Lizard Profile: Kragar (Proud to be Kafir)
This netizen is one of the very few remaining regular lizards from the 2005+ era. Kragar’s probably the most surprising regular member left, if for no other reason than he’s the only one who still has one of those old LGF trademark Islam-mocking nicknames. I guess that makes him a throwback in more ways than one.
Speaking of which, this thread was going to be about guessing the percentage of current LGFers that know what Kragar’s nic means, but I thought that might just make a good exit question. For I found a more interesting and related topic when I stumbled upon a thread where CJ exposed the lizards to the “old” LGF in Drudge Report ‘Terrorists Have Won’ Photo is from 2007…
The first batch of comments featured several epiphanies, and even reading it days later one could feel the shock in the air. Light bulbs suddenly appeared in all corners of the lizard kingdom:
RadicalModerate
Mon, Nov 15, 2010 12:14:02pm replyquote 5downupreportThere are more than a few posts in the linked LGF ’07 thread that absolutely turned my stomach, including people extolling the virtues of Robert Spencer, and others spouting blatantly racist statements (that got freaking updinged). Statements that likely would get people BANNED today.
It’s worth noting that a majority of those commenting are now blocked accounts.
OK, yes, that’s hilarious. (even better would have been use of the word “cesspool”) But this initial shock soon passed as, under the watchful eye of the Grand Lizardoid, the cult psyche adapts to the new information and constructs a coping mechanism. A feeling of relief soon spreads, as the topic switches to “thank god it’s changed”. This is where Kragar comes in:
Says the wise, old lizardoid. And it’s true, he would know.
In fact, these new lizards like RadicalModerate have no idea. Kragar has been around so long, he could tell RaMo about some of LGF’s really dark days. Back then, it wasn’t just (what would now be considered) veiled bigotry. To a hatchling’s horror, the archives reveal days when lizards, if perturbed, would let it all out there and post things like death wishes toward one another (rather explicitly, too):
Indeed, under LGF’s long period of what is now officially called the ”laissez faire comment moderation policy“, there were lizards who would even fantasize about dragging bodies in the street, and putting heads on pikes:
And loons who shrieked over that bunk Flight 93 memorial nontroversy:
But Kragar toughed it out, and survived that brutal, medieval period in LGF’s history. He endured that Wild West-style comment section, ”sharia watch” thread after “sharia watch” thread, and even kept his head from exploding when CJ adoringly called Pam Geller “babe“. It took years, but LGF is finally everything that Kragar (Proud to be Kafir) hoped it would be, and fought for. What a brave and Loyal Lizard of Legend.
Excellent history lesson, Chen.
I don’t have any kind of historical beef with Kragar, for the record. I’m posting this because I’ve been curious about the handful of folks that are still there. It’s one thing to contemplate CJ’s 180, but another with these folks that have been along for the ride, and seem to have followed right behind.
Netizens like lawhawk and Killgore are more moderate it seems, and appear to more content being useful and/or doing what they can to bolster whatever meme CJ is trying to push that day. So, maybe they haven’t changed as much ideologically, but instead are more political operatives who’ve simply changed their targets. They just like being sidekicks.
It looks like Cato followed for quite some time until he couldn’t take it any more, and just up and left. So there might be a point where the cognitive dissonance reaches critical mass.
But Kragar is one of those folks who I assume did the 180, and you got to wonder about how they reconcile CJ’s flip flops and their own past statements. And the community i.e. what they think about all those folks who were friendly and are now banned or even considered taboo. Even complete groupies like Sharmuta and Irish Rose -folks you would have thought would stay with the site no matter what- have come and gone during all of it. Everyone who wasn’t banned walked away or lost interest for whatever reason. But there’s Kragar (Proud to be Kafir), almost daily.
I wonder if Kragar wishes he could change his nic?
Minotaur – great work! Yes Kragar (Proud to be a Kafir) – a Kafir being a non Muslim) is one huge hypcorite.There are only two of the old guard LGF left, Shiplorkd Kirel and Krager who sold out. lawhawk is still there but does not make stupid comments like the other two.I hope you continue going through the comment archives and exposing Kragar and the you also should do the same for Shiplord Kirel. Ben-Hur left or was banned) sometime late last year. He knew that Johnson was whacked.
Great job Chen.
Or perhaps he got tired of drinking the cool aid of the far right. What idiots like you seem to not understand is that personal growth happens.
Ah yes, alongside CJ, Kragar was “duped” (for years), but with CJ’s wisdom and guidance he became “enlightened”. I suppose that is possible.
During which, Kragar endured an “inner struggle”. A “jihad”, I guess.
Or, he’s such a sycophantic suck up that he sold himself out to stay in the cult.
That’s what we’re trying to figure out.
Nothing wrong with changing one’s opinion, but then to go on a rampage stabbing your friends in the back for what one himself was guilty of is not only unethical, it’s obnoxious. That’s why we’re here laughing at 1.0. It’s a soap opera.
(That was a response to “Cashew.”)
FYI, “Cashew” is “Activelizard”.
yes I resurrected that comment because it was more reasonable (by its standards; “idiots” notwithstanding)
Drinking the Kool-Aid? He was the Kool-Aid factory, for many, many years. You don’t seem to get that.
A nut for a sock. How appropriate considering your master is one. How many pats on the head do you expect for defending him?
Growth implies a significant advance. It requires self-examination, humility, and scepticism as a necessary starting point. It is not driven by narcissism, petty squabbles, and attention-seeking. Nor is it driven by the wind, the crowd, or the cult-leader.
Changing the object of one’s obsessional hatred from one convenient bogeyman to another is not “growth.”
Disenvowling isn’t “growth”. Neither is a personal jihad against Pam Geller.
Is that a banana in your pocket, or personal growth?
This is hilarious.
Kragar is as bad as Sharmuta flipping ideology over some fatass blogger that couldn’t care less about either one of them, lol.
Here’s another mildly interesting metric that correlates with Johnson’s abrupt shift in ideology 20 or so months ago. Starting out, in 2001, Johnson did ~100 top posts per month. In LGF’s heyday, he was doing 400-500 posts per month. Since his change in ideology ~20 months ago his monthly post count has been dropping consistently. His whole monthly post count curve could be fit nicely by a parabola whose peak was ~2006. Guess the ‘political science is settled’ for him now that he’s come back to the left.
The context of the metric was wondering how often Johnson could pack all his political insights into top posts of 50 words or less (answer: often, about 10,000+ out of 37,000+ total posts).
Link: http://sites.google.com/site/nilstooge/lgf/stats/prou
While at the same time spending a lot more time commenting on the threads.
This is worth $10/mo?
Right.
And the graphic doesn’t convey the other LGFactoid here, which is that fifty words is the absolute maximum for those 10,000+ terse posts.
The average word length of the 10,000+ posts of less than fifty words is twenty-four words.
Maybe this is the “improvement” that Kragar refers to?
The average character count for these 10,000+ posts is just 150 characters. That less than a Twitter tweet holds.
Johnson could tweet about a third of his top posts (10,000+) – think about that.
Is it any wonder his magnum opus – “Why I Was Right to Have Left the Right for the Left” – reads like fifth grade homework the dog should’ve eaten?
“Is it any wonder his magnum opus – ‘Why I Was Right to Have Left the Right for the Left’ – reads like fifth grade homework the dog should’ve eaten?”
I think that on some level CJ knew the magnum opus fell short of brilliance, given his loud claim that he wrote it in a hurry. Yet I honestly don’t think he knew (or knows) how very awful it was.
I know the Left. (I work in a leftist-dominated field.) The minute I read that dogfood-worthy ‘masterpiece’ I knew that any dreams CJ had of being a real player in the left-wing or “moderate” blogosphere were over. He has nothing to offer but embarrassment.
This is yet another demonstration of something everyone here already knows — that what drove LGF’s popularity in its heyday (and still does) is not Johnson’s pithy two-dozen-word top posts, but rather the lizards’ comments.
Considering how upset Iceweasel and Jimmah got over Mandy’s Calvin pissing on the Koran avatar, I am surprised they have not hassled the Mullah of mag wheels over his nic.
LOL
Ha! Fatass Johnson would not piss on the best part of Kragar or Sharm-wow nor would he toss either of them a nickel if they were out on the street starving.
It was a stream of consciousness rant that was worthy of a 5th grader.