Reviewing a Conservative Young Adult Novel

[@trinodot8112]

I love how the idea of designing a city in a way that you don't have to spend an hour in traffic to get from place to place is dystopian to conservatives. It's such a self-flagellating political position.

[@bibubbletea]

SITTING IN TRAFFIC FOR 25 OF THE 30 MINUTES I SPEND DRIVING TO GET MILK FROM THE STORE IS AN AMERICAN STAPLE GODDAMNIT

[@Dr_Cigarettes]

Making it so that most of my daily necessities are within walking distance is an infringement of my rights as a red-blooded American. How am I supposed to roll coal as a pedestrian?

[@somik-i3x]

Imagine if they look at older city before the advent of cars.

[@jessicathomasflute]

I would love to be able to walk places instead of drive.

[@3baxcb]

I wonder how they would react to an oil crisis like the one that occurred in the 1970s.

[@algi1]

The dystopia of purchasing at the corner store instead of a mall a highway away.

[@kahlilbt]

My freedom tho 😢

[@tcaprecap1448]

uhhh if everything is within walking distance, how will I tell the world that I definitely, certainly, surely have a great, big snake in my pants by driving an F350 and rolling coal on my way to my office job?

[@Jin420]

​@@tcaprecap1448 appreciate the laughter... 😂😂 I live in a small rural area surrounded by those heavy duty pick up trucks.... (and no, they're not farmers or anything... many of them are young students attending the local university)

[@pengwin_]

it's so funny because these people probably LOVE japan but in japan the convivence stores are WAY BETTER for this very reason! They have 15 min cities! Oh who am i kidding, they like it because of the racial homogeny and want it for america.

[@TheModdedwarfare3]

Begone spirits! I have seen the error of my ways! Cars good! Traffic and smog good!

[@Jallakuntilliokan]

It's always so funny when conservatives bring up banning books as something negative and yet they are the ones banning and burning books.

[@seeleunit2000]

The point is they have no problem banning books except those that they personally like.

[@philipvipond2669]

"Read this book about a dystopia where books are banned." -Moms For Liberty

[@ericcarabetta1161]

Self awareness is not something these people are “afflicted” with.

[@Ryuzaki-Yagami]

They only burn them so that the books don't end in hellfire

[@blurg2712]

I've watched conservative Christians try (and succeed in some cases) to ban/cancel books, music, TV and movies my whole life. Their denial/confusion about this reality has also remained consistent.

[@mojoforthewin3069]

the scene with the Oarsmen reciting ‘banned history’ is ironically a very succinct illustration of the problems with conservative historiography as it’s just a bunch of factoids and slogans utterly removed from context and history to try and work its audience into a patriotic fervor

[@tayzers69]

its honest to god strange and unnerving the fervor with which these people regurgitate the american mythology without even a hit of awareness or cognition. i cant imagine believing in anything so dogmatically even my current beliefs

[@warlordofbritannia]

History without context isn’t history, it’s trivia.

[@LuciferMorningstar-uk7oh]

​@@warlordofbritannia triva is a generous description when its deliberately obscuring real history

[@highlander2705]

I'm trying to think about a comparison and the closest I can get IRL is in a post-Roman Germanic kingdom some guy just gets arrested for disturbing the Peace and gets dragged off screaming; "WE INVENTED TIME KEEPING, PUBLIC INFRASTRUCTURE, OUR ARMIES WERE UNDEFEATED, THE FIRST EMPEROR WAS AUGUSTUS CAESAR, FOLLOWED BY TIBERIUS, FOLLOWED BY CALIGULAAAAAAA-" The actual collapse of the Western Empire was a slow process of two hundred years where Germanic Kings went from de-facto vassals to de-facto regional powers to eventually fully independent powers. That in most cases ended up assimilated back into fully Latin culture because the nobles wanted to be closer to the idea of 'Rome.' Which became a whole lot more attractive once the Empire fell and 'Rome' became a lot more pliable. Of course if you went with the actual IRL example you'd have a post-America where people have family mottos that are bits of the constitution or Americana reiterated without context, everyone important is somehow related to the founding fathers or presidents, the nobles try speaking American (badly), the commoners both old and new are mixing their languages, and every two-bit King is trying to claim himself as the heir to Washington (DC). But that's boring right?

[@sylph8005]

I was amazed they were gonna mention the Atomic Bomb, considering that's not a moment that makes America look very good (well, debatably I guess)

[@christianbuffum-robbins8904]

I'm really struggling to understand how conservatives hear "urban planning that emphasizes the wellbeing and convenience of its citizens over needing a car," and think "DYSTOPIA!"

[@tinfoilslacks3750]

"Cities are where the black people live" That's it. That's all there is. There's a reason that, to them, all of the old walkable cities of Europe are "our heritage 🥲" and beautiful vacation destinations and all of the American cities they otherwise like to use as props when discussing American economic prosperity are "crime ridden hellholes".

[@peterwindhorst5775]

@@tinfoilslacks3750 But with the European ones - they will look down at all the POC tourists as interlopers but not themselves - while the Americans photograph themselves before that Eyesore in Paris.

[@SnakeMan448]

The conservative strategy does appear to be to call anything beneficial to human wellbeing dystopian so that they can call their destruction of wellbeing liberating.

[@davishickey1465]

It's unbelievable that someone would believe that, but that's because they don't believe that. They just have money invested in, or have been receiving money directly from, the auto industry. 15 minute cities are pretty anti-car. It's that simple. It all goes back to fossil fuels grasping at lily pads to keep them afloat.

[@Coestar]

To understand it, it is necessary to damage the brain

[@alexp.288]

I find it really interesting that even in a piece of conservative schlock, the villain is still a corporation that used its political power to exempt itself from government regulation

[@animeotaku307]

Happy that Glenn and I can agree that corporations have no place in politics!

[@tinfoilslacks3750]

A common criticism of capitalism is that it means the eventual corporate capture of government, but conservatives like to insist that the corporate capture of government means it isn't real capitalism, paying no mind to the fact that it's pre-existing capitalism that necessarily cedes ground to this "not real" capitalism.

[@noneofyourbusiness4616]

Not to mention it's a book about book censorship that an organization that censors books in school libraries is trying to get placed in libraries to replace the books it censored.

[@SleepyMatt-zzz]

Yeah, it's weird they think that's dystopian. It's literally the world they want to create. I guess the only difference between THIS dystopian corporate setting and their very real corporate dystopian fantasy is that it doesn't have a theocratic aesthetic.

[@thatonewriter8043]

@@SleepyMatt-zzz It's because that kind of world is only NOT a dystopia if you're the one running the corporations.

[@addabad4276]

I really do love the fact that in this secret society of truth tellers, their historical knowledge only really resembles the glossary of a middle school US history textbook.

[@megafire7]

Well, they *are* still Conservatives.

[@djangofett4879]

they are illiterate

[@seeleunit2000]

Exactly. This is why right-wing conservatives are terrible when it comes to trying to create anything. They have absolutely no ability for critical thought, and addition to no ability to self-reflect. Things you need to be able to be creative

[@connorsullivan1855]

Yeah its funny that its not a specific verison or part of history that's banned. It's super basic historical facts. And there's no attempt to provide an alternative verison of history. So I guess the evil company is trying to turn all of society into blank slates. Which seems like a great way to have a society that's unbelievably susceptible to conspiracy theories and and radicaliving movements, not an easily controlled one.

[@warlordofbritannia]

Middle school is generous.

[@MoreEriksson]

Hilarious that Mom's for Liberty would financially back a project where the villains are the ones banning books. Irony much?

[@seeleunit2000]

Not really. Organizations like that are all about control oand oppression. They're the bad guys that pretend that they're good

[@warlordofbritannia]

One of their banned books is Fahrenheit 451. So yeah, this seems in their oblivious wheelhouse.

[@artemys5197]

​@warlordofbritannia this is the funniest shit ever. They banned THAT BOOK???? WHY??? I don't even understand banning books honestly, if you really don't think your child should read certain books you just???? Tell them? And explain why? And give them years later after you know they're ready. I guess I can agree a 6yo shouldn't read the main kampf but you just have to explain to them why and years later they can read it with a more critical mind and understand better why these ideas are wrong. If you ban books.... That makes it more desirable. .... Anyway I can't believe they banned Fahrenheit 451 of all book. Why????

[@donquickoats]

Censorship is acceptable for me, but not for thee, because I'm censoring the things that really need it. Very similar thought process in what "free speech champion" Musk had done to Twitter.

[@myepictbr6968]

@@donquickoatsno, you see, when they are censoring things it is to save kids’ eternal lives. Heaven knows that, heaven understands.

[@garysmith6218]

He thinks "15 Minute Cities" means little pocket dimensions people aren't allowed to leave! Priceless.

[@lindamarshall3485]

My city is pushing the idea of 15 minute cities quite hard, and oh yes there are a lot of people who insist that means they won't be allowed to leave their neighbourhoods. Those same people complain a lot about traffic, too, ironically.

[@cloudycolacorp]

if only someone would trap him in a little pocket dimension

[@vegasa2067]

I don’t understand how their brains do not process information like come on just do the most minimal amount of thinking and you too can process what words mean!

[@UntoTheBreach24]

​@@vegasa2067 they simply aren't incentivized to do that. They get a kick out of being mad, literally why dig any deeper? That just cuts into "being mad" time.

[@torthos1]

Oh, don't you know? They're called that, because if you don't leave in less than 15 minutes, your soul gets bound to walkways and other pedestrian spaces, and leaving them after that would result in instant death! /s

[@bbrbbr-on2gd]

Imagine if you started a "Hunger Games" video by saying. "We meet our protagonist, 'Hunger' as she...". God I love Conservative stories, just always on the nose. 💀

[@kahlilbt]

The title strokes me as Catching Fire meets City of Ember

[@Squall20XXuk]

What do you expect when the audience for this book may not actually be able to read.

[@thatonewriter8043]

It's a wonder they don't name their heroes Rand and their villains Marx and then spend the next two hours jerking themselves off over the "clever symbolism".

[@critormiss6084]

It's her, Hunger James, noted protagonist of the Hunger Games series!

[@404maxnotfound]

Commenting because of fellow Chuck fan spotted in the wild. Also agree

[@EJMStudio10]

5 minutes in and Glenn Beck has already referenced the ONLY MLK quote Conservatives know 😂 Instant classic

[@seeleunit2000]

Exactly. You think that someone like Glenn Beck would ever entertain the idea of actually reading about Martin Luther King Junior and everything else he said ?

[@thatonewriter8043]

@@seeleunit2000 "I Have a Dream" is absolutely the only palatable part of Dr. King's political ideology to these people. Had he lived a full, natural lifespan, these same baboons would be decrying him as a Marxist, no different in their eyes than Al Sharpton or Louis Farrakhan. I mean, Rev. Jesse Jackson started out working for Dr. King, so while they obviously weren't the same person, their ideologies align enough that we could assume the reaction to Rev. Jackson is pretty similar to the reception Dr. King would receive today.

[@supahsean6710]

​@@thatonewriter8043 You don't have to imagine it, that is exactly how he was perceived back then.

[@noalowenstein6741]

Conservatives want you to believe MLK came out of the womb, said "something something content of their character, something something color of their skin," and then immediately died of natural causes

[@matthewgagnon9426]

@@thatonewriter8043 They assassinated him BECAUSE he was that way. You can find contemporary newspaper comics of MLK Jr. saying "I'm glad we had a successful peaceful protest today" while the city burns around him, because the racism has never gone away and it hasn't even changed form with how many people made up garbage about how BLM "burned cities down to the ground." They hyperfixate on one specific line of the "I Have a Dream" speech so they can take the power away from him by taking that sentence out of context.

[@lizabell6782]

The idea that Beck couldn't see a reason that Marx could be popular aside from it being rebellious is both insane and fascinating.

[@a_level_70_elite_raccoon]

Well yeah, Marx's ideas can't possibly have any factual basis or kernels of truth that apply to people's lives or speak to lived experiences, that would mean that capitalism is flawed and we can't have that.

[@MartijnterHaar]

"Oh, I am so happy working 12 hours a day for 6 days a week in a factory with no safety regulations and still not making enough to feed the family. The idea of seizing the means of production doesn't appeal to me at all."

[@tinfoilslacks3750]

​@@a_level_70_elite_raccoonI think OP's point is more, is Beck being intentionally dogmatic and disingenuously making this accusation about people who read Marx, or does he earnestly believe it's impossible for people to be supportive of Marx's writings for sincere reasons?

[@xibalbalon8668]

He can't imagine life outside of his upperclass WASP american bubble. These are the same guys who think the CIA destabilizing third world leftist governments for the greater good, how dare the peasants demand better. People like Beck have different brains, or none at all.

[@SleepyMatt-zzz]

​@@tinfoilslacks3750Beck probably believes that people hold socialist views because they are "envious" of rich people, rather than the reality that people just don't want to be exploited, a position so reasonable that it boggles the mind as to how a conservative can disagree.

[@angelinabrown3142]

They're preserving American mythology, not American history. Of course Glenn Beck thinks that this is endangered. It's like they came up with a list of "teenage dystopian novel" tropes and just went down the list, checking them off.

[@SiRenfield]

And also brought to you by the people that will try to shut down any conversation about historical racism like slavery or Japanese internment camps because it’s “critical race theory” (even though it’s actually not what that is)

[@rocksandsocks7]

There's a 2003 YA book called The City of Ember which was a condemnation of post 9/11 nationalism. I don't know if Glenn Beck radically misinterpreted City of Ember's message, or wanted to create a conservative alternative; but I don't think the similar titles are a coincidence. Especially since there are some plot similarities (dystopian future, planned city, historical knowledge being hidden, one girl and one boy protagonist). The kids in the City of Ember are around 12 or 13, so a rip-off would even explain the age weirdness.

[@3baxcb]

If you're right, then Glenn's book could be a ripoff that's altered as much as possible in order to avoid any potential legal action.

[@jacobs2099]

I thought this book sounded familiar. Of course conservatives can't create culture, they can only copy and revisionize.

[@ollie2111]

That was such a good book. Also there was a sequel and a prequel :)

[@r.s.4231]

Oh my god thank you for mentioning this book. I was literally thinking about it the other day but couldn’t recall the title!!! And a genuinely backward hilarity if he truly drew the most referential material from The City of Ember lol

[@halfbloodprincess989]

Scrolled down to find this comment, yup he totally ripped off "City of Ember" - which probably explains why his book includes messages like 'ratting out your friends is bad' (weird, as he surely wants his kids to rat out the trans kid). It's a rip-off.

[@emexdizzy]

I don't understand what the point of this book is. If you give this to Christian youth to read, they will ALL grow up to deconstruct once they encounter ANY amount of mainstream news or discussion, because it's teaching that: 1. Censorship of literature is bad 2. Organizations that try to suppress dissent are bad 3. Control youth by forcing them into conformatist youth programs is bad 4. Ratting out your friends to adults is bad 5. Authoritarian measures to suppress unrest are bad ...and literally ALL OF THOSE THINGS are stuff that the conservative Christian Right does. Like, I was taught ALL OF THIS growing up, and it made me deconstruct because I put it together that Conservative Christianity was full of bull once I learned a basic amount of knowledge about history/news. The only way to prevent that is to forcibly censor what your kids access, but your kids will immediately note the hypocrisy. This is ridiculous, this is just gonna make young people think Glenn Beck is full of bull.

[@djangofett4879]

it was most likely written by an A.I. with very little oversight so I doubt they noticed the ideological and inconsistency. also, nobody actually reads these conservative books.

[@papermr.magolorguy7957]

Liberal Christianity is more reasonable to me.

[@seeleunit2000]

That's the point. It's all about control. Any adolescent growing up in a secular house wouldn't believe in this crap, but someone in a more conservative, religious fanatical house just might.

[@nanashi7779]

​@@seeleunit2000 you'd be surprised what children in a secular house are willing to believe. In my experience it can be as ridiculous as these evangelical Christians. I think generally the family in the West is an absolute mess

[@tcaprecap1448]

the ghost-writer is actually a deep state plant trying to infect the minds of conservative teens with the most marx'ed-out marxism??

[@TheZombifiedGuy]

"Oarsmen" being an acronym - and learning what that "acronym" stands for - caused me so much pain. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the guy who infamously misspelled "oligarch" isn't very good at handling words, but my god.

[@naota3k]

Came looking for this comment. My eyes are still un-rolling.

[@ZedAmadeus]

oh my god I just googled that. He was like "one letter is missing!" Ohh okay so he _knows_ he's spelled 'oligarh' then he put the Y on the end and I lost it

[@ThePapaja1996]

One Aliance Rebels Some Mighty Evil Nightmare

[@Kimberly-xg9eq]

Using Ben Shapiro’s picture for the “dorky kid waiting to get punched” absolutely cracked me up.

[@DerAptrgangr]

Hilarious. Also interesting that this 12 old scrawny wimp could beat up the 17 year old? Wtf?

[@Best_Stressed]

“We don’t organize like that… when WE organize, there are tiki torches!” -Glenn Beck, translated for clarity

[@warlordofbritannia]

“And our chants are way cooler!”

[@SnakeMan448]

On the "we have jobs" thing he says, I've noticed that protesters get demonised for allegedly not having jobs, and that it's an outrage that they're doing something other than working. Those critics seem to have been brainwashed into thinking that people must always be working and to never take issue with exploitation - that one should be a good little worker drone and take it.

[@WidespreadKnown]

These conservatives are such Teeks...

[@fashion-baller3399]

"15 minute cities are dystopian" Why do so many Americans (including conservatives) go on vacation to European cities like Rome, London, and Paris if they're so dystopian? They could vacation to the middle of nowhere USA but prefer to go to touristy spots that let you walk and use public transit. Makes no sense! Obviously they're not that horrible if you're spending tons of money to visit them.

[@brenatevi]

Do you know what the difference between European cities and American cities? Just think about who is populating American cities...

[@PasCorrect]

Enh, I get it. You can visit a place without wanting YOUR home to resemble it. I'll go to the states for a few days and have fun, but that doesn't mean I endorse anything about it.

[@n00dle69]

@@brenatevi… Americans? are you being racist or just stupid lmao

[@fashion-baller3399]

@@PasCorrect I personally would not visit anywhere that I described as "dystopian" but maybe you are more adventurous than me... For example, North Korea...

[@seeleunit2000]

​@@brenateviWe get it, it's all about racism. What do you expect from a bunch of right-wing, white conservatives.

[@Robbay363]

I love when conservatives try to explain why Hitler was bad without mentioning any of his actual beliefs for fear of revealing that they basically agree with him about everything.

[@iluvtacos1231]

I'm absolutely losing it that a 15 minute city is somehow a dystopia in Glenns mind.

[@xibalbalon8668]

They have to bend over backwards to pretend it's going to be like big brother, or a thing at all in a place like america

[@maybemablemaples2144]

They need to drive 2 hours to the hospital to feel more American, I guess?

[@newsystembad]

It's because then he would have to live close to black people.

[@heroedify]

I would be surprised to learn that there were any Black characters in this book but the name Lincoln Freeman has real "Neal Adams trying to explain to the writers that they can't name a Black superhero Lincoln Washington" energy.

[@mykal4779]

that and the part where sky called him a fictional racial slur

[@heroedify]

@@mykal4779 I'll be honest I suspect that scene is supposed to be a take on "cis is a slur" where the evil intolerant leftists come up with new slurs for us normal people. As you say, though, it definitely comes across as a racial thing in context

[@mykal4779]

@@heroedify hm, maybe but even the oarsmen get mad a sky for saying it? not sure but maybe!

[@AnEnemySpy456]

You have to have a minority character in your book when you're a conservative so you can have them agree with everything you believe as proof that actually black people love the Republican party.

[@elliefitzpatrick2791]

You made that reference for like three people and I am one of them. God that comic series has aged weirdly but I still have a soft spot for it

[@Naahhh34]

Glan Beck would replace convenience stores with inconvenience stores if he could

[@marctm7614]

Lmao.

[@shakirashipslied9721]

The retail workers are replaced by the worst types of customers. The aisles are switched up every time the store opens. The cost tags are always incorrect.

[@3baxcb]

​@shakirashipslied9721 Adc cold coffee, the beer fridge positioned beside a deep fryer or non-working septic unit which doesn't meet any health safety regulations and you might have Glenn's ideal paradise.

[@animeotaku307]

“A store where ready-to-eat food is sold at reasonably low prices? It’s like something out of Orwell!” - Glenn Beck, probably

[@Thekalllllllll]

'Moms for "liberty" ' succeding with getting ACTUAL American history banned from being taught in schools, to replace it with their own FANFICTION is peak cringe..

[@Creepsandwicheater]

How dare you im sure 90% of stories on AO3 and FFN stomp this lol.

[@Arkholt2]

"The only reason why he's popular is because it's cool to be different." He genuinely believes that people who have different opinions than he does only think those things because they want to be "cool." He doesn't believe that they have put any thought or contemplation into them. He thinks that if they used their brains they would agree with him, but instead they close their minds and have certain beliefs simply because they're "popular." He really believes this stuff. It's wild. Like, he just plain doesn't believe that two people can be familiar with the same exact idea and come to two different conclusions about it. I don't understand this mode of thinking.

[@speedslider3913]

I think it's just projection. Conservatives get mad at things they're told to get mad at, then move on to the next thing they're pointed at. Glenn probably doesn't even know what a 15-minute city actually IS. Sure, give him 10 minutes and he'll be able to get his brain cell in order enough to chop out a 6-year old's definition, but he couldn't tell you the possible benefits or why people would like the idea, just that it's bad because big government will trap you or communism or something.

[@a_level_70_elite_raccoon]

I think it has a lot to do with the conservative mindset of "right vs wrong," "good vs evil, "moral vs immoral," whichever way you want to spin it. There can't be room in the world for interpretations or differences because uncertainty is scary. That's the underpinning of every moral panic in history: they don't understand something, therefore it's immoral and wrong. LGBT+ people can't just be people, they're trying to tempt the youth into demon worship, etc.

[@lindamarshall3485]

I have had those exact same words said to me, when interacting with conservatives online. But I've run into its corollary among liberals, when genuinely trying to understand some point about conservatives - how can anyone not see what Trump is, for example. All you hear is "They're racists!" which is probably part of it, but it's not the only answer

[@blurg2712]

It's somewhere between difficult and impossible to conceive of the world through someone else's eyes. It's one of those exercises that we need to practice, and we'll probably never know if we've really nailed it. The important thing isn't to be perfect at trying to understand the point of view of others who see the world drastically differently, but to try. We could all stand to have a good stretch and give these perspective muscles a good sweat.

[@steelemimbs877]

​@@lindamarshall3485 Some people are so wholy owned by motivated reasoning that you can't really get coherent explanations from them. Every answer for why they think something is just an explanation of why it needs to be that to prove them right. Not all of them, but certainly the most infuriating group to interact with. If you don't understand how completely they fall into motivated reasoning then their explanations seem just utterly incoherent.

[@smjaiteh]

I love fiction by conservatives because I like to think they’re bad because they didn’t want to pay attention in their liberal arts classes.

[@dagothkronk348]

they look down on art, assume its easy, and when they act on this assumption they fall on their faces every time

[@DiamondKingStudios]

Maybe they gush about their 19th/20th century literary predecessors a lot because they envy those writers’ prose abilities. Part of me feels like they lost their ability for coherent discourse around the late 20th century. At some point enough of them just stopped caring.

[@Janokins]

I'm going to assume that the Azaz Aylo character is more of a reference to Azazel, the demon who introduced forbidden knowledge to humans in the Bible, since it's got them Christian undertones. But it is funny that they picked that surname in particular.

[@madhatt3r93]

I picked up on that too and almost croaked 😭 isn't Azazel's name also spelled as Azazello sometimes? Like he's not even TRYING to be subtle 😭

[@DeviantDork]

Aylo (from Africa) means a spirit guide, which sound like a Beck thing to do. But it's also the company name for the owner's of Brazzers and other porn sites.

[@noalowenstein6741]

kind of a dommy mommy ngl

[@zZzZzyxel]

My immediate thought as well. Those guys and gals absolutely love "clever" wordplay like this.

[@MarxistMomentum]

Ironic how a book that claims to be against historical revisionism engages in the most egregious historical revisionism.

[@PetroBeherha]

Precisely. The thinking seems to be "your revisionism bad, our revisionism good."

[@warlordofbritannia]

I wonder what they think of the Lost Cause.

[@dinosaysrawr]

Their idea of oppression is a more educated person burdening them with nuance and context, instead of allowing them to exist in a blissful state of childlike innocence where everything is simple and straightforward.

[@pengwin_]

"He went back because he missed his family or somthin, idk" LOL

[@sylph8005]

Because history used to be whitewashed and a wave of (technically) revisionist history occurred to show the more detestable aspects and conservatives want to RETVRN to the whitewashed version

[@seraphonica]

"fifteen minute cities" is such a triggering concept for conservative conspiracy theorists. when they come up, I've started calling them "large cities made out of small towns" and unsurprisingly they seem to like that idea far more, despite it being the same concept.

[@speedslider3913]

Conservatives really are just sleeper agents, huh?

[@Reginald_Ritmo]

I would guess that the turn off point is the idea of a government exercising so much authority over how a city takes shape rather than the city developing organically through external investment. Which is a really dumb thing to be turned off by.

[@-tera-3345]

@@Reginald_Ritmo But the government kind of already controls how a city takes shape via zoning and building permits and such.

[@Reginald_Ritmo]

@@-tera-3345 Yeah, again, why the conservative criticism is kinda unfounded

[@scragar]

@Reginald_Ritmo American Conservatives really, really love cars. The idea that someone might make a car unnecessary means there's less need for everyone to drive which means it's easier to justify taking away people's licences.

[@RealLukeWilson]

I bet Glenn Beck played Bioshock, thought “Rapture was such a great city until this Fontaine Corp. ruined everything,” and then suddenly had an idea for a novel.

[@RedShocktrooperRST]

Pft. Glenn Beck wouldn't play a video game.

[@MartijnterHaar]

The cover art is really good though, makes it look really badass. I can imagine a 14-year old who has no idea who Glenn Beck is picking this up because of the cover.

[@Mystemo]

Sadly, yes 😔

[@killian9314]

@@Mystemonice pfp, thought it was the jurassic park original logo for a bit

[@Mystemo]

@@killian9314 thanks, it's been my online pic for nearly 20 years now ^^

[@shakirashipslied9721]

Yeah, it has a cool cover and snappy title. Definitely catches attention.

[@3baxcb]

Hopefully most 14 year old learn never to judge such a book by its cover because they would regret wasting their money on it.

[@S.A.F.I.vs3r]

ember's parental approval-seeking behaviour thing could be an interesting character trait. but i do not think the author is even aware of it

[@winterwatson6437]

-canonically the only reason to agree with glenn beck-

[@HisRoyalFreshness163]

I do think they are aware, they just see it as a positive trait. To them it is great that a young girl goes from seeking the father's approval (her dad), to her husband's (the love interest), which leads her to become a mother figure.

[@2nd3rd1st]

"So anyway, I wrote an eye-opening novel about a dystopian society under the oppressive yoke of wheelchair accessibility and child-friendly neighborhoods."

[@vylbird8014]

I actually want to see that - as a satire. It could be funny, if you make the protagonist someone who really doesn't fit the setting. Perhaps a man from a small rural town that has remained culturally unchanged for decades, proud to be a bastion of tradition in a world of change, who has been forced by some family circumstance to travel and discovers a world that has left him behind. The humor coming from his endless ability to see the bad in every change. We can see him desperately try to appear strong and intimidating to deter the thugs he is sure lurk on every bus, hear him shout in anger that the streets are too narrow for his pick-up truck. He can argue with shop attendants who keep assuming he wants the vegetarian option, and desperately try to find a bar with a smoking section and proper beer. Think something like Demolition Man in concept.

[@halcyon1644]

​@@vylbird8014He could also be named Norm or smtn on the nose like that

[@vylbird8014]

@@halcyon1644 Yes. The comedy comes from him being an asshole all the time, but also entirely unaware of it. See events from his perspective while also laughing at his stupidity and ability to find offence in every petty thing.

[@noahvance6160]

​@@vylbird8014In the end he'd probably get arrested for getting violent towards some people for one of the harmless things he dislikes, and it would end with him going to a minimum security prison, with his narration treating the situation as if he'd just been shipped off to the Ministry of Love. 😂

[@lostmarble540]

it's so weird seeing a pro-Manifest Destiny argument in 2024, I thought we all agreed that was bad like 40 years ago

[@hogndog2339]

Really? I feel like most Americans try to justify it. I mean, just last week I heard my coworkers say that the Natives “kinda had it coming” and that they “deserved it”

[@iantaakalla8180]

In my opinion, people have stopped talking about it simply because we all “know it is bad”. I sincerely think if there is a legitimate way that Manifest Destiny could be recalibrated to appear more prosocial and pro-leftist, people would take it. To be fair to most people in the US, most people are well beyond that and are legitimately distrustful of any seeming change. The issue, however, is that this distrust is not borne of the want of fundamentally guarding against gnawing human tendencies, but that it is obvious that whatever is going is not working and is not making people happy. Admittedly, yes, people now get the point that individual prosperity is not general prosperity and are trying to reverse this. But I do legitimately have the feeling that if Manifest Destiny was made to appear more leftist, like a very extreme version of liberalism as it is now, and realized prosperity through its fake ideals by a magic trick, people would be back to believing in Manifest Destiny. The other issue is that the US has conquered all of the contiguous land it can and has to declare war when it wants to appear good.

[@RyuKyu.77]

Nope "we conquered, get over it" "Shouldve been more civilized" Is a common position, it's kinda psychopathic

[@anezay4987]

I am so mad about how they rewrote actual hero Raoul Wallenberg as "the guy who stopped Hitler" instead of "the guy who saved somewhere between thousands and tens of thousands of people through sheer courage and charisma, then died in a Soviet prison".

[@SOBEKCrocodileGod]

I had to hold back laughter when one of the rebels yelled “in 1492, Columbus-“ as he was getting dragged away by dystopian government goons

[@sholem_bond]

I really hope he was genuinely going to finish with "... sailed the ocean blue!" I hope that's that guy's personal historical fact he chose to nobly preserve for the Youth (a la "Fahrenheit 451," but with trivia factoids instead of whole books).

[@PeaceInExile]

I feel like those lines after Columbus were chosen to make Columbus not sound like a monster by chaining sentences that aren’t actually linked right after some that are.

[@xibalbalon8668]

A society where you get arrested for bragging about Columbus and the dropping nukes sounds like a utopia. I imagine the rest of the world is doing better without US meddling

[@emisformaker]

Also remember that borrows from libraries give authors royalties. So even borrowing this book for laughs will support its creators. Source: I am an author, and I've made most of the money from my book through the public lending right (PLR) program. I make between $500 and $1000 per year this way, and I am not a known or popular person. Obviously, Jose needed to read it somehow to give us all this analysis, so he took one for the team. He did it so none of us have to.

[@tinymxnticore]

Wow! Didn't know that at all, thanks for explaining

[@emisformaker]

@@tinymxnticore It's not widely known, but I wish it was. I didn't even know about it until I was signing my contract.

[@winterwatson6437]

this makes me feel better about all the times i’ve gotten busy and returned library books without actually reading them!

[@sylph8005]

I genuinely don't know why this KZbinr brought a copy of the book to his house in any capacity.

[@eCodex]

are you in canada or using a pan-NA publisher? PLR isn't a thing in the US, or at least in the EU framework where lending stats match contribute to a % payment (~10p) to the author. please don't discourage people from using libraries as a valid resource for reading or researching controversial (& like, actually bad) authors.

[@jonathanstern5537]

Technically, we didn't become an independent nation in 1776. We declared ourselves an independent nation, but had we lost, Washington, Jefferson, Adams, etc. would have been hanged as traitors, and we would have still been a British colony until such time as it was untenable to keep us. We didn't become an independent nation until September 3rd, 1783, with the end of the American revolution. Plus we didn't ratify the constitution we have today until June 21st 1788.

[@vylbird8014]

There is still a mocking tradition in which every 4th July the British will greet their American friends across the internet with "Happy Treason Day, ungrateful colonials."

[@shadyguy23]

It’s always funny when people depict a corporate dystopia and then try to be like “actually this has nothing to do with corporations/capitalism, it’s because of the woke left!” (Or if you watch Idiocracy, “it’s because we let the dummies keep breeding!”)

[@JinStreams]

It is weird how idiocracy depicts a corporate dystopia but blames it on us not doing eugenics instead.

[@nacicomi]

Reminds me of a comment I saw on youtube that said that only a communist goverment could force brainchips onto us and have AI generated ads streamed into our brains

[@phangkuanhoong7967]

right-wingers opposition to 15-minute cities is just bonkers to me. why wouldn't you want everything you need within accessible distance from your home?

[@JinStreams]

Because the oil billionaires would make less money if people could walk to places instead of needing to drive an hour to get groceries

[@vylbird8014]

Not that hard to understand, really. Remember that to many people, the car is a symbol of freedom. Take away their car, and they'll feel imprisoned. The idea of walking, cycling or public transport is alien to people who grew up in many American cities, because the urban planning makes these things impossible. Some homes don't even have sidewalks - it would be pointless, as there's nowhere to walk to when the housing zone is surrounded by eight-lane roads. This is why owning a first car is something of a rite of passage - it is the first time in someone's life when they can leave the house without having to ask for the aid of an adult, and so makes their transition to independence.

[@newsystembad]

Because black people would also benefit from that

[@moscuadelendaest]

@@vylbird8014 Owning your first car is also a kind of a rite of passage in Europe, and almost all our cities are 15 minute cities. That's just weird.

[@desdenova1]

This book sounds like it was written using a ChatGPT prompt: "Write me a novel in the style of 1984 and The Hunger Games, where Christian Nationalists are the oppressed underclass, with metaphysically derived morality conflated with an American Constitutional founding fathers mythos."

[@vylbird8014]

Upon which GPT just starts reciting the script from Left Behind.

[@3baxcb]

​@@vylbird8014While glitching in and out I presume.

[@drafezard7315]

That prompt sounds way too sophisticated for these illiterate ass hats.

[@phi4721]

Wow

[@welbroh]

My best guess is that the "Teeks" slur is short for "antiques."

[@piedpiper1172]

Beck wanted so desperately to respond “that’s racist” to being called a Boomer he hired a writer to pen an entire book

[@jayjaybee]

"Raoul Wallenberg: The Guy Who Stopped Hitler" Bullet: Am I a joke to you?

[@saturniidspectre]

In the end, Hitler stopped Hitler.

[@Cooom]

@@saturniidspectre And thats a sad truth to the world. The worst man in history stopped the worst man in history after realizing all is lost. Firstly a coward but shouldve given that honor to anyone of the many people who hated hitler, or done it Caesar style and have all of them take turns

[@Flameclaw123]

A young adult dystopia novel where the main character's parents are the "correct" freedom fighters is something you'd really only see in conservative media (when, of course, parents always have to be right and know what's best for their kids), where as for just about every other YA dystopia I can think of the parents are either reinforcing the status quo or wholly detached/disinterested from the main conflict

[@Thomaas551]

Or dead

[@DiamondKingStudios]

I think there’s a way to make it work outside a conservative context, though the writer would have to go out of his way to show why the parents are to be supported rather than just “they’re your parents and you honor them as such” Show some extraordinary act of heroism, maybe even something that briefly breaches the trust of their leaders.

[@RyuKyu.77]

Marxists in America in the 1950s-70s experienced this level of oppression, thank you J Edgar Hoover!

[@Necro352]

"...Frogs gay--" "...away christmas--" "Inside Job--"

[@ic5889]

"Transgender operations-"

[@tehn00bdude]

The difference between Chasing Embers and Fahrenheit 451 is that one was written by a gibbering baboon and the other was written by one of the seminal sci Fi authors of our time.

[@bbrbbr-on2gd]

"The blurst of times!" - Glenn Beck, probably.

[@djangofett4879]

gibbering A.I.

[@FowCowMow]

I dunno if Glen Beck rises to "seminal author of our time" standard, but...

[@MrAweeze]

Shame on you​@@FowCowMow

[@Jin420]

As if beck can actually write words... Ai or ghost writers.... IJS

[@christianwhalen9263]

No no, Beck really cooked on this one. Y'all ever see a picture of one of those old districts in European cities like Amsterdam or Barcelona? The kind with cobblestone streets where you can't even fit a single Ford F350 Super Duty down the street because there's all those trees and benches and people in the way? Absolute horrorshow

[@davidalex565]

So the people that ban books, write a book where banning books are bad..?

[@bluepaint9923]

makes sense because it's likely that what matters to them is not that books are being banned, but *what kinds* of books are being banned

[@asagoldsmith3328]

​@@bluepaint9923exactly it's bad because _their_ magic fairytale book gets burned

[@RedShocktrooperRST]

They like to pretend that the current historical re-contextualization is history being destroyed. I actually have pet theories about a tank getting a fake nickname that it never had while it was in service.

[@gregisbased5205]

One thing you might have missed is that Beck is specifically MORMON. Hence the wearing a hat (garments) opens a door (the temple), they had to espouse what they believed (bearing testimony, a big deal in mormonism), and the overtures of American exeptionalism which mormonism has a proclivity for in general.

[@newsystembad]

You might enjoy Knowing Better's video that describes Mormonism as "American Exceptionalism as a religion"

[@blinky5247]

As an exmormon, most of this sounds right, but the hat bit is a *huge* stretch. Garments go under your clothes and aren’t supposed to be seen by normal people, literally the opposite of a hat. Also technically you can access certain parts of the temple with just a recommend card you get from the bishop at 12. Like I understand wanting an explanation for the hat thing, but I think it’s just a piece of really stupid worldbuilding and nothing else.

[@GuntWastelander]

“Hitler hated god” my brother in the non-existent Christ, he was a Catholic 😭

[@Transconaslim7075]

It’s really interesting listening to this after listening to the Behind the Bastards ep on Curtis Yarvin. Considering that Yarvins ideal is a corporate controlled city-state is the bugaboo for his co-ideologue beck.

[@xibalbalon8668]

Conservatives take the logical extreme of corporations controlling our lives, and call it communism. I think it's intentionally so the average schmuck doesn't stop and think capitalism is going too far. They talking about "living in the pods" as if the US didn't have horrible company towns before regulations and trust busting

[@timbates12]

OARSMEN might be the single dumbest acronym I have ever heard in my entire life

[@graysontatters5068]

I was doing laundry and missed it if it’s explained in the video. What’s the acronym stand for?

[@timbates12]

@@graysontatters5068 It's at 34.46, I truly cannot explain it

[@rocketbilly]

its seriously the stupidest thing I've heard in weeks.

[@seeleunit2000]

Give it time, I'm positive there's going to be another conservative making up another crappy YA story, with an even dumber acronym then this one... But right now it is pretty dumb

[@pseudonym8791]

Please don’t read this as an apology for the concept, just an explanation - OARSMEN looks like it’s not an acronym, it seems to be closer to an acrostic poem, like “Elizabeth” by Edgar Allan Poe. It’s probably a shout out to symbols from crypto-Christianity like icthys (Jesus Fish), the letters of which in Greek can make an actual acronym. And yes, OARSMEN is still objectively a pretty bad acrostic poem!

[@DesolatedChild018]

I have the impression that 95% of people who reference “Fahrenheit 451” either never read it or didn’t exactly got it, mostly due to lacking information regarding the context in which the book was written. All people mention is the whole “oppression through suppression of information” thing, which is *fair*, I won’t be an insufferable nerd about that - unless if, as is the case here, you try to use it in a manner which completely distorts it in favor of your own political views. The book was written in the time mass media, and in particular TV, were new but already increasingly popular in the manner that it’s eventual omnipresence was already a given. Enters intellectuals like Adorno, and enters Bradbury novel. The society in “451” prohibits ALL books. Of any kind. The criticism is that the vapid, top-down decided and most importantly inherently impermanent of TV would be favored by the status quo for allowing the creation of a superficial, ignorant, incapable of introspection and utterly complacent society. You watch “I Love Lucy” and whatever gameshow was on, you got an ad to tell you whats cool to buy and next week all that information could change and that would become the “new thing” because nobody had how to preserve what came before and it was all so fast paced and unfavorable towards the development of critical thought. Consumers first, citizens second. It’s lowkey “why can’t I click the book” meme in book form. Ok, I’m being unfair. Nowadays it seems like it, but there’s value to keep that criticism in mind. We now have preserved the past through mass media. We know how rich and complex ideas can be and are, regularly as a matter of fact, communicated through mass media. I mean, it’s happening right now with the video playing as you are down here in the comments. But also, in many ways the opposite happens too. The whole “reading books is the gold standard for intellectuality” is the most annoying thing ever, and at its worst that’s how 451 can be interpreted, but there’s more to it than that. It would be just as incorrect to have that reading as the reading people like Beck (or the clown he got to write the reference in) have. But conservatives, in particular older conservatives, know only two dystopian novels - And they didn’t got the point of that other one as well. It’s ironic because you would think they would incorporate “Atlas Shrugged” more into their works. It’s right there, most of them praise it, but they always fall back to “Fahrenheit 451” and “1984”. That’s how little of a cultural influence Ayn Rand’s works are. That the most popular work was an influence on was Bioschock, which basically said “so, you know Atlas Shrugged? that shit wouldn’t work at all dog”. They don’t seem to vibe with “Objectivism” too, now that I think about it. I start to think that they only like Ayn Rand because of the hyper-individualism and their sense of superiority and entitlement… Hmmmm Anyway where was I? Oh right, no one likes Glenn Beck, conservatism have moved out of him and his brand of politics long ago. No matter how hard he tries to mutate accordingly he cannot keep up. Next book he will have to keep the passages about fighting Hitler out if he wants to match the vibes of the rest of his target audience. There will be *another* dystopian novel he will be using as inspiration for the sequel of his Amber series, which it will be written in the form of her diaries.

[@TheKeyser94]

But what we known about Fahrenheit 451 is more for cultural osmosis, because they are huge difference between the book and the movie, Bradbury was a hardcore conservative and that show in his books, at difference of the movie, burning book is the less of his concerns, he didn't care why they are burning books or what books they were burning, in the book the main character was more concern about gossiping wives and what on TV all day, he never question his work, the movie is close to the book in name only.

[@DesolatedChild018]

Also, I need to comment how funny and somewhat revealing that there is a character that - as pointed out - matches the description of Ben Shapiro and have the scene in which he is told by the blatant insert of Beck that’s ok to lie for a greater cause. I like to think that’s a interaction that really happened between a once *actually young* Ben when he was starting his career had with Beck, then at the top of the game, in which Mr. Facts and Logic asked him about his Pepe-Silvia style panels and he answered the same thing written in the book… in reference to stop Obamacare. And… Well, we know the direction that went for Little Ben. He then either subconsciously wrote it in the book or told this story to his employees (presumably several times, because he’s 100% that boss) and his co-writer put it in, probably because these people aren’t the most inspired of people to come up with ideas that aren’t slightly modified versions of other things that happened. In case anyone else needed more to know that conservative pundits are very cognizant of the grift, and unironically have a way to try and justify it.

[@ZeldaQueen64]

Yeah, I was thinking of that. The book-banning in 1984 was a symptom of the larger issue, that people were being discouraged from engaging in self-reflection and critical thinking. Clarice points out how houses don't have porches anymore because people would sit on porches and talk. Millicent and her friends consider political discussion to be deciding which candidate has a better-sounding name. One of the friends hears one poem and is so freaked out by the feelings it inspired that she immediately leaves. There's definitely room in current times to discuss that sort of issue. The trouble is, this book isn't doing that. Ironically, it just tries to drum up cheap feelings by having characters spouting soundbites from Traditional American Texts. Never mind why anyone would ban knowledge of who the first three US presidents are. Never mind that there's zero thought put behind what it actually is about those quotes that makes them inspiring. It makes us puff up our chests to imagine a group of people being arrested while quoting the preamble of the Constitution, so that's what we get.

[@smrndalodz7182]

I never got Atlas Shrugged. If 1% of the population decided to 'go galt' because they were just so important, well, the next 1% would just take their place. And that next 1% was probably really no different in talent. Civilization has kept on going for us because even the best of us aren't essential. Its the whole web of human knowledge.

[@TheKeyser94]

@@smrndalodz7182 I have read Atlas Shrugged and Ayn Rand is more concerned to propagate her message than actually write a good book, hell one of the characters do a five pages monologue about money, and the characters are utterly selfish and proud about it, and Galt comes like a delusional buffoon, when you learn the personal history of Ayn Rand she sound like a spoiled rich aristocrat that lose it all and become poor, but instead of learning from being poor, and actually gain empathy, she double down in her spoiled attitude, ironically maybe for gain her lost status and fortune, for the rich people at the time, she was nothing more than a tool, she can have affairs with many of them as she wanted, but non of them would marry her, and she never become rich again, ironically is the same system that she fought so hard to protect that simply throw away after she served her purpose, because she was expendable like everyone else, the only that survives are her bad written books and her "philosophy".

[@beej741]

True to form for conservatives to jump on a bandwagon-dystopian ya fiction-about 10 years after it was popular

[@djangofett4879]

also, a genre which has never been good. teen dystopia novels are the worst of the worst. I blame Kurt Vonnegut. I feel like all of this crap was heavily influenced by his terrible dystopian fiction.

[@3baxcb]

What's next? Glenn tries to create his own cinematic universe in the vein of Marvel or DC? Or try adapting a novella into a trilogy as was done with The Hobbit?

[@l3gacyb3ta21]

@@djangofett4879 Kurt Vonnegut???? That's who you're blaming for like, Divergent??

[@sholem_bond]

​@@djangofett4879 1. Who hears "YA dystopia" and thinks "Kurt Vonnegut"? I guess he wrote a lot of dystopian future sci-fi stories, but dystopian fiction on its own didn't cause Dystopian YA (the current/recent YA trend was arguably started in the 90s by the Book Series That Cannot Be Named). 2. "The Giver" series is really good (ignore the movie). There's good things about the "Hunger Games" books too IMHO, when the series doesn't get too hung up on the dumb love triangle stuff. Hating entire genres just because they're popular is not a replacement for having a personality.

[@benverboonen1108]

Being a conservative at a young age is just ghoulish

[@casanovafunkenstein5090]

I feel like it's really the only time I would give someone the benefit of the doubt. We're talking about people who have been in a very controlled environment and don't have as many life experiences to counter those ideas. A young Conservative is the most likely to grow and change, whereas someone older is much less likely to be willing to engage with something that challenges their existing ideological positions due to the sunk cost involved in building their identity around those beliefs.

[@krankarvolund7771]

One of the "details" that would totally ruin "Squanto's" story is Samoset, the Sagamore of the local Abenaki people, that was the first Native to welcome the English, and he did so in english, that he learned from english fishermen taht were passing by regularly at the time. Tisquantum was a better translator, and soon accompanied Samoset, but the contact would have probably been possible without him and his captivity in England ^^

[@Batgirl219]

The dystopian horror of being able to walk to the grocery store. lmfao Edit: This shit is too much. There was some cataclysmic event that destroyed America and they're fucking worried about 9/11.😂

[@countjondi9672]

Beck's book is inspiring me to be an author. If he can put that "Oarsmen" acronym into a book with a straight face, I can probably take the chance of putting my own work out there.

[@corranhorn85]

I shouldn't be surprised that Beck put his name on slavery apologia, but here we are.

[@pururin42]

I hope u kno u have the best voice ever to help my insomnia and get me sleepy.. i never fall asleep but listening with my eyes closed is a big comfort

[@KingsandGenerals]

what fresh hell...

[@KK-bl1oc]

Didn't except you here. Love your content tho.

[@Dr.Ahmed.Tah81]

God bless your heart comrade for reading this monstrosity and reviewing it for us, love from Egypt 🇪🇬 ❤

[@SilverDragonJay]

Those acronyms are hilariously tortured. Its bringing to mind Codename: kids next door, where the acronyms being tortured was a joke...you know, because the people making them up were all under the age of 13. Except I feel like KND's dumb acronyms still actually made more sense then these ones. Like the creators were making a deliberate joke, but at the same time were considering what words would still make some tenuous sense. BRA stands out in my mind: battle ready armor. I'm sure the creators of the show wanted to have something that sounded innocuous but turned out to be a dangerous weapon and so they picked the word 'bra' deliberately because they knew they could make it stand for 'battle ready armor'. It feels like Glen Beck (or his writer) put in not even half that amount of effort. They started with the word they wanted to use and worked backwards then said "good enough" and hit "publish"

[@mrnonsense1031]

Only in America would a society where you don't need a car to get around be called a dystopia.

[@Stephen-Fox]

My immediate thought about the 'mysterious figure to obvious to feel like a mystery and that's annoying' - I have definitely encountered works that fall into a similar problem - is that they'd have been able to bypass that issue in this case if they'd have made it clear to the reader who the man is, but not to the character, making it a piece of dramatic irony rather than 'too obvious to be a twist, but presented as if it is one' ...But I suspect the book is too married to the idea of being a YA novel to do that since that would potentially require a chapter or two from the perspective of a middle aged man.

[@jm221]

"It's this dystopia where everything is super dystopian, man, you don't even know" - Glenn Beck

[@thedreadpiratewesley]

"Mom, can we get City of Ember?" "No, we have City of Ember at home." City of Ember at home:

[@LezbeOswald]

naming the protagonist in a book about book burning Ember is. painful.

[@Butterfly-ql4pg]

A group of book-banning moms financially supporting a Fahrenheit 451 rip-off? That's not ironic at all 🥴

[@nathanh9871]

Finally Glenn Beck address the youth of the nation, but it’s hot now.

[@seeleunit2000]

Nope, it just sounds like Glenn Beck wrote a crappy book and it didn't address anything. He's still the out of touch conservative moron that no teenager wants to hear

[@KH-zr6pt]

A book about banning books and history written by people who want to ban books and history is wild

[@austinlee5408]

I'm glad that Mom's for Liberty realized that book banning is bad. Great development arc for them.

[@sarahgent2674]

Fun fact! As someone who knows a writer who has done this, whenever a book says it was written by a celebrity "with" another person, that usually means the other person wrote it. There is usually some guidance involved and the celebrity will have control, but it's not dissimilar from saying the Sistine Chapel was painted by the Pope with Michelangelo.

[@joe19912]

Yep, it's just part of the right-wing grift. Before he got fired, Bill O'Reilly was pumping out two books a year by "co-authors".

[@moscuadelendaest]

it's still so bad. no reason for the author to be mad at us for not recognizing their input

[@kareemdavidjames8023]

Wow @jose, I made the 15 minute city graphic you used in your video. Surreal, 15-minute city are the most foundational and entry level principles for good urban design and accessibility . Before vehicles, the first cities evolved organically for walkability and the human scale. It’s crazy anyone could be against that.

[@blurg2712]

The Squanto story is also a classic attack on immigrants and the underprivileged. It's the "just improve yourself, it's a simple decision" trope which ignores the reality that the circumstances of our birth and rearing are the primary deciders on how we interact with the world. People who were raised to see opportunity all around them tend to see opportunity all around them, while people who were raised to see failure all around them tend to see failure all around them. It's an error in perspective, at least that's my take.

[@blurg2712]

"I guess the divine hand of providence has a light touch" lol, I almost spit out my drink

[@CampaignerFilms]

Whoa! I thought for a sec the characters were saying Columbus was endowed by his creator... 4:55

[@ItRemindMeOfHome]

As an aside, its probably the least important aspect, but I notice how we in the US never call the "Allied Powers" in WW2 by the alliance's actual name. Why might conservatives not want to say the **United Nations** won WW2?

[@bujustic]

I mean, The Allies has been the informal name for decades even in Europe

[@drascalicus5187]

Wouldn't the name be The League of Nations?

[@Cooom]

I never picked up on that now. Even hit ww2 game, made by Swedes using their weird laws of Swedish Physics and Swedish History called Allies, the Allies

[@HisRoyalFreshness163]

Everyone among the western powers and countries influenced by the calls it "The Allied Powers" or "The Allies". Sorry, but this is a major stretch.

[@cloudycolacorp]

It's weird how they can make a book about burning books being bad whilst constantly barbecuing books

[@summertime69]

Love this. Please keep reading "conservative lit" so we dont have to!

[@TheFabledSon]

Thank you Jose for explaining what a deus ex machina is. Have heard the term so many times but never knew what it meant. Also makes the game titled Deus Ex make more sense now.

[@DichotomousRex]

I'm sincerely curious why you never searched the phrase to learn what it meant

[@TheFabledSon]

@@DichotomousRex life happens, other things come up that take my attention

[@eldritchzora]

These types of videos always make me feel a lot better about my own writing.

[@a_level_70_elite_raccoon]

With every new quote you read I said to myself, "Wow, that is some of the worst writing I've ever heard, surely the rest of the book isn't as bad as that." And I was wrong every time. I do hope that the writer is truly messing with us and is just making a quick buck on Glenn Beck's dime. Otherwise... yikes. Great video, though. I especially liked the dedication to using Tisquantum's real name. That idea you brought up about the cop-out narrative device of Providence makes a lot of sense to me, though, because it reflects the way that conservatives in general just don't understand Capital-H-History. What I mean is that History isn't a collection of distinct facts and events that had to happen or could only have happened that way. Our puny human brains can only grapple with and understand the immensity of Time through narratives and selective omission. Who writes the narrative and chooses what gets included and what doesn't has a big hand in how that story can be understood. There is entirely too much information that goes into even just a singular historical event, and that's why getting any degree other than an undergraduate in history means you have to turn yourself into a specialist in a singular theme, event, or sector of time. That's why I was laughing so ridiculously hard at the section you read where Ember's parents were shouting out random facts because it displays such a rain-puddle sized view of history, where you can see and observe specific things as simple thoughts. Columbus sailing to the """"new"""" world in 1492 was the result of THOUSANDS of interlocking events and complex power struggles between nations, trading companies, and individuals, and had a multitude of cascading effects on its own. The founding fathers weren't divinely guided to revolution by God, they were wealthy land owners who didn't like paying taxes and wanted a system of government where they wrote the rules. History is happening **all the time**, but frequently the only way to make sense of it is to pare it down to individual stories (like the one about Tisquantum) or to simplified series of events. Glenn's note at the end about the writing's of Thomas Jefferson being cool or not based on whether you 'can't read them' is also so laughably small-minded. It's not that modern day people don't find his writings 'cool', and as someone who has two history degrees I can tell you that they are still widely read and discussed and are, in fact, pretty cool. We just understand them from a more evolved viewpoint: he was a racist hypocrite who slept with his slaves. Smart guy? Yeah, at some stuff. "Brilliant"? Ehhhhh, not really.

[@Prizzlesticks]

Skip this, read Fahrenheit 451 instead, have a better time.

[@starlight8554]

As someone who was raised Christian (Catholic, of the eastern flavour), American Christianity is so weird. It so strangely intertwined with American exceptionalism and white nationalism that I can’t really fathom that they understand it’s a religion that deifies a Middle Eastern dude who was somewhat socialist leaning, if anything. For people who take a lot of bible verses v seriously and want laws codified based on them it really makes me wonder if they’ve sat down and had a holistic look at the book and its larger themes.

[@AammaK]

As a Nordic person, I bursted out lauching at him calling the idea of 15 minute cities dystopic. Literally. Oh horror, my neighborhood has all the immediate services provided on walking radius! What tragedy, I'll never need to own a car as long as I live in the city! This "dystopian future" has been the basis for urban planning for nearly a literal century here. And yes, I'm still allowed to travel all the way to downtown and, shockingly, out of the city! Still no need to own a fcking car, though. Such exploit of freedom! What a miserable existance that public responsibility and accessibility!

[@b1uezje]

They genuinely seem to think that if you live in a 15 minute city, it suddenly is illegal for you to own a car. Unfathomably stupid. But that's classic conservatives, getting mad at their own made up shit and at arguments literally no one is making. What a way to live your one and only life. Holy hell...

[@johnmayer413]

Really funny that her parents are being dragged away and they decide the most pertinent piece of history to share are the names of US presidents. Is there really nothing else more important to the people of Oasis- a city that has intentionally hidden its own origins?

[@vylbird8014]

I can believe that. If a group of Americans got together and decided they could only preserve a short list of the most important documents in all of human history, they would probably decide the bible is #1, the constitution is #2, the declaration of independence is #3, and spend a long time arguing the rest before deciding upon a series of famous presidential writings and speeches. Maybe some time around #60 or so they might consider a document written before 1776 or outside of North America.

[@Hamhamsnoozer]

The name Chasing Embers gives "hope granny confuses this for hunger games at christmas time"

[@gussiejives]

There’s something deeply pathetic about this world’s “forbidden knowledge” being a bunch of bumper sticker slogans. But that conservatism for you.

[@cheesybrik]

Holy shit, a José video not a month apart??? Must be blessed.

[@ebwarg]

This book’s version of Tisquantum’s story also has a message of “This is America-Speak English!”

[@kicksyo2171]

I would love to be an Oarsman! For no other reason, other than the fact that I just love coming up with what random spiel, I would yell when I get captured. "my friends are my power, and I'm there!" "if you threw a party, and invited everyone you knew…" "Guess what day it is?....HUMPDAY!"

[@paulgibbon5991]

"We live in a society, Bottom Text!"

[@TheEnoEtile]

I had to go back to the Oarsman acronym 3 times because I thought i was losing my mind. Didn't get it until I watched the video instead of just listening

[@Sam_on_YouTube]

Fun fact in the midst of tragedy. It is not known for sure, but likely that Tisquantum and Amonute (also known as Matoaka and Pocahontas) likely knew each other at least a little. They were both in England at the same time and were literally the only two people there from their continent. And they were both traveling in similar high society circles of those who had the luxury to be curious about such foreign people. There is no record of them meeting, but it is likely to have happened.

[@Thomaas551]

Do you watch knowing better?

[@Sam_on_YouTube]

@@Thomaas551 Yes. I also fact checked my own comment. I think it's less likely than I thought that they met. They were mostly running in different circles and were only there together for about a year before Amonute died. There were also a few other American Indians in England, but not many. Those were the only two that are famous now.

[@xliza5242x]

Oh dear, what a way to find out I live in a dystopia... Who knew that having supermarkets, hospitals and schools within biking/walking distance was actually bad?! - Sincerely, a concerned European😢

[@miker4588]

Jose! if Sky's name is Trotsky then they probably are pronouncing Sky as Skee. Which I think is hilarious and exactly how I am deciding to think of this from now on.

[@404maxnotfound]

The one good thing about these books is they are so poorly written they give people like me courage to write because not matter what I do it can't be as bad as this. That oremans acronym was more painful and cringe inducing then Glenn Becks comedy.

[@paulgibbon5991]

Stephen King advises writers do this. Something that'll make you think "Well, if THIS schlock got published, it can't be that hard!"

[@elevationsickness8462]

A female main character?? I cant stand this woke bullshit anymore

[@sholem_bond]

Glenn Beck's gone woke

[@gussiejives]

Every time you say “Oasis” in this, I just imagine it’s run by the Gallagher brothers.

[@heywoodjablome5380]

Is the populace kept in by a Wonderwall?

[@zumazuma568]

I laughed outloud when it turned out that "forbidden knowledge" wasn't something about how the world works, or what lurks outside the city walls, or how the corporation came to be, but just like... names of presidents three hundred years ago.