• dohpaz42@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    For those like me who like to have more context and enjoy learning about things, there is a Snopes article describing this cartoon (and many others) from the 1969 issue of Mad Magazine. I found it an interesting read.

      • _NoName_
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        4 months ago

        Yep, you get it pretty clearly that the creator was an edgy centrist.

        • Dagwood222@lemm.ee
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          4 months ago

          You say that like it’s a bad thing.

          Next you’ll be calling out ‘Blazing Saddles’ for it’s offensive language and sexism.

          • _NoName_
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            4 months ago

            Blazing saddles isn’t really centrist, more just anti-rightwing from my memory of it.

            Let’s talk about the chapters shown in the snopes article above.

            Chapter 3 is making fun of (an) American Student(s). This was 1969, in the middle of the Vietnam war. He’s saying they were idiots and that they shouldn’t have been protesting the Vietnam war.

            Chapter six - The Yippies. The action they are doing is the fighting against two things. The first would be gentrification which is always an issue driving the poor into homelessness. The other was the bulldozing of entire neighborhoods to make way for the highways from 1957 to 1977, an act which displaced 1 million people.

            Chapter seven - the Black Militants. This would include Malcolm X and the Black Panthers along with the Philadelphia organization MOVE. Hell, this was a year after MLK Jr was assassinated, and the white general public probably still saw him as an agitator. These were a movement in opposition to very overtly racist cops supported by a largely pro-apartheid populace. And the Author completely misrepresents every view they had from a brief skim over.

            We could talk about the looters but I don’t think we’re ready for that convo.

            • Dagwood222@lemm.ee
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              4 months ago

              First, it’s funny to me that you care so much about a comic book that’s over 50 years old.

              Second, the magazine had a long history of attacking everyone and everything, including themselves.

              • _NoName_
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                4 months ago

                You cared enough to challenge ‘centrist’ as a bad thing, so I explained why I viewed it as bad.

                Comedy is always used as a political tool, and that was the case then too. Being critical of all media, including comedy (even when satirical). We have the

                MAD was highly influential back then and no doubt formed in part the current centrist white liberals who are now opposing anything outside the status quo given its large teen audience back then.

                • Dagwood222@lemm.ee
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                  4 months ago

                  Blazing saddles isn’t really centrist, more just anti-rightwing from my memory of it.

                  There’s the problem right there.

                  There are plenty of books and articles about the making of the movie. I’ve read a few and don’t remember anyone involved talking about trying to carry a political message. Plenty of people thought it was offensive, but no one thought it was going to change minds.

                  What I’m challenging is you trying to put things into history that just weren’t there.

                  The people at MAD weren’t trying to influence a generation’s politics, they were trying to make a buck. If yippee jokes were popular they’d print them.

    • NewAgeOldPerson@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      I read the whole interchange of your experience, and thank you. But even from my own perspective (left Reddit during the API debacle), it felt like, “hail traveler! What news from yonder?”

      It was nice. Thanks haha

      • 1stTime4MeInMCU@mander.xyz
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        4 months ago

        Thats probably a more accurate and charitable meaning of what they are referring to here, I’m just being cheeky. Cause that’s the thing, all the “rich” people that conservative middle class people are mad at are upper middle class people lol it’s people that have it slightly better than them, ignoring / simping on the mega rich

        • ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          all the “rich” people that conservative middle class people are mad at are upper middle class people

          They also hate wealthy actors and musicians.

  • Brickardo@feddit.nl
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    4 months ago

    I love looking through these small windows into our near past! It shows that some people were definitely as based then as many are now!

  • Kalcifer@sh.itjust.works
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    4 months ago

    It’s always intrigued and annoyed me when the term “liberal” is used in this manner. I generally assume that, when the term is used, it isn’t being used to refer to the political science concept of “liberalism” — I would guess that it is being used in place of something like “leftist” (which is a rather nebulous term in itself). At the very least, I would hope that any person, who is currently enjoying the fruits of relative civility, and prosperity in the western world understands that they are doing so because of liberalism.

  • Melvin_Ferd@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    1969 Mad Magazine would be cancelled by the ‘liberals’ now. All the artists for the magazine would tweet about topics in retaliation driving them further away and the liberals would shout more and they’d take to social media more and eventually we get a Mad Magazine owned by TPUSA

    • TachyonTele@lemm.ee
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      4 months ago

      What’s it like living a strange fantasy world where you hate everyone without understanding why?