EldritchFeminity
@EldritchFeminity@lemmy.blahaj.zone
- Comment on Liminal Space 1 week ago:
So…step 2 is figuring out how many cells are needed to run DOOM on wetware?
- Comment on Saved you a click: a 1911 1 week ago:
You beat me to it. I saw a post probably almost 20 years ago by a kid on Facebook talking about how he got banned from a Young Republicans Facebook group for giving this answer. His reasoning was: it’s a carpenter’s tool, not a weapon, and used to help people and improve the community. Kid actually read the Bible and got hate for it.
- Comment on 2 weeks ago:
To add to Wolf’s really well thought out and written post, as kids a ringing phone was something you were expected to answer. Voice mail and caller ID were common by 2000 to the point of being essentially everywhere, but not everybody had it before then and that meant that if the phone rang, you HAD to pick it up. The only way to avoid it was to not be home.
Then when cell phones happened, as Wolf already said, Millennials had them so parents could keep track of you even when you weren’t at home and calls were pricey enough that they were really for emergencies only, not for talking with friends, so they were just another leash for helicopter parents to control their kids with, like putting gps trackers on kids’ cars nowadays. They weren’t even smart phones at that point, so all they could really do was call or text.
And then jobs started expecting you to be available in your off time. You know the meme about Americans being available out of the office by cell phone during surgery? That exists because there was a period where bosses everywhere expected to be able to call you at all hours of the day to check your email or answer questions and work unpaid. It’s gotten better now to some degree, but it’s still definitely a cultural thing. I’ve heard plenty of people complaining about getting a call from their boss asking them to come in on their day off.
There was a short period of time where phones were cool and people did stuff like make custom ringtones, but I’ve had enough spam calls wake me up at 4am, people calling and “ruining the mood” with a gf or whatever, and even getting called by a parent who threatened to call 911 on me because I didn’t respond to their text within 10 minutes that a ringing phone does nothing but piss me off now. I’ve heard that Gen Z/Alpha just permanently leave their phones on silent, and I completely get it. The act of privacy of simply being unreachable is lost in today’s world.
- Comment on 2 weeks ago:
A plastic shell could be even worse, too. Using plastic and glass for shrapnel (I think ceramic as well?) is considered a war crime because they don’t show up on x-rays, which makes it very hard to find - practically impossible in the case of small glass shards.
- Comment on Would the United States actually risk a Tiananmen Square incident? 4 weeks ago:
Transgender rights
You mean the rights that largely don’t exist in half of the US?
As of July 2025, 40.1% or 120,400 trans youth aged 13-17 are living in the 27 states that have passed bans on gender-affirming care. This includes 2,300 youth living in the two states–Arkansas and Montana–where bans are currently on hold or blocked from enforcement through court orders.
While our map focuses solely on high school-aged youth (age 13-17), some states, such as Oklahoma, Texas, and South Carolina, have considered banning care for transgender people up to 26 years of age. Additionally, several states prohibit public funds from being used to provide transgender health care for anyone, so adults are also unable to access critical health services if they receive their healthcare through Medicaid, if they work in the public sector, or are incarcerated.
Trans people were already reporting their identifying documents like passports, birth certificates, driver’s licenses, and social security cards were being confiscated in the period after the election and before Trump got into office.
We haven’t “won” trans rights, we’ve only had them because the fascists hadn’t yet gotten around to destroying them. Violence in one form or another is a requirement for successful change, whether that violence be economic or otherwise. The oppressor isn’t going to give you justice simply because you demand it. It wasn’t until after MLK was murdered and billions of dollars in property damage were done that Civil Rights were drafted, voted on, and signed into law - one week of rioting after his death.
- Comment on Gaming market melts down after Google reveals new AI game design tool — Project Genie crashes stocks. (A.K.A . Investors panic because they don't understand what "real" videogames are) 4 weeks ago:
So it’s like the Meta-verse, but somehow even worse.
- Comment on Why are they different shapes? 5 weeks ago:
Combine the two ideas and make cheesy garlic bread with them.
- Comment on it's right there 😖 5 weeks ago:
Put a bucket over his head and you can take the entire set.
- Comment on Being Trans Isn't Normal or Part of Nature...or is it...? 1 month ago:
Gay, lesbian, etc. are sexualities, which has nothing specifically to do with gender per se. Gender is a performance we do based upon what our culture expects of us based on specific labels and (often physical) traits. Think “goth girl” or “punk” or something. When given a label like that, you probably thought of a specific set of physical traits and behaviors, including fashion, hairstyle, and makeup. That’s gender in a nutshell. Sexuality is more “if not attractive, then why x shaped?”
It gets complicated because people really like to put things into an either/or box when life is so much more than a or b. Originally, sexualities were defined as two states: heterosexual and homosexual. Hetero, meaning other, means an attraction to the other sex (generally thought of as the opposite sex/gender due to a lack of information on intersex folk and the aforementioned two boxes appeal in the human psyche). And the opposite would be homosexual - an attraction to people of the same sex. But this is an elementary level of understanding, like when we teach kids about the 3 states of matter and leave out things like plasma.
Because people have preferences and all straight men aren’t attracted to 100% of women, and then there’s lesbians and gay men and bisexuals and then there’s how gender presentation plays into our attraction like with butch vs femme lesbians or how men and women both can appreciate a girl who could bench press them. And then some people are into femboys and women only while some are into men that belong in the Scottish Highlands wearing kilts and claymores and women who own fainting couches and ball gowns and wouldn’t even glance at anything outside of those 2 groups, and then some people are only attracted to specific body parts (dick or pussy) but are less strict on who those parts are attached to, and then there’s the people who don’t care about anything beyond personality, and then…the list goes on and on.
And then it gets even more complicated when you start talking about romantic attraction, because that’s entirely its own spectrum as well. People can be romantically attracted to the same or different genders compared to sexual attraction. Some people are sexually attracted to multiple genders but could only see themselves dating one specific gender, some people experience no romantic attraction at all or no sexual attraction, or even both together. The human brain is a massive mess and there’s simply no way to easily quantify the human experience - if we even can at all. I saw a post recently that went something like “the brain is 3lbs of mostly fat puppeting a meat suit by using less electricity than a light bulb, and if it can hallucinate algebra into existence then I’m fully willing to believe that it’s also capable of identifying its own gender” and I think that sums it up pretty nicely.
- Comment on Circumcision classed as possible child abuse in draft CPS document 1 month ago:
I completely agree and experienced it myself (missing what you don’t have). I just meant in the terms of a bunch of replies that I’ve gotten in here to the tune of “I’m a cis guy who was circumcised at birth and it doesn’t bother me at all.”
There’s the possibility of something akin to how some trans people experience permanent low-grade dysphoria and it affects their frame of reference. Basically, if we were to map the feelings of dysphoria out on a scale from 0 to 10, the average person would be at a 0 under normal circumstances, but some people are born at a 2 or a 3. So to them, a 5 would be the average person’s 3, and experiencing a 0 would be like getting glasses for the first time and realizing that trees have individual leaves and this is how everybody else sees the world. If you can only reach a 6 on a scale of how enjoyable an experience is while the average person can hit a 10, how would you have the frame of reference to know that you are or aren’t missing something when you’ve never felt a 7 or above? So these people saying that they weren’t negatively affected could just be mistaking a 6 for a 10 and there’s no way for us or them to know for certain.
- Comment on Circumcision classed as possible child abuse in draft CPS document 1 month ago:
I’m trans and I brought it up for a couple of reasons: first, Weevil brought up gender affirming surgeries in regards to trans people as part of some slippery slope argument. Secondly, trans medical issues tie very well into my exceptions that I mentioned in the second part of my comment - medical necessity and consent.
You may not have any issues with being circumcised, but there are plenty of men out there who do. To the point that there’s a “foreskin restoration” process that involves using clamps and rubber bands to yank on the skin of your penis until it stretches into some resemblance of a foreskin. It doesn’t reverse any of the consequences of circumcision, but some men at least feel less dysphoric after doing it. I myself thought that my dysphoria was related to being circumcised before I learned words like “transgender” and “gender dysphoria.” Still not a fan of what was done to me, though. Enough to weigh in on conversations around the subject in the way that I have.
Generally, I think it’s a situation of “people don’t miss what they never knew they had.” There’s plenty of data from men who were circumcised later in life reporting a loss of sensitivity and difficulty with sexual pleasure and satisfaction post procedure compared to before. And this is why I compare it to being forced through an unwanted puberty. Permanent physical changes that you do not consent to. A baby cannot consent to having their genitals permanently altered. And a trans kid unable to access puberty blockers is as capable of preventing an unwanted puberty as a baby is capable of fighting a doctor/Rabbi/priest/etc.
Now for the exceptions: consent I’ve kinda already talked about, but if you understand the consequences and want to do it, I don’t see why you shouldn’t be able to anymore than somebody who wants to get a Prince Albert or a Jacob’s Ladder. And the big one, medical necessity. There are a number of reasons that it would be medically necessary, and they’re all valid regardless of the age at which they appear. Phimosis is a real thing that can hit at pretty much any age up to post puberty. I once worked with a poor kid who had to get it done for that reason at the age of 18. Although, based on a comment I saw elsewhere in this thread about the number of babies who die from UTIs related to circumcision, there may be some room to talk about what strictly is and isn’t “medically necessary.”
Basically, if your doctor says that you need to for health reasons or it’s your own informed choice, go right ahead. But if you’re forcing it on a baby due to peer pressure from the dead or because of some sense of “my dad hit me and I turned out fine,” then that isn’t right and should not be considered kosher.
- Comment on Circumcision classed as possible child abuse in draft CPS document 1 month ago:
They’d probably respond similarly to telling somebody who was circumcised without consent and doesn’t like it that it’s just a harmless cosmetic surgery. Or telling a trans person forced to experience the wrong puberty that it isn’t a big deal/we can’t allow trans kids to go on puberty blockers because they might regret it (despite the fact that all the effects of puberty blockers are reversed by…stopping taking them).
Source: am trans, was forced through the wrong puberty, and was circumcised without consent as a baby and hate it. Did you know that there are people out there so traumatized by being circumcised as a baby that they willingly use clamps and rubber bands to slowly stretch out the skin on their dick until it looks like a foreskin again? The info on how to do it is easily accessible online and the tools are easily purchased. I know this because I discovered it and considered it not long before I discovered words like “transgender” and “gender dysphoria” and found out that there were words for feelings that I did not have the language to understand before.
I used those specific body parts as examples for a few reasons. Namely, they’re all designed to protect mucus membranes and keep them moist, like the foreskin. Removing them would also be permanent and result in negative effects - like how circumcision causes nerve damage and desensitization. There really isn’t a great comparison, and those who had it done as a kid don’t know what they’re missing. We do have plenty of reports from people who had it done later in life, though, and there’s plenty of data on the loss of sensitivity and struggle with sexual pleasure and satisfaction post-circumcision.
I guess the closest thing would be if people were ritualistically shooting lasers into their babies’ eyes to damage the lenses so that they needed glasses or something. Some people just like the way that glasses look. I knew a guy who didn’t need glasses and wore a pair without any lenses in them just because he liked the way that they looked. But given the choice between glasses and 20/20 vision, I’d personally take the 20/20 vision, thanks.
- Comment on Circumcision classed as possible child abuse in draft CPS document 1 month ago:
It is not a “harmless cosmetic procedure.” It’s more akin to ritual scarification or removing something like a lip, eyelid, or nose. It destroys nerve endings, causing a permanent loss of sensitivity, and the head of the penis is a mucus membrane that the foreskin is meant to keep moist and protect from damage. Most people had it done before they were old enough to be aware of the difference, but those who had it done later in life often report things like a reduction in the ability to feel sexual pleasure.
Medically necessary circumcision or somebody choosing to have it done is one thing, forcing an amputation onto a baby is entirely different. It’s like forcing a trans person to go through the wrong puberty: unwanted and permanent physical changes that can take years of therapy and medical procedures to heal from.
- Comment on Circumcision classed as possible child abuse in draft CPS document 1 month ago:
If you want to go the teeth route, removing the molars or canines is a better comparison. There are medical reasons why this might be necessary, but to rip out a baby’s teeth that have yet to grow in with a pair of pliers for ritualistic reasons is not the same thing at all.
Circumcision destroys nerve endings and can cause permanent scarring, potentially dramatically reducing the ability to feel sensations. The head of the penis is also a mucus membrane and the foreskin is meant to both keep it moist and protect it from damage. Have you ever had dry eyes or the inside of your nose dry out? Imagine cutting off the outside of your nostrils or part of your eyelids so that it was like that all the time.
If somebody wants to have it done, that’s fine. That’s their choice to make, just like getting a tattoo or piercings is. But forcing it on somebody without it being strictly necessary for medical reasons is cruel. It can be very traumatic. If it wasn’t, “foreskin restoration” - the act of using clamps, pulleys, and rubber bands to stretch the skin of the penis out into a fake foreskin - wouldn’t be a thing.
- Comment on What's it going to take to truly stop the US? 1 month ago:
Netanyahu actually would’ve been another good comparison.
My comment wasn’t a “Russia = bad” deflection, but a comment about world leaders’ response to the invasion of Ukraine and what I expect their response to the continuing aggression of the Trump regime to be: strongly worded letters and not much else.
Also, let’s get our facts straight on the genocide in Palestine. The US hasn’t put any boots on the ground yet, despite Trump’s promises from earlier in the year. As of the time that I’m writing this, the US is enabling the genocide but not an active participant. That could change tomorrow or may have already changed, but we don’t need to make things up about the government when there’s already so many evils to point at. They’re already war criminals, we wouldn’t want them to get off on account of making false accusations.
- Comment on What's it going to take to truly stop the US? 1 month ago:
I haven’t watched the Simpsons in over a decade so I don’t get the reference, but my point was the similarity between the world’s response to the invasion of Ukraine and the likely response to continuing US aggression.
A lot of strongly worded letters and not much else is what I expect.
- Comment on What's it going to take to truly stop the US? 1 month ago:
What’s it going to take to truly stop Russia?
- Comment on What's it going to take to truly stop the US? 1 month ago:
Don’t forget about the Sword of Damocles that is the lack of social safety nets. Also, political ignorance is a feature, not a bug in our political system. A quarter of the American population would kill the rest because they think the regime is “hurting the right kind of people” and not anybody that they care about. This also includes the minorities who will soon learn that being “one of the good ones” just means that they go to the showers later rather than sooner.
- Comment on w e a k n e s s 2 months ago:
When you ask a Mechanicus player what their type is: 316 stainless.
- Comment on [deleted] 2 months ago:
Freud would’ve creamed his pants were he still alive.
- Comment on Delicious rocks 2 months ago:
That just means that you aren’t a fossil (yet). Give it a century or two.
- Comment on Indie Game Awards Disqualifies Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Due To Gen AI Usage 2 months ago:
Except, right now, they absolutely are. The tools are largely as you describe - though thinking about it, I think I’d describe it more as an airbrush vs a paint brush - but that’s not the way that upper management sees it for the most part, and not how the average supporter of GenAI sees it even if they don’t recognize that that’s their view. Both of these groups see it as a way to cut costs by reducing manpower, even if the GenAI folk don’t recognize that that’s what their stance is (or refuse to accept it). It’s the same as in the programming side of the conversation: vibe coders and prompt generators being hired instead of skilled professionals who can actually use the tools where they’re truly useful. Why pay an artist or programmer to do the work when I can just ask an LLM trained on stolen work to do it for me instead.
I read a great post probably a year ago now from somebody who works for a movie studio on why the company has banned hiring prompters. The short of it is, they hired on a number of prompters to replace some jobs that would normally be filled by artists as a test to see if they could reduce their staff while maintaining the same levels of production. What they found was that prompters could produce a massive volume of work very quickly. You ask the team for pictures of a forest scene and the artists would come back in a week with a dozen concepts each while the prompters had 50 the next day. But, if you asked them to take one of their concept pieces and do something like remove the house in it or add people in the foreground, they’d come back the next day with 50 new concept pieces but not the original. They couldn’t grasp the concept of editing and refining an image, only using GenAI to generate more with a new set of prompt parameters, and therefore were incapable of doing the work needed that an artist could do.
A feel-good story for artists showing what AI is actually capable of and what it isn’t, except for one thing: the company still replaced artists with AI before they learned their lesson, and that’s the phase most of the world is in right now and will probably continue to be in until the bubble bursts. And as Alanah Pierce so eloquently put it when talking about the record setting year over year layoffs in the gaming industry (each year has been worse than during the 2008 financial crash): “Most of those people will never work in games again. There’s just too many people out of work and not enough jobs to go around.” These companies currently in the fuck around phase will find out eventually, but by then it won’t matter for many people. They’ll never find a job in their field in time and be forced into other work. Art is already one of the lowest paying jobs for the amount of effort and experience required. Many artists who work on commissions do so for less than minimum wage, and starting wages in the game industry for artists haven’t increased since I was looking at jobs in the field 15 years ago.
- Comment on 2 months ago:
Agreed, my first thought was about the stats for Twitch streamers where having more than something like 10 concurrent viewers consistently for a 30 day period puts you in the top 15% of streamers on the platform or whatever. I forget the exact numbers, but it’s something crazy like that.
- Comment on idk abbout this one discord 2 months ago:
Can’t be worse than the Tumblr algorithm banning photos of deserts as porn.
- Comment on Why do .ml users get a bad rep? 2 months ago:
There are some exceptions to this. Blahaj blocks downvotes, for example. You can downvote a post on Blahaj, but people (like me) with accounts on Blahaj cannot downvote nor can they see downvotes. I’m sure there are other instances doing similar things, as it sounds like Lemmy has a robust set of instance settings/options.
- Comment on Anon asks out a girl 2 months ago:
If you can’t get a big tiddy goth gf, become the big tiddy goth gf.
- Comment on Valve dev counters calls to scrap Steam AI disclosures, says it's a "technology relying on cultural laundering, IP infringement, and slopification" 2 months ago:
Ironically, one of the defining features of the techno-cultists in Warhammer 40k is that they changed the acronym to mean “Abominable Intelligence” and not a single machine runs on anything more advanced than a calculator.
- Comment on 3 months ago:
I’ve seen estimates put the materials cost somewhere around the $425 - 500 USD range because of the specific, semi-custom hardware that they’re using. It’s also good to note that Valve will be able to get a better deal than any of us will because they can get bulk discounts and aren’t buying each part at a market rate profit from retail vendors.
Some people seem to be of the mind that it will be somewhere around the $500 - 800 USD range if tariffs and the RAM situation don’t screw with the price, and that it will probably price out the Xbox with Microsoft’s 30% profit demand and be slightly more expensive than the PS5 while having comparable but not quite as much power.
- Comment on Had to look this up 3 months ago:
True, but the first time we see him try in the books I think he’s like 12.
- Comment on Had to look this up 3 months ago:
I think it varies from school to school based on what they think is important, but I wanna say that I learned about it in high school years ago. Of course, I also grew up in an area with a lot of Irish immigrants and descendants of Irish immigrants who were very supportive of the IRA. To the point of arms deals with the IRA being a thing with organized crime in the area. So I might know of it simply from living in Whitey Bulger country.
