China censors all literature, film, music, and internet discourse employing advanced technologies and multiple tens of thousands of people while also running the world's largest prison for journalist. VPNs are blocked. Apps like Signal are blocked. Online gaming for minors is limited to 3 hours per day on weekends and holidays only. People get harassed by police for what they post online. Many go to jail for criticizing the government, spreading pornography or health related sexual content (including anything LGBT), supporting Taiwanese independence, or casting doubt on Chinese folk legends. Then, in addition to that (which I have not even begun to do justice to), all media companies run their own internal censorship regimes so as not to get in trouble with the authorities. And this rolls downhill: you the individual self-censor to not get in trouble with your boss or worse.
Shacktastic
That's the logic of a witch hunt. I mean, obviously there are behaviors so suspicious you'd feel almost complicit not to report them. But a lot of the times all we have are the subtle impressions built up by our unconscious brain and it's not until the answer is shown that it all clicks into place and what once was hidden is now so obvious.
I can't boycott Tesla because of Musk because their reputation for poor build quality and horrific servicing means I wouldn't even consider them to begin with. That and I want my control stalks.
This. I cannot conceive of a world where everyone peacefully coexists and nobody uses violence to extract advantage (or revenge) from others. That's fantasy. A warlord will always arise and in time such authority legitimizes and becomes a state. The best we can do is to democratize that authority and spread power around as widely as possible.
But that is funny. Granted, I go for deadpan and maybe Lemmy isn't into satire, but it's worth at least a smirk.
Pretty hard to avoid the drawer. Maybe find a new home for that scale (maybe sideways in a deep drawer?), throw a few rarely used tools into a ziploc bag, and introduce a caddy or two to corral the small stuff.
Photographic art is drowned in a world of snapshots. That which we obtain too cheaply we esteem too lightly. Of course, there are a lot of awesome upsides and people can still do photography as a hobby, but there's a real "you can't go home again" feeling. You probably would have had to been into the hobby prior to the smartphone to appreciate the loss.
Yes., absolutely. The post-WW2 world order was led and architectured by the US. Think of the Marshal plan, Breton Woods, NATO, the UN, the space race and cold war, and the huge impact of the US Navy providing global security for oceanic trade.
Shoot... US imperialism is soft-serve ice cream compared to the empires of history. Those military bases by and large extend the American security umbrella to protect the host country, not to put its population to the colonial boot and extract wealth. Yeah they sort of have to tow the line on US foreign policy, but it's a far cry from, say, the Boer enslaving natives in South Africa or Alexander the great wiping out populations who defied him.
The US has a long laundry list of dirty deeds, but overall the US "empire" has led to the longest and wealthiest period of global peace and scientific/technical/social advancement in the history of humankind. That doesn't excuse anything but neither is it particularly useful to condition our allegiances on utopian absolutes of moral purities. When we do, evil wins (e.g., see recent election where 10M Democratic voters stayed home).
Metal detector enthusiast who found a hard drive in the landfill 12 years ago:
"Yeah, I should get around to seeing what's on that."