What is with chuds and them loving Joel from the last of us?

I've played the first TLoU like 4 times (?) and the second just once (so far, I'll play again some day ™️)

I honestly don't remember Joel being like overtly awful, but maybe I missed or forgot a bunch of shit.

(Spoiler warning? The games are old-ish at this point, but, whatever. Don't read if you don't like spoilers)

Joel shoots the doctor (Abby's dad(if I remembered her name correctly)) who we can assume was legitimately trying to find a vaccine or cure, I guess?

I always took that as morally ambiguous if that made Joel "bad" or not. He shot a doctor who was going to kill a girl that he had essentially adopted and bonded with, so in that way, he's defending his friend/adopted daughter. On the other hand, he essentially doomed humanity to extinction or at least forever having to live with the scourge of the fungus-virus whatever the fuck thing. Incredibly selfish, but one of those "hmm, what would I do?" things that I don't anyone can truly answer. It's an impossible choice. When you're shooting all those militia guys and medical staff, it's like "oh shit, these are just doctors and nurses and their defenders! But also, they wanted to kill his daughter [to save humanity potentially]."

That mixed feeling makes you fully empathize and understand why Abby had a blood feud with Joel and wasn't satisfied with anything short of his death. Even if you also realize that her actions are irrational and purely revenge based since nothing will undo the death of her father and the hopeless situation the world is left in without his expertise + the patient who might hold the answer.

This of course fuels Ellie to hold a blood feud against Abby and her friends which leads to the deaths of all Abby's friends, etc. and I guess the cycle is supposed to be ended at the end end? I honestly forget the ending and aren't there multiple endings anyway? Whatever.

As far as Joel goes, I don't know that chuds love him, but if they do, it's probably for all the reasons one would imagine. [from his perspective] he's a good man in a fallen world. He was wronged by his government (chud checkmark) who caused the death of his young, beloved daughter. He was a single dad (?) I think. A Texan. A good-ol boy with a truck and guns on standby for the apocalypse which he instantly acclimated to. He failed to save his first daughter, so he became gruff, cynical, and uncaring. Then he meets Ellie who has a personality similar to his daughter and clearly he replaces her, in a way, with Ellie. Then the "terrorists" Fireflies want to end Ellie's life. He couldn't save his first daughter, but he does inhuman things in the pursuit of saving his new daughter. But he never tells her. The stoic, self-sacrificing ideal of a man who will give his life and soul to protect those around him from death or the emotional consequences of "what it takes" to survive. Including murdering a doctor, sparking a blood feud cycle of violence.

He appeals to basically every single "traditional" value that men are told, through stories like this one!, that they are supposed to hold. Protect your family, be prepared for anything, bare the burden of pain and suffer when you must to spare those you love.

I suppose they miss the consequences of that mindset. The cycles of violence, the dehumanization of others, etc.

This is purely from memory, apologies for any name or story mistakes.

Joel represents a power fantasy and he does it well. He’s also incredibly loyal to those he’s close with, which is an easy way to excuse all the awful things he does. He’s just defending himself, right? And you’d do anything to protect your own children, right?

Completely unrelated, but Neil Druckmann is on record stating that the series at least partially pulls from his experiences growing up in Israel and the “cycles of violence” involved in that.

He's a great character, but he's an awful awful person

It seems like you already know why chuds love him

Grisly middle-aged violent father figure that must avenge/protect the fridged wife/imperiled daughter figure. Again.

It's just a bunch of buttons pressed in their treatbrained minds that panders to their very nonpolitical politics. Any "this is not a thing to admire or emulate, actually" is lost on them, every time.

He's a multifaceted character who commits arguably unforgivable actions for relatable, understandable reasons. To finish the story with the impression "wow, there was absolutely nothing to like about that guy at all and I did not empathize with him one bit" is just as bad as worshiping him as a hero, really.

Blue curtains and their consequences

Well you see, they shrunk his shoulders, made him look soft.

Pausing in the midst of editing my 2 hr youtube rant about why it was wrong of the developers to change Ellie's appearance in the remake to think "gee, I am a stoic just like Joel from the vidya. I don't react to anything."

-CHUDs

Do they? The last of us seems too slow and too gay for the average chud. I don't recall many talking about it

He hates the world and wants to protect his surrogate daughter and improve his relationship with her, which also represents his last remnants of humanity.

From a parental viewpoint, I don’t think I would’ve done anything different from TLOU 1 Joel, maybe aside promoting communism more to Ellie. But yes, conservatives tend to like him for the violence and vigilantism, but also they want to fuck Ellie, and they have a myopic view of their actions - regardless if his actions were understandable, killing a doctor and ruining any hope of saving humanity is objectively based.