What they don't want you to know about Islam

For years the regressive left has been engaging in a whitewashing campaign about Islam. Muslims in general, and many Islamic scholars in particular, especially the extremists, are happy to play along, and repeat all the same mantras as the regressive leftists (who know absolutely nothing about Islam).

However, there are many well-known facts about Islam that they simply want to ignore, and categorically deny, against even the word of Muslim scholars themselves.

The first two of these facts are they key to the rest of them, so they are the most fundamental.

1) Islam is a "Muslims-only" religion

One key thing to understand that whenever Islamic scholars speak of positive aspects and attitudes in the religion, they are talking about having those positive attitudes with and doing the positive things to other Muslims. In general, non-Muslims are not included in this category.

Many of the points below are related to this, but here's a good example: Many extremist Islamic preachers will happily declare, especially after an unusually large and publicized terrorist attack, that Islam condemns the killing of innocent people.

What they won't tell you is what they mean by "innocent". You see, in Islam only Muslims can be innocent. Non-Muslims are not included in this category. This is especially conspicuous if these preachers fail to specifically declare those victims of the attack as the "innocent" ones (although, by the next point below, they aren't above doing exactly that.)

2) Lying to and deceiving non-Muslims is acceptable

In many religions absolute honesty is considered a virtue, and lying and deception (no matter who is being lied to) is considered a sin.

Not so in Islam. In Islam, deceiving non-Muslims is perfect acceptable, especially in societies where Muslims are the minority and are not in power, in order to protect Islam and Muslims, and to advance their agenda. This is not just theoretical, as this is quite directly stated in the Islamic scriptures. It's not even a big secret, as Islamic scholars and preachers are quite open about it.

Islamic scholars and preachers will happily go along anything that western people want them to say, even if it goes blatantly against their own convictions and religious teachings. In their own view this is not treachery or being a sellout, nor a sin against their god. It's simply an acceptable tactic, when not in power in the surrounding society.

3) In Islam, "peace" means something else

The west keeps pounding on about how Islam is "the religion of peace". Islamic scholars will happily go along with it, and in this case they aren't even lying per se. They are just being deceitful. Lying by omission.

That's because when they use the word "peace" in this context, they mean something else than what the non-Muslims mean. It does not mean being amicable and cooperating with other cultures and societies. In their religious view, "peace" is only achieved when the entire world has been subjugated under Islam. When the entire world has been converted, and is 100% Islamic. That's the "peace" they are seeking, and fighting for. Thus, "Islam is a religion of peace" is, in this context, technically correct. It's a synonym for "Islam is a religion that aims to conquer the entire world and subjugate to Islam." That's the goal. That's the "peace" that they advocate for.

4) The hijab/burqa is a symbol of submission

The regressive left has engaged in a massive campaign to whitewash the meaning and symbolism of both the hijab and the burqa. They often don't exactly try to explain what its symbolism is, but they want people to believe that A) it's just a choice, and B) it's just an innocuous religious symbol, not unlike a Christian having a cross necklace.

The hijab and the burqa are much more than that in Islam. Most fundamentally, they are a symbol of submission to Allah and Islam. And in most Islamic societies it's most definitely not a choice. A woman is considered a pure and innocent Muslim only if she covers up with a hijab or a burqa. In these cultures it's widely viewed that women who do not wear them are promiscuous whores, who are either not Muslim at all, or rebellious Muslims who do not submit to Allah and deserve punishment. In many Islamic countries, and Islamic communities in western countries, only women who wear a hijab or a burqa are to be respected, while western women who do not wear them are considered whores.

It's especially egregious when female world leaders will wear a hijab when visiting an Islamic country, or being visited by Islamic dignitaries. These women believe that it's simply a sign of respect to their culture. In reality what they are signaling to those Muslims is that she, and by extension her entire country, is submissive to Islam. It's a symbol that says that she holds Islam as the highest authority, above everything else.

5) Islam is most definitely not a feminist religion

Many Islamists will happily claim that Islam is the only feminist religion. Again, see point #2 above.

Islam is most definitely not feminist. It's the exact opposite. It's extraordinarily and blatantly patriarchal. How anybody can believe otherwise is mind-boggling.

Islamic scriptures very explicitly allow polygamy, and allow it in one direction only: A man can have up to four wives (a woman cannot have multiple husbands). Moreover, the same scriptures explicitly allow husbands to physically beat their wives to discipline them (and this is a fact often defended by Islamic preachers, especially among their own congregation, even if they keep it more under the wraps when westerners are listening.) The exact same scriptures state, quite clearly, that women are mentally inferior to men, which is why the testimony of one man is worth that of two women. Indeed, if there is some kind of accusation against somebody, and there is witness testimony, the testimony of two women weights as much as the testimony of one man. This is very clearly and unambiguously stated. (The reason for this is also quite unambiguously stated, as women being mentally weaker and more unreliable than men.)

Islam enacts a traditionally fundamentalist patriarchal system. Rather obviously, the husband is the head of the family, in all aspects. Inheritance goes first and foremost to a father's first-born son, or his other sons to some extent. Only if he has no sons, only daughters, could inheritance go to one of them. In many Islamic countries women are generally not allowed to own much property, are not allowed to even drive cars (with some Islamic countries only recently allowing a limited form of this), and often not even allowed to walk alone on the streets without a male companion. Even when a woman may have some property (eg. inherited from her father, who had no sons), she relinquishes this property to her husband when she gets married.

Universities are the key to our success and our doom

It is highly ironic that universities played a key role in building modern western civilization, and now they are playing a key role in the destruction of that very same civilization.

More and more aspects of our society have been invaded and taken over by totalitarian quasi-religious zealots who are intent in destroying everything that makes our civilization a successful and peaceful technologically and socially advanced modern welfare society.

The main influencer of public opinion, the press, the mainstream media, is in the western world almost unanimously extreme-leftist, and has become in an ever-increasing and accelerating manner nothing but a propaganda machine and mouthpiece for the totalitarian ideology of the regressive left, regularly engaging in distorted and fabricated stories in order to promote the agenda. More and more schools and other educational institutions have been taken over by activists whose mission is to indoctrinate people, from as a young age as possible, into the agenda.

In our capitalist-economy society, the main goal of companies and corporations is to make money for their owners, shareholders and employees, yet in an ever-increasing manner this goal is being supplanted by another goal: That of political activism, virtue-signaling, and imposing the ideology onto their clients (including up to refusing service and banning clients that refuse to conform to the ideology), even at the expense of the monetary income of the company.

Even science itself is becoming more and more anti-science by the day, with the political agenda taking a hold on the scientific community, where it has become more important to push the political agenda and ideology, even at the expense of finding out scientific facts. More and more fields of science are being invaded, with some fields even starting to go against the scientific method in order to promote the sociopolitical ideology. This gets very dangerous and scary when the field in question is medicine and the medical practice. Postmodernist ideas, which are deeply and inherently unscientific and anti-science, are getting more and more hold, especially on the so-called soft sciences (such as medicine, psychology, sociology, etc.) Promotion of the ideology, and the ensuing discriminatory practices are becoming commonplace in all of science.

Discrimination, racism, the erosion of basic human rights and freedoms, are becoming more and more prevalent, with many institutions, schools and companies already openly engaging in discriminatory practices based on things like race and sex.

How did it come to this?

Universities. They are the key, and the source of all of this.

Universities are the primary source of all knowledge and progress in the world. They are the birthplace of all scientific endeavors, research and progress. They are the primary source for the world's scientists, journalists, doctors, CEO's, politicians and lawmakers. For centuries universities have been the driving force for technological and social progress. University alumni, by far and large, are the people who become the main influencers of progress and society.

And now the vast majority of universities, especially in certain key countries, have become completely invaded by totalitarian ideologues, who have converted these learning institutions into indoctrination and political activism training camps. The staff of many universities is not only pretty much unanimously extreme-leftist, but it also pretty much unanimously consists of political activists dedicated to imposing their agenda onto society, via their students.

The devastating effects of this invasion can already be seen. The west is becoming more and more totalitarian by the day. Discrimination based on political opinion, race and sex, by all kinds of institutions and corporations, has become a common occurrence. An agenda of destruction of the western world, both by destroying the very foundations of society and progress, and by the mass importation of foreign incompatible cultures with the aim of replacing the western culture, has been enacted at an ever-accelerating rate. It's only a matter of time before a literal genocide, in the same vein as what the USSR engaged in (where an estimated 80-100 million people were massacred for political reasons during the history of the regime), will start being enacted.

The population, especially the part of the population that forms its vast majority and is also the most affected by all this, ie. the working class, has already begun to some extent trying to fight back, at least in some countries, via the only way they have (still) available to them: By the democratic process of voting. So-called "right-wing" political parties are slowly becoming more and more popular, in order to combat this self-destruction.

The problem is, while the government is indeed in a key role to affect this change, it will not be enough, and voting for "right-wing" parties will probably not solve the problem. That's because voting these parties into the government is only fighting the symptoms, not the root cause. The root cause is found in universities, not in the government. As long as universities remain under the iron grip of the identitarian zealots, they will always produce more and more political activists who will do everything in their power to undermine even the strongest of governments.

I strongly believe that the only way to save the western world is a complete and total reform of universities. Universities are the key to everything. We can vote for opposing political parties into the government all we like, we can do all the online activism we like, but that's not going to be enough, as long as universities are being controlled by the zealots. As long as universities are not completely reformed, the western civilization is doomed to self-destruction.

However, I don't know how this could happen. Once the zealots have got hold of power, and in universities they have, they will not let go of it. They will never, ever step down voluntarily, and will fight with everything they got to remain in power. I have absolutely no idea how they could be removed from universities without, hypocritically, infringing upon their fundamental human rights.

And even if by some miracle, like some extreme governmental intervention, universities are completely reformed, with their staff being completely exchanged with neutral scientists and professors, what exactly stops them from being slowly re-invaded by the zealots? How can we stop that?

I don't see any future for the western society. We are going down at an ever-increasing rate. Our society is collapsing, our economy is going to collapse, and the only future I can see for western society is a soft Islamic invasion, due to the mere fact that we are importing millions of them, and they are having significantly more children than non-Muslims. And since they are the only demographic that's completely untouchable, and the regressive leftist zealots will never indoctrinate, they are free to build their totalitarian ideology in the west, until they become the majority, and take over. And after that happens, it will probably be centuries before any form of recuperation may happen. Perhaps the only solace one can take is that once Islam takes over, the regressive left will be no more. But it won't be much better. (Ironically, the regressive left will welcome this with open arms, even if it means their own destruction. Perhaps even their own literal death.)

Universities were the key to build our society, and they are the key that will destroy it. Oh, the irony.

Getting tired of American conservatives' obsession with the 2nd Amendment

Many times when watching YouTube videos about the latest incident of censorship by one of the Silicon Valley tech megacorporations, or the latest stupidity said or done by some institution, like a university or whatever, or whatever the latest craziness or trampling of people's rights is, almost invariably you will see in the comment section of the video people saying things like:

"This is why we need the 2nd Amendment!"

or:

"Remember: Never give up your guns!"

I have several times written a response to such a comment, along the lines of:

"How exactly is the 2nd Amendment helping this situation?

University after university, corporation after corporation, institution after institution, has been invaded and overtaken by regressive leftist ideologues, who are indoctrinating their students into becoming activists, and enacting all kinds of draconian rules that trample over people's rights and freedoms. What exactly has your beloved 2nd Amendment done to deter or stop this? Absolutely nothing.

Giant tech corporations are censoring, banning and discriminating against people because of their political opinions. Social media and online video services are banning people, payment processors are denying their services and discriminating against people, banks have refused service to people, because of their political opinions. What exactly has the 2nd Amendment done to deter or stop this? Absolutely nothing.

Masked terrorists are roaming the streets, harassing people, beating up people, disrupting traffic, rioting, vandalizing and breaking all kinds of laws, trying to intimidate people. What exactly has the 2nd Amendment done to deter or stop this? Absolutely nothing.

So far, I have got no rational response. Very often they will go to the stereotypical yada-yada about "the 2nd Amendment stopping the government from becoming tyrannical", to which I respond that the problem is not the government, but all these corporations and institutions trampling over people's rights and freedoms, and restricting their free speech, and denying them essential services. We are talking about problems that are happening right now, with people being discriminated against right now, not about some hypothetical future overtaking of the government. The 2nd Amendment has done absolutely nothing to stop this from happening, and is not going to do anything.

They just have no response.

One particular person responded to me, in the comment section of a video that was about Google, Facebook and Twitter, something along the lines of: "Maybe you won't do anything about it."

I asked him (paraphrasing): "And what exactly would you do about it? Go to the Google headquarters on a shooting spree? How exactly would that help anything?"

I got no response.

The 2nd Amendment is not the solution to this problem. (The only solution to the problem that I can think of is a complete reform of universities from scratch, but that's a topic for another blog post, which I have been thinking about.)

Predictions for the near future, part 16

One thing about the regressive leftist social justice ideology is that when they get something completely wrong, and are explained why they are wrong over and over... they eventually learn. Not always, but in some cases they do eventually learn, especially when the evidence is too overwhelming.

The problem is, they learn the wrong lesson.

As an example, for years and years, and to a large extent to this day, they kept pounding on and on about how white people in the west are the most "privileged" class, and that all the other ethnic groups are significantly less privileged. Their critics started pointing out to them that actually no, white people are not the ethnic group that's the most "privileged". Using pretty much any measure of "privilege" and "success" you want, east Asians are actually better off than white people. On average, east Asians living in the west (especially in the United States) have the highest income, the best jobs, the highest salaries, the best school grades and scores, commit and experience the least amount of crime, have the least amount of single-parent families, and pretty much any other thing you may want to use to measure success and "privilege".

After years of presenting this counter-argument, some entities have actually taken heed and, ironically, in many institutions and companies east Asians are nowadays the most discriminated-against ethnic group, eg. in enrollment or hiring, and in career advancement.

For example some universities, like Harvard, apply different standards of qualifications for enrollment for people based on their ethnicity (and somehow this supposedly is not racism), and the group of people with the highest requirement, and thus the group of people most discriminated against in enrollment, is east Asian men (with east Asian women being slightly below them, but still higher than white people.) It has got so bad that Asians need to lie about their origin in order to not get discriminated against. Some companies are likewise discriminating against east Asians in hiring, salary raises and career advancement (Google being infamously one, as pointed out by the lawsuit they are currently facing.)

So they have learned the facts... but come to the horrendously wrong conclusion. The point of presenting this counter-argument is not to have them discriminate even more against east Asians!

Given this propensity for eventually learning the facts, but coming to the completely wrong conclusions based on it, I'm predicting that something else related to this will happen in the near future:

For years and years the regressive left has pushed forward the tabula rasa hypothesis, or "blank slate" hypothesis: That is, the hypothesis that people are born completely "blank", with no innate instincts, personality traits, feelings or attitudes of any kind, and that everything, every single aspect of their personality and thoughts is learned, a product of upbringing and what they learn from the surrounding environment. Therefore any differences there are eg. between men and women is 100% learned and cultural, taught to them by society. Therefore, they conclude, we need to change society to "teach men not to rape", and to get rid of "toxic masculinity" and to allow them to show their feelings, and for women to stop being submissive and subservient.

In fact, some social justice ideologues go as far as claiming that even physical differences between men and women (such as differences in strength) are learned, not innate.

We know for a fact that this hypothesis is false. It's false on two aspects: For one, we know for a fact that people do have innate instincts and personality traits that are inherited and innate, not learned. (This doesn't mean that all personality traits are innate. However, it does mean that some are.)

Secondly, there are differences on average in terms of personality between boys and girls, and one of the major factors that affect these differences is not culture, but biology. More precisely, testosterone.

We know for a fact that not only does testosterone cause a very big difference in physical traits (such as strength, stamina, muscle structure, lung capacity and height, among others), but it also has a great effect on personality. There is, in fact, a rather direct correlation between testosterone levels in childhood, and the strength of the personality traits caused by it.

For example, males tend to be less empathetic than females. The higher the testosterone levels during childhood, the less empathetic the boy tends to be. Curiously, this also directly correlates to how interested the person is in mechanical things (finding out how things work, tinkering with them, building them...) This demonstrably happens even before these children have had any sort of opportunity to be taught about these things. Males also tend to be more stoic, being less easily driven by and overwhelmed by emotion. They of course also tend to be more aggressive, and have a propensity to taking risks.

Girls, on the other hand tend to be more empathetic, and be more interested in people than in machines. Girls and women can more easily read and understand people's feelings and emotional states (while men tend to be completely oblivious to them), can sympathize more easily, and are often much more driven by emotion. The fact that young girls tend to be more interested in dolls and boys more interested in toy cars is not a learned stereotype that they are taught. It's innate, and this has been tested again and again.

And here's my prediction: Since it has been tested again and again that there's a direct correlation between testosterone level and how stereotypically "manly" a person becomes (stoic, aggressive, unempathetic, taking risks...), it's perfectly possible that the regressive left will finally end up accepting this... and come to the completely wrong, and horrendous, conclusion.

What is this horrendous conclusion? Well, consider that hormone blockers exist. And consider that they are already being given to children that are younger and younger.

And consider that all medical doctors graduate from universities, which have been for decades taken over by regressive leftist social justice activists, who are engaging in an absolutely massive indoctrination campaign of their students.

It's not a very far-fetched prediction to make.

Why I'm not a fan of Final Fantasy 7

Final Fantasy VII is considered by many to be one of the best, if not even the best, game in the entire Final Fantasy series. In my opinion, it's not a horrible game per se, but I'm not a big fan of it either, for many reasons.

My initial experience with the game was less than positive, as it left me with a quite sour impression. To understand why, we have to go back to the time when I played the game for the first time, in the early 2000's.

I had previously played Final Fantasy VIII, as well as Final Fantasy IX. All three of these games are for the same console generation, namely the first PlayStation. My primary notion of what a (at that time) "modern" 3D Final Fantasy game should look like was shaped by these two games. At the time, FF VIII looked absolutely fantastic.

It might not look like much by modern standards, but you have to remember that this was the era of the first PlayStation, and the year was 2000. In that time period, in that context, the graphics of FF VIII, as well as its prerendered cutscenes, looked absolutely stunning.

FF IX, for the same console, was also very good-looking, even though the visual design was rather different.

As mentioned, this is the background I had about the (at the time) "modern" 3D Final Fantasy games. Believe it or not, I didn't actually know what Final Fantasy VII looked like, graphically. While the internet was already in full form in the early 2000's, and I had internet access, I was still completely unaware of what the game looked like.

When I first started playing the game, I was seriously thinking if it was some kind of joke.

It was surreal. I was wondering if this was some kind of prank, some kind of really weird April's Fools joke being played on me, or something. No way the game looked like this. Even the prerendered cutscenes (which in FF8 were absolutely fantastic) looked like complete ass.

It slowly dawned on me that yes... the game does really look like this. It's not some kind of joke, or some kind of weird in-game hallucination, where the characters start looking like this for some reason, but later the actual graphics are revealed. No, it's like this all the way through.

I'm not making this up. For like the first hour or two I played the game I was kind of hoping that this was just some weird intro thing, like some kind of weird dream sequence, or someone's imagination, or something, where the dream is being represented by chibi characters, and that the actual real graphics would appear at some point. But nope. The more I played the game, the clearer it became that it would be like this in its entirety.

It was a disappointment. I might have played the games in the "wrong" order, which had put my expectations on technical quality too high, but still, it was a disappointment.

The other major problem was that even though I hadn't got myself "spoiled" on the graphical look of the game, it was pretty much impossible to not having been spoiled about the biggest twist in the game. This meant that since I knew what would happen eventually, I didn't emotionally invest at all in the character involved. Since there was no emotional investment of any kind, the whole sequence where the twist happens felt completely hollow and emotionless. Even boring.

Overall, as a game, as a JRPG, I didn't find it all that great. Definitely not the worst JRPG out there, and not even the worst Final Fantasy game out there... but it was mostly quite meh. I just didn't understand, nor have I since understood, what was so great about it. It was just... meh.

In retrospect I do understand one reason why I found it quite meh even back then: The complete change in setting and tone compared to previous games in the series.

All six of the previous games were high fantasy games, set in some kind of fictional universe based at large on medieval Europe and Japan. You know, your archetypal high fantasy setting. Perhaps the only exception to this is, partially, Final Fantasy VI, which already started showing more sci-fi influences in it (by having steampunk-like magitech machinery and technology). However, it was still mostly pure high fantasy, with the magitech part not being extremely intrusive or tone-setting. (And, in my opinion, Final Fantasy VI is the best game in the entire series.)

But what started a bit with FF6, they went full swing in FF7. Where FF6 is like 90% fantasy, 10% sci-fi, FF7 is more like 95% sci-fi, 5% fantasy. This was a very radical change in setting and tone.

I'm not very fond of this kind of setting in JRPGs. Unfortunately it appears that Square is set-on in making all Final Fantasy games use this 95%/5% sci-fi/fantasy setting (with the only exception being FF9, which was almost pure high fantasy. But that game was a deliberate throwback anyway.)

What started with FFVII has continued with FFVIII, FFX, FFXIII and FFXV. (I have not played FFXII, which I understand is more fantasy once again. It might be an exception. The remaining two are MMORPGs, which I have zero interest in.)

I'm actually not looking forward to the upcoming FF7 remake, especially since it seems to follow this obsession by Square Enix of removing every possible traditional JRPG element from the Final Fantasy franchise, which they started with FFX and have continued all the way to FFXV, which has almost no traditional JRPG elements of any kind (although it's not even nearly as bad as FFX and FFXIII were in this regard.)

In my opinion, the last good Final Fantasy game, the last actual Final Fantasy game, was the 9th one. After that... they took the FF7 formula and went way too far with it.

In a way, one could say that FF7 ruined the entire franchise. It paved the way for the modern Final Fantasy games, which are just unenjoyable and retain pretty much nothing of what made the first games in the series so good.

One thing that no social justice warrior understands

Social justice warriors are trying to gain absolute power and control, and create a society that's to their liking. However, there's one thing that absolutely no social justice warrior understands. Not a single one of them:

There will be no time, no matter what happens, when they will declare "OK, society is now exactly as we want it, it's perfect, and there's no more need for social justice activism. Everything is fixed now."

That will never, ever happen, no matter how society is changed.

The reason is not because society cannot be changed. The reason is that social justice warriors will never be happy with how society is, no matter how it's changed.

The social justice ideology is a cult of oppression. Being oppressed is exalted as a virtue. The more oppressed you are, the higher your pedestal is. It doesn't matter if you are actually demonstrably oppressed, or whether you are just making up more and more forms of "oppression" that you are allegedly a "victim" of.

Social justice warriors are deeply indoctrinated into this cult of oppression, and thus they will always, always, find some way in which somebody is being "oppressed", no matter what. Being "oppressed" is a virtue, and not being "oppressed" is being "privileged", and "privilege" is the ultimate sin, and thus must be avoided at all costs. Thus social justice warriors actively seek for oppression, either for themselves, or for others, often both.

And there can't be oppression without oppressors. If somebody is being oppressed, then somebody is oppressing that person. There's always a culprit, a scapegoat. An enemy to fight.

This cult mentality is not going to end no matter how society is changed. There will never come a time where they will suddenly stop thinking in terms of oppression and declare that "all oppression has ended, our work is done and we can stop".

No, they will always seek and find "oppression", no matter what. They will always seek and find "oppressors", no matter what. Even if they have got rid of all the old "oppressors", they will find new ones, even if it's among themselves. They are in fact doing that to some extent right now. This is only going to get worse and worse with time, if they get in power and get rid of their current "enemies" somehow. They will just find new enemies among their own ranks.

It's never going to end. Society will never be "fixed". Even in the best possible scenario, from their own perspective, it will only end up with them destroying themselves by infighting, as they find more and more "oppressors" and enemies among their own ranks, until nobody is left and everything has been destroyed.

It's a completely doomed ideology. The only way it's going to last is, ironically, if they don't gain absolute power, and their opposition holds them at bay, and stops them from taking over everything. (Which is, ironically, a dilemma. Fighting the social justice ideology and stopping it from gaining absolute power is only perpetuating the ideology. On the other hand, the alternative is much worse.)

I don't understand what Doug Walker/Nostalgia Critic is doing

Doug Walker is a comedian/actor who self-publishes comedy sketches, reviews and other sort of videos online. By far his most famous fictional character role is "the Nostalgia Critic", which gained him and his small team enormous online fame (and huge amounts of income) since about 2007-2008. The Nostalgia Critic show concentrates on making humorous "reviews" of movies (for the longest time only movies from the 80's and older, hence the name "nostalgia" critic). He showed a great amount of talent at making these "reviews" interesting, entertaining and hilarious. He also made a few other shows with other fictional characters, some of them being quite good as well.

Then, in 2012, pretty much at the height of his popularity, he suddenly decided that he was tired of his Nostalgia Critic show, and decided to end it, and start an entirely new and unrelated show named "Demo Reel".

This didn't sit well at all with his audience and fans. Not only did he receive a huge amount of backlash for ending the Nostalgia Critic show (especially given how he ended it), but the "Demo Reel" show was universally panned and considered extremely boring and uninteresting, and just a very bad show. The criticism was so bad that he ended the new show after a mere 5 episodes, and started making Nostalgia Critic episodes once again (and has been doing them since then, as of writing this blog post.)

Anyway, here is what I'm really puzzled about his subsequent decisions in regards to that whole debacle.

Seemingly because he was pretty much swimming in money thanks to the Nostalgia Critic show and its popularity, he decided to make Demo Reel a more high-budget show and, among other things, hired two new professional actors for it, Rachel Tietz and Malcolm Ray (who, as far as I understand, was, and still is, actually a member of the Screen Actors Guild, so he's a bona fide professional actor). I'm guessing hiring two actors (at least one of them an actual professional actor) isn't exactly cheap.

His plan was most probably to make Demo Reel a long-lasting relatively high-budget show that would last for years and years, with probably dozens and dozens, perhaps even hundreds of episodes. Due to the huge backlash, however, it ended short, after a mere 5 episodes. So he ended it, and went back to making good old Nostalgia Critic episodes.

Except... he kept the two actors hired. For reasons I cannot even begin to understand.

I understand their need for the Demo Reel show, because it wasn't a review show, but a fully acted comedy sketch show, with lots of screen time for all actors.

However, he dragged the two actors into his Nostalgia Critic show... even though they don't have much to do there. In most episodes the two actors have like a few minutes of screentime (from an episode that's often over half an hour long.) In most episodes they are more like cameos rather than actual roles. In most episodes they play no significant role, and are pretty much superfluous.

In fact, with only a few exceptions, the more screentime they have in a particular episode, the more boring the episode tends to be. That's because these episodes are too reminiscent of Demo Reel (which, apparently, Doug is still trying to imitate to some extent, for reasons known only to him.) He has, in fact, made a few Nostalgia Critic episodes that are pretty much Demo Reel episodes, with no footage whatsoever of the film being "reviewed" (or in these cases parodied). These are some of the worst and worst-received Nostalgia Critic episodes ever.

As said, there are a few exceptions to this (eg. I consider the "The Shining" episode, where the two actors actually have considerable screentime, and contribute quite a lot, to be quite good), but they are extraordinarily rare. In most episodes they contribute pretty much nothing, and nothing of relevance would have been lost if they didn't appear at all.

What's even more puzzling is that after a couple of years one of the actors, Rachel, had to leave the show due to other commitments (which, if I remember correctly, required her to move to the other side of the country). What did Doug do? Hire another actress to replace her!

Why?

No offense to them (they are fine actors), but they don't contribute pretty much anything to the show! They are for the most part completely superfluous, only appearing in essentially short cameo roles and quick jokes (that are very lame and uninspired ones for the most part).

Why Doug keeps them hired is beyond my comprehension. Surely they cannot be cheap. He's pouring what's probably a rather significant amount of money for mostly some useless cameo appearances, often requiring just a minute or two of screentime that doesn't really contribute anything to the episode. And he has been doing this since 2012.

Even after all the #changethechannel controversy and the mass exodus and boycott of the Channel Awesome organization, which surely caused it a lot of lost revenue, he is still keeping the two actors in the payroll. For no discernible reason. The two actors haven't had a significant role in years (long gone are the times of episodes like the "The Shining" one. They have for a very long time been uninspired and boring, painted-by-the-numbers.)

I cannot comprehend what goes inside the head of this man.