Hot Tip to Unionize Video Games Now

Get a load of this shit: Activision-Blizzard Hires Amazon Union-Busting Firm.  As Boots Riley from the Coup said, “If we’re ever gonna do it let’s do it now.”  That is to say, when a government agency in a state with anti-worker wildcat strike laws decides to bring charges against a company for fucking massive systemic sexual harassment, and as employees start to organize, and that is their response?  Workers of the world unite!

The game industry is massive in profits thanks to selling gambling to children, but small in workforce, which makes it extremely vulnerable to labor revolt.  It hasn’t happened yet only because douchebros attach sucking corporate ass product to their sense of manhood and identity, and have stacked the industry with like-minded people.

But the video game industry, like all creative industries, is so vicious and life-draining that even scumbag misogynist right wingers last an average of two years there before flaming out and going back to work at Electronics Boutique.  The sausage is made out of art students and young programmers, and management thinks nothing of it because there’s always a new graduating class to brainrape (or sometimes just physically rape).

So here’s how you do it.  Organize their asses before they leave the schools.  You can’t do this at one school or you’ll just get the grads there shadowbanned.  You need to hit them all at the same time.  There are not that many schools producing video game creators.  Find them, do not involve the faculty in any way, and infiltrate their shit.  Full court propaganda press.

You get enough traction and make these vampire businesses face a united group of graduates saying NO.  I don’t have the time to do a two year unpaid internship, or take starvation wages.  NO.  It is not acceptable to make drinking to excess normal during business hours.  NO.  Seriously, your entire fucking culture must die, now, so that the silly people who love video games enough to want to make them can stop being chewed up and shit out.  Having a dream should not make you into so much bloody meat for billionaire pit bulls.

Video game workers of the world unite.  You have nothing to lose but your mass exploitation.

Some Art

This July, like our Mr. Brinkman, I’m trying to finish some novels.  In my case, I’m only going to get the first drafts done, if I succeed.  One is my old commie magical realism bullshit Rent is Theft, the other is my misanthropic UFO story Centennial Hills.  Nothing exciting to announce in that, but I liked the way this combo cover turned out.

 

 

Last Post Art – Juneteenth

Lest anyone get the impression I’m not deep, allow me to present some art worthy of a junior high student’s pee-chee margins.  The skull is white greed, black blood on its mouth.  As the date of Juneteenth was the result of freedom delayed, we see spirits escaping the greedy thing gradually but triumphantly.  Of course, an artistic image is what you make of it, and there may be bad interpretations of this that I haven’t conceived in this moment.  And with that, I’m done!

 

I Hate Fanfic

I tried googling the phrase “I hate fanfic” in hopes of finding somebody with a similar annoyance to one I have.  Sometimes it’s fun to see a hateful rant that echoes your prejudices.  But there were zero good results on the first page when I tried this.  The closest to the exact phrase and intent was from somebody that seemed to hate it because their own fic was not well received – that ain’t me, chief.

I don’t actually have time to get into depth about this right now, just wasting a precious minute due to the naggings of that imp of the perverse.  But I will likely elaborate if pressed, or if I’m feeling similarly irresponsible at some point later in the next few days.  I feel safe in making this declaration here because nobody in my writers group – which includes many ficcers – reads my blog.

Let this somehow rise through the google ranks like a phoenix and spark a conversation that doesn’t center either the demented opinions of ficcers, or the needlessly hateful opinions of people who are just legit misogynists or elitists.

Another Anime Girl

U kno u want it. It’s the famous Flora dans le galaxie étincelante, of Distorsion céleste fame. Never heard of it? We’re writing books that are, in part, about anime that never existed. Both this and the last one were made in sharpie ink on poster paper, though the other one was sweetened in photoshop compared to this.


International Goths and Terrible Promotion

In response to the pandemic, Italian band Ash Code – together with friends like André Savetier, host of The Wave of Things – assembled a sort of online music festival to raise money for charities. They’ve transitioned to raising money to make the festival a meatspace event, using their most recent version of the online fest to hold out the proverbial cup. But not only did they do a terrible job of publicizing their newest festival, they also tempted people like me to unsubscribe from their yewchewb channel by repeatedly posting videos of this one basic joke, clogging up my subscriptions with foolery.

But if you want to know what goths are up to these days, all across the world, check out the Gothicat Festival videos. And if you’re in Europe* and it might be possible for you to go to an IRL Gothicat Festival, consider donating to the weirdos. One word of warning: All of these videos have strobing lights on some tracks, and they don’t always provide adequate warning.

*Theoretically they could do the festival anywhere. Some of the acts on these shows are from Mexico, Canada, the US, South America, Australia, and I think Taiwan? But the vast majority are based in Europe, so safe money where the IRL fest will end up – assuming they can raise enough money like this.

EDIT TO ADD: Speaking of new gothery, here’s a US track that dropped just a few days ago, from a black transwoman, if that’s a kind of person you want to support & you like heavy sounds:

Return of the Mikla

Kælan Mikla has a new video debuting like seven hours from the time of this post. I’ll be sleeping, then rushing to work, and unable to truly dig it til Friday evening. Kælan Mikla is a divisive band, with some of the most shrieky lady vocals out there. They’ve veered hard into gothy territory on recent albums and by the design of this thumbnail I expect more of the same. Will this be more chilled out, or still have the shrieks? No idea. Anyway, these girls always amuse and entertain me with their earnest ice witch theatrics. Lemme know if you love or hate them, as by the time you see this post, you can find out for yourself.

Horrible Art Goblin Chanteuse

Why it’s Kennedy Ashlyn of Them Are Us Too and SRSQ fame, of course.  This song is old enough that the other band member died in a horrible tragedy years ago ( ;_; ), but it’s delightful to slow groove on the fruits of art people going off the chain.  I have nothing useful to say about it.  Content Warnings:  Non-Eyebrow Having and Tearing Out One’s Wig.  Low Mood.

Easy Kudos for Hollywood

Hey Hollywood!  With Elliot Page out as trans, you’ve got a golden opportunity for cheap liberal kudos and award bait!  Cast Elliot as a man and treat him as a man, in a classy cool movie.  Like a Christopher Nolan joint, where he’s draped in GQ having man feels opposite a fellow gentle-looking man like Joseph Gordon-Levitt.  It would be cool if you’d give him a romance plot, gay or straight, but if you wanna hedge your bets like the cowardy custards you are, you can leave that out – just have it be a bro show.

Just getting him up on the screen looking cool, doing film noir stuff, you’d have an instant cult classic for the kind of people who are horny for people like him but never get to see that in cinema – lots of blu-ray sales.  He’s sexy enough that you’d make millions of mildly transphobic cishet women uncomfortably atttracted in a way that would push controversy and attention.  You’d have all the right full-blown shitheads screaming about how you’re evil, making you look like saints to mainstream viewers.

It’s time, motherfuckers.  Do eet.