Hogwarts Legacy - Not as good as Dog Kid University

[Floshenbarnical]

I'm not buying this game because:

 

- ew

- I was sick of Harry Potter 10+ years ago and absence has not made the heart grow fonder. "It's like the Sopranos - it's over. Get a new show."

 

I couldn't care less if people buy and enjoy it. But then again I can only speak for myself.

[Lying Cat]

The thick, white, sticky, sinuous ropes of woke - furiously sprayed and woven into a diabolical web, dripping with hot, greasy politics. Heed my warning and do not become snared, lest the avocado spider, bedecked somehow with 4 left legs, and 4 far left legs drain you of your Gamer blood, leaving you resembling nothing but a dried hunk of soy.

[Ork1927]

I keep meaning to write this, but the the whataboutery dies down, but its back again so.....

 

Why is this game released at the particular time generating such comment/debate compared to <insert over game/thing>. 

 

1) Harry Potter is a mega franchise that millions have a strong attachment to/relationship with, be it for themselves or their kids.  The books, the films, the play, the Theme Park lands, the Merch, the whole world/lore, conventions/parties/cosplay etc, etc. It is massive/worldwide and in the same league (or not far off) as Star Wars and LOTR and Marvel.  And if you like the books or not - its hard to argue that they were a positive phenomenon with children and Adults queuing up at midnight over and over again to buy massive books at a time where people would start to argue that print was dying and kids weren't interested in reading anymore.

 

2) The game is a big budget, single player in a popular open world/RPG genre at a time were big budget/single player games are rare so its going to generate a reasonable level of interest even without the franchise attached to it.  

 

3) The creator of Harry Potter is intrinsically linked to it. Her story of creating it is well known and she has always been in the public eye to some degree since the books came out.  More crucially, she still owns the rights to it all and is an active participant in whatever licensed stuff is released as well as discussing the world and its characters.  This isn't a creator that is long dead, or anonymous/reclusive and it isn't a franchise now owned by a mega corp with its creator having no control (if they ever did).

 

So big franchise, high profile game and an active creator of that franchise who owns the rights and benefits from every sale and is very well know as the creator of that franchise.

 

4) Trans rights/laws is a big story at the moment. The laws being introduced in Scotland and the recent prisoner controversy and then the UK government weighing in as well as the Trans discussion as part of the Conversion Theory ban. Debates about Trans athletes in Sport happening all the time. Various laws being enacted in U.S States.  

 

5) JK Rowling is very, very active in the Trans rights debate. Irrespective of what anyone thinks she actually means or how 'wrong or right' her views are, she is a very prominent figure in trans and gender recognition discussion.  She is campaigning against the Scottish government. She gets referenced by politicians in the UK and further afield in discussions about trans rights (in some cases along the lines of Trans rights must be respected but so should JK Rowling).She is wrote about in the press both positively and negatively on these issues and I'm sure she is, as usual, tweeting or retweeting up a storm.  This is not someone who made a comment on something 3 years ago or said something recently and rolled it back. She is vocal, loud and active.

 

6) This is hard to quantify, but plenty of reports suggest Trans people are facing increased harassment and abuse at the moment and certainly right wing politicians are weaponising the trans debate or, especially in America, trying to put through draconian laws that will severely curtail trans rights.  At best, it has to be a worrying time for trans people or people with family members or friends who are trans and at worst, it could be a very difficult, dangerous time.

 

So - Trans rights are a hot topic. JK Rowling is very active in this debate and not considered an ally. Trans people are under attack and scared their rights are going to be taken away or worse.

 

All of that above adds up to it being a bit different and higher profile at the moment than any other game being released by any publisher regardless of who funds them or allegations about their employees or what someone involved has said or done in the past.

 

And I think posters on here need to remember that we have trans posters on here or posters that have family and friends who are trans so, don't treat this like an Xbox/Playstation debate and think before you post.  Its fine to want the game and buy it.  Its fine if your opinion on Rowling or boycotting is different, but remember that being called out for buying the game (which isn't really happening on here anyway) or, as is really all that is happening in this thread, being annoyed that people are stating that it should be boycotted or giving their negative opinion on Rowling is not actually that big a deal compared to anyone who grew up loving the Potter franchise and is now gutted they can't play the game while worrying about their or their friends or family members future.

 

And don't jump on the "I can't believe this is happening/being posted' train in this thread based on things that aren't actually happening. The trolling/baiting/faux outrage on things that aren't even being said is getting too much.  There are very, very few posts where people are being called names for buying this game, but there are plenty of posts acting as if every other post in here is that.

 

[Festoon]

25 minutes ago, Graham S said:

Haha. How do I make clear which boycott in particular I’m participating in?

 

Man, Rowling won't like that. She'll be online making clear that this is a man dressed as a woman in the next few days, mark my words.

 

Her Nazi mates will be taking her to task online.

[JoeK]

I don't have any desire to buy the game, but if there was any way to extricate the game from all the controversy I do have to say that after watching some of the early parts of the thing, the devs do need to be congratulated - it's very much in keeping with the movies, that's for sure. I was looking at the PC version which I'm assuming is on a 4090, so the shinies were especially shiny indeed.

[Broker]

3 hours ago, yakumo said:

 

It sort of reminds me of the ridiculous situation regarding Mr Beast recently and him helping people with  blindness calling his action demonic:

 

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/kelseyweekman/mrbeast-helping-blind-people-youtube-stunt-philanthropy

 

I just find it ridiculous that you remove someone because they played it, that is some next level Idiocracy?.

Mr Beast is a smug, self satisfied knob who turns literally everything into a story about himself. He has a massive level of influence and power and instead of drawing attention to an insane scenario where there is an affordable surgery which can give blind people their sight back that our repulsive society refuses to give them because they’re not rich, he makes it into a story about how he is great and special and rich. Every one of his videos is an exercise is massaging his colossal ego, with vulnerable people who are living difficult lives through no fault of their own existing only as props in his endless self congratulating. 

 

2 hours ago, Majora said:

It does seem like some on this forum are far more zealous about encouraging people not to buy this game than they were about encouraging people not to buy Cyberpunk on release despite CDPR having a long and murky history of repeatedly upsetting the trans community. I'm sure it was absolutely nothing to do with that being a new insanely hyped game from the developers of The Witcher 3 of course.

Much like some of the posts in this thread, the Cyberpunk thread was an endless parade of people who can’t bear to hear anyone say anything negative about their special game crying that they should get to have a nice echo chamber where everyone agrees with them. 

[NecroMorrius]

Isn’t that every thread though?

[Zael]

The Cyberpunk comparison is funny to me. In the build up to Cyberpunk there was actually a lot of discussion on Rllmuk about the controversy. Then the game came out and the thread became flooded with opinions on the actual game and the trans stuff fell off. 

 

The same thing that will happen to this thread. 

[MK-1601]

6 minutes ago, Zael said:

The Cyberpunk comparison is funny to me. In the build up to Cyberpunk there was actually a lot of discussion on Rllmuk about the controversy. Then the game came out and the thread became flooded with opinions on the actual game and the trans stuff fell off. 

 

The same thing that will happen to this thread. 

 

[Broker]

9 minutes ago, Moz said:

Isn’t that every thread though?

Fair point. I was actually discussing this with my son today, his friend wanted to discuss a TV show they both watched but got upset when he said he didn’t like it. He seemed baffled by her just wanting a space to say nice things about the thing she liked and not discuss it’s relative merits, because in his mind “talking about why things are bad or good and hearing what other people liked or didn’t like about them, even if they don’t agree with you, is more interesting than just sitting around saying something is good”. I did gently suggest to him that maybe as they were friends she just wanted to have a space to talk about the show she loved, but he said that because he likes a debate she never has any problem telling him that the things he loves are shit. I was going to try to get into that but he went off to his room to play Mario kart because he was tired from extra GCSE preparation classes. 

[scottcr]

Are any of the reviews from non millennials who weren’t 5 when HP came  out?  Pretty much every review I’ve read has been ‘this is the game I’ve always wanted… lists a bunch of flaws and says 9/10 because POTTER’

[yakumo]

25 minutes ago, Broker said:

Mr Beast is a smug, self satisfied knob who turns literally everything into a story about himself. He has a massive level of influence and power and instead of drawing attention to an insane scenario where there is an affordable surgery which can give blind people their sight back that our repulsive society refuses to give them because they’re not rich, he makes it into a story about how he is great and special and rich. Every one of his videos is an exercise is massaging his colossal ego, with vulnerable people who are living difficult lives through no fault of their own existing only as props in his endless self congratulating. 

 

Much like some of the posts in this thread, the Cyberpunk thread was an endless parade of people who can’t bear to hear anyone say anything negative about their special game crying that they should get to have a nice echo chamber where everyone agrees with them. 

I don't know much about Mr Beast but glancing and reading about him briefly it seems his whole set up is giving stuff away to get views, to make more money, to give away more stuff to get even more views. Basically  a way for him to endlessly give away money and stuff like paying for surgeries etc. and it just becomes more and more.I think if you want to help people it’s actually a pretty genius approach. You can’t do much if you don’t have money, the more he gets the more he can do.

 

Personally I don't care if he's a knob, and doing all this for himself which I disagree since there's no evidence, but at least he's doing something and making an impact. 

[Unofficial Who]

1 hour ago, Flub said:

I’ve seen some trans folk casting shade over her name. As in would anyone transitioning mtf call themselves Sirona?

 

 I’m giving the developers the benefit of the doubt here because I’m going to assume this character wasn’t just added as a way to control the narrative around the game. Right? (Padme gif)

[Festoon]

1 hour ago, Ork1927 said:

I keep meaning to write this, but the the whataboutery dies down, but its back again so.....

 

Why is this game released at the particular time generating such comment/debate compared to <insert over game/thing>. 

 

1) Harry Potter is a mega franchise that millions have a strong attachment to/relationship with, be it for themselves or their kids.  The books, the films, the play, the Theme Park lands, the Merch, the whole world/lore, conventions/parties/cosplay etc, etc. It is massive/worldwide and in the same league (or not far off) as Star Wars and LOTR and Marvel.  And if you like the books or not - its hard to argue that they were a positive phenomenon with children and Adults queuing up at midnight over and over again to buy massive books at a time where people would start to argue that print was dying and kids weren't interested in reading anymore.

 

2) The game is a big budget, single player in a popular open world/RPG genre at a time were big budget/single player games are rare so its going to generate a reasonable level of interest even without the franchise attached to it.  

 

3) The creator of Harry Potter is intrinsically linked to it. Her story of creating it is well known and she has always been in the public eye to some degree since the books came out.  More crucially, she still owns the rights to it all and is an active participant in whatever licensed stuff is released as well as discussing the world and its characters.  This isn't a creator that is long dead, or anonymous/reclusive and it isn't a franchise now owned by a mega corp with its creator having no control (if they ever did).

 

So big franchise, high profile game and an active creator of that franchise who owns the rights and benefits from every sale and is very well know as the creator of that franchise.

 

4) Trans rights/laws is a big story at the moment. The laws being introduced in Scotland and the recent prisoner controversy and then the UK government weighing in as well as the Trans discussion as part of the Conversion Theory ban. Debates about Trans athletes in Sport happening all the time. Various laws being enacted in U.S States.  

 

5) JK Rowling is very, very active in the Trans rights debate. Irrespective of what anyone thinks she actually means or how 'wrong or right' her views are, she is a very prominent figure in trans and gender recognition discussion.  She is campaigning against the Scottish government. She gets referenced by politicians in the UK and further afield in discussions about trans rights (in some cases along the lines of Trans rights must be respected but so should JK Rowling).She is wrote about in the press both positively and negatively on these issues and I'm sure she is, as usual, tweeting or retweeting up a storm.  This is not someone who made a comment on something 3 years ago or said something recently and rolled it back. She is vocal, loud and active.

 

6) This is hard to quantify, but plenty of reports suggest Trans people are facing increased harassment and abuse at the moment and certainly right wing politicians are weaponising the trans debate or, especially in America, trying to put through draconian laws that will severely curtail trans rights.  At best, it has to be a worrying time for trans people or people with family members or friends who are trans and at worst, it could be a very difficult, dangerous time.

 

So - Trans rights are a hot topic. JK Rowling is very active in this debate and not considered an ally. Trans people are under attack and scared their rights are going to be taken away or worse.

 

All of that above adds up to it being a bit different and higher profile at the moment than any other game being released by any publisher regardless of who funds them or allegations about their employees or what someone involved has said or done in the past.

 

And I think posters on here need to remember that we have trans posters on here or posters that have family and friends who are trans so, don't treat this like an Xbox/Playstation debate and think before you post.  Its fine to want the game and buy it.  Its fine if your opinion on Rowling or boycotting is different, but remember that being called out for buying the game (which isn't really happening on here anyway) or, as is really all that is happening in this thread, being annoyed that people are stating that it should be boycotted or giving their negative opinion on Rowling is not actually that big a deal compared to anyone who grew up loving the Potter franchise and is now gutted they can't play the game while worrying about their or their friends or family members future.

 

And don't jump on the "I can't believe this is happening/being posted' train in this thread based on things that aren't actually happening. The trolling/baiting/faux outrage on things that aren't even being said is getting too much.  There are very, very few posts where people are being called names for buying this game, but there are plenty of posts acting as if every other post in here is that.

 

 

I can think of one poster here that's seemingly delibrately pointedly taking joy in ignoring the issues. It's simply the meanest thing I've ever seen on rllmuk.

[Strafe]

Watched a video of the common rooms. Ravenclaw’s looks pretty gucci.

[jonny_rat]

4 hours ago, Scribblor said:

This is an interesting discussion and without wanting to properly derail the thread (I should start a new topic, probably), how would you like game writers to handle things if, for example, I'm they're writing/narrative designing a sci fi game set in a future where trans and non-binary people are totally accepted?

 

Surely the characters should just be treated as themselves, without drawing attention to the fact they're trans or NB? Other than some of them using they/them pronouns, shouldn't it just go unremarked? If every non-cis character has that fact mentioned (either by themselves or someone else) wouldn't that feel wrong and tokenistic in a world where it's just accepted? Especially if, say, most of these characters are side characters because there are only a very few main characters in this game and they're not all trans/NB.

But how would the player know it's just accepted without it being mentioned?

 

Mentioning it to explicitly say it's just accepted could be seen as being tokenistic about it (and where do you mention that anyway?)

Not mentioning it, on the other hand, would mean that, pronouns aside, the trans or non-binaryness of the characters would be invisible. Given our society today, that invisibility would be minimising that aspect of the character, surely?

 

And minimising the inclusion of trans and non-binary people is something that's definitely not the idea, but if drawing attention to it is othering, that's also not the idea.

 

I think the solution is to do the best I they can and ask for a lot of feedback to make sure it's being handled sensitively, which is probably easier if there are a few trans and non binary people at the studio.

 

I think this thread can handle a bit more derailing..

 

The most interesting stuff for me is about how you go about writing about sensitive issues well: getting feedback on narrative in games in development (at least, early enough to be actionable) is tricky. By the time you can get community feedback it's either too late to address comprehensively, or more difficult and expensive. Microsoft employees have given talks about ways of testing narratives, and I know at least one of the games series out there that does queer and trans issues very well has a comprehensive process for getting narrative feedback (from audiences including NB folk). I suspect Sony has similar processes as well, but they're more secretive.

 

On the wider picture, I've always loved how Iain M Banks handled transitioning in the Culture books, but they were mostly written before any of the current wave of controversy, and I wonder how they'd hold up if I went back now. I liked them because they took both the approaches you mentioned: changing sex in those books was both no big deal on a societal level, but also a massive deal on a personal level: so there was always a good reason to mention it and talk about it.

 

In practice, in game I think the temptation for writers is always to be too on-the-nose, because they've designed this character with a certain story, and with representation in mind, and they want to find a way to highlight it. Maybe as K said, there is a temptation to highlight it for brownie points, or whatever.

 

In a sci-fi RPG, I can imagine it being communicated nicely through lore stuff, collectible reading/logs, character backstories, and that. I don't think it's ever going to be easy to drop in that kind of detailed information in a game where you don't have all that stuff available to flesh your characters out.

[JoeK]

What's the game engine in this? Is it Unreal? Because if it is, it at least makes the thought of the untold thousands of games using the thing to not feel quite as depressing as it was before.

[jonny_rat]

22 minutes ago, scottcr said:

Are any of the reviews from non millennials who weren’t 5 when HP came  out?  Pretty much every review I’ve read has been ‘this is the game I’ve always wanted… lists a bunch of flaws and says 9/10 because POTTER’

 

I thought Keza MacDonald's review was fairly even-handed (I don't know how old she is though):

https://www.theguardian.com/games/2023/feb/06/hogwarts-legacy-review-wizarding-wish-fulfilment-whose-magic-wears-off

 

[Rex Grossman]

I posted something similar the other day but I’m going to say more.

 

It’s obviously natural to take the potential success of this game, or the fact that people in the thread are ignoring the JKR-shaped elephant in the room, very personally. Especially if you have a family member or partner etc who is trans/NB. It’s literally very close to home.

 

I think it’s worth remembering that because of the property the game is based on there will be people who also have deeply personal reasons to play it. Maybe their mum read them the books and they watched all the films together. Maybe as their mum was dying they rewatched them all again imagining what it would be like to explore Hogwarts. Perhaps they’ve got a child just getting to that age when the last thing they want to do is play a game with their parents and this gives one last bittersweet opportunity to have a shared gaming experience like they used to have.

 

I’m not saying that everyone buying the game has a sob story but people have lives we don’t know about and shit can get very deep especially when we’re talking about a franchise that could’ve been a big part of someone’s childhood. Maybe it’s selfish of them, maybe it isn’t.

 

But it’s sometimes more complicated than we choose to acknowledge.

 

Putting aside the idea of who is an ally or not (be suspicious of anyone giving themselves that label - you don’t get to self-apply) I’m not going to automatically lump people who buy the game in with the anti-abortionists, far-right grifters and opportunists who have spied an opportunity to create a culture war where there shouldn’t be one.

[Festoon]

3 minutes ago, jonny_rat said:

 

I thought Keza MacDonald's review was fairly even-handed (I don't know how old she is though):

https://www.theguardian.com/games/2023/feb/06/hogwarts-legacy-review-wizarding-wish-fulfilment-whose-magic-wears-off

 

 

Young.

[fat flatulent git]

25 minutes ago, Strafe said:

Watched a video of the common rooms. Ravenclaw’s looks pretty gucci.

Can’t remember any mention of those in the books or a single glimpse of Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff common rooms in the films.  We barely see the Slytherin one apart from when Harry and Ron have taken polyjuice in CoS.

 

That’s why playing as a Griff will definitely not happen on my first few playthroughs.

[g wings]

If you want to make a difference (beyond keeping your wallet in your pocket) why not use the time that you would have spent playing the game contributing directly to a trans cause. There will be plenty of organisations that would love your support and would bite your hand off for 30-40 hours of your time and energy. 

[dreamylittledream]

36 minutes ago, Festoon said:

 

Young.

She’s in her mid 30s which whilst hardly aged is certainly no longer young

[K]

1 hour ago, Broker said:

Much like some of the posts in this thread, the Cyberpunk thread was an endless parade of people who can’t bear to hear anyone say anything negative about their special game crying that they should get to have a nice echo chamber where everyone agrees with them. 

The Cyberpunk 2077 thread was just endless positivity, from the moment the game was released until about a year and a bit later. Nobody criticised the game at all. Its politics, its balance, the pre-release statements from CDPR, the level of performance on the previous generation of consoles; all of it as calm and and as free from any kind of disharmony as the finely polished mirror of a galactic-scale space telescope. 
 

It’s like the old saying - “as quiet and peaceful as the Cyberpunk 2077 thread on rllmuk”. 

[Isaac]

The Cyberpunk controversy was all pre-release, when it appeared that they had created a vulgar, tasteless world that was deliberately transphobic and provocative like some GTA-esque satire on too much Red Bull.

 

And then you played it and it was the grimmest, most depressing yet human world portrayed in games for quite some time, and the whole point was that everyone was being exploited all the time, and the game didn't tell a story that was some pornographic celebration of that darkness, but instead managed to find little pockets of humanity and brilliant characters clinging onto whatever they had left in a world that was unspeakably horrific, whilst being a powerful indictment of extreme, unbridled capitalism.

 

It was shockingly good, and confounded all expectations going in.

 

Having said that, the marketing manager was dodgy AF and whilst the artist has defended the advert in question, it is undeniably transphobic. Here was her defence of it at the time:

 

Quote

"You'll notice many advertisements - for anything, a table, chair, a roof tile - slap a random sexy person on top and say 'hey, buy this'. This shows the sexploitation of those people, and many of our advertisements feature this sexualisation. We sexualise men, women, and people in between, all to show how terrible this is.

 

"With our advertisements, we want to say something. For instance, there's an advert for a fashion shop with the Colosseum - this beautiful piece of architecture - which has been taken over and turned into a marketplace. It's art destroyed for consumerism's sake. We have more examples here [in Cyberpunk's E3 2019 booth]."

 

Redesiuk and I are standing next to a poster which says 'three mouths, one desire'. It's a nod to Total Recall's 'I wish I had three hands' scene, she says, but also an example of the grotesque sex movies available in Cyberpunk 2077's world.

 

"So yes, we have a person with both breasts and a penis on an advertisement, done on purpose, because it's terrible to exploit people's bodies like this," Redesiuk continues.

 

The poster in question is an advert for Chromanticore, a regular cola, one of many fictional drink brands in the game.

 

"We thought this would be a brand which would slap a body on the advert and think nothing of it. It's a terrible thing to say 'mix it up' [the poster's tagline]. We're emulating what a company would say in Cyberpunk 2077."

 

"It needs context. Some people are shocked by it, moved by it. That's a normal response," Redesiuk told me. "It's showing a problem."

 

"It was meant to make people feel uncomfortable," Redesiuk concludes. "Not because they're seeing someone with breasts and a penis, but because the body is being exploited. I didn't slap the penis there for people to laugh about it. There is a beautiful body there being used to sell soda."

 

Whilst it works in-world, I can see how taken out of context it's too much, and probably was best left out of it.

[MK-1601]

1 hour ago, jonny_rat said:

 

I thought Keza MacDonald's review was fairly even-handed (I don't know how old she is though):

https://www.theguardian.com/games/2023/feb/06/hogwarts-legacy-review-wizarding-wish-fulfilment-whose-magic-wears-off

 

"it’s remarkable there’s been no credible attempt at a big-budget Harry Potter video game before now. "

 

[Haribokart]

1 hour ago, scottcr said:

Are any of the reviews from non millennials who weren’t 5 when HP came  out?  Pretty much every review I’ve read has been ‘this is the game I’ve always wanted… lists a bunch of flaws and says 9/10 because POTTER’

 

No because unless their parents forced them to get into the series nobody who doesn't have nostalgia for it would ever enjoy anything from this shit kids franchise.

[Strafe]

 

[macosx]

Sirona runs the Hogsmeade pub at 53.24  . Amazing amount of detail in all the interiors and looks like the an accurate recreation of the films to carry all the usual open world stuff.

 

[Dig Dug]

9 hours ago, yakumo said:

I don't know much about Mr Beast but glancing and reading about him briefly it seems his whole set up is giving stuff away to get views, to make more money, to give away more stuff to get even more views. Basically  a way for him to endlessly give away money and stuff like paying for surgeries etc. and it just becomes more and more.I think if you want to help people it’s actually a pretty genius approach. You can’t do much if you don’t have money, the more he gets the more he can do.

 

Personally I don't care if he's a knob, and doing all this for himself which I disagree since there's no evidence, but at least he's doing something and making an impact. 

I've spoken about this topic at length elsewhere but it is a pretty nuanced situation.
In the most basic terms on one hand you have feats of philanthropy where huge amounts of money are being used to help people in a very direct peer-to-peer level. In the most basic terms this is an overall good which should present no downsides, it is a wholly good act.

However, the road to hell is often paved with good intentions. I'm going to skip the ethics of these videos are a piece of monetised media as that debate can be circled endlessly and is not actually relevant to the wider issues. What about the things we don't see upfront when watching these videos?

• We see this money being used to pay for the treatments of people who cannot afford treatment under the American healthcare system. At no point does it stop and question why sight saving treatment is something that needs paying for? Surly fewer blind people is a net positive for society? There is a problem that exists but the cause of the problem is something everyone involved appears to be (pardon the pun) blind to, instead only focusing on the immediate problem in front of them). You can't kill a weed without dealing with the root.
   
• This brings us to the messaging of the media and the act: We have to buy people their sight back because that is the way things are. The monster that is the American healthcare system is not going anywhere and we have no choice to appease it, creating a feedback loop where the American healthcare system justifies its own existence by generating vast amounts of income. No one is seeking a solution to what is quite blatantly the cause of everyone's suffering. There doesn't have to be a financial barrier there to prevent those 1000 people receiving their treatment. Someone made it that way by design. The conclusion found by many on the outside is that the system needs to be torn down, demolished, replaced, and made so that no one should go living with an easily curable illness. But none of this happens; the system isn't to be fought, it is to be lived under. You better hope you're lucky enough to not fall ill, or if you are ill be fortunate enough to have a guarantor who can pay the costs for you. This brings me to the final and arguably most worrying message of the whole thing whether it was meant that way or not.
   
• The worship of the wealthy as our saviors, betters and idols: The USA loves rich people, adores them, celebrates them, more so than any other country in the world. Taking into account everything that has been written above. What message does it send to the tens of millions of Mr Beast subscribers on YouTube when these videos, perhaps without meaning to, offer philanthropy as a solution to a problem caused entirely by a product of politics and economics? It sends the message that our greatest hope is the money of a generous millionaire or billionaire.
  I'm not going to throw Mr Beast in with the lot I'm about to talk about but this entire attitude towards wealth, that rich people have the power to do the most good, has allowed monetary whitewashing to become one of the greatest forms of power on earth. Just look at sports, look at football: entire cities and communities overlooking the evils committed by oligarchs, their associates, oil states, and so on because those people did alright by those billions invested. Is it a coincidence that many systems of capitalism now rely on becoming indebted to the wealthy either monetarily or in gratitude? Absolutely not. It's all intentional, it's a proven winner and it is something we are seeing pursued with alarming regularity.
   
• Mr Beast was by no means looking to play god with these peoples lives but that is what such acts have done here. Millionaires and Billionaires are the gods of the modern world: To be addressed directly by one is to be addressed by the gods themselves. The doctors didn't cure those blind people, Mr Beast did. They are the blind man of Bethsaida and Mr Beast is their Jesus Christ. The fucking irony of it all.

So yeah, pretty nuanced stuff. I don't hold ill feelings towards Jimmy Donaldson the person. As a human being he means well and he's come up with what he sees as an effective way to game capitalism to help people. It's not hard to appreciate the sentiment, but it is also a shame. It's a shame knowing the potential impact such wealth and status can have in swaying actual political discourse and policy making. Then again for all I know maybe $100m net worth isn't enough to fight that war these days, it's all incomprehensible amounts to us commonfolk. To add another layer of irony: the discourse seen in this very tread is a result of a billionaire using their wealth and status to do just that. Food for thought.