By simply not mentioning certain subjects, by lowering … an iron curtain between the masses and such facts or arguments as the local political bosses regard as undesirable, Totalitarian Propagandists have influenced opinion much more effectively than they could have done by the most eloquent denunciations, the most compelling of logical rebuttals.
– Aldous Huxley
Retard – [ ri-tahrd, for 1-3; ree-tahrd for 4 ]
- verb: to make slow; delay the development or progress of (an action, process, etc.); hinder or impede.
- verb: to be delayed.
- noun: a slowing down, diminution, or hindrance, as in a machine.
- slang (Diparaging and Offensive): a contemptuous term used to refer to a person who is cognitively impaired. A person who is stupid, obtuse, or ineffective in some way.
One of the great-yet-ultimately-annoying outgrowths of the shift in technology is the change in how we communicate with friends. Being the age I am, I fall into that rather unique subcategory of people who grew up in a childhood without internet but was young enough as it came into the limelight to fully adapt it as I came out of my adolescence. I remember wanting to hang out with friends and calling their houses to get permission from parents or just walking over and ringing the doorbell and waiting to see if anyone showed up. If no one was there, well, I’d just have to figure out something to do on my own. Then, we got chat rooms, lobbies, eventually cell phones and texting, and our connectivity increased by leaps and bounds until we eventually arrived where we are now. Fully connected all the time. Which, again, that certainly has its benefits. I love that I can chat with people whenever and hear back from them when they get a spare moment.
That said, now we have approximately a hundred and fifty trillion methods of communication and everyone seems to be on something else. Texting, Messenger, WhatsApp, Discord, Slack, Google Chat – you name it, everyone seems to have their go-to. I’ve been on a bit of a quest to get things consolidated with my friends but it’s a crap shoot. I’ve settled on Discord for a few reasons. One, it’s clean. Easy to understand, easy to use. It’s also where I’ve entered a few communities of strangers who’re topic focused – I’m in a few writing servers and fighting game servers. Finding a place for shared interest groups that also serves as direct communication is great. Big fan.
So, what the hell is the point of all this? What do the name of this post, the quote from Huxley, and the leading definition, have to do with anything in those first two paragraphs?
The way we talk to friends tends to be different than the way we talk to the world. Friends understand us, we have a rapport, we get the jokes. We talk a lot of shit. Good times, do recommend.
One of the ways we do that is through gifs. I love gifs. Love ’em. Ask my friends, ask my co-workers, they’ll probably say it’s annoying the amount I use. There’s a part of my brain that religiously holds on to movie quotes and can find one for pretty much every situation. That’s not restricted to gif use, either – a few of my friends and I bat around movie quotes all the time in person. Either way, the gifs let me bring that random quoting to people who might not be as familiar with the source and need the visual as well. Could I just talk like a normal person? Sure, but we all have our ticks.
I can’t remember the first time I noticed this because it was a while ago, and I don’t know what we were talking about (probably something to do with politics or some fighting game takes), but I felt the need for a “You never go full retard” from Tropic Thunder. So I pulled up the handy gif tool in Discord and searched for it. Discord gif search is… I don’t know the name for it, but as you’re typing it’s constantly updating the search, so I see things filter, quickly narrowing down to Tropic Thunder until I get part way through the word “retard.”
And then, everything disappears.
I back up a little and look at what was there before. Yeah, I thought so – gifs from that exact scene, but with different phrases. “Never go full Rockstar.” “Never go full Kamala.” “You went full degenerate.” Literally none of these are the line, obviously. This bore investigating, so I backed out and just typed “retard.”
Nothing.
In fact, it stops giving you any result at “reta.” And, no, before you ask I’m not including the period in the search, that’s just being properly grammatical and it annoys me in this case. Retard, it turns out, is essentially a banned word in Discord’s gif search. Verboten. You’re not allowed to reference it. A word with real meaning, with actual definitions that are useful, because it’s commonly used as an insult and is considered mean.
This bothered me quite a bit, but it was what it was and I moved on. Wasn’t going to make a huff about it because, well, whatever. There are other ways to find the things I want to find and send them. Life goes on.
And then.
The funny thing about banning words is that it’ll never stop at one. Or even at a word. The idea, I would assume, is to prevent people from using “bad” things. To prevent “bad” thought. So, recently, when this same friend and I were chatting (ironically about fighting games and not politics) and he was sending me off to the gulag with a gif of Stalin, I, of course, had to get into a dictator-off and send him a Hitler.
But wouldn’t you know it? He’s not there.
Salin? You bet. In fact, the first couple you get are airbrushed and photoshopped, hair blowing in the wind, making a heart with his hands. Good ol’ Stalin, the benevolent dictator who clearly did nothing wrong.
And, despite knowing deep in my being, I had to check. Yes, my good Dwellers, Mao is also there. Everyone’s favorite chairman with gif after gif of happy, kind, granpappy Mao.
I try not to swear often, both in person and here. But I gotta be real with you guys, I lost my ever-loving shit. What – who – has the fucking temerity to look at three of the modern age’s greatest monsters and declare one of them shoved down the memory hole while allowing / actively idealizing the others? Are we so ignorant – so retarded – that we think Hitler was the only bad person? Or we think bad people can’t be referenced? Committing the Holocaust gets you erased from reference. Willingly starving / working / beating to death forty-five million of your own people earns some happy fun time memes. Sure. Brilliant.
That led me to gearing up for a rant against Giphy, as I assumed that’s what Discord uses. It’s not, though. As far as I can tell they use Tenor. Tenor, which is owned by Google. Actively memory holing words. Actively memory holing history. All by their own direction, by their own definition of what should and should not be allowed.
Giphy is owned by Meta, so that was my point of confusion. I knew I’d seen them somewhere on one of my chat applications, I’m sure they’re not doing the exact same thin-
Well, it’s not the exact same. Looks like Giphy has banned ALL of the dictators mentioned. Yes, Meta, more censorship is the answer. Bad ideas can’t form if we can’t think about bad things in the past. That’s how humanity works. Curate us more, Zuck.
These people are curating the memory hole to fit their whims, and it’s only going to get worse as we lurch forward under an industrial-era government with no clue how technology functions. They’re attempting to banish things they see as negative from the world, as though making us forget about the horrors humanity is capable of is an answer to anything when, in the end, it can only do one thing.
Retard us.
Themeattics 