Seems like the time has come to address the brouhaha surrounding @RealDeanCain's "Fox & Friends" interview earlier this week where he criticized the newfound wokeness of Captain America and how prominent comic book industry figures like Heather Antos are bashing him for it. 1/17
This (rather lengthy) thread will be divided into three parts devoted to the following topics: 1. Explaining the controversy surrounding Captain America. 2. Discussing the status of Clark Kent/Superman's citizenship. 3. Addressing how Heather Antos has lied about Dean Cain.
2/17
The bone of contention at the center of this is Steve Rogers' monologue from "The United States of Captain America" #1, where he essentially makes the argument that the American Dream and the concept of Americana are self-delusional at best and outright lies at worst. 3/17
He then coins the term "White Picket Fence Fallacy", questioning the American dedication to the words of Emma Lazarus - "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free" - and stating that those opposed to this are nationalistic gatekeepers. 4/17
I can't tell if the writer is deliberately engaging in misdirection, but there are some major errors in logic here. First, the American Dream is a dream in the sense of being an ideal to strive for. You may never reach it, but you make the world a better place by trying. 5/17
Second, it doesn't matter how good or how widely shared your dream is; if you're to have any hope of realizing your goal, you need to be absolutely certain that the intentions and values of the people you're working with towards that end are perfectly aligned with yours. 6/17
Just like you wouldn't let members of an opposing political party into your own for fear of being undermined, it makes no sense to "keep no one out" because you risk allowing enemies or those with ulterior motives into your camp. "Gatekeeping" in this case is common sense. 7/17
Various nerd/geek communities and fandoms currently face a similar problem: They've been infiltrated by ideologues who're trying to repurpose them into propaganda delivery vehicles in the name of "diversity", with opposition to their efforts being framed as discrimination. 8/17
Now for the matter of Superman's citizenship. Is he an American? Well, considering he once announced his intention to renounce his U.S. citizenship - something which, it should be noted, we never found out if he was successful in doing - I'd say the answer to that is yes. 😋 9/17
Superman's history has been revised many times since his 1938 introduction, but, on those occasions where it was addressed, it was established that he was granted special U.S. citizenship by Congressional vote. He also has citizenship in all United Nations member countries. 10/17
But what of Clark Kent? Well, as Anthony Dean of "Diverse Tech Geek" correctly pointed out, according to U.S. law (specifically 8 U.S. Code § 1401) since Kal-El arrived on Earth as a baby/toddler and wasn't established as an alien before the age of 21, he's a U.S. citizen. 11/17
During the John Byrne era, things were taken one step further. Since that continuity established that Superman was conceived inside of a "gestation matrix" (Kryptonian artificial womb) and that removal from said matrix constituted "birth", he was technically born on Earth. 12/17
While this falls outside of any version of regular continuity, there was an alternate future where circumstances resulted in Superman running for President of the United States and the U.S. Supreme Court were unanimous in their decision that he had birthright citizenship. 13/17
Now that we've addressed Heather Antos' ignorance about comics, let's get to her misrepresentation of Dean Cain. She made a follow-up tweet clarifying that her statement about Superman's citizenship was based on his claim that being an immigrant doesn't make you American. 14/17
But if you actually read the quotes in the article she linked to, AT NO POINT DOES DEAN CAIN MAKE ANYTHING RESEMBLING THAT CLAIM. He simply bemoans the wokeness, lack of patriotism, ingratitude, ignorance, and anti-Americanism prevalent in American public discourse today. 15/17
Antos is engaging in a popular SJW tactic: lying her ass off by attributing a false statement to someone she dislikes while operating under the assumption that no one will fact check her. Thank god Twitter users like @PCaterina6, @Cam_El_Tow, and @sykora4417 called her out. 16/17
So, in short, Dean Cain is the subject of another false media narrative/cancel culture witch hunt and Heather Antos and other major comic book industry professionals are lying about him. For transparency, the full interview with him is linked below. 17/17 foxnews.com/media/dean-cai…
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I really didn't want to weigh in on the situation with @TSR_games and @Gygax_Jr because I've never had much involvement with the original company or "Dungeons & Dragons" (except for the 80s cartoon, which I was a fan of), but it's time to set the record straight on this. 1/10
First of all, Ernie Gygax never said, as some are insisting, that "he created the new TSR for people who wanted to enforce two gender identities". What he specifically said was that a lot of old school tabletop role-playing game artists and designers had been getting flak... 2/10
...for allegedly being old-fashioned and not subscribing to modern trends, citing differing opinions on gender identity as an example. Specifically, he said they were getting grief for, among other things "enforcing or even having the concepts of gender identity" and felt... 3/10
Though I should probably know better by now considering the flak I've gotten in recent weeks, I'm going to try explaining the controversy and cultural clash surrounding lewd fanart of the anthropomorphic female racehorse characters from "Uma Musume: Pretty Derby". 1/10
On June 20, 2018, a post appeared on the "Uma Musume Project" website from the staff asking fans not to create fanart that might tarnish the dignity and reputations of the racehorses whose names their owners had granted permission to be used. In other words: no porn, please. 2/10
This situation's unusual because, as opposed to recent incidents where overzealous translators, localizers, government officials, or third parties (such as SJWs) were pushing for self-censorship under threat of bad publicity or through blackmail and coercion, this message... 3/10