Tracking toy tariffs

AceofKnaves said:
I remember times on the ‘old board’ when we’d get some real bad actors shredding on “woke” and talking large about redhat-adjacent stuff.
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Yes, that really opened my eyes to what several of you are about and was something I mentioned to DarthDre758 when AT started up. It happened a few times, and was always met with well articulated non-tolerance without being dickish and it was incredibly inspiring to me. So yeah, this forum couldn't have come at a better time.
 
Like everyone else I'm just totally bowled over by the tariff numbers they rolled out. It's insane. Maybe the "best case" scenario is that this is just the ultimate grift, and he wants individual companies or countries to pay fealty to have their products exempted. What an absolute nightmare this country has willingly walked itself into. I work for a nonprofit and roughly ~40% of our revenue came from federal grants - all canceled as of last week. Layoffs are happening, and while I'm not part of this first round, nothing's guaranteed for long. Fuck us for wanting to work on reducing forced labor in the global economy, am I right?

I'm pretty much freezing on all figure spending for the time being. I've got about $1,300 in preorders, most of which hit later in the year. Not canceling anything yet, but I'm dreading how this is going to affect Dragon Man or the 3 '97 Sentinels that are on that list. If a 54% tariff is *actually* applied to goods from China then there's no way Hasbro is honoring the preorder prices - they'd be absorbing losses on every unit. And even if they somehow are unaffected I'll probably cancel anyway unless things have somehow stabilized by then - way too much uncertainty to be spending any money unnecessarily.
 
AceofKnaves said:
I’ll be real: I don’t just love toys these days, I *cling* to them for sanity and solace, and also a bit as a ‘fuck you’ to the dominant paradigm that wants to try to tell me what a “real man” should and shouldn’t want and do and be.
I feel cowardly and weak for saying so, but getting cut off from that joy definitely worries me. It feels very selfish to worry about such things, and yet.
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I don't think you should feel weak or ashamed about it. We're the richest country on earth by a wide margin. We're going to see austerity and the potential for Soviet-style collapse because less than half the country elected a cruel, unqualified moron to the most important job in the world after they saw how poorly he performed the first time. I won't even mention the fact that he tried to overthrow the government.

As someone who lives in Seattle and is surrounded by liberals, it's crazy-making. Unlike Ru, I know people who voted for him. I guess that helps a little bit. I'm from an insanely conservative town, and most of my relatives are lifelong Republicans. It doesn't make it any easier to stomach the fact that a few hundred thousand people in three or four states doomed us to the end of the republic. Still, I have a lot more in common with people in Vancouver, BC than I do with most folks in rural Wisconsin. Over the last three months, it's become hard for me to swallow the idea that those people have this much sway over my life.

Worst of all, we're not suffering because the world economy cratered, or because there was a food or water shortage or a global pandemic. It's purely self-inflicted. It's the worst own-goal since Brexit, and it's probably magnitudes worse. If Republican voters, legislators, and judges sold their souls to a cult-like fascist worth worshipping, I think it'd be easier to stomach. Truth is, there's only one person I have ever met who I think would be a worse president than Trump. And maybe not even them. He has to be one of the dumbest public figures of my lifetime.

As someone who also lived and worked in DC, it's an insult to the intelligent, compassionate people who work to keep us safe behind the scenes. I know several people who were fired from their government jobs because Trump's a dummy and Elon's a ketamine-addled dummy. It's fucked.
 
TheSameIdiot said:
I won't even mention the fact that he tried to overthrow the government.
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As someone who lives in Seattle and is surrounded by liberals, it's crazy-making. Unlike Ru, I know people who voted for him.
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Hey, I know one! I actually knew a few others but we argued with them so badly they moved to a far more accepting area closer to San Diego.

I guess that helps a little bit.
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Well, and the one I know, it's one of my brothers-in-law, but we continue to engage with him maybe once a week on these topics just trying to grasp why in the hell he is so desperate to guzzle the kool aid. So far we've been unsuccessful, and I'll blame him because he can't justify anything without resorting to Joe Rogan quotes or "What about Kamala"isms.
EDIT: I want to add that this guy will tear down anyone, mock everyone. Anything someone does wrong, he's the first to point it out, and the closer he is to them, the louder he is about it. Yes, he does "ha ha" like Nelson if you fall down or stutter, but if his brothers or my wife slip up, oh man you'll never hear the end of it. But the one person he refuses to even acknowledge any fault in? Yeah, and that's confounding as hell.
Worst of all, we're not suffering because the world economy cratered, or because there was a food or water shortage or a global pandemic. It's purely self-inflicted. It's the worst own-goal since Brexit, and it's probably magnitudes worse. If Republican voters, legislators, and judges sold their souls to a cult-like fascist worth worshipping, I think it'd be easier to stomach. Truth is, there's only one person I have ever met who I think would be a worse president than Trump. And maybe not even them. He has to be one of the dumbest public figures of my lifetime.
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This is another great point. I remember back in, what was it, 2015? People were saying "oh, he's such a great business man! He can bring that know-how to the country!" First off, and I'm sorry to generalize as I'm sure not all business people are horrendous scum, but business people are horrendous scum who want to screw people hard and fast in all the ways. Secondly, the guy who went bankrupt how many times? Who stiffed how many contractors and such after projects were completed? His dad can't bail him out when he sinks the country damnit.

As someone who also lived and worked in DC, it's an insult to the intelligent, compassionate people who work to keep us safe behind the scenes. I know several people who were fired from their government jobs because Trump's a dummy and Elon's a ketamine-addled dummy. It's fucked
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Right. It's such a thorough and efficient assault. I wish I could just skip to the amazing A&E documentaries about this period in the country produced long after things improve. The latest installment of What In The Actual Fuck Were They Thinking?
 
I really appreciate this thread. I maintain that the only way out of this is to find common ground with folks that don't agree with you and engage them in a civil discourse that builds on it. But, it's also nice to see that I'm not crazy for having these same thoughts and recognizing that we're past the point of things turning out well.

I never thought I'd live in a country that deported people without due process and then turn it into a photo op. I never thought I'd live in a country where the executive branch openly defies judicial orders and gets away with it. I never thought I'd live in a country where I'd have to explain to the refugee family that we help sponsor - all of whom are here legally - how to handle military-armed government agents knocking on their door without a warrant. The very thing they fled from. Or that their daughter that was born here may not have a legal status. I never thought I'd live in a country that sides with Russia over NATO. I never thought I'd live in a country where a former President that attempted a coup was openly talking about staying past his term limits.

Most of all I never thought I'd live in a country that voted for this to happen.

Captain America has been my favorite hero ever since I was a kid. Something about the color scheme and the shield really appealed to me, but as I got older he stayed my favorite because he's always stood for doing the right thing regardless of what other Americans pressure him to do. I'm going to continue to aspire to live like Captain America.
 
Every single person I've talked to in person about the tariff chart thought the numbers were accurate, that the import trade deficit numbers were actually their tariffs as stated. Democrat or Republican, they didn't know. And how would they without doing research?

There's not nearly enough punishment for lying, for misleading, for incompetence. Trick enough people, and it doesn't matter; a vote is a vote.

Tap into their hateful thoughts and truth becomes meaningless.
 
vicious said:
There's not nearly enough punishment for lying, for misleading, for incompetence. Trick enough people, and it doesn't matter; a vote is a vote.
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This one million percent. We need to punish lying again. You can't have a functioning society if brazen liars constantly get away with peddling falsehoods, especially when they occupy positions of power. I think this is part of the larger discussion about masculinity and young men voting for Republicans. They want masculine virtues. Let's start with honesty and integrity.

The other issue is the news media. They completely and utterly failed us. They have since at least 2016, and likely going back much further. I'd start in 2003, when they credulously covered W's WMD lies. Of all the things I believe, this is the one that most makes me sound like a conspiracy theorist. Why do even supposedly liberal papers, like the New York Times, cover Trump with such a generous slant? Because they like him and want him to succeed. Not everyone at the paper, of course, but those writing headlines, laying out the paper, and sending push notifications. Back in the olden days, we would've called them gatekeepers.

If they started covering Trump fairly, even in 2023, we wouldn't be in this boat. Talk about the fact that he was found liable for rape. Talk about his felony conviction. Remind people about January 6. Don't accuse Kamala Harris of lying about Project 2025 or his proposed tariffs or mass deportations. If people knew who he was instead of the version the media propped up and sanitized, I'm certain he wouldn't have won a single election.

Journalists often use the excuse that they don't have that much sway anymore. It's simply not true. They threw everything they had at stories about Biden's supposed senility, to the point that it became common knowledge. They have the power, they just choose not to use it.
 
I don't have anything to say about the tariffs that hasn't already been eloquently said in this thread. I do want to reiterate what others have said, though; I appreciate the way in which this is being discussed and, without throwing stones at a dying old forum, I must say I'm glad this specific community exists.
 
I can’t even begin to say how much the tone of this thread makes me feel amazing to be here.
I dunno: I always assumed (wrongly, as it turned out) that there was a certain moral camaraderie around folks who loved heroic fiction and its expressions in action figures and such, and that we all absorbed those PSA’s from He-Man and the Joes about integrity and looking out for other people and valuing fairness and respect and dignity, even if we rolled our eyes while doing it. Like I really thought that was a baseline when I was a kid, cute little sheltered neurospicy child that I was.

It’s nice to feel like maybe that *is* true here.
We don’t all need to agree, but I do value a baseline of, for want of a better expression: “Captain America values”.
 
I hesitated for so long before posting this thread because I was sure it would devolve into a pit of animosity but I'm so happy it has turned out to be a bit cathartic and I'm sure there are some who don't like it but it is 100% on the topic of action figures and it will affect us all, whether you are against him or for him.

Also if there is anyone here who is a fan of him it's okay to not be okay with all of his policies. If your toys are going up dramatically because of him, it is okay to be upset but maybe it is time to pull back the curtain and investigate who your wizard really is.
 
I opened this thread with my heart in my throat worried it'd be a bloodbath and am so relieved to see the empathy and thoughtfulness everyone's bringing to it. (One more huge cheer to TSI for setting up this space and making it so great.)

Both my day job and my father's are wildly directly impacted by stuff before the tariffs and I won't lie, buying and talking about action figures has been the ONLY bright spot in my life lately so I'm more anxious about it screwing up the price of figures than I am the price of eggs. (I also work in publishing as well and watching for the price of paper to skyrocket any minute, too.) Having the one little thing that wasn't stressing me out also become a political nightmare is weirdly devastating.

And just knowing ALL of it is utterly self-inflicted. Bad things will happen in the world. I can accept that. Watching an entire culture slam its head in a proverbial car door is... anyone else no longer really sleeping? I was a five hour a night guy BEFORE all this happened, and now I just kinda pace the halls at three a.m. wondering what next.
 
docsilence said:
Both my day job and my father's are wildly directly impacted by stuff before the tariffs and I won't lie, buying and talking about action figures has been the ONLY bright spot in my life lately so I'm more anxious about it screwing up the price of figures than I am the price of eggs. (I also work in publishing as well and watching for the price of paper to skyrocket any minute, too.) Having the one little thing that wasn't stressing me out also become a political nightmare is weirdly devastating.
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Given the choice between eggs and figures, the eggs would get tossed.
 
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