Initiateofthevoid
@Initiateofthevoid@lemmy.dbzer0.com
- Comment on What's the best way to respond to someone who says "transracial is just as valid as transgender"? 3 days ago:
You don’t. That’s not even a dogwhistle, it’s outright racism and transphobia, and isn’t worth responding to any more than the normal flavors of racist. Report, block, and (for mods) ban.
- Comment on But but but 5 days ago:
Don’t worry, actual vikings within one generation of the fjords get a pass for being fans.
Same with Italians and being fans of Rome.
Not Germans, though. Sorry Germans. You know how it is.
- Comment on Make it stop 5 days ago:
I’ll do you one further - their pay is no more than 3x the minimum unemployment benefit. This means maximum 3x the minimum wage, minus whatever unemployment doesn’t normally pay out.
(Federal for federal congress and executives, state for state congress and governors, etc.).
Their healthcare plan must be basic medicare (or their district’s minimum socially provided healthcare plan, if it covers more)
They must divulge past 5 years of tax returns to be on the ballot, and divest all stocks and blind-trust all assets to take office. Failure to do so defaults ownership of the asset(s) to the Treasury.
Merge medicaid into medicare and provide it universally for free, and wow, a whole lot of problems disappear like magic. It’s a pipe dream, and still nowhere near enough to fix everything, but the transformation would be dramatic.
- Comment on Basically 5 days ago:
That’s some incredible history. I hope your family has (carefully) taken scans and such!
That was an incredibly prescient move by the Reverend. And also an insane amount of money!? That’s somewhere around a quarter of a billion pounds today?
- Comment on Basically 5 days ago:
They wouldn’t even remotely be surprised. They knew this type of shit was inevitable, and that any generation under any system would have to face the ever-present threat of tyrants.
Every constitution, then, and every law, naturally expires at the end of 19 years. If it be enforced longer, it is an act of force and not of right.
-Thomas Jefferson
The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge natural to party dissention, which in different ages & countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism.
-George Washington
[The Constitution founded a] Republic, if you can keep it.
Benjamin Franklin
- Comment on Basically 5 days ago:
Six years passed between the Boston Massacre and the Declaration of Independence. Six years. And Boston was not the first issue, just the worst. They were working on the opposition movement for a long time.
If anything, the idea that protests in Chicago and DC could appear within two days of the federal LA invasion would be astounding to them. Some guy on a horse would still be riding through the Rocky Mountains to bring the news.
The only issue is, the news has gone from :
hear ye, hear ye, the king said this 3 months ago!
And everyone physically gathering in squares and pubs for weeks to say “hey what the fuck?”
To:
did you hear what <insert random dickhead> said 5 seconds ago?
And everyone clicking like, subscribe, and next!
- Comment on AGI achieved 🤖 6 days ago:
I came to the comments really hoping more people would be talking about the fact that it took 14 minutes, I thought that was the joke
- Comment on Instead of asking all my stupid questions separately, could I just get a ton of "How to Adult" type resources in the comments? 6 days ago:
I can’t unlock my phone with my thumbprint anymore.
There’s a different tip here, but I can’t quite put my finger on it.
- Comment on I've hated donald trump since day one but then I saw this and thought.... 1 week ago:
Oh now it’s about flag burning?
Fuck the optics. Wave the flag of our allies who are under attack in this nation, and refuse any suggestion that they are our enemies. Freedom of speech is patriotic as fuck.
- Comment on Mission impossible 1 week ago:
nothing happened because I was reasonable and took everything slow.
That’s fair! It does all come down to taking things slow
- Comment on Mission impossible 1 week ago:
If nothing else lift heavy things off the ground like with deadlifts.
You got the spirit, but everyone - do NOT do this if you’re extremely out shape or don’t know proper form. Lift with your legs first and only.
Of all the possible exercises to start with, deadlifting is by far the most likely to permanently damage your back. If you need to start small, start with core and trunk exercises like crunches and squats.
- Comment on All this produce is going to spoil at the food bank where I volunteer 1 week ago:
Oh, hey, you’re all the way down here responding to other comments instead of mine, which answers this. Just a troll having fun, huh?
… How exactly do you imagine this works? How do you accept food that you can’t put anywhere? Do you take it, and put it outside, so it can spoil faster?
If you put it out on the street in an urban area, it would be infested by rats within the hour, which would literally make them more dangerous than starvation. Sickness from eating food tainted by rat droppings would leave you with far less calories than you started with.
- Comment on All this produce is going to spoil at the food bank where I volunteer 1 week ago:
they had no place to store a case of tomatoes, or cauliflower.
It wasn’t homeless or starving people turning it away. It was other organizations that didn’t have the space to store it. Probably because their shelves were also full of food that they need to give away before it spoils.
storing it is their main concern
… How exactly do you imagine this works? How do you accept food that you can’t put anywhere? Let me guess, you think they should just bring it to the homeless? Well:
Word got out that we were loading up my pickup with food and taking it to the homeless camps. I did get a number of them to start coming to the bank to get food. But it was easier when I could take stuff to them.
He literally can’t bring the food to the starving. If he could, the food would all be eaten by the people that need it. There are people that absolutely will take and eat this food because they are starving, but OP can’t deliver it to them.
- Comment on All this produce is going to spoil at the food bank where I volunteer 1 week ago:
OP (this dickhead):
Have you considered giving it away to your neighbors?
OOP:
If we could simply give it to anyone we would not be in this situation
They can’t give it away. There are unfortunately rules. If they were caught doing so, they would no longer be giving it out to anyone. This is, again, why basic income would be better than food banks.
Not to mention the fact that plenty of people aren’t starving today, but will be starving in the next week or two, after this very perishable food is spoiled.
Why are you like this? Are you having fun mocking the impoverished?
- Comment on The future of warfare is now 1 week ago:
I’m not making light of casualties, I’m making light of the baseless claim that there even could be casualties, because I reiterate:
If they had identified Ukrainians smuggling weapons platforms into the country, the whole operation would have failed.
You think if they found spotters deep in Russian territory near their nuclear bombers the operation would have succeeded?
So, you’re not gonna defend the claim that we should worry about retaliation? Just move the conversation elsewhere? This is so incredibly bad faith.
To quite treating this bloodbath as a fucking football game.
Congratulations, it’s not working. You just sound like a cheerleader yourself.
- Comment on The future of warfare is now 1 week ago:
Lol what unreported casualties do you imagine there could even be? The drone operators developing carpal tunnel?
And then nobody wants to talk about retaliation as a consequence.
Right, because Russia hasn’t been trying until now? They haven’t really tried to crush Ukraine, they’ve just been playing around? But now that Ukraine has bloodied their nose, boy are they sure gonna find out what Russia’s capable of. Lol.
“Things will be worse once the bombs stop falling” is pure war propaganda.
No, “things will be worse when a nation is conquered by a hostile dictatorship” is not propaganda. Ukraine knows that for a fact, because they’ve been through this before.
- Comment on The future of warfare is now 2 weeks ago:
This entire post is literally about a successful counterattack on Russian soil. One with zero Ukrainian casualties.
What, exactly, do you want from this conversation? People to recognize that Ukrainians are suffering? They do recognize that - that’s why they don’t want Ukraine to lose.
A defeated Ukraine would suffer far worse than they are now, as retribution for defending themselves and embarassing Russia in the process. Ukrainians would inevitably be conscripted to fight in Russia’s next attempt at conquest anyway.
- Comment on Pull to enter, you say? 2 weeks ago:
Especially when almost any other time something takes up half a screen, it’s a goddamn ad.
- Comment on Congratulations, homosexual! 2 weeks ago:
Absolutely - rainbow capitalism can be a problem, and actively attacking that rainbow capitalism from a place of bigotry-in-power can be a far bigger problem. Visibility and representation matter.
- Comment on Airbuddy 🦛 2 weeks ago:
That’s much more significant of a difference for bipedal animals, so mostly just humans. 1 of 2 legs vs. 1 of 4 legs touching the ground. Elephants will never get airborne, but you certainly wouldn’t describe a stampeding elephant as “walking”
- Comment on [deleted] 2 weeks ago:
Why on the fediverse, though? Without reddit-style karma for a black market, or corporate-interest algorithms for advertising, what would be the purpose of deploying a bot like this? Field-testing?
- Comment on what’s the difference between “he died” and “he’s dead”? 2 weeks ago:
Native speaker here, the OP you are responding to is incorrect.
“Dead” isn’t a verb and so it does not have past or future tenses. It is an adjective describing a state of existence.
Died and dying are tenses of the verb die.
“He died, I am dying, now, I die.”
“He is dead, I will be dead, I am dead.”
I agree with your interpretation, but it’s not a hard rule - “I thought he was dead” and “I thought he died” are both grammatically correct regardless of how long ago the death happened, but the latter sounds more specific to me.
“I thought he was dead” sounds like “I haven’t heard about him in awhile, I assumed he was not alive anymore”
But “I thought he died” sounds like “I thought he specifically died in that fire three years ago.”
- Comment on what’s the difference between “he died” and “he’s dead”? 2 weeks ago:
Mostly right, but “dead” is just an adjective. He is big, he is red, he is dead are all the same format.
Adverbs are basically just modifiers for adjectives and verbs. He is very big, he is slighty red, he is almost dead, he will be dead soon.
- Comment on do you think freewill truly exists? 2 weeks ago:
Entropy!
- Comment on do you think freewill truly exists? 2 weeks ago:
It’s because the burrito is getting cold.
- Comment on how do I stop being a sucker for alcoholic stuff on sale? 2 weeks ago:
I am sorry to say that this part of your relationship with alcohol is a massive warning sign:
I then promise myself to drink it within several days, not all within 3 days, but something snaps in me each time I open the fridge and see all that beer. I sometimes drink 2 pints a day till I have no more beer.
This indicates that you do not have a healthy psychological relationship with a substance.
By promising yourself one thing and doing another, you have lied to yourself. Self-deception is extremely self-destructive. It is effectively the first and last lesson every alcoholic learns - substance abuse is never about willpower, it’s about honesty. No amount of willpower can save you when you lie to yourself and say “it will be okay.”
The influence of the substance in question reinforces that self-deception at every turn. Based on your description, when you are drinking, it feels okay to keep drinking. Even with a headache, or fatigue, you will have another drink. You will drink the next day. You will drink until you run out of drinks to drink.
When you are not drinking, it doesn’t feel okay. You know it’s stupid, you know it hurts you, you know you don’t really want it, and yet you think that there is no real internal force stopping you from drinking - there is only the externalized influence of the price.
By creating an external justification for your drinking, you have abandoned your own autonomy and authority. It is cheap, you drink. It is not cheap, you do not drink. It is in your fridge, you drink. It is not in your fridge, you do not drink. You do not choose, you just drink. With that behavioral pattern, it is only ever a matter of time until your next binge.
Generally speaking, the most reliable way out of this thought process is to seek help. Be honest with yourself and others (where it is safe and sensible to do so!), and seek support. You have done so here - you have opened up about your fears. That is strength, not weakness.
Groups like AA do not check your alcoholic level at the door. You do not need to drink a liter of vodka a day to be an alcoholic. If you are presently sober and say you are worried about your relationship with alcohol, they will welcome you. They will share their stories, and they will share what works for them and what doesn’t. Many groups are also welcome to families and friends, so you do not need to present yourself as an alcoholic if you do not wish to do so.
If you walk away from those meetings, drink more, and come back (again, while sober), they will welcome you again. They will welcome you as many times as is needed, and they will welcome you whether you are 24 hours sober or 24 years sober.
But it all starts and ends with honesty. You are worried about your behavior. Do not let yourself brush that aside. Do not believe yourself when you think “it’s not that bad.” Do not believe yourself when you think “these people are ‘real’ alcoholics, I don’t belong here, I don’t need help.”
Every last recovering alcoholic you ever meet would have rather they stopped earlier then they did. They would rather they stopped when it wasn’t a big deal. They would rather they hadn’t thrown so much of their time, money, and health into that bottomless pit.
There is no rock bottom, there is no moment where you can no longer dig the hole deeper. There is only the moment you start climbing out of it.
I cannot tell you that you are an alcoholic. I can only tell you that you feel anxious and worried about being an alcoholic, and that you should face those feelings with as much strength and honesty as you can muster. Best of luck. I am happy to listen, if you want to talk more.
- Comment on Cyberpunk 2 is now in preproduction, CD Projekt says 3 weeks ago:
“This is the live cannibalism option”
“… the what?”
chomp
- Comment on a flower for mother's day 3 weeks ago:
Don’t sell yourself short! I don’t know you, you could be a racoon for all I know, but most people are at least a little trash, which means you’re probably just as good as most people. Better, even, based on your willingness to consider your own responsibility for your life.
- Comment on (・∀・) 3 weeks ago:
Much love for the antipasta! Thanks for the writeup.
This bellowing bit is awesome:
We suggest that male mating-season bellows function to reduce physical confrontations with other males allowing them to space themselves apart, while, at the same time, attracting females.
Emphasis mine.
Koala males really be out there screaming so loud so other males will stay away? I think that’s neat. Like biological magnets, pushing and pulling with the same scream.
- Comment on 70% of games that require internet get destroyed 3 weeks ago:
Ahh, the pinnacle of internet discourse - pretending that one wins an argument by minor differences in tone, rather than content. Only… suggesting over and over that someone is throwing an entitled tantrum certainly sets a tone, don’t it?
Strange, that I am the only emotional one here. Perhaps if you take a deep breath, and read my comments slower? Maybe ask a chatbot to read them in the voice of David Attenborough or Morgan Freeman?
Maybe you’re right, and I’ve just gone deaf from all this blind rage. At this rate I’ll never achieve my dreams of being acutie…