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Is there anything we can't sugarcoat?
emnmnme
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I was wondering if there was anything, any violent concept or horrific imagining, that can't be made into something family friendly with enough sugar coating. That is, taking a group of killers, for example, and making that group suitable for kids.
You can take pirates, Norse plunderers, mobsters and ninjas and turn them into Lego sets. You can make a devil costume for a two year old for Halloween. Very cute. Avarice? Ducktales was my favorite cartoon growing up and every other episode had Scrooge McDuck swimming through his money. Thievery? Those rascal kids are always trying to steal Lucky the Leprechaun's cereal. War? GI Joe action figures. Gender bias? Prince Charming always rescues the girl, not the other way around. Slavery? Slavery's often shown in kids' cartoons but the bad parts aren't. You can see chain gangs and forced labor, though. Cannibalism? Eating gingerbread men.
These are silly but is there anything that can't be made into something family friendly with a little thought? Rape comes to mind. You can't sugarcoat rape. Anything else?
You can take pirates, Norse plunderers, mobsters and ninjas and turn them into Lego sets. You can make a devil costume for a two year old for Halloween. Very cute. Avarice? Ducktales was my favorite cartoon growing up and every other episode had Scrooge McDuck swimming through his money. Thievery? Those rascal kids are always trying to steal Lucky the Leprechaun's cereal. War? GI Joe action figures. Gender bias? Prince Charming always rescues the girl, not the other way around. Slavery? Slavery's often shown in kids' cartoons but the bad parts aren't. You can see chain gangs and forced labor, though. Cannibalism? Eating gingerbread men.
These are silly but is there anything that can't be made into something family friendly with a little thought? Rape comes to mind. You can't sugarcoat rape. Anything else?
emnmnme on
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you don't read enough romance novels.
The point is how much spin can we swallow. If you can turn something vile into something cute, innocuous, and a big seller for the holidays, well, I was just curious.
Genocide - everyone cheers when the Death Star blows up and all those millions of personnel inside die, too. The Empire collapses. I'm sure there are better examples but massacring the bad guys is pretty popular as a plot device.
See: Anything that involves monsters or aliens or robots.
Botched surgery - the Operation board game.
White collar crime and corruption - the Monopoly! board game.
Animal cruelty/ cock fighting - Pokemon, both the videogames and the card games.
These send horrific messages if you really think about them. :P
Or watch enough movies.
Impact is a crucial part of any argument. You must tell us why to care. Just arguing something isn't really very interesting if we don't care about the issue whatsoever.
You've basically just addressed what the status quo is. You haven't really even gone so far as to come up with harms or inherency, let alone a solvency or an impact.
Edit -- I guess this could be a fact debate. But seriously fuck those. Policy debates are hells of sexier.
Or The Fountainhead.
Seriously, Rand deserves kicking around for that one scene alone.
A puppy dieing.
EDIT: Double points for a gruesome death - he was stabbed through the chest by a pirate.
Casper the Friendly Ghost
All Dogs go to Heaven
Murder? Don't show the crying family/friends, the body in rigor mortis.
War? Don't show the torn apart bodies in the trenches.
Rape? Don't show the victim becoming depressed.
Genocide? Don't show the dead children
Slavery? Don't show the slaves /after/ a few months of working 12 hours a day in the mines
I mean, geez. This is pretty basic knowledge.
Again, my claim about Scientology holds true. There is not one morsel of it that isn't absurd and disgusting.
Both these posts are gold.
24 karat gold.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Um, dude.
I'd say Scientology does a pretty good job of sugarcoating Scientology.
And I'm pretty sure it can be sugarcoated by only showing the smiling actors telling you how scientology gave them purpose in their lives.
It is just furry.
Lacey (agitated): "Why would you name a town to remember that? Was there a town meeting where someone got up and said 'hey, let's name our town after that maniac!'?"
Emma (stoic): "Yes, but that's another story."
that and Mr hands.
and... you know, furries.
What's the difference between a pick-up truck full of bowling balls and a pick-up truck full of dead babies?
. . .
What is that from. It sounds so familiar.
Scientology was another good one, kudos to who got that one.
I really think you're taking those way too seriously... :P
One thing that has always disturbed me is how Willy Wonka uses Oompa Loompas for experimentation. And, well, slavery in general.
And I wouldn't say blowing up the Death Star is genocide per se. Genocide is rounding up a people of a certain descent and killing them -- premeditated mass murder. Blowing up the Death Star is killing bad guys in self-defense. That and they're all dark-sided.
I know there are several cartoons where characters try to kill themselves. I can't remember the specific names, but I do remember them.
Ren and Stimpy for one. The Simpsons is another. Though if you want to count suicide, you can go back pretty far too. Shakespeare for instance.
and that deal with 'totally not betty boop' done by comedy central. Bunch of cartoon characters live in a house. Forget the name, but one of the running gags was that she cut herself.
Tonnes of stuff glamorizes smoking, most of the modern stuff is in jest, but historically it is not uncommon.
They weren't slaves; Wonka hired them and paid them in chocolate.
As to the Death Star, yep, that was a justifiable military action. Would it be wrong to sink a battleship shelling New York just because some innocent deckhands might be on it?
I'll be fine, just give me a minute, a man's got a limit, I can't get a life if my heart's not in it.