…Seriously?

http://images2.fanpop.com/images/photos/3400000/Jacob-Black-twilight-series-3497205-1636-1236.jpg

Honestly, I don’t have too much to say about this one.  It just made me laugh so much that I had to post it.  I’m not even sure how much there is to say about it as far as propaganda goes, but I found it while searching for a picture to use in my final project. 

Clicked the link and still don’t know what I’m talking about?  Look a little harder.  I’m sorry if you’ve already noticed it and wish I would just get on with my point.  

Well, it’s just that Jacob Black here is wearing Abercrombie & Fitch undies.  Product placing at it’s finest.  XD  Good job, Twilight.  Peace, people. 

-M. Murazzi 

order and cHaos

Avatar: The Latest Nature Hype

Well, it’s almost midnight… I’m starting to reach that point where I was tired a few minutes ago, but I’ve somehow outlasted my own tiredness.  I have a feeling those words are going to come back to bite me before this blog is through. 

So anyway!  I’m here tonight to talk about the movie Avatar that I saw a few months back and the sort of “Go Green” propaganda it displays.  Essentially, the movie works off the cliche that the imperialist bastards are trying to take down a pure, perfect society of nature-loving aliens so they can get the resources that exist conveniently right where the natives have set up base.  Lots of conflict ensues, one earthling manages to work himself into the alien society, blah, blah, blah. 

The real issue I have with this movie is the way it literally drags concepts like “connection with nature” and “let’s be eco-friendly” across the screen every five minutes.  It’s preechy and it talks down to the viewer.  My dad even said after seeing the movie, “Did it make you feel kind of bad?”  Let’s not even pretend for a second that the “resources” the bad guys were after wasn’t symbolic of oil. 

It’s like the movie is implying that to disagree with it and not feel bad about “what the white man has done” is to be one of the evil sonuvabitches that got their butts kicked in the end.  I do feel bad about what’s been done to other cultures by the “white man,” but what in the name of hush-puppies does this movie want me to do about it?! 

I really hate being talked down to. 

So anyway, it’s now about ten past midnight, and surprisingly I haven’t gotten spontaneously tired again.  Though because I just said that, I probably be suddenly drop out of my seat from fatigue as soon as I post this.  Well, probably not.  It’s only a little past midnight.  But all in all, that’s my problem with Avatar as a propaganda piece.  Peace all. 

-M. Murazzi 

order and cHaos

Medication for Liberalism???

http://cz.altermedia.info/images/liberalism_mental_disorder.jpg

Right, so I just typed liberalism into google images, and I found a whole bunch of signs with the slogan, “Liberalism is a Mental Disorder.”  I then went to dictionary.com for an official definition of mental disorder.  It gave me: any of the various forms of psychosis or severe neurosis. 

It’s an interesting piece of propaganda, that.  Mostly because, well… it makes even less of an attempt to draw a connection between what it’s comparing liberalism to that the other piece I saw the other day that looked kind of like this: LIbEraliSm.  Get it?  All the letters in “lies” are in the word liberalism!  Obviously there is a connection. 

But like I was just saying, this “Liberalism is a Mental Disorder” campaign makes even less of an attempt to rationalize itself.  I find this very interesting considered this is the slogan that popped up the most when I did my search, more so than any of the pieces that actually attempted to poke fun at a certain aspect of liberalism, which at least would makes some ioda of sense. 

I think its shortness is probably why it actually succeeds as a piece of proganda.  It’s short, sweet, and fits easily on a t-shirt.  It can’t really be argued because it really isn’t saying anything even remotely substantial. 

So where’s the medication? 

-M. Murazzi 

order and cHaos

Mind Control via Fantasy

Don’t have a picture for this one.  Sorry.   

All right, what I’m going to talk about today is maybe a little pulling at edges calling it propaganda, but I do feel like it’s certain individuals trying to force certain ideas on others through forms of manipulation, so I’m pretty sure it can still count. 

I’ve read quite a bit of contemporary fantasy in my day, and there’s something I’ve been noticing about a good portion of the books I read from said genre that’s starting to bother me, specifically in the latest book I read: the tactics used to force readers into liking or disliking characters.  The primary tactic I’m talking about here is how villains are always sex-nuts and heroes are much more “pure” as if to imply that by siding with good they do not posses a sex-drive. 

To be more specifc, the book I just recently finished had two major villains.  One viewed women as being nothing but a tool for pleasure, while the other was a pedophile that murdered little boys.  Now, this kind of stuff doesn’t really bother me that much in books, to be honest.  Without conflict in a couple hundred pager, it can get kind of boring.  However, the traits in these characters felt incredibly out of line with the rest of the personalities.  It was an incredible turn-off to the series because while I often do enjoy reading about the villains’ perspectives in books, the whole time I was reading about these two characters, I felt like the author was looking over my shoulder, saying, “You shouldn’t be enjoying this part.  You shouldn’t be able to even remotely sympathize with these characters.” 

Okay, I guess this is starting to sound more like a book review that a propaganda examination (big surprise).  However, I’ve seen this appear is fantasy books many times, and the constant use of it reminds me so much of concepts we’ve used in class, like repetition.  If you say it enough, it becomes true.  If the author says that this guy is evil enough times, he must be.  What I’m trying to say is that while maybe it doesn’t have the same affect or motive as other kinds of propaganda, it’s still using a lot of the same techniques: repitition, fear of sexual abuse, etc, to force an idea into the minds of the readers. 

Over and out, 

M. Murazzi 

order and cHaos 

P.S. I really am actually a fan of fantasy, and there are a lot of fantasy books I’ve loved that this doesn’t apply to.  Honestly. 

Sparkly Vampires

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs38/f/2008/365/d/d/sparkly_vampire_by_blastedgoose.png

I personally think it’s a good idea to provide examples of what I’m writing about, so the picture above works pretty well as a demonstration, me thinks. 

Obviously I’m going to be handling the tender topic of Stephanie Meyer’s young adult vampire series, Twilight.  Specificially, I wanted to point out the complete lack of logic surrounding certain arguments made against this specific book series. 

As is probably easily discerned by the picture, one instance I wanted to point out is how much Twilight is looked down on for having its mythical creatures “sparkle.”  This picture and many others demonstrate the major vampire, Edward, in some sort of goofy, even feminine position, while sparkling in the sunlight. 

The next issue is how so many people feel the need to poke at Twilight for the introduction of “vegetarian” vampires, who feed off animal blood instead of human blood as an attempt to maintain some level of decency.  “They’re not real vampires!” people shout.  There aren’t so many pictures regarding this topic, but the phrase is enough propaganda. 

My question regarding everyone who attacks the story with these arguments is this: What in the name of all that is literary does either have to do with the quality of the book?  If authors don’t occasionally try something new, such as vampires sparkling in the sunlight, then where will literature ever go?  It would become doomed to sit at a standstill while we all wade in our traditional ways.  Likewise, is it so terrible to write about characters fighting the sterotype they’ve been placed in?  Anne Rice took a similar approach in her novel Interview with a Vampire, and I haven’t seen too many people yelling at her over it.  And while they may not be real vampires, the point is irelevent because… well, vampires aren’t real at all.  Sorry.   

So, in conclusion: Don’t pick on Twilight for stupid, illogical reasons.  There are plenty of completely reasonable, valid approaches to tearing it apart piece by piece. 

In case that last paragraph didn’t get the point across, I hate Twilight with a passion.   

-M. Murazzi 

order and cHaos

Legend of Zelda Propaganda for… what?

Here is a link to the image I’ll be discussing:  http://static.gamesradar.com/images/mb/GamesRadar/us/Features/2009/10/Videogame%20Propaganda/Zelda2–article_image.jpg

Here we have an image of game company Nintendo’s well-known hero of time character, Link.  He is featured with red eyes instead of his normal blue, implying rage, and has his sword drawn.  In the background are the scenery ceramic pots commonplace to any Legend of Zelda games.  The text reads, “HERO?!  LINK WANTS TO SMASH YOUR POTS” 

What exactly this image is trying to get at confuses me considerably.  While I’m fairly certain it’s someone’s idea of a joke, I still don’t quite get what point they’re trying to make.  Are the pots a reference to the well-known plant turned drug?  Is it a jab at video games implying the senseless violence towards inanimate artworks?  Is there some reference that’s just going way over my head?  The downright confusion of the piece definately makes it fail as a piece of propaganda. 

Taking a moment to examine how the piece gains credibility has helped me to at least establish an audience: gamers.  Link is a well-known, extremely well-loved character among gamers, but unlike other characters like Mario from the Mario brothers games, he isn’t as easily recognized by non-gamers.  His name especially is unknown. 

This conclusion leads me to believe that the piece is not aimed at trying to convince people that video games are too violent because it could only conceivably be understood by gamers, who are just not going to be convinced by something like this.  Thus, I feel I can conclude that the piece is a “parody” aimed at gamers to express the idea of how silly the opinions of non-gamers are.  That is how it is propaganda: It makes an opinion held by a certain group of people appear worthless and completely unfounded.  (Even if it is, though I won’t deny I have a bias here.) 

-M. Murazzi 

order and cHaos

Greetings and Salutations

Hey ya’ll, just thought I’d make myself a little introductory post before coming up with anything actually serious.  My name’s Michele Elaine Murazzi, I’m currently nineteen years old, am from Northeastern Pennsylvania, and major in English Education at our fair West Chester University.  I love to read and write, and I read anything from classic literature to contemporary fantasy.  I’ve practiced as many martial arts as I have fingers on one hand, and that’s including the thumb.  My favorite word is “defenestrate.”  Look it up if you don’t know what it means.  I’m also a master gamer. 

The purpose of this blog is for comments on texts or other such entities I unconver throughout my daily life.  Hopefully sometime soon I’ll have an actually substanstial post.  I’ll try not to get overly ranty, which is definately known to happen when I find something I want to talk/complain about, and we’ll see how this goes. 

Over and out, 

M. Murazzi

order and cHaos

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