Hegseth is a cartoon villain that shouldn’t be anywhere near a position of power

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has reposted and praised a video interview of a self-described Christian nationalist pastor whose church doesn’t believe women should be allowed to vote.

Just an utter scumbag.

I used to try to explain to management that some debt is high interest.

One of the guys at my old job submitted a PR with tests that basically just mocked everything, tested nothing. Like,

with patch("something.whatever", return_value=True):
  assert whatever(0) is True
  assert whatever(1) is True

Except for a few dozen lines, with names that made it look like they were doing useful.

He used AI to generate them, of course. Pretty useless.

then it would force them to actually confront the morality of themselves eating meat.

For many people, “I am a good person” is a core belief. An emotionally strong person may be able to look at a challenge to their core beliefs, assess its validity, and adjust. Most people are not emotionally strong. They see this thing like vegetarianism as an attack on their core self. And since they are not emotionally sound people, they lash out or make excuses. That’s easier than accepting maybe they’re not flawless paragons of virtue.

The oatmeal did a comic about this: https://theoatmeal.com/comics/believe

D&D webcomic “the order of the stick” also did a comic that touches on it. One of the characters says that people like this, who refuse to look in the mirror and honestly assess maybe they’ve done something bad, are cowards. https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1151.html

And honestly that’s kind of it. People are scared, and scared people are stupid. The big “i eat nothing but MEAT” people are probably, contrary to their posturing, cowards. Worse than children, because they’ll probably never grow up.

People are emotionally invested in eating meat and it’s stupid.

Neat. Now if we could get some protected bike lanes. I’m too afraid to ride a bike here other than a handful of routes.

Conservatives say stuff for effects, not for truth or consistency. They are not honest people arguing in good faith.

They’ll say “states rights” when that benefits them and "federal supremacy " when that benefits them. They are not good people.

The followers must feel humiliated by the ostentatious wealth and force of their enemies. When I was a boy I was taught to think of Englishmen as the five-meal people. They ate more frequently than the poor but sober Italians. Jews are rich and help each other through a secret web of mutual assistance. However, the followers must be convinced that they can overwhelm the enemies. Thus, by a continuous shifting of rhetorical focus, the enemies are at the same time too strong and too weak.

https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/umberto-eco-ur-fascism

Eco 's essay on Ur-Fascism is worth reading

As we see more examples of our institutions giving bad, cruel, and nonsensical outcomes, support for violent responses like Luigi will grow. I think a lot of the people involved in perpetuating injustice don’t even see themselves as bad people. Some corrupt prosecutor that knowingly sent innocent people to jail could be bleeding out on the sidewalk at the feet of their past victims, and they’d be like “what did i ever do to deserve this??”

It does depend on the size of the company. If it’s a small business, it may have no leeway occasionally, and you may need to time your PTO.

Really? Really though? Because unless I’m a part owner with a substantial stake, fuck all the way off with that boot licking nonsense. Capital is not your friend. They are not your family. A small business is at best like a cute little bear cub, that will maul you to death without a moment’s remorse when it is bigger.

It’s upsetting that people can be colossally stupid and factually incorrect and face no meaningful consequences. Like, who is the OP? Why are they just walking around without a warning sign that says like “This person is stupid”?

One of the many things that’s infuriating about this is that these people are so profoundly stupid, but they keep getting all the money and power. If there was any justice in the world, people like the decision makers in your stories would be living a very spartan life somewhere, reflecting on how they are so fucking senseless.

And yet people continue to worship these “job creators” and “visionaries”.

Why do we even have laws if they’re not going to protect people from abuse? Shit like this is why people cheer for Luigi. People are just trying to get the basics - health care, shelter, food - and the rich are taking too much.

It doesn’t feel like there’s any class solidarity in the US except between the very rich.

Find people that want to play, there’s more than you can think.

Something I learned a long time ago is it’s easier to find people who want to play D&D (or whatever game) and make friends with them than it is to make your friends play D&D.

There’s probably a nicer way to put this, but frankly most people are a fucking mess. And who can blame them? This is a capitalist hellscape. But that means if you’re semi randomly selecting people, you’re going to get a lot of people who are barely holding on, and won’t make fantasy elf time a priority… Some of them might sincerely want to play, and overestimate their energy levels. Other people are terrified of confrontation, and will say yes even when they absolutely do not want to do that.

But if you go the other way around, and find folks that seem friendly at a meetup or whatever for RPGs, they’re more likely to show up. They already put in effort and showed up somewhere.

I don’t think “mental healthcare” is a silver bullet (pun intended) to fix the problems. That’s not going to fix the consolidation of power and wealth. That’s not going to get people shorter work weeks, and more quality time with friends and family. That’s not going to break up the media megaliths that profit from anger inducing feeds.

Health care will help, but the problem is conservatism and it’s shitty brother capitalism.

I think two of the somewhat fancier grocery stores I go to have grinders there. The more basic one I usually go to I don’t think does. I don’t drink coffee myself, so I’m not 100% certain.

This doesn’t seem like something that benefits the majority of people.

If it was like “here’s free (or at least legitimately cheap) access to some virtual actors. Go make the movie of your dreams, kids!” maybe that would be cool. Maybe there are people out there with brilliant ideas that are blocked by not having real actors to act for them. Maybe.

But this just seems like another way for the rich to keep more wealth for themselves.

No. Person sounds like an idiot

People are emotionally invested in meat and that often shuts down any conversation