domain:alethios.substack.com
naraburns
nihil supernum
9hr ago
I wish that was hyperbole. I wish I was exaggerating. That is literally what they think, and any pushback will get you banned fairly quickly.
To apply some boardgaming lingo, here, this strikes me as a good example of how the American culture wars are being waged asymmetrically. (As is so often the case, Scott Alexander noticed years ago.) Although I don't actually know of any, I'm sure there are places on the Internet where (say) criticism of Donald Trump will get you banned--but they are explicitly "right wing" spaces. Whereas places you might naturally suspect to be politically neutral--hobby websites, for example!--are routinely very much not. BoardGameGeek and NexusMods are the two hobby sites that I know technically "ban" politics, but apply that ban selectively in exactly the way "Conservative Versus Neutral" implies. Reddit has a site-wide rule against calls for violence and often bans accounts for using certain right-coded no-no words, but I don't think a day goes by that I don't see at least one comment calling for the literal extermination of Trump voters, conservatives, etc. Is that nut-picking? Maybe! But if so, there are an awful lot of nuts to pick, and no one in my outgroup suggesting they chill. (And probably some of those posters are AI/actual Chinese psyops, but still.)
Having Trump in office hasn't really changed this, though it has perhaps limited some of the more egregious examples in the federal bureaucracy, higher education, and corporate world. The "alt right" inverts left wing identitarianism and adopts some of its methods, but they don't noticeably control a bunch of putatively "neutral" spaces. Politics moves in cycles, and eventually the Republicans will be the minority party again. If Sweeney and CGE is what we get when Republicans have control of the federal government, what can we expect when that changes? I do not think "a cooling off of the culture wars" is on the Democratic agenda!
I think a lot of it comes down to people living lives with so little that's "real" in it, so little family, friends or genuine romantic loving relationships, that the comparison isn't between an illusion and real, but an illusion and nothing.
A long time ago, I read some article talking about people who found romance on Compuserve. And if you aren't as old as me, I can barely explain it. Everything I want to compare it to is also long gone, like AOL. But it was basically one of the earliest proto-internet services, with some messaging and chatrooms. I think it was even before the World Wide Web. So people would meet on there. Wives would leave their husbands, move across the country to see this guy they'd only ever spoken to over proto-email. And then it wouldn't work out. The relationship was different when it wasn't mediated by a screen.
Something strange has happened since then. People now spend more time on screens than off them, and all relationships seem to be mediated by screens. It's almost as if relationships on screens have taken primacy over relationships in real life. If you meet someone online and go to see them and it's weird, there is no longer any need to deal with it. You can sit on the couch side by side on your phones and keep having your relationship through your screen. You might even still fuck! Though I increasingly doubt it.
In this context where reality has become subordinate to the screen, it's no wonder people no longer have a sense for what's real or what's illusion.
aldomilyar
9hr ago
I've always felt asses are more fundamentally meritocratic than breasts for similar reasons, though the whole 'gigantic asses' thing kinda circled back the other way.
aldomilyar
9hr ago
I'm currently parenting my kids in first world Asia (which is a way better deal especially for child-rearing), partly due to my parents being in my home country's equivalent of Florida and therefore being of limited help during childrearing. So chicken and the egg I guess
Corvos
9hr ago
Right? And from the sound of your other messages it sounds like you’re ready to take on Stormveil.
Good hunting!
AvocadoPanic
9hr ago
No relatives really. I am only child, both my parents have passed. I'm the youngest of my cousins, and they're all 3000 miles away. Only one of my cousins would really be able / competent to help. My wife's mother and brother are in Germany. Their relationship is odd / tense.
The mother and brother are in the same Regierungsbezirk and don't see eachother that often. We traveled to Germany late last fall. We were there for 3 weeks. It was the first time she met 3 of her grandchildren and her only granddaughter and the first time she'd seen our oldest in 10 years. We saw her twice. The brother and his family we saw 4 or 5 times though 2 of those were with their mother and 2 were activity outings with the children.
We're active in our local church. I've shared all of this with the pastor and his wife. They've been incredibly supportive. I shared this yesterday with my 'work wife' he was shocked but very supportive. I've a good group of friends in my men's bible study group. I've not shared any of this with them. I feel if I were to they would be supportive but I also feel it would make church uncomfortable for my wife.
WhiningCoil
Ghost of Quokka's Future
10hr ago
Ah the BPD girlfriend. I'm not sure we've all been there, but I remember my turn. Two even! And it does seem to permanently fuck your scale for what a satisfying relationship can be. Leaves you chasing the highs they gave you, without the catastrophic swallow a gun barrel lows they'd inflict with their boundless histrionics.
The thing you need to keep in mind with BPD's is that none of it is real. There are only barely people in there. It's all for effect. They might as well be LLMs, making whatever mouth sounds (even with your dick in it) are required to get what they want from you. Be it attention, money or security.
It was off putting for my wife, when I first met her, to hear from my friends that my ex's were crazy. I think every woman is afraid of being pigeon holed as being "crazy". Sometimes she feels a little crazy, in that way I think most women struggle with the instability of their own emotions and the tides of hormones that batter them. And I'd tell her, back when this used to come up, "You don't understand, they were crazy". I'd tell her about the time one came at me with a knife because I was playing a violent video game with her in my apartment. Or the time one secretly started moving in, established residency, and then refused to leave when we broke up. Or the time one had a whole backup boyfriend primed and ready for her to dump her pets and her lease on, moved down south and then married a 3rd guy.
I guess my point is, detoxing from BPD highs is just like coming off any other drug. I do hope one day you can settle for "Stable but boring". Because you're entire concept of "boring" has likely been utterly destroyed. You're unlikely to find a normal girl willing to fuck you and flatter you the way she would when she was trying to pull you back in.
Then again, I mentioned BPD's are like LLMs, and once again it's thoughtless AI which brought all this up with imagined offspring in the first place. I'm not sure what the cure for illusions are. Weirdly enough, I've found 40K bullshit not terribly off the mark.
My armor is contempt. My shield is disgust. My sword is hatred.
anti_dan
10hr ago
This is actually a major problem I have with Hanania. Wokes are not the Japanese holding out in 1960, they are (strategically not morally) much more like the US as MacArthur fled the Philippines. "I shall return" wasn't just a promise, it was a threat and prediction based on the reality of America's industrial might and determination. Woke has no such iconic statement and figure yet, but they do have the cultural equivalent of the 1940s American industry, that being the media, schools, civil services, NGOs, etc. This is why Hanania's "woke right" project has always been very stupid.
Mantergeistmann
10hr ago
I'm just so profoundly exhausted by it all. Why do these people have to make it so fucking hard to just enjoy things?
I've seen it described as gang tags, basically: if you can tag (or in this case, say) "Sharks Suck!" and make it clear it's a hostile environment to anyone saying "Jets Suck" or "Sharks Rule", well, it's demonstrably your space now.
VoxelVexillologist
Multidimensional Radical Centrist
10hr ago
One question would be whether American Eagle actually considers this press coverage a negative. Edgy ads that fill opinion pages are hardly unheard of. But is it actually selling jeans?
VoxelVexillologist
Multidimensional Radical Centrist
10hr ago
This seems true, but it seems a bit funny to me because in many ways it's easier to change your figure (via diet and exercise) than your face (beyond haircuts and grooming). The human figure is a very functional thing that conforms to what you do with it.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
10hr ago
I am not a Palestinian negotiator and do not have a peace solution worked out.
I am however confident that RPing as the Waffen SS is not the way to go.
MadMonzer
Pedo! Pedo! Pedo! Out! Out! Out!
10hr ago
The point is that whatever the mechanism is, it is affecting 1st-world Asia worse than the West, so it isn't something primarily Western like the decline in extended families.
MadMonzer
Pedo! Pedo! Pedo! Out! Out! Out!
10hr ago
I had a manic pixie dream girl; the dream had too much nightmare in it. Some lives feel like literature. Literature is bad for your eyes. Ask me how I know, or don't, because I just laid my still bitter heart bare before you.
(In exchange, please tell me something useful about places to visit in London today. I was eyeing the Camden Fringe, but not sure if it's worth the hassle)
I'm assuming you have long-since exhausted the standard tourist trail.
My favourite trips in the London suburbs are, in no particular order:
- Hampton Court
- Royal Greenwich (Observatory, Cutty Sark, Painted Hall)
- Richmond riverside and Park
The best small museums you might not know about are Sir John Soane's museum, the Cortauld Institute gallery in Somerset House, and the Handel/Hendrix museum.
think that part of the backlash is simply because a lot of people started out primed with a disdain for Sweeney, mainly because of the perception that her popularity is driven purely by her looks, namely her curves
The backlash is because she was in proximity to something Republican - a MAGA-themed party for her family - while looking like the stereotypical hot blonde and playing into it.
There's a similar thing where there's a sort of lurking contempt for Chris Pratt a) being overexposed and b) the church he goes to and his mere silence on progressive issues. The fact that the attempted canceling of him failed when his costars circled the wagons makes it worse: a certain sort of person becomes even angrier in this situation. So the whole thing never goes away. They just...wait for the next thing.
This might sound a bit crazy. That's because it is strange, odd behavior. Nothing is new about this of course. The internet is full of such people (one could argue their labour keep parts of it running). Anyone who's modded can tell you about that crazy person that just can't let go of the bit between their teeth. They become incensed that X is wrong online, they make endless sockpuppets, they lie in wait, they make all sorts of tendentious claims as a way to attack people. Left to their own devices, even just a few can change the culture of a place. I suspect they get off on that too: forcing everyone to be hyper-vigilant around whatever they've decided is their issue today. The main difference is that the media and the masses of right-thinking "allies" don't encourage the ones you run into on random forums, unless it serves some interest of theirs.
COVID was a halcyon age for such people and they don't want it to be over.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
10hr ago
Of course, it’s your call whether you trust a word I’m saying. I don’t blame you if not.
Nah, I trust you alright. It's my anecdotes against yours, which means we probably just saw largely different movies on mostly different screens. And as for the overlap, you may well be right. I'll think about it.
FiveHourMarathon
Wawa Nationalist
10hr ago
Who knows, but old heads still talk about them so they must have worked.
Southkraut
The rain fell gentlier.
10hr ago
It's probably a downward spiral. Parenting and grandparenting are becoming less rewarding in part because of low fertility, and so fewer people are prepared to make that investment, which further drives down fertility. Or so I might speculate.
Amadan
Enjoying my short-lived victory
10hr ago
I'm a boardgamer and have to sit on my hands every time this comes up in /r/boardgames or boardgamegeek, because there is basically no tolerance allowed for any dissent. JK Rowling is a transphobic genocidal Jew-hating racist fascist and buying HP content is the equivalent of donating money to fund concentration camps.
I wish that was hyperbole. I wish I was exaggerating. That is literally what they think, and any pushback will get you banned fairly quickly.
benmmurphy
10hr ago
dunkin donuts has also pushed out an advertisement in the same style: https://youtube.com/watch?v=OW7FytdloWU I wonder if this was a coincidence. I suspect its quite difficult to get an ad developed in such a short amount of time so the only non-coincidental explanation would be if they had something already cooking and then just tweaked it slightly to make it more triggering.
kky
10hr ago
I mean, the obvious confounder is that the kind of person who gets involved with a serious relationship as soon as able, progresses it aggressively, and takes responsibility for the natural consequences is different from the kind of person who doesn’t. In Rome those people were required to do their military service. Now they aren’t. But I think what’s actually at the heart of what you’re asking of people is not to make different decisions, but to be different people. Failing to recognize that is the source of most unhelpful advice. If a guy who is not really in the mindset of growing up, devoting energy, and so on has a kid, he will find it very unpleasant no matter his age. An older one might enjoy it regardless.
For your points… yep, childcare matters, and I preempted your point on women. The third point seems like a personal problem more than systemic. Happy parents, from what I see, just take it easy. I sympathize with point four similarly to point one (although the younger parents I know seem to spend an awful lot of time working…), and for point 5… I mean, I hate modernity as much as the next guy, but reading through some older memoirs or cultural histories I’m struck from time to time at how familiar the life of the mind can be. If anything is different, it’s a sense of personal responsibility. Those who blame their circumstances on external forces seem to have a hard time with acting, and boy do we have a lot of explanations for external forces these days.
My own experience is a little different from yours. I’ve got one kid, and am around 30, and am very happy with the situation and want more. If there’s anything I regret, it’s that my circumstances are NOT like my (then) 40-year-old father, who was financially better-established than I am and could spend much more time and energy doing cool things with me over working. But I hope to be in a more secure situation some years from now, and at that point, who knows? Could be a pretty comfortable circumstance. On the other hand, if I’m being frank, having a kid at 20 would likely have been a disaster, most importantly for the kid. I’ve changed a lot in the past decade. Would having a kid a couple years earlier than I did have worked? Sure, but there’s definitely a limit there, as far as my own self is concerned. It was only around 25ish that I really started to become the kind of person who could enjoy being a good father.
Of course, it’s your call whether you trust a word I’m saying. I don’t blame you if not.
WhiningCoil
Ghost of Quokka's Future
10hr ago
This one really broke my heart. I'd been pulling away from the boardgame community for years and years at this point. I get maybe one new game a year, I listen to a single board gaming podcast more because I like their banter than anything. I no longer visit any boardgaming website because they are all so overrun with activism. And sadly, that single podcast I listen announced they were severing their relationship with CGE after being sponsored by them over this Harry Potter incident.
I'm just so profoundly exhausted by it all. Why do these people have to make it so fucking hard to just enjoy things?
MadMonzer
Pedo! Pedo! Pedo! Out! Out! Out!
10hr ago
her popularity is driven purely by her looks, namely her curves
This. Both the Red Tribe and the Blue Tribe think that prioritising figure over face is lower-class-coded, or perhaps wog-coded, or perhaps that is a distinction without a difference.
coffee_enjoyer
☕️
10hr ago
you bolded 'against an unarmed population,' which isn't relevant to the statute
The civilians, you mean? As I’ve mentioned in my last few posts now, the claim about a war crime occurring is only about the civilians, who are no threat to the security force. We know this from the context. We also know this from the other article I provided you. The reason not to take a single sentence in isolation is because he is narrating his experiences, not writing a textbook, as I mentioned. The actual context is as follows, given the preceding sentences:
The actions on the sites — escalation of force, no standard operating procedures to dictate that, no rules of engagement provided to the armed contractors on the ground, the indiscriminate use of force, lethal and nonlethal, against unarmed civilians. I want to make that clear. We aren’t there on the distribution sites defending ourselves against Hamas. We are using indiscriminate force, targeting civilians, escalation of force that goes far beyond the measures of appropriate, against an unarmed, starving population.
So, because he’s talking about lethal indiscriminate use of force against civilians, that this would violate intentionally directing attacks against the civilian population as such or against individual civilians not taking part, provided that its conditions are met upon litigation, for which there is additional evidence as well. Does this clarify things? Remember, this is just a transcript of a person talking, so “Why would anyone need that, even if to defend themselves for their defend their lives, against an unarmed population” can be rendered “Why would anyone need that — (even if to defend themselves for their defend their lives?) — against an unarmed population”.
The statute does not say that. It forbids directing any attack whatsoever 'against individual civilians not taking direct part in hostilities.' The fact that attack is performed with a rifle with live bullets is entirely irrelevant
Right; as I mentioned, his complaint is in the use of shooting people with lethal ammunition as faux crowd control. Perhaps you just really hate how he said this. They use live bullets for this. So the bullet matters, relative to rubber bullets; and even the gun they got mattered, because Israel usually uses an even less lethal munition (in the case of their needing to use it), which may show intent. You know how police who want you to leave can use pepper spray, but they can’t immediately shoot you in the head? All of the follow up questions you pose are based on this misunderstanding / misreading.
If I didn't bother to check the cite and replied, 'Oh, wow, and Aguilar says every contractor is using a rifle with live bullets to deal with civilian crowd control! That must be hundreds or maybe thousands of violations of international law right there!' would you have corrected me and clarified the war crime is actually just using those rifles to shoot non-violent civilians? Would you have said, 'Aguilar's remarks were off-the-cuff, you can't take his words at face value?' Or are you just retreating to the motte after I've challenged the bailey?
I care about the substance of relevant points, not nitpicking an isolated sentence in a person’s verbal testimony. I don’t know why you think this guy would be a professional speechwriter or something. I can’t help but feel you’re doing everything you can to obfuscate the points so you can discount his testimony, something you wanted to do as a prior perhaps. You are hung up on one sentence that has an aside in it (indicated by the hyphen), when the very preceding paragraph explains what he means, and when I even linked you with a very easy to digest short video where about the soldiers committing a war crime. As best as I can understand your argument as it relates to the substance of the discussion, it is: “I interpret him as claiming that carrying a specific ammunition type is a war crime. -> therefore his testimony is invalidated”. (Even were this true, it would be very silly, because he’s not a war crimes lawyer).
misreading
I’m accusing you of not understanding basic things, because you replied “I mean, it won't be. Israel hasn't signed on to this statute.” But whether Israel signed on to this statute is literally immaterial as to whether it’s a war crime. It’s not even 0.01% relevant. It’s a war crime if it goes against customary international law. Will you accuse me of not reading your post holistically by hyperfocusing on an isolated sentence?
Especially since this is the infamous ICC which the US and Israel refuse to subject themselves to.
Yeah, this also doesn’t matter. This isn’t how customary international law works.
I'm pretty sure Israel's opinion on this question matters a great deal for whether the trial is ever going to happen
No more than in Nuremberg. If they are found to have violated international customary laws, they can be executed regardless.
Exactly. There's one for the Ford Capri I can't forget about.
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