I'm a 2D animator and the creator of FIL: an RPG about robots who save the Solar system!

My website- www.cartmart.art/

Contact me at carterish632@gmail.com


Clip Mart

Check out this excellent, funky film I helped make! It was my capstone project in college where I met a bunch of incredible people and I’m so glad it’s finally public to watch!

4 months ago | [YT] | 2

Clip Mart

So I’m gonna get political real quick and even though I’m not exactly a public figure of any kind and what little “brand” I have is very much silly and goofy, I have some heavy thoughts and this is the only forum I could think of to convey them publicly. It’s gonna be long-winded, pretentious and kinda gloomy so watch out. TLDR; I’m not happy about the election results and I think we’re better than this.

It seems as though the ideals the US was founded on are not aligned with the priorities of its people. The belief in a populist nation guided by the fundamental right to autonomy for its citizens and a government that can be trusted to uphold and enable their liberty, a country whose identity is not intrinsically linked to its geography or a religion, but to the coming together of people from all countries, religions, and walks of life, with a collective interest in elevating the common good by enabling the pursuit of happiness. Yet what that pursuit evidently means to some is the ability to carve out their own place in a social hierarchy, to subjugate or expel the “others” whose existence and pursuit of happiness is in some way inconvenient to theirs. Thus, we habitually give power to a government who promises to use that power, not for the country’s prosperity or the country’s ideals, but for our individual prosperity and our individual ideals. “Are YOU better off than you were 4 years ago?” is the question a candidate will ask the masses when running against an incumbent. The emphasis is always and forever on the individual. We give power to the rich because we envy their success. To be wealthy enough that common problems are beneath you is something we find hypnotically aspirational. If you’ve truly gotten yours, then it doesn’t ultimately matter how you did it. “Richest man in the world” somehow seems like the pinnacle of human existence, and if you could just get to even a fraction of that level one day, then perhaps you would finally be happy. We’ve designed a culture where self-actualization is tied to metrics beyond the self, beyond character. So it doesn’t matter who you are, it only matters what you’ve achieved on the external level. We give power to those who reflect our values, and our values are based solely on a pragmatic assessment of success vs failure. A person’s moral character is only important in the abstract, and it can be twisted to be directly associated with their level of affluence. And this mindset only makes sense if you fundamentally believe that there is actually, universally, no real moral standard to which we should hold ourselves or each other. Basic human compassion and civil justice is only worth employing if it “works”. When we argue about immigration, the only point we know how to make is in the affirmative or negative on whether it’s good for the economy. We worship the almighty economy as though it is God, and the rich are its prophets of profit.
All our supposed values become a construct of our egos, too afraid to admit when our motivations lie in self-interest. And when the true motivation is obscured even from ourselves, we allow ourselves to justify terrible things. But as our culture evolves, the facade begins to slip. The mask of ego-based principles and justice cracks and reveals the odious void underneath it all, and instead of having the courage to be horrified, we naively embrace it as our truth. Gone even is the pretense that we believe in our country’s ideals. We only believe in what sells, because we cannot seem to believe there is anything more to our people than a cynical mass of kicking, biting animals, and so our best bet is to scramble to the top of the pile.
But it’s only when you believe that’s the case that it can become even half true. There is a full range of motivations and desires within any human population, and selfishness is only one of them. It can only have the power we choose to give it, and that power only becomes so gnarly and repulsive because it is not, at its core, the thing that truly defines us. Those who gain their power through depravity will always tell you that depravity is at the core of human nature. They cannot accept it for the fault that it is, and so must pretend it is who we all are. It is only in cynicism that cynicism can be born. We cannot keep accepting it. Because it is precisely in a bitter counter-culture argument that pretends to be for the people that the cynicism perpetuates itself the same way. I’m trying not to quite make that kind of argument here, even if it sounds like I’m saying “eat the rich” or something like that. You cannot truly escape the dog-eat-dog mindset that creates wealthy autocrats in the first place until you admit that people can be and in fact are better than that.
But it seems too many people are still stuck in that zero-sum game, giving over power to the very people who subjugate and oppress them because those people speak to the ill-gotten belief in the fundamental depravity of the human condition, which will always seem to us a convenient explanation for all our problems. We should be ashamed of ourselves for not expecting better from our country. Shame, not fear or hatred or resignation, is what I feel in this moment. Shame that we bought into the lie of human depravity once again. Shame that we chose the facade of pragmatism and personal success over morality and truth. Shame that we have such a deep capacity to debase ourselves and dehumanize others. Shame that a person’s character is so profoundly unimportant to our populace that we would once again celebrate and elevate someone to power who wantonly undermines the common good.

L.

9 months ago (edited) | [YT] | 10