WEBVTT - The Curious Case of Nazi Catboys: Part 1 0:00:04.960 --> 0:00:16.279 Oh, Robert, that's how you start a podcast. This is 0:00:16.320 --> 0:00:20.680 it could happen here. That's right, that's Robert talking. That's right. 0:00:20.720 --> 0:00:25.159 Also with us accurate Christopher Wong and Garrison Davis do 0:00:25.239 --> 0:00:32.240 your podcast. Yeah, So we're all gathering today on on 0:00:32.520 --> 0:00:34.839 the day after what I think we'll go down as 0:00:34.880 --> 0:00:37.839 the single most momentous moment in the twenty one century. 0:00:38.280 --> 0:00:42.800 Will Smith slapped Chris Rock on stage at the Oscars. 0:00:43.240 --> 0:00:46.879 So the entire world has pivoted from obsession with the 0:00:46.920 --> 0:00:52.080 massive land war in Eastern Europe to discussing how Chris 0:00:52.240 --> 0:00:54.800 Rock getting slapped is like the massive land war in 0:00:54.840 --> 0:01:00.480 Eastern Europe or or eleven or nine eleven. Yes, yes, yes, 0:01:00.800 --> 0:01:04.600 so it's a it's an amazing, like an unprecedentedly incredible 0:01:04.640 --> 0:01:07.959 time to be on on Twitter right now. That said, 0:01:08.440 --> 0:01:11.960 we're going to talk about Nazi cat boys today. I've 0:01:12.000 --> 0:01:14.760 seen everyone's post on the subreddit being like, why aren't 0:01:14.760 --> 0:01:18.120 you guys giving blow by blows about the war in Ukraine. 0:01:18.720 --> 0:01:22.280 Then this is this is pressing topic and we're going 0:01:22.319 --> 0:01:26.559 to talk about Nazi cat boys. Previous to the Chris 0:01:26.640 --> 0:01:28.920 Rock slap. This is the most pressing topic of the 0:01:28.959 --> 0:01:32.640 twenty one century. Um is why there's Nazi catboys, and 0:01:32.680 --> 0:01:34.840 now we're going to talk about it well, because I mean, 0:01:34.840 --> 0:01:37.919 the roots of the crisis in Ukraine are the different 0:01:37.959 --> 0:01:43.319 kinds of catboys. That's Alinsky and Putin are, yes, Robert 0:01:43.520 --> 0:01:46.319 is fan art. Up, It's gonna be fine. I'm sure. 0:01:46.319 --> 0:01:50.840 I'm sure we'll find some horrible fan art. Yes, of yeah, 0:01:50.920 --> 0:01:53.640 we have. We have to figure out if if Putin's 0:01:53.640 --> 0:01:56.640 ever watched Shelsing, and then we'll build to know. So 0:01:57.040 --> 0:01:59.040 I don't know what that means, but okay, you're you're 0:01:59.080 --> 0:02:05.400 about to find out. So great, So we we have. 0:02:05.480 --> 0:02:07.840 We have gathered here today to talk about to talk 0:02:07.880 --> 0:02:10.840 about the curious case of why they are Nazi capboys. 0:02:11.400 --> 0:02:17.640 UM route throughout one TikTok and Twitter pushed from boys 0:02:17.639 --> 0:02:21.280 and cat boys into kind of the cultural mainstream, plunging 0:02:21.320 --> 0:02:24.440 these once much more niche subcultures out of the dark 0:02:24.480 --> 0:02:28.880 depths of fortune, Reddit, Tumbler and discord and uh the 0:02:29.520 --> 0:02:34.040 latest rebirth of these kind of gender bending communities. It's 0:02:34.040 --> 0:02:38.520 pretty socially progressive and affirming. Uh. Like generally most most 0:02:38.639 --> 0:02:42.160 fem boys catboys are are lefties. There's a whole bunch 0:02:42.240 --> 0:02:45.400 of like Twitter communists. I'm sure there's a whole bunch 0:02:45.400 --> 0:02:48.600 of cat boys who like stalling or something. Um, but 0:02:48.720 --> 0:02:53.000 they're they're generally more generally more on the left. But 0:02:53.000 --> 0:02:57.200 but but for for those who've dug deeper into the 0:02:57.280 --> 0:03:00.760 history and origins of these Internet subcultures, you may have 0:03:00.760 --> 0:03:04.560 found a dark, racist, and hateful underbelly. So we're going 0:03:04.600 --> 0:03:08.200 to talk about that today. I do have to note, Garrison, 0:03:08.200 --> 0:03:10.520 as soon as you said that, I found a Stalinist 0:03:10.600 --> 0:03:16.880 catboy the Twitter. It's an incredible account. So that their 0:03:16.960 --> 0:03:19.520 their background image for their Twitter account is a picture 0:03:19.639 --> 0:03:23.720 of Dang Xiaoping and the Ayatollah of Iran having a meeting. 0:03:25.040 --> 0:03:31.160 Their their PfP is a lavender haired uh, it's like 0:03:31.200 --> 0:03:34.680 a it's like an anime pic avatar catboy. Yeah, with 0:03:34.720 --> 0:03:38.320 like a Soviet hat and then Marxist Leninist bisexual catboy 0:03:38.440 --> 0:03:42.440 stalin did nothing wrong at North Korea. Stand incredible. This 0:03:45.200 --> 0:03:48.119 is this is this is why the Left will never win. 0:03:50.600 --> 0:03:55.560 That's perfect. I'm pretty sure this is like illegal in 0:03:56.160 --> 0:04:00.320 those countries. It's it would have had this person shot 0:04:00.360 --> 0:04:03.440 in the second someone tried to describe a catboy to 0:04:03.520 --> 0:04:06.600 Joseph Stalwin, he would have had this person executed. Oh yeah, 0:04:06.600 --> 0:04:09.160 oh wow, yeah, I see I see it now, that 0:04:09.320 --> 0:04:13.200 is that is intense. You know. The thing is, this 0:04:13.240 --> 0:04:14.840 type of thing is not going to be uncommon. We're 0:04:14.880 --> 0:04:17.040 gonna be again, We're gonna be going into like actual 0:04:17.120 --> 0:04:19.520 fascists who are also cowboys, and obviously they would have 0:04:19.560 --> 0:04:22.520 been would have been killed for being degenerous as well. 0:04:22.839 --> 0:04:24.760 But now we're gonna kind of talk about how this 0:04:24.880 --> 0:04:28.279 how this kind of came to be. And I've been 0:04:28.320 --> 0:04:30.480 writing this for like over a year. Actually, I've interviewed 0:04:30.480 --> 0:04:33.160 a few people for this that I've kind of contributed 0:04:33.279 --> 0:04:35.400 to the script. And initially this was going to be 0:04:35.400 --> 0:04:37.720 conceived as a video. Um, and you can't only talk 0:04:37.760 --> 0:04:40.840 about these things in a video format without dressing up 0:04:41.279 --> 0:04:45.320 like a silly character. So I am. I'm wearing a 0:04:45.440 --> 0:04:48.880 very actually a very very high quality catboy outfend right now, 0:04:49.200 --> 0:04:51.080 which the audio we'll just have to you'll have to 0:04:51.080 --> 0:04:53.320 you'll have to see it through the audio, So good 0:04:53.400 --> 0:04:59.320 luck with that synesthesia. Um yeah, yeah, yeah, so you are. 0:04:59.360 --> 0:05:01.560 At the same time, You've done that enough that I 0:05:01.560 --> 0:05:05.120 don't know that anyone really noticed. I've never dressed as 0:05:05.120 --> 0:05:08.080 a cat boy for recording, before you addresses something. Every 0:05:08.080 --> 0:05:11.520 other recording that's true, I addressed as something. I generally 0:05:11.560 --> 0:05:16.200 addresses something. So first section one, Section one? What is 0:05:16.360 --> 0:05:18.920 what is a catboy? What? What is what is this? 0:05:19.240 --> 0:05:21.880 Um So? But first of all, of a few ground 0:05:21.960 --> 0:05:25.479 rules will be circling back too often. UM One, not 0:05:25.680 --> 0:05:30.039 all catboys and femboys identify as LGBT or queer. Um 0:05:30.120 --> 0:05:33.479 and two, gay people can still be racist. These are these, 0:05:33.560 --> 0:05:35.279 These are these, These are two points that we're gonna 0:05:35.279 --> 0:05:37.160 be coming back to over the course of these of 0:05:37.640 --> 0:05:41.680 these Deep Night episodes. So first things first, let's let's 0:05:41.720 --> 0:05:43.440 just define what a cat boy is for all of 0:05:43.440 --> 0:05:45.840 the boomers in the audience. Um And if you are, 0:05:45.880 --> 0:05:49.280 if you are a boomer listening to this, how why 0:05:49.320 --> 0:05:51.159 how did you find this? Why are why did you 0:05:51.240 --> 0:05:53.800 choose to listen to Garrison? The instant I became a 0:05:53.839 --> 0:05:56.440 boomer was the first time you tried to describe explain 0:05:56.520 --> 0:06:00.080 cat boys to me, Like I I suddenly developed a 0:06:00.120 --> 0:06:08.080 strong opinion on HRC because of me. You so most 0:06:08.080 --> 0:06:12.000 administration joke, but most simply m a cat boy? Is 0:06:12.279 --> 0:06:15.479 this what I'm doing right now? So someone who is 0:06:15.640 --> 0:06:21.240 kind of kind of boyish who who? Who? Who sometimes 0:06:21.360 --> 0:06:25.720 enjoys dressing in cat like apparel. I guess it's like 0:06:25.920 --> 0:06:29.000 cat ears. It is different from furries from and we 0:06:29.040 --> 0:06:32.680 will we will get into this, um. I mean, but 0:06:32.760 --> 0:06:34.840 I'm I'm definitely less boyish than I first was when 0:06:34.839 --> 0:06:37.080 I wrote this like a year ago, now that I'm 0:06:37.080 --> 0:06:40.640 on recreational estrogen. But nevertheless, someone who's a boyish and 0:06:40.720 --> 0:06:43.520 dresses or likes to dress in cat like kind of 0:06:44.480 --> 0:06:49.920 outfits generally on an anime trajectory of aesthetics. Uh now 0:06:49.920 --> 0:06:51.840 this is this is this is different from furies from 0:06:52.000 --> 0:06:55.160 multiple reasons. The physical cat like attributes on catboys are 0:06:55.200 --> 0:06:59.880 mostly confined to ears and pause sometimes with tails, but 0:07:00.120 --> 0:07:03.359 it's it's iffy um. Whereas you know, furries like to 0:07:03.400 --> 0:07:05.600 have like the full first suit thing going on, whereas 0:07:05.600 --> 0:07:07.680 catboys they still have like human faces and they wear 0:07:07.720 --> 0:07:10.800 like human clothes. So this is actually a very key difference, 0:07:10.800 --> 0:07:14.040 which will lots of made costumes like and yes a lot. 0:07:14.120 --> 0:07:17.520 And the other other big kind of recurring trope um 0:07:17.720 --> 0:07:21.000 is that is that well they well catboys you usually 0:07:21.040 --> 0:07:23.000 wear clothes. Is that they usually dress up in something 0:07:23.040 --> 0:07:26.120 similar to like a French made outfit um or or 0:07:26.240 --> 0:07:29.120 like different outfits like anime girls will were so like 0:07:29.280 --> 0:07:32.760 the tennis skirt thing, but generally on a made outfit 0:07:32.840 --> 0:07:37.600 to anime trajectory. So despite, despite the animal ears, right 0:07:38.040 --> 0:07:40.600 despite like the furry cat eers, the catboy or cat 0:07:40.640 --> 0:07:42.720 girl thing has much more in common with the fenboy 0:07:42.720 --> 0:07:45.600 community than the furry community and a lot of instances 0:07:45.680 --> 0:07:48.880 but more more more on that later. So after some 0:07:48.960 --> 0:07:51.680 initial research into the Nazi catboy meme, I decided it 0:07:51.680 --> 0:07:54.880 would be useful for tracing back the roots of this 0:07:54.960 --> 0:07:57.560 kind of odd online phenomenon to broaden the scope of 0:07:57.600 --> 0:08:00.320 research to include fem boys as well, uh, which is 0:08:00.360 --> 0:08:03.600 succinctly just cat boys without the cat part. It's like 0:08:03.800 --> 0:08:06.920 boys who or generally male identifying people who dressed in 0:08:06.920 --> 0:08:11.280 like feminine ways. Um, not a lot of fen boys 0:08:11.320 --> 0:08:13.280 will turn out to be trans and not all of 0:08:13.320 --> 0:08:15.760 them do a lot of fen boys identify as straight. 0:08:16.400 --> 0:08:18.679 But you know, I like to wear you know, boys 0:08:18.760 --> 0:08:22.040 generally kind of in the twink variety who likes to 0:08:22.080 --> 0:08:26.400 wear skirts, dresses, whatever, So I a much of it, 0:08:26.440 --> 0:08:28.360 a dissection to which gets a little bit more silly. 0:08:28.680 --> 0:08:33.520 Um but but yeah, so M boys. It's excited this 0:08:33.520 --> 0:08:35.680 This doesn't get less silly as we go on. But 0:08:35.679 --> 0:08:38.439 but yeah, catboys, feen boys. Feen boys identify as male 0:08:38.520 --> 0:08:41.440 dress up in more stereotypically feminine ways. There's a lot 0:08:41.440 --> 0:08:45.280 of similarity and crossover between fen boys and catboys. Um. 0:08:45.360 --> 0:08:48.800 But since fenboys have more of an established online history, uh, 0:08:48.840 --> 0:08:50.679 including them in the research seems like the best way 0:08:50.720 --> 0:08:53.000 to kind of dig into like the fascist femboy nazi 0:08:53.040 --> 0:08:58.160 catboy idea. So, speaking of section two, the racist femboy 0:08:58.240 --> 0:09:01.200 meme the past the past few years, there's been kind 0:09:01.200 --> 0:09:04.760 of a growing meme and perception across social media that 0:09:04.840 --> 0:09:08.240 femboys are like really racist, um and just kind of 0:09:08.280 --> 0:09:12.800 pretty fascy in general. Um, even really homophobic and transphobic 0:09:12.840 --> 0:09:14.720 and a lot of in a lot of senses, as 0:09:14.760 --> 0:09:17.600 much as a homophobic or transphobic femboy may see them 0:09:17.640 --> 0:09:22.920 contradictory at first. But again, more more on this later. Um. 0:09:22.960 --> 0:09:25.079 So when I'm talking about this going forward, I'm probably 0:09:25.120 --> 0:09:28.600 gonna be mixing words and terms like nazi and fascist, 0:09:29.400 --> 0:09:32.160 all right or far right now not not all of 0:09:32.200 --> 0:09:34.760 these racist femboys are what I would call Nazis by 0:09:34.800 --> 0:09:38.559 any means, um and not not not all advocate for 0:09:38.760 --> 0:09:42.400 even joke about genocide, but there were absolutely recruitment attempts 0:09:42.440 --> 0:09:45.560 from self described Nazis. And you know, the line between 0:09:45.679 --> 0:09:48.800 jokes and actual beliefs is intentionally very foggy in this 0:09:48.920 --> 0:09:52.439 kind of internet subculture. So I'll kind of be lazily 0:09:52.480 --> 0:09:55.960 lumping together everything from racist to far far right wing 0:09:56.000 --> 0:09:58.720 folks for the sake of simplicity, because it's all like 0:09:58.840 --> 0:10:01.840 in the same spectrum. And like I mentioned at the beginning, 0:10:01.960 --> 0:10:04.520 not all femboys and cat boys identify as being queer 0:10:05.040 --> 0:10:06.880 um and gay people can still be racist. These there 0:10:06.880 --> 0:10:08.920 are these are points we're going to be circling back 0:10:08.920 --> 0:10:12.920 to a lot. So at this point, the alright femboy 0:10:13.160 --> 0:10:17.000 meme has kind of actually or overshadowed the actual phenomenon 0:10:17.080 --> 0:10:20.079 of it happening. Right in the past few years, the 0:10:20.120 --> 0:10:23.920 popularity of leftist fem boys has skyrocketed, Yet if you 0:10:24.200 --> 0:10:27.200 still do digging on like Twitter or Discord, you can 0:10:27.200 --> 0:10:29.920 indeed fed users who appear to be fem boys but 0:10:29.960 --> 0:10:34.439 are also everything from racist to just openly fascist. Now, 0:10:34.520 --> 0:10:37.560 naturally that leaves people wondering, how can one have such 0:10:37.600 --> 0:10:42.040 a kind of contradictory lifestyle and belief system, which leads 0:10:42.120 --> 0:10:45.240 us to Section three. The Internet and that's it. That's 0:10:45.280 --> 0:10:46.839 kind of that's kind of the answer. We that's we 0:10:46.880 --> 0:10:49.719 can kind of pack it up here. Um. We that's 0:10:49.720 --> 0:10:51.880 the answer. It's the Internet. That's that's why that that's 0:10:51.920 --> 0:10:58.720 why this has happened. That's what I'm getting out of this. Yeah, sure, whatever, whatever, 0:10:58.760 --> 0:11:02.040 it's it's Garrison. Are you you are? Have you been 0:11:02.080 --> 0:11:04.680 caught up on why people say al Gore invented the Internet? 0:11:04.720 --> 0:11:09.680 On where that joke came from? You you have to 0:11:09.760 --> 0:11:16.400 you have to remember Chris Carrison's Oh no, So there 0:11:16.480 --> 0:11:19.560 was like al Gore was among a bunch of different 0:11:19.559 --> 0:11:22.400 people who like voted to fund some of the different 0:11:22.480 --> 0:11:25.080 government kind of projects that became the Internet, right, like 0:11:25.120 --> 0:11:27.400 you have the r pnet and ship all that stuff. 0:11:27.679 --> 0:11:30.880 Like he was one of the people who like pushed that. 0:11:31.040 --> 0:11:33.559 And then in the debate with George Bush while running 0:11:33.559 --> 0:11:38.679 for president in uh two thousand, he uh like basically 0:11:38.840 --> 0:11:42.600 made some claims that you could uncharitably translate as him 0:11:42.640 --> 0:11:45.840 saying that he invented the Internet. Um, he didn't actually 0:11:45.880 --> 0:11:47.400 say that. It was more like he was saying, well, 0:11:47.440 --> 0:11:50.760 I you know, supported from an early stage the development 0:11:50.760 --> 0:11:53.839 of the Internet, but it got turned into like al 0:11:53.920 --> 0:11:57.240 Gore claimed to have invented the Internet because it was funny. 0:11:57.520 --> 0:12:00.640 Ab yes, and and so now that that's that's the 0:12:00.720 --> 0:12:04.800 joke is even though he didn't really he just was 0:12:04.880 --> 0:12:08.199 not you know. But anyway, so we can we can 0:12:08.240 --> 0:12:12.240 blame Nazi cowboys on on al Gore. Absolutely well, that 0:12:12.240 --> 0:12:14.840 that does it for us today. Um you can find 0:12:14.920 --> 0:12:17.000 us on Wait okay, we still have a we still 0:12:17.080 --> 0:12:21.160 have like half an episode to do. Alright, well, here's 0:12:21.520 --> 0:12:25.280 here's speaking of of of al Gore and the Internet. 0:12:25.559 --> 0:12:38.760 Here's some ads brought to you by the Internet. Ah boy, 0:12:38.840 --> 0:12:42.840 those ads were so good they made me wanna be 0:12:43.320 --> 0:12:51.959 a cat. Okay, all right, Wow, moving on. If you're 0:12:51.960 --> 0:12:55.199 in any way familiar with facism, you are probably aware 0:12:55.720 --> 0:12:58.600 that one of it's more consistent traits is that it's 0:12:58.640 --> 0:13:03.440 notoriously ideologically inconsistent. Um So, for for this project, I 0:13:03.480 --> 0:13:06.720 interviewed multiple people who have a more personal history in 0:13:06.760 --> 0:13:09.400 the cat boy and femboy online communities than I do. 0:13:09.960 --> 0:13:12.360 Um So, those interviews, plus my own online digging through 0:13:12.480 --> 0:13:16.800 like hundreds of threads from various form websites. I've I've 0:13:16.840 --> 0:13:19.959 literally looked through hundreds hundreds of the cat boy posts 0:13:20.040 --> 0:13:22.640 on Fortune. But doing doing all that has been very 0:13:22.679 --> 0:13:25.880 helpful for understanding kind of this intersection of politics and subculture. 0:13:26.320 --> 0:13:28.080 And since I did all this research, you don't need 0:13:28.120 --> 0:13:30.640 to so there you go. Um. But one of the 0:13:30.640 --> 0:13:33.000 first kind of big takeaways I had after the research 0:13:33.000 --> 0:13:36.320 and interviews is that the Nazi femboy cat boy thing 0:13:36.920 --> 0:13:40.240 is not actually unique at all in terms of Internet radicalization. 0:13:40.520 --> 0:13:44.520 It just has some aesthetic abnormalities that can confuse on 0:13:44.600 --> 0:13:48.920 liquors or normalise, which makes the internet phenomenon seen more 0:13:48.920 --> 0:13:52.400 outlandish than that actually is. But before we dig deeper 0:13:52.440 --> 0:13:54.200 into this litter box of hate, I would like to 0:13:54.920 --> 0:13:59.920 divide the femboy and catboy kind of racism spectrum into 0:14:00.000 --> 0:14:04.000 actually to two assistinct categories. First, um, we have we 0:14:04.040 --> 0:14:06.760 have type one, which I'm calling the fem fast people 0:14:06.760 --> 0:14:09.839 who are initially into the femboy community and aesthetic and 0:14:09.880 --> 0:14:12.520 then got introduced into far right politics online. And then 0:14:12.520 --> 0:14:14.800 we have type two, the fasci fem people who were 0:14:14.840 --> 0:14:17.920 already into far right politics and only then got introduced 0:14:18.000 --> 0:14:21.960 to the femboi community online. So I usually break down 0:14:22.080 --> 0:14:25.840 lots of instances of fascists mixing with various subcultures into 0:14:25.920 --> 0:14:29.080 these like similar like to two categories of people starting 0:14:29.080 --> 0:14:31.320 off with politics and then getting into the culture, and 0:14:31.400 --> 0:14:33.600 people starting off with the culture then getting into politics. 0:14:34.040 --> 0:14:36.240 I think it's actually kinda it's useful for understanding a 0:14:36.240 --> 0:14:38.480 whole bunch of how there's like differences between different types 0:14:38.480 --> 0:14:43.520 of fascist people in various subcultures. So these two types 0:14:43.520 --> 0:14:45.120 I'm gonna I'm gonna be using to help to help 0:14:45.160 --> 0:14:49.040 talk about these different kind of strains of of the 0:14:49.080 --> 0:14:53.640 fascist femboy. For for now, we're gonna focus on the 0:14:53.640 --> 0:14:57.120 first one, the fem fast. So let's let's let's wind 0:14:57.200 --> 0:15:01.000 let's wind the clocks back. Let's say a decade. Broadly, 0:15:01.080 --> 0:15:05.000 gay people can't get married, and to most kids, trans 0:15:05.040 --> 0:15:08.080 people are ostensibly a myth um. So what kind of 0:15:08.200 --> 0:15:10.320 person is going to become a femboy in this in 0:15:10.360 --> 0:15:13.920 this type of in this type of environment. Simplest answer 0:15:14.080 --> 0:15:16.960 is like a certain sect of social outcasts and anime nerds, 0:15:17.320 --> 0:15:20.280 as well as some people who maybe don't consciously know 0:15:20.520 --> 0:15:23.600 or accept that they're queer yet really the only way 0:15:23.640 --> 0:15:26.160 to get initially exposed to the fembo aesthetic back then 0:15:26.600 --> 0:15:31.160 was via anime, manga, hanti porn, and you know, select 0:15:31.440 --> 0:15:35.960 video games specifically multiplayer games, and random and internet browsing. 0:15:36.040 --> 0:15:37.320 Right this, this is this is how you're gonna get 0:15:37.400 --> 0:15:40.320 exposed to this type of aesthetic. In fact, one of 0:15:40.360 --> 0:15:43.200 the probably the oldest example of a Nazi catboy is 0:15:43.200 --> 0:15:45.760 from an anime called hell Singh where they had they 0:15:45.800 --> 0:15:49.960 had this Nazi catboy character who is the who was 0:15:50.040 --> 0:15:52.520 the source of a lot of Nazi catboy memes on 0:15:52.560 --> 0:15:56.360 four Chan, like the it's very very popular meme figure um. 0:15:56.480 --> 0:15:57.840 And this is I think a lot of where that 0:15:58.000 --> 0:16:00.760 aesthetic tied to fatchism actually really start from. But of 0:16:00.800 --> 0:16:03.960 course there's a lot of fascist fans of anime in general, 0:16:04.280 --> 0:16:07.480 so that the type of aesthetics that the type of 0:16:07.480 --> 0:16:11.240 aesthetics of femininity that animey kind of presents get used 0:16:11.280 --> 0:16:13.520 by fascism a lot. Even among like they're more like 0:16:13.520 --> 0:16:15.880 a cottage core styles, it's still of that very like 0:16:15.960 --> 0:16:20.960 patriarchal um type of femininity that is popular among Japanese animation. 0:16:21.520 --> 0:16:24.160 So now the reasons that someone might be drawn to 0:16:24.160 --> 0:16:27.800 this specific community can vary from person to person. Maybe 0:16:27.840 --> 0:16:29.800 they just don't feel as connected to like the hyper 0:16:29.880 --> 0:16:33.920 macho masculine style that American culture promotes. Maybe it's a 0:16:33.920 --> 0:16:36.800 way to get attention and validation, or maybe you just 0:16:36.840 --> 0:16:40.360 like wearing skirts or find it kind of hot. There's, there's, 0:16:40.360 --> 0:16:42.440 and there's there's always the possibility that someone is transfer 0:16:42.440 --> 0:16:44.240 gain they just don't fully know it yet. This is 0:16:44.280 --> 0:16:47.120 the case with a lot of these people actually, Um, 0:16:47.200 --> 0:16:49.120 but some of some of you may be surprised to 0:16:49.160 --> 0:16:53.400 hear that before our modern TikTok femboy craze, most femboys 0:16:53.520 --> 0:16:56.800 did self identify as straight ancests. Uh. There is a 0:16:56.880 --> 0:16:59.320 lot of reasons for this, including like increased to aphobia 0:16:59.400 --> 0:17:02.520 and transphobi back then, plus, like non binary was hardly 0:17:02.560 --> 0:17:06.159 even the thing like culturally at that at that point. Um. 0:17:06.200 --> 0:17:08.040 One of the people I interviewed for this project talked 0:17:08.080 --> 0:17:10.960 about how some of the sis straight fem boys he 0:17:11.000 --> 0:17:15.280 knew back then now do identify as trans or queer. Um, 0:17:15.320 --> 0:17:17.480 but back then that wasn't really the case. Um. The 0:17:17.520 --> 0:17:19.959 other person I interviewed for this called themselves the sis 0:17:20.000 --> 0:17:22.600 gender femboy at the time of the interview, but has 0:17:22.680 --> 0:17:24.920 now since come out as trans so like it says, 0:17:25.000 --> 0:17:27.639 it is definitely a recurring pattern, but it's not a 0:17:27.640 --> 0:17:29.720 thing for everybody, Like there is definitely like a lot 0:17:29.760 --> 0:17:32.040 like a lot of these people do call themselves straight 0:17:32.080 --> 0:17:35.080 even still now um, and that is something that a 0:17:35.080 --> 0:17:37.240 lot of kind of people don't have a don't have 0:17:37.280 --> 0:17:40.080 the easiest time kind of comprehending. That's I'm gonna what 0:17:40.119 --> 0:17:43.600 I'm gonna kind of try to get into. So let's 0:17:43.800 --> 0:17:47.719 let's let's say you're a kid, young teen and like eleven, 0:17:48.000 --> 0:17:51.199 you're getting into anime and video games. What kind of 0:17:51.200 --> 0:17:53.600 websites are you gonna gravitate to? Right, You're gonna gravitate 0:17:53.720 --> 0:17:56.560 to read it, You're gonna gravitate to four Chan especially 0:17:56.600 --> 0:17:58.679 in right. These are the these are kind of the 0:17:58.720 --> 0:18:02.240 cultural meccas of of those types of type type types 0:18:02.280 --> 0:18:06.160 of subcultures. So what is prelevant on these websites? Well, 0:18:06.320 --> 0:18:08.760 on four Chan we have a slash b which is 0:18:08.840 --> 0:18:11.920 their random channel um which also has a not Safer 0:18:11.960 --> 0:18:15.480 work designation, and it's was often flooded with femboy picks 0:18:16.000 --> 0:18:18.800 UM and since there are so few female users of 0:18:18.840 --> 0:18:21.640 that site, you see a lot of hentai and occasionally 0:18:21.880 --> 0:18:25.200 boys dressing up like not safer work female anime characters, 0:18:25.720 --> 0:18:29.199 just because there's people still like femininity, but there's so 0:18:29.400 --> 0:18:32.240 few actual girls using those sites that the femininity that 0:18:32.280 --> 0:18:34.560 you see is either through anime or it's through kind 0:18:34.560 --> 0:18:37.720 of cross dressing. Um. And then there's also the slash 0:18:37.800 --> 0:18:40.600 d page which is just completely dedicated to Henta I, 0:18:41.000 --> 0:18:42.800 So you get a lot of a lot of a 0:18:42.800 --> 0:18:45.640 lot of that type of like anime style of femininity 0:18:45.800 --> 0:18:49.159 through kind of that that type of appropriation and and 0:18:49.160 --> 0:18:52.800 fetishization on the slash d page. So there's there's a 0:18:52.800 --> 0:18:55.960 decent chance that anime and gaming nerds that browse their 0:18:55.960 --> 0:18:58.840 interests online will get exposed to fen boy staff at 0:18:58.960 --> 0:19:03.040 some point. Right nowadays it's discord, used to be four Chan, 0:19:03.200 --> 0:19:06.679 used to be Reddit, So it becomes this type of 0:19:07.119 --> 0:19:09.399 figure right infinity loop of people who are exposed to 0:19:09.440 --> 0:19:12.480 something and then start propagating it and get exposed to 0:19:12.560 --> 0:19:15.159 new people to it, and it's just like continuous cycle. 0:19:15.480 --> 0:19:17.760 Because if if you're a kid who discovers they kind 0:19:17.800 --> 0:19:21.000 of like this super niche, almost taboo thing, where are 0:19:21.000 --> 0:19:22.879 you going to go to find other like minded people 0:19:23.080 --> 0:19:25.560 that you're gonna go back to? Online multiplayer gaming, Reddit 0:19:25.600 --> 0:19:27.159 and four chune. It's it's it's it's all. It's all 0:19:27.160 --> 0:19:29.960 the same circles. So if if even if you don't 0:19:29.960 --> 0:19:31.880 get exposed to it in places like four chune, you're 0:19:31.880 --> 0:19:37.239 probably gonna end up there or somewhere similar regardless. And 0:19:37.240 --> 0:19:39.679 the other other and and the other thing that's important 0:19:39.720 --> 0:19:41.640 to talk about I which is going to talk about 0:19:41.640 --> 0:19:45.359 like how how the femboys start getting into politics is 0:19:45.400 --> 0:19:48.960 like who else is very prevalent and actively recruiting on 0:19:49.040 --> 0:19:51.879 these types of sites with on like on multiplayer gaming, 0:19:51.880 --> 0:19:55.560 on Reddit and four chan. It's it's nazis right that 0:19:55.920 --> 0:19:58.479 the people who are who are into very far right 0:19:58.760 --> 0:20:01.840 politics try to mask trying to mask some of their 0:20:01.840 --> 0:20:05.200 beliefs initially, and like humor and memes. You know, a lot, large, 0:20:05.280 --> 0:20:07.960 large part of Internet radicalization is done through is done 0:20:07.960 --> 0:20:11.159 through memes, especially especially back in there's like so so 0:20:11.200 --> 0:20:14.280 many like memes. A memes as a social and recruitment tool, 0:20:14.640 --> 0:20:17.760 we're very very common, especially on like you know, if 0:20:17.800 --> 0:20:20.320 you're on like an image board, that that's the whole 0:20:20.320 --> 0:20:23.760 point is that you're sharing images. Um. So a big 0:20:23.800 --> 0:20:27.520 part of this overrepresentation of racists in the femboy community 0:20:27.760 --> 0:20:31.359 was simply the online proximity between these groups of people, 0:20:32.000 --> 0:20:34.840 between the femboys and then the fascists on four Chan 0:20:35.040 --> 0:20:37.080 or have they read it in certain online games, whether 0:20:37.160 --> 0:20:40.119 they be like Second Life, whether it be like MMS. 0:20:40.640 --> 0:20:42.560 You know, all these types of places, and in any 0:20:42.560 --> 0:20:44.520 place that you can design your own character as well, 0:20:44.840 --> 0:20:46.879 You've got got a lot of this type of like 0:20:47.160 --> 0:20:50.199 anime femboy type thing, because a lot of a lot 0:20:50.240 --> 0:20:52.520 of these games that are main in Japan can like 0:20:52.720 --> 0:20:56.760 give like more feminine options for like male characters, or 0:20:56.800 --> 0:20:59.800 just have like Copboy like years and stuff available as 0:20:59.800 --> 0:21:03.840 a cosmetic option. So a lot a lot of this 0:21:03.920 --> 0:21:06.600 fetish fetishization that we see on four Chune and on 0:21:07.119 --> 0:21:10.040 and in the early two thousands and tens is now 0:21:10.160 --> 0:21:12.239 is now applied to Discord. Like this you did kind 0:21:12.240 --> 0:21:15.159 of carry over for trans obviously not the kind of 0:21:15.200 --> 0:21:17.760 cultural behemoth that it used to be. A lot of 0:21:17.760 --> 0:21:20.000 this stuff just happens on Discord now um where you 0:21:20.040 --> 0:21:22.840 can kind of cultivate online communities that are more self contained. 0:21:33.200 --> 0:21:37.200 So throughout the entirety of the fascism was pretty successful 0:21:37.200 --> 0:21:41.119 infesting among nerd spaces, right nerds and geeks of many types, 0:21:41.480 --> 0:21:44.520 whether that be gaming or anime, or these more like 0:21:44.680 --> 0:21:50.399 esoteric communities esotericism like niche um. But these communities generally 0:21:50.480 --> 0:21:53.720 they attract people who are more disenfranchised, right, and them 0:21:53.800 --> 0:21:57.280 boys generally feel disenfranchised in one way or another, which 0:21:57.280 --> 0:21:59.959 just pushes them into these, you know, less mainstream subculture. 0:22:00.480 --> 0:22:02.800 At this point, they could be pretty easy targets for 0:22:02.880 --> 0:22:05.960 fascist recruiters to start suggesting that maybe some of their 0:22:05.960 --> 0:22:09.280 problems in the world are actually coming from feminism, immigrant 0:22:09.320 --> 0:22:12.879 stealing jobs fromative action, and slowly leading into talk of 0:22:12.920 --> 0:22:16.199 like i Q and racism and anti semitism. So for 0:22:16.280 --> 0:22:19.399 those who famil these ideas initially like abhorrent, uh, it 0:22:19.480 --> 0:22:21.440 can be explained at all this talk and simply etgy 0:22:21.520 --> 0:22:24.280 jokes in irony attempting to trigger the enormies, which was 0:22:24.320 --> 0:22:28.280 a big part of that type of propagation of this 0:22:28.359 --> 0:22:31.960 type of humor and then politics masses humor on these 0:22:32.000 --> 0:22:35.000 sites and on these like gaming chats. This isn't unique 0:22:35.480 --> 0:22:38.320 to fem boys or cathboys in any way. Right. The 0:22:39.000 --> 0:22:41.000 more people I interviewed and the more kind of old 0:22:41.040 --> 0:22:44.240 forms that I read, I started to actually see stuff 0:22:44.280 --> 0:22:46.800 that seemed much more familiar. Um, And there's a lot 0:22:46.840 --> 0:22:49.879