Friendlyneighborhoodmenace - Gamma

one must imagine sisyphus actually pretty miserable. because he has to roll a huge rock up a hill over and over and that sounds like it would get old fast. i dont know why you would imagine him happy

Dear Followers and Mutuals, if you come across this, should I make a separate blog for my Politics and Arguments? My blog is mostly lighthearted stuff but after my posts about the Israel-Palestine conflict, I can see how that can feel out of place here.

If Hbomberguy made this image about me I'd simply walk into the fucking ocean my time on Earth would be over

Hell is the same except only the bad bits

Heaven is actually just a big comfy couch in front of a TV that plays all of your favorite shows but changed to get rid of all the bits you don't like and add in new things that make it even better

I was gonna ask about r/197 because I scrolled for a bit out of curiosity, and all the memes I found were just regular memes, nothing seemed Right-Wing or Bigoted about them at all, even if some were a little edgy, though nothing worse than the kinds of jokes that some of my Discord friends make.

But then I saw the comments underneath a post venting about a ban from r/196, wherein someone called the mods, their words not mine, 'virtue signaling cucks who don’t actually give a damn about anyone other then [sic] themselves', which knowing the online Right... Yeah, that definitely smells like fascist talk.

I also found some strange comments under one of the pinned posts, and while it's unfair to judge a whole Subreddit based on just a few people, I am a bit suspicious of it now; I will definitely tread carefully there should I ever decide to visit again.

a summar(ule)y of 196 culture

since the tumblr veterans have been kind enough to introduce us newbies to their site and culture, i think it is only fair that we explain the culture of our glorious former home to any tumblr users who might be interested in the #196 tag. keep in mind, all these things are based on my perspective of the situation.

first of all, some general information (that you might’ve already heard):

196 (r/196 on reddit) was a subreddit with only one (official) rule; "post before you leave." it was mainly a meme/shitposting sub, but it cultivated a large queer and left-leaning community. in protest of the recent api chances in reddit, 196 has shut down indefinitely until reddit reverts these changes.

now for some culture/references that you might come across

spronkus kronkus:

spronkus is this yellow, rabbit-like creature.

they were the mascot of our subreddit. their appearance can vary from images to image, but as far as i’m aware, their full outfit consists of a bandanna in the colours of the trans flag around their neck, a gun labelled as such (other wise you obviously wouldn’t know what you’re looking at), and an axe also coloured like the trans flag.

r/place:

this is a rare event on reddit where the entire website gets a huge white canvas and can start creating pixel art on it. 196 participated by collaboratively creating our mascot, spronkus with "196!" written next to them.

this version of the pixel art was recreated by me as i couldn't find a nice image of it. there were some changes between the first version and the end result, so this might not be exactly how it looked in the end

post titles/"rule":

reddit forces it's users to title every post they make. as most of the posts on 196 spoke for themselves, many user instead titled their posts "rule", to indicate that they followed the subreddit's only rule. some people also tried to make puns with the word or tried to include it in words that shared some letters (example: wor(ule)d).

anarcho-stripperism:

as the amount of cropped porn jokingly posted to the subreddit increased, the moderators decided that porn would be banned from the sub, with one exception: anarcho-stripperism. she made food fucking videos, in which she jokingly tested the fuckability of different food items (fruits, pasta, etc.)

bigotry showcase:

bigotry showcase was a post flair (basically the reddit equivalent of tags) on the subreddit and was later restricted to only be used on saturdays. under this flair people posted instances of different forms of bigotry to make fun it.

eating babies/hungryposting:

at some point, the subreddit started to pretend to like eating babies, which started a variety of memes regarding the subject. even a post flair called "hungrypost" was added because of this

goblinhog:

goblinhog is the most prominent and well-known member of the 196 moderation team. besides this, on 196 he was mostly known for changing people’s flair if you enjoyed him enough about it.

flairs:

flairs are little tags that are displayed under your name in posts or comments, they are also subreddit specific. most subreddits give their users a palette of preset flairs and the option to make your own custom flair. however, in 196 you only had the option to customize your flair during special events. if you wanted to customize your flair outside of those events (which was basically the entire time), you had to ask a mod to do it for you.

punching nazis:

from time to time, the same gif of a person with a nazi armband getting punched in the face, and promptly falling to the ground, was reposted to the subreddit. this became a sort of tradition.

discourse/drama

wasp discourse:

the wasp discourse was a one to two weeks long heated discussion that generally divided the subreddit into two factions. one side said that they were justified in killing wasps if they were attacked by them, while the other claimed that since wasps are just animals, they aren't aware of what they're doing in the same way humans are, and therefore should be spared.

drama about the british:

there was a time when jokes along the lines of "ew, british" became pretty frequent on the subreddit. as a response, some user claimed that this was akin to racism and tried to get others to stop with the jokes. a debate over whether or not it was important or necessary to stop followed afterwards.

pillar discourse:

this was a debate over which type of pillar should be considered the best (ionic; doric; corinthian). i have seen the question "which pillar is the best?" being used as a sort of greeting between 196 refugees on here.

related subreddits

195:

195 was the predecessor to 196, and also was a social experiment with the same premise as 196 (one rule, post before you leave). as the creators of 195 ended the experiment, the community wanted something with the same vibe to continue posting, and thus 196 was born.

197:

197 is another part of the 196 ecosystem and is commonly understood to be the more politically right-leaning and bigoted as 196, as some people who were banned from 196 continued posting there. besides that, the subreddits were essentially the same in terms of how they functioned.

19684:

this subreddit adds a second rule which banned all mentions of sex (that’s why it’s name is a pun on 1984). some people took this as banning all discussion of sexuality, which resulted in a community that was slightly less accepting of queer people. it is currently still up and running as the 196 moderation team wants a way to stay in contact with the community.

amendments to the posts:

u/femboy_expert:

another well-known 196 user. as the name suggests they're an expert on the subject of femboys, with their flair on 196 reading "phd in feminine boys". as the subreddit was somewhat obsessed with femboys, it's no wonder that they became popular.

u/shitcum_backup:

this was the main account of a pretty popular shitposter on the subreddit. although i didn't see them as much in the last few months, i remember them sometimes having a unique speaking pattern, in which they referred to themself in the third person.

u/monko74:

this user commented "Every day I thank god for not making me a r/196 celebrity," which led to many users of the subreddit treating them like a micro celebrity. there are even a few subreddits solely dedicated to u/monko74.

691:

a sister subreddit that inverts the rule of 196, here you would be (temporarily) banned for posting. some time ago the members of this sub initiated a rebellion/revolution against the bot who performed all the bans (roomba).

u/Smart_Calendar1874:

this wasn’t necessarily part of the subreddit, but it was a pretty popular meme. and since it’s getting posted on here again, and i know enough about it, i’ll add it to the post. this user made a post to r/AskReddit titled "How would you get a small cylinder (5.1in length, ~4.5in girth) unstuck from a mini M&Ms tube filled with butter and microwaved mashed banana? [sic]" it was pretty clear that they were referring to their penis, yet they continued to claim "it’s a cylinder," in the comment section. this lead to comments like "it is imperative that the cylinder […] remains unharmed," in response to people’s advice of cutting the m&m tube.

it's going to be very interesting to see which aspects of 196 culture are going to survive the tumblr migration, and which aspects won't be applicable on this site.

i'm obviously not the ultimate scholar on 196 lore. if i’ve missed or left out anything, or said something wrong, please comment it.

i just realized that tumblr allows multiple audio files in a row and they autoplay consecutively on mobile

I used to be pro-Palestinian. I thought Israel was wrong for carpet bombing Gaza and using siege warfare on civilians.

But then I ran into a very wise Israel apologist who changed my way of looking at things forever.

I was walking down the street and I saw him leaning against a lamp post, smoking a pipe as wise men do.

“Your shirt says Free Palestine,” he said from behind a plume of smoke.

“Yep!” I replied.

“So I guess that means you love Hamas then?” spake he.

I stopped in my tracks. I’d never thought of it that way before.

Could it be? Could my opposition to murdering civilians really be indicative of a deep affection for a Gazan militant group? Maybe I really did love Hamas and think everything it did on October 7 was great and wonderful?

“Is this really how I want to live my life?” I thought to myself.

“I — I — I…” I said out loud.

“Or perhaps,” he said with a raised eyebrow, “you just HATE JEWS??”

I fell to my knees.

Oh my God. He really had a point. What possible reason could anyone have for opposing military explosives being dropped on buildings full of children besides a seething lifelong hatred of adherents to the religion of Judaism? How could anyone possibly oppose siege warfare tactics which cut off civilians from food and water and electricity and fuel and medical supplies unless they harbored a dangerous hostility toward members of a small Abrahamic faith?

“Who… who are you?” I asked.

“That’s of no consequence,” he said, casually blowing a smoke ring through another larger smoke ring.

“But… but the children,” I stammered as my entire worldview crumbled before my eyes. “The civilians! They’re dying! Isn’t it bad that they’re dying?”

And then he went for the coup de grâce.

“Have you considered,” he said before a pregnant pause, “… that all of those deaths are the fault of Hamas?”

I fell flat on my back. The world was spinning. A trickle of blood ran down into my hair from my ear.

I felt all the anti-colonialism leaving my body. I suddenly could no longer remember why I thought it was bad to rain down military explosives on a densely populated concentration camp.

Everything went black.

When I finally came to, the mysterious stranger was gone. But his wisdom and profound insights into Israel and Gaza will always live on in my heart.

—Caitlin Johnstone, (satire: Hamas ≠ Palestine and pro-Palestinian ≠ antisemitism)

Shout out to Linda. The he/him asexual woman from my psychology quiz from a few years ago

Friendly reminder that, while what both Hamas and Israel did and have done is extremely wrong, it is no excuse to spread hate speech against people who follow Judaism and Islam; If I see any of you doing that shit on my blog, you're getting blocked.

unfollowing your ass for the hamas posts. theyre literal antisemitic terrorists who hate america lmao?? they would kill you???

if you think hating america is bad why the fuck were you following me before