StoneToss: Episode 58

Comic Name: Flaming F(l)ag
Description: Intersectional effigies.
Mouseover: a bundle of sticks
Image Name: flag-burning-comic.png
Originally Published: 6/4/2019

What The Comic Is: The first panel, labeled “Free Speech” shows a man stomping on a burning American flag. The second panel, labeled “Hate Speech” shows a man stomping on a burning gay pride flag.

What StoneToss Actually Thinks: If you can destroy an American flag, then you should be able to be homophobic, because it’s hypocritical to say one is okay and the other isn’t.

Why It’s Fucking Stupid: StoneToss is like the personification of bigotry’s duality. On one hand, he wants to make an argument, in bad faith, that can at least vaguely pass as somehow fair or having its own point. In this case, that it should be okay to burn gay pride flags if it’s okay to burn the American flag. This sparks discussion that serves as a catalyst to lead people into potentially agreeing that burning the gay pride flag is something that should not be protected as hate speech. This tactic can, and often does, bear success. However, in order for it to work, the arguer (StoneToss, in this case) has to construct their bad faith in a way that can, on some level, reasonably be seen as a good point (make a comic that isn’t total garbage, in this case). StoneToss wants to achieve this, but he also really wants to hate gay people.

The “right” way to make this argument would be to lean heavily into the comparison to the American flag. By making the people that are represented by the American flag into the ‘victims’ (and being that it can easily be said that literally all Americans are represented by the flag, you can apply this victimhood to everyone/anyone), you can then sway them into thinking the gay rainbow flag should be no different. “They can burn the American flag!” an outraged listener thinks, feeling that the flag burning is a personal affront to them. “The gay pride flag should be no different!“, the listener concludes, feeling that equality in flag burning translates to equity in society.

With such underhanded and intentionally duplicitous rhetoric, it’s easy to put a spin on things that cause people who may’ve only been moderately ignorant on social justice issues to take hard-leaning stances against something like hate speech protections for gay people. StoneToss is either way too lazy, way too stupid or just way too bigoted (or way too all of the above) to compose himself long enough to veil any of his childish hatred. Thus, we get amazingly BASED and BBCPILLED jokes like “Flaming F(l)ag”. Not just “Flaming Flag”, because that would be way to subtle and people might not get that StoneToss is a homophobe. Did you know “faggot” (alternatively spelled as ‘faggat’, ‘faget’, ‘fagett’, etc) is an archaic term denoting a unit of volume? It’s also derogatory slang for a homosexual or a fellow video game player! StoneToss, you clever little dumbfuck. By calling someone a “bundle of sticks”, you’re using a coded form of homophobia hahaomglololo

What exactly makes it hate speech to burn the gay pride flag, while it’s legal to burn the American flag? Well, first of all, “American” is a very vague and broad classification of people. Gay people in the USA are also American, and it’s not like it’s homophobic to burn the flag that represents them (and all other Americans). To put it more bluntly, “American” is a very generic, shallow categorization. Also, much to the chagrin of alt-rightest conspiracy theories across the land: Gay people aren’t a government. The USA, however, does have a government, and it’s been firmly cemented in our constitutional rights from day one that citizens are free and able to disagree and protest their government. Burning an American flag is recognized as a form of protest against the government. You do not need to “protest against the gay pride government”, because it doesn’t fucking exist. Burning the gay pride flag says only one thing: gay people do not have equity in human rights. All governments may be gay, but not all gay are governments. It is written.

Comic Name: Think of the children
Description: Let’s be real for a second.
Mouseover: Pre-pubescent drag queens are only the beginning
Image Name: gay-molestation-comic.png
Originally Published: 6/6/2019

What The Comic Is: A man groans at the gay pride flag. His friend clasps him by the shoulder, asking him how he’d feel about it should his son would turn out gay. The man, shocked, alarmingly questions why he’d ever molest his own son.

What StoneToss Actually Thinks: Blah blah blah, gay people are caused by childhood trauma. Also, however, that homophobia is defensible because you can simply argue that you’d never “create” a homosexual child by molesting them.

Why It’s Fucking Stupid: We’ve been down this same road with StoneToss in the past, so this isn’t new territory. However, StoneToss uses this comic as an attempt to workshop a “perfect comeback” in response to questioning a homophobe how they’d feel if their own child turned out to be gay. Many homophobes, depending on the depth of their bigotry, would simply tell you they’d disown or even harm their child if they came out as gay. Some would deny their child would ever be gay, though they’d stop short of explaining just how their child would assuredly never be gay. StoneToss puts one wet match against another wet match and, discovering that no spark is created, opts to make a fart noise with his mouth and pretend his stupid plan actually worked. Combining the amazing idea of denying a child could turn out gay and the science-denying bigotry of “people are only gay because they were molested as a kid”, StoneToss bids all to feast their eyes on his latest shittake: claiming your kid won’t turn out gay because you won’t molest them!

Add in a quick dash of conflating child drag queens with homosexuals and the classic slippery slope fallacy of “first gays, then trans, then pedos”. Just because we can’t have a StoneToss comic that isn’t not too stupid.

I love the head-up-the-ass smugness of the comic’s description. Like StoneToss is throwing back the peel of (((political correctness))) and asking, in exaggerated deadpan, if we can all just “be real” for a second. See? There’s literally NO ARGUMENT OR FACT you can’t defeat if you’re willing to be ignorant and bigoted enough! Inspiring.