domain:drmanhattan16.substack.com
Tiber727
13hr ago
I'm someone who subscribes to the capitalism but nice theory. I read your linked previous comment. I think some mandatory training is stupid, but I think you're picking some low-handing fruit. Capitalism but nice can just as easily be EU telling phone manufacturers to stop making proprietary phone chargers when USB exists, or that John Deere needs to stop making their tractors unrepairable by third-parties for arbitrary reasons. Good or bad depend entirely on which law we're talking about.
Primaprimaprima
...something all admit only "TRUMP", and the Trump Administration, can do.
13hr ago
· Edited 13hr ago
The Marxist mythology is very much based on the story of Eden and the fall of man. It is imagined that the first stage of human society was "primitive communism", which is when, contrary to your assertion, society was at its most egalitarian, gender and race relations were at their most egalitarian, society was not based on hierarchical relations of authority, etc. And then that whole "agricultural civilization" thing had to come along and ruin it.
The orthodox Marxist position is that "there's nowhere to go but forward", the only way to reclaim what was lost and make Man whole again is through the ever-increasing development of the technological forces of production. But there's also an anarcho-primitivist strain of leftist socialist thought that says that we should actually be going backwards, back to the garden, back to our lost innocence. For certain environmentalists, degrowth is the mythological symbol of the ultimate fulfillment of the demands of woke identity politics.
Not to say that every member of a Green party is a self-conscious primitivist of course, only that this way of thinking is "in the air". People who emotionally resonate with these ideas are disproportionately likely to be attracted to environmentalist politics.
thejdizzler
13hr ago
A lot of people love to criticize Marx without actually having read him. You and this sub-stacker included. Where does Marx ever support wokeness in his writings? Capital was a critique of capitalism and the social systems that it encourages that is largely correct. I have yet to hear an actually convincing critique of commodity fetishism or the labour theory of value that isn't a nitpick. Western leftists don't actually want to read Marx (because he is hard), nor do they seriously want to implement his ideas (also hard, and never successfully done, you can complain all you want about me pulling out the "not real communism" card, but the Soviet Union and China very clearly still engaged in capitalistic commodity production, which Marx would have criticized).
nomenym
14hr ago
When people talk about tribalism, they're usually only talking about the psychology of inter-tribal competition. The failure mode is xenophobia, and it codes masculine. But when our ancestors started to live in tribes, they also developed a psychology for intra-tribal competition. This is also a kind of tribalism, but it is usually ignored. It's failure mode is oikophobia, and it seems to code more feminine.
The types of people who join geen parties and such seem to excel at the intra-tribal competition. They tend to thrive in institutions, especially when there are few outside threats to their society (which they tend to not recognize and ignore). They join factions that push against or subvert the existing hierarchy, often surreptitiously. But whe they become surrounded by people just like them, their inherent oikophobia kicks in and they start to push against and subvert their own faction and start the cycle all over again. I think it's like a evolved social strategy that is now firing in an evolutionarily novel habitat, and it tends to create a lot of dysfunction.
Armin
14hr ago
I know that maybe is a bit OT here, but I cannot wrap my head, after seeing communists argue on /r/wikipedia (that, as the wiki itself, is full of radical leftists arguing inside) about communism.
When I think how Marxism was gladly embraced by èlites in the West, and, after the fall of the URSS, the more anglocentric progressive one that took his side, it makes me think about the type of people that embrace it.
As Zagrebbi argue here https://salafisommelier.substack.com/p/a-robin-hanson-perspective-on-the Marxism is really the Platonic Realm of wordcellery!
All arguments, apart from being factually false, are reduced not on "policy" or "government", but on words, and how to define words, how to use words in a different manner, how words can be used in different ways, how different ideologies are different because "words" says so. A typical argument goes like this: "Communism is good because, unlike Fascism or whatever else, has a good objective. The objective is good because Communism say so. Different types of Communism are born from different interpretation of Communism, who are not all good (choose here if we are talking about Stalin, Social Democracy, Left Liberalism, Anarchism, Maoism etc) because they did not adhere to the ideal definition of Communism, and everyone who does not produce a good result has secretly bad objectives or it was a Fascist all along"
Obviously I am paraphrasing an hypotetical argument of an hypotetical communist, so I am really fighting against a non-entity here. But I saw enough debates that I could crystallise it in few phrases, and understand that the marxist galaxy today has been reduced to discussions about hypoteticals and fandoms, as if it was Fanfiction.net or Archive of Our Own. Gone are the immense volumes of marxist economy or revolutionary action, in autistic dissertation on good end evil. Or maybe not, and I do not have enough knowledge of historical marxist politics, maybe they were like this all along, but I refuse to believe that communists won for decades using this kind of reasoning.
It is not surprising why Wokism had an evolutionary advantage on post-URSS marxism. All of this autism is pretty ick, it works on Reddit but not on real life, because every normal person can smell with a bullshit detector that this lines are actively trying to scam you as a North African reseller on an Italian beach. Wokism is better as an ideology because it refuses, partially, to play words. Patriarchy and Europeans are not evil because machiavellian people have tried to derail the progressive project, and our objective is to clean it arguing that, no, whoever did something bad was actively trying to sabotage the Real Meaning of Patriarchy. No, they are evil because of biology/social constructs and they deserve suffering. Autistic screeching and wordcelism do not play well with modern political coalition and the Schmittian Friend/Enemy distinction, and they also makes the women have the ick and the supporters smells like Redditors!
ABigGuy4U
14hr ago
I don’t know how you can observe the last 3 years of war and think Russia would roll over a NATO country
Most NATO countries are geographically smaller and less well well equipped than Ukraine, and have fewer troops.
TowardsPanna
14hr ago
Early-game civ is easily 10x as fun for me.
I agree. Everything has got higher stakes in the early game. Things that later seem like insignificant motions to go through, like securing a new unique luxury or defending/taking a city, or getting a trade route going to boost your growth, are very fun in the early game. Because it matters and because the future of your civ is uncertain and at risk.
I think you can use mods to help with this though - sort of. You can cap the tech at a certain age, or cut the build times by half or more, which effectively makes the early game last longer if you play at a slower game pace. Here's one such mod: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=664327211
Now you can e.g. conquer the world long before the modern era.
I'll take his slot, if the game is still running.
This is why I feel like environmentalist parties are not serious. Every single one inevitably ends up falling victim to the SJW, and care more about those issues than things like the environment. These days hear them all saying "climate justice" because more important than climate change itself is how it affects minorities and lgbt. I'd imagine if the roles were switched and whitey lived in the hardest hit areas, the SJW would be sneering with glee at their misfortune.
I actually wonder if the advent of electric cars and cheap solar will spur the development of an environmentalist faction of the right wing. Since the cost of pumping guzzoline into their monster trucks is the most salient reason why normies despise decarbonization efforts.
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
14hr ago
Or, there never was any national security threat from TikTok, the ban was just classic bipartisanship in the "evil and stupid" sense, and Trump keeps kicking the ball down the road because he thinks doing so gives him some leverage in trade negotiations.
Lizzardspawn
14hr ago
Come to the black sea resorts and try to figure out who is who.
Skulldrinker
14hr ago
I had to stop reading Stross too, quality fell off.
JarJarJedi
14hr ago
You have a dangerous line of thought.
Thank you, I guess? Usually the ideas that can be endangered by thinking aren't the worthy ones.
You're almost downplaying the problem of police brutality and similar abuses of power.
I didn't "downplay" anything, I didn't discuss this topic at all. I think you are projecting some kind of bias on me which is not related to what I have said.
Predators seek out vulnerability in the victim and the opportunity to get away with the crime
Not sure what you mean here.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
15hr ago
The second is a general distrust of the profit motive. Several of my (mostly male) friends who are much more successful than me (managing-your-own-company or high-tier BigCorp middle-manager successful) have had more than enough personal experience of engaging in what they perceive as anti-social behaviour just to keep their company/section afloat
I've seen a lot of this too. It's pretty simply a lack of awareness about the last 50+ years of the political-economics of employment law and state regulation. I've written about this before.
The champagne liberals who engage with the "capitalism - but nice!" fantasy fail to see that many of the market dislocations that result in a race to the anti-social bottom have been created by well-intentioned but economically illiterate federal and state policy. "The road to hell..." and all that.
One of the more effective coups of the left has been to make the term "deregulation" associated with Enron and Lehmann Brothers scale fiascos in the popular conscious. When, in reality, deregulation means more, cheaper, and better houses in the places that need them most. Or, as my self-linked comment outlines, a much lower friction coefficient in hiring. Or making it possible to cut women's hair without demonstrating you can shave a man with a straight razor. (I'll admit that the "licensing to become a barber" meme is a but of a trope at this point.)
But change is scary and real meritocracy might mean you aren't quite as sharp as you think you are. Credentialism is the soft mattress of the careerist - so long as they/them have the right master's degree from the right university, they can probably secure a coastal sinecure for between $150,000 - $250,000 depending on level of technical rigor and direct connection to revenue generation. These people who want "capitalism - but nice!" sure are excited about changing the marketplace, so long as their jobs aren't effected. "No, you see, I am an enabler for my team. I remove obstacles for them so they can do the really cool work! I'm just so thankful I get to be around such amazing people," says the functionary who will later fire one of their staff for being a "bad culture fit."
When you throw in a disproportionate fixation on egalitarianism, it gets even worse. That's trading both sides of the distribution curve for the fat middle and stasis. If we deregulated at scale, yes, there would be even more giga-billionaries. But the wage floor for those who can simply work full time would shoot up as well. Those who would suffer? That sliver between about 80 - 90th percentile who are the poster children for bullshit jobs; HR managers, compliance (literally a regulation created job), some level of accounting, lots of legal-ish jobs, tons and tons of "report A into slot b" information processing jobs. And that's the sliver that contains enough people with enough extra time and extra income that their votes and organizing matter. And that's the sliver that, over the last 50 years, has zoomed to the left.
I'm not anywhere near the 'sperg level of Elon to say whatever he said about compassion being the worst virtue ever. In fact, as an LARPing practicing Catholic, I try to live virtues like that daily. But I do it of my own accord in my private life. I am against trying to turn personal, emotional relationships with virtue and metaphysical ethics into a political platform or party. Because, if you do that, you give yourself license to ruin a whole lot of materially important policy.
magicalkittycat
15hr ago
The US refuses to even take on the national security threat propagandizing our children despite a literal ban passed on the books because we're too scared to actually enforce it. Either we're cowards or the Chinese propaganda is so powerful and entrenched that the security threat is even greater than we realized (and thus all the more reason we need to ban it now). And yet we aren't.
The only shows of military strength are bombing nations like Iran which are basically toddlers compared to China, when we're up against another adult we can't even do a fraction of what they do without backing down.
We have lost, we will not make any sacrifice even as they brainwash our youth. We will not stand up to them in a literal war either in the region.
magicalkittycat
15hr ago
but it’s a rather different situation than South Korea or Taiwan.
Taiwan is ethnic Chinese who literally speak the same language, and lots of Taiwanese celebrities and people visit China on vacation/tours/etc. They're arguably more linked to our adversaries.
In Ukraine, we helped the anti-Russia faction gain power in 2014. Taiwan and South Korea have been die-hard against Chinese rule for generations
Nice so in 2014 we got strong allies in the region, and now because of two weak and cowardly presidents in a row we might lose it. I guess the days of America growing more powerful and influential is behind us.
Tenaz
15hr ago
I find the entire arc of a game of Civ fun, and while the late game isn't quite as good as the early game, it's still really fun to me.
Which one do you play? I find the late game of 6 to be quite a drag, and 5 isn't much better. Early-game civ is easily 10x as fun for me.
Chrisprattalpharaptr
Ave Imperaptor
15hr ago
There's a (likely just-so) hypothesis they teach you in undergrad biochemistry, or at least there was many years ago. The first enzyme in the catabolism of glucose, phosphofructokinase, is thought to be a key regulatory step in the pathway - as downstream products build up, flux through the glycolytic pathway is decreased. Fructose has a parallel catabolic pathway that bypasses this regulatory step and thus keeps churning and is more likely to stimulate de novo lipogenesis in the liver (aka getting fat).
I'm not sure how much stock I'd put in this, or how it interacts with CICO. But I think this hypothesis trickles down in an increasingly garbled form to the public and may be a large part of the hostility towards HFCS.
The_Golem101
15hr ago
Remember these aren't civilian towns anymore, they're warzones, you're supplying soldiers in an area with enough water to survive, alongside food, ammunition, entrenching equipment etc, and taking fresh men in and the wounded etc back. If Russia could stop every truck into a given area, they would control it and quickly occupy it, it's not defensible, same for Ukraine the other way around, their effective actions around Izium mostly involved Russian units panicking as their supply lines were close to being closed and they ran for it.
For a town close to the front you use trucks, for one on the front you use MRAPs and APC/IFVs, for a fighting position on the edge of town you use runners through your trenches, but again interdiction means that you are degrading but not stopping this, which might largely happen at night, under fog etc. It's absolutely not the case that Russia can stop anything like all deliveries even to these contested areas, but it be high cost for the Ukrainians, forcing them back in the end. Here's a video (that's certainly wrong in bits, but gives you an idea) that covers one of these key town sieges: https://youtube.com/watch?v=igFrblANpQk .
Almost none of the civilian infrastructure is working, these places are wrecked, and the utility pipes are shredded. Meanwhile, Russia is trying to degrade utilities to big cities, but they can be repaired, there's some redundancy and defended by AA assets etc. If your assumption as to why Russia is moving too slowly is that they're being far too soft, that almost certainly isn't the case.
HereAndGone
15hr ago
Reading the linked Guardian story, here's a line about the Morning Call paper which broke the story and was getting fed all the heart-rending details from the family:
They noted the purported family ceased responding to their requests for clarification on Monday, and they couldn’t verify details in Guatemala.
Well, I'm sure the heart-broken family will get right back to them any day now in order to clarify what is going on!
zeke5123a
16hr ago
Ever hear of the story of the boy who cried wolf? I don’t think even Garak can salvage this one.
zeke5123a
16hr ago
And now it turns out the guy died in Chile in 2019.
Honestly if you hate the west so much why are you living in the west?
Edit: didn’t realize the OP was banned. Didn’t mean to challenge someone who couldnt respond.
Lazuli
16hr ago
I'm not a fan of deckbuilders, either, but Balatro makes the process accessible and fun. If anything, you could focus on the roguelike angle of getting to the end game.
faceh
16hr ago
I'm playing around with the idea of them basically becoming a semi-colonized nation where they sign various deals for access to their resources with enough countries, and have enough 'foreign' infrastructure built up in certain areas of their territory, (ideally nearer the Russian border) that there's now broader interest in maintaining their independence.
This would also grant more interest in providing foreign investment to rebuild. Unfortunately I probably underestimate Russia's motivation to crash such a party.
Not at all. Ukraine was still pretty divided internally between vehemently anti-Russia and pro-Russia factions, with lots of less dedicated people in the middle. It was conceivable that the pro-Russia faction could have gained the upper hand again eventually.
I think what is novel after 2014 is that US war material starts moving into the country. So maybe the pro-Russia faction would have been forcibly suppressed if it looked like they were going to win another election. But it would have been messy
Personally, I think it served US interests just fine to leave Ukraine as a border state. The war has been very costly in men and treasure, and the US seemed to be in the driver's seat in starting it.
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