Erika3sis [she/her, xe/xem] @ Erika3sis @hexbear.net

"I am reckoned a horrid brute because I had not been cowardly enough to lie

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2 yr. ago

Which client are you using?

♫ They say in Harlan County, there are no neutrals there: you'll either be a union man or a thug for J. H. Blair — Which side are you on, which side are you on? ♫

Put simply, in the trolley problem, my continent would pull the lever, and your continent would give drugs to the people tied to the tracks to ease the pain.

Left and right are always relative terms. I like to describe those who feel like they are or could be represented by a political party in the governing coalition of an average western liberal democracy, as the "non plus ultra" left. This comes from the old story of the Pillars of Hercules on either side of the Strait of Gibraltar, which were said to bear the warning "non plus ultra" — "nothing further beyond". For as far as people knew back then, there truly was no land for sailors to find further to the west of that point; but now Europeans are well aware that there is a whole gargantuan continent across the Atlantic, a continent that makes the idea of the Iberian peninsula and the Maghreb as the furthest western extent of land in the world seem downright laughable.

And so those who call themselves left-wing, but who would be comfortably represented in the government of a liberal democracy... Well, they would be left-wing by the standards of the beliefs which can be comfortably represented in the government of such a country. So they're left-wing to that extent. But in the grand scheme of things, they're no further left of the parliamentary center compared to Marxists and anarchists, than Gibraltar is west of the Prime Meridian compared to Alaska. As I'd see it, frankly, all the beliefs which can find success in a liberal democracy, can be said to occupy the same "continent" of politics; and all those beliefs which cannot, can be said to occupy a different "continent", and those on the former continent would certainly stand to benefit from "crossing the sea", so to speak.

My recommendation is PeerTube.

I noticed this last night. Playing videos not from YouTube still works fine. This affects Piped as well.

This had happened previously a different time, which is why I tried reconstructing my music playlists with Soundcloud uploads until YouTube started working again.

False consciousness, as we say, is very widespread in the United States compared to other countries. I think that one part of this is that the United States is built on the stolen resources of exploited countries, including its very own territory, which is occupied illegally in violation of treaties with indigenous nations. These stolen resources allow the United States to essentially "buy" the loyalty of its citizens. I also think that another part of this is that the United States isolates its people from the rest of the world in various ways, for instance that monolingualism is very widespread in the United States, or Americans consume less foreign media, et cetera, and this means that Americans exist in more of a bubble compared to other countries.

In the ruling class of the United States, the furthest left that you get is Bernie Sanders, because people like Bernie Sanders or historically FDR or Huey Long etc exist to facilitate that buying of loyalty that underpins the whole of American society. That is, they exist to make exploitation less apparent and hardships more bearable, without addressing the conditions that lead to exploitation and hardship in the first place — so they're the political equivalent of a smoke break or office pizza party, basically.

I learned this yesterday from the same video. Dr Geoff Lindsey is great.

♫ Everything I used to love has turned to shit ♫

Hell yeah

K-On!

I was raised bilingual, and speaking from my own experiences I'd say that it's a good idea to consider the following questions if you want to maximize the child's ability in either language:

1. Is there a parent who the child sees more or less often than the other? What will one do in case one parent dies, or in case the child has a language disorder, or there is otherwise some sort of unexpected problem that could impact the child's language development?
2. What are the language dynamics at play in the family and in the local area? What will the child associate with each of the two languages? Can the child have all its needs met in the non-dominant language? Does the child have access to a broader community of speakers, and in what way?

I'm not sure if it's a good idea to share my own story because it gets pretty melodramatic at points, but yeah, language skills need to be built and maintained over the course of one's entire life, so you need to be able to adapt to changing circumstances. But as a whole I think that what you're planning for your own kid sounds like it will work well, or at least decently well — the only way to know for sure is to get a time machine and go forwards 20 years, and until then I think it's best to have faith in your competence as a parent. There's no-one who knows a family better than itself.

And beyond that, one should also ask oneself... Well, what types of language skills does one want to see in one's child, and what happens if the child ultimately does not reach the goals one has set? I'd say that I have sort of a nuanced or over-complicated relationship to so-called "bad grammar" because of my position.

Well, it is now 3 years since that article was published back in 2017, and I'm proud to say that my memories have not been altered in any way that I can tell.

On an unrelated note, I've been hooked on this sparkling water called "Dr. Breen's Private Reserve"

I watch basically any channel with 100,000+ subscribers through Piped so that my views or retention or engagement don't get counted by YouTube.

Jimmy Neutron "sodium chloride" ass reply, "everything is edible at least once" is a common joke that works precisely because words' definitions are not rigid

Edit: I think it's best to leave this comment up as I originally wrote it, but I'm also going to go on the record to say that I could've and should've phrased this a lot more cordially.

Washington Post is @washingtonpost.com, so evidently not.

Edit: Bluesky has this about page which is relevant.

The long awaited sequel to Tako Luka Maguro Fever

Amanita bisporigera, or the aptly named eastern North American destroying angel, if anyone's wondering.

From Wikipedia:

The principal amatoxin, α-amanitin, is readily absorbed across the intestine, and 60% of the absorbed toxin is excreted into bile and undergoes enterohepatic circulation; the kidneys clear the remaining 40%. The toxin inhibits the enzyme RNA polymerase II, thereby interfering with DNA transcription, which suppresses RNA production and protein synthesis. This causes cellular necrosis, especially in cells which are initially exposed and have rapid rates of protein synthesis. This process results in severe acute liver dysfunction and, ultimately, liver failure.

I could not confirm that it causes liquefactive necrosis of the liver specifically, however. I wouldn't doubt it, but I couldn't confirm it.

Edit: I should clarify, I got this from the original thread on Bluesky, not my own identification.

"Have these gentlemen ever SEEN a" yadda yadda