Stonetoss

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Rating Summary

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Background
Back in 2018 this was suggested for review. That it first got reviewed now was, for once, not because a tryhard newbie on the forum jumped the gun and made a page for it. Things is: It's not secret that the BWW community is at least a little right leaning, so for the most part a fair number of BWW members seem to somewhat agree with a lot of the political commentary that Stonetoss makes. To this end, the debate had been ongoing for years on whether this comic deserves a review or not.

Basically, consensus seemed to be that this comic - despite being undoubtably offensive to people who didn't agree with the comic's politics - then it's not that bad, even if it's not all the jokes that Stonetoss cranks out that seem equally... kosher.

Story & Plot & Writing
Considering that this is a political comic, it must be reviewed accordingly. It is to be expected that it will have a one-sided view of things, for such is the nature of this kind of comics. Thus, the only real way to review a comic like this, is to do the same as has been done with the many other political webcomics on this wiki and look at the messaging. What are the political or ideological messages that this cartoonist is pushing, and are they crazy or not?

This was actually a prime point of contention on the forum, because the consensus seemed to be that we know he's an edgy boy, we know he fucking LOVES to push buttons, and we know that not all his jokes are funny or in good taste.

But ok, first up let's try to compare this comic to some of the other political comics out there:

This comic doesn't have a serial narrative like The Probability Broach, and it doesn't advocate for pie-in-the-sky utopian politics either. It's not pushing religion over science, and while it most certainly mocks a lot of political characters then it does so better than most and while you're never in doubt when an SJW stereotype is on display, then they're not equally as whiny as often shown in comics. Stonetoss also doesn't advocate race-war - indeed, the closest political comic would probably be Quantum Vibe, though the utopian politics pushed in that does put it a bit off the mark. Stonetoss has yet to push a comic that has the direct message of "If everyone converts to my views, the world would be perfect" which is what pretty much ALL other political commentary comics seems to do these days.

See, when it comes to political messaging in the Stonetoss comics, then there often aren't much. The comic's style is more of a "hey look at this stupid thing being done" style, which can then be open to interpretation. A few are pretty clear, but many are simply meant to make you think a bit - of course, to some that is a high crime on its own if they don't like you weighing both sides of a debate equally.

As for the Stonetoss comics themselves, then the format hasn't changed since its start - it's usually a simple strip or page, with a clear setup and punchline. On quite a lot of forums, and various subreddits, especially ones that discuss politics, his comics even tend to harvest the occasional bit of praise - because you don't have to be a political extremist to enjoy this comic.

But does that mean that everything is honky dory and there's nothing to debate here?

No of course not. Stonetoss LOVES to court controversy and vigorously fucks with all kinds of sacred cows. This is where most of his critique also comes from, but again it all primarily falls back on whether or not you agree with the political messages being put forth - because depending on your mindset, then very of his comics will be very offensive... or pretty much all of them.

The comics that get the most critique are likely the ones where he pokes fun at jews... thing is, we're not talking swastika-waving bullshit here. And this is how even his even jew-centric comics can "get a pass" if you squint a little:

His very first one is about how quite a lot of jews are very rich, and the description of said comic, he links to a Jewish professor who talks about the social pressure in Jewish communities for getting a good education and focusing on upward social mobility, pointing out that 48% of American billionaires are Jewish. This starts a long line of comics where Stonetoss simply spouts what is often called "hate-facts". You know, things that are factual, but can be interpreted as hateful depending on your political tastes, even if entirely true.

...and its comics like that which Stonetoss fucking loves to crank out - because they make you think. Worse yet, he'll try to make you think about uncomfortable topics like circumcision, like the amazingly high suicide rate of trans people, or mocking how pride parades in many places have become fetish displays, or perfectly innocents topics like immigration or mass media manipulation.

But yes, he does comics where he mocks Jewish customs - but it's not like he's the only one who is against that sort of thing. To this end a lot of his jew-centric comics could very well be argued to have perfectly valid and not at all antisemitic points. Of course, being an absolute edge-lord, then Stonetoss does occasionally crank out utter cringe when trying to mock jews, which only gives fuel to his haters.

Of course, some of his comics are so amazingly spot on that its quite eerie. This one about male feminists who turn out to be abusive predators have been prophetic in so many ways, considering the number of cases, stories and articles that have come up over the years on that topic. It's almost as if a lot of creeps use feminism to cover their abuse, or to get close to women to abuse them. Mind you, the BWW community has seen plenty of wannabe activist comics that similarly use activism to cover for racism and other flavors of madness. This wasn't the first time his comics turned out to predict the future either, such as his take on the Jussie Smollett hate-crime hoax.

Another topic he absolutely loves to poke fun at is good old political hypocrisy, especially wannabe communists, and virtue signaling. Sure, its low-hanging fruit, but Stonetoss knows how to make a simple comic strip push an easy-to-understand message that doesn't necessarily come off as preachy, though make absolutely no mistake: Stonetoss's politics in the comics are conservative and libertarian, with a lot of pro-gun comics.

Mind you, this isn't to say that Stonetoss wont also mock conservative and right-leaning bullshit, as well as those who 'claim' to be neutral if they're doing something that's worth mocking. He was also an early supporter of bitcoin, and even poked fun at gamergate. There are several Stonetoss comics mocking US republicans as well. Shit like this is just hilarious.

However, generally his satire pokes fun at lefty bullshit and things like wannabe communists, but he can also simply mock memes.

Another sacred cow Stonetoss has received a lot of hatred over are his comics poking fun at topics related to race and related hate-fact statistics. Of course, even here he can surprise you by mixing up a black race joke with one that has jews for a punchline. Again, it makes you think a little. Comics like that where he has a clash of conflicting messages as the joke, or in this one with immigration and minimum wage work well to demonstrate how Stonetoss can encourage debate with his comics - though at the same time comics like that are also excellent demonstrations of his ability to absolutely short-circuit the brains of his haters., such as this one That said, then once more: Not all of these attempts are equally funny.

This of course also begs the question of whether Stonetoss personally believes what's in the comics, or if he purely writes them to get a reaction out of people. His haters will point to the comics where he mocks Jewish culture and politics, or the previously linked one about questioning the holocaust, and say that of course he does. His fans will probably just shrug and say that he's making fun of extremes. This reviewer is somewhere in the middle of that - but at the same time this reviewer recognizes that you don't have to find everything that a comedian or a cartoonist produces funny or agreeable, in order to enjoy the sum of their work. As linked more than once, he does occasionally post absolute cringe. Similarly, a lot of Hollywood actors are idiots, but you can still enjoy movies with them.

Another fun topic that Stonetoss loves to poke fun at is antifa. He has dozens of comics mocking their violence against innocent people, and generally also what one could call protest culture for its strange hypocrisies. It's a common theme in a lot of these comics to simply have the setup and punchline be images showing socially acceptable forms of protest contrasting unacceptable forms of protest, where both are of course in essence identical. Funny shit though, and the mix of humor with political messaging means that anyone can see both assuming that they don't just recoil in horror and scream that you're a Nazi when they see you're showing them a Stonetoss comic. Sometimes all he has to do is satirize current events or turn their own silly statements on them. Sometimes all he has to do is portray reality to demonstrate the double standards and hypocrisies of the left and modern pop culture.

Hell, he even made fun of Trump a few times.

But hey, as long as he makes jokes that involve jews that means he's a Nazi right? I mean, you don't even have to click on that to read the comic to know he's a bad person, right? It can't be that his stuff is harmless, or that the policing of such content and opinions might be a bit unevenly distributed, but that's the tricky bit about reviewing a divisive political cartoon when you like most of its content. It'll be a straight dogwhistle to his haters. But that is the price of raising uncomfortable topics while also pointing out the hypocrisies of political extremists.

But ok, all in all Stonetoss's comics work well in that their messaging is easy to understand, doesn't require a grand degree in politics to comprehend, and can quickly be read through and pretty much always contain a punchline that can at least make you chuckle - even if it is a 'oh I shouldn't really be laughing at this' kind of chuckle. Even his more subtle comics can accomplish this, and quite a few of his comics simply have as punchline a demonstration of how times have changed or employ hate facts as punchlines. He presents the agendas of social justice warriors and lefties clearly, letting their own truths highlight their questionable morals and hypocrisies.

Is it perfect? Nah, but even when he pokes fun at jews its often for a punchline that raises potentially valid political questions, such as US involvement in the middle east, or when he takes jabs at cancel culture, race, the US pull-out of Afghanistan, the bias in main stream media, wannabe communists or absolute crimes against humanity like jokes.

Art
The art of Stonetoss is simple, even crude, but over the years he's built up a solid and easy to read visual language in his comics. Despite how similar the faces of his characters often look, then you know that the one with the purple twirly bit of hair is usually some kind of social justice warrior, and so on. It can take reading a few comics to get the full load of references, but even without them they're easy enough to understand even for the uninitiated. Take the two following examples:





Another point that Stonetoss should be seriously commended for, is that in his comic he has more or less entirely avoided the sadly common trope in political comics of drawing his political opponents/strawmen in a visually distinctively negative manner. This is a sadly common gimmick used in other other political comics, though when he has trans and LGBT characters on display they do start to look a bit weird - but one could just as well make the increasingly legit argument that he's not in any way exaggerating, which is sort of the joke in and of itself. Again, this goes to the visual storytelling of his comics, which can often carry the punchlines on their own.

Artist
He's yet to be doxxed, though not for the lack of trying of his hatedom - but honestly the only things that are known about Stonetoss is what he's put up on the about page on his comic. He claims to just enjoy slaying society's sacred cows... and if nothing else, he most certainly delivers on that.

Cumclussion
Basically he's worse than Hitler. A total ultra-Nazi who must be hounded off the internet, at least if you go by his hatedoms on Reddit and whatnot. You either love him or hate him, for he is without a doubt polarizing, and that's clearly by design. He's also addressed his opinions on israel and jews via his comics repeatedly, and ultimately they mainly seem to center on the notion that he doesn't like how much money the US is giving to the country or how many US soldiers have died over the years to protect the country.

He was also recently embroiled in some drama about some NFTs he sold, because some NFT exchanges straight up banned his NFTs - which struck a lot of people as odd, and revealed a lot of hypocrisy in that business.

Stonetoss courts drama and revels in it, and while this reviewer has repeatedly pointed out that not all his comics are without fault - indeed he has posted DAS CRINGE more than once - then his comics can be worth a good chuckle, if you're into that kind of stuff.

Links

 * The webcomic