Twilight Sparkle dies at the end of the movie during the fight with the Storm King, when the whirlwind carries her away. A wandering changeling watches it happen, and sees an opportunity to subvert Equestria for the lulz. He transforms himself into Twilight, picks up the discarded staff of whatever, returns to Canterlot and assumes Twilight's role as Princess.
The changeling then decides to undermine society and destroy Equestria from within. "Twilight" announces that >she will be opening a "friendship school" open to "everycreature." Princess Celestia, who plans on retiring soon anyway and leaving control of the nation in the hands of her star pupil, gives her blessing and the school is constructed. Chancellor Neighsay is intelligent enough to see the problems that the influx of diversity would cause, and attempts to shutter the school, but he is shouted down by Twilight's cult of popularity.
Slowly, Equestria is pozzed from within by changelings, dragons, yaks, and other races which begin to migrate in droves and form insular microcommunities that constantly fight amongst each other and make city life unbearable for the native pony population. Crime, which had previously been nearly unheard of in Equestria, is now on the rise. Gangs of yaks rampaging through city streets destroying everything in their path is now a common occurrence. The murder rate in Canterlot quadruples as more and more dragons and zebras begin to flood the city's lower quarters. Changeling pride parades become open displays of wanton degeneracy too depraved even to describe. Griffon-run banks begin offering loans at suspiciously low introductory interest rates, and soon real estate prices in Manehattan skyrocket, even as the quality of its neighborhoods declines. Anypony who speaks out is branded an anti-friendship bigot, although most forward-thinking ponies loudly proclaim their enthusiasm for these welcome changes to what they see as an oppressive and antiquated old order.
Chancellor Neighsay is eventually "deplatformed" after a herd of yaks upset about the unfairness of pony beauty standards stampedes a speech he was attempting to give at Celestia's school for gifted unicorns. After weeks of student protests, Celestia announces that Neighsay has stepped down as chairman of the EEA, and that he will be replaced by somecreature more in line with the organization's current goals. She also announces that her magic school will now be open to everycreature, regardless of magical ability.
Within the space of a single generation, Celestia's empire, which has stood for over 1000 years, is brought to the brink of total ruin.
/mlpol/ - My Little Politics
Archived thread
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>>222990
Counterpoint: The known communist hasn't changed one bit since her """""redemption""""", and has been using her proximity to twilight to poison her mind to the point that we see now. Let us all remember that the communist is also directly responsible for the faggot deer as well and is in league with the god of chaos.
Counterpoint: The known communist hasn't changed one bit since her """""redemption""""", and has been using her proximity to twilight to poison her mind to the point that we see now. Let us all remember that the communist is also directly responsible for the faggot deer as well and is in league with the god of chaos.
>>222999
fluttershy had no part in this, she's been proven to be safe to work with. No, I'm talking of the masterbooping menace Glimmer
fluttershy had no part in this, she's been proven to be safe to work with. No, I'm talking of the masterbooping menace Glimmer
>>222990
>>222995
Here's one for you:
>Changelings get god-tier competence suddenly and replace absolutely everypony overnight, ever
>Including Twilight, Pinkie Pie, and more
>absolutely nopony was awake when the lings attacked
>nopony was woken up by the ling attack and tried to break out
>even Zecora was replaced
>even fucking Celestia and Luna
>They fail to locate and replace Obligatory Good Changeling, which makes some sense
>They don't replace Discord, which makes sense, as no creature can deal with this guy without the EOH-
>and they don't replace the 2 ponies the Lings have no reason to forget to replace overnight, one bullshit-tier Suenicorn with limitless OP magic and the selfish brat who could easily be impersonated due to being a selfish brat, and could easily be replaced due to living alone, and could be used to lure Glimmer away from civilization and into some secluded area for replacement
>Glimmer wanders around a replaced Ponyville and doesn't trigger any alarms
>Trixie, Discord, Glimmer, and Discord go to Changeling Castle, where a magic throne erases all non-Changeling magic, even Discord's magic
Gee, this would have been a useful thing for Celestia to have when keeping Discord contained/keeping Tirek weak and contained
And it would have been a useful thing for the Changelings to have when infiltrating and taking on Canterlot. Don't "It's too heavy to move" me, Changelings can turn into big strong creatures and gain their physical strength, a swarm could easily drag that wherever.
anyway
>four idiots sneak up the Changeling tower
>they get to the top and the writers realize Trixie already used her fireworks, so the gang has no way to destroy the anti-magic throne keeping Discord from snapping his fingers and saving the day
>so the Good Changeling says "Everyone, share love instead of stealing it!" and the Changelings around him decide to listen to him, disobey their queen, do that, love other bugs, and suddenly gain bullshit god laser powers that remove their species's need to eat, AND would have been real useful during Canterlot
>the Good Changeling takes over, Chrysalis flees, and the whole Changeling race becomes a living mockery of how it sees ponies
Honestly it wouldn't surprise me if the Changelings only "Didn't need to eat love now" because they gorged themselves on the love of kidnapped ponies and nonponies kept wherever they want, because everypony's convinced the Changelings are a morally-good race of overemotional babies now.
>>222995
Here's one for you:
>Changelings get god-tier competence suddenly and replace absolutely everypony overnight, ever
>Including Twilight, Pinkie Pie, and more
>absolutely nopony was awake when the lings attacked
>nopony was woken up by the ling attack and tried to break out
>even Zecora was replaced
>even fucking Celestia and Luna
>They fail to locate and replace Obligatory Good Changeling, which makes some sense
>They don't replace Discord, which makes sense, as no creature can deal with this guy without the EOH-
>and they don't replace the 2 ponies the Lings have no reason to forget to replace overnight, one bullshit-tier Suenicorn with limitless OP magic and the selfish brat who could easily be impersonated due to being a selfish brat, and could easily be replaced due to living alone, and could be used to lure Glimmer away from civilization and into some secluded area for replacement
>Glimmer wanders around a replaced Ponyville and doesn't trigger any alarms
>Trixie, Discord, Glimmer, and Discord go to Changeling Castle, where a magic throne erases all non-Changeling magic, even Discord's magic
Gee, this would have been a useful thing for Celestia to have when keeping Discord contained/keeping Tirek weak and contained
And it would have been a useful thing for the Changelings to have when infiltrating and taking on Canterlot. Don't "It's too heavy to move" me, Changelings can turn into big strong creatures and gain their physical strength, a swarm could easily drag that wherever.
anyway
>four idiots sneak up the Changeling tower
>they get to the top and the writers realize Trixie already used her fireworks, so the gang has no way to destroy the anti-magic throne keeping Discord from snapping his fingers and saving the day
>so the Good Changeling says "Everyone, share love instead of stealing it!" and the Changelings around him decide to listen to him, disobey their queen, do that, love other bugs, and suddenly gain bullshit god laser powers that remove their species's need to eat, AND would have been real useful during Canterlot
>the Good Changeling takes over, Chrysalis flees, and the whole Changeling race becomes a living mockery of how it sees ponies
Honestly it wouldn't surprise me if the Changelings only "Didn't need to eat love now" because they gorged themselves on the love of kidnapped ponies and nonponies kept wherever they want, because everypony's convinced the Changelings are a morally-good race of overemotional babies now.
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>>223021
>An alternate theories thread? This sounds like a perfect opportunity to bitch about stuff from the show that I don't like, which is pretty much everything post season 2. This is my chance to rage more about, I can't even say her name without my asshole puckering, but maybe if I phrase it as a hypothetical scenario instead of my usual bitch-fit they will finally start to like me. And then after that, I can tell them more about Yu Ghi Oh, Sanic, Pokémon, Ben 10, Teen Titans, before telling them more about the super-bestest pony evar who's totally not Mary Stu like, grrrrr I won't say it cuz this is supposed to be 'a theory'. Surely they won't see through my clever ruse this time.
>t. Nigel
>An alternate theories thread? This sounds like a perfect opportunity to bitch about stuff from the show that I don't like, which is pretty much everything post season 2. This is my chance to rage more about, I can't even say her name without my asshole puckering, but maybe if I phrase it as a hypothetical scenario instead of my usual bitch-fit they will finally start to like me. And then after that, I can tell them more about Yu Ghi Oh, Sanic, Pokémon, Ben 10, Teen Titans, before telling them more about the super-bestest pony evar who's totally not Mary Stu like, grrrrr I won't say it cuz this is supposed to be 'a theory'. Surely they won't see through my clever ruse this time.
>t. Nigel
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>>223021
I don't really see the connection between what you wrote and what the thread is about, but I'm glad you're having fun.
I don't really see the connection between what you wrote and what the thread is about, but I'm glad you're having fun.
>>222990
Okay, this is based off of a complete but common misinterpretation of what the Friendship School is, and why the foreign students are there. The 1 Griffin, 1 Changeling, 1 Yak, 1 Dragon, and 1 Hippogriff are not immigrants, and they are not the vanguard some great deluge that will soon drown the ponies out of their homelands. An immigrant is a foreigner that intends to stay permanently, which these do not. They are high-born youth selected by the sovereigns of their respective nations to learn of Equestrian harmony and friendship, to return to their home nations and teach the pony ways to the creatures of those nations, so that they can learn to live in harmony amongst themselves, and with Equestria.
Imagine if the governments of Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, China, and Japan, all decided that they wanted to slowly convert their nations to Christianity, or otherwise learn western ways, so they each sent one or a small number of their more promising youths to study in Rome or Paris, then return home and start teaching the rest of their countries what they learned. This is pretty much exactly what happened historically, especially with Japan, and to a degree continues to this day. No one, seeing the tiny number of foreigners, would scream “OH MY GOD ITS A FLOOD ITS THE END IF THE WEST” because obviously, nothing is changing internally. The only thing that is happening is that some foreign nations may start to become more like us, which does not undermine the integrity of our own nations.
Chancellor Neighsay’s problem with the Friendship school isn’t so much that it allows a small number of non-pony students - these lines are there, but are casual and ancillary to his main issue - its that he misunderstands what the Friendship School is, and compares it to schools designed to teach magic or arithmetic. It’s not a school designed to teach general education, science, or arts. It’s a school designed to teach a philosophy, a philosophy that functions also as a sort of religion or political system. Think of it how like ancient China requires an intense knowledge of Confucianism as the basis of its exam to enter the Civil Service, or how becoming a preacher requires training at seminary school, or how becoming a citizen in the US requires a knowledge of the US constitution and political system. Twilight was right to refuse to accredit the School of Friendship under EEA rules, because the school doesn’t have the same intent or teach the sane thing as schools about magic. That would be like demanding a School of Theology be certified the same way and by the same metrics as an engineering school.
The School of Friendship is designed to spread the philosophy of Harmony and Friendship to Equestrians and beyond. The foreigners are a tiny minority even within the student population of the school. All of these things about zebra immigration and Griffin banking, while not an implausible direction for the politics of Equestria, aren’t implied by it either, nor does it follow from the season 8 opener.
\r
Okay, this is based off of a complete but common misinterpretation of what the Friendship School is, and why the foreign students are there. The 1 Griffin, 1 Changeling, 1 Yak, 1 Dragon, and 1 Hippogriff are not immigrants, and they are not the vanguard some great deluge that will soon drown the ponies out of their homelands. An immigrant is a foreigner that intends to stay permanently, which these do not. They are high-born youth selected by the sovereigns of their respective nations to learn of Equestrian harmony and friendship, to return to their home nations and teach the pony ways to the creatures of those nations, so that they can learn to live in harmony amongst themselves, and with Equestria.
Imagine if the governments of Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, China, and Japan, all decided that they wanted to slowly convert their nations to Christianity, or otherwise learn western ways, so they each sent one or a small number of their more promising youths to study in Rome or Paris, then return home and start teaching the rest of their countries what they learned. This is pretty much exactly what happened historically, especially with Japan, and to a degree continues to this day. No one, seeing the tiny number of foreigners, would scream “OH MY GOD ITS A FLOOD ITS THE END IF THE WEST” because obviously, nothing is changing internally. The only thing that is happening is that some foreign nations may start to become more like us, which does not undermine the integrity of our own nations.
Chancellor Neighsay’s problem with the Friendship school isn’t so much that it allows a small number of non-pony students - these lines are there, but are casual and ancillary to his main issue - its that he misunderstands what the Friendship School is, and compares it to schools designed to teach magic or arithmetic. It’s not a school designed to teach general education, science, or arts. It’s a school designed to teach a philosophy, a philosophy that functions also as a sort of religion or political system. Think of it how like ancient China requires an intense knowledge of Confucianism as the basis of its exam to enter the Civil Service, or how becoming a preacher requires training at seminary school, or how becoming a citizen in the US requires a knowledge of the US constitution and political system. Twilight was right to refuse to accredit the School of Friendship under EEA rules, because the school doesn’t have the same intent or teach the sane thing as schools about magic. That would be like demanding a School of Theology be certified the same way and by the same metrics as an engineering school.
The School of Friendship is designed to spread the philosophy of Harmony and Friendship to Equestrians and beyond. The foreigners are a tiny minority even within the student population of the school. All of these things about zebra immigration and Griffin banking, while not an implausible direction for the politics of Equestria, aren’t implied by it either, nor does it follow from the season 8 opener.
\r
>>223037
What? Are you roleplaying or are you serious? Becuase the OP is meant as a joke. So if you are roleplaying i sugguest you pick a chracter in universe and a chracter in univese would not know of China.
What? Are you roleplaying or are you serious? Becuase the OP is meant as a joke. So if you are roleplaying i sugguest you pick a chracter in universe and a chracter in univese would not know of China.
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>>223038
The OP, like so many other posters on this website, clearly thinks that the season 8 premier was a departure from the show’s communitarian philosophy and represents a new, leftist political influence in the show. Look at the archived season 8 premier thread. No fucking shit I know OP doesn’t believe this theory and wrote it as a satire on Season 8, but it’s just as obvious that the only reason he write this satire is because he, and many others, think the Friendship school and the young six is necessarily a departure with the show’s earlier implicit endorsement of community and traditions, which I don’t think it is. I’m not addressing this as a theory, I’m addressing the OP as a satire because I think it’s premise qua satire is incorrect. The reason I wrote >>223037 here and not in the Season 8 premier thread was because I didn’t see the episode until months later, and this is the first time my thoughts have really been relevant short of making a new thread on it. If you don’t think my thoughts add anything and you’d rather read stuff like >>223021 which is even less on topic, then I can delete my post
Finally, if I were role playing, so what? What the hell else would we do with this OP except either comment on it’s message as a satire, or pretend to take it seriously in a role play?
The OP, like so many other posters on this website, clearly thinks that the season 8 premier was a departure from the show’s communitarian philosophy and represents a new, leftist political influence in the show. Look at the archived season 8 premier thread. No fucking shit I know OP doesn’t believe this theory and wrote it as a satire on Season 8, but it’s just as obvious that the only reason he write this satire is because he, and many others, think the Friendship school and the young six is necessarily a departure with the show’s earlier implicit endorsement of community and traditions, which I don’t think it is. I’m not addressing this as a theory, I’m addressing the OP as a satire because I think it’s premise qua satire is incorrect. The reason I wrote >>223037 here and not in the Season 8 premier thread was because I didn’t see the episode until months later, and this is the first time my thoughts have really been relevant short of making a new thread on it. If you don’t think my thoughts add anything and you’d rather read stuff like >>223021 which is even less on topic, then I can delete my post
Finally, if I were role playing, so what? What the hell else would we do with this OP except either comment on it’s message as a satire, or pretend to take it seriously in a role play?
>>223042
>What the hell else would we do with this OP except either comment on it’s message as a satire, or pretend to take it seriously in a role play?
Could always just ignore it.
>What the hell else would we do with this OP except either comment on it’s message as a satire, or pretend to take it seriously in a role play?
Could always just ignore it.
>>223042
>Finally, if I were role playing, so what? What the hell else would we do with this OP except either comment on it’s message as a satire, or pretend to take it seriously in a role play?
I never said that roleplaying wasn't okay. I just wanted to know that you actually were commenting in the real world and not roleplaying so that I could answer appropriately.
>>223037
I haven't scene this s8 e1+2 yet but if your description of the events are correct I do agree with you that in universe i wouldn't have a problem with it. In fact, when this episode first came out I made a thread about the fact that the writer's made the ponies almost out to be colonizers that spread their superior culture to lesser races.
However, when I did that I did so with the intent that saying, "Look what these liberal do when they don't think har har." I am to cynical to believe that they would actually do this for that purpose or a similar one.
While I don't think there is a problem with having friends that are of another race this is not what is being promoted here. Just because in universe the perspectives between these across bounderies meetings are on an individual level does not mean that the story will be interpreted as such.
It is like saying that, "Guess who is coming for dinner?" is just two individuals so it doesn't matter on the macro perspective. If one makes a story one must think about how it will be interpreted. If they in the show presents this very diverse group of chracters and basically says that, "Friendships across race borders are possible," which I agree with; then I also want the story to say, "But on certain bounderies that I don't need to mention here."
>Finally, if I were role playing, so what? What the hell else would we do with this OP except either comment on it’s message as a satire, or pretend to take it seriously in a role play?
I never said that roleplaying wasn't okay. I just wanted to know that you actually were commenting in the real world and not roleplaying so that I could answer appropriately.
>>223037
I haven't scene this s8 e1+2 yet but if your description of the events are correct I do agree with you that in universe i wouldn't have a problem with it. In fact, when this episode first came out I made a thread about the fact that the writer's made the ponies almost out to be colonizers that spread their superior culture to lesser races.
However, when I did that I did so with the intent that saying, "Look what these liberal do when they don't think har har." I am to cynical to believe that they would actually do this for that purpose or a similar one.
While I don't think there is a problem with having friends that are of another race this is not what is being promoted here. Just because in universe the perspectives between these across bounderies meetings are on an individual level does not mean that the story will be interpreted as such.
It is like saying that, "Guess who is coming for dinner?" is just two individuals so it doesn't matter on the macro perspective. If one makes a story one must think about how it will be interpreted. If they in the show presents this very diverse group of chracters and basically says that, "Friendships across race borders are possible," which I agree with; then I also want the story to say, "But on certain bounderies that I don't need to mention here."
>>223042
>so many other posters on this website, clearly thinks that the season 8 premier was a departure from the show’s communitarian philosophy and represents a new, leftist political influence in the show.
That's not really my biggest issue with the season, tbh. My main problem with the series was primarily that a lot of the episodes in the past season just weren't that good.
My only complaint with the "diversity cast" was that when watching a show called "My Little Pony", I didn't really sign up to watch plotlines featuring anything but ponies as the protagonists.
Except for Kirin. That episode was pretty nice.
And aside from that point, this is /mlpol/, which means it's half-/pol/: posters are always going to find ways to politicize things that they dislike; it's not a thing to be surprised about. Even if it wasn't an inherently leftist message, the promotion of inter-racial friendships was enough to set off some posters to interpret it that way.
>so many other posters on this website, clearly thinks that the season 8 premier was a departure from the show’s communitarian philosophy and represents a new, leftist political influence in the show.
That's not really my biggest issue with the season, tbh. My main problem with the series was primarily that a lot of the episodes in the past season just weren't that good.
My only complaint with the "diversity cast" was that when watching a show called "My Little Pony", I didn't really sign up to watch plotlines featuring anything but ponies as the protagonists.
Except for Kirin. That episode was pretty nice.
And aside from that point, this is /mlpol/, which means it's half-/pol/: posters are always going to find ways to politicize things that they dislike; it's not a thing to be surprised about. Even if it wasn't an inherently leftist message, the promotion of inter-racial friendships was enough to set off some posters to interpret it that way.
Far too intelligent writing for a kids show
>>223073
Honestly, that would make a great fanfic. Twilight would only ever "go evil" if someone convinced her a bad way was the right way. And this would be a great way to get that Twilight VS Celestia civil war everyone's wanted since season 1. Celestia represents traditional Ponyville, Twilight represents Muh Diversity.
I don't personally like the idea of Twilight taking that side, and I also think it'd be better writing if she was Celestia's pawn in a different war where Celly makes everyone think it's black and white but it's not, but at least this has more depth than those "Muh solar empire vs lunar republic, because queens rule republics and Luna just swears she'll step down as godqueen once she wins, you guys" fics.
Honestly, that would make a great fanfic. Twilight would only ever "go evil" if someone convinced her a bad way was the right way. And this would be a great way to get that Twilight VS Celestia civil war everyone's wanted since season 1. Celestia represents traditional Ponyville, Twilight represents Muh Diversity.
I don't personally like the idea of Twilight taking that side, and I also think it'd be better writing if she was Celestia's pawn in a different war where Celly makes everyone think it's black and white but it's not, but at least this has more depth than those "Muh solar empire vs lunar republic, because queens rule republics and Luna just swears she'll step down as godqueen once she wins, you guys" fics.
>>223121
In all seriousness here's an idea I've been thinking about
Okay, imagine you take the protagonist of one of those "Rarity but she's raised by Batman" or "Twilight but she's raised by fucking Dante" fanfics, then you drop her into the real pony world
In the body of the real pony
So one day, Rarity isn't Rarity any more. She's lost, confused, and wondering where the hell Dante is.
and then
instead of throwing in random shit for the "new cooler X" to fight to distract the audience
the fic focuses entirely on the emotions of everyone
Their friend is effectively dead and they can't bring her back without rewinding her body back through time, erasing the new consciousness currently in her.
Their friend is dead and an impostor wears her face.
and that impostor misses her own world but some magic bullshit means Twilight can't just portal her there and end the fic in two paragraphs.
boom, depth.
In all seriousness here's an idea I've been thinking about
Okay, imagine you take the protagonist of one of those "Rarity but she's raised by Batman" or "Twilight but she's raised by fucking Dante" fanfics, then you drop her into the real pony world
In the body of the real pony
So one day, Rarity isn't Rarity any more. She's lost, confused, and wondering where the hell Dante is.
and then
instead of throwing in random shit for the "new cooler X" to fight to distract the audience
the fic focuses entirely on the emotions of everyone
Their friend is effectively dead and they can't bring her back without rewinding her body back through time, erasing the new consciousness currently in her.
Their friend is dead and an impostor wears her face.
and that impostor misses her own world but some magic bullshit means Twilight can't just portal her there and end the fic in two paragraphs.
boom, depth.
>>223069
No, I have nevver stated that I was just pretending to be retarded. If I beehaved retardedly, then I was so al asong.
No, I have nevver stated that I was just pretending to be retarded. If I beehaved retardedly, then I was so al asong.
>>223051
>the writer's made the ponies almost out to be colonizers that spread their superior culture to lesser races.
Yeah, Neighsay's concern was "Frienship has maintained ponies safe for ages...what if they use what they've learned here against us?".
It was funny though, how the EEA waged in as this institution that protects the existence of the ponies and equestria as a future for their foals. Even dividing the different purposes of all three pony-races in a caste system.
And they just got fucked by Twilight's new-rules, Starlight dropping the EEA's book to the water gave the trips, though it was funny.
>the writer's made the ponies almost out to be colonizers that spread their superior culture to lesser races.
Yeah, Neighsay's concern was "Frienship has maintained ponies safe for ages...what if they use what they've learned here against us?".
It was funny though, how the EEA waged in as this institution that protects the existence of the ponies and equestria as a future for their foals. Even dividing the different purposes of all three pony-races in a caste system.
And they just got fucked by Twilight's new-rules, Starlight dropping the EEA's book to the water gave the trips, though it was funny.
>>223136
I could make a big deal about how utterly pointless your ability to triple jump and pull off some sick nasty sword combos is in a setting where the average enemies are playground bullies, omnipotent malevolent dieties that can only be beaten by an omnipotent benevolent magic rock collection only kind folk can wield, and goodish ponies being retarded this week.
Rainbow Dash got that training from hell on how to shoot Raiders/punch Joker/fight demons for nothing, nothing at all
I could make a big deal about how utterly pointless your ability to triple jump and pull off some sick nasty sword combos is in a setting where the average enemies are playground bullies, omnipotent malevolent dieties that can only be beaten by an omnipotent benevolent magic rock collection only kind folk can wield, and goodish ponies being retarded this week.
Rainbow Dash got that training from hell on how to shoot Raiders/punch Joker/fight demons for nothing, nothing at all
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>>223037
>They are high-born youth selected by the sovereigns of their respective nations to learn of Equestrian harmony and friendship, to return to their home nations and teach the pony ways to the creatures of those nations, so that they can learn to live in harmony amongst themselves, and with Equestria.
I'll admit this is an interpretation that hadn't occurred to me, and it makes sense now that you point it out. I'm not sure I believe it since Neighsay was clearly intended to be a stand-in for Trump and the whole episode emanates such a bright glow of left-wing poz you could see it from space. However, I'll admit I like your headcanon better than how I would interpret the show's actual canon at this point. I only just watched the S8 premiere for the first time a couple of days ago, so I can't really comment on how the rest of the season plays out, so most of what I wrote is just my knee-jerk reaction to it. I may reassess my position once I've gotten caught up.
>>223042
>The OP, like so many other posters on this website, clearly thinks that the season 8 premier was a departure from the show’s communitarian philosophy and represents a new, leftist political influence in the show
I think it's a little naive at this point to deny that there is clearly a leftist influence on the show. A cursory glance at the Twitter feed of nearly everyone involved in it can confirm this. /pone/ has a thread with some pretty decent screencapped examples that's worth a read: https://8ch.net/pone/res/323756.html
However, I think it's more accurate to say that the show really has no philosophy at all at this point, either nationalist, leftist or otherwise; it's a gigantic mishmash of a lot of incongruous ideas and elements added by the many different people who have had their hands in it over the years. More than anything else, this show has suffered from the "too many cooks in the kitchen" problem that sadly befall a lot of corporate properties.
Lauren Faust created the original world and characters, and I think most of its communitarian and nationalist elements come from that. Not because I think Lauren Faust consciously embraces those beliefs, but because she was clearly influenced by fantasy and classical mythology, which is part of a much older primordial tradition going back to the dawn of human history, that includes those elements naturally. She was muscled out of the series early on though, and since then it's been influenced by a number of different visions. Hasbro is really only interested in it as a vehicle to sell toys, so there's been a lot of "we need to sell a wedding playset so create a new princess character and have her get married" kind of shit grafted onto the story. Jim Miller previously worked on Ed, Edd and Eddy and he's basically chosen to terraform the slightly more serious fantasy landscape envisioned by Faust into a less threatening cartoon world since taking over. The writers in general have never really come up with a coherent vision for the world and the overall story since the end of the third season, and the end result has been a lot of varied and self-contradictory elements (contrast the more medieval-style setting of Ponyville and Canterlot with modernized locations like Manehattan), odd ancillary characters awkwardly wedged into the universe (Cadance, most of the villains, etc), and characters being altered/retconned to suit whatever purpose the writers are trying to achieve at a given moment (Glimmer, Discord, Trixie, etc). The obvious left-wing political bias of the show's writers is annoying but the show's real problem is just an overall lack of direction and focus.
>>223052
>My only complaint with the "diversity cast" was that when watching a show called "My Little Pony", I didn't really sign up to watch plotlines featuring anything but ponies as the protagonists.
Agreed, this is part of the problem for me as well. Even though most of the individual Diversity Six don't seem like necessarily bad characters, it's hard to get past their visual designs and the fact that they aren't ponies (except for the one that is a pony I guess). Part of the original appeal of this show was that the ponies were cute af, and their relative uniformity of design made it easy to "ponify" everything. Nearly any individual or concept could be rendered as a pony character, and it gave rise to an infinitely-expanding universe. Much like rendering things as anime girls requires a certain uniform definition of what constitutes anime, rendering things as pony requires sticking to the pony theme. Even though there were other creatures that appeared in the world from time to time, the show so far has mostly focused on pony characters. This "everycreature" business, regardless of the reasons for doing it, is just a bad idea and I don't care for it.
>They are high-born youth selected by the sovereigns of their respective nations to learn of Equestrian harmony and friendship, to return to their home nations and teach the pony ways to the creatures of those nations, so that they can learn to live in harmony amongst themselves, and with Equestria.
I'll admit this is an interpretation that hadn't occurred to me, and it makes sense now that you point it out. I'm not sure I believe it since Neighsay was clearly intended to be a stand-in for Trump and the whole episode emanates such a bright glow of left-wing poz you could see it from space. However, I'll admit I like your headcanon better than how I would interpret the show's actual canon at this point. I only just watched the S8 premiere for the first time a couple of days ago, so I can't really comment on how the rest of the season plays out, so most of what I wrote is just my knee-jerk reaction to it. I may reassess my position once I've gotten caught up.
>>223042
>The OP, like so many other posters on this website, clearly thinks that the season 8 premier was a departure from the show’s communitarian philosophy and represents a new, leftist political influence in the show
I think it's a little naive at this point to deny that there is clearly a leftist influence on the show. A cursory glance at the Twitter feed of nearly everyone involved in it can confirm this. /pone/ has a thread with some pretty decent screencapped examples that's worth a read: https://8ch.net/pone/res/323756.html
However, I think it's more accurate to say that the show really has no philosophy at all at this point, either nationalist, leftist or otherwise; it's a gigantic mishmash of a lot of incongruous ideas and elements added by the many different people who have had their hands in it over the years. More than anything else, this show has suffered from the "too many cooks in the kitchen" problem that sadly befall a lot of corporate properties.
Lauren Faust created the original world and characters, and I think most of its communitarian and nationalist elements come from that. Not because I think Lauren Faust consciously embraces those beliefs, but because she was clearly influenced by fantasy and classical mythology, which is part of a much older primordial tradition going back to the dawn of human history, that includes those elements naturally. She was muscled out of the series early on though, and since then it's been influenced by a number of different visions. Hasbro is really only interested in it as a vehicle to sell toys, so there's been a lot of "we need to sell a wedding playset so create a new princess character and have her get married" kind of shit grafted onto the story. Jim Miller previously worked on Ed, Edd and Eddy and he's basically chosen to terraform the slightly more serious fantasy landscape envisioned by Faust into a less threatening cartoon world since taking over. The writers in general have never really come up with a coherent vision for the world and the overall story since the end of the third season, and the end result has been a lot of varied and self-contradictory elements (contrast the more medieval-style setting of Ponyville and Canterlot with modernized locations like Manehattan), odd ancillary characters awkwardly wedged into the universe (Cadance, most of the villains, etc), and characters being altered/retconned to suit whatever purpose the writers are trying to achieve at a given moment (Glimmer, Discord, Trixie, etc). The obvious left-wing political bias of the show's writers is annoying but the show's real problem is just an overall lack of direction and focus.
>>223052
>My only complaint with the "diversity cast" was that when watching a show called "My Little Pony", I didn't really sign up to watch plotlines featuring anything but ponies as the protagonists.
Agreed, this is part of the problem for me as well. Even though most of the individual Diversity Six don't seem like necessarily bad characters, it's hard to get past their visual designs and the fact that they aren't ponies (except for the one that is a pony I guess). Part of the original appeal of this show was that the ponies were cute af, and their relative uniformity of design made it easy to "ponify" everything. Nearly any individual or concept could be rendered as a pony character, and it gave rise to an infinitely-expanding universe. Much like rendering things as anime girls requires a certain uniform definition of what constitutes anime, rendering things as pony requires sticking to the pony theme. Even though there were other creatures that appeared in the world from time to time, the show so far has mostly focused on pony characters. This "everycreature" business, regardless of the reasons for doing it, is just a bad idea and I don't care for it.
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>>223187
>The writers in general have never really come up with a coherent vision for the world and the overall story since the end of the third season, and the end result has been a lot of varied and self-contradictory elements (contrast the more medieval-style setting of Ponyville and Canterlot with modernized locations like Manehattan)
I want to challenge the idea that the setting has no real consistency. Though I am sure that Faust took more inspiration from classical high fantasy that her successors, the difference between the writers maters less than you'd think. In fact, when you look at it carefully, its been remarkably consistent over the past 8 seasons if you ignore the pop music.
First, what is the evidence that Ponyville or Canterlot are “medieval” locations? Is it because Canterlot has a Castle? You can go to Prague, to Salzburg, Rome, or to any number of modern European cities, and you will find castles that are many centuries old, even as these are now modern cities. I think that the belief that Ponyville is “medieval” comes from the fact that most the buildings have thatched roofs. But is thatched roofing really “medieval”? Let’s go to the Wikipedia article:
>In most of England, thatch remained the only roofing material available to the bulk of the population in the countryside, in many towns and villages, until the late 1800s. Commercial distribution of Welsh slate began in 1820, and the mobility provided by canals and then railways made other materials readily available. Still, the number of thatched properties actually increased in the UK during the mid-1800s as agriculture expanded, but then declined again at the end of the 19th century because of agricultural recession and rural depopulation. A 2013 report estimated that there were 60,000 properties in the UK with a thatched roof; they are usually made of long straw, combed wheat reed or water reed
Thatched roofs were common in the United Kingdom during the 1800s in rural areas, and only began to decline at the end of the century because of urbanization and the decline of agriculture, rather than obsolesce. Ponyville is an agricultural hamlet. It’s hardly surprising that its architecture differs greatly from a modern urban city. Hell, ride a train through Austria, and you’ll see that most of the houses along the countryside are timber framed houses of a style that predates the 19th century. Anachronistic architecture is not really that uncommon in places that have history beyond a few hundred years, because not all old buildings are replaced after they go out of style.
Also look at the other architecture of Ponyville. Twilight’s library has a wrought iron railing on the balcony on the upper level. The first use of wrought iron railing was in 1710, and in this setting it seems pretty common. Look at Sugarcube Corner. It has several wrought iron elements, and as a whole has a kind of Victorian era look to it, like it wouldn’t be out of place in Sweenie Todd. Same with the Carousel Boutique.
Now, let me examine in deep, autistic detail, all the post-medieval elements of the first three episodes. I am choosing these three episodes because these are the only three episodes completely written by Lauren Faust, and thus the “original” vision for the setting in the show. When you examine them, you find that they are consistent with much of the rest of the show.
In the theme song, season 1, we see a hot air balloon. The first untethered flight with passengers on a hot air balloon occurred in 1783.
Also during the theme song, we see a color photograph of the Mane 6. Color Photography in any widespread form was introduced in 1907. In a later episode in Season 1, “Green Isn’t Your Color,” we also see photography. The photography in that episode is evidently in color and certainly doesn’t have a long exposure period, implying photography at least as advanced as 1907, but there’s nothing to suggest it’s more modern than WW2.
Twilight Sparkle lives in a house filled with books in Canterlot, and then in a library in a rural hamlet upon moving to Ponyville. The vast numbers of books clearly imply the existence of the Printing Press, invented 1439, and thus after that date, probably long after that date because of the modern looking design of the books. (Later, in Ponyville Confidential, we see a Rotary Printing Press, invented 1843).
In the first scene after the intro song, we see a present with modern wrapping paper, introduced in 1917.
Spike holds a modern pencil, invented 1795.
In episode 1, Spike wears a lampshade. Lampshades were invented in the Late 17th Century.
During the Benny Hill Skit in episode 3 we see Twilight try to hide using a baby stroller. The very first baby stroller was made in 1733, and the perambulator Twilight is using looks like it is at least a Victorian era model.
At the very end of the Benny Hill skit a background pony offers “I’ll do your taxes,” implying a modern or semi modern tax collection system (in the US this would be after the introduction of the Income tax in 1913).
Pinkie Pie has a number of helium filled latex balloons around her in episode 3. Helium-latex balloons like the ones we see in the show were invented in the 1920s and were introduced on a commercial scale at the Chicago World Fair in 1933.
Upon a cursory rewatch, I found a weird boiler in the background of Twilight’s Canterlot home, and Twilight briefly wears a Statue of Liberty dress.
Those are some of the details found in the first three episodes that seem to date the My Little Pony setting sometime in the Industrial Era. Yes, I know that most of these are only in the background, or are used only for gags. The fact remains that they are there, and that there are quite a few of them. All of these examples clash with the idea that Lauren Faust intended a medieval setting but fit fairly well with the setting we see in later episodes.
>The writers in general have never really come up with a coherent vision for the world and the overall story since the end of the third season, and the end result has been a lot of varied and self-contradictory elements (contrast the more medieval-style setting of Ponyville and Canterlot with modernized locations like Manehattan)
I want to challenge the idea that the setting has no real consistency. Though I am sure that Faust took more inspiration from classical high fantasy that her successors, the difference between the writers maters less than you'd think. In fact, when you look at it carefully, its been remarkably consistent over the past 8 seasons if you ignore the pop music.
First, what is the evidence that Ponyville or Canterlot are “medieval” locations? Is it because Canterlot has a Castle? You can go to Prague, to Salzburg, Rome, or to any number of modern European cities, and you will find castles that are many centuries old, even as these are now modern cities. I think that the belief that Ponyville is “medieval” comes from the fact that most the buildings have thatched roofs. But is thatched roofing really “medieval”? Let’s go to the Wikipedia article:
>In most of England, thatch remained the only roofing material available to the bulk of the population in the countryside, in many towns and villages, until the late 1800s. Commercial distribution of Welsh slate began in 1820, and the mobility provided by canals and then railways made other materials readily available. Still, the number of thatched properties actually increased in the UK during the mid-1800s as agriculture expanded, but then declined again at the end of the 19th century because of agricultural recession and rural depopulation. A 2013 report estimated that there were 60,000 properties in the UK with a thatched roof; they are usually made of long straw, combed wheat reed or water reed
Thatched roofs were common in the United Kingdom during the 1800s in rural areas, and only began to decline at the end of the century because of urbanization and the decline of agriculture, rather than obsolesce. Ponyville is an agricultural hamlet. It’s hardly surprising that its architecture differs greatly from a modern urban city. Hell, ride a train through Austria, and you’ll see that most of the houses along the countryside are timber framed houses of a style that predates the 19th century. Anachronistic architecture is not really that uncommon in places that have history beyond a few hundred years, because not all old buildings are replaced after they go out of style.
Also look at the other architecture of Ponyville. Twilight’s library has a wrought iron railing on the balcony on the upper level. The first use of wrought iron railing was in 1710, and in this setting it seems pretty common. Look at Sugarcube Corner. It has several wrought iron elements, and as a whole has a kind of Victorian era look to it, like it wouldn’t be out of place in Sweenie Todd. Same with the Carousel Boutique.
Now, let me examine in deep, autistic detail, all the post-medieval elements of the first three episodes. I am choosing these three episodes because these are the only three episodes completely written by Lauren Faust, and thus the “original” vision for the setting in the show. When you examine them, you find that they are consistent with much of the rest of the show.
In the theme song, season 1, we see a hot air balloon. The first untethered flight with passengers on a hot air balloon occurred in 1783.
Also during the theme song, we see a color photograph of the Mane 6. Color Photography in any widespread form was introduced in 1907. In a later episode in Season 1, “Green Isn’t Your Color,” we also see photography. The photography in that episode is evidently in color and certainly doesn’t have a long exposure period, implying photography at least as advanced as 1907, but there’s nothing to suggest it’s more modern than WW2.
Twilight Sparkle lives in a house filled with books in Canterlot, and then in a library in a rural hamlet upon moving to Ponyville. The vast numbers of books clearly imply the existence of the Printing Press, invented 1439, and thus after that date, probably long after that date because of the modern looking design of the books. (Later, in Ponyville Confidential, we see a Rotary Printing Press, invented 1843).
In the first scene after the intro song, we see a present with modern wrapping paper, introduced in 1917.
Spike holds a modern pencil, invented 1795.
In episode 1, Spike wears a lampshade. Lampshades were invented in the Late 17th Century.
During the Benny Hill Skit in episode 3 we see Twilight try to hide using a baby stroller. The very first baby stroller was made in 1733, and the perambulator Twilight is using looks like it is at least a Victorian era model.
At the very end of the Benny Hill skit a background pony offers “I’ll do your taxes,” implying a modern or semi modern tax collection system (in the US this would be after the introduction of the Income tax in 1913).
Pinkie Pie has a number of helium filled latex balloons around her in episode 3. Helium-latex balloons like the ones we see in the show were invented in the 1920s and were introduced on a commercial scale at the Chicago World Fair in 1933.
Upon a cursory rewatch, I found a weird boiler in the background of Twilight’s Canterlot home, and Twilight briefly wears a Statue of Liberty dress.
Those are some of the details found in the first three episodes that seem to date the My Little Pony setting sometime in the Industrial Era. Yes, I know that most of these are only in the background, or are used only for gags. The fact remains that they are there, and that there are quite a few of them. All of these examples clash with the idea that Lauren Faust intended a medieval setting but fit fairly well with the setting we see in later episodes.
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>>223187
>>226074
Let’s look at the technology in the later episodes of the first two seasons, and I think you’ll see it’s rather consistent.
In Griffin the Brush Off, we see Pinkie Pie using something like an auto-gyro, invented 1923
In Suited For Success we see that Rarity has a rather modern looking domestic sewing machine, like the ones made by Singer after 1856.
In Over a Barrel, we see the Friendship Express for the first time, a 4-4-0 Steam Locomotive. I think the existence of Trains in the My Little Pony universe deserves special notice, because they are seen so often. While the one in Over a Barrell is horse powered (available 1807), the ones in later episodes are steam powered (available for public use 1830, and phased out beginning in the 1930s, but still in use widespread use through the Second World War). Equestria has a well-developed rail infrastructure. You can go anywhere in Equestria on a train from the Crystal Empire, to the Kirin Grove, to the Hippogriffs. The American transcontinental railroad was completed 1866.
In Read it and Weep, we see Rainbow Dash has been given an x-ray. The X-ray machine was invented in 1896.
In The Mysterious Mare Do Well, we see a Hydroelectric plant (yes, you can see electric coils.). Invented 1881.
In The Last Round Up, in the I Love Lucy skit in the Cherry town, we see a conveyer belt, invented 1892 and used more broadly in the two decades after.
In Party of One, Pinkie sends a “singing telegram.” Western Union started singing telegram services in 1933. No, I’m not joking. Look it up. In any case, telegrams were introduced after 1753 and were phased out sometime before the 1950s.
And now I want to cover my absolute favorite technology reference in the entire first two seasons. In Suited for Success, the song “Art of the Dress” includes the lines “even though it rides high on the flank, Rainbow won’t look like a tank.” In Find a Pet, Rainbow Dash names her pet Tortoise “Tank.” I want you to ask yourself, what the word “tank” must mean in context, and why it appears not once, but twice in My Little Pony. It’s use in Art of the Dress must refer to something big, bulky, and unwieldy when moved, yet movable, while its use for the tortoise implies something slow, big, heavy, tough, heavily armored. Also, just for fun, note that the song “Find a Pet” uses the phrase “faster than a speeding bullet.”
You say that the locations in My Little Pony clash and vary too much, like Canterlot, Manehattan, and Ponyville. First of all, as stated above, Ponyville’s thatched roofs isn’t really out of line with its agricultural-rural location, nor do the little hamlets scattered about modern Europe necessarily look all that different, and some of Ponyville’s buildings look more modern anyways like Sugarcube Corner.
Second, it’s pretty common for cities to have very architectural styles. Lisbon Portugal has many buildings that look like colonial Brazilian architecture, and almost no buildings older than 1755. This is because the Great Lisbon Earthquake of 1755 virtually obliterated the city, and Portugal hired an architect whose experience mostly consisted of making cheap buildings for the colonies to rebuild the city. Paris has wide open streets and consistent architecture from around the late 1800s. This is because much of Paris was leveled during the French Commune Rebellion in 1871, and the French government rebuilt the city with wide streets that radiate from central points specifically designed to make it easier to put down future rebellions in the city. Prague still has its old buildings and castle complex from the Hapsburg era, as virtually the whole city, even the synagogues, survived the last two centuries. Venice looks as it did when the doges ruled, while Berlin has almost no buildings older than 1945, and much of it is dominated by Soviet architecture. Cities look older and younger than each other because they basically are, for reasons that come from their individual histories.
Equestria is likely the same, with some cities older or younger, and more or less preserved. Of course the ancient court city looks more stylish and medieval than the poorer, urban, more industrial and newer city of Manehattan. They look different because they are different.
Let’s also take a deeper look at the Manehattan Skyline. Manehattan is first introduced in Season 1 in Cutie Mark Chronicles. In Manehattan we see a number of tenement buildings (built 1867+) and skyscrapers (Built in steel frame 1885+). In particular, the skyline is dominated by a pony version of the Statue of Liberty (dedicated 1886) and an art deco building that almost looks like a Knight chess piece, which we know from other sources is named the “Chrystaller Building,” and seems to be a version of the Chrysler building, completed 1930. Interestingly, there is no pony-version of the Empire State Building, completed 1931, making the skyline of Manehattan resemble the New York City skyline during a short period in 1930.
Does Manehattan – introduced mid-season 1 – really clash with the world of color photography, latex balloons, wrapping paper, Statue of Liberty dresses and personal income taxes we see in the first three Faust-written episodes in Season 1?
Even the technology we see at random at later episodes, like the pneumatic jackhammer in Princess Spike (1851) and the Phonograph in the Yak village in Not Asking For Trouble, Season 7 (~1877), is fairly consistent. The My Little Pony Movie introduces Airships, seen again in “Once Upon a Zeppelin,” (invented 1899), which of course take a more fantastical style than the Hindenburg-style rigid airships we may see in the real world.
>>226074
Let’s look at the technology in the later episodes of the first two seasons, and I think you’ll see it’s rather consistent.
In Griffin the Brush Off, we see Pinkie Pie using something like an auto-gyro, invented 1923
In Suited For Success we see that Rarity has a rather modern looking domestic sewing machine, like the ones made by Singer after 1856.
In Over a Barrel, we see the Friendship Express for the first time, a 4-4-0 Steam Locomotive. I think the existence of Trains in the My Little Pony universe deserves special notice, because they are seen so often. While the one in Over a Barrell is horse powered (available 1807), the ones in later episodes are steam powered (available for public use 1830, and phased out beginning in the 1930s, but still in use widespread use through the Second World War). Equestria has a well-developed rail infrastructure. You can go anywhere in Equestria on a train from the Crystal Empire, to the Kirin Grove, to the Hippogriffs. The American transcontinental railroad was completed 1866.
In Read it and Weep, we see Rainbow Dash has been given an x-ray. The X-ray machine was invented in 1896.
In The Mysterious Mare Do Well, we see a Hydroelectric plant (yes, you can see electric coils.). Invented 1881.
In The Last Round Up, in the I Love Lucy skit in the Cherry town, we see a conveyer belt, invented 1892 and used more broadly in the two decades after.
In Party of One, Pinkie sends a “singing telegram.” Western Union started singing telegram services in 1933. No, I’m not joking. Look it up. In any case, telegrams were introduced after 1753 and were phased out sometime before the 1950s.
And now I want to cover my absolute favorite technology reference in the entire first two seasons. In Suited for Success, the song “Art of the Dress” includes the lines “even though it rides high on the flank, Rainbow won’t look like a tank.” In Find a Pet, Rainbow Dash names her pet Tortoise “Tank.” I want you to ask yourself, what the word “tank” must mean in context, and why it appears not once, but twice in My Little Pony. It’s use in Art of the Dress must refer to something big, bulky, and unwieldy when moved, yet movable, while its use for the tortoise implies something slow, big, heavy, tough, heavily armored. Also, just for fun, note that the song “Find a Pet” uses the phrase “faster than a speeding bullet.”
You say that the locations in My Little Pony clash and vary too much, like Canterlot, Manehattan, and Ponyville. First of all, as stated above, Ponyville’s thatched roofs isn’t really out of line with its agricultural-rural location, nor do the little hamlets scattered about modern Europe necessarily look all that different, and some of Ponyville’s buildings look more modern anyways like Sugarcube Corner.
Second, it’s pretty common for cities to have very architectural styles. Lisbon Portugal has many buildings that look like colonial Brazilian architecture, and almost no buildings older than 1755. This is because the Great Lisbon Earthquake of 1755 virtually obliterated the city, and Portugal hired an architect whose experience mostly consisted of making cheap buildings for the colonies to rebuild the city. Paris has wide open streets and consistent architecture from around the late 1800s. This is because much of Paris was leveled during the French Commune Rebellion in 1871, and the French government rebuilt the city with wide streets that radiate from central points specifically designed to make it easier to put down future rebellions in the city. Prague still has its old buildings and castle complex from the Hapsburg era, as virtually the whole city, even the synagogues, survived the last two centuries. Venice looks as it did when the doges ruled, while Berlin has almost no buildings older than 1945, and much of it is dominated by Soviet architecture. Cities look older and younger than each other because they basically are, for reasons that come from their individual histories.
Equestria is likely the same, with some cities older or younger, and more or less preserved. Of course the ancient court city looks more stylish and medieval than the poorer, urban, more industrial and newer city of Manehattan. They look different because they are different.
Let’s also take a deeper look at the Manehattan Skyline. Manehattan is first introduced in Season 1 in Cutie Mark Chronicles. In Manehattan we see a number of tenement buildings (built 1867+) and skyscrapers (Built in steel frame 1885+). In particular, the skyline is dominated by a pony version of the Statue of Liberty (dedicated 1886) and an art deco building that almost looks like a Knight chess piece, which we know from other sources is named the “Chrystaller Building,” and seems to be a version of the Chrysler building, completed 1930. Interestingly, there is no pony-version of the Empire State Building, completed 1931, making the skyline of Manehattan resemble the New York City skyline during a short period in 1930.
Does Manehattan – introduced mid-season 1 – really clash with the world of color photography, latex balloons, wrapping paper, Statue of Liberty dresses and personal income taxes we see in the first three Faust-written episodes in Season 1?
Even the technology we see at random at later episodes, like the pneumatic jackhammer in Princess Spike (1851) and the Phonograph in the Yak village in Not Asking For Trouble, Season 7 (~1877), is fairly consistent. The My Little Pony Movie introduces Airships, seen again in “Once Upon a Zeppelin,” (invented 1899), which of course take a more fantastical style than the Hindenburg-style rigid airships we may see in the real world.
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>>226075
Turn of the century technology always had this special charm to it for me. Living from say the 1830s to the early 1900s must of been quite the sight to witness. A time of unprecedented change, innovation, and social upheaval. I always enjoyed that mlp choose that to be the basis for their technological era.
Turn of the century technology always had this special charm to it for me. Living from say the 1830s to the early 1900s must of been quite the sight to witness. A time of unprecedented change, innovation, and social upheaval. I always enjoyed that mlp choose that to be the basis for their technological era.
>>226074
>>226075
That was a nice read, thanks for posting and it's good to see that /mlp/ autism is still alive and well here.
I have some mild objections I have to mention - like that the presence of magic throws off the progression of technology and the idea of the tank, an armored vehicle with a crew to operate projectile weapons, has been around since at least da Vinci - but that's nitpicking and you have made a good case for the show's technology having a pretty consistent base, as well as pointing out the rough time period where that is.
>>226075
That was a nice read, thanks for posting and it's good to see that /mlp/ autism is still alive and well here.
I have some mild objections I have to mention - like that the presence of magic throws off the progression of technology and the idea of the tank, an armored vehicle with a crew to operate projectile weapons, has been around since at least da Vinci - but that's nitpicking and you have made a good case for the show's technology having a pretty consistent base, as well as pointing out the rough time period where that is.
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>>226075
>>226074
>>223187
But wait! There’s more!
Found another one: in Bloom and Gloom, a pony appears wearing a strange gas mask (invented ~1912, and whether this version is more advanced or less advanced than a WW1 mask I can’t say).
Not only has the My Little Pony setting always had a very large number of devices and contraptions that were only invented in our world after the late 1800s, but it also has a sort of cutoff date – almost nothing in the My Little Pony universe was created after World War 2. You do see some exceptions, like for instance, the use of Instant Cameras in Pinkie Apple Pie and The Mean Six (invented 1948), or the primitive helicopter seen in Testing, Testing 1, 2, 3 (invented 1942, mass produced 1944) but even these only expand the range by a few years. We do see Rainbow Dash wearing an Astronaut costume in Scare Master, but space exploration like Buck Rogers of the 24th century existed around 1928.
Further, even where the device in question was of a variety made by a certain date, in most instances the particular device looks more modern. For example, Rarity has a domestic sewing machine. Sewing machines were first invented in the 1700s, but were not commonly available and look nothing at all like Rarity’s device. Sewing machines for domestic use began sale in 1856, and the particular model that Rarity has looks about like the ones made by the Singer corporation around 1930, so I would take Rarity’s sewing machine as evidence of a 1930ish date.
Pretty much everything in the My Little Pony world is consistent with an Anglo-Saxon civilization with technology levels around the mid-1930s, except they never discovered the internal combustion engine or radio, but also have magic. Everything, that is, except when it comes to music. Musical technology has been the one big area where the writers of the show have chosen to introduce more modern equipment and culture. See The Mane Attraction, Slice of Life, The Saddle Row Review, or the The My Little Pony Movie for where technology associated with musical production seems to be greater than that existing before 1950. It does seem that the writers have disregarded setting in some instances where they wanted to insert pop music.
>>226124
I'm'a have to respond to these objections
Firstly, on the issue of magic, it doesn't really look like it affects the technology of the setting that much, as not a lot that would normally be done by machine is done by magic in that setting. We do see magic used to `power rarity's sewing machine in lieu of electricity, and magic seems to power the machine in Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000. Basically, where magic is found it seems to do what electricity or an internal combustion engine would do in real life. Despite that, we still see a hydroelectric damn in Mysterious Mare Do Well - I would hardly be surprised if its combined with magic for a kind of "Tesla Coil" distribution - an we see steam being used to heat the spa in Applejack's Day Off.
The one clear area where it looks like magic overtakes technology in My Little Pony is in communications. Celestia uses dragon burps rather than telegrams to communicate to Twilight, and in both the second Equestria Girl's Movie and The My Little Pony Movie, we see magic used in a way that references videochat and text messaging. That's about it.
> the idea of the tank, an armored vehicle with a crew to operate projectile weapons, has been around since at least da Vinci
I think this merits a full response. Sure, the idea of something like an armored moving thing that was not called a tank may have existed among the thousands of pages of scribbled designs of an engineer long before 1916, and it's true that if you squint hard enough at these drawings, or the armored wagons of some protestant rebel in Bohemia, you might think you have an idea that kind of sort of vaguely maybe-ish resembles a tank. But what we see in Suited For Success and May the Best Pet Win is not the idea of a Tank, what we see is the word "Tank" being used as synonym for sturdy, bulky, heavy, tough, but still movable. That requires not merely an idea existing, but the concept of a tank being so widespread, commonplace, and well known, that it can be used as a word that anypony immediately understands. That requires much more than just a few drawings of something that was never called a “Tank.”
The modern idea of a tank was first developed by a French artillery officer who proposed a “self-propelled cannon” in 1903. Later that same year, H.G. Wells wrote a short story “The Land of Ironclads” that featured “land ironclads” that kind of resemble tanks. If you really want to insist that reference-to-technology-does-not-equal-existence-of-technology, then for the tank, I would point to 1903 as the real world date, as that is the first time the idea appeared in literature. Of course, these ideas were still not widely known, and neither was called a “tank.” The word “Tank,” meaning a tracked armored car, was first created in December 1915 when the British referred to their landships as “tanks” and “water closets” in multiple languages, as a way of tricking the enemy into believing these were water tanks. The tank became widely known as a weapon of war in 1916.
Yes, I know that it seems a bit unusual for the My Little Pony World to have weapons of war like tanks. But damn it, they use it twice, including for a character name, and it’s obvious from context what they mean by the word. To me, the use of the term implies widespread public knowledge of the weapon of war as would have existed 1916 and later. And if that isn’t convincing, don’t forget that the first time we see the theme song, we see a color photograph – 1907 – and the presents for Moondancer, seen in the first three minutes of the show, use a wrapping paper that wasn’t available until 1917. And then, there's that gas mask in Bloom and Gloom that is also WW1ish.
\r
>>226074
>>223187
But wait! There’s more!
Found another one: in Bloom and Gloom, a pony appears wearing a strange gas mask (invented ~1912, and whether this version is more advanced or less advanced than a WW1 mask I can’t say).
Not only has the My Little Pony setting always had a very large number of devices and contraptions that were only invented in our world after the late 1800s, but it also has a sort of cutoff date – almost nothing in the My Little Pony universe was created after World War 2. You do see some exceptions, like for instance, the use of Instant Cameras in Pinkie Apple Pie and The Mean Six (invented 1948), or the primitive helicopter seen in Testing, Testing 1, 2, 3 (invented 1942, mass produced 1944) but even these only expand the range by a few years. We do see Rainbow Dash wearing an Astronaut costume in Scare Master, but space exploration like Buck Rogers of the 24th century existed around 1928.
Further, even where the device in question was of a variety made by a certain date, in most instances the particular device looks more modern. For example, Rarity has a domestic sewing machine. Sewing machines were first invented in the 1700s, but were not commonly available and look nothing at all like Rarity’s device. Sewing machines for domestic use began sale in 1856, and the particular model that Rarity has looks about like the ones made by the Singer corporation around 1930, so I would take Rarity’s sewing machine as evidence of a 1930ish date.
Pretty much everything in the My Little Pony world is consistent with an Anglo-Saxon civilization with technology levels around the mid-1930s, except they never discovered the internal combustion engine or radio, but also have magic. Everything, that is, except when it comes to music. Musical technology has been the one big area where the writers of the show have chosen to introduce more modern equipment and culture. See The Mane Attraction, Slice of Life, The Saddle Row Review, or the The My Little Pony Movie for where technology associated with musical production seems to be greater than that existing before 1950. It does seem that the writers have disregarded setting in some instances where they wanted to insert pop music.
>>226124
I'm'a have to respond to these objections
Firstly, on the issue of magic, it doesn't really look like it affects the technology of the setting that much, as not a lot that would normally be done by machine is done by magic in that setting. We do see magic used to `power rarity's sewing machine in lieu of electricity, and magic seems to power the machine in Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000. Basically, where magic is found it seems to do what electricity or an internal combustion engine would do in real life. Despite that, we still see a hydroelectric damn in Mysterious Mare Do Well - I would hardly be surprised if its combined with magic for a kind of "Tesla Coil" distribution - an we see steam being used to heat the spa in Applejack's Day Off.
The one clear area where it looks like magic overtakes technology in My Little Pony is in communications. Celestia uses dragon burps rather than telegrams to communicate to Twilight, and in both the second Equestria Girl's Movie and The My Little Pony Movie, we see magic used in a way that references videochat and text messaging. That's about it.
> the idea of the tank, an armored vehicle with a crew to operate projectile weapons, has been around since at least da Vinci
I think this merits a full response. Sure, the idea of something like an armored moving thing that was not called a tank may have existed among the thousands of pages of scribbled designs of an engineer long before 1916, and it's true that if you squint hard enough at these drawings, or the armored wagons of some protestant rebel in Bohemia, you might think you have an idea that kind of sort of vaguely maybe-ish resembles a tank. But what we see in Suited For Success and May the Best Pet Win is not the idea of a Tank, what we see is the word "Tank" being used as synonym for sturdy, bulky, heavy, tough, but still movable. That requires not merely an idea existing, but the concept of a tank being so widespread, commonplace, and well known, that it can be used as a word that anypony immediately understands. That requires much more than just a few drawings of something that was never called a “Tank.”
The modern idea of a tank was first developed by a French artillery officer who proposed a “self-propelled cannon” in 1903. Later that same year, H.G. Wells wrote a short story “The Land of Ironclads” that featured “land ironclads” that kind of resemble tanks. If you really want to insist that reference-to-technology-does-not-equal-existence-of-technology, then for the tank, I would point to 1903 as the real world date, as that is the first time the idea appeared in literature. Of course, these ideas were still not widely known, and neither was called a “tank.” The word “Tank,” meaning a tracked armored car, was first created in December 1915 when the British referred to their landships as “tanks” and “water closets” in multiple languages, as a way of tricking the enemy into believing these were water tanks. The tank became widely known as a weapon of war in 1916.
Yes, I know that it seems a bit unusual for the My Little Pony World to have weapons of war like tanks. But damn it, they use it twice, including for a character name, and it’s obvious from context what they mean by the word. To me, the use of the term implies widespread public knowledge of the weapon of war as would have existed 1916 and later. And if that isn’t convincing, don’t forget that the first time we see the theme song, we see a color photograph – 1907 – and the presents for Moondancer, seen in the first three minutes of the show, use a wrapping paper that wasn’t available until 1917. And then, there's that gas mask in Bloom and Gloom that is also WW1ish.
\r
>>226150
>Pretty much everything in the My Little Pony world is consistent with an Anglo-Saxon civilization
I get a lot of French vibes from Canterlot, imo.
>Pretty much everything in the My Little Pony world is consistent with an Anglo-Saxon civilization
I get a lot of French vibes from Canterlot, imo.
>>226266
He made drawings of something that could be described as a helicopter. It was a human powered "air screw" but it couldn't have worked as it was.
He made drawings of something that could be described as a helicopter. It was a human powered "air screw" but it couldn't have worked as it was.
>>226180
England (the birthplace of the Anglo-Saxons) has been heavily influenced by the French. With several cases of huge interaction. England & Wales was originally conquered & united by a Norman, basically a Christianized French-speaking Nord.
England (the birthplace of the Anglo-Saxons) has been heavily influenced by the French. With several cases of huge interaction. England & Wales was originally conquered & united by a Norman, basically a Christianized French-speaking Nord.
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>>226266
> shit-tier helicopter
I don't understand why people suck him off so hard. He was obviously a great artist, but he was also probably a gay. On top of that, all the 'science' stuff people credit to him were either garbage that never would have even come close to working or shit other people were already considering. The number of people that honestly think that DaVinci was the first guy to ever get the idea of building a human powered tortoise is astounding.
> shit-tier helicopter
I don't understand why people suck him off so hard. He was obviously a great artist, but he was also probably a gay. On top of that, all the 'science' stuff people credit to him were either garbage that never would have even come close to working or shit other people were already considering. The number of people that honestly think that DaVinci was the first guy to ever get the idea of building a human powered tortoise is astounding.
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>>226074
>if you ignore the pop music
It's hard to; most of it is pretty catchy.
Anyway, as far as the consistency of the setting goes, I guess my point is less about the technical composition of it and more about the themes and mood the setting creates, and how that affects the type of story being told. I've never actually sat down and watched the original 1986 My Little Pony cartoon, but from what I gather it was basically a high fantasy setting, which usually resembles a Western medieval world. Faust, as far as I know, watched that show as a child and wanted to build her world along similar lines.
It's not uncommon in fantasy to incorporate elements from other eras of human history and mix them into the setting, for instance there's an old game called Arcana set in a traditional medieval-style fantasy world experiencing a scientific revolution, so the setting is a combination of medieval and Victorian styles. A more recent game called Lost Odyssey does something similar. I'm frankly impressed by your autistic attention to the background details in the show and what you know about the technology required to present them, so I'm willing to concede to you that Equestria is probably intended to be an analog of a European nation with technology comparable to the late 19th to early 20th centuries. However, before I move on, I have a few autistic points of my own I'd like to drop:
>Twilight Sparkle lives in a house filled with books in Canterlot, and then in a library in a rural hamlet upon moving to Ponyville. The vast numbers of books clearly imply the existence of the Printing Press, invented 1439
1439 was technically still the Late Middle Ages, as most historians usually place the end of the medieval period at around 1500. Also, the number of books don't necessarily imply the existence of a printing press, it just implies that a method of mass-producing books exists. Such methods existed prior to the development of the printing press. At the height of Imperial Rome, literacy was common among the upper classes at least, paper (or parchment, or papyrus, or whatever they used exactly) was relatively cheap and plentiful, and the use of slave labor made copying books fast and cheap. They actually had a commercial book industry very similar to ours, in which pop literature and even pornography was mass-produced and sold in bookshops for the entertainment of the literate portion of the population. Roman "books" were actually scrolls, but the point is that if the ponies had an efficient method of copying large numbers of books they could do it without a press. The rotary press you mention, however, does prove that the technology exists in the world, and particularly proves that it has been perfected to the point that it's cheap enough for a small-town school to own one. So, again, I'll concede the point to you, so long as you are aware that you're not the only one who can pull obscure facts out of his ass.
>Lampshades were invented in the Late 17th Century.
False. Lampshades were invented in 1933 by Wolfgang Adolphus Hitlerstein, who perfected the technique of removing the skin from the indigenous Bavarian Hebrew and spinning it into an attractive lamp covering. The invention was a hit, and so Hitlerstein eventually shortened his name and moved his operation to Berlin, where he opened a large factory. He soon discovered that much like the American Buffalo, the Bavarian Hebrew was an adaptable creature that could be put to many uses, and soon his factories were producing soap and other consumer goods as well. At the height of its success, his operation was producing as many as 11 million lampshades per day. Unfortunately, due to intense demand for his products, the Bavarian Hebrew became nearly extinct, and soon his factories shut down. They are still standing and can be toured to this very day. Several movies have been made about the incident, the most popular of which was called The Lorax.
>Twilight briefly wears a Statue of Liberty dress
That means nothing unless you're implying a connection between Equestria and the human world Apart from EQG, which, as we all know, is canon. A statue of a pony wearing a dress and crown holding a torch, clearly modeled after the Statue of Liberty, appears in shots of Manehattan, and it's likely that statue that Twilight would have been imitating. However, despite that it's clearly intended to reference our Statue of Liberty, the statue does not necessarily reflect the presence of industrial era technology. The Colossus of Rhodes, for instance, was built around 280 BC and is approximately the same height as the Statue of Liberty.
>You can go anywhere in Equestria on a train from the Crystal Empire, to the Kirin Grove, to the Hippogriffs.
The Hippogriffs live on Mount Aris and the Kingdom of Seaquestria beneath it. On all official maps I've seen, this is depicted as an island off the coast of the southern tip of the land mass that Equestria is on (its depiction in the movie is consistent with this). From what I can tell, the northern edge of the desert in which Klugetown is located marks the southern boundary of Equestria, and no train lines go beyond this point. There are no lines that go anywhere near Mt. Aris in general, so anypony attempting to get there would have to use an alternate transportation method. I don't remember if the show explicitly depicts a train going there, but if it does it means either the official map is wrong, or there is a glaring continuity error in the series. Pics related.
Interestingly enough, while conducting autismo research on Equestrian train lines, I found this fan-created map, https://www.deviantart.com/keenkris/art/Map-of-Equestria-And-Beyond-790278917, which seems well researched and shows Ponyland from the G1 series as part of the same world. This would imply a connection between the continuity of both series that could potentially merit more autismo research.
>if you ignore the pop music
It's hard to; most of it is pretty catchy.
Anyway, as far as the consistency of the setting goes, I guess my point is less about the technical composition of it and more about the themes and mood the setting creates, and how that affects the type of story being told. I've never actually sat down and watched the original 1986 My Little Pony cartoon, but from what I gather it was basically a high fantasy setting, which usually resembles a Western medieval world. Faust, as far as I know, watched that show as a child and wanted to build her world along similar lines.
It's not uncommon in fantasy to incorporate elements from other eras of human history and mix them into the setting, for instance there's an old game called Arcana set in a traditional medieval-style fantasy world experiencing a scientific revolution, so the setting is a combination of medieval and Victorian styles. A more recent game called Lost Odyssey does something similar. I'm frankly impressed by your autistic attention to the background details in the show and what you know about the technology required to present them, so I'm willing to concede to you that Equestria is probably intended to be an analog of a European nation with technology comparable to the late 19th to early 20th centuries. However, before I move on, I have a few autistic points of my own I'd like to drop:
>Twilight Sparkle lives in a house filled with books in Canterlot, and then in a library in a rural hamlet upon moving to Ponyville. The vast numbers of books clearly imply the existence of the Printing Press, invented 1439
1439 was technically still the Late Middle Ages, as most historians usually place the end of the medieval period at around 1500. Also, the number of books don't necessarily imply the existence of a printing press, it just implies that a method of mass-producing books exists. Such methods existed prior to the development of the printing press. At the height of Imperial Rome, literacy was common among the upper classes at least, paper (or parchment, or papyrus, or whatever they used exactly) was relatively cheap and plentiful, and the use of slave labor made copying books fast and cheap. They actually had a commercial book industry very similar to ours, in which pop literature and even pornography was mass-produced and sold in bookshops for the entertainment of the literate portion of the population. Roman "books" were actually scrolls, but the point is that if the ponies had an efficient method of copying large numbers of books they could do it without a press. The rotary press you mention, however, does prove that the technology exists in the world, and particularly proves that it has been perfected to the point that it's cheap enough for a small-town school to own one. So, again, I'll concede the point to you, so long as you are aware that you're not the only one who can pull obscure facts out of his ass.
>Lampshades were invented in the Late 17th Century.
False. Lampshades were invented in 1933 by Wolfgang Adolphus Hitlerstein, who perfected the technique of removing the skin from the indigenous Bavarian Hebrew and spinning it into an attractive lamp covering. The invention was a hit, and so Hitlerstein eventually shortened his name and moved his operation to Berlin, where he opened a large factory. He soon discovered that much like the American Buffalo, the Bavarian Hebrew was an adaptable creature that could be put to many uses, and soon his factories were producing soap and other consumer goods as well. At the height of its success, his operation was producing as many as 11 million lampshades per day. Unfortunately, due to intense demand for his products, the Bavarian Hebrew became nearly extinct, and soon his factories shut down. They are still standing and can be toured to this very day. Several movies have been made about the incident, the most popular of which was called The Lorax.
>Twilight briefly wears a Statue of Liberty dress
That means nothing unless you're implying a connection between Equestria and the human world Apart from EQG, which, as we all know, is canon. A statue of a pony wearing a dress and crown holding a torch, clearly modeled after the Statue of Liberty, appears in shots of Manehattan, and it's likely that statue that Twilight would have been imitating. However, despite that it's clearly intended to reference our Statue of Liberty, the statue does not necessarily reflect the presence of industrial era technology. The Colossus of Rhodes, for instance, was built around 280 BC and is approximately the same height as the Statue of Liberty.
>You can go anywhere in Equestria on a train from the Crystal Empire, to the Kirin Grove, to the Hippogriffs.
The Hippogriffs live on Mount Aris and the Kingdom of Seaquestria beneath it. On all official maps I've seen, this is depicted as an island off the coast of the southern tip of the land mass that Equestria is on (its depiction in the movie is consistent with this). From what I can tell, the northern edge of the desert in which Klugetown is located marks the southern boundary of Equestria, and no train lines go beyond this point. There are no lines that go anywhere near Mt. Aris in general, so anypony attempting to get there would have to use an alternate transportation method. I don't remember if the show explicitly depicts a train going there, but if it does it means either the official map is wrong, or there is a glaring continuity error in the series. Pics related.
Interestingly enough, while conducting autismo research on Equestrian train lines, I found this fan-created map, https://www.deviantart.com/keenkris/art/Map-of-Equestria-And-Beyond-790278917, which seems well researched and shows Ponyland from the G1 series as part of the same world. This would imply a connection between the continuity of both series that could potentially merit more autismo research.
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>>226468
>>226075
>>226150
>In The Mysterious Mare Do Well, we see a Hydroelectric plant (yes, you can see electric coils.). Invented 1881.
Actually there's numerous instances of electricity being used in the series, you can see electric lights and many other modern electrical devices at various points. For instance, while looking up clips from the Foal Free Press episode to get a look at the rotary printing press you mentioned, I noticed there are plainly electric lights hanging from the ceiling in the room where Diamond Tiara gives the CMC their assignments.
>tanks
>gas masks
Questions about whether or not ponies have reached the tank and chemical warfare stage of civilization is a separate thread topic in itself. I'd be very curious to know what the Great War would look like being fought by ponies. New thread theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5L7GyZeazM
>Pretty much everything in the My Little Pony world is consistent with an Anglo-Saxon civilization with technology levels around the mid-1930s, except they never discovered the internal combustion engine or radio, but also have magic. Everything, that is, except when it comes to music. Musical technology has been the one big area where the writers of the show have chosen to introduce more modern equipment and culture. See The Mane Attraction, Slice of Life, The Saddle Row Review, or the The My Little Pony Movie for where technology associated with musical production seems to be greater than that existing before 1950. It does seem that the writers have disregarded setting in some instances where they wanted to insert pop music.
Don't forget Vinyl's headphones, or more generally, the depiction of her as a modern DJ. She uses a dual turntable and mixing console setup that was originally developed in the 1970s for disco clubs. Most of the time, the series depicts records being played on gramophones that would be consistent with your dating the tech of the show around the early 20th century, but Vinyl uses a modern setup. While the technology needed to cobble together something like what she has would have been available at least as early as the 1940s, putting those elements together to make that type of device would make no sense without a cultural progression similar to the period between 1970 and 2000 in our world. As I said, that sort of dual turntable setup was initially developed in the disco era because DJs in clubs needed to be able to switch records quickly and seamlessly. It's possible radio DJs would have had something similar at an earlier date, but what we think of as modern DJ culture, as in the use of DJ equipment as an expressive medium in itself rather than just as a way of playing records for broadcast, began specifically with disco music and dance club culture. From there it progressed through the 1980s into experimentation with cutting up and sampling pieces of records rather than just playing them from start to finish, using the filters on the mixing console for effect, playing two records simultaneously to create remixes and mashups, looping breakbeats from songs to create new tracks, record scratching as an expressive medium, and so forth. The whole progression of dance club culture from the disco era until at least the early 1990s when electronic house music became popular would be necessary for a character like Vinyl Scratch to make sense. I highly doubt some hick pony from a far-flung provincial town that still uses roof-thatching would have thought to just wire two gramophones together for no reason one day and then suddenly invent dubstep music. Really, there's more cultural anachronisms in the show than technological ones.
Anyway, that's probably enough of this wacky autism for one night. I think I had something else to say more in line with my original topic, but I forgot what it was. I may return to this.
>>226075
>>226150
>In The Mysterious Mare Do Well, we see a Hydroelectric plant (yes, you can see electric coils.). Invented 1881.
Actually there's numerous instances of electricity being used in the series, you can see electric lights and many other modern electrical devices at various points. For instance, while looking up clips from the Foal Free Press episode to get a look at the rotary printing press you mentioned, I noticed there are plainly electric lights hanging from the ceiling in the room where Diamond Tiara gives the CMC their assignments.
>tanks
>gas masks
Questions about whether or not ponies have reached the tank and chemical warfare stage of civilization is a separate thread topic in itself. I'd be very curious to know what the Great War would look like being fought by ponies. New thread theme: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5L7GyZeazM
>Pretty much everything in the My Little Pony world is consistent with an Anglo-Saxon civilization with technology levels around the mid-1930s, except they never discovered the internal combustion engine or radio, but also have magic. Everything, that is, except when it comes to music. Musical technology has been the one big area where the writers of the show have chosen to introduce more modern equipment and culture. See The Mane Attraction, Slice of Life, The Saddle Row Review, or the The My Little Pony Movie for where technology associated with musical production seems to be greater than that existing before 1950. It does seem that the writers have disregarded setting in some instances where they wanted to insert pop music.
Don't forget Vinyl's headphones, or more generally, the depiction of her as a modern DJ. She uses a dual turntable and mixing console setup that was originally developed in the 1970s for disco clubs. Most of the time, the series depicts records being played on gramophones that would be consistent with your dating the tech of the show around the early 20th century, but Vinyl uses a modern setup. While the technology needed to cobble together something like what she has would have been available at least as early as the 1940s, putting those elements together to make that type of device would make no sense without a cultural progression similar to the period between 1970 and 2000 in our world. As I said, that sort of dual turntable setup was initially developed in the disco era because DJs in clubs needed to be able to switch records quickly and seamlessly. It's possible radio DJs would have had something similar at an earlier date, but what we think of as modern DJ culture, as in the use of DJ equipment as an expressive medium in itself rather than just as a way of playing records for broadcast, began specifically with disco music and dance club culture. From there it progressed through the 1980s into experimentation with cutting up and sampling pieces of records rather than just playing them from start to finish, using the filters on the mixing console for effect, playing two records simultaneously to create remixes and mashups, looping breakbeats from songs to create new tracks, record scratching as an expressive medium, and so forth. The whole progression of dance club culture from the disco era until at least the early 1990s when electronic house music became popular would be necessary for a character like Vinyl Scratch to make sense. I highly doubt some hick pony from a far-flung provincial town that still uses roof-thatching would have thought to just wire two gramophones together for no reason one day and then suddenly invent dubstep music. Really, there's more cultural anachronisms in the show than technological ones.
Anyway, that's probably enough of this wacky autism for one night. I think I had something else to say more in line with my original topic, but I forgot what it was. I may return to this.
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