Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
"Behind our efforts, let there be found our efforts."
User ID: 83
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
2yr ago
The last paragraph invalidates whatever else you may have written. By associating yourself with environmentalism and animal welfare, you break the illusion of your post being purely an objective evaluation of a diet - it instead comes to appear that any seeming facts you deliver are likely cherry-picked to support your moral politics.
And maybe this is untrue, maybe it really is purely about practical health concerns, but then why that last paragraph? It smells too strongly of missionary zeal.
What I'm trying to get at is this - it's disappointing to give a text the benefit of the doubt only for it to ruin its credibility in its last lines.
As for my own excuse: Eating meat is normal, the vegans I know tend to be crazy, better stick to my guns.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
19d ago
Random thoughts: This is a return to normal. The 20th century saw an excessive standardization of all work as office or factory work, i.e., external workplace work where employed and salaried workers work under direct supervision. Employers now realize that this needn't be universally enforced. You can in fact just hire people to do their job, let them handle the details, and judge them based on their effective output. It may take some bossware to make it function for jobs that rely more on putting-in-hours than on getting-things-done, but that's a fairly minor hurdle.
What was once the craftsman's workshop adjacent to his living quarters, the farmer living on his farm, the daytaler sleeping right next to tomorrow's task, is now the employee working from home. It's a revival of an older and universal theme that was briefly obscured by some of the excessive outgrowths of the industrial revolution.
I recall one genuinely intelligent friend who told me in late 2020 that "once the vaccines come everyone just needs to get jabbed and this will all be over" and in early 2022 "you should have gotten vaccinated because that's a fixed viral load whereas the virus in the wild might give you any sort of load and then you don't actually know what happened to you."
My impression from this and similar interactions: Arguments are soldiers and covid vaccinations are primarily a tribal signal.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
2yr ago
Yeah, I'd call it uglier. The scene in the painting looks mundane, not pretty but simply normal because it depicts a real situation in a real place, realistically. The scene in the poster is an illustration of an imaginary ideological utopia, so ugly that it needs to be stylicized in order to avoid reactions of disgust.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
2yr ago
What is that conference and why does it matter?
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
1mo ago
No offense, but can the mods please just blanket ban any post that builds an argument based on LLM output?
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
3mo ago
become legal because you do it really fast.
Exactly this has been the modus operandi of immigration advocates and migrants themselves. I don't want to be rude, but man, your side (assumption mine) smashed the defect button so hard on that issue, I'm having a hard time not laughing out loud at your complaint.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
4mo ago
I've always had a sense that "stop illegal immigration" is the bailey while "stop all immigration" is the motte.
Yes it is.
Mostly ignoring the American context, I think it's important to be explicit about this so that nobody gets any funny ideas about calling the job done when illegal immigration is finally consider not-actually-OK again. Mass immigration is a problem in and of itself, illegal or not, and arguing that the problem is merely the legality of it just invites pro-immigration actors to game the system by changing or subverting the laws.
Trying to play cute motte-and-bailey-games by tactically condemning illegal immigration because you think it an easier target when what you really mean is to condemn mass immigration or even any kind of immigration just sets you up for failure further down the line.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
1yr ago
Tangentially related.
I recently received a gift copy of Pacific Drive (https://store.steampowered.com/app/1458140/Pacific_Drive/). Ostensibly a game about driving, scavenging, tinkering with the car, and uncovering the mysteries of its setting.
Well, at some point fairly early on, you unlock the ability to decorate your car...and the available decorations are a large assortment of "pride" flags, plus "black lives matter".
I searched and discovered a mod that removed all those, installed it, it worked, and so as to facilitate the same procedure for others I posted a guide on steam on how to remove those flags. Hardly a day later, the guide was banned. I asked Steam Support why this was, and they told me that it had violated the community guidelines. I asked which one exactly and how, and received a non-reply that simply gestured at the guidelines again, but also told me that I should not have included an obscured link the guide. I offered to remove the link and asked whether that would make the guide pass muster, and if not, what other rule remained broken. They finished up by telling me that the issue was resolved, and closed my ticket.
I wonder a little how people can stomach doing customer support in such a way.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
1yr ago
AFAIK the usual story is either "women grossly overestimate their market value" or "women underestimate how destructive a signal divorce initiation is, initiate to create pressure on the husband, and the outraged men escalate by actually going through with it".
I have no idea whether there's any truth to either of those.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
1yr ago
My take is that your mind is stuck in some kind of bizarre loop and I'm not sure what might help you get out of it. Touch grass? Get blackout drunk to reset your brain? Start boxing?
I don't currently have the wit to write up anything worth reading, so here's my research-free quick take for the purpose of just adding one more German perspective, based on having known some people from that and adjacent subcultures, and having lurked in some of their channels. No claim of factual correctness, but here's how I see it:
Eins (1.). No, they're all LARPing. How far they'd take it in the end is hard to tell, but these kinds of subversives are all either delusional, dumb or putting on a performance for their ego's sake. I won't even attempt any armchair psychology of the types involved, but the ones I knew were all very eager to be special, to be seen as special, and to embrace beliefs that enhanced their special status even if only in their own minds. The german conspiratorial milieu is also full of Bauernfänger (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Bauernf%C3%A4nger) peddling anything from crystal therapies to unlock the power of your mind to novel covid cures. I mean to say they're a credulous bunch.
As for chances of success: Though they overtly deny it, they must know on some level that the people do not have their backs, and wouldn't even if they were to conquer berlin and every state capital on top of it. Old Germans hate change, and young and new germans hate wrongthink in general and right-wing think even more so. An armed revolution in favor of everything most of the population despises, which all institutions are sworn to oppose and that only a tiny conspiratorial segment of a small and politically marginalized part of the people actually desires? Even delusions can only carry you so far. Most of them, I suppose, revel in the aesthetics of being a serious revolutionary, but would never have gone through with it.
Zwei (2.). They're there, at least this subculture is strongly pro-russian, anti-american, anti-NATO and so on. But whether this is purely a grassroots artifact of cold-war era pacifist activism or at least partially an astroturf by Putin himself, I cannot say. Money flows from Russia to certain German organizations, as others have noted, so it wouldn't be entirely surprising.
Drei (3.). Firstly refer back to 1. for one large cause. It's just the kind of people who want to be special.
Secondly, again refer back to 1. again, most of them must have known that they could never succeed, and this lack of ideological prospects extends to parliamentary politics as well - the German right will not get much further than it already has; not within our lifetimes. Going into politics for the right means fighting not just an uphill battle, but committing to a sisyphean struggle just to keep the overton window from snapping left so hard that it leaves even the last conservative out in the cold. That's a bleak thing to dedicate yourself to, and it seems to me that some people require a more colorful political vision, no matter how unlikely its implementation.
As for institutional capture, I must repeat: Most Germans reflexively and thoroughly hate anything smelling of right-wing wrongthink, in a way that even American wokes have not yet come close to. Yeah, you guys over the pond have the crazier issues with your trans and your blackbodies, but post-war Germany has mastered the science of mental inoculation against political deviancy. There is no chance whatsoever of capturing any institution that matter, nevermind of reversing the long-accomplished capture by the left of all institutions that do. This isn't even an unequal fight; it's a non-fight.
Exit is not an option. They want to either be special, to see themselves as heroes who overthrow the oppressive regime that's selling out Germany while keeping the people in ideological lockstep, or they actually believe this and want to save Germany. Creating a new society isn't on their agenda.
And, let's assume that it were on their agenda: As with all ideological crusaders, they don't want to move out into the cold to put theories they themselves believe in in so far as psychologically necessary, which they cannot implement without substantial manpower and material, the failure of which would not only embarrass their ideology but also them personally. Let me rephrase this: they don't want to move out of what is one of the comfiest, cushiest countries in the world to try their hand at building a nation out of thin air, ego and delusions. No matter how serious they are about their beliefs, there must be at least some small part of themselves screaming at the madness of giving up material paradise for what is barely even a pipe dream. But as prefaced, I don't think this is even an option for them.
Eh, my coffee is drained and I still don't think I've been able to say anything of value. I keep trying to find something of value in the German right, something more to stop the leftward slide of the country than inertia and a little friction with reality, but so far I've been mostly disappointed. Hardly surprising given Germany's history and the last 75 years of everything that can be done to weaken the right having been done, and mostly successfully so. These kinds of failed nonstarter revolutionaries are, IMO, not to be taken seriously. They receive outsized media attention because anything that mobilizes people against the right and anything that discredits the right always receive outsized media attention in Germany. Don't read too much into the particulars of this case; it's not that significant.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
1mo ago
Here in rural Germany, being a volunteer firefighter is very high-status, and provides excellent networking. And that is on top of, well, getting to play firefighter.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
1mo ago
Why not both? She rapidly solved a local problem and may have had some adverse effects on the commons. She's practical and pragmatic but also a liar and a thief. Fuck, but don't marry. Possibly kill if you're some avatar of zero-tolerance law and order.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
3mo ago
I'd better stop here. I've been noticing misandry against men in Western culture for quite sometime, but now it looks like boys are targets too, which makes me a bit upset.
In addition to @DiscourseMagnus' reply, consider the following: What is an attack on men if not an attack on boys? For what else should boys aspire and expect to be?
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
5mo ago
Isn't it a bit early for a triumph?
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
1yr ago
called an x-phobe,
Any community afraid of this has no defenses worth a damn.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
1yr ago
Hate to pile on, but as others have said - if this is overwhelming evidence, then you simply longed to be overwhelmed.
If this violates the leave-the-internet-at-the-door rule, please say so and I'll happily delete. I'm posting in spite of it because it seems relevant, but it's n=1 so no sweat if the rule comes first.
So I just got banned from my favorite Battletech discord server for very politely disagreeing (in fact, for saying no more than that I respectfully disagreed) with very severe new anti-anti-lgbt rules that even made having anything joke-like in your global pronoun field a bannable offense. Following this I was told that it was not acceptable to call for the annihilation of groups of people and that I shouldn't be a shithead, but that it was of course permissible to politely state one's opinion. I invoked that principle and stated that the language involved in the matter seemed excessively dramatic and directed at strawmen besides. I was called a troll and banned within seconds.
I'm getting similar vibes here that I got when I politely declined vaccination and suddenly half my family turned on me as if I were planning murder. People I presumed to be reasonable overtuning their reactions to benign disagreement. Other places just don't play by Motte rules.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
2yr ago
His post may have been shitty, but the literary critique of Hlynka taking too long to make a simple point is not entirely off the mark.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
2yr ago
I somehow managed to get out of a major months-long slump. Still not sure how. Salient aspects below, but most of them may be cause or effect and I don't know which.
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Winter ended. It's warmer and less dark. Switching time zones is annoying, but I do appreciate summer time. I probably do get a major case of the SADs (Seasonal Affective Disorder) in winter, not that I'd ever go to anyone who might diagnose me. But psychospeak aside, I hate winter. I hate the cold and the dark and the denuded trees and the grey skies and the soggy ground and the feeble sun and the shortness of the days. I can get comfy at home, but it still feels like some kind of half-hearted afterlife with the best parts of living gone and not coming back for many months. It's still too cold to go swimming or cycling, but I'm planning to go on as long a hike as my busted knees will take to take in the springtime sights as soon as there's a sunny weekend.
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Had some modest but tangible successes at work. It's been a slog before, and I'm still not doing anything praiseworthy, but right now I'm managing without needing to rope in others to help me out. Maybe I just lucked out and picked some easy tasks for once, but it's nice either way.
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Managed to fix up my own codebase. I was immured by bugs of my own making from having been too sloppy, overambitious or just plain distracted in the past. Couldn't do anything without it falling apart thanks to the shamefully low level of code quality. Just about everything failed one way or another. I considered scrapping some features, quarantining others until I might fix them, and simplifying the rest until I might manage. I considered just trashing it all and starting over. I considered trashing it all and never starting over. Instead I sat myself down and did the only right thing - wrote tests. Wrote a lot of tests. There are still large swathes of code that are unusable right now, and it does take me serious effort, but it bears fruit. Bugs are getting fixed. Functionality is restored. And I even manage to add some new things and see them work out.
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Marriage is much more harmonious. I get along better with the wife and we even managed to talk about some difficult topics without it devolving into pointless arguments. Wife has more patience for the child. Child is much more agreeable than she was a few months ago. We went on a trip and had a good time. Nice.
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Successfully extricated myself from work-from-home for once and spent a day in the office. It was productive and I got a lot of workplace socializing done. The 4-hour commute sucks, but once in a while it's absolutely worth it. I try to make it once in a week, but so far I've been held up. I hope to get there again soon, maybe spend a night, get in a few hours of exercise and even meet some old friends.
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Finished playing Cyberpunk 2077. See https://www.themotte.org/post/449/friday-fun-thread-for-april-14/88260?context=8#context . Mostly when I play games it's just to unwind, or to challenge myself, and I have a hard time justifying the waste of time. This one, for once, actually had me along for the ride purely for the story. I normally scoff at storytelling in video games - stories in games universally suck, why not just read a book instead? - but in this one case I'm convinced that it was actually well-served by its format. I'm still thinking about it days later. Still listening to related music (https://youtube.com/watch?v=p4cqqUUfy3A). Maybe I'm just impressionable, but somehow it's been a good impression and I feel that playing this game has somehow done me good.
None of my fundamental life problems are fixed, but somehow in spite of them it's going ever-so-slightly uphill right now. If it really is seasonal, then I hope very much that I manage to get as much as possible out of this season, and to prepare as well as possible for what comes after.
Apparently we recently had an honest-to-god serial old-people-killer very near our home in the absolute nowhere of rural Germany. Seems he was active over several years, and a suspect has been caught a few weeks ago. My old grandparents then had an extra bolt installed in their front door, which they used to have unlocked during the day.
Guns are, for self-defense or home-defense purposes, banned in Germany. Families are atomized.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
2yr ago
Increasing TFR by 0.3 in a Western country means approaching something like stable demographics; it's hardly an idealization of the ever-climbing population count.
Kindness and Truth being different terminal values seems like a bit of a Motte to me, where the Bailey is "be as unkind as I feel like being". Introducing yourself via a link to your substack, and in fact introducing yourself at all, also smells to me of an above-average sense of self-importance for a participant on the motte. That, or you're just fishing for clicks.
But
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I may be wrong, my impression may be off. Maybe I'm being uncharitable.
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You may still be an acceptable poster.
Since you already made a profile, what do you have to lose by just participating?
I "have" to feel that the great sin of Germany was what it did to the Jews, Cripples and Gypsies. I do feel that the greatest sin of Germany back then was what it did to Germany and the Germans.
As for those WWI vets, you can validly suggest that they weren't all unhinged gangsters, but I will insist that more than enough of them in positions of great power were, and this includes big names like Himmler, Göring, the non-veteran Göbbles and Hitler himself, and a thousand lesser party barons who managed to escape post-war condemnation only because they lorded it over the Germans instead of bullying foreigners or minorities. Some more unhinged, some more gangster, some perhaps neither but alas the the party was top-heavy with unhinged gangsters and the top had the last word on acceptable behavior.
I'm fine with denouncing the common depiction of the Nazis as fundamentally evil, fine with admitting that they did some good, fine with any claim of there being worse things in the world than Nazis, fine with theories that posit that Fascism may have good points, but not fine with attempts to whitewash those particular Nazis as saviors of the Germany they destroyed in their mania and incompetence.
Look at their mismanagement, the purges, the wealth accumulated by party functionaries, and the ground-level stories of German peasants and tradespeople being bossed around and told to shut up and get with the program or else, and look at the total and utter catastrophe that was WW2. It takes a lot of revisionism to clear them of the blame for that. You can, if you like, completely ignore the horror stories of concentration camps and death squads or any principled objection to authoritarianism - there's still more than enough left to condemn the Nazis in general both for what they attempted and for what they ended up achieving.
And I honestly don't know enough about JFK to answer your question.
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