Iconochasm
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Iconochasm
2. Bootstrap the rest of the fucking omnipotence.
1yr ago
Forgive student loans so we can give them more loans to gamble on college sports teams so they need a new loan. With sufficiently altruistic accounting, we can feedback loop GDP to infinity, pay ourselves a few trillion (pocket change compared to infinity!) while lecturing the plebes that they only think food and gas cost unpayable abstract numbers because they're bigots.
I want to say this is how Economics 2.0 worked in Accelerando, but I don't think Stross was cynical enough to flesh out the details.
Iconochasm
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1yr ago
Because that doesn't meet any reasonable definition for incitement to violence, it is clearly a ban for being inflammatory and unpopular, which can easily normalize to banning for being unpopular.
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1yr ago
arbitrarily seized and transported by agents of the state?Offered a free plane ticket to a rich sanctuary city.
Your phrasing here is histrionic to the point of derangement.
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1yr ago
I have a few issues with this comparison. First, the thing we'd be treating is the depression, with medications and therapies designed to fix the undesirable internal state. Secondly, the state of depression treatment is, AIUI, not really where we'd like it to be in terms of scientific reliability, and that's still a much better situation that the fraught nightmare of running experiments on trans people. And third, my issue is not with "access to treatment and therapy" (for adults, at least), but with epistemic demands on other people. If a depressed person demands that we validate their belief that everyone hates them for being smarter than the rest of us, and if we fail to validate that belief they might kill themselves... that is toxic AF. That's emotional blackmail. That's either despicably insincere, or something to have that person committed over. The worst response would be enabling that person in their toxic, abusive behavior.
If someone is suicidal, there are ways to seek help that aren't virulently anti-social, and empathy is not a blank check.
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1yr ago
It's true that they're anti-racism to a degree, which was part of the appeal, but there are other aspects that would be very troubling to the left today. For example, government officials are mostly incompetent, petty tyrants. The wizard newspaper prints only fluff pieces and official propaganda. It's not a book with that supports the "trust the experts" style of government that's been a staple of leftism for a long time but has ramped up even more since 2016.
Nah, they went a decade+ without noticing it's a story about armed children in school fighting the government, or that the Slytherins are a better "Jewish conspiracy" stand-in than the goblins. Shallow thinking is endemic, and motivated reasoning is a hell of a drug.
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1yr ago
whereas US equity ideology fairly reliably favours the rich and urbane over the poor and boorish).
So does socialism, in many cases. It's hardly novel to note that much of the energy and leadership in socialist movements comes from upperclass failsons who reliably prioritize using the movement to claim status and resources for themselves over actually helping the truly disadvantaged. Writers like Orwell and Steinbeck were noting this dynamic a century ago.
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1yr ago
Queens of what?
That's the question, isn't it, much more general than just the fertility topic. Every young woman is relentlessly reminded that she is a Qween who Slaaaaayyys, and anything countering that narrative is absolutely haram. But where is her dominion? What does she slay?
Consider this pop hit. #13 on Billboard, on the chart for half a year. If the men do all the work of enthroning the women, then the women will do their part by consuming luxuries and dancing. This is what passes for "female empowerment".
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1yr ago
I think there’s a bailey of “the world is pretty much meritocratic nowadays and any attempt to correct disparities is an unjust overreaction”.
I don't think this line works because the age effect is a meritocratic difference. The kid who is 8 months older than their peer isn't the beneficiary of unfair favoritism, or subtle preference effects. They actually are bigger, stronger. They actually have had more time to develop their coordination. Their brain actually is more developed, and was for the entire process of schooling.
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1yr ago
This is why it is relevant that so many of our would-be thought leaders are childless 30-somethings. It takes a gargantuan effort at doublethink to raise a few kids and see them interact with other kids, and not have your ape brain sort them into the glaring binary categories that apply 95% of the time.
Iconochasm
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1yr ago
The God of Growth Mindset
On this Winter Solstice, let's take a few minutes to consider the merits of Norse Paganism. Epistemic disclaimer: Head-canon derived from decades old, fringe Neopaganism, with supporting research helplessly confounded by a certain fucking new video game.
First, consider the example of Gaston.
No one's slick as Gaston
No one's quick as Gaston
No one fights like Gaston
Douses lights like Gaston
No one hits like Gaston
Matches wits like Gaston
No one shoots like Gaston
Makes those beauts like Gaston
No one fucks like Gaston
No one cucks like Gaston
Er, little confused at the end there, but it's got the spirit.
And then this incredible dude (Perfect! A pure paragon!) gets into his first real scrap and in spite of his multiple sneak attacks, weapons, morale advantage and assorted other edges, attributes and bonuses he fucking dies.
Imagine being the toady, or just any of the people in the village who knew the guy. How do you reconcile that? How do you interpret that in a world that still makes sense? Do you just embrace chaos and the premise of an uncaring malevolent universe?
How often must this have happened in real life? Actual combat is messy and chaotic and subject to the vicissitudes of chance and fate. How many local champions and heroes were heralded by oracles, won the admiration of their peers, and then died ignominiously before actually accomplishing anything?
I think Valhalla is the answer to this problem. Valhalla is the Hall of the Slain, and it's inhabitants are those killed in combat. As far as afterlifes go, this one is pretty fantastic. Valhalla is an enormous tessellated Hall made of lesser-but-still-enormous Halls, and it's aesthetic is metal as hell. The rafters are spears, the roof is overlapped golden shields. You wake up every day and PVP all of your friends. You can all go all out because come dinner time, everyone's wounds will heal and the "dead" will get back up. Then you get to feast on the succulent meat of the boar Sæhrímnir, who gets a much less pleasant go of things, being slaughtered and risen to be slaughtered anew every day. You get as much mead as you want from the udders of the goat Heiðrún, served by buxom blonde valkyries.
Importantly, the einherjar are not there by chance; one of Odin's many names is "Chooser of the Slain". The Slain have some role to play during Ragnarok, as the army of mooks for the named Gods while they have their Endgame-tier epic battle against All Of The Antagonists At Once. Several of Glad-of-War's adventures in the myths are centered around preparing for Ragnarok, mostly in the form of acquiring Int bonuses and wizard powers. Gallows-God hangs himself on Yggdrasil to gain knowledge of the runes. Old One-Eye gouges out his own eye to earn the right to drink from Mimir's well of wisdom. The Father of Magic Songs goes to circuitous lengths to steal the Mead of Inspiration (the few drops he loses are said to be responsible for mediocre poets and scholars; throw shade as you will). Truthfinder has riddle-fights with other renowned sages to pick up any missing scraps of lore about how the end will go down.
The senseless deaths of great heroes seems more obvious when we consider it from Odin's perspective. He needs warriors, and he needs them more than these random mortal chiefs and kings. And obviously, he wants them at the height of their martial prowess, before they are bowed by age, their strength stolen by the thief Time. Good and mighty people die randomly in battle because Odin wants them preserved at their best... is a much nicer thing for grieving friends and family to tell each other than some cynical account of meaningless chance. The weak and cowardly fighter who slinks off to live another day survives because he doesn't deserve a noble death in battle, a seat in Valhalla. This too feels closer to justice.
It's a fun Just-So Story. But it implies that Odin wants you at your best, if you're still alive, it could mean that you have stronger yet to grow.
Paganism intrigues me because of how different the relationship with the divine is. I was raised Catholic. We prayed for salvation. We prayed for grace and mercy. For all that the priests talk of what God wants from us, it's a categorically unequal relationship. I want eternal paradise, and God wants me to not be such a piece of shit that he feels obligated to keep it from me... but that's entirely his decision. There's nothing really I have to offer Him. The pagans viewed their gods as being amenable to trades (though it's usually phrased in a less mercenary/capitalistic manner). Father of Victory isn't someone you pray to for salvation. He won't fix your problems for you. But he might, with a worthy offering, nudge you in a direction that can help you grow in a way to handle your shit yourself. This view of Odin is as something like a Dungeon Master who could be bribed into offering side quests. He benefits himself, by growing you stronger before he claims you into his forces, soul to be spent in a Pyrrhic stalemate with fire giants. You prove your commitment to being worth the effort by making an offering/sacrifice.
I know a few people here were formerly soldiers. Probably none of us will ever die in battle. But I would argue that given what his stories focus on, more than battle and leadership, Wand-Wielder is a god of knowledge, learning, and truthseeking. He's the patron god of X-risk. He is a god of frenzy, but that frenzy overlaps in concept with inspiration. If you've ever succumbed to the manly urge to binge amphetamines and code or research for nine days and nine nights, perhaps the Dispenser of the Mead of Inspiration was with you.
This mess of myth and fanfiction has coalesced into a small ritual for me. I take the night of the Winter Solstice as an opportunity for reflection and contemplation for the year to come. I think about the lessons I've learned in the past year, the areas I have personally improved, especially the ones I didn't expect or plan for. I have this notion in my head (probably from EY), that the hardest part of seizing an opportunity is noticing that one exists in the first place. I try to think of which ones I noticed and took advantage of, and what events might look like misses with the benefit of hindsight.
And then I think about what the next year might have in store. I try to imagine the idealized, heroic Iconochasm that might look back at me from next year, and wonder what roads he could have walked, and chances he could have taken. How is he better than me, and how might he have gotten there from here?
Odin doesn't eat, he only drinks mead, and sometimes inhales burned plants used in magic. Obviously, mead is traditional, but it's the symbolism that counts. A proper offering is an intoxicant, for the Lord of Frenzy, Madness, and Inspiration. I'll be gifting the Yule Father whiskey and an edible tonight. And in return, I'll be asking for CR-appropriate "random" encounters to optimally foster personal growth.
Iconochasm
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1yr ago
So Massachusetts isn't willing to help refugees? Because they're not legal migrants? It's a novel form of fraud, tricking someone into receiving a valuable service for free with no strings attached or expectations. And it's fraud because MA lawyers and politicians are hilarious hypocrites about illegal immigrants to Texas vs illegal immigrants to MA?
Fun fact, "Defrauding someone to travel somewhere" appears to be a newly coined phrase. Google has no record of it ever appearing anywhere on the internet before.
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1yr ago
And? By the logic of disparate impact, the residents of Martha's Vineyard (which includes the Obamas) are "openly white supremacist". It's a community founded in, steeped in, and projecting outwards colonial Whiteness. The residents should welcome their town of stolen land being aggressively decolonized by Latinx folx with indigenous ancestry.
Less schadenfreudenly, has anyone ever been happy with the claim of "I'm not racist, just classist"?
Specifically, previous efforts to stir shit by bussing immigrants to major cities on the eastern seaboard failed to draw attention or rile up anti-immigrant sentiment (few noticed and no one cared - little enough surprise, as these are big cities and already have very large immigrant populations, including large numbers of illegal immigrants)
This is completely incorrect.
DC declared a public emergency.
NYC also considers a few hundred immigrants "emergency declaration" worthy.
There are hundreds of articles on this topic, and none of them have the Blue Sanctuary Cities taking a small bump in immigration with grace and aplomb. The freak-outs here are nakedly hypocritical and deserve to be called out as such.
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1yr ago
Er, this is actually the level of incompetent hostility that right-wingers already expect from the ATF, and the response from the Democrats is less "this is good on a meta level" and more "this is good because fuck your ilk".
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1yr ago
Qualifications aside, it still seems like a red flag for a raging case of Main Character Syndrome. My dude, get over yourself and put on some business casual.
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1yr ago
Disappointed with Musk here. Maximally inflammatory schitzoposting is the stuff that needs free speech protections the most.
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1yr ago
As a calibrating scenario, remember that guy who tried to assassinate the conservative supreme court justices a few months back? That situation seems to have gone very quiet, but let's speculate that he was found to have been "inspired" by the rhetoric of a leftist group or media. Would it be reasonable to sue/prosecute Ruth Sent Us or MSNBC into oblivion?
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1yr ago
Alien vs Predator 3: No Matter Who Wins, We Lose.
Some final thoughts and commentary on this race, focusing mostly on the campaign ads. I had wanted to link the ads I'm seeing as I discuss them, but there does not seem to be any easy repository. Some of the Oz ads, or similar clips, are available on his website and Youtube channel. Fetterman has a much more expansive listing of clips on his Youtube channel, but they don't seem very similar to the ads I'm actually seeing FIVE TIMES EVERY COMMERCIAL BREAK. Note that this is all in the Philly market.
Let's start with this Fetterman ad which is not one I've ever seen on TV, though there are some similar themes, and some glaring omissions. The ads I see do hit that note about wanting to "cut taxes for working families", but I have never seen a Fetterman ad say one word about the minimum wage. His ads talk about how Oz has 10 mansions, but Fetterman wants to cut taxes and make sure no community gets left behind and he definitely wants to fight crime and get more stuff made in Pennsylvania.
He still plays this like he's an anti-establishment Republican; you could be forgiven for thinking he was a moderate Tea Partier. Zero references to progressive or left-wing causes, he is nativist, vague on actual policies, but he is definitely One Of Us, not like that Turk.
On a related note, Josh Shapiro has a spot running where is also in favor of cutting taxes, and promises to put parents on the state education board. Taking in the tenor of these campaign pitches, I would be very morose if I were a leftist.
Fetterman does also have another ad running a lot, with a very positive, uplifting tone, where he doesn't say anything negative and ends by "respectfully asking for your vote".
Oz has a parallel one (unfortunately, it evades my Google-fu). In it, Oz expresses gratitude on behalf of himself and his family for "your kindness, and your grace". Just a strong positive note from both of them to end on, only mostly ruined by the shitflinging from the last few months... and their other ads... and all the ads being run by affiliated groups.
Oz has this ad, or one very similar running all the time. Oz stresses that he is like, amazingly super compassionate, and that the real problem is extremism on both sides. His ads position him as a moderate, who just want solutions gosh-darnit by listening and working together and building a reality-warping engine from a condensed singularity of generic moderation.
Both men have allies running harsh attack ads. CRAZY JOHN FETTERMAN WANTS CRIMINALS TO RUN WILD. He also, I hear, MOOCHES OFF HIS PARENTS. It must be nice to actually work for a year, and be so upset about it that you have daddy buy you a political office that is supposed to be extremely part time instead. There is another pair of ads featuring black people ripping into Fetterman for the whole situation where he heard gunfire, grabbed a shotgun, and held up the first black jogger he saw. Obviously a brutally negative ad aimed directly at the black community in Philly.
The other side has ads running against Oz, but almost more at Republicans in general. Republicans want to BAN ALL ABORTION even in cases of RAPE AND INCEST. Look at this 10 YEAR OLD GIRL who could be FORCED TO CARRY HER RAPISTS BABY. Republicans apparently also are going to DESTROY SOCIAL SECURITY AND MEDICARE. These ads focus less on attacking Oz directly, and more on the logic that as a Republican vote, he'll enable the other more extreme Republicans, which is an interesting bit of raw tribalism/game theory. They make a bit of hay out of Oz's statement at the debate that abortion should be between "a woman and her doctor and local politicians", but not as much as is made of Fetterman's performance. One ad just runs this clip, almost without commentary. Another has a bunch of Very Concerned People discussing how much Fetterman's debate failure changed their opinions, because he clearly can't do the job. One line effectively pings off a previous Fetterman ad where he bizarrely talks about how grateful he was to get to spent time with his family while recovering, by saying that he looks like he should be resting with his family instead of running for Senate. Oz is also going to RAISE YOUR TAXES (lolwut?), including one little snippet that should win an award for dishonesty, where the name "OZ" is pasted above a newspaper headline style snippet reading "CUT MEDICARE" and "RAISED YOUR TAXES", clearly implying that he has already done so, in spite of his never having held office before.
So, I want to talk about the REPUBLICAN PLAN TO DESTROY SOCIAL SECURITY AND MEDICARE. I went to look and see if this is something that anyone is actually talking about, but what I'm mostly finding is onion links in partisan outlets that link to stories that link to stories that link to stories that have that one time in 2010 that Mike Lee said we were going to have to do something about SS going insolvent. Are there any actual, current plans by actual Republicans to do anything that could reasonably be called "gutting SS/Medicare"? My impression is of desperate, disingenuous fearmongering, but I only have so much tolerance for digging through Dark Hinting from the outgroup, and I'm not entirely discounting the possibility that there is something serious in there.
Finally, some Kabbalah. I find it delightful that his support for releasing criminals has been an albatross around the neck of a candidate named Fetter-man. Unfortunately, the surname apparently has no linguistic connection to fetters, it's actually an old Germanic nickname/insult for "the fat guy", which again is odd because John looks like he has lost a bunch of weight, all of which went to his hideous neck goiter. "Mehmet Oz", OTOH, apparently just means "praiseworthy courage", which is so bland and boring and inappropriate I can't even make fun of it.
"John Fetterman" has a gematria of 1065, which is the Return of Partnership Income Tax form. "Mehmet Oz" has a gematria of 728, and Luke 7:28 reads "I tell you, among those born of women there is no one greater than John; yet the one who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he.” The Khabbalistic implications of this are obvious, but I cannot find anything saying if Oz was a C-section or not. If Fetterman wins, this should be a critical attribute of the next Republican challenger in 2028.
If there is some hidden message in their names that will reveal the winner, it eludes me. But I can say with confidence and joy that 48 hours from now I will be 5+ years away from seeing a single ad for either of these fuckheads again. May God have mercy on us all.
Iconochasm
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1yr ago
The gay claims about Mateen seem thoroughly disproven. Further, Pulse wasn't even his preferred target, and he seems to have not even known it was a gay nightclub.
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1yr ago
What exactly would the crime be? And why wouldn't it apply to every NGO, congressional staffer and lawyer doing similar things to get people to and over the border in the first place?
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1yr ago
Wordlessly and thanklessly picking up after toddlers is what adults do. If this is actually Extremely Dangerous To Our Democracy, then suck it up and throw a few votes to McCarthy to end the circus and move things along. Crying and caterwauling about how the situation is so bad, but you refuse to do anything about it is the behavior of a shitty 10 year old.
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1yr ago
When that is the primary lens through which you view things, you end up adopting this incredibly airy-fairy idea that you can shape society into anything you want and IF ONLY you could get enough people on board we could live on Heaven On Earth. Most "artsy people" really don't tend to develop very complex thinking about societies and why they operate the way they do, and it doesn't matter how much history or anthropology or evolutionary theory or whatever they learn, most of them in practice tend to remain stuck in this mindset.
This is a critical part of whatever the full answer is here. Progressive art is unbound by the need to work, hold up to logical scrutiny, or make literally any sense at all. It's pure aesthetics. Dig into the lyrics of the average punk song, or celebratory ghetto anthem, or vaguely progressive pop hit and they are fucking retarded, Gringott's with it's fixed precious metals exchange ratios stamping on the human sense-making organ forever. It's a vibe and a glib line and never ever having to worry if the underlying mechanics will function on any level.
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1yr ago
At some point in the recent past it was probably true that national news organizations were more accurate/fair in their reporting than the explicit partisanship of right-aligned media.
ABC morning news in 2022 reminds me of clips John Stewart would play of Glenn Beck in 2004. Even the pretense of objectivity feels like gaslighting. They don't care at all that you learn any facts about what happened, the only important thing is that you feel who are the bad guys (the Republicans) and who are the good guys (the Democrats).
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1yr ago
Well, if you want Limited Government then I hear Somalia is a great place.
Somalia-the-meme was a civil war between a half dozen competing governments, many of which were fundamentalist Islamic. And that was still an improvement in most QoL measures over the previous socialist government.
Do they? Many of them seem to be children of enormous wealth and privilege, because no one else can afford J-school and then 2-5 years of garbage internships in the most expensive cities on earth. How many of them actually ride the subway, especially outside of the safest business hours?
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