eddsworld fans can be so blissfully unaware of the antisemitism theryre (usually) unintentionally perpetuating by just drowning their red leader fanart/designs in nazi imagery and it would be heavenly if when jewish fans talk abt it they didnt get hushed. the biggest ones i see are the nazi(-inspired or directly copied) caps and the armband system put to use which are so easy to fix because 1. tord already has a stupid hat 2. just use armpatches instead of armbands please im begging you the nazis made the armband system and said system was only used by nazis. lets stop insinuating that tord is a nazi 😟
heres a brief guide to illustrate my point
armbands and the nazi cap are by far the most recognizable symbols of a nazi. dont use them. it will always be read as a nazi no matter what symbols you put on it ESPECIALLY by groups fascists go after. notice the moment you take those accessories off tord looks Significantly Less Like A Nazi. also stop getting rid of his canon hat his hat rules.
there are alternative designs you can give to a cartoon leader of an army. so many! since tord is a cartoon character in a cartoon universe there are limitless directions you can take him and the idea of red leader! the ones above are just from the top of my head.
cartoonish villain tord can let you have fun with the ‘evil’-ness, if you want to give tord a downright Evil motive for being a leader your safest bet is to exaggerate that evilness into something recognizable as almost goofy. avoid giving him a uniform that looks like an actual real life army get-up in this type of portrayal bc that can lead you into TBATF territory which we’ll get to.
for more serious storylines or whatever general and soldier designs work really well to set the tone. its not as hard as it looks to pull it off if you just do the bare minimum of research to make sure youre not portraying him as a Fascist general or Nazi soldier. use different examples from history OUTSIDE of ww2! it doesnt have to look the way i drew it above, just use literally anything else than ww2 as your reference.
now heres a brief lesson in nazi imagery. the things that make nazis nazis (eugenics, white supremacy, genocide of racial minorities, jews, gays, communists and the disabled) usually go ignored in media because nobody really likes talking about those things esp in lighthearted media. instead, you have: ominous standing, ominous posing, ominous gestures, sovereign ideologies and overall authoritarian appearance. these are all substitutes for portraying ‘ambiguous militant evil guy’ without actually outright making them nazis and signals to the viewer what their ideologies are adjacent to and that the guy is A Villain. with that said looking at THE worst example of what not to do we can not only see that, design-wise, tord looks like a nazi, but also by the posters! and the way he talks! and the poses hes doing! THE SLOGANS OF HIS ARMY BEING ‘HEIL RED LEADER’(???HELLO???) AND SUCH? all of it combined is BLARING the message ’TORD IS A NAZI’ in neon letters. DONT DOOOO THIIIIISSSSS!!!!!!!!! if EVER you are confused as to what to avoid just look at tbatf.
