Hindu Swastika

Source: Bigstock

The Week’s Floppiest, Stroppiest, and Corn-Poppiest Headlines

SWASTIKY WICKET
It is said that as Hans Frank ascended the gallows at Nuremberg, Joseph Kingsbury-Smith, the lone American press representative at the executions, posed a question: “How does it feel, having ruled all of occupied Poland with an iron fist, sending scores of Jews to their graves, to now be condemned to hang after a trial in which Jewish officials held so much power over you?”

Frank paused for a moment before responding, “Well, you win some, you Jew some.”

Everyone on the scaffold had such a good laugh, they almost forgot to kill him.

That story may be apocryphal (if by “may be” one means “absolutely is”), but it still contains a kernel of truth: Ever since April 1945, Nazi victories have been few and far between, so Nazis gotta take ’em where they get ’em.

That goes for Nazi accoutrements, too.

Last week was a surprisingly good one for New York swastikas. It didn’t start off well; a Harlem native was recorded by security cameras writing a swastika in the snow outside a famed Upper East Side synagogue. Bafflingly, Manuel Barrera, who bears a disconcerting resemblance to Gabby Hayes (“yee-haw, gonna rustle me up some grubenführer”), didn’t write in the snow in the “yellow ink” manner, which surely would’ve been more disrespectful than the finger he actually employed. For the three-second act of scrawling the ’stika, Barrera was arrested and charged with aggravated harassment, because in the utopia that is New York City there are no worse crimes on which to focus.

Sadly, the snowstika melted before Sarah Silverman could arrive on-scene to be outraged by it.

That said, the week ended much better for the despised symbol. The New York State legislature was all set to pass a bill mandating that “New York school children be educated regarding the meaning of swastikas and nooses as symbols of hatred and intolerance.”

From the bill:

As many of our youth are not aware of the hateful connotations behind swastikas and nooses, it is necessary for the legislature to mandate compulsory education in all schools across our great state in regard to the meanings of these two symbols of hate.

The measure was sailing through committees unopposed…until New York’s Hindu residents decided to bud-bud-butt in. Hindu leaders (including the Consul General of India in New York) pelted the legislature with demands that their sacred symbol not be portrayed to children as an icon of hate. In a contentious Zoom call, the peeved Punjabis explained that they were dharmad as hell and if the bill was not rescinded, they’d get their ten-armed elephant/cow/lemur deity to curse the state so that it freezes over in the winter and swelters in the summer as its elderly die in rest homes, its tax base flees, and its largest city falls to anarchy and chaos.

“Too late, Jub-Jub,” replied New York State Democratic chair Jay Jacobs, who was then reminded by an aide of how much money the state’s prosperous Indian-American community pumps into the party. In an abrupt about-face, Jacobs yelled “pull” as the bill was launched into the air and blasted with a shotgun.

“I am familiar with Swastik as a positive symbol of peace, prosperity and good tidings among people of many cultures and nationalities. We in this country have a culture of respecting each other. This bill would have been an affront to that basic premise of American democracy,” Jacobs announced to the press as his party killed the measure in committee. The bill “will not move forward, it will not be advanced in the Senate or the Assembly,” he proclaimed as the victorious Vedics lit up the night sky with burning brides.

Funny how that works. In recent months, whites have been penalized and “canceled” for innocently flashing the “OK” sign because the harmless symbol had been co-opted by trolls as a “white-power dog whistle.” “Intent doesn’t matter!” groups like the ADL declared. A white person might be using the symbol in the traditional, benevolent way, but because it might be confused with the evil, 4chan iteration, those whites must be punished.

But all of a sudden, when confronted by brown people with money, the left learned the value of respecting different interpretations of contentious symbols.

Crazy how nuance and context apply in some cases but not others.

Brown privilege, indeed.

“ME SO SOLLY”
Remember that time in 2015 when a lone hate-filled maniac shot up a black church, and because the shooter once posed for a photo holding a Confederate flag, all reruns of The Dukes of Hazzard were banned because the car on the show had a Confederate flag on the roof?

Did you ever think you’d look back on those days as a time of sanity? Well, compared with where things are now, 2015 was a veritable Age of Enlightenment.

Whereas the Charleston shooting was without question a crime motivated by blatant racial hatred, the recent Asian massage-parlor shootings were apparently motivated by the bizarre, idiosyncratic fever dreams so common to mass shooters (from the “I hate Mondays” girl straight through to the “I’m the Joker” guy in Aurora). But the fact that the Atlanta spa shooter was not motivated by racism isn’t going to get in the way of a new round of idiotic cancellations. And with the shooting still fairly fresh in the news cycle, last week’s tally of “things we can’t do anymore because an incel went bonkers” is likely just the beginning.

Hey—did someone say “incel”? Legendary Games is a major player in the exciting world of RPGs (no, not “rocket-propelled grenades.” That would be cool. This is RPG as in “role-playing games,” as in “fat nerds pretending to be cacodemons). In response to the Atlanta spa shootings, Legendary issued an apology for “racist” and “inherently culturally insensitive Asian-inspired magical spells” that had been included in one of its Dungeons & Dragons game supplements.

In the apology statement, Legendary made it clear that the spells should not have been offered to a gaming community with a “predominantly white player base.” Because the last thing society needs is a bunch of dateless fat-assed socially maladroit losers casting imaginary spells that don’t conform to their race in an imaginary game where they’re playing monsters that don’t conform to their species.

Not to be outdone, Topps trading-card company apologized for a satirical card in its “Shammy Award” Garbage Pail Kids series. The “Shammies” mocked Grammy-nominated artists by portraying them as Garbage Pail Kid-style unflattering caricatures. And one of the lampooned musical acts was BTS. No, not BDS the anti-Israel boycott-divest-sanction movement, but BTS, the Korean boy-band comprising fragile androgynous epicenes perfect for the female American pop fan who wants a boy band that screams “for girls almost ready to go lesbian but not quite yet.”

Topps apologized for the possibility that its BTS trading card might have contributed to the “plague” of anti-Asian violence “sweeping” the nation, although one could argue that a larger contributor is BTS’ crappy music. Topps withdrew the card from circulation out of fear that, in the wrong hands, the BTS card combined with the banned D&D “magic spells” could lead to a Hiroshima-level anti-Asian extinction event.

Funny enough, even Asian-owned firms got in on the apology bandwagon last week.

Apparently, there’s an Asian-owned media company called 88rising (a name tailor-made for people looking for hidden racist messages). Founder/owner Sean Miyashiro describes his outfit as a “hybrid management, record label, video production, and marketing company.” Before becoming 88rising, the outfit was known as CXSHXNLY, arguably the only name on earth that makes 88rising seem like a good choice in comparison.

Last week Miyashiro got it in his inscrutable little head that if BLM could commemorate George Floyd’s death last year with a “blackout” day, in which blacks and “allies” on Instagram posted black squares in “solidarity” with the dead fentanyl freak, Asians and allies should do a “yellowout” day of posting yellow squares on Instagram in solidarity with the dead spa workers.

Sadly, all Miyashiro ended up doing was disproving that whole “high Japanese IQ” thing. Everyone hated the idea. Asians hated being called “yellow,” BLM hated seeing their “black square” idea “appropriated,” and “allies” attacked Miyashiro for choosing a publicity stunt over “concrete action.”

88rising issued an apology, pledging that its yellow-square-posting days were through.

It’s surprising that Miyashiro didn’t try to cast one of those banned “Asian spells” to erase all the hostility directed at his company, especially as he’s got the acceptable DNA for it.

Rather selfish of him to sit on all that Asian magic while white D&D incel wizards are forced to go without.

STEVE ROGERED
Captain America’s gone gay! Look out Red Skull—you’re gonna be Red & Raw Skull once the new Captain America penetrates and injects you with his supersoldier serum. Forget HYDRA—this new Cap needs only one head to subdue his foes.

Yep—Captain America’s coming out for Pride Month, with his original triangle-shaped shield now painted pink.

Except not exactly. Technically, the new gay teen character is a Captain America, not the Captain America. In a limited-edition comic-book series debuting during Pride Month (that’s the month when LGBTXYZs really really really express pride in their identity, as opposed to the other months of the year in which they only really really express pride in their identity), Steve Rogers, the “incumbent” Captain, has lost his shield, so he’s forced to travel the country in search of it.

Great premise; a hero quest modeled after a septuagenarian looking for the TV remote.

In the course of his journey, he comes across other Captain Americas, including a gay teen named Aaron Fischer, a local Captain America who “protects” young runaways in a manner that is probably best left to the imagination.

Marvel is playing up the loafer-lightened Cap to great effect, as if it’s the first comics company to pander to gays. Which it isn’t. To this day, nothing matches the magnificent poofery of 2010’s Foreskin Man. California-based artist Matthew Hess created that character because, according to a 2011 Vice profile, “gay men love a good foreskin.”

Foreskin Man traveled the globe fighting doctors, rabbis, African tribal leaders, and Muslim clerics in a never-ending quest to prevent circumcision so that all gays worldwide would have the opportunity to “love a good foreskin.”

“Gays have more experience with different kinds of penises than heterosexual men,” Hess told Vice. “They’ve seen intact penises in an intimate way so they are one step ahead of the next guy.”

Or “behind.” Get it?

Foreskin Man was discontinued after the ADL sounded the alarm over the foreskinverse’s supervillain character “Monster Mohel,” who steals children’s foreskins in a quest to deprive gay Jews of penis pride.

Now, that was a gay comic!

Yet as the mainstream media celebrates Marvel’s “stunning and brave” commitment to readers who are LGBTQ (as opposed to LGBTO, which stands for lesbian, gay, and Bachman Turner Overdrive), veteran DC comics artist Shane Davis, known for his work on the Batman and Superman books, has a slightly more cynical take on the matter. On his Talking and Drawing podcast last week, Davis explained that the “new gay Captain America” is simply Marvel’s way to weasel out of paying for the creation of a new original character. As Davis outlines it, Marvel’s “work for hire” doodlers get jack spit for riffing on a preexisting character; they’d be entitled to far more compensation for creating a character from scratch. As long as Marvel keeps churning out new iterations of old characters, it can get away with paying its artists diddly.

Industry insider Davis points out that this is why these corporate brands keep doing these black or gay or lesbian or Hispanic or feminist or tranny variations of old characters; they don’t have to pay the artists more than cab fare, and they can use the cheaply produced incarnations to pander to an identity group for a few months, while at the same time ensuring additional publicity from fawning woke reporters and outraged conservative commentators.

This dynamic usually occurs close to the release date of a new Marvel movie or TV show featuring the riffed character. And wouldn’t you know it? The Falcon and the Winter Soldier debuted last week on Disney+.

Wotta coincidence!

Davis sees the entire sordid affair as nothing more than a cynical and manipulative ploy by Marvel to extract money from its salivating fan base.

It looks like even though it’s the new Captain America who’s gay, the fans are the ones taking it up the rear.

BREAKIN’ 3: ELECTRIC ANARCHY
What a year for Florida! Remember the days when if somebody mentioned that state, the first thing that came to mind was a naked transient high on bath salts eating the face off an astronaut in a diaper as an alligator wrestled a tiger for dibs on Caylee Anthony’s drugged carcass?

Not every 2021 political seismic shift is bad. Look at the Sunshine State today, growing so red, Democrats have practically written it off. While other states soiled their britches over Covid, Florida remained levelheaded in its balance of public safety versus individual rights and personal freedoms. Governor DeSantis is on the short list of 2024 GOP presidential contenders (second only to Trump), and as winter ends, Florida seems poised for an immediate post-Covid economic comeback.

Good news all around for America’s wang! The only thing missing from Florida’s recipe for success is a throng of intoxicated young black people, because nothing makes a good thing better than a throng of intoxicated young black people.

Back in the old days, “Black Spring Break” was an event held annually in Virginia Beach. Eventually, it was moved to the Mississippi Gulf Coast (a logical choice as East St. Louis doesn’t have a beach). This year, however, the organizers of “Black Beach Weekend” (the official governing body of Black Spring Break) announced that, due to Covid, Mississippi festivities would be postponed until the end of August.

And America’s young black partyers, known for their abstemious levelheadedness and agreeable temperament, responded by saying, “Indeed, we shall postpone our revelry until such time as the properly ordained public health officials do henceforth deem it uninjurious.”

CORRECTION: They actually said the exact opposite: “If Flurda be open, Flurda where we’ll go…and the streets shall run RED with the shed blood, broken press-on nails, and rended weaves of brawlers.”

And just like that the good people of Miami regretted not being under lockdown.

Responding to “exceptionally large and violent crowds” that city leaders admit “involve predominantly young African Americans,” last week Miami officials imposed an 8 p.m. curfew, as police were forced to use “chemical irritants and high-pitched noises to disperse crowds along Miami Beach’s famous entertainment zone on South Beach.”

The specifics of those dispersion techniques were not revealed, but rumor has it that the “chemical irritant” was the condensed and bottled scent of a library, and the “high-pitched noises” were the screams of a baby in need of child support.

Both guaranteed to disperse a certain type of crowd.

The videos from Black Spring Break (Miami edition) are, to be kind, not flattering. Brawls in restaurants, brawls in the street, diners skipping out on checks, cars stopped cold by noble, proud black twerkers, as other twerkers kung-fu-fight in the middle of traffic underneath the stoplights their ancestors invented.

Naturally, black leaders nationwide condemned the lawlessness and called on black spring breakers to display the dignity and decorum befitting the 1619ers who built this country.

CORRECTION: They actually said the exact opposite. Black political leaders and advocacy groups condemned the Miami police for intervening in the anarchy. Indeed, they claimed that attempts to stop the public violence were “racist.”

Remember last year when we were told that BLM violence was good and permissible because it was in the service of a noble cause?

Yeah, that was pretty much a crock. Turns out that such violence is equally good and permissible in the service of drunkenly tearing up a town during spring break.

For its part, Florida—its road to image rehabilitation temporarily impeded—sent an official message to Mississippi:

“How much do we have to pay you to never cancel Black Spring Break again?”

¡AY YI YIKES!
Welcome to Mexico, where the primary cause of death is the primary.

See, in the U.S., when this or that political or ideological advocacy bloc gets pissed off at a politician, they’ll say, “We’re gonna primary you!” Meaning, “We’ll run an opposing candidate to electorally remove you from office under the right and proper guidelines and conditions of our functioning constitutional republic.”

That’s a few too many words for the average disgruntled Mexican, who’s more likely to respond to a similar situation by simply telling the targeted politician, “I KEEL YOU!”

It’s always been understood by Mexican politicians that they either sell out to the drug cartels or they die. It’s the “gotta kiss some babies” principle, with a south-of-the-border twist (“gotta kiss some narcotraficantes”). It’s something the Mexican people have learned to live with. Hernando gets elected mayor of AyChihuahuateca. Hernando either plays ball with the cartels and lives (muy bueno!) or he opposes the cartels and dies (muy not bueno).

But now, the cartels have started killing off politicos before they even win their election. After all, if the nation’s storied fruit-pickers are expendable and disposable, why not the politicians?.

“Politicians Keep Getting Killed in Mexico,” read last week’s AP headline. And the attached article told a messy story of Messicans being murdered after merely filing to run for office. “Analysts said Monday 18 pre-candidates have been killed so far in the run-up to the June mid-term elections. They were killed before they opened formal campaigns.”

According to the report, potential mayors, governors, and local councillors have been blown up (kablooey bueno), riddled with bullets (pew-pew-pewey bueno), and stabbed to death (arterial spewy bueno). The killings are being carried out by a diverse coalition of “drug cartels, political rivals and corrupt police” who view murder as a cheaper alternative to graft.

Because one of the recently iced candidates was female, Mexico’s National Women’s Institute told the AP that “violence against women cannot be allowed or tolerated in a democratic system.” In theory, one would think that murdering male candidates should also not be “allowed or tolerated in a democratic system.”

Political assassinations are not uncommon in Mexico, perhaps the most well-known example being the point-blank execution of presidential candidate Luis Colosio while greeting supporters at an outdoor rally in 1994. Though blamed on a lone gunman by the corrupt political machine that ran Mexico at the time, independent researchers have long pointed to the likelihood of a conspiracy in the murder, which was supposedly orchestrated by then-President Salinas, who viewed Colosio as a threat to the party’s agenda.

Recent investigations have revealed that Salinas had indeed dispatched two backup gunmen to a nearby grassy knoll, but they forgot their mission objective when their Mexican instinct kicked in and they began to mow it.

With fewer and fewer Mexican politicians willing to run for office due to the current spate of assassinations, many worry that a Mexico devoid of political leaders could deteriorate into a lawless, anarchic hellhole of drugs, gangs, murder, kidnapping, pollution, and despair.

Uh, wait…