You can only do what you can when you can. When it's time too vote, vote. When it's time to help your community, help them. When it's time to lend your voice to the cause, then do so.
But most importantly, stay safe. Protect your loved ones. Do what's needed to keep them safe even if it means finding safety elsewhere. People have survived this kinds of political authoritarianism before. People have survived fascist regimes before. You can too.
In a deterministic reality, where all things are due and subject to causation, there can be no free will. If we did not live in a causal reality, we'd never be able to make accurate predictions or models.
"Randomness" is not free will either. If you're not in complete control of your influences, then you can not be said to have free will. Randomness does nothing to help the argument for free will.
With that said. Regardless of the existence of free will, what does exists is your awareness of what it's like to be you. To be in the circumstances that currently govern your life. And in that awareness exists the boundless capacity for compassion. Once you understand that no one is in control of their lives, that all things are causal, it allows you to be less judgmental.
"If a man is crossing a river and an empty boat collides with his own skiff, he will not become angry. He will simply guide his boat around it.
But if he sees a person in the boat, he will shout at the other to steer clear. If the shout is not heard, and the boats collide, he will curse the other person.
Yet, if the boat were empty, he would not be angry."
The fact that people in this thread are bitching at each other and calling each other names over how they approach meditation is sad. Over the last year I have practiced Transcendental Meditation, Samitha, Vipassina, and I am now working on Zazen. I practice for two hours each day. Once in the morning and once in the late afternoon.
From all of them the one thing I have taken away is an increase in empathy and compassion. By calming the mind and noticing the impermanence of thought and coming to the realization that the majority of people suffer from their thoughts which they have little control over, I was able to extend compassion and widen my capacity for empathy. So I don't understand the vitriol being tossed around by those professing to know what meditation "really is".
If someone is saying that they meditate and it's as good as drugs for them, then who am I to judge? If someone says that they meditate and it's not as good as drugs, who am I to judge? If someone says that they meditate and that it doesn't increase their capacity for empathy and compassion, again, who am I to judge?
There is a Zen saying... "Practice like a blind person in a dark room.” I encourage everyone to meditate on this informal Koan.
I love GTAV and play Online almost everyday. But this bullshit about delays and more delays every year is just annoying as hell. How many years have they had to get this right?
I'm reminded of the quote "Don't let perfect get in the way of good." and I'm beginning to wonder if that's what's going on here? Are they delaying a good game because it's not "perfect" or are they just so incompetent that they have to keep going back to "fix" things???
And watch, when it does come out it'll be buggy as hell. Everyone will be asking "You've had all of this time. Why are there so many bugs?" and Rockstar will just shrug their shoulders all of the way to the bank.
I like your thoughts about having them look different from each other in someway to make them distinguishable. I think that might be a smart thing to do if you’re an instance owner.
I also think that we’re not really that far apart in what we’re both saying. When I read your example of the on boarding process for some people, it just reinforces what I said in my original reply, which was “ It's been my experience that people who couldn't figure out how to join Mastodon are the same people that get so used to doing things one way, that when you introduce a different way, they fall apart.” it’s not that ideas like “instances“ are difficult subjects to grasp, it’s that the person who is joining is expecting a different experience. Which I think causes part of their brain to kind of shut down a little. So things start to become confusing. I think this becomes obvious when you talk to people who had no issues joining. What they usually say is something along the lines of “I read it and caught on pretty quick.“ Which was my experience as well. Sure, once I got in it took me a few moments to realize what was what and get a grasp on @names but it was never something that made me say “this is too confusing“. It was just new. And I treated it like that.
Which makes me think that the people who say they don’t understand things like “Federation“ never really tried to understand them to begin with. As you noted, email is a handy comparison to use. When I’ve explained it to them like that, most people kind of smack their head and “get it” pretty quickly after that.
I’ve thought for a long time the first thing that someone should read when they try to join Mastodon is “This isn’t like any social media you’ve ever joined. We do things different, and if you read along, you’ll understand why.” Or something similar to get the person who is joining out of that frame of mind where they think they’re joining something that they’ve done before. I think that would put people in the right frame of mind right away.
I can't imagine how much you must have suffered choosing an email client. 🙄
It's been my experience that people who couldn't figure out how to join Mastodon are the same people that get so used to doing things one way, that when you introduce a different way, they fall apart. Regardless if they've done virtually the same thing with different services.
Mastodon isn't difficult to sign up for and use. FFS there are people of all ages and tech experiences who figured it out easily. I've seen grandmas who only ever used Facebook figure out Mastodon and teens who failed english figure it out. It's not rocket science. It's just not what you are used to when signing up for similar services.
I love that the people who weren't smart enough to leave Twitter two years ago are now eagerly jumping from one frying pan into another.
Fortunately there have been a few who learned their lessons a bit late and came over to Mastodon.
But the rest of them? The one who tolerated the racism and misogyny that Musk brought with his red pilled idiots? Let them have Blue Sky and the rest of us can watch as history eventually repeats itself.
I've been testing it this morning. Obviously not a lot of content so I've been uploading some old content of my own.
It is VERY bare bones. Still needs a lot of work and effort. You can't even upload an avatar yet. And the character limit in your bio is only 80? Should be at least 250.
It's just going to take some patience. It's only (I think?) two people working on this? So development is going to be sloooooooooow.
Still, I think it's worth the effort. Alternatives to centralized apps are important. Social media deserves to be in the hands of the people and the more we can take away from centralized services, the better.
I just started using Bitwarden almost a year now. I don't know how I lived without it before? It's nice to know I wont have to switch to something else.
I have hundreds of short form videos which are designed to uplift, encourage, and speak positively about mental health issues. I’ve had lots of people tell me that my videos in some small way encourage them to take the next step in their mental health.
In other words, it’s not the form of the video that matters, it’s the content.
As for the cost of the server, I think the videos will expire after a certain amount of time. Something like Snapchat.
The great thing about the Fediverse is that it offers options. Is this going to be exactly like TikTok? Of course not. Will it serve a purpose for some? Time will tell.
What I was looking at was the percentage of registered democrats that vote. But even if I am wrong, and your numbers are right, it would seem to me to be even more of a reason to widen the gap and help people to register to vote blue.
MrFunkEdude @ MrFunkEdude @piefed.social Posts 1Comments 26Joined 1 yr. ago
You can only do what you can when you can. When it's time too vote, vote. When it's time to help your community, help them. When it's time to lend your voice to the cause, then do so.
But most importantly, stay safe. Protect your loved ones. Do what's needed to keep them safe even if it means finding safety elsewhere. People have survived this kinds of political authoritarianism before. People have survived fascist regimes before. You can too.