#(This is not a claim about antis in general but might be relevant to some people's experiences)

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

Im doing a project about disinformation (specifically pseudoscience) and I've found a great paper that is trying to define pseudoscience by one common characteristic.

"Boudry and Braeckman (2011) have distinguished between ‘immunizing strategies’ and ‘epistemic defense mechanisms’, documenting how these appear in various guises in practically every pseudoscience (the relationship with Popper’s “conventionalist stratagems” will be discussed in 4.1). Immunizing strategies are defined as generic arguments or tactics that serve to protect a belief system from critical scrutiny and adverse evidence, while defense mechanisms refer to the special cases in which the immunizing tactics form an integral part of the belief system itself. (...) In many pseudoscience, core concepts are either ambiguous and amenable to a range of interpretations, or they are retrospectively redefined whenever threatened with refutation. Such strategic vagueness is characteristic of creationism and Intelligent Design theory, astrology, Freudian psychoanalysis, graphology, homeopathy, and various forms of alternative medicine." - Diagnosing Pseudoscience – by Getting Rid of the Demarcation Problem, Maarten Boudry

I just thought it might be relevant in your fight against astrology/anti-science crowd. Science doesn't try to immunize itself against scrutiny, only pseudo-science does.

I want to be so clear here that I do pretty vigorously disagree with the notion that everyone working in the sciences is a noble intellectual who's always open to new data and loves being proven wrong. anyone can be a shithead and I never made the claim that every psychologist in the world is a beacon of perfect, unbiased research and is above reproach. of COURSE some scientists try to immunize themselves against scrutiny, for any number of reasons including biased ones because people in any field can be real shitheads who 100% let their own bigotries color their work. that of course includes psychologists, given that psychologists are human and therefore fallible.

my stance is not and has never been "psychology is superior to astrology because it's an academically unblemished field of study," it's "psychology is more credible than astrology because it's a.) a field of study that is at least held to some standards and b.) dedicated to studying something that demonstrably has an effect on human behavior, unlike planetary movements."

[smellslikebot]

"how do I keep my art from being scraped for AI from now on?"

if you post images online, there's no 100% guaranteed way to prevent this, and you can probably assume that there's no need to remove/edit existing content. you might contest this as a matter of data privacy and workers' rights, but you might also be looking for smaller, more immediate actions to take.

...so I made this list! I can't vouch for the effectiveness of all of these, but I wanted to compile as many options as possible so you can decide what's best for you.

Discouraging data scraping and "opting out"

robots.txt - This is a file placed in a website's home directory to "ask" web crawlers not to access certain parts of a site. If you have your own website, you can edit this yourself, or you can check which crawlers a site disallows by adding /robots.txt at the end of the URL. This article has instructions for blocking some bots that scrape data for AI.

HTML metadata - DeviantArt (i know) has proposed the "noai" and "noimageai" meta tags for opting images out of machine learning datasets, while Mojeek proposed "noml". To use all three, you'd put the following in your webpages' headers:

<meta name="robots" content="noai, noimageai, noml">

Have I Been Trained? - A tool by Spawning to search for images in the LAION-5B and LAION-400M datasets and opt your images and web domain out of future model training. Spawning claims that Stability AI and Hugging Face have agreed to respect these opt-outs. Try searching for usernames!

Kudurru - A tool by Spawning (currently a Wordpress plugin) in closed beta that purportedly blocks/redirects AI scrapers from your website. I don't know much about how this one works.

ai.txt - Similar to robots.txt. A new type of permissions file for AI training proposed by Spawning.

ArtShield Watermarker - Web-based tool to add Stable Diffusion's "invisible watermark" to images, which may cause an image to be recognized as AI-generated and excluded from data scraping and/or model training. Source available on GitHub. Doesn't seem to have updated/posted on social media since last year.

Image processing... things

these are popular now, but there seems to be some confusion regarding the goal of these tools; these aren't meant to "kill" AI art, and they won't affect existing models. they won't magically guarantee full protection, so you probably shouldn't loudly announce that you're using them to try to bait AI users into responding

Glaze - UChicago's tool to add "adversarial noise" to art to disrupt style mimicry. Devs recommend glazing pictures last. Runs on Windows and Mac (Nvidia GPU required)

WebGlaze - Free browser-based Glaze service for those who can't run Glaze locally. Request an invite by following their instructions.

Mist - Another adversarial noise tool, by Psyker Group. Runs on Windows and Linux (Nvidia GPU required) or on web with a Google Colab Notebook.

Nightshade - UChicago's tool to distort AI's recognition of features and "poison" datasets, with the goal of making it inconvenient to use images scraped without consent. The guide recommends that you do not disclose whether your art is nightshaded. Nightshade chooses a tag that's relevant to your image. You should use this word in the image's caption/alt text when you post the image online. This means the alt text will accurately describe what's in the image-- there is no reason to ever write false/mismatched alt text!!! Runs on Windows and Mac (Nvidia GPU required)

Sanative AI - Web-based "anti-AI watermark"-- maybe comparable to Glaze and Mist. I can't find much about this one except that they won a "Responsible AI Challenge" hosted by Mozilla last year.

Just Add A Regular Watermark - It doesn't take a lot of processing power to add a watermark, so why not? Try adding complexities like warping, changes in color/opacity, and blurring to make it more annoying for an AI (or human) to remove. You could even try testing your watermark against an AI watermark remover. (the privacy policy claims that they don't keep or otherwise use your images, but use your own judgment)

given that energy consumption was the focus of some AI art criticism, I'm not sure if the benefits of these GPU-intensive tools outweigh the cost, and I'd like to know more about that. in any case, I thought that people writing alt text/image descriptions more often would've been a neat side effect of Nightshade being used, so I hope to see more of that in the future, at least!

[snarky-art]

Worst couple you know

Figuring out some Eraklyon stuff rn

Info on some fashion and cultural notes as well as general outline for where Eraklyon is situationally at the start of my rewrite:)

Tl;dr tho: it’s a hellscape lol

Traditionally feminine clothes have rounder gems.

Traditionally masculine clothes have more angular cut gems.

Red is the color of power so the Emperor must always wear it.

Asymmetry is big in style right now and so are pearls. Jewel and pastel tones are the norm for high fashion and the wealthy with most of the nobility sticking only to jewel tones.

The orange gem present in Erendor’s crown and outfit is their most common jewel on their planet.

Lots of golden and coppery color ores and unique rock types there.

The green gem is cut into an octagon to represent the entire Magical Realm, green for the concept of life energy of other beings. Only the Emperor and next in line for the throne may wear green gems in that cut.

The orange color from their gem is claimed to be a sign The Great Dragon blessed them, and they are above the concept of life, that they are a power all their own. The diamond shape is to represent their rigidity in customs and categorization which they claim has lead them to their (once) great power and expanse over everything, the green octagon included as a sign that they reach to and claim power over all in the 8 realms, the rulers of a mighty empire that will one day encompass everything.

Spoiler alert: it didn’t work out and they only have direct rule of Dyamond and whatever planet I’m having Samara be from (might be Dyamond too, am unsure rn) and have an excellent alliance with Solaria through its Imperialist faction. That’s about it though. They’re considered a Pillar of The Magical Realm because of their industrial prowess but even that is being diminished in its qualifications as magical culture as a whole is redefining what that looks like and means and as other planets are finding more effective or enjoysnle methods for things in ways that aren’t relevant at all to how Eraklyon would go about it. Eraklyon is also trying to push production on mining up through overworking their people to an insane degree and demanding things get done faster and as a result are producing lower quality product. Their whole socioeconomic culture right now is just Late Stage Capitalist Hell Scape.

To top it off, even back when they were still an actively growing empire, Domino was actually trying to get them to stop with using The Great Dragon in the name of their conquests since Domino was starting to work on reparations for the horrors they’d committed in the past right before it fell.

After it’s fall, Eraklyon used that event as a propaganda to say it was proof they were meant to rule after all and that they would be the ones to show The Magical World what needed to be done. Insert an increase in power and claims over planets for about 200 years, and then a steady decline of power followed by a huge dip in the last 150 years.

Eraklyon is a grossly Patriarchal society that holds a lot of views that are directly anti egalitarian in every way it can be in a culture.

A man (very rigid binary structure too with sex and gender being treated as the same thing. Think our current irl world basically. Like our world, the people are getting more and more sick of it, especially since pretty much all the rest of The Magical Realm is like “that’s a really stupid thing to reinforce so harshly and punish people who don’t fit that construct.” More backlash and pushing for it to change from the public, which isn’t vibing with the elites since the government is already in such a precarious position in terms of its power) must rule. A bride must be taken from off planet as a way to strengthen their Empire.

Green is a color of conquest due to its association with The Magical Realm as a whole, so the Empress is always adorned in it since she is a conquest in and of itself. A selection of gems are also chosen by the council of the royal court that they deem suitable for the bride to choose as her identifier when she becomes Empress. Samara was only given green ones to choose from due to the desperate need to try and reinforce strength and power through conquest, which once again she as the bride is a symbol of. Their Empire is basically no more. They are grasping at straws and the bride being used as a propaganda piece is already the norm so it’s whatever they might as well ramp it up. They also tote her red hair as a way to show that The Dragon still favors them, sending her their way, the fire of It present and on display, and even redder than that of the last Queen of Domino. Samara is proof that they can conquer anything, even The Great Dragon, if the people remain loyal to The Crown and The Empire.

Along with The Eraklyon Empire being in ruin, empires themself are very few and overall wildly shunned by the general public, Eraklyon and Solaria being some of the last notable ones, and even then just barely one at all, still using the term as a way to pretend they are still formidable and far reaching in their power.

[max1461]

Motivated by this post by @eightyonekilograms, although not a direct response to it (just some general thoughts I have). This is not a defense of making unsubstantiated claims in academic articles!

I think bullshitting has always been totally normalized and uncontroversial in most spaces, except very carefully cultivated ones with strong anti-bullshitting mechanisms. I've been saying this for years: people's words don't actually mean anything much of the time! Normal people do not ask themselves if something is true before saying it. They say it because it sounds good, or feels right, or they expect it will please their audience. This is not some unique quirk of this or that political faction, it's the near-universal nature of the human social world. You can't, like, just go around literally believing people on things (unless they give you a really good reason to do so) or you'll find yourself totally epistemically adrift.

You also can't go around demanding evidence from people on every claim they make, because you don't have the time for that and neither do they. Beyond that, if they're telling you some shit about their personal life it's very often (I might even say: almost always) best to treat it as true regardless of whether it actually is or not, for both practical and moral reasons (the latter related to respecting others' autonomy).

So what does one do? In my opinion:

Practice passive skepticism. When you hear a new claim, don't start by evaluating its truth value! You probably don't even have the requisite background knowledge to do that effectively anyway, and you probably don't need to know the truth value of every random claim the people around you make (most of it has little relevance to you). Just suspend judgement on shit by default. This also means you won't easily be duped, because you're not in the habit of believing (or disbelieving!) random claims that you hear. Only actually go to the trouble of making a truth deliberation if you're genuinely interested in a claim, or genuinely need to know its truth value for some practical reason. You can hold a claim in your head for years "just in case", and then deliberate on it when doing so actually serves you instead of right when you hear it, and you'll be able to do it right instead of doing it in a hurry. Stop with the relentless truth-seeking! It's not a good strategy.

Get comfortable just going along with what other people are saying to you while your judgement is suspended, or even while you actively disagree (as long as you judge the disagreement not to be of practical or personal relevance). I think people worry about... accidentally coming to believe something, just because they've gone along with it? Well, don't do that. You're an independent mind with your own set of epistemic standards; apply them! But (this is social advice, not epistemic advice): you don't always need to be externalizing them, vocalizing them! That will get you into needless bullshit arguments over bullshit that you already know is likely bullshit, which you could have just avoided. Determine for yourself what you think is true, on the inside, and vocalize it when it's relevant or desirable to do so.

Uh, probably some other stuff that I forgot while I was writing this, whatever.

People are really wonderful, they are wonderful creatures, but they don't mainly use language for conveying truth (that's a common misconception) and if you go into life expecting that they will, they will come out looking horrible! But truth-seeking is not the main thing most people understand language to be for, and this isn't wrong, it's a perfectly valid use! I myself do all kinds of stuff with language other than truth-seeking; in fact, as articulated above, most of my truth-seeking does not involve linguistic exchange at all (or, well, it does, but it's linguistic exchange that doesn't superficially look like it's related to truth-seeking). Uh. And you don't have to be a liar to do any of this, I mean you can tell people honestly "I don't really know" about something on which you have suspended judgement if they ask. You can be perfectly open about your passive skepticism (and why shouldn't you be, it is a desirable state of mind IMO). So yeah.

[anti-rq-gumi]

I'm sorry I can't 8e a good folken. I'm transa8led and transharmed and want to take my eye and am the victim in a cona8usive rel8ionship. I wish I could 8e 8etter and 8e accepted 8y this community.

It must be hard. I've seen your attempts to interact with other antis, expressing what you believe in on your own terms, like how we do, and get next to no response or validation. I admire your persistence. You may have gone about trying to better yourself in some flawed ways, but that doesn't take away how you have put in effort.

I'll do my best to give you some pointers.

Members of the anti radqueer discord server I'm in have claimed that you've groomed not just one, but several people, and also that you're attempting to do that again now. These are obviously some very serious accusations. I've tried to find information on this but most of what's currently available online are old callout posts that ignore any sort of nuance to your actions. A few of your posts address that nuance in throwaway sentences. I recommend making one centralized post addressing all that - it might give some of my fellow antis some insight into what you regret, what you don't, and what you're currently doing.

Your experience with BIID is something I completely believe. Your identities of transabled and transharmed are real feelings, and you're not a terrible person for feeling that way. Scores of people in both the anti and radqueer communities have experiences similar enough to you that those terms you identify with exist. I get the impulse to act on those feelings. It isn't exactly the same for me because I have depression rather than BIID, but on some level I understand the desire to self harm. I understand that breaking out of that sort of pattern if you're used to it and you want it is extremely difficult to do.

What being anti radqueer means to me and my mutuals is doing our best not to cause harm. Not to harm ourselves and not to harm other people. That's the foundation of our community. You might've noticed that a lot of my tags are stylized as anti- something accepted among radqueers I want to discourage due to its harm. From what I've seen of your current beliefs, you're already part of the way there. You just have to take more steps in order to reduce the amount of harm you're causing in your own life. And if you need help doing that from professionals or relevant resources that's okay.

I did see your reply to my conabuse masterpost by the way. Your usage of a safeword and clear communication is genuinely really good. Much better than most conabusive relationships I've seen. Really only one thing stuck out to me.

"4ND 47 7H3 3ND 0F 7H3 D4Y, 1F 17 15 48U51V3? WH0 FUCK1NG C4R35. 1 D0N'7 W4N7 0U7, 1 D0N'7 N33D 0U7."

(Plain text: "And at the end of the day, if it is abusive? Who fucking cares. I don't want out, I don't need out.")

We care very deeply. We want victims of abuse to become free of it and eventually recover as much as they can. You seem to be safely enjoying the between-BDSM-and-conabuse dynamic you have, so I won't push anything on you, but please keep in mind this is the general attitude of the group you want to join.

[phoenix-is-the-hottest-thing]

I do understand that of course bullying is bad because bullying is not criticism as the bully does not want the person to improve and instead just takes joy in the suffering of others so it really just helps no one not even the bully because it throws all the reasons behind the actions that might have made them right had they not bullied down the drain. I do however think that there is a limit even in fiction, because there are people who draw sexual artwork of canon minors which is illegal in a lot of countries as well as I do not like when people ship straight up abuse or invalidate explicitly canon sexualities, but I guess if it is actually bad I can just report it and let admins decide. What do you think?

I think you need to look at yourself in a mirror and say that again out loud. Who are you to make yourself judge of what others enjoy? You can not like it, but taking actions to stop a random shipper when they’re totally unrelated to you?

You’re not their mom, you’re not a cop (or at least if you are this isn’t your jurisdiction), you are overstating the degree of “illegality” that has occurred by making generalizations, and you are equating legality with morality when queer people are illegal in plenty of places too. They are not the same thing; some laws are immoral (ex. anti-sodomy laws), and some morals require you break laws (ex. letting poor parents shoplift baby formula).

Furthermore, since we’re on Dudu specifically, by claiming art of fictional anime girls is equivalent to a crime that causes human children real-life suffering, you’re also weaponizing the pain of victims to make people shut up about ships you don’t like, so you’re also being inconsiderate and petty.

Strangers online owe you nothing, leave them alone. Don’t bother reporting someone if you can’t actually pinpoint an actual wrong they’ve committed against someone, just block them if you don’t vibe.

If you witness a user go after a real minor, asking them for intimate details about their lives, if you see someone try to isolate a kid by claiming they’re the only one that can be trusted, if someone is sharing porn with minors (yes even to say “look at how morally terrible it is”)…

THAT is what you report. That is dangerous and can be a sign of real harm, and it should be investigated further by relevant authorities. You can also try to warn the kid (do not control them, give them the facts), or share educational resources on protecting oneself online.

Nobody cares about anime. Reporting that is just wasting everyone’s time.

[sophieinwonderland]

i was scrolling r/SC and its weird the mods are saying you arent responding to their modmail responses and claiming you are "threatening sub members". I have seen no evidence of this anywhere.

Ive seen the odd claims that somehow you are only citing older DSM sources because it "supports your narrative" but then they dont read the criteria for how vague it actually is. Nothing you have show has supported the sysmed claims and I have a degree! I've studied this for more then 6 years and I'm licensed! It's vague for a reason.

The mods there seem to think that our life should revolve around them just because I sent a message to them asking them to remove a post mentioning my name and age. I have asks in my box, and other posts I want to make. I got what I wanted from that conversation, which was proof that I reached out to them to ask them to remove comments naming me. I might respond further if I find the time and the interest. But I haven't yet decided.

As for threatening members of the subreddit... I really have no idea what they're talking about. If anyone there has received any actual threats, it wasn't from me.

I think either they're making things up, or are taking some sort of statement that I'll continue to post about their hate sub as a "threat."

I don't have any idea what they're talking about with citing older DSM entries either. I rarely discuss the DSM, and when I do, it's almost always the DSM-5.

I prefer the ICD-11 as my go-to source, as it explicitly acknowledges that you can have multiple "distinct personality states" without a disorder.

Furthermore, most of the published papers researching and acknowledging endogenic plurality that I cite have all come out within the past decade.

Varieties of Tulpa Experiences: 2016

The Plurality chapter of Transgender Mental Health: 2018

The ICD-11's Boundary With Normality for DID: 2019

Exploring the Utility and Personal Relevance of Co-Produced Multiplicity Resources with Young People: 2021

Conceptualizing multiplicity spectrum experiences: A systematic review and thematic synthesis: 2023

It's just a body: A community-based participatory exploration of the experiences and health care needs for transgender plural people: 2023

And many others.

Practically the only time I cite the DSM is when debunking people falsely claiming the DSM says you need trauma to be a system.

Otherwise, I generally don't consider it that relevant. It never claims you need trauma to be a system. It acknowledges possession states as real phenomena. And the existence of criterion C implies you can meet the other criteria without a disorder. But I feel there are better sources out there to use.

Like you say, it's vague. Despite leaning towards the existence of non-disordered and endogenic plurality, it doesn't go far enough to make it valuable for me.

I'm certainly not going to use older versions of the DSM as sources.

But yeah, there really is nothing to back up their claims. I've been asking anti-endos for years for even ONE single peer-reviewed paper stating that you can't be plural without trauma or a disorder. Just one.

Because I can name countless reputable psychologists and psychiatrists who have made it clear they believe in other forms of plurality in peer-reviewed papers from reputable publishers. I've seen others who are open to the possibility but seem neutral for no other reason than the fact their specialization is in trauma disorders, and they don't deal with people who aren't traumatized or don't have mental illnesses of some kind.

What I have never once seen is a single anti-endo provide a peer-reviewed source stating that you can't possibly be plural without trauma. And I mean this with any wording. It doesn't have to say "plural" or "system," as long as it communicates that this is the only possible way to have multiple self-conscious agents in your head.

See, for example, how the creators of the theory of structural dissociation have said in one paper that "self-conscious" "dissociated parts of the personality" may be involved in mediumship and hypnosis.

In the years I've been asking for this, not one person has been able to link to a peer reviewed source where a psychiatrist or psychologist has stated the opposite.

All they have on their side is The Big Lie. I've talked about this recently. Just repeat a claim over and over again until people believe it. Claim the experts support and agree with you, and you never need to source any of those non-existent experts. That's what r/systemscringe, and sysmeds in general, are depending on. That their members will be gullible enough to just accept whatever they say.

[balketh]

Lol, sorry if I want clear: I'm not here to debate. If you disagree with my thoughts on Starfield because you still like what Bethesda are doing, keep it to yourself. Triple A gaming has gotten worse because of this acceptance of shit (aside from the CEO capitalistic nightmare in the industry atm.) I truly could not want to hear those opinions less; it's like hearing from sports video game fans that current gen sports games are fine being so utterly engorged with dark pattern microtransations. Have some fucking standards, please.

Skyrim was truly only worth a damn because of modding. Oblivion, Morrowind; only still relevant because they're moddable. Bethesda wouldn't have been the first company ever to successfully shoehorn PAID MODDING on CONSOLES if that wasn't 100% the case. Something literally NO other company forced through before them. Skyrim would not have been a mega success if players on PC couldn't fix their issues. It didn't last because of console players. It lasted because of bugfixing and pornmaking modders, and that's a goddamn fact.

Nothing else they've done since has been nearly as good or long lasting. That longevity - because of modding - is the only real reason they've had so many chances to make more games. It's the only reason they're such a big fucking company now. If it wasn't, they wouldn't have released the CK for Starfield.

They have not learned; their games keep getting worse, their sales keep going down. It might be slow, but it's a fucking fact. Reviews aren't everything, just as sales aren't everything, but Bethesda is, largely, on the decline, and that's not up for debate.

Jee, it's almost like headlines like "An All-Time Low For Bethesda Studios" re: Starfield DLC completely support my entire point that Bethesda is in a serious decline that they won't recover from because they keep making worse shit than the last thing they made, and it's been that way SINCE THEY JUST KEPT REMAKING SKYRIM.

I cannot be clear enough when I say it won't improve. A writer for Bethesda, Will Shen, (one of the better writers - responsible for all of Nick Valentine/Far Harbour in FO4, the best bits of FO4), left Bethesda after Starfield, because of how awfully run by upper management it was. That's 1000000% what I'm talking about. I could not be more correct. You don't have to believe me if you don't want to, but people inside the fucking company can see it, exactly as I said.

Emil Pagliarulo, lead writer on - let's see, Bethesda's four worst written games, games known for having shitty stories that people actively disregard in favour of just playing with the game like a sandbox full of toys - FO3, Skyrim, FO4, and Starfield, (with known shitty contributions to Oblivion) claims that Starfield is Bethesda's best work yet. The guy who wrote the Dark Brotherhood storyline in Oblivion, which, to be clear, is dogshit. Not the 'kill creatively' gameplay, not the lore from TES at large, the actual writing, dialogue, and in-game narrative surrounding your actions; go and look it up right now. It's contrived slop, and this was his 'big win'.

The man who openly stated that he doesn't like using design documents in his work. On massive, sprawling, open-world narrative games. The man literally responsible for every single bad story Bethesda has released since Oblivion - yes, all of them, because that's what lead writers do, they approve and direct the writing of their team. The awful non-protag from-birth-fInD-uR-dAd of FO3. Skyrim's utterly generic dRaGoNs-R-bAcK! Go shout at them until they stop! and the god awful lol-all-sides-are-shitheels-but-whatever Thalmor, Legion, and Stormcloaks. FO4's hilarious improvement on FO3, 'SHAUN, WHERE IS MY BABY SHAUN', with the most obvious fucking minute-one twist imaginable, and now, his pièce de résistance, an entire universe of uninteresting, themeless, cookie-cutter sci-fi drudgery with no real reason to explore or be invested. A man so anti-protag in singleplayer games that rather than make you the protagonist in Starfield, they used the restartable ending to write off your singular importance by having there be infinity of you.

The fucker responsible for Shattered Space's absolutely dogshit reception, and its terrible writing and narrative direction. That lead to article headlines like 'Bethesda Honcho says Starfield is "the best game we've ever made" in massive bout of amnesia', something that would only fly if, oh, I don't know, we were generally all aware of how dogshit Bethesda's writing and dialogue have been for a decade. He might not have done the genuinely fucking bland, soulless gameplay, or riddled the game with fucking BETHESDA MENUS, but he's responsible for the most unfixable thing in all of these games: the writing.

That's who will be doing ES6, probably with Todd backing him.

People didn't buy Skyrim 17 times (yes, that's how many discrete versions of Skyrim you could have bought without buying the same game on the same console twice) for the fucking story. They bought it because it's a fucking fantasy sandbox that did not have a competitor of similar scope for years. Starfield is a bad sandbox, and it shows.

Yeah, no, Bethesda's a fucking goner if he does ES6. It won't flop, because people will fucking RUSH to buy it day 1 without knowing a thing about it, but the reviews that follow will eviscerate it. ES6 will be the downfall of Bethesda. Both of them need to fuckin' retire, and let some actual talent do the writing for once in this decade.

I can only wish it would drop sooner rather than later, so they could just fucking stop.

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Bruce Hoffman

Published: Oct 10, 2023

“Not every German who bought a copy of Mein Kampf necessarily read it … But it might be argued that had more non-Nazi Germans read it before 1933 and had the foreign statesmen of the world perused it carefully while there was still time, both Germany and the world might have been saved from catastrophe.” — William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich

--

How many Israelis, or Jews, or anyone else for that matter, have read the 1988 Hamas Covenant or the revised charter that was issued in 2017? With 36 articles of only a few paragraphs’ length each in the former, and 42 concise statements of general principles and objectives in the latter, both are considerably shorter and more digestible than the 782-page original German-language edition of Mein Kampf. Moreover, unlike Hitler’s seminal work, which was not published in English until March 1939, excellent English translations of both the original Hamas Covenant and its successor can easily be found on the internet.

Released on August 18, 1988, the original covenant spells out clearly Hamas’s genocidal intentions. Accordingly, what happened in Israel on Saturday is completely in keeping with Hamas’s explicit aims and stated objectives. It was in fact the inchoate realization of Hamas’s true ambitions.

The most relevant of the document’s 36 articles can be summarized as falling within four main themes:

The complete destruction of Israel as an essential condition for the liberation of Palestine and the establishment of a theocratic state based on Islamic law (Sharia),

The need for both unrestrained and unceasing holy war (jihad) to attain the above objective,

The deliberate disdain for, and dismissal of, any negotiated resolution or political settlement of Jewish and Muslim claims to the Holy Land, and

The reinforcement of historical anti-Semitic tropes and calumnies married to sinister conspiracy theories.

Thus, as fighting rages in Israel and Gaza, and may yet escalate and spread, pleas for moderation, restraint, negotiation, and the building of pathways to peace are destined to find no purchase with Hamas. The covenant makes clear that holy war, divinely ordained and scripturally sanctioned, is in Hamas’s DNA.

Israel’s Complete and Utter Destruction

The covenant opens with a message that precisely encapsulates Hamas’s master plan. Quoting Hassan al-Banna, the Egyptian founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, of which Hamas is a constituent member (Article 2), the document proclaims, “Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it.”

Lest there be any doubt about Hamas’s sanguinary aims toward Israel and the Jewish people, the introduction goes on to explain:

This Covenant of the Islamic Resistance Movement (HAMAS), clarifies its picture, reveals its identity, outlines its stand, explains its aims, speaks about its hopes, and calls for its support, adoption and joining its ranks. Our struggle against the Jews is very great and very serious … It is a step that inevitably should be followed by other steps.

After some general explanatory language about Hamas’s religious foundation and noble intentions, the covenant comes to the Islamic Resistance Movement’s raison d’être: the slaughter of Jews. “The Day of Judgement will not come about,” it proclaims, “until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.”

Article 11 spells out why this annihilation of Jews is required. Palestine is described as an “Islamic Waqf”—an endowment predicated on Muslim religious, education, or charitable principles and therefore inviolate to any other peoples or religions. Accordingly, the territory that now encompasses Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank is

consecrated for future Moslem generations until Judgement Day. It, or any part of it, should not be squandered: it, or any part of it, should not be given up … This Waqf remains as long as earth and heaven remain. Any procedure in contradiction to Islamic Sharia, where Palestine is concerned, is null and void.

In sum, any compromise over this land, including the moribund two-state solution, much less coexistence among faiths and peoples, is forbidden.

Holy War

Article 12 links the exclusive Muslim right to the land between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River with the religious obligation incumbent upon all Muslims to wage a war of religious purification. “Nothing in nationalism is more significant or deeper than in the case when an enemy should tread Moslem land. Resisting and quelling the enemy becomes the individual duty of every Moslem [sic], male or female”—a point later reiterated in Articles 14 and 15.

Article 15, moreover, highlights the importance of inculcating this mindset in children. “It is important that basic changes be made in the school curriculum, to cleanse it of the traces of ideological invasion that affected it as a result of the orientalists and missionaries who infiltrated the region following the defeat of the Crusaders at the hands of Salah el-Din (Saladin).” Along these lines, Article 30 also points out that jihad is not confined to the carrying of arms and the confrontation of the enemy: “Writers, intellectuals, media people, orators, educaters [sic]” are called upon “fulfill their duty, because of the ferocity of the Zionist offensive and the Zionist influence in many countries exercised through financial and media control, as well as the consequences that all this lead to in the greater part of the world.”

Nothing is negotiable

Article 13 rejects any kind of negotiations for, or peaceful resolution of, Jewish and Palestinian territorial claims to the land. On this point, the covenant is completely transparent: “There is no solution for the Palestinian question except through Jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavors.” Nor are these words historical artifacts. Hamas “military” communiqués heralding the triumphs of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood end with the words “It is a jihad of victory or martyrdom.”

Indeed, this part of the covenant stresses that:

Initiatives, and so-called peaceful solutions and international conferences, are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement. Abusing any part of Palestine is abuse directed against part of religion. Nationalism of the Islamic Resistance Movement is part of its religion. Its members have been fed on that. For the sake of hoisting the banner of Allah over their homeland they fight.

The covenant further says of international negotiations that the “Palestinian people know better than to consent to having their future, rights and fate toyed with.”

Base Anti-Semitism

The covenant is especially noteworthy for its trafficking in odious calumnies and conspiracies about the Jewish people and the alleged superhuman influence and power that they exercise over all mankind. “In their Nazi treatment [of other peoples], the Jews made no exception for women or children,” Article 20 begins. “Their policy of striking fear in the heart is meant for all. They attack people where their breadwinning is concerned, extorting their money and threatening their honor. They deal with people as if they were the worst war criminals.”

Article 22 advances this theme. Channeling the fantastical arguments of the infamous Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion (which is discussed in Article 32), Hitler’s Mein Kampf, and the Ku Klux Klan, it elaborates on the depth and breadth of Jewish perfidy. The language of this article is so unhinged that it is worth quoting in full:

For a long time, the enemies have been planning, skillfully and with precision, for the achievement of what they have attained. They took into consideration the causes affecting the current of events. They strived to amass great and substantive material wealth which they devoted to the realization of their dream. With their money, they took control of the world media, news agencies, the press, publishing houses, broadcasting stations, and others. With their money they stirred revolutions in various parts of the world with the purpose of achieving their interests and reaping the fruit therein. They were behind the French Revolution, the Communist revolution and most of the revolutions we heard and hear about, here and there. With their money they formed secret societies, such as Freemasons, Rotary Clubs, the Lions and others in different parts of the world for the purpose of sabotaging societies and achieving Zionist interests. With their money they were able to control imperialistic countries and instigate them to colonize many countries in order to enable them to exploit their resources and spread corruption there.

You may speak as much as you want about regional and world wars. They were behind World War I, when they were able to destroy the Islamic Caliphate, making financial gains and controlling resources. They obtained the Balfour Declaration, formed the League of Nations through which they could rule the world. They were behind World War II, through which they made huge financial gains by trading in armaments, and paved the way for the establishment of their state. It was they who instigated the replacement of the League of Nations with the United Nations and the Security Council to enable them to rule the world through them. There is no war going on anywhere, without having their finger in it.

Article 28 continues this theme and again cites various civic organizations and fraternal orders as the malign vessels through which the Jewish people relentlessly pursue their goal of global domination. Alcoholism and drug addiction are integral tools of the Jews’ nefarious plot:

The Zionist invasion is a vicious invasion. It does not refrain from resorting to all methods, using all evil and contemptible ways to achieve its end. It relies greatly in its infiltration and espionage operations on the secret organizations it gave rise to, such as the Freemasons, The Rotary and Lions clubs, and other sabotage groups. All these organizations, whether secret or open, work in the interest of Zionism and according to its instructions. They aim at undermining societies, destroying values, corrupting consciences, deteriorating character and annihilating Islam. It is behind the drug trade and alcoholism in all its kinds so as to facilitate its control and expansion.

After Palestine, Article 32 explains, “the Zionists aspire to expand from the Nile to the Euphrates. When they will have digested the region they overtook, they will aspire to further expansion, and so on. Their plan is embodied in the ‘Protocols of the Elders of Zion,’ and their present conduct is the best proof of what we are saying.” Standing against this overwhelming force is Hamas—“the spearhead of the circle of struggle with world Zionism and a step on the road.”

Tucked into Article 31, toward the end of the delineation of its three dozen guiding principles, Hamas claims that all faiths can “coexist in peace and quiet with each other” under its unique “wing of Islam.” But lest anyone be lulled into believing the promise of this paradise on Earth, Hamas demands as the price of entry full allegiance and unquestioning compliance with its rule: “It is the duty of the followers of other religions to stop disputing the sovereignty of Islam in this region, because the day these followers should take over there will be nothing but carnage, displacement and terror.”

A Kinder, Gentler Charter?

On May 1, 2017, Hamas issued a revised charter. Gone were the “vague religious rhetoric and outlandish utopian pronouncements” of the earlier document, according to analysis prepared for the Institute of Palestine Studies. Instead, the new charter was redolent of “straightforward and mostly pragmatic political language” that had “shifted the movement’s positions and policies further toward the spheres of pragmatism and nationalism as opposed to dogma and Islamism.” Nonetheless, the analyst was struck by “the movement’s adherence to its founding principles” alongside newly crafted, “carefully worded” language suggesting moderation and flexibility.

Israel immediately dismissed the group’s effort to promote a kinder, gentler image of its once avowedly bloodthirsty agenda. “Hamas is attempting to fool the world, but it will not succeed,” a spokesperson from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office predicted.

In fact, the new document differs little from its predecessor. Much like the original, the new document asserts Hamas’s long-standing goal of establishing a sovereign, Islamist Palestinian state that extends, according to Article 2, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea and from the Lebanese border to the Israeli city of Eilat—in other words, through the entirety of Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza. And it is similarly unequivocal about “the right of return” of all Palestinian refugees displaced as a result of the 1948 and 1967 wars (Article 12)—which is portrayed as “a natural right, both individual and collective,” divinely ordained and “inalienable.” That right, therefore “cannot be dispensed with by any party, whether Palestinian, Arab or international,” thus again rendering negotiations or efforts to achieve any kind of political settlement between Israel and the Palestinians irrelevant, void, or both. Article 27 forcefully reinforces this point: “There is no alternative to a fully sovereign Palestinian State on the entire national Palestinian soil, with Jerusalem as its capital.”

The most striking departure from the 1988 charter is that the 2017 statement of principles and objectives now claims that Hamas is not anti-Jewish but anti-Zionist and, accordingly, sees “Zionists” and not “Jews” as the preeminent enemy and target of its opprobrium. The revised document therefore modulates the blatantly anti-Semitic rhetoric of its predecessor but once again decries Zionism as central to a dark, conspiratorial plot of global dimensions.

For centuries, Jews have been blamed for causing the anti-Semitism directed against them. The new Hamas charter perpetuates this libel, arguing, “It is the Zionists who constantly identify Judaism and the Jews with their own colonial project and illegal entity” and who are therefore responsible for the conflation of anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism.

The Zionist project, according to Article 14, is a “racist, aggressive, colonial and expansionist project based on seizing the properties of others; it is hostile to the Palestinian people and to their aspiration for freedom, liberation, return and self-determination. The Israeli entity is the plaything of the Zionist project and its base of aggression.” Article 15 goes on to claim that Zionism is the enemy not just of the Palestinian people but of all Muslims, and that it poses “a danger to international security and peace and to mankind and its interests and stability.” The following article then attempts to thread the needle between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism: “Hamas affirms that its conflict is with the Zionist project not with the Jews because of their religion.”

Although the new charter lacks the febrile denunciations of “initiatives, and so-called peaceful solutions and international conferences” of its predecessor, it makes Hamas’s position on Israel’s existence abundantly clear. “The establishment of ‘Israel’ is entirely illegal and contravenes the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people,” Article 18 states, “and goes against their will and the will of the Ummah.” Driving home this point, the new Article 19 proclaims, “There shall be no recognition of the legitimacy of the Zionist entity. Whatever has befallen the land of Palestine in terms of occupation, settlement building, judaisation [sic] or changes to its features or falsification of facts is illegitimate. Rights never lapse.”

As for the promise of peace between Israel and Palestine expressed in the 1993 Oslo Accords, Article 21 is explicit in stating Hamas’s rejection of that landmark agreement: “Hamas affirms that the Oslo Accords and their addenda contravene the governing rules of international law in that they generate commitments that violate the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people. Therefore, the Movement rejects these agreements and all that flows from them.”

Hamas affirms, instead, its commitment to liberating Palestine by force. “Resisting the occupation with all means and methods is a legitimate right guaranteed by divine laws and by international norms and laws,” the document states. “At the heart of these lies armed resistance, which is regarded as the strategic choice for protecting the principles and the rights of the Palestinian people.”

Perhaps the most astonishing statement in the entire new document—issued by a terrorist group that has forbade elections in Gaza since 2007—is the fatuous claim in Article 29 that “Hamas believes in, and adheres to, managing its Palestinian relations on the basis of pluralism, democracy, national partnership, acceptance of the other and the adoption of dialogue.”

Plus Ça Change, Plus C'est La Même Chose

In the British historian Richard J. Evan’s magisterial account of the Third Reich, he recounts the reflections of a young German woman who’d read Mein Kampf in 1933: “Like many of her upper-middle-class friends, she discounted the violence and antisemitism of the National Socialists as passing excesses which would soon disappear.”  Until October 7, 2023, many in Palestine, Israel, and elsewhere may similarly have dismissed or discounted the acuity of Hamas’s aims and ambitions, its true objectives, and its as-yet-unfulfilled master plan as stated in both the 1988 and 2017 documents. Few are as ignorant or uncomprehending now.

[ Via: https://archive.md/Wm9tH ]

==

If you want to read the original 1988 Charter for yourself, you can find it here, in Yale's law library: https://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/hamas.asp

If you've read the Charter all the way through and still regard Israel as the bad guy, I legitimately don't know what to tell you.

[bimboficationblues]

what is the connection you see between liberalism and "prevent suicide at any cost"? i get the other two but not liberalism

oh I'm so glad you asked, this is a super fascinating topic imo.

One of the interesting shifts that goes on in the philosophical conversation around suicide in early modernity is that while religious objections to suicide were being undermined, this didn't necessarily stop objections. (Hume is one of the few bigger names that doesn't seek an alternative secular grounding for opposition to suicide and instead just rebukes the religious argument.) Instead the anti-suicide attitude became sociopolitically driven. On the ideological level, anti-suicide thought assumed a particular kind of social and political subject and image of society that would have been alien to earlier Christian writers like Aquinas. On the more material level we see the modern state developing an increased interest in the health of their populations (though only on an abstract, utilitarian level, for the purposes of maintaining security and control) via the disciplinary institutions of law and medicine.

A really good example: while John Stuart Mill, Boy Genius, never explicitly addresses suicide in On Liberty, he does indirectly discuss it when carving out exceptions to his "harm principle." While generally intervening in the behavior of others for "their own good" is politically and socially undesirable for Mill, there are some exceptions. He uses the example of selling yourself into slavery as an "extreme example" of how one should not be permitted to give up their own liberty and ability to make reasoned decisions about their life. Personally, I think this passage might cut either way on the question of suicide; Mill's primarily interested in social and political liberty and so the idea of removing one's own "metaphysical" liberty through self-annihilation seems outside his scope.

But he also argues that, despite the harm principle, society can intervene if someone is putting themselves at risk or going to harm themselves if they are a "child, or delirious, or in some state of excitement or absorption incompatible with the full use of the reflecting faculty" - i.e. a non-rational agent in some way. Even if it's not what Mill is directly addressing, there's a clear line to be drawn between his ideas about the ability to exercise reason as a foundation for autonomy and modern, non-religious anti-suicide sentiment. This is a recurring theme of modern liberal attitudes towards suicide, which regard it as a fundamentally anti-rational act and therefore grants society permission to override, restrain, and act upon you in ways contrary to your individual desires. (For the record, this same supposed lack of ability to govern oneself effectively is also Mill's self-absolving justification for authoritarianism and colonialism: "Despotism is a legitimate mode of government in dealing with barbarians.") You and I might conceive of suicidal ideation as a rational or at least quasi-rational response, but that's not typically, or at least consistently, something that liberal thought grants.

You can find similar views (if unique to their own frameworks) in Hobbes (natural right), Kant (deontology), even Spinoza to some extent (egoism), even as each of them is (in some form or another) trying to resist a religious justification for their opposition.

Contemporarily, in response to Washington v. Glucksberg (an assisted suicide SCOTUS case), Rawls, Nozick, Judith Jarvis Thomson, Ron Dworkin, and a couple other schmucks filed an amicus curiae brief arguing in defense of assisted suicide. That might seem to cut against my claim - maybe this is a change in the shape of liberal thought? But! I think what's noteworthy is that 1) their argument still takes place entirely on the terrain of rights, i.e. what the state is willing to grant and enforce (which is appropriate considering the venue, but still relevant), and 2) assisted suicide has been the main contemporary avenue of discussion in philosophy and policy regarding suicide. You don't see a generalized defense of suicide too often these days. it's taken as something of a given that while it may or may not be okay to end your life because of physical illness or debilitation, and this is an acceptable debate for public policy, it is definitely NOT okay to end your life because of mental illness or because you want to.

I'm pointing to political philosophers because it comes immediately to me, but I think they serve as good representatives of how the anti-suicide perspective can have a political "liberal" shape beyond just religiosity or psychiatric intervention, and how it's changed over time. sadly don't have the time to do a full historical genealogy effortpost on this subject, but to put on the Foucault hat for a very brief moment: suicide is decreasingly arbitrated by religious institutions. Instead we find it governed by secular law and judges (e.g. Washington v. Glucksberg), and by health regimes of psychiatry and medicine, all of these forces that developed and intensified their discipline over large populations as part of the contemporary science of statecraft.

Anyway, so when I say that anti-suicide attitudes are rooted in bad values and institutions like liberalism, that's what I mean - the idea that suicide is an irrational act that needs to be suppressed by state power, in the process producing a "suicidal subject" that needs to be contained by law and medicine.

An interesting article on some of this stuff, by way of Hobbes, Foucault, and ideas around the legality and social convention of suicide.

[kimyoonmiauthor]

Nanowrimo supports AI (along with a groomer) AKA Downfall of Nanowrimo.

In case you don't want to click, here are some screen captures from the page:

What is NaNoWriMo's position on Artificial Intelligence (AI)? 2 days agoUpdated Not yet followed by anyone NaNoWriMo does not explicitly support any specific approach to writing, nor does it explicitly condemn any approach, including the use of AI. NaNoWriMo's mission is to "provide the structure, community, and encouragement to help people use their voices, achieve creative goals, and build new worlds—on and off the page." We fulfill our mission by supporting the humans doing the writing. Please see this related post that speaks to our overall position on nondiscrimination with respect to approaches to creativity, writer's resources, and personal choice.  We also want to be clear in our belief that the categorical condemnation of Artificial Intelligence has classist and ableist undertones, and that questions around the use of AI tie to questions around privilege.  Classism. Not all writers have the financial ability to hire humans to help at certain phases of their writing. For some writers, the decision to use AI is a practical, not an ideological, one. The financial ability to engage a human for feedback and review assumes a level of privilege that not all community members possess. Ableism. Not all brains have same abilities and not all writers function at the same level of education or proficiency in the language in which they are writing. Some brains and ability levels require outside help or accommodations to achieve certain goals. The notion that all writers ���should“ be able to perform certain functions independently or is a position that we disagree with wholeheartedly. There is a wealth of reasons why individuals can't "see" the issues in their writing without help.  General Access Issues. All of these considerations exist within a larger system in which writers don't always have equal access to resources along the chain. For example, underrepresented minorities are less likely to be offered traditional publishing contracts, which places some, by default, into the indie author space, which inequitably creates upfront cost burdens that authors who do not suffer from systemic discrimination may have to incur.  Beyond that, we see value in sharing resources and information about AI and any emerging technology, issue, or discussion that is relevant to the writing community as a whole. It's healthy for writers to be curious about what's new and forthcoming, and what might impact their career space or their pursuit of the craft. Our events with a connection to AI have been extremely well-attended, further-proof that this programming is serving Wrimos who want to know more.  For all of those reasons, we absolutely do not condemn AI, and we recognize and respect writers who believe that AI tools are right for them. We recognize that some members of our community stand staunchly against AI for themselves, and that's perfectly fine. As individuals, we have the freedom to make our own decisions.

BTW, grooming is here: https://www.ravenoak.net/the-fall-of-nanowrimo/

And they had issues with racism before that.

And BTW, it's not ableist to not use AI. I knew a ton of people with various disabilities on the boards who were actively arguing for activism and disability.

I saw an argument that it's anti-ND to say that people can't use AI and that's horseshit, seriously. And then they tried to say autism, but I know PLENTY of autistic authors and writers. There are autistic people in every profession. like WTF. And BTW, not Autistic, but to argue anti-ND? No.

It's not classicism either.

But I will tell you that Nanowrimo in my days there was highly racist. They claimed for days they had a "diverse staff" and then when they did a group photo they were all white in the picture (as far as I could tell) and were A-OK with people posting pro-KKK things on forums like threatening PoC writers with burning crosses on their lawns.

So am I surprised they went down the double dark path, no. But I do wish they had turned it around. And BTW, I have to plug a tiny IToldYouSo to We Need Diverse Books. I was like, why are you supporting Nanowrimo when they have a history of racism? And they were like, A-OK with us. (I had the thread at the time with the moderators saying that the N word spelled out was OK and this is not a democracy and making excuses that people who were literally of those labels argued against while they were like But what about autistic people and autistic people said, we'll be just fine with this (in thread). Also, WTF is with NTs hanging out Autistic people out to dry while autistic people are telling you WTF?). What exact reform happened? None.

Ah, do I remember the long threads of people arguing how Europe didn't trade? I absolutely do.

BTW, the reason they locked the forums they way they did was so people couldn't complain about their groomer whom they protected.

Sometimes you know before you know. That's me with nanowrimo and that author who shall not be named. I felt iffy about her first book.

BTW, I didn't know with the recent other author who tried to blame his autism for his SA. But Like WTH is with people also *shocked* that his shows are being canceled? That whole block baffles me. But I'm irked.

[theangryjikooker]

I have a hard time believing the Daeun thing, just cause it came out of the blue. He has never been seen with her. Not even by saesangs or stalkers. One day she was wearing a 13 shirt for her favorite player and it escalated from there asking if she was supporting Jimin, cause you know. If you're in korea and post 13 its automatically linked to Jk or Jm according to fans. In one of her lives, she was genuinely so confused when someone asked her to talk about Jimin and she said why would I talk about someone I don't know & has never met. She got asked again on her live about dating and she said she was single. Then when asked about JImin again she started getting irritated & said she already denied it to leave her alone. Once her followers started going up, seems she started playing into it & suddenly she's got sponsors on her posts and stuff & posting Jimin antis cussing her out. Seems she thought she might get Hybe to respond with a denial, which would make her more relevant. Her ex's house has the same layout as Jimin's. Even his table is the same cause he posted pictures from his home and it was the same one they claim is Jimin's. Plus as you said, Jimin is extremely private and would never give an okay for her to do that. And if she's an insane bitter ex trying to expose him, they have NDA's that would keep her from doing that. She's been accused of this same thing too & media called her out.

Posting for info on the matter (I’ve received plenty trying to prove/disprove this, and most of you are saying the same things) as I’m not too informed of the JM-Daeun lore, except for snippets here and there, and really don’t care about it overall.

While I think she’s full of it, another anon who requested I keep their submission private to avoid the ire of Jkkrs (which honestly is a bit silly because I also don’t care about that, and I’d be the one taking the hit), said some things like the timing of Daeun’s photos which were taken before the release of FACE lines up and seems to prove they were at least together at one point, etc.

I will say that I’ve seen the same thing said about her photos—that the layout, furniture, dinnerware, etc. apparently matched everything about JM’s house (how any of you manage to make this claim is beyond weird, by the way)—and if it’s true, Daeun going out of her way to match “everything” to JM’s space is less likely than her being at his place at some point.

Side note: I’ve been to Korea numerous times/our friends live in Apgujeong, Yongsan, and Seongsu. Some of those friends share the same cutlery/furniture, but that’s also because a lot of Koreans evidently go shopping at the same places. They have a nearly uniform taste in things. I’m not saying that this is the case for JM-Daeun, but it’s something I’d question for myself since I’ve seen firsthand how similar Korean households can be but that’s also because of what’s available to them. JM doesn’t strike me as someone who gives too much thought about the interior design of his house like TH and NJ do, so I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of what he owns is generic.

I say this from a logical standpoint, but without having seen any of the threads and “proof,” I still think she’s an oddball.

[gemsofgreece]

https://twitter.com/nonregemesse/status/1665090309636644866?t=Wam_pcFXnis0kcl45Kg2Uw&s=19

Welp even Brits can't escape this nonsense. Teaching at universities that an important part of England history isn't real to make it anti racist?? How is it anyway??

In general i think it's some false stereotypes that has to do with skin colour otherwise i don't know why people in Europe view parts of their history as racist (and i fear USA started it).

I saw it when you sent it to me but now the Twitter link seems to have been taken down, so I found the Telegraph article on Reddit (because it’s behind a paywall in their own website)

I would like to comment on your use of the word “even”. Western Europe has been way more submissive to the expansion of American wokeness and it has been a few years it largely inflicts itself on it. It is not like in the east, where this is still more like an external trend we try to resist to, it has largely been embraced there. Of course we are talking about the problematic, hugely toxic new movement that has lost all sense and respect for historical truth in its effort to establish equality and justice in the very special and one-sided way it alone understands it. I am obviously not talking about any well-based, founded and studied movements for inclusivity of all groups of people or the respect and support of their rights in our lifetimes, which is CRUCIAL.

Back to the article, apparently Anglo-Saxons did not exist according to the University of Cambridge and the reason behind their non-existence is an attempt to stop nationalistic sentiment of British-born people claiming an Anglo-Saxon ancestry, therefore suggesting they originate from tribes coming from North and Central Europe, and therefore being white by heritage. Of course the Anglo-Saxons are one of the historical groups that make the genetic make-up of the old Brits, not the original or the exclusive one. I don’t understand why Cambridge feels the need to lower its IQ by 100 points and self-inflict a blow in its reputation just to converse with the potential dimwits who might feel superior for may or may not having some part Anglo-Saxon descent (also how can this be proved anyway?). But this is the problem with wokeness: instead of rising intellectually above its opponents, it falls on their level, except from the other side. The results are laughably sad, like in this case.

On the other hand, maybe the article is sensationalising (or the University is exaggerating) the fact that the Anglo-Saxons were more of a cultural group that developed any sort of unity after establishing themselves for long in Britain and not prior to that. They usually landed there in large spans of time as small groups of people migrating from NC Europe without any particular ethnic unity and sense of identity. It’s not like a full blown nation called “Anglo-Saxons” landed there and took Britain by force. From the little reading I did anyway, I am not all that knowledgeable on English history, even though it is fascinating and I would love to learn more in the future.

In any case, it’s evident by its arguments that the University did this for political reasons and not for reasons of exhaustive historical accuracy. And again it’s a different thing to say Anglo-Saxons were not like what the nationalists paint them to be from saying they never existed at all.

In the Reddit thread, someone has reposted the whole article.

Also spot on Greek-relevant comment in this thread under the cut:

🙃

[discorddramahub]

Don't read all this (or dismiss its gravity) if you don't like big rants (it's relevant though), but anyways...

I don't understand the compulsion people on Discord, Guilded, Matrix, etc. have to pressure people into voice chatting with them. I've experienced this a lot today and it's becoming bothersome. It's like anything else that's consensual, it should be up to an individual if they want to voice chat, and it's not even the final nail in the coffin of who someone claims to be anyways, there are better nails for that.

It's probably more normal in fact to reject voice chatting; it could be, one, for technological reasons (not everyone has a mic, some don't use mic devices), it could be, two, environmental (slow internet, too much background noise, too much of a need not to disturb anyone, etc.), thirdly it could be medical (someone might be mute, deaf, have a sore throat, etc.), fourthly it might be cultural (abusive households might not let someone, their religion might not, or they speak another language when not typing, etc.), there could be a legal implication (restraining orders or parole for example, or someone might live somewhere where the internet is legal but monitored for anti-government expression), or six, it could be ethical/emotional/technical (you might be demanded to do it by someone you dislike and not want to reward them when it would be unfair to a friend, or it might conflict with your policy on commissions for some reason, or you might be following Anonymous' doctrine which specifies one non-anonymous person can compromise everyone's anonymity, or fear that someone will take your voice and use it for AI, etc.)

If you see ANYONE try to pressure ANYONE into voice chatting (or trying to perpetuate the supremacy of VC culture in general), BLOCK the person who is doing the pressuring. Or rather that would be my advice. Most often I see incels doing this, they want to decrease their distance with people for all the wrong reasons, one aspect about them at a time. Even to just make the statement is a good cause. If one is to VC, their existence onto the VC scene will flow into being.

Alright, I won't.

[filthforfriends]

Most white people are racist to some extent even if it's internalized and that's not a problem if they acknowledge it because us poc suffer from internalised racism as well

But it's so much worse when people like må pull crap like this Because they claim to care for us

I'd rather an openly racist person abuse me because atleast I know what to expect from em

THIS.

Reminds me of a video I just saw from Racial Equity Insights called Drop the "Good/Bad Person" Binary. It made me check myself. Before, I talked about white celebrity's lackluster anti-racism being incentivized by personal gain. But thats true of the general population, who are incentivized by being seen as a good person. To decide who qualifies as a Good Person™️ - and is deserving of the subsequent social validation - criteria had to be created by white "allies." Which landed us in this mega fucked situation where white people now ultimately designate what is and isn't racist, despite never experiencing racism.

Nuanced racial insensitivity like treating POC as props? Too difficult to measure. Designation: Not Racist. POC's emotional struggles like internalized racism? Unrelatable. Designation: Not Racist. Institutionalized racism like the 13th Amendment? Logistically complicated. Too much effort. Designation: Not Racist. Topics that require research like racial equality vs. racial equity? Confusing. Allyship shouldn't demand research. Designation: Not Racist. Historically relevant racism like the representation of Black people in entertainment? Too intimidating. Brain go ouchie. Designation: Not Racist. But most of all, suggesting that anything not already included in the Good Person Criteria™️ is racially insensitive? UNHINGED OUTRAGE

Because if white allies have to add to their Not Racist Criteria™️, then everyone could potentially lose their Good Person™️ status. Which means they'd lose all the social validation that accompanies it! They'd have to adjust their self-image, their world view, and thats just asking too much.

I've received a couple anons who are either outright denying that Maneskin are at fault or they're saying that while Maneskin's actions might have been racially insensitive, Maneskin themselves aren't. But white people don't get to decide what's racist/racially insensitive, even if society has mislead us to that belief. So, frankly, tough shit. Learn something new.

[florenceisfalling]

y'know there is something to be said about how many atheist circles (including those that rub elbows with occultism/witchcraft) that pride themselves in being anti-religion are built on an inflated sense of superiority over the Delusional Mass Of Religious Sheep where these atheists and those like them Are The Only Rational People and the way those circles will always, invariably, devolve into being vaguely pro-eugenics, religious intolerant as fuck (while claiming religious intolerance is the proof religion is the root of all evil) and espousing white supremacist talking points (not to mention the like actual white supremacists lol)

okay attempting to answer this TWO! because tumblr hates me :(

YEAH

tbh i am v frustrated by the tendency of some ppl on both sides (not tryin to be generalizing, this isnt abt everyone just Certain People) to be aggressively moralizing about atheism. like Obviously people are gonna think their own beliefs are superior, thats why they believe em in the first place. but it drives me bonkers whenever some ~progressive agnostics~ who claim to believe in religious freedom turn around and shit on atheists for "not being spiritual or emotional enough" which is stupid bc the whole point of religious freedom is that you have the liberty to NOT be religious too! and then you have some atheists who act like they're right because everyone else is sooo stupid while ignoring the many many reasons someone might be religious other than just "make-believe"!! reminds me of when ppl talk about how crazy it is that anyone could fall for "obvious" cult tactics bc they have no understanding of how cult behaviors can exist outside of the stereotype of a spooky commune with a fake jesus leader

and goodness gracious atheism is just as fucking fine as anything else Obviously. and tbh i respect it enough if someone being straightup anti-theist on a political level if they genuinely believe that religion is the root of the problem and Acknowledge That after genuine thought . but some ppl will do shit like take a snippet of religious text and strip it from all context/interpretation/etc while waving it around like Evidence that Religion Is Silly and thats it

there is also this annoying divide between ppl who are chill with big religion and not with more niche personal beliefs and vice versa. like u get ppl who think christianity, islam, etc are fine and excusable (regardless of whether they believe in it or not) bc they have "cultural value" but dunk on peoples less popular practices bc they think it must be some mental problem or just "too weird!" ... and on the flip side youve got people who are fine with the personal beliefs they think will always remain harmless while opposing bigger religions under the assumption that every single believer's practice of them must fit neatly into the category of Oppressor. but that is somewhat a less relevant conversation and im starting to experience very weird vertigo shit rn so im gonna stop staring at a screen god bless