Randomness thread, part two.

[OngBonga]

Oh and Ireland. Sorry Ireland, I just assumed it was the UK.

[MadMojoMonkey]

I've been playing since i was 7.

Segovia, Pepe Romero and Pacu de Lucia are my favourites.

Oh hey! I didn't know.

I have 2 guitars, and the only one I've played in the past 10 years is my Classical Ovation.
I play my bass more than either, though.

[Poopadoop]

Oh hey! I didn't know.

I have 2 guitars, and the only one I've played in the past 10 years is my Classical Ovation.
I play my bass more than either, though.

Well well.

I have a Yamaha G-235S, which is the same one I've had for about 40 years. My parents paid $300 for it back then. Still works.

http://yahoobuckaroo.blogspot.com/20...al-guitar.html

Don't know much about guitars, to be honest. Is the Ovation good?

[MadMojoMonkey]

This is not my guitar, but it looks like mine, minus the decades of wear and tear.



It's not the best, anymore. I'm guessing this was made in the early-mid 70's, based on looks. It was my dad's old guitar.
It has pretty nasty cracking in the face plate behind the bridge, which has thrown the intonation off.

I also dropped it on the headstock when I was like 17, and part of it chipped off, but I don't think that has affected the sound at all.

In general, I love the sound of Ovations. If you have the chance to pick one up to play around with in a guitar store, definitely do it. Even if it's a steel string. They sound great. I've had a few experiences where I'm at an outdoor event and the tone of a guitar hits me before I see it, and I'm like... what is that guitar? It sounds great! Oh... it's an Ovation.

[oskar]

Do you use the TAB thing where it tells you where to put which finger, or just try to copy what you're looking at/copy it by ear?

Most of the songs I learn are simple enough to learn by ear. For chord melody arrangements I think Ted Greene notation is the most convenient.

[oskar]

Wuf, the movement is waiting for you to join!

https://twitter.com/JoshuaPotash/sta...961146369?s=20

[CoccoBill]

On topic:

On Survivor and Big Brother US only on one occasion each a contestant has tried to offer a split of their winnings as a bargaining tool. On both occasions these parts were not aired.

[MadMojoMonkey]

On topic:

On Survivor and Big Brother US only on one occasion each a contestant has tried to offer a split of their winnings as a bargaining tool. On both occasions these parts were not aired.

Interesting. I was wondering about that the other day.
I've only ever watched Survivor, not Big Brother.

Seems like if you can strike a deal with your alliance to split the winnings, that would promote a unity that would be hard to break. Doesn't even have to be an even split. The actual winner of the season can take a larger portion, but the others who remain loyal get a cut, too.
It certainly makes sense to me, given the winner-take-all payout structure.


Out of curiosity, do you know any more details about the Survivor deal? Like what season / who was involved / did any of them win / if so, did they actually go through with the deal?

There are a couple pointed examples of people making big deals on Survivor, then not following through when it came time to pay up on the deal. Like a favor now for a favor later, and the later favor didn't happen because the person who received the first favor changed their mind after the fact in a way that would only be described as shitty if it wasn't a game based on lies and deception.

[CoccoBill]

I read it on some article, or actually might have been a reddit post, can't find anything to verify it now. On Survivor Nicaragua a contestant apparently offered to pay off another player's mortgage for a vote, and on some other season someone may have offered to buy a motorcycle in return for something. That's all I can find now. Apparently all kinds of quid pro quos have been forbidden in the players' contracts at least since 2010. Makes sense that they'd be banned from doing that, it might kill the whole competition and just become a bidding war.

[MadMojoMonkey]

OK. That makes sense. I'd speculated that there may be something in the contract that says as much, but kinda dropped it because it would be about impossible to enforce. If players can ever get a chance to speak with each other off camera, then they could secretly make an agreement. The show could be over and the money split before the producers could find out about the agreement.


I know there was one season back when the show awarded a car as a reward for one of the challenges. The guy who won the car offered it to another player in exchange for a very particular favor.
If both of them were still in the game at final 4, AND IF the player who received the car won the immunity challenge at final 4, then he would give up his immunity to the guy who gave him the car.
Then that seemingly unlikely event happened, and the guy who accepted the car did not give his immunity to the other guy.
Ultimately, the guy who gave the car apologized for putting the other guy in such a difficult spot... class act, IMO.

[Poopadoop]

https://twitter.com/aybarlyy/status/1273725231140442113

What's wrong with some people? You get to call them Fuck Boy all the time; it's a golden opportunity!

[OngBonga]

Phucking hell that's phunny.

[OngBonga]

I couldn't stop myself...

Also the name Matthew Hubbard means bitch ass racist motherfucker

Excuse me, my name is Matthew and I take this as an insult, you're basically saying my name means "bitch ass". Please be more respectful.

[Poopadoop]

It's so dumb that the immediate reaction is to escalate the whole thing and make it out like it's a racist hate crime. It's not. It's stupid and insensitive but it's not like he's telling you you have to change your name or something bad will happen to you. It's just some ignorant guy being ignorant. I don't get why some people have to lose their shit over things like that. Get a fucking life.

[Poopadoop]

This, on the other hand, is a racist douche being a racist douche. I'm glad he got the sack.

https://twitter.com/t_fishhh/status/1273815213696057344

The best part of this is how he tries to be all 'oops, sorry' about it afterwards, like pretending it was an accident. Haha dude there's no coming back from that.

[OngBonga]

Yeah I don't think that guy is racist, but it doesn't hurt to pull the girl to one side and quietly ask her "How do you pronounce your name?". She might appreciate the gesture enough to have a good laugh about how it sounds if mispronounced phonetically.

That said, people are so fucking quick to be outraged, and it's cost this guy his job. The timing was awful.

Fuck the second guy, he clearly deserves the sack.

[Poopadoop]

Yeah I don't think that guy is racist, but it doesn't hurt to pull the girl to one side and quietly ask her "How do you pronounce your name?". She might appreciate the gesture enough to have a good laugh about how it sounds if mispronounced phonetically.

That said, people are so fucking quick to be outraged, and it's cost this guy his job. The timing was awful.

Yeah I mean the first email he is just asking her nicely to anglicize her name. Not something I would do but whatever.

Then she gets all pissy and he seems to be decide 'well fuck you then' and doubles down, instead of just saying 'sorry I didn't mean to offend you Phuc Bui, it's all good.'

[OngBonga]

I did laugh at this "eat a dick" comment, highly insensitive but extremely amusing.

In other news, #BritishLivesMatter is trending on Twitter because tons of people are triggered by the hashtag. It's hilarious. Lots and lots of people saying "why is #BritishLivesMatter trending?". Idiots.

[OngBonga]

I'm currently buying Chris Lilley's back catalog, before he gets deleted from history.

He got cancelled mostly for this...

[MadMojoMonkey]

https://www.oceanvoyagesinstitute.org/


IDK what they're going to do with all the trash, but getting it out of the ocean seems like a good first step.

[Poopadoop]

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/t...box=1594551993

If this is what I think it is, it's a story about a woman transitioning to a man, deciding she'd rather be a woman after all, then transitioning back.

I have a few views on this:

1. Lol. Typical woman can't make up her mind.

2. If there isn't currently a Guinness record for higher number of transitions, I think there should be.

3. In all seriousness, what are we meant to be sensitive to here? I mean, I feel sorry for the person who is that confused, but other than that, is there something I'm supposed to be doing to help? And also, is this a big issue, where someone is being discriminated against for being a back-and-forther? I don't get why this is presented as a touchy feely kind of story where we're meant to do some soul searching about society as opposed to a 'wtf is with this person' story.

[Poopadoop]

Time lapse microphotography of a neuron growing dendrites.

https://twitter.com/LecuitLab/status...91608563814401

[OngBonga]

idk what the fuck is going on with gender identity. Twitter is a cesspit for this kind of thing. JK Rowling says something along the lines of "I love trans people but the rights of women need to be protected" and the hate mob descend upon her as though she just killed a baby. People think this kind of thinking is literally dangerous because someone who feels upset about it might jump off a bridge. They use words like "torture", and call any woman that doesn't agree with their deluded views on gender identity a "TERF", which ironically means trans exclusive RADICAL feminist, as though JKR is the radical one.

This is just like racism. If you don't agree completely with the "woke" crowd, you're a bigot.

[Poopadoop]

There's been something similar going on with Steven Pinker as well recently. Haven't delved into the details, but apparently he said something mildly wrong and now the mob is trying to get him fired from Harvard or MIT or wherever the fuck he is. It's just enough.

[Poopadoop]

My biggest problem with this is although I'm very careful about what I say on social media, and I bite my tongue a lot, I can imagine someday being taken the wrong way and having the argggggh crowd get up in my face much easier than I can imagine seeing some flippant remark and feeling justified in using it to get someone sacked.

[Poopadoop]

That is one agile robot.

https://twitter.com/ValaAfshar/statu...35507110379520

[MadMojoMonkey]

Just let individuals set their own boundaries and respect those boundaries.
There are struggles associated with every human life, and pretending that other people's struggles are the same as yours is almost uniformly incorrect.
Educate yourself to what the reality behind any discrimination claims are and judge for yourself where you stand.
Try not to be a jerk, but if you're a jerk, then apologize and be less of a jerk going forward.

Ignore the idiots and white knight rage junkies and don't worry about their nonsense. Whether or not they're acting in earnest good faith is not a concern. Whether or not you act in earnest good faith is what matters.

[Poopadoop]

Just let individuals set their own boundaries and respect those boundaries.
There are struggles associated with every human life, and pretending that other people's struggles are the same as yours is almost uniformly incorrect.
Educate yourself to what the reality behind any discrimination claims are and judge for yourself where you stand.
Try not to be a jerk, but if you're a jerk, then apologize and be less of a jerk going forward.

Ignore the idiots and white knight rage junkies and don't worry about their nonsense. Whether or not they're acting in earnest good faith is not a concern. Whether or not you act in earnest good faith is what matters.

Sounds good in principle, but in practice anyone in the public eye (even if they're only there because they've been put there by someone else with an iphone) has to walk on eggshells all the time for fear that someone is going to catch them slipping (or even not slipping) and make a federal case of if in front of the whole world.

[OngBonga]

This cancel culture bullshit doesn't inspire me much to find myself a job. On the contrary, it makes me quite happy I haven't got one. Try cancelling me, dickheads.

This is quite serious though, this transgender thing. I mean they're talking about toilets right now, but what they really want is sport. When cismales can turn into women and compete with women in elite sports, then women's sport is dead. Little girls will have no incentive to take sport seriously, because they know they will be outcompeted by "women" who were born with dicks. And if we're going as far as to say that it's purely identity, then a man in a dress can claim to be a woman and shit all over their world records.

And of course, it's very much a problem having a well hung "lady" sharing public showers with teenage girls. Why is the feelings of a trannie more important than the safety of women?

Hounding people for these very understandable concerns does the opposite of help their cause. It makes people more anti-trans. What is happening is doing more harm than good for the rights of transgender people. There's a backlash, and anti-trans discrimination increases.

[oskar]

3. In all seriousness, what are we meant to be sensitive to here? I mean, I feel sorry for the person who is that confused, but other than that, is there something I'm supposed to be doing to help? And also, is this a big issue, where someone is being discriminated against for being a back-and-forther? I don't get why this is presented as a touchy feely kind of story where we're meant to do some soul searching about society as opposed to a 'wtf is with this person' story.

Contrapoints has a pretty insightful video about being a transgender lesbian: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7WvHTl_Q7I

tldw: She has had long periods where she wanted to fit the classic gender role as a woman and felt guilty for being a transgender lesbian. I can imagine that many feel they need to commit to the new gender, feel pressured into surgery, and end up regretting it.

[oskar]

JK Rowling

Would it kill her to just not?

[Poopadoop]

This cancel culture bullshit doesn't inspire me much to find myself a job.

Nothing inspires you to find a job lol.

what they really want is sport. When cismales can turn into women and compete with women in elite sports, then women's sport is dead.

I forget his/her name but there was someone who did exactly that in MMA. There's videos of him/her kicking the shit out of women. Joe Rogan did a video basically saying 'this is bullshit' (ldo) some time ago. I think s/he has been banned now or something.

And of course, it's very much a problem having a well hung "lady" sharing public showers with teenage girls. Why is the feelings of a trannie more important than the safety of women?

They should be more worried about some of those female gym teachers really.

Hounding people for these very understandable concerns does the opposite of help their cause. It makes people more anti-trans. What is happening is doing more harm than good for the rights of transgender people. There's a backlash, and anti-trans discrimination increases.

I mean I don't really care is the thing. It's not like I ever run into a tranny, and if I did I'd just be like 'sure, whatever.' I've had a couple pretty ambiguous students, maybe they were trannies, but it's not like I'm going to say anything rude to them. The whole thing is barely even on my radar until they start raging on social media 'cause someone accidentally called them 'her'. Then I think 'well, some of these are real tards.'

[Poopadoop]

Would it kill her to just not?

This is why people shouldn't post when they're drunk.

[Jack Sawyer]

How the fuck was twitter mass hacked like that?

For the uninitiated, what just happened should not be possible. It's absolute madness!

This probably means CHANGE YOUR FUCKING TWITTER PASSWORD now. It had to have been a password database breach, there is just no other way unless they a) possess a quantum supercomputer or b) it's an inside job. Also, enable 2FA yesterday. Go.

[Jack Sawyer]

The reason why you should change your TWITTER password (and everywhere else you might be using it, which if true, also indicates you're an internet sec dumb-ass and therefore prime hacking target) is that the way this hack happened, a large amount of other account passwords that were in use on twitter.com are now out in the wild. It really has to be a password database breach. Probably there were too busy smelling their own farts over at twitter to remember to practice proper back-end security hygiene.

[Jack Sawyer]

[MadMojoMonkey]

I'm back to work, back in my office, doing physics again.

Feels good to be out of the house. There are no faculty in the building, though. It's just me, a couple of staff in the physics office, and the machine shop guys downstairs, AFAICT. It's so quiet, and there's nothing to give me a sense of urgency or deadlines or accountability. Normally that's not an issue for me, as I'm mostly self-motivated and kinda resent being micromanaged. However, I'm finding it hard to get back into the mindset of "productive employee" so far.

I know it will pass as I spend more time at work and get back into the pattern of spending my time constructively, but it's weird so far, is all. I daydream too much, and find myself avoiding actual work because, in part, I know that no one will bust me for it.

It's nice to not be stressed out by a sudden change of my life's pace, but also kinda feels bad to not just naturally bounce back immediately.

[Poopadoop]

[OngBonga]

A very British image... emergency services prepare to repair a damaged dam, which could give way and flood a town at any minute.

Always time for a cuppa.

[Jack Sawyer]

This is delicious AF and easy to make

https://www.thespruceeats.com/cuban-roast-pork-4691717

[Poopadoop]

So had a debate of sorts* with someone on twitter over whether this guy was being racist or not. This all based on his first post, up to where his gf calls him a racist.


https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAssho..._was_cheating/

My view: He's definitely ignorant and an asshole in a stupid kind of way where someone doesn't have the sense to see when they're wrong, but you can't assume he's racist based on OP alone.

Thoughts?


*I say of sorts, because the person I was arguing with just kept insisting the guy was racist and threw his toys out of the pram and blocked me when I dared to suggest he was leaping to a conclusion without direct evidence.

[MadMojoMonkey]

IDK why race is even being brought up as an issue. Because he said something ignorant about India?
India is a country, and Indian people are of all races.

Do they mean racist not to mean specifically bigoted about race, but any bigotry?
'Cause his ignorance that English is one of the primary languages in India (a nation with hundreds of spoken languages), and his typical male ego are the faults, here. Whether or not he's also racist is not evidenced at all in the reddit post.


Who's to say he's not really sexist, though? Maybe he just bites his tongue and doesn't say anything if it's a man, but since Priya is a woman, he feels the right to call her a cheat. Or maybe he felt that right because Priya has brown skin and he is, in fact, racist. There's just not enough info to tell based on his clearly biased recounting of the story.

The idiot criticizes the word "ostensibly" as an odd word, so he's not exactly the wordsmith he thinks he is. Furthermore, the way he says he "jokingly" said he knew she was cheating, then went on to defend his position is a typical red flag of a gaslighting jerk.


Not necessarily a reason to break up with him. We know nothing about his GF and maybe she's just as much of a gaslighting troll and they deserve each other. Her whole passive aggressive, "I'm reconsidering our relationship" angle isn't exactly good adulting, either.

[Poopadoop]

Yup, pretty much where I stood on it. Reddit guy seems like an idiot more than anything.

Even if you argue "Indian" is a race, he never said anything against Indians, so he may be racist, but concluding that based solely on the fact he was an asshole to a person of colour is just looking for an excuse to find racism.

[Poopadoop]

Funny though, if you scroll through the reddit replies, "racist" is a pretty common conclusion there as well.

Looks like Ong was finally right about something. A lot of people really don't know what the word racist means.

[OngBonga]

Looks like Ong was finally right about something. A lot of people really don't know what the word racist means.

You can be guilty of this, too. I must admit though, it's nice to see you being critical when it comes to allegations of racism, instead of knee jerking.

It's not so bad when people say racism when they mean xenophobia, even though they are not the same thing. At least both are a form of bigotry. But assuming an Indian girl will be inferior to you at scrabble, chances are this guy is just a bad loser. He's probably trying to convince himself she's cheating because that's easier to accept than losing at Scrabble to some Indian girl. It doesn't have to be racist at all, I assume the same would apply if it were a white French girl. Sexism is more likely, but even that's an assumption.

I doubt the girl was cheating. Indians speak English, although often it's a hybrid, but they teach it at school and some of their schools are outstanding. I suspect there's also a level of ignorance about Indian culture, like it's easy to assume it's a third world shithole, but that's not quite true. Of course, there are lots of poor people living in slums, but if your family is wealthy in India, you're likely to enjoy a good education with high chances of social success. Perhaps our idiot isn't quite aware of this.

Ignorant, bad loser, sexist, all these seem more likely than racist.

[Poopadoop]

You can be guilty of this, too.

Possibly.

I must admit though, it's nice to see you being critical when it comes to allegations of racism, instead of knee jerking.

The logical part of my brain has always been at odds with the idea that anything involving people of different races interacting in a negative way was automatically a sign of racism.

It's not so bad when people say racism when they mean xenophobia, even though they are not the same thing. At least both are a form of bigotry. But assuming an Indian girl will be inferior to you at scrabble, chances are this guy is just a bad loser. He's probably trying to convince himself she's cheating because that's easier to accept than losing at Scrabble to some Indian girl. It doesn't have to be racist at all, I assume the same would apply if it were a white French girl. Sexism is more likely, but even that's an assumption.

Like Mojo said it could have been any girl for all we know and he might still react the same. Or even any person. Maybe he thought he was a Scrabble God and when someone burst his bubble his ego needed some way to explain it away.

I doubt the girl was cheating.

She went to the bathroom once during the whole game for 3 minutes, but in reddit guy's mind she looked up every word in the dictionary while she was there and remembered them all. It's pretty ludicrous.

Indians speak English, although often it's a hybrid, but they teach it at school and some of their schools are outstanding. I suspect there's also a level of ignorance about Indian culture, like it's easy to assume it's a third world shithole, but that's not quite true. Of course, there are lots of poor people living in slums, but if your family is wealthy in India, you're likely to enjoy a good education with high chances of social success. Perhaps our idiot isn't quite aware of this.

Ignorant, bad loser, sexist, all these seem more likely than racist.

It's funny because the initial knee-jerk reaction on twitter assuming he was a racist was from an Indian guy who I otherwise respect, and who isn't what I'd consider a snowflake victim type. When I said it's just as possible reddit guy was ignorant and there's no evidence in OP he was being racist per se, a different (black) guy I don't know jumped in and said it was totally racist. I calmly outlined why I thought evidence of racism was lacking, at which point he basically accused me of sticking up for white racist people, and that he wouldn't argue with a white person about racism.

I pointed out that I'm not strictly white, and so if he liked he could argue with the non-white portion of me instead. I added it's a problem what you guys are saying here because accusing people of racism without evidence makes things worse, not better. I could have added that he was sounding a bit racist himself, but I didn't want to go down that road. Then he blocked me lol.

No-one else tried to argue with me, even the Indian guy. It was just this one guy who must have been having a bad day and had a bit of a meltdown. Or maybe he's been the victim of racism so much he sees it everywhere whether it's there or not. Anyways, whatever.

I'm half inclined to start an AITA thread on reddit myself over this, just to see how many people call me a racist.

[OngBonga]

It's funny because the initial knee-jerk reaction on twitter assuming he was a racist was from an Indian guy who I otherwise respect, and who isn't what I'd consider a snowflake victim type. When I said it's just as possible reddit guy was ignorant and there's no evidence in OP he was being racist per se, a different (black) guy I don't know jumped in and said it was totally racist. I calmly outlined why I thought evidence of racism was lacking, at which point he basically accused me of sticking up for white racist people, and that he wouldn't argue with a white person about racism.

At the risk of bringing politics into this, you describe here exactly how the left engage in debate on Twitter, and presumably Reddit. It's this kind of activity that caused me to drift away from left-leaning politics. I know you guys think I'm right wing, and compared to you lot, I am, but I'm more left leaning than the average right winger. But I was seeing a problem with the way left wing politics was evolving, I could see it becoming an argument that basically said "agree with me or you're a cunt". It became a moral crusade. I'm not in the business of morally judging others, largely because I'm a flawed human being and I understand morality is subjective.

I despise identity politics. Unfortunately I also think it's inevitable in a democracy, so I don't really have any solutions.

[Poopadoop]

I could see it becoming an argument that basically said "agree with me or you're a cunt".

To be fair, I think there's people on both sides who take that attitude. If you picked 100 random left-wing and 100 random right-wing people on twitter and disagreed (or pretended to disagree) with their politics, I suspect roughly the same number on each side would be like that. Can't prove it of course, but there's an exp't for you. But, I also think that number would be comparatively low, like maybe 10/100.*

The problem as I see it is the perception one has of people on the 'other side' is based on who reacts to you. People who are tolerant of dissent don't jump in other's convos to rant at people and foam at the mouth, they more likely just think 'hmmm, hadn't looked at it that way' or 'i don't really agree but not a hill i wanna die on' or whatever and say nothing. But when 99/100 of the people that DO react are these righteous dickheads you get the impression that the other side is full of righteous dickheads.

Most of my comments on twitter are in line with left-wing liberal views, and most of the dickheads I encounter are not surprisingly right-wing. That doesn't mean there's not a lot of reasonable right-wingers out there, it's just that the dickheads amongst them are the ones who will jump and be dickheads.

In this case, my comment was pretty moderate, but superficially at least beared more resemblance to something a right-winger would say if the reddit guy had in fact been acting racist. And so this time, I attracted a left-wing dickhead. I also looked at the analytics and 50 or so people read my tweet, presumably mostly left-wingers and a fair number of POC based on it being posted by the Indian guy I mentioned, and only that one dickhead said anything at all.

* Edit: This is actually probably too high. It could be really low, like <1% for all I know.

[OngBonga]

The problem as I see it is the perception one has of people on the 'other side' is based on who reacts to you. People who are tolerant of dissent don't jump in other's convos to rant at people and foam at the mouth, they more likely just think 'hmmm, hadn't looked at it that way' or 'i don't really agree but not a hill i wanna die on' or whatever and say nothing. But when 99/100 of the people that DO react are these righteous dickheads you get the impression that the other side is full of righteous dickheads.

There's probably a great deal of accuracy to this. Also, Twitter is infested with righteous dickheads, certainly more than 1%. And I don't doubt I've been successfully trolled on more than one occasion. I mean, I pretend to be a righteous dickhead sometimes, to bait people into an argument. I tell people I'm transgender so I can pretend to have moral authority against all the retards screaming at JK Rowling for basically being a feminist. I must have been baited too. But I think for the most part, those screaming on social media (on both sides) are somewhat more honest than I am, and somehow less mature, because they only seem to know schoolyard tactics when it comes to debate... insult, lie, block, gang up, cry, what you say is what you are, I'm telling on you, my Dad is bigger than your Dad.

[Poopadoop]

There's probably a great deal of accuracy to this. Also, Twitter is infested with righteous dickheads, certainly more than 1%

I know a lot of people on twitter and the vast vast majority of them are willing to show their stripes but at the same time are not on there looking for a fight with the nearest righteous dickhead on the other side. If anything they're looking for people to agree with them and echo-chamber them, discuss work or family or sports or whatever, and share their jokes. Only rarely do I see one of them get into a serious kerfuffle with anyone over politics, and if they do it's because someone comes from out of nowhere and attacks their views in a way that's so personal and obnoxious they feel they have to defend themselves.

This is what makes twitter so toxic imo. It's like you're sitting at a table with all your friends, but with a rule that you have to leave empty seats at the table, so at any moment one or more drunk assholes can sit down and make everyone's life miserable.

[CoccoBill]

https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR...AAAAAQAQ&hl=en

The juicy stuff starts at around 42 mins. Worth the trip.

[Poopadoop]

^ Which one of the videos is it?

[CoccoBill]

The first one, 516.

[CoccoBill]

When a pesticide is approved for use, how many other plants and animals are tested for effects?

[Poopadoop]

The first one, 516.

Thanks!

When a pesticide is approved for use, how many other plants and animals are tested for effects?

You're hoping there's an expert on pesticide testing on FTR?

[CoccoBill]

You're hoping there's an expert on pesticide testing on FTR?

I'd be happy to hear I'm wrong. Either way, I'd think that the number is significantly lower than all of them. How do they know it's not gonna kill a few extra species? Shouldn't that be kinda relevant info though?

[Poopadoop]

I'd be happy to hear I'm wrong. Either way, I'd think that the number is significantly lower than all of them. How do they know it's not gonna kill a few extra species? Shouldn't that be kinda relevant info though?

Depends what it's being used for I imagine. If you're spraying a wheat field you might not be too bothered about what else dies as long as it's not the wheat (assuming your priority is to maximize the yield).

I'm guessing they also have some fairly sophisticated understanding of biology, like how we understand there are certain chemicals that are bad for all animals (e.g., cynaide, strychnine, antifreeze), and other things that are bad for some animals but not all of them (e.g., chocolate and dogs, penicillin and bacteria). So maybe pesticide X is bad for knapweed but not for wheat? Dunno.

There's also the dosage, where if you give the same amount of a pesticide to a tree vs. a weed the latter is small enough for it to be fatal but the tree can shrug it off.

There was the tail end of a big scandal about DDT when I was a kid because it harmed nearly everything but the crop it was being used to protect, plant and animal, so it obviously wasn't properly tested before they brought it out. But that was like 50 years ago so I assume testing standards are higher now.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDT

[Poopadoop]

If any of you guys are looking for a broken hair dryer, let me know and I'll hook you up!

From my local community forum:

Hair dryers. My hair dryer stopped working and when I reached for my old one - though it's working it's making an unhealthy noise so I don't think it's safe to use and I'm going to buy a new one.

Is anyone interested to take these off my hands?
Posted in General To 16 neighbourhoods

[MadMojoMonkey]

There's a part of me that always hesitates whenever I throw away an otherwise broken device that still has a working motor.

Things sometimes break, but the motor is fine, and it feels so wrong to throw away a perfectly good motor.

[Poopadoop]

Maybe, but I think it'd have to be something with a bit more value for me to think it's worth salvaging, not a motor from a £30 hair dryer.

Either that or I'd already have to own something to install the working motor into that didn't require major modifications. Which pretty much means another hair dryer of the same make and model.

[MadMojoMonkey]

"Guys, let's not lose sight of what's important, here. The way a dog wags its tail so hard that it can't keep both hind legs on the floor when it greets you coming home from work every day. That's what's important."
-some rando in a discord comment that kinda made my day

[OngBonga]

More dogs, less people.

[Poopadoop]

When you're REALLY late for your flight.

[Poopadoop]

People trying to be toxic on Twitter, and getting more and more pissed that you're not letting it bother you, is hilarious.


This one started off as a pretty civil debate, then turned into an argument, then they went full retard and just kept repeating the same arguments over and over and acting like I must be an idiot not to agree with them. Here's the end of it.



Random Angry Person on Twitter: You're wrong and an idiot and you suck!





Me: Ok, well I gotta go now. Bye.




RAPT: Sure, just leave when you're losing the argument, idiot!!




Me: Ok then. Adios.



RAPT: Why do you get to decide when the discussion is over?




Me: What part of "goodbye" don't you understand?



RAPT: You can stop talking but you won't silence me! Not until I finish telling you why you're wrong!





Me:



RAPT: [blocks me]


Damn, now I won't be able to talk to them anymore! Checkmate, I guess.

[OngBonga]

Blocking someone is basically an admission that you've lost the argument. I think I have one person blocked on Twitter, and I didn't even engage with him, I just read something so horribly offensive (rape) and was about to reply, but thought it's probably just best if his tweets didn't appear on my timeline.

When someone blocks me, I consider that a win.

[OngBonga]

Fucking hilarious.



In case this joke needs an explanation...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSuHrTfcikU

[Poopadoop]

Blocking someone is basically an admission that you've lost the argument. I think I have one person blocked on Twitter, and I didn't even engage with him, I just read something so horribly offensive (rape) and was about to reply, but thought it's probably just best if his tweets didn't appear on my timeline.

When someone blocks me, I consider that a win.

It was another one of these "everything and everyone is racist" people, but even worse because it was a white woman SJW with a side order of Karen that came out when I got tired of shooting down her arguments and tried to end the convo.

Long story short, she had claimed someone's research was racist, I calmly explained why it had nothing to do with race and that she probably shouldn't make such serious accusations with no evidence, and why was she out trying to find racism in places it's not when there's plenty of actual racism to fight against. She kept arguing it was racist and then threw in the old standby that "you must be racist 'cause you're sticking up for a racist."

Looked at her past tweets and one of them was something about never voting for a white man again. I quoted it and told her that was both racist and sexist, as well as stupid, and that's when she lost it.

[OngBonga]

Haha I adore the hypocrisy of these people. They don't even realise it.

[Poopadoop]

I feel a bit sorry for people like her tbh. I think her heart is in the right place, and she's trying to do the right thing. She just lacks the powers of reasoning to do it properly, and ends up doing the cause more harm than good. That's why I was trying to be patient with her at first.

I took the kid gloves off when she started calling me a racist though. That's when I went looking through her tweets 'cause I assumed she'd have something idiotic like that 'never voting for a white man' thing in them.

I can imagine her thought process goes something like this:

1. POC aren't being treated fairly. This pisses me off.
2. I want to help POC.
3. The best way to do this is to find racism and call it out.
4. Another way is to not support white politicians.

I'm totally on board with 1-3. The thing with 3 is though it doesn't help if you just go around accusing everyone who is white of being a racist on flimsy/no evidence. All that does is alienate people.

And 4 is just retarded. It's like saying a white person can't possibly NOT be racist, and a POC can't possibly be racist. What?

If she just changed 4 to say "I think POC are often better able to understand problems with racism, so I'll consider that when I cast my vote" that would be reasonable. But basically she's saying that given a choice between a moral whte person and a despicable POC, she'd vote for the latter only because they're a POC. Well, that's fucking racist!

[OngBonga]

It seems to me you're beginning to learn why the BLM movement is counterproductive. I appreciate a large number of their followers are people like you, those on board with 1-3. But far too many vocal idiots hurt the cause by assuming white people are all racist and black people cannot be racist. This doesn't just alienate people, it makes good people feel the cause is flawed. And it is. The leadership of BLM are encouraging this kind of mentality. They promote the siege mentality, they promote the "us vs them" identity politics that goes with it. And that's why these vocal idiots feel empowered, they think they're on the right side of history, and when you're arguing with someone who thinks they are morally superior, you're not going to have a reasonable, well thought out discussion, instead it's going to be a shit slinging contest.

BLM use white guilt as a weapon. White guilt is racism. If you say to someone "you are white so therefore you should feel bad about the state of the world" you have identified someone's skin colour and made a judgement based on that identity. Unfortunately there's no solution. This is the world we live in now.

[Poopadoop]

Yeah, I think they mainly get tripped up on 3, which leads them on to increasingly levels of irrationality in where they go after that (4, 5, 6 etc.).

First, their interpretation of 3 allows a very wide net to be cast, including things that are either grey areas or just clearly not racist by any reasonable definition.

Second, where something is either not racist or ambiguous they behave as if it's both racist and a major problem that needs addressing right now, as if identifying and solving this smaller "problem" would somehow solve all the bigger problems.

At one point I said to her that doing this is like seeing your neighbour's house on fire and offering to go and weed their garden - it's not helping. She didn't get it.

The truth is the bigger problems need to be tackled and solved. This will make it clear the smaller problems are really pretty insignificant in the big scheme of things, assuming their even real problems at all. Proper activists get this, a lot of the SJWs don't.

I cannot imagine MLK Jr. going around on twitter picking the fights she does, for example. He'd actually be focussing on the things that matter, like he did in real life.

[MadMojoMonkey]

There are a lot of definitions of racism, and people tend to pick the one that makes them feel good and ignore the nuance in the way other people understand the concept.

One definition of racism holds that simply being mistreated as a result of your race is just normal human behavior and not an -ism. However, if you're being mistreated as a result of your race, AND those mistreating you are in a position of power over you (for any reason), then it's racism. The position of power matters because if the person in power is mistreated, they have avenues of recourse. Whereas the person without power has no recourse. This definition holds that it's not racism if 2 people with equal power over each other hate each other on the basis of race. Both have equal standing, and no one is being exploited beyond their ability to respond in kind.

I'm not saying it's the best definition of racism, but it's one of them. Understanding what someone means, specifically, when they talk about racism is important to understanding them, and their perspective.


Personally, I think it's not enough to just want to not be racist yourself. You need to commit to antiracism work, too. You can't deny that there's rampant racism around the world, and to accept that and do nothing is not good adulting, IMO.


One problem is that the Karen's of the white world think that posting tripe on facebook is antiracism work, and it's not. Another problem is the whole white saviorism angle that tends to come up. White people want to "save" black people as if the black people would need saving if not for the white people's racism, or as if they couldn't save themselves if they tried. That's just veiled racism.

A good step for white people who want to be real about antiracism work would be to find the community organizations already lead by people of color, and see if you want to join and support that group.

[OngBonga]

Racism is well defined. It's discrimination or hatred based on race, or it is a belief that one's own race is superior to that of another. Being in a position of power is irrelevant. If that were true you're basically saying it's impossible for me to be racist, because I have no power, certainly no more than a black person in the UK. Of course, that's silly. Of course I can be racist. Racism comes from the heart, it's how you feel about other cultures, not something that society imposes on you based on status.

Personally, I think it's not enough to just want to not be racist yourself. You need to commit to antiracism work, too. You can't deny that there's rampant racism around the world, and to accept that and do nothing is not good adulting, IMO.

There's lots of terrible things happening around the world. In some places, homosexuals are persecuted. That's exactly as terrible as persecuting someone because of their race. Unfortunately, it's part of what humans are. No individual is capable of changing human nature, it can only happen over time, the only process that can change human nature is evolution. It's easy to forget we are just animals.

All any one individual can really do is try to be the best person they can be. Most of us fail. I certainly do. I could be a better person. Why can't I make the changes in my life that would make me a better person? I don't know the answer to that question. But while I'm not the best person I can be, I'm still, on balance, a good person. I have no violent tendencies whatsoever, I am not a criminal, I do not go out of my way to make other people feel bad. I'm mostly happy with who I am. I feel like that's the only true power I have... the power to be who I want to be.

Some people are in positions of influence. These people do have greater responsibility, and it's these people who are failing the human race. Not me, not you, not anyone in this thread, and not anyone you're going to meet at the pub.

A good step for white people who want to be real about antiracism work would be to find the community organizations already lead by people of color, and see if you want to join and support that group.

I think this is part of the problem. Why an organisation led by people of colour? Right there, you are continuing to use race as an identity. It shouldn't matter what colour someone's skin is, the only thing that matters is their message.

[Poopadoop]

Not really much of a rah-rah activist. I prefer to have pointless arguments on twitter myself.

But seriously, I try to be sensitive to racial issues without losing my shit and going overboard the way some SJWs do. If something is clearly racist I call it out. But I'm not losing sleep over whether I'm the most fair person that ever lived 'cause I think I'm pretty damn fair and that's good enough for me.

Our dept. recently had interviews for a teaching assistant. One of the applicants was black, and also happened to be the best candidate. I pointed out we didn't have a single black person in our department as an argument for hiring her, and whether that worked or not, she got hired. But really I just thought she was the best person for the job and I didn't want her not to get it because she was black (not that I think that would happen, our dept. is pretty decent).

I don't hold any illusions that what I said was manipulative and itself somewhat racist (I was using race to make an argument that really should have nothing to do with race), but my motives were the correct ones I think. I wanted her to be hired 'cause she was the best person for the job regardless of her colour.

I'm also pretty certain that if I posted that little confession on twitter I'd trigger some random SJW who would find some reason to "call me out" for it.

Also agree the power structure is irrelevant. It just makes it easier for some people to get away with being racist than others.

[Poopadoop]

It seems to me you're beginning to learn why the BLM movement is counterproductive.

The biggest problem with it imo is that it's leaderless. If Obama or whoever could take it and focus it in the right direction, it'd be a lot more effective.