#And they're like 'will moral support do?'

[unoriginalcontent]

Been thinking a bit about this post; I do believe that to empathize with Trump voters, at least on an intellectual level, is important for purely pragmatic reasons. The idea there is that the right wing propaganda machine is a menace that no one knows how to deal with, and so if we can understand the concerns and anxieties of the conservative voter, we might have an opportunity to demonstrate how Trump is tangibly not addressing their problems and turn them against him. And hell, even if they did vote for him out of bigotry, maybe they'll still be willing to turn on him out of self-interest. However much it sucks, many of these people will not care if you simply point out that his policies harm other people. They've already set the human cost aside as acceptable losses, or else they outright support harming these people, which is why a different strategy is necessary for them. If we can get conservatives to turn on Trump, then even if it's not for the right and morally-correct reasons, that's still a win.

Of course that's all in reference to conservatives who were probably already predisposed towards whoever has an R next to their name on the ballot. When it comes to leftists who refuse to associate with democrats out of protest, I just don't know. I can understand that someone might want to vote out of self-interest and also believe that a Trump presidency is beneficial to them. Obviously they're likely to be wrong, but it's not hypocritical to have believed a lie and acted accordingly. Conversely, I think most leftists are people who will claim that government and voting shouldn't just be about self-interest, and that helping other people is a worthy end unto itself. And yeah, they should have known better.

If you're educated enough on the issues to have known all of Harris's shortcomings, how the hell do you not also know Trump's? If you know them both, how the hell can you conflate the two as equally bad?

We have this idea in the left that our systems are bad, and therefore we can never make progress until we destroy the systems entirely and build something new from the ashes. If you believe that, then please get your head out of the clouds because that's what Trump and Musk are trying to give us, and it turns out to be bad. We live in the system, we depend on the system, if we didn't then it wouldn't matter how many federal programs Trump is trying to abolish. Even if you specifically will be fine, you're writing everyone else off as an acceptable loss. It's not wrong to imagine and strive for a better world than this one, but unless you have viable alternatives ready and waiting, you won't get there by breaking things.

Maybe it's unfair to blame the current situation on people on the left who didn't vote for Harris. I don't even know how much blame matters at this point. And yet I think this is an important thing for all of us to keep in mind. Your moral clarity can be used against you. No matter how good and pure your ideals are, the real world has to come first. And right now that means acknowledging that a huge portion of our democracy chose Trump. And they don't care if you're hurt from his policies, or if I'm hurt, for a lot of these voters your suffering is probably just sugar on top. OP is absolutely right, they probably don't regret wishing leopards onto other people, but that doesn't mean it's not worth convincing them that we should stop the leopards before their faces are eaten. People are going to be poisoned by food which they voted to deregulate, and a part of me wants to think of that as justice. I feel angry. I feel spiteful. These people are taking human rights violations and touting them as victories, fuck them. But anger and spite won't fix anything, even from our side. And no matter how awful some of these people might be, together they're a hell of a voting block. I wish that I could force people to care about the suffering of others, but I can't. And so I hope that it's possible to at least get them to care about themselves.

And if you do think of yourself as progressive, and you still refused to vote for Harris, then I think OP is right, and you really do take a look at yourself. It is true that many of our problems are created and perpetuated by larger institutions beyond our control, but when it comes to democracy, it's not enough blame the system. You're a part of the system. If you don't want to participate, you need to have an alternative that is—crucially—viable, actionable, and realistic in the immediate short term. If you don't have that, which I guarantee you don't, then high-stakes elections are not the time for moral grandstanding.

Sorry for rambling here on your post, I'm probably a bit scattered. I've been having a lot of discussions with people about this sort of thing lately. Whatever strategy the left has for winning hearts and minds, it clearly hasn't worked if someone like that can still win the popular vote. I don't know how to fix that. But I think we all need to be a lot more comfortable ceding the moral high ground if it means making progress in the trenches.

Trump voters owe me financial compensation.

[qoldenskies]

been into those raph&leo against donnie&mikey pre-movie fics lately. and like. thoughts on don being the more outspoken at how destructive and idiotic the other two are, while mike is more sensitive and overwhelmed by everything? not that im hating on these characterizations! i enjoy the angst they bring, but overanalyzing is fun.

sure, mikey is the youngest and it makes sense to an extent. however, dr delicate touch and dr feelings are very loud and blunt. and yeah the situation is more extreme, but i think about donnie taking a similar position to what he did in hot soup: the game, staying out of the raph&mikey debate until directly addressed.

personally, i see mikey taking the lead on trying to get through to raph+mikey with donnie there to mediate and give his input when needed. and behind closed doors they definitely take turns comforting each other for sure. they’re both shown to be distraught over familial situations (turtle-dega nights and hidden city’s most wanted), so it makes sense to me for them to take shelter in each other as opposed to one of them being a total shield for the other.

oh, i dont like it. i actually find it unfaithful and flanderizing when it comes to their characters, especially since mikey is a lot more outspoken and direct while donnie is passive-- and this manifests in their behavior as a duo, too.

if not directly emotionally affected by it, i could see it slowly shifting donnie's behavior. he starts to close himself off more, works harder, becomes quieter and more standoffish, not really understanding why he feels so bad because the tension is slowly getting to him. being neurodivergent also makes arguing uhhh hard to witness especially if it were to get intense, loud noise and all that. not to mention raph and leo do almost get into a fistfight at the beginning of the movie so there is a VERY good chance that's happened before, especially with how quick donnie and mikey are to try and pull them apart.

i think comfort would be mutual though, yeah. mikey being distresed and fearful doesn't feel like it aligns with the way he normally acts in conflict? like disinterested and annoyed and then determined and frustrated feels like it aligns with him better. he's not a helpless crying child but i could see him getting more and more upset the longer it goes on, especially because he loves both of his bigger brothers and he feels like they're acting so stupid lmao.

mikey's also not really a savant when it comes to mediating because that's ALWAYS been more raph's job, maybe leo sometimes. he's more likely to go "guys stop fighting!" instead of actually breaking it up and that does very little, it'd probably just come off like moral high-grounding. even in the doctor feelings seminar he did with donnie in the show he was not exactly taking a very empathetic approach he was just being condescending LMAO

generally with donnie i feel like it would manifest in more avoidant behavior (and maybe this is a bit of a hot take but i feel like he would be more likely to have an "is it me?" reaction to something like this, especially because so much of this is about team synergy and he plays such an essential role in support), while mikey would be desperate to "fix" it (more than he is to actually resolve it) once he realizes it's becoming a persistent problem, but because he's unable to properly get to the root of it, it'd just make him increasingly more frustrated. and ofc i do think this would also seriously strengthen donnie and mikey's bonds with each other because i could see both of them having a breaking point about it eventually.

i DO actually have a fic in the works about this exact scenario, it's a sequel to coming undone that mostly addresses the kind of pain and frustration of donnie being unable to properly harness his ninpo as seamlessly as the others can, having some gifted kid issues because it's really hard to try new things when he's been so effortless with science for so long, all while there's so much tension in the family because of the leadership switch,,, it's about donnie and mikey bonding and confiding in each other mostly but ive put it on the backseat for canary continuity, maybe one day i'll pick it up again!!

[adrenaline-revolver]

from an anthropological standpoint the fact that the moment Epic got super popular people started making funny and horny little spin offs like the manwhore au delights me to pieces. it's giving satyr play. Euripides would be so proud.

[mayasaura]

For some reason, the dnd:hat movie has been living rent-free in my head for over a week. Xenk is just rattling around in there right now, having a long talk with Kira about morality, mortality, personal sacrifice, and being a child who saw the Beckoning Death unleashed on their home.

I feel like Xenk would have a lot to say that Kira needs to hear, and be a good listener for the things Kira needs to talk about that she can't tell her dad or Holga. He'd probably benefit from talking to her, too. Kira almost experienced the same tragedy he did when he was her age. It would be cathartic for him to help her through that, knowing he helped save her from ever experiencing what he went through

[butts-bouncing-on-the-beltway]

I think people forget that mobs are affinity organizations. They act like large extended families because THEY ARE. Even if they're not your *blood* the whole point was that when immigrants arrived from overseas they would need community, familiarity, family, and support to succeed (esp those who came from places or erhnic groups that were particularly unwelcome by local white systems of authority).

When my family arrived in Chicago in the 20s, one of first things that happened after they were settled was representatives of the local Sicilian mafia came and started asking what they needed, trying to help them get work, etc.

My great grandma didn't tall about this much, because she really hated the local organization, but she also at the time was a 14 yr old girl with 6 younger siblings to raise and protect, and she and her older brother took the mob's support and she worked on other more legitimate systems of settling. Ultimately, her brother died working for the mob, and she and rest of the siblings thrived. They were cared for, even if what happened was still fucked.

Anyway I got off topic, but my point is that mobs LITERALLY had an original function as "de facto family and community" for anyone brave and desperate enough to show up on US shores without enough of either, and yeah the criminal organization that follows is complicated and hard to describe as morally good but damn man, who else was doing what they did for little orphans out there doing their best???

People joke at me about my family being the mob or being mafia-coded but honestly that's just what having a big family is like.

"How do you have a guy for everything!" The average person's got a guy for like 2-5 things and I have the combined got-a-guy resources of like 75 people.

"You can't have a cousin every place I mention!" I absolutely can, there's fucking 40 of them, are you kidding?

"But normal people's families aren't that organized!" Do you know how difficult it is to schedule a holiday party for a family this size? There's spreadsheets involved. Half our holiday traditions are carefully crafted ways to help the children learn everyone's names. One of my aunts couldn't make it one year and cousins were assigned grandma's cookie recipes that she usually makes. Making sure everyone was informed when my uncle died this fall was such a nightmare, we now have an emergency phone tree.

It's not that this is mob behavior, it's that any successful mob must have Large Family levels of networking and coordination.

[bloodied-dagger]

man I really feel like I missed out with splatoon

[venussaidso]

I love a good scamming/gold digger love story where the manipulative fraud has her target eventually stumbling & falling, all wrapped around her finger, as she's solely concentrated on her goal which turns to shit when she's the one to catch feelings next. Throw in some family dynamic superhero shit along with that too? I'm fucking in. I'm kinda obsessed with this pairing actually, and I haven't been sucked into a kdrama pair for a while so I'm curious to see how this develops. I think I wish Do Dahae had a much more ruthless/witty side like her fake Mom (ofc I like my FLs morally-grey but leaning just a lil more towards evil ehehe) so the romance and her relationship with that kid would be more of a slowburn. She's a bit too plain for my taste for now but I'll accept it because this is my favourite trope & the acting is not shit, so I'm willing to overlook that for more Dohae x Gwiju scenes and the story unfolding.

[kaidanalenkosprmanager]

THE BEST OF SHENKO 1/?

The end of the world has a way of reminding you of all the things you forgot to say do. Mass Effect: Legendary Edition (2021)

[thehollowwriter]

I could write a goddamn essay about how the "Nazis are inhuman pure evil monsters" logic has actually helped Nazis but unfortunately saying "Hey Nazis ARE people, choosing a group that you don't like and deeming them subhuman and okay to treat as such is not only nazi logic but also makes it easier for Nazism to rise" will probably just have people claim I myself am a Nazi because there are way to many idiots who think that dehumanization is ok when they do it to those who "deserve it"

[7-oh-ta1]

Smth I don't praise enough is YunoboCo. LIKE FR they're my favorite part of totk. Basically Yunobo takes it upon himself to do some community building after Death Mountain becomes dormant again, which goes from volunteer work to opportunities for employment -- literally obliterating the Goron Mining Co which is fine imo becs that led by the Elder who. Is an Elder and it didn't have much direction beyond mine mine mine. The community project was supposed to make lives better for the gorons -- the majority of which were employed under Goron Mining Co, and they ended up just being absorbed into YunoboCo as a mining branch like Yunobo really said take care of your workers or else.

They also paved TWO new roads into Goron City because getting up and down the mountain was proving too dangerous, and they're pretty long roads! They also are the ones who hung up the colorful lights around the city to bring back the bright atmosphere the lava originally gave, and overhauled the entire minecart system. Like YunoboCo went SO hard. Death Mountain glew up in totk and I wish everywhere else got the same improvement treatment

[llycaons]

me and a beloved mewtual going LITERALLY and EXACTLYY to each other as we reaffirm a core part of the story being wwx's overall journey in his social dynamics to stability and security as he goes, not without tragedy and loss, but from a contentious and unsupportive main relationship in a hostile social setting that degenerates quickly into dysfunction and instability and violence to end up with a supportive and healthy and happy life partnership with someone whose main life goals involve taking care of him

[averlym]

whshdfhfjf.,,,

[aces-to-apples]

Am I thinking about silly Crow!Rook and Lucanis time-travel shenanigans where they end up as teenagers and, half out of their minds with shock and disbelief, say fuck it and run around Thedas feral reuniting the also too-young Veilguard And Friends? Yes of course, have you met me?

[paisleywraith]

Hey, Honey.

[lemonduckisnowawake]

Me, today: I will not get angry about people slandering Jesus. I will not lose my temper seeing yet another post throwing His character in the garbage as some politically woke or politically conservative people pleaser. I will not stab my hand with a fork when I see people poking fun at his friendships as homoerotic - *sees a post like that and slowly steps out of the internet*

No seriously. I am shaking the screen and BEGGING people to remember that even though Western Christian traditionalism has deep, *deep* wrongs, There Are Literal People Dying And Being Tortured Because Of Their Faith In Christ In The Modern World. And the way I see people making light of faith and outright mocking it or "dumbing it down" to appeal to their own moral worldview is sometimes kind of painful

[astriiformes]

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