ResetEra strikes again. This time, claiming that Square Enix has made Barrett an “ignorant racist caricature”.

The OP of the thread elaborating on that stance;

“The amount of rage this man generates inside me whenever he is on screen is insane. I haven’t seen anything this hilariously racist in a AAA game since…. I don’t even know when. Who the hell has angry black man and scary black man tropes in their games in 2020? Seriously. SE a global billion dollar conglomerate with all sorts of people working for them so I’m not going to buy the Japan excuse at all.”

When some users began to question the take, Abdul entrenched himself.

Because why give an explanation of your thoughts using actual logic and critical thinking (which the OP seems devoid of anyways, so I guess it’s not surprising) when you can just link to TV Tropes.

When in questioned again, Abdul just repeats the process adding, “Don’t be goofy”. Really quality work here Abdul.

Where this entire entire situation goes directly to Clown World is when moderators start mass banning people who question Abdul’s claims of Square and Barret actually being a racist depiction. Most of the bans lasting between 2 and 3 weeks long. Simply for disagreeing with the OP’s take.

All of those users banned, from ranges mostly between 2 weeks to a month. 2 weeks to a month for disagreeing with an OP who was most likely self projecting his own racist views…

Also, let me disclaim this. To keep my sanity, I didn’t go through the entire 24 page thread, only about the first 10 pages. It’s likely there were even more people banned throughout the thread.

Perhaps almost as embarrassing as those bans is the lack of consistency, as a few other posters who seemed to question the narrative did not receive bans.

I was holding out on one other banned post though… This one, where the poster even predicts their ban and calls out the hypocrisy of Reset Era. (Copy past with the text below, since it’s easier to read.)

“I will get banned for this, which is baffling considering that this is supposed to be an inclusive community. I’ve stumbled upon the link to this thread elsewhere, so probably that qualifies as “drive-by posting”. I understand how this might feel, the trope is prevalent in numerous works. I concur that Barret may feel like a generic representation of “angry/scary black man”. What I do not understand is the consent for reducing him to mere trope. I have not played remake, because I refuse to participate in blatant milking of one of my favorite games, but I guess in the original, the argument still holds. Even in the link to tvtropes, the thumbnail shows Jules from Pulp Fiction. Assuming this is an accurate example of the trope, Barret’s character complexity is way beyond Jules and it feels unfair to keep the same ramifications for assessing his character. He’s angry for a valid reason; everyone should be as angry as he was – given the situation Midgar was in. At many times Barret is just as angry about the situation as he is about people not being angry about Shinra. He loves his daughter and he wants her to thrive in a beautiful, pristine world. Yet today, he’s just an “angry black guy with a gun”. He’s just Mr T, who breaks shit. I’m assuming most people here are leaning left, many perhaps are activists. I can also safely guess that a lot of you care about environment. How many times were you reduced to a “whacko nutjob” – because you cared about something passionately? Dismissed and reduced to a “femi/eco/gay-nazi”? People who say: “I don’t care, I like him” and get banned in the aftermath, are correct. They don’t care about Barret’s race or gender, but what he represents. Isn’t that what everyone here would like? To not be profiled? To not be labeled? To not be reduced to a bloody tv trope?”

It seems that poster has no time limit on their ban as most of the others did, I assume they were banned permanently.

That’s the agenda Reset Era seems to push. A safe space, free from any actual conversations and discourse, where everyone agrees with each other on various topics to be faux outraged about. I can’t imagine why anyone would want to run a community like that. Or partake in a community like that.

Pathetic.

(Art by @jdotkdot5 )

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