Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
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User ID: 1864
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
26d ago
It's true, although if Asmongold hops on the stage at the RNC and says "The more pain and terror inflicted in the process, the greater the psychic wound sustained on the collective consciousness of these illegals and all others interested in following them, the better" to thunderous applause then is deplatforming really the answer to our problems?
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
5mo ago
Saying that groups are conspiring to do the thing that the group would describe themselves as doing
I had said:
'Perhaps there's a simple reason for this anti-America deal. Two of the key players you mentioned, Alice and Bob are both radical leftists. You even mentioned that Bob harbors anti-America sentiment. Subversive radical leftists are trying to undermine America's power when the nation is weak and vulnerable. Biden, though not a radical leftist (I know, I know), fits the role of senile idiot here.
Radical leftists is usually a stand in for anyone who voted blue in the last election cycle, and I doubt that any significant number of democrats would describe themselves as being anti-Americans trying to undermine America's power.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
5mo ago
Unless this is someone's alt, doesn't look like they're a regular Jewposter.
Anyways, object level aside since obviously I don't like the people obsessed with Jews either, this is just a much less lofty expression of free speech ideals for a community to follow. What @self_made_human articulated was more or less reddit with a right-shifted Overton window, but not far right enough (yet) to tolerate regular Jewposting. What's the difference between 'we treat anti-semites more harshly because our userbase finds their opinions inflammatory' and 'we moderate conservative opinions much more harshly because they're just sealioning single-issue posters?' There's plenty of garbage posts here with nary a fact in them and packed chock-full of opinions I find plenty inflammatory (and even articulated in a much cruder and more inflammatory way than the Jewposter!), and the only difference between them is the opinions of the majority.
Sure, if the mods make enough unpopular decisions the community dies. Sure, nobody can reach some platonic ideal of objectivity or impartiality. But abandoning the pretense so easily is a bit of a letdown.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
5mo ago
And you're talking about credibility because?
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
9mo ago
Honestly, these histrionics about Altman being some gay supervillain make me like him more, not less...And the notion that because he's gay, he doesn't care about anything is ridiculous.
And the lack thereof for Peter Thiel should tell you all you need to know, particularly given the fact that he's specifically working on and enabling AI in the contexts of surveillance and defense.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
11mo ago
Good. There should be consequences for advocating for political violence. It has ever been thus, and some social consequences are better than being (literally) tarred and feathered.
This isn't even a problem as far as free speech is concerned. The Gestapo didn't kick down her door and drag her off to a reeducation camp, a private corporation fired her because it thought her opinion beyond the pale. Free speech doesn't guarantee that you can say whatever you want to whoever you want without consequence.
As an aside, this is hilarious considering that less than a week ago people (@Jiro et al.) were still pulling the LoTT is a powerless private citizen compared to the checks notes cathedral juggernaut that is Social Text. At some point the fig leaf of 'punching up' just isn't going to work anymore when LoTT is getting people fired like that.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
11mo ago
Ah, thank you for the correction.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
1mo ago
I wasn't talking of Canadian perceptions. Are you playing for pity now with this ridiculous «nuh-uh»? Yes it was.
Your link is showing data from 2020. Your initial argument was:
How have the last 20 years been for them? Are they famed for their Deep State? I rest my case.
So, despite 15 years of supposed collapse it is still one of the most popular countries for people to emigrate to. Clearly, even taking your arguments at face value, they aren't coming here because the country is 'well-run,' or because the deep state is (in)competent. Your entire argument is internally incoherent.
But Canadians were endlessly preening about their moral superiority and greater civility and safety, too, much to the consternation of Americans.
None of which have anything to do with the government, or how well the state is run? The people believe that they are better than the stupid uncultured Americans, while the Canadian government widely (and correctly) recognized as an inefficient nightmare that completes everything massively overbudget and years behind schedule. This has been true for decades.
You want to prove me stupid and ignorant on every turn
Stupid no, ignorant in same cases, but a massively overblown ego always. Which makes you say stupid things, in a way that's fun to read.
If you think otherwise, make some concrete predictions for the next few years based on your grand narratives, and let's see what happens.
Now even first generation immigrants flee south for better opportunities
Brain drain to America has again been a problem for decades, and the trends are dead flat prior to the pandemic. Meanwhile, US emigration to Canada increased in the same timeframe you're discussing.
the government barely has popular mandate,
In the last 25 years there have been more minority governments than majority. Nothing has changed.
there's increasingly not-jokey talk about Alberta accepting American annexation.
Are you aware of two prior actual referendums for a province to separate from the dominion, the second of which failed to pass by a hair? A province that was much more valuable to the country at the time, and that still has a larger fraction of national GDP? The second of which was supposedly during your 'well-run' state period? Yet you talk about Albertan annexation by the US when 2/3rds of the province opposes independence, let alone US annexation. Do you just write this based on reddit vibes or something? Come on man, it's all nonsense. I'm out.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
1mo ago
Particularly given that many of those same people have likely ridiculed the purity spirals on the left.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
2mo ago
I thought he was the same guy as Julius Branson?
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
4mo ago
But if you hear what she's actually saying, brashly, it's that there should be no hyphenated Americans. You need to abandon your native land, your culture and your history at the door. Sam Seder needs to leave only in so far as he's incapable of dropping his distinctly Jewish identity.
It's not clear to me whether this is your view as well, or if you're just trying to correct the record. But if true, would you (or your interpretation of her views) welcome my immigration to the United States if I wholly identified as an American? Say I surrendered my previous citizenship, listened to the Hamilton soundtrack a couple times and passed the citizenship test? What if I weren't Christian? Or what if I weren't white? What if I supported trans children in choosing what to do with their body (which you see as sterilization and self-mutilation, I know, let's not get hung up on semantics)? Increased redistribution and welfare relative to what I expect you would want?
The above is more or less directionally true, even if I changed many details/positions. I am an immigrant, I do largely identify as American, I do love the history and origin story and culture of this country. But I also, broadly speaking at least, align with a set of values that clearly melt your brain. Yet those values are undeniably a valid set of cultural values in this country - have I assimilated, or not? Is 'abandon your native land, your culture, and your history' code for 'you need to adopt political positions that I like?'
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
5mo ago
The Jewish conspiracy angle leaves a lot of unanswered questions. I do not actually accept the reasoning that Jewish people want to undermine the UK any more than I accept the reasoning that the American left wants to undermine America. I think that the thing you most need to justify when making that argument is the premise. Any time anyone posits a Jewish conspiracy, they never explain the alleged motivation of the alleged Jewish conspiracy. I believe that the American left wants to close military bases, because it makes sense according to their goals (spend less on military and more on welfare). I do not believe that British Jews want to 'undermine the UK’s geopolitical power when the nation is weak and vulnerable' out of sheer evil Jewishness, because that is not a real motivation.
Au contraire, I can promise you that we have some very elaborate explanations for the motivations of the Jewish conspiracies.
Paging @SecureSignals - What do you think?
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
8mo ago
And yet she was evidently damn good at her job, and it seems to me that it ain't the same working class, nor the same neoliberalism, nor the same world for that matter. She fought for liberty and against bureaucracy and communism.
She was good at her job based on what, winning elections? Justin Trudeau won as many, after breaking 9 years of conservative rule, yet I doubt you think he's a particularly good candidate or Prime Minister.
As for fighting against bureaucracy and communism, these are just partisan buzzwords. 50 years ago, our ancestors were sitting in a pub bemoaning the sorry state of British politics and the terrible candidates and the country going to hell in a handbasket because the new generation was a bunch of pussies.
Not to mention it's telling that you picked a politician from 50 years ago that (I assume, based on the apparent age of your children) you were barely alive for in a country you never lived in. I'm willing to bet that 50 years from now our grandchildren will lionize the greatness of Obama and Trump without having to deal with the shitty day-to-day reality we inhabit. I'm willing to bet that very few people think [current year] politicians are particularly talented.
I'm pretty sure I wasn't. I was planning to vote for Hillary until Trump cinched the nomination, because I wanted the neoconservative wing of the Republican party destroyed forever. She was quite unpopular in much the way Trump is, but 2016 was a very close election.
Whatever - without guessing the particulars of who you have voted for, would you agree that my characterization fits a broad swathe of the at least the American public, and likely the local commentariat?
As for the 'historical unpopularity' that gets thrown around constantly - this absolutely drives me up the wall. Look at favorability polls (first figure). Insofar as Trump and Hillary were historically unpopular, they're just continuing a 70 year old trendline with vanishingly few exceptions. Do you think our politicians suddenly became retarded and unlikable in the 90s? Here's a bet for you - the next pair of candidates for both major parties will be historically unpopular (say the bottom quartile of favorability). Want to take it?
I am pretty sure that I have never agreed with the moderate talking point that Hillary was a uniquely bad candidate and the only one the Dems could have picked that would have lost to Trump.
I actually largely heard this from progressives and the right, not the center? If anyone liked Hillary it was the center. Bernie bros ain't moderates.
And Progressives sticking their fingers in their ears about it is how he was allowed to vegetate in office, which is why they had to dump him at the eleventh hour, couldn't get their actual talent to sign on, and were left with running Kamala.
Because if we had 25th'd Joe out (presumably he wasn't about to leave on his own)in the middle of the COVID and inflation shitshow and let Kamala run things for 2 years, this election just would have gone swimmingly for democrats? If you think 'the actual talent' refused to sign on this year, they 100% wouldn't have signed up in your hypothetical. Not to mention you'd be sitting here lecturing me about how stupid it was to 'allow' Joe to get elected in the primaries in the first place, or something.
And...you think progressives like Joe Biden? Is this just some Overton ploy to define Joe as a progressive such that everyone to his left is some insane fringe radical, while Trump and Vance live in the center? Public figures endorse him because they hate Trump, but Joe Biden was not the progressive candidate of choice in 2020.
And sure, I claim Biden was a bad president, because I think the record pretty clearly shows that his policies had numerous woeful effects in the real world. The exception, of course, was the Afghanistan Pullout, which I think was a masterful achievement and which I will defend against all comers.
I disagree. With the exception of inflation (and who knows whether the counterfactual recession would have been better or worse than inflation, or whether there actually was a center path that avoided both) I think he's been on point and centrist for the most part. CHIPS act and infrastructure are both great (though we'll see if either can actually be implemented in a meaningful way, there seems to be a lot of grift), the economy is doing well (just watch - the economic doomerism on the right is about to evaporate with the election alongside the voting fraud narrative), he tried to push immigration reform. The manufacturing sector is doing better under Biden than Trump. But I imagine this is an entire separate discussion.
I'm not on your side.
We're all on the same side here, brother.
Progressives have suffered multiple, severe unforced errors due to believing their own bullshit. Their control of the consensus narrative has made them lazy, and now that this control is failing, they're stuck in a position where the main effect their spin is having is to compromise their own decision-making. Biden was in fact too old, as was RGB when she tried to hang on till Hillary. They should have picked a running mate who could actually run for his VP, but they were too busy playing identity bingo, and besides, it was an article of faith that he was sharp as a tack. They did this to themselves.
And what was that mistake, not being leftist enough to inspire the workers revolution (cf Freddie De Boer, Bernie bros)? Not being centrist enough (cf Tracingwoodgrains, stupidpol, I'd guess some MSM outlets in the next few weeks) to win the suburban wine mom vote? You all agree that progressives are stupid and lazy and mistakes were made, you just completely disagree about the directionality.
Here's a different narrative - in 2020, Biden wasn't senile yet and won the primary. In 2020, the focus was on winning the election in front of you, because there's four years to worry about the next one. He governed well, although Harris got some tough assignments and the optics for both of them were bad with COVID/inflation/Ukraine/Gaza. Ending lockdowns would have enraged one section of the population as much as enacting them would another. Bombing the shit out of Gaza or taking a hard stance against Israel both would have pissed off a core constituency. Refusing to fire up the money printers may have triggered a recession that would have lost the election just as surely as inflation/idpol/whatever else actually did.
As an aside, you say identity bingo, analysts say lock down the black vote because you're an out-of-touch old white man. For all you know Biden would have lost in 2020 with a different VP pick.
I am pretty sure it is in my direct interest for Progressives to see things the way you do.
Y'know, the funny thing is Trump will probably push policies that benefit me more personally. Please cut my taxes and kill my competition from China, what do I care?
Whatever. Anyways, you think I'm an arrogant, complacent and intellectually lazy progressive who can't see the flaws in his own party. Leaving aside whether any of those are true, I just think the arguments here are lazy, superficial and mostly ignorant of the realities of governing and winning elections in America. Discussing politics is >95% hindsight bias.
I predicted a Trump win, with weak confidence, based on a lot of factors that seemed to be leaning his way. This does not appear to have been a coin-flip election; pretty much every state in the country shifted right by significant margins, with Donald Trump as the candidate.
If it wasn't a coin flip election, why did you have such weak confidence? And given your uncertainty, why would you say running Kamala was a mistake if you (and presumably the dem machine) couldn't have predicted her loss in advance?
But as I said above, I am pretty sure that Progressives doubling down further is pure advantage for my side. By all means, don't let me dissuade you.
Four years from now, conditional on the Trump faction losing the general election, will you be here saying you guys fucked up and Rs had better learn from their mistakes? Somehow, I doubt you'll take that L particularly gracefully if past experience is any indicator. I know the drill - time to reach for the fourth box, the election was rigged, America will be destroyed by a communist dictatorship.
I hope Trump is as successful as you think he will be, and that our country flourishes over the next four years.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
9mo ago
What, do you live in Istanbul or something? Why does your neighborhood have so many feral cats?
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
27d ago
You started your post with:
Why Should I Care? To provide some context, I've been in a bit of a malaise for the last few days, having had a rough week at work, and I get into a spiral of fantasizing about quitting my job when the thought hits me - why, exactly, do I even care about the job? Why do I actually care about contributing to society?
You followed up with 20 different ways society fails men, whom you depict as passive victims in your narrative. None of these actually answer the question you started with - okay, in the past men could be decidedly average and the church would still furnish them with a doe-eyed virgin and 20 acres of land on their 18th birthday. Even if you and all the NEETs lived in that world, what's the point of getting married? Of having children, raising them well, working to feed yourself? Why do you bother to call your elderly parents?
If your answers were orgasms, economic utility, economic utility, not starving and I don't talk to my parents on a regular basis then your problems run a lot deeper than dating market hard and my life is pointless because the state won't let me starve. If you don't want to do your job then don't, but quitting to pick pineapples isn't going to make you any happier until you find something larger than your own ego and physical pleasure to live for.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
27d ago
Welcome back.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
2mo ago
Once upon a time, this is what I got out of Wheel of Time. It didn’t matter if the prose was florid or the plotting glacial. The sprawl was the point. I wasn’t reading it to find out what happened in each finale, but to watch the setting evolve, further selling the illusion of another world.
That's curious; I'd find myself skipping Perrin, Egwene, Elayne, Nynaeve POV chapters out of boredom to get to the climax with Rand. Almost all the moments from the series that stick with me a decade or so later are with Rand: Picking up Callandor (and trying to revive the dead child), Rhuidean, cleansing saidin, using the True power against Semirhage for the first time, his epiphany on dragonmount.
I suppose as a teen I was even more of an uncultured swine than I am now.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
3mo ago
attacking the big tariffs on major trading partners.
Trump announced tariffs on Canada and Mexico in his first week or two. Everyone complained about tariffs on our major trading partners, Trump supporters just don't give a fuck. People here were unironically saying alienating our allies and destroying the post-WW2 coalition was a good thing.
At this point, what's left to do but either wait for congressional republicans to start panicking about their political futures or wait for the midterms? It doesn't matter what the media or twitter accounts focus on, Trump supporters know what they want and they're going to get it.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
3mo ago
But like, why would I do that when I can just ask computer?
More seriously, it's hard to measure my old bottom bracket without being able to take it out, right? Or is there something I'm missing? My understanding was that if I bought a bottom bracket that was slightly wider it may change my pedal width and I'd just have to adjust my derailleur.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
3mo ago
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
6mo ago
I handle a lot of cases involving mesothelioma due to asbestos exposure and, though this is completely anecdotal, immunotherapy seems to be working wonders on that front. It seems like a few years ago meso was a death sentence, and now there are people who, while not exactly cured, seem to be living with it for years
I don't know mesothelioma because it's relatively rare, and I don't see patients - just lines on a graph. That being said, it seems like a pretty similar story with 2 year survival rates of 41% versus 27%. Don't get me wrong, if I get cancer I'll take the pembro, but we're laughably far from curing cancer or LEV.
If you get diagnosed with a solid tumor (i.e. not a leukemia), basically you're either lucky and we caught it early enough to remove it entirely by surgery or you're going to die from it with vanishingly rare exceptions.
One case involved a 60 year old woman who had a resection and subsequent immunotherapy after being symptomatic for over a year before doctors even figured out the correct diagnosis, and she was judged to be completely cancer free, which is something I thought impossible.
I imagine that's bad for your bottom line. Or she lived long enough for you to collect?
I honestly wonder for a guy his age who wasn't having any problems if the treatment is worse than just living with the disease until he needs palliative care, considering that he was otherwise active but was wiped out by the cancer treatments.
Yeah. That's the choice to be made. Hopefully he was of sound mind and deciding for himself.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
6mo ago
I'm aware of the temporary workers. I don't think they return. I'd be happy to be proven wrong, but I doubt I will.
I have no idea what will happen, but is your position based on anything beyond vibes? Do you live in Canada, or spend a lot of time there? Why do you believe the things that you do?
This article claims that only one in three that have arrived since 2010 have received permanent residency. There seem to be a number of articles claiming that 1.2 million visas are set to expire in 2025; how many will actually leave versus try to claim refugee status or just stay illegally, I don't know.
And, yes, the trendline was there pre-Trudeau. As I mentioned, Conservatives went along for the ride because they too believed the myth that migration was good for the economy. I believed it too! They were wrong. I was wrong.
So...why is it Trudeau's legacy? Are you saying that it will be because people never bothered to put the least amount of effort into researching the topic, and will just say liberals bad? Are you saying he deserves it? But then, according to you, it's your legacy as well as the last 30-40 years of Canadian politicians as well? At that point, it seems nonsensical to pin this on the scapegoat du jour for continuing the status quo.
I don't follow Canadian politics in any meaningful way, and I don't have real contacts with anyone on the ground. From what I can tell, Trudeau wrecked his legacy with scandals, stupidity and bad luck. But come on, your initial take was absurd and poorly researched, no?
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
8mo ago
Do you think if she ran a campaign and lost, the commentariat here (and elsewhere) would say I know she lost, but damn, she's a fine politician?
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
9mo ago
Oh, I like Peter Thiel as well. I don't really know what you mean by "all I need to know".
Ah, sorry for being unclear. We're on the same page.
I just meant that people here turn a blind eye to Peter Thiel's AI panopticon empire and buggery because he hates on woke people. Zero to One and that op-ed about flying cars and twitter also fit the aesthetic/worldview of the locals.
The Alt Man, on the other hand, has none of those things. Or at least so far as I'm aware.
In neither case is the operative quality being a childless homosexual, just the perceived political valency.
I'm skeptical of my ability to do so, and loath to try.
But firstly, I'll note that we were discussing:
The link between this and open-air drug markets is tenuous to non-existent (was he buying his drugs at one of your markets...?) at least as far as I'm aware of the story of David Depape, though I can see how discussing drug markets rather than sticking to the example the OP gave is much more convenient for you. As far as Democratic policies go, do you want the cops to round up and jail polyamorists for life? Anyone who uses something harder than marijuana? People living in old buses? And that failing to do so means that when David Depape reads a bunch of conspiracy theories about the Jews and pizzagate on facebook, well, the Pelosis just had it coming? As well blame Republicans for not being willing to censor obvious disinformation that sent him off the deep end, both positions are equally stupid.
Not even mentioning the fact that Democratic politicians are elected on these 'soft on crime' platforms, and are presumably executing the will of the majority - particularly in the aftermath of Floyd. It's not clear to me why they should be murdered by drug addicts because their constituencies support 'soft on crime' policies.
But whatever, you don't want to talk about that, right? You want to score points. So no, I don't support 'open-air drug markets,' you are correct, but also nobody has a pro-drug market position. I assume you mean people are 'soft on crime' or against prosecution of drug offenses, and the mess in SF/Philly is the byproduct. But the tradeoff of cracking down on crime will be more citizens incarcerated and paying those costs, more fatherless households, more Rodney Kings and George Floyds (and associated riots) which you may not care about or even see as a good thing, but most of your fellow citizens disagree with.
It's clear the pendulum has swung too far in one direction and a correction is coming/already here. But America is not Singapore, and (this is conjecture on my part) I believe that most Americans value freedom and liberty such that they're willing to allow some level of crime and homelessness. Pushing your argument to the extreme means that any politician that isn't pro-social-panopticon deserves to be murdered by the criminals for their soft-on-crime policies.
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