Something's been brewing in the back of my brainpan for a while now: who here remembers the "which side are you on" marketing campaigns of the 2010s?

posted 32 days ago by yeldarb1983 32 days ago by yeldarb1983 +33 / -0

going off my vague and admittedly rusty memory, there were at least three major examples of this that I personally encountered:

1. The Marvel Civil War story arc in the comics
1. The Twilight Saga Edward Vs Jacob marketing for the movies (which admittedly was handled somewhat tongue-in-cheek. I seem to recall a fast food commercial taking it to what I hope was an intentionally absurd degree)
1. The MCU retread of Civil War from the comics, adapted to the silver screen
*** 4) Edit: Injustice: gods among us (thanks to u/Kinglion for pointing that one out)***

Whether this was intentional or not is beyond the scope of this screed, but it is interesting to note how many real-world examples of this phenomenon occurred during and after these campaigns, gamergate, the ghostbusters fiasco, the trump/anti trump movements, etc.

maybe it's nothing, or maybe it's something. I honestly have no idea, but the timing is certainly interesting at the very least.

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– Gizortnik 2 points 32 days ago +3 / -1

It's not accidental, polarization is a primary goal of authoritarian regimes. This is because it radicalizes loyalists an oppositions.

You what a good example of this was?

GamerGate.

Yes, most of us said: "Fuck you Kotaku"

But a strong number of people literally rejected the idea that Kotaku could do wrong, and declared themselves absolutely devoted to the media. You called them GamerGhazi.

Either way, the polarization from the media attacking it's user-base created loyalists that protected their sales.

Abortion, believe it or not, has the same issue. The rest of the world doesn't see abortion as a major political issue, including Europe. Not because abortion is 100% legal in all cases. Actually, many European countries are as restrictive as Mississippi. The reason people bombed abortion clinics, and have 100,000 person "March For Life" and "Pussy Hat" dueling protests, or people threatening to kill SCOTUS, is all because Roe v. Wade ripped the issue out of political moderation via debate. Declaring a single-size solution turned it into a political football that caused division.

The dichotomy is always designed to support the person offering the dichotomy, whichever choice you make.

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