netstack
Texas is freedom land
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User ID: 647
netstack
Texas is freedom land
1mo ago
Eh, that’s the motte-and-bailey, isn’t it?
a worldview in which trans women are just perverted men intentionally trying to prey on women and destroy them,
gets watered down to
You can't say that the rapist isn't a pervert,
No shit, the convicted rapist of this example is a pervert grasping at any opportunity to keep hurting women. His credibility went out the window because of the crime.
Is the least sympathetic rapist representative of the broader category of trans people? Keep in mind that many of them are aggressively disinterested in sex, perhaps on account of the long-running hormone therapies. Are the dreaded trans youth all rapists, desperate for an excuse?
I don’t think so. You’re making the same judgment as the woman who, after a bad date, concludes that men are scum. Not all men. Not all transwomen.
Side note: I agree with you that YouTube videos, especially those made by your opponents, are incredibly unappealing. No matter how succinct and reasonable it is, the argument would be better served by a text document. And there is zero incentive for wannabe documentarians to make their work short.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
2mo ago
This is often referred to as the progressive stack,
By whom? The people I’ve seen insist on this term are not progressives, but critics interested in scoring rhetorical points.
Say I argued that Christians rely on a “religious stack.” I could probably come up with a half-decent ordering. Surely Christians tend to prefer Judaism to Islam, or insular Amish sects to rival missionaries, or spirituality to atheism. But it would be foolish to use a placement on this list—which I had just created—as an argument for Christians to do something differently. The model might be descriptive, but it is very much not prescriptive.
If progressives don’t pick their causes according to a stack, your strategy is dead on arrival. You will never gain mainstream support by fitting yourself into a model which the mainstream doesn’t use.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
4mo ago
What’s supposed to happen if an ineligible candidate wins a state?
Let’s say a write-in candidate wins due to a generational gap. Turns out the last Silents were the only thing holding back fascism, and now Hitler has the plurality in Colorado. What gives?
- Votes for an ineligible candidate aren’t counted.
- Votes for an ineligible candidate are counted, but electors are bound to choose the highest eligible count.
- As above, but electors aren’t bound at all, and can pick Hitler anyway.
- Electors are bound to pick the highest count, regardless of eligibility, but the US Senate won’t sign and certify votes for ineligible candidates.
- As above, but the Senate certifies the results; ineligibility only matters after tallying the final result.
- As above, but the seat gets filled by the VP instead of the Presidential runner-up, since this is “the case of the death or other constitutional disability” from the 12th amendment.
This is a genuine question. Article II doesn’t say anything about faithless or stupid electors, and it certainly doesn’t say anything about the state population picking a dead man. If there’s something in the 14th or in the 12th, I missed it.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
5mo ago
Huh. The first few stock images that come to mind are a mixed bag. Harold, old white guy. “Why can’t I hold all these limes,” young black guy. “Distracted boyfriend,” three white people, one of whom is male. Maybe those are just dated?
Googling “stock photo” and looking at the first page of results gives a bunch of white people, mostly solo. The first black guy is playing a saxophone—does that count as stereotyping? There are a few Middle Eastern men, a couple Indians, and a single dog.
So I’m not really seeing it.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
6mo ago
Out of curiosity, what movies would you say capture that male, high-octane, martial precision?
netstack
Texas is freedom land
6mo ago
I have to assume you mean this WaPo article.
If so, I guess I’d better head off any misunderstandings. There’s really no sense in getting heated over this long-dead loser. Even in its current state, this statue holds together better than the Lost Cause mythos. It’s more defensible than the Confederacy, too. I think Lee’s just getting caught up with what Sherman did to Georgia.
Also, it looks like the detractors are doing this legally. I don’t see why you should get the final say over whether Lee’s body parts get to remain in a Union.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
10mo ago
Funny. I’m a regular /r/MawInstallation participant, and I’ve mostly heard good things about the High Republic. Sure, a niche fan group isn’t going to generate the sales Disney expects. But wouldn’t the anti-war message annoy them first? The sub is literally themed around Imperial military research!
Reading the article, it starts to make a little more sense. The first section is all about how woke the buildup was, based largely on a screencap of a whiteboard. Plus some tea-leaf interpretation on character designs. By his standards Maya here is far too androgynous to be, uh, a good character. If the tits aren’t out, she can’t be a good Jedi, hmm?But I digress.
The follow-up to this condemnation of the rollout is…an argument that the first book was actually successful. Which segues smoothly into all the reasons High Republic sucks. There’s no self-awareness in sight. This author started from the premise that Star Wars was woke badthink, and by the Force, he’s going to see it through.
Here we get to another shocking claim: Zahn did it right. Truly the hottest take in this article. I suppose it demonstrates better taste than the Rabid Puppies whom this author so openly apes.
Never mind the graveyard of non-Zahn Star Wars projects. Media tie-ins are a crapshoot. If we weren’t lucky enough to get Zahn, we’d have been stuck with Splinter of the Mind’s Eye. I’m sure the author was aware of melodramatic runs like Dark Empire or Legacy of the Force. Not to mention multimedia projects like Shadows of the Empire. More successful than High Republic, surely. But it’s easier to say “member Zahn? I ‘member.”
Could there be another reason than a woke mind virus? Maybe writing a decent novel is tough, and even tougher if you’re stupid. Er, third-rate talent operating on a budget. Maybe it gets worse when there is stifling corporate oversight. (Hey, I hear Marvel has multimedia projects. And is owned by Disney. And has a plan with similar Phases…) Maybe 2021 wasn’t the best time to release half a dozen books. How’s the hardback market looking, in this era of streaming services and Fortnite tie-ins?
I shouldn’t be surprised that the pseudo-review ends with a Joker quote. Censored, too. How fitting for an article which regurgitates so much else.
I’ve already drawn your series as the soyjak, and my series as the chad!
netstack
Texas is freedom land
11mo ago
What’s your favorite bird?
I’ve been watching the local Great Blue Herons. Majestic, yet goofy. Love ‘em.
I still want to go somewhere I can spot a Green Heron. Basically all the same advantages, but they tuck in their neck and look like a completely different bird. This amuses me.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
6d ago
cover sheets
Hot damn. If the FBI managed to screw up the investigation of what should be obvious misconduct, I’m going to be so disappointed. Let’s see what exactly they did…
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/05/03/mar-a-lago-trump-classified-documents-00156124
Looks like they added placeholders and cover sheets when they initially sorted the fifteen boxes. And then possibly failed to remove them? Assuming every cover sheet was left in the count, and there are really only half as many documents as stated in the warrant, that could mean Trump’s 15 boxes held fewer than 100! Witch hunt!
This is stupid. It’s also not the cause of the delay, which stems from the complaint that those searched boxes are now out of order. How much did they change? No idea. How did they notice the change? Because the contents were exhaustively documented after the seizure.
It’s not a great look for the prosecution. But it also has no bearing on the facts of the case. If Trump’s team could point to any version of the boxes as favorable, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. I don’t mind a delay of the trial, but I’m not going to treat this as exculpatory.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
1mo ago
No, you need to come across as less smug.
I’m not exaggerating. Almost every time I see your name in the report queue, it’s attached to something combative. Either directly insulting people or laying on the sarcasm. People do not appreciate this.
You are clearly capable of writing with tact or at least good humor—I’ve approved enough of your comments to see that. It’s when you choose not to apply that skill that you get dogpiled.
If you make the same points but with more tact, you will receive fewer downvotes.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
6mo ago
Prior to her death last month, my grandmother spent about two years in a retirement home. They struggled with staffing constantly. I’m not even talking about technical employees giving care, though I’m sure they were hard to find too. I’m talking about cooks, cleaners, and receptionists.
Quality of service fluctuated noticeably. Each time someone quit, the remainder of the staff were more stressed, and the inhabitants were more cranky.
The overall impression was that wages weren’t keeping up. I think the management might have cut them mid-pandemic? Either way, they could not or would not afford to crank up wages. There were rent hikes, but old people are a strange customer base. While they have lots of sunk costs keeping them from moving, they are particularly inclined to raise hell when something goes poorly. Or to just ignore a rent increase—what are you going to do, sue them? I could easily see this become a death spiral if morale got low enough to push out new clients.
Thing is, I don’t know why this would be limited to elder care. Was there a particular reason—COVID restrictions, or some regulatory regime—pushing staff to other industries? Or does every service job in Dallas have a similar level of churn? Is this post going to start another fight about inflation and lived experience?
Since she passed, I haven’t spent much time at her apartment. I doubt that they’ve reached a happy equilibrium. There’s a complex web of rents and reputation pulling against wages and property taxes and material costs. In better days, maybe a vacancy in the kitchen was easy to fill. Today, if frictions really are higher, maybe that gap pulls everything else down with it.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
7mo ago
Wait, so how’d McCarthy manage to cock up the support of his own team?
I wasn’t really clear on why choosing a speaker was so hard in the first place, to be honest.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
8mo ago
And you’re doing this by…joining other threads to talk about the ADL?
The OP hewed pretty close to bare links, so I can’t really blame you for taking your own spin.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
1mo ago
I’m going to jump in, mod hat on, to say that I specifically appreciate the contrarianism.
Policy debates should not be one-sided. If an issue comes up in the CW thread, it probably isn’t one-sided. There is nothing wrong with presenting positions which would otherwise be ignored. Steelman at will.
In fact, users simply love to ask for defenses of facially unpopular opinions. Sometimes this is rhetorical bait. Other times it’s an attempt to get around the “look what those people did!” rule. And there are times it’s genuine, because this community really is unusually fond of sensemaking.
But.
There is one glaring, obvious risk of playing the devil’s advocate. People may think you’re actually, wholeheartedly helping out the devil. And he’s not known for acting in good faith.
A lot of people are convinced that you will say anything to score points for Your Team, whatever that may be. I’m not sure that you can disabuse them of this notion, but I’d love to see it.
Best of luck.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
6mo ago
False dichotomy, no?
There’s no ordinal scale of evil. A convicted murderer is not necessarily a rapist or even a jaywalker. Likewise, believing that Islamic terrorists are willing to commit atrocities in general does not imply that they committed any atrocity in particular.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
20d ago
No, it doesn’t.
I’ve laid out the case for deterrence before. That only requires Russia to think they can succeed quickly and easily. Correcting their estimate is valuable.
In the world where we refused to supply any of them, Russia could exert power over its NATO neighbors.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
2mo ago
I don’t find that line of reasoning very convincing. If the religious critics were right, it was in a stopped-clock sense.
Here are some circa-2010 objections, mostly on theological grounds. Either it’s a sin or it’s not. Either the denomination can extend rites to unrepentant sinners, or it can not. Lots of link rot, but in the statements I could access, churches weren’t justifying based on a slippery slope.
Here and here we have articles debating the slippery slope, but it’s towards polygamy. That’s a more credible threat than this 2004 scare story about horse marriage, though it’s more a vehicle for delivering the full slate of polygamy, social consensus, and “think of the children” arguments.
Transgender politics wasn’t in the Overton window at this point. It still wasn’t as of 2012, from what I see. Which makes sense—their issue isn’t marriage, or even equal rights. The current debate over social acceptability is categorically different.
I’m left with an impression that churches had their theological debates. The secular public backed those up with arguments like the slippery slope against polygamy. Nobody talked about the tiny, weird minority within the minority. But once that group gained traction, pattern matching kicked in, and suddenly this was the next step of the slippery slope. I don’t buy it.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
3mo ago
Let’s say there was an “anonymous mode” box on your profile. While checked, any comments or posts you made would be reassigned to a single, anonymous account. Mods would still be able to see who wrote it, and you would be held to the usual rules, but other users could not.
- Would you use this feature?
- Would it make you less likely to delete/overwrite old comments?
- Am I overlooking an obvious way for bad actors to exploit this?
netstack
Texas is freedom land
3mo ago
Tabooing the phrase “sexual act,” there are two obviously distinct clusters. Reproduction is not the same thing as intercourse, even though one can follow from the other. I can say I would like to eat a nice meal without personally being the one to cook it.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
7mo ago
I was surprised by this.
The low-effort rule, as described in the sidebar, seems to be targeting “three-word shitposts.” This does not feel like a shitpost to me. It has a fact (which I had not yet seen) and two legitimate questions—what happens next, and is it likely to shift the Senate one way or another? More importantly, it steers relatively clear of cheap shots.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
8mo ago
Ah, Tyler. If there was any place I’d have expected to be in the news for this…no, I still wouldn’t expect Tyler.
Let’s see what Strickland actually said…
Among the bishop’s stances have been urging Pope Francis to deny Holy Communion to former U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi over her support of legal abortion, accusing the Pope of a “program of undermining the Deposit of Faith,” and condemning pro-homosexuality “blasphemy” from Jesuit Father James Martin.
That second one is what makes me a little skeptical. Let’s try a site that isn’t quite so obviously partisan:
The visitation included questions about the governance of a diocesan high school, considerable staff turnover in the diocesan curia, the bishop’s welcome of a controversial former religious sister as a high school employee, and the bishop’s support for “Veritatis Splendor” — a planned Catholic residential community in the diocese, which has struggled with controversy involving its leadership’s financial administration and personal conduct. …
In July, following the apostolic visitation, Strickland released a pastoral letter to his diocese in August in which he warned Catholics about “the evil and false message that has invaded the Church, Christ’s Bride.”
Now, I’m not an expert on Catholicism. It sounds like Strickland is making the kind of moves which would be untenable even in a secular workplace. If he’s so insistent that the Catholic Church has been invaded, undermined, and otherwise corrupted, perhaps he shouldn’t be calling himself a Catholic.
netstack
Texas is freedom land
8mo ago
the primary factor
What would it take to convince you otherwise?
Obviously if we hung Israel out to dry on anything important. But since that seems pretty unlikely, is there any way you might be convinced that Israel really is the most practical ally in the region?
They’re relatively westernized. They aren’t Islamic fundamentalists, which has made Americans nervous since at least the Iranian Revolution. (Though we put up with the Saudis, so it can’t be too much of a dealbreaker…) Most importantly, they owe their security to us in a way that none of the other ME states can match.
I also wouldn’t underestimate the wedge that is Palestine, at least on the left. While my understanding is that the neoliberal, pro-Israel wing still dominates foreign policy, there’s at least some tension going on. If there’s a point where we really break with Israel, that’ll probably be it.
Eh, I’ve heard it before. He hires the best people, right?
What’s the deal with Virginia? Last I heard, the fights over schooling worked out okay for Republicans. Same for trans issues in general. What else is salient in the state, such that the polling leans so blue? @WhiningCoil
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