FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
User ID: 1175
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
2hr ago
Yeah, I guess this is just a major cultural difference between urban Ireland and the US.
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
2hr ago
Right. The one person in my immediate social circle I can imagine showing up to a party with a blade would be my cousin who does landscaping work. But even if he did, I'd much rather he leave it in the van, especially if he's going to have drink or drugs taken (which he almost always will).
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
2hr ago
Well, gosh, I really am experiencing culture shock now.
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
2hr ago
That makes more sense, thanks for clarifying.
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
2hr ago
I suppose I should have said "in urban Dublin" rather than "Ireland". I can imagine lots of entirely legitimate reasons someone living in the countryside might have to carry a knife around with them.
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
2hr ago
I know you didn't say how long it was. As I said I was under the impression that you started carrying your knife as an alternative to carrying a gun, and therefore assumed it could be used as a weapon.
But looking at photos of that model, it certainly looks like the kind of thing I'd look askance at someone for if they brought it with them to a party.
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
2hr ago
I guess I must have misinterpreted you. From this:
When I started to consider concealed carry, I realized that I had a pocket knife and pepper spray that I never carried around even though it's really not much more cargo than what I already had, and I just need to build the habit.
it sounded very much like you started carrying around the pocketknife as an alternative to carrying a gun. My apologies if I got that wrong.
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
2hr ago
I guess it comes down to expectations. While a Leatherman could in theory be used to kill someone, it's hardly optimised for that purpose, and my default assumption if I saw someone carrying one would be that he uses the various tools on it (including the blade) for his job. I would certainly find it surprising if I invited someone to a party and they showed up with a multitool, but that might just be a reflection of the circles in which I move (there are no electricians, plumbers or other tradies in my immediate social circle). I would probably ask him why he carried it with him, if only to satisfy my curiosity. It wouldn't be an automatic "you are no longer welcome in my home" thing.
But if someone showed up to a party I was hosting carrying a knife (just a fixed blade, rather than a multitool), my immediate assumption would be that they were a drug dealer. I think this assumption is an entirely reasonable one in Dublin.
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
3hr ago
I'm specifically picturing a multitool small enough to fit on a keychain, and I have a hard time imagining how something that small could be used to kill someone. How long would the blade on something like that be, two inches?
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
3hr ago
My sister gave me a bottle opener that I carry on my keychain. I've gotten more use out of it than every other gift she's ever given me combined.
A multi tool or Swiss Army knife that's small enough to fit on your keychain, fair enough. I'm talking about a knife that's long enough to be used as a weapon, which the OP explicitly stated his is. I misinterpreted, apologies.
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
3hr ago
Maybe you can provide an example of what you're referring to by a pocketknife.
In the car, fair enough. And even a Swiss Army knife would be far less objectionable to me than some of the specimens people are sharing here. But I can't imagine a Swiss Army knife would be a whole lot of use in a self-defense situation, and OP explicitly claimed that was his reason for carrying one. I misinterpreted, apologies.
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
3hr ago
I guess I'm experiencing culture shock. In Ireland, the only people I can imagine carrying around a knife like that would be drug dealers or aspiring drill musicians (but I repeat myself).
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
3hr ago
Agreed. As much as I might criticise the man, I'd take one of his films over the modal green-screen Marvel/Disney slop any day.
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
5hr ago
You use cutlery at a barbecue? La-di-da Mr. Frenchman.
I recently reported on a series of stabbings that took place in Dublin at hip hop concerts, and a recurrent sentiment I've seen expressed by multiple people independently is that a person who brings a knife with them to a gig probably fully intends to stab someone at said gig, and the fact that they were carrying a knife on their person should be judged evidence for premeditation.
I cannot fathom why anyone would carry a knife with them to a social occasion. If I was hosting a party or barbecue and someone brought a knife with them (without a good reason, like they were coming straight from work), I would mentally strike them off all future guest lists.
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
9hr ago
It sounds like you're in about as good a place mentally as you could hope for in these circumstances. If you don't mind my asking, do you have children?
At the same time, the publishing industry has swallowed so much of their own bullshit that they're stuck. Publishing has pretty much been captured by what people call "woke" around here. Getting published is wildly easier if you are some form of favored minority.
Freddie deBoer points out that:
- the publishing industry collectively made a loud pre-commitment to publish more books by writers from "historically underserved communities" i.e. fewer white males
- This wasn't just cheap talk, and the composition of the writers whose books they published changed accordingly
but when you point out the obvious inference of the former two points (namely: that publishing more books by women and minorities means publishing fewer ones by white males, and consequently that it has never been harder for a white male novelist to get published), people tend to scoff and roll their eyes. It's just basic mathematics: if you don't increase the total number of books published (and there's no evidence that this has happened), then publishing more books by women and minorities logically entails publishing fewer books by white males.
Despite being a white male and an aspiring novelist, I am not completely opposed to the trend towards publishing more books by female novelists. Although the proportion of Americans who claim to have read a book in the past year has fallen dramatically over the past fifteen years, women have always read more than men, and this remains true today. All things being equal, I can imagine a female novelist having an easier time writing a novel which would appeal to female readers compared to a male novelist doing the same thing. It follows that the drive to publish more novels by female writers might be a fundamentally sound business decision. It's the same basic argument as to why I could never get too bent out of shape about female underrepresentation in video game development*: PC and console gamers are overwhelmingly male, and all things being equal I imagine a male developer would have an easier time designing a video game which would appeal to men than a female developer would. Note that this argument does not apply to the drive to publish more writers from ethnic minority backgrounds: white Americans read far more books than every other ethnic group (including Asians, to my surprise).
But my question is this. As with any affirmative action-adjacent argument, the drive to publish more books by women and minorities logically implies that, for the last ~decade, literary agents and publishing houses have been optimising for something other than literary quality and/or commercial viability**. Has this resulted in any concomitant decline in revenues? Are revenues from publishing meaningfully lower now than they were ten years ago, controlling for inflation? And consequently, is there a potential gap in the market for a new publishing house to announce "at $Publisher, we don't care about a writer's identity markers and only care about how good the book is?" Or is publishing such an effective oligopoly that this isn't a viable option?
*Not to mention another more, uh, prurient entertainment industry.
**Spare me your "always has beens": I'm not completely naïve. I don't think it's controversial to say that the publishing industry is loudly, conspicuously announcing its decision to optimise for something other than commercial viability for the last decade in a way it wasn't before.
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
11hr ago
So... you're okay with the existence of Israel, then?
FtttG
Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.
14hr ago
The Israelis as they exist today never intend to relinquish any relevant representative control over the explicitly racially defined jewish state of Israel to anyone other than jews. They define themselves ethnically. They define their state ethnically. It is not possible for Israel to exist without jews. It's not possible for the state to be jewish without jewish sovereignty.
And I assume you're similarly outraged by the existence of Japan, South Korea, Liberia etc., all of which are ethnostates in fact if not expressly in law? Or for that matter, essentially any Arab nation, most of which purged themselves of their Jewish, Christian, Druze etc. minorities at some point in the last eight decades or so.
Or better yet.
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