boring as fuck jokes, liberal cringe opinions, 9 bad takes out of 10, and more galore. Should hexbear really keep associating itself with Chapo, it really seems that hexbear has outgrown it in general.

edit: by associating i mean using things like chapotraphouse com or askchapo or chapochat. maybe we’ve grown beyond it, maybe its a neat part of site culture and a nod to its roots while not connected to the cringe stuff.

    • CriticalOtaku [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
      25·
      10 days ago

      Did they say something cringe recently?

      I still listen from time to time. Not to my knowledge. Hell they’re one of the handful of left media figures who’ve been consistently good on Palestine.

      • SadArtemis [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
        13·
        10 days ago

        Same, still listen very rarely (moved on to even more based/educational channels like Geopolitical Economy Report admittedly, or more informative ones)

        TBH didn’t even know the connection between Chapo and Hexbear when I first joined a month ago- and this is despite having been around the old r/Chapo till- I think it got banned for saying death to slavers or some other based shit? (Ancient history). So the association isn’t very obvious (IMO).

        • Frank [he/him, he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
          11·
          10 days ago

          Yeah iirc and i almost certainly don’t their excuse for finally axing us was people posting about killing slavers who were specifically already dead or something.

        • CriticalOtaku [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
          7·
          10 days ago

          Yeah, I think everyone who was a fan of Chapo/Trueanon in 2016 has moved on to The Deprogram / Blowback / Democracy Now! etc.

          I still tune in to Hasan and Chapo if a topic interests me, for things like movie reviews and stuff.

          (Also Hasan has been blowing up in my feed because of all the Twitch drama atm)

          • SadArtemis [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
            4·
            10 days ago

            Yup… and those who were in r/cth moved to- other places, wherever they might be. I wound up in r/Sino and r/GenZedong (still look once in a while) before hopping onto the 'grad, and then coming here (for emotes and larger community) lol

            • CriticalOtaku [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
              4·
              10 days ago

              As for the users, there’s overlap between r/TheDeprogram, r/LateStageCapitalism, r/WorkersStrikeBack… and here and Lemmygrad, but I don’t envy anyone who stayed on reddit cos the place is hella astroturfed right now, between Zionists and Liberal “Harm Reduction” Dems (I know I repeat myself, but still).

              • Ram_The_Manparts [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
                3·
                9 days ago

                Lol I happen to be a mod in one of those subs and holy shit have the libs been going wild lately. We’re probably banning like 1500 people a week or something

          • Ram_The_Manparts [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
            4·
            9 days ago

            Yeah, I think everyone who was a fan of Chapo/Trueanon in 2016 has moved on to The Deprogram / Blowback / Democracy Now! etc.

            I really doubt that this is the case. The Deprogram seems to have a much younger audience than Chapo and TA (at least if their subreddit is anything to go by and a lot of their stuff seems to be purposely geared in that direction as a sort of “baby’s first socialism”), and DN is just a completely different concept altogether. Blowback seems to be popular with basically everyone, but is also a very different concept.

            • CriticalOtaku [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
              1·
              8 days ago

              I guess I meant more as in that Chapo’s audience has moved further left than them, and are looking for more “serious” analysis.

              Deprogram is more internationalist (which is good) but it also tends to draw out the class reductionist (which isn’t as good).

  • ClathrateG [none/use name]@hexbear.netEnglish
    33·
    10 days ago

    I probably listen more frequently than most, and I can’t say I’ve noticed any racist jokes? Can you think of a specific one?

    The opinions haven’t changed much still mostly ok with smattering of bad takes but nothing outrageous that I haven’t seen expressed here, maybe more lowbrow since maths absence

    Bit they still get decent guests, and for someone outside the US I appreciate the perspective on internal politics that isn’t too lib, although you can get all that elsewhere

    My opinion on the matter is it does really matter anymore, but if it ain’t broke don’t fix it, like what is there really beyond associations other than this sub name and older users like myself who may still use the chapo.chat domain

    Can’t prove it but I think it’s probably a driver of new users since I see here mentioned on places like the blackwolffeed reddit

    • HelltakerHomosexual [she/her, comrade/them]@hexbear.netOPEnglish
      25·
      10 days ago

      self crit it was pointed out that i kinda mixed up cumtown and chapo so my annoyance with chapo deflated and my point about the racism stuff was wrong. Sorry.

      i can see your side, especially since it is a reference to its roots, and its already here so why change it.

      conversely, maybe in order to improve the site, and get rid of the reddit-ness that is so often causing issues, its necessary to move the site culture away from those things. Probably overboard though.

  • videogame [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
    32·
    10 days ago

    Idk I’ve listened to like the last 100 episodes and I haven’t noticed any racist jokes. Maybe anti-semitic jokes from felix but even that’s a stretch

      • grazing7264 [they/them, comrade/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
        8·
        10 days ago

        Very funny mixup lmao, they’ve been really struggling every since Matt had a stroke since he was the one that could apply theory, it’s all riffs without him but maybe he’ll come back and make it good again

        It’s been over a year and he’s still having critical health problems kitty-birthday-sad

  • booty [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
    31·
    10 days ago

    Genuinely curious, what alternate universe version of the site have you been looking at? The chapotraphouse podcast is mentioned here in passing maybe once a week if that, sitewide

  • Esoteir [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
    27·
    10 days ago

    afaik main isn’t called that because people actually like chapotraphouse, it’s an extended bit because the chapos hated r/chapotraphouse so we kept the name out of mutual disrespect

    that being said i wouldn’t have any problem fully converting over to c/main or a different/funny comm name, it’s site culture but it wouldn’t be a loss if it was dropped

  • Venat [he/him, any]@hexbear.netEnglish
    24·
    10 days ago

    I just strongly dislike the man-children aspect of their dynamic, especially Felix who seems to be stuck emotionally as a burnout turned 27 year old gamer. Just everything about his speech mannerisms, his vocal fry, the limited vocabulary and adolescent presentation, the revelations of his habits, hygiene, and “hobbies” (i.e, gaming & internet addiction).

    All this is of course excluding Chris Wade who seems to be the only professional, and Matt Christman who seems to be the only one moving forward with building a life and family.

    It’s probably, most definitely if I was forced to make a decision and commitment, that I - perhaps you too - am just growing out of news podcasts as entertainment. Even long since 10/7, I kind of find these podcasts - Chapo, Trueanon, Trillbilllies, etc - to be a mix of “finding catharsis in the darkness via public broadcasting” and grifting the disintegration and decline of empire for affluence and notoriety.

    • GarbageShoot [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
      12·
      10 days ago

      and Matt Christman who seems to be the only one moving forward with building a life and family.

      I’m glad Matt is able to do at least this much of what he wants, but I think that the way you’re judging people here is extremely toxic in a patriarchal nuclear-family-worship kind of way. You don’t need to have a partner, much less a child, to be an adult and a worthwhile person.

      If Felix had a wife and a child, it wouldn’t make him the slightest bit less pathetic outside of the time and effort spent on childrearing, which I think he’d be shit at anyway and probably have the wife bear the brunt of indefinitely.

      So, uh, be nicer to Will, his affect annoys me but I think on a personal level he seems perfectly fine, plus he’s the actual show runner while everyone else just riffs and rants.

      • Venat [he/him, any]@hexbear.netEnglish
        10·
        10 days ago

        You’re right. Though it was not my intention to pedestal the nuclear family or building one as an ultimate goal, I suppose I was measuring the milestones of life through the parallels of responsibility and personal growth, and used that observation about him to mean that he sees a future and existence for himself outside of the podcast. And that sort of seriousness and forecasting is a mark of adulthood and maturity, from my perspective.

        Will’s alright; I guess I was trying to not singularly focus on Felix.

        Felix to me is my personal bogeyman, that despite success and affluence, he is seemingly incapable of escaping his adolescence in both his manner of speech, presentation, habits, and career. A “positive” identity is what a person identifies themselves by what they are, Felix has helped me form a “negative” identity by telling myself what I should not be.

        I dunno. I just knew people like that, blessed by success or fortune from birth, and saw them spend their lives in adolescence way into their late 30s.

        • GarbageShoot [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
          7·
          10 days ago

          I agree, Felix is existentially terrifying. I’m not as irked by his speech patterns as some people are, but the rest of it, from spending all his time on game slop, to his attitude toward sex (e.g. bragging about being able to get groupies who are much more attractive than him via the show), to spending however many thousands of dollars on a replica of a sword from Dark Souls, he’s like a rich version of what I’m personally terrified of ending up as, to the point that I earnestly would prefer being a corpse and being saved the trouble of looking back at my life and seeing that I really never did anything worthwhile. He’s only tolerable to me because usually he focuses on jokes and his knowledge about various internet figures and Israel.

      • Venat [he/him, any]@hexbear.netEnglish
        3·
        10 days ago

        Yeahhh…no…yeah… it’s-it’s like when you find a date on -intense clicking noises in the background - tinder but your car dealership has stopped selling parts for the Metal Gear, but it’s like we’re all children now and neoliberalism has turned us into babi- deeep vaping noises - and this is what DemoniusX has in mind for our future! it rules! it’s awesome! I love this Re Dwah of the Bush Era! I’ll use Gee-Aw-Sit-Tees to book us a hotel.

  • bazingabrain [comrade/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
    23·
    10 days ago

    imma be honest. I never, ever, listened to these guys or watched their show (is it a show? idek man)

    i dont even remember how i even found this website, i vaguely remember typing “wtf is a chapotraphouse” and you fuckers showed up

  • Chapo_is_Red [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
    20·
    10 days ago

    So we’re at this point of the hexbear discourse cycle again?

    I don’t really see the benefit to changing it, especially for most of the reasons you mention. I don’t think the chapos are libs and I’m not sure what you mean by “cringe.”

    I agree it does feel anachronistic, but that’s kinda how culture works. Things from the past hang around even after the origins are lost

    • CommunistCuddlefish [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
      10·
      10 days ago

      For that matter why is this place named “Hexbear”? I remember it was chapo.chat but I didn’t join up during that time, later decided to try it only to find it’s now Hexbear

      • REgon [they/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
        17·
        10 days ago

        It was because the mods at the time were mad that people only used c/main and had voted not to rename c/main to something other than c/main (I voted for c/slop) so then they stopped having elections about things like that. Next thing you know we change the name of the site to hexbears because some the then mods/admins thought the association with Chapo was bad and decided to name/brand the website after a stale, but wholesome meme (look at this dope-ass bear)

      • Chapo_is_Red [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
        3·
        10 days ago

        This site was initially chapo.chat but they decided to change the name (shortly after I joined, so I dont really know all the details) presumably because they wanted to distance themselves from chapo (see op). Why they chose the shortlived ‘hexbear’ meme for the name? I’m not sure.

  • rootsbreadandmakka [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
    20·
    10 days ago

    Yeah tbh I’d support this. Having the chapo name still around is sort of nice for those of us who were on the subreddit, but I haven’t listened to the podcast in 4 years and so much of that “dirtbag left” moment has sort of imploded. The chapo guys are fine, but I’m thinking of the red scare girls becoming fascists, stupidpol becoming a reactionary cesspool, jimmy dore becoming a reactionary, Bernie sanders dead (in spirit), cumtown refusing to move on from edgelord humor, sevendeadlyfetishes banned from the site. Maybe some of that stuff was never good, but it was a moment, and an important one, both politically since it put to rest that distinctly apolitical period that preceded it, and I’d guess personally for a lot of people on this site. But moments end and that moment has surely ended. We sort of tried to move away from it by changing the name to hexbear, but yeah I think it’s time we complete that process and make our identity wholly our own.

    • scarcity_of_the_self [none/use name]@hexbear.netEnglish
      1·
      8 days ago

      Are they really that much better? I will admit it’s actually worth a listen since it’s not like listening in on the most depressing video conference ever, it is an actually structured and informative show made by people I consider well-intentioned radlib idealists. I listen to it for the same reason I tune into Al Jazeera building credibility to attack the “totalitarian dictatorships” backing Hamas, or willingly subject myself to John Mearshimer’s screeds. They bring something to the fucking table.

      Chapo was interesting a few years ago when they were clearly doing a lot of drugs and thought they were hot shit, but it was also wince inducing. There was also the potential of them becoming more widely relevant but instead they are just huffing duster wirh Chris Smalls and Tim Heidecker. Nobody should be surprised but at one point they did have this air of uncertain potential.

      This community you have formed is very funny. On the one hand you have Mark Fisher pilled extreme idealists who have begun to bridge their way over to the critical theory posting (please stop, but not my life so I won’t stop you), on the other hand you have geopolitics watchers who have independently realized that Mearshimer is a knucklehead, thinks every country seeks HOI4 style world domination and that the US is controlled by its suzerainties (LOL) when they hold every single industry by the balls and provide all military intelligence and marching orders.

      Those things would be more contradictory if people had worked things out without spending every single moment consuming or producing posts. This is almost four paragraphs about Chapo Trap House and r/ChapoTrapHouse so I will finish here adding, it is clear why this happened, you can talk about any facet of it for days.