panic, finds themselves in the company of a useless buffoon who, although in the same terrifying position, is only capable of "helping" by cheerfully explaining the obvious. An experience we can all relate to on some level, especially if the comic as a whole is read as a metaphor.

I think it's pretty well done.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

I agree, the only thing I would add is swap the two. That way the buffoon is technically in a worse position.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

I think that's a very generous read, and I just don't see it. The first three panels are well done, but the last adds nothing. It's like someone ending a Little Johnny joke with "and then the teacher sent him to the principal's office" instead of with whatever dirty thing Johnny said that was supposed to be the actual punchline.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago

Well, I guess your read of it suggests the cartoonists didn't really write this comic and just sort of made it up as they went, I suppose? Or got lazy?

I would argue the artist wrote several punchlines before eventually settling on this one, and for good reason. It's subtle and, frankly, funny. It relies on character humor rather than a blunt pun or ham fisted political zinger while still making a point. It's really well crafted, imo.

But I'm just some dumbass on the internet and this cartoonists could be huffing glue, I suppose, so who knows?

[-] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

Lol, I never suggested anything about the author’s writing process and I certainly never even implied that I thought you were a dumbass, which I don't. But now I'm not convinced you're not the actual cartoonist, since you seem to have intimate knowledge of their creation process and their recreational habits. It's not a "character study"—you would need characters for that—it's a setup with no punchline, it's half a joke. Actually, it's worse, it's a joke with a decent punchline, followed by a whole extra panel that just restates what the reader already learned in the previous panel with the actual punchline, making me feel like the author thinks I'm a dumbass.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

I'm sorry, I didn't mean to imply you were calling me a dumbass, I was calling myself that, I apologize.

I can assure you I am not the cartoonist. It seems like I am intimately familiar with the process because I am. You can look at my post history to see a few examples of comics actually created on the fly with no thought, writing, or pencils done ahead of time, just stream of consciousness and pens in a sketchbook. I can tell you, a lot of thought was put into the comic we are discussing because I've been through that grinder plenty of times myself.

You're correct about that third panel housing what most people would consider the actual punchline, which is why the fourth is so interesting. I'm not familiar with this cartoonist, so it could be that they are just so stuck in a four panel writing pattern that they felt the need to fill that panel with something, anything, so they just slapped something in there, but it really reads to me as much more thought out and deliberate. I suppose I could, like, go look at more of their work, but, eeeeeeehhhhhhh......

I also disagree that it's not a character study. When working with three or four panels, cartoonists have to set characters up quickly and efficiently and this comic does that extremely well. That red guy is consistent throughout every panel,, as is the protagonist ,we know exactly who he is. To the point where in panel three, the speech balloon is not attributed to anybody, yet we know exactly who is speaking, which is harder to pull off than you might think.

Anyways, you got me blabbing and blabbing. I could talk this kind of shit all day, I take it pretty seriously, in case you hadn't noticed.

Again, you could totally be right. Without looking at more of their work, it's possible this artist is a hack fraud and I am talking up a total sloppy amateur. But just judging from this single piece of work, I suspect they're probably pretty good.

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[-] [email protected] 23 points 4 months ago

I think it's fine as it is. It's trading funny for poignanncy

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[-] [email protected] 9 points 4 months ago

How about "Welcome to reality"

[-] [email protected] 23 points 4 months ago

"Don't worry! The money will trickle down!"

[-] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago
[-] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago
[-] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

"Don't worry, I think he's gonna pull it!"

[-] [email protected] 12 points 4 months ago

Worse, you could be the train driver with no control panel

[-] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago

You are in a trolley problem. Everyone is wearing a hat. No one sees their own hat. There are 2 red and 2 blue hats and everyone knows this. The guy to your left is wearing a red hat and the guy to your right has a blue one. The guy at the lever is too far away for you to see if he wears a hat at all and it doesn't really matter since they will no pull the lever no matter what.
What do you do?

[-] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago

What can you do you stupid fuck? You're tied to a train track.

[-] [email protected] 14 points 4 months ago

Congrats! You solved the riddle!

[-] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago

I’ll try spinning. That’s a good move

[-] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

I've seen enough western movies to know that I'll succeed in untying myself before the train gets to me.

[-] [email protected] 7 points 4 months ago

Happy go lucky guy is fine - they expected it and are just rolling with the punches.:-)

In the USA, the leopard about to get his face eaten off would normally be colored red I believe... :-P

image saying Karma is not a bitch it's a mirror

[-] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago

only thing wrong with this cartoon is the capitalist is touching a lever. those guys dont do such menial work

[-] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

True, but the keys of power, the ownership, the control are in the hands of capitalists.

[-] [email protected] 0 points 4 months ago

Do you have a pension fund? If so, you are providing force to the levers.

[-] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago

The guy at the lever represents the oil execs and we all know they would rather kill people than sacrifice money.

[-] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

and we all know they would rather kill people

[-] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

Finally! Sweet release...

[-] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

The original position is designed to be a fair and impartial point of view that is to be adopted in our reasoning about fundamental principles of justice. In taking up this point of view, we are to imagine ourselves in the position of free and equal persons who jointly agree upon and commit themselves to principles of social and political justice for a well-ordered democratic society.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/original-position/

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this post was submitted on 07 May 2024
150 points (91.2% liked)

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