CuriousCat Archive Page 183 of 202

  1. How many countries have you been too?

    3

  2. Anita hill gained an hbo story and more from her allegation against Thomas.

    Monica Lewinsky is a public speaker and has also gained so much from her situation.

    When are we going to retire the notion that accusers have nothing to gain but ridicule for calling out public figures?

    Name two of Bill Cosby's 60 accusers from memory.

  3. Are you for real when you say you don’t listen to music? And if it is, can you elaborate on why?

    I have never heard a song in my life.

  4. Eminem is a good rapper on a technical level but his content just plain sucks. Like, do we really relate to this edgelord angst crap any more?

    For me, no. Even going back and listening to his older stuff, it just hasn’t aged well as people have aged. On a side note, auto tune mumble rap is crap but everyone knows. We don’t need Em telling us this.

    None of this is a question.

  5. Are there any platforms onto which one can upload video essays besides youtube and vimeo? Do you consider vimeo a viable alternative?

    I mean, sure, you can always use DailyMotion or VidMe or whatever. If you want your videos to be seen by the public, YouTube is the only game in town. Vimeo is a viable alternative if "getting seen by lots of people" is not your priority.

  6. Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen or Viva La Vida by Coldplay?

    is this a joke?

  7. What's your streaming music platform of choice? Spotify? Apple music? YouTube Red? Soundcloud/Bandcamp?
    Are there any you feel are better for artists than others? Are there any of these "good" ones that I can listen to all my music on?

    I don't listen to music.

  8. About the edgy kids - I’m thinking specially of voice chats in online games which don’t have vote-kick features.

    Tell them you won't play if they can't behave, and quit and join another game if they continue.

  9. Generally, the answer to any question of "why does [false belief] persist?" is "because someone with power benefits from believing it."

    Socialism has persisted for almost 200 years.

    sick burn bro i am so pwned

  10. dogs, yes or no?

    yes

    but also

    turtles

  11. There are transgender people who don't believe nonbinary people exist. Do you think they are somehow empowered by this belief?

    Bigotry is rarely beneficial to the average person. Poor white people who are racist against Black people are still poor. They profit off their privilege, but far less than, say, the police, the prison industry, politicians, and the wealthy do. Bigotry mostly serves to flatter poor whites' egos and create some group cohesion.

    Trans people are not the source nor the largest vector of bigotry against nb folks. They are marginally privileged, in that they pass for cis easier than nb people, and, however slow the mainstream is to accept people who flip sides on the gender binary, they are even slower to accept those who reject the binary entirely. But, generally, they gain little beyond the same pleasure as the poor white: The knowledge that there is someone beneath you in the social hierarchy.

  12. How would you recommend dealing with edgy teenagers who make racist jokes online? I’m not talking about people who make “arguments,” but young folks who are just trying to offend people? People who call you a f****t when you try to explain redlining to them? In a lot of online spaces one can’t simply remove such people, but we can’t just let their normalization of bigotry go unchallenged.

    Why can't you remove them?

  13. Who the hell am I supposed to vote for if I want smaller government?

    The right memes about being "pro freedom" and then goes and increases deficits, makes their political campaign center on deporting people, and start foreign wars

    The left is headed down on this "neo-socialism" path the economy is suddenly a zero sum game and captured agencies like the SEC need to be there to ""regulate"" everything

    And I can't want to vote for Gary Johnson because he'll never fucking win

    Why would you come to me, of all people, for your Libertarian recommendations?

  14. What's the best simpsons episode?

    In my youth I would have gone for Lemon of Troy or You Only Move Twice, but nowadays I'm more sentimental and would probably pick something from seasons 3 or 4 like Lisa's First Word.

  15. Playfully serious or seriously playful?

    yes

  16. Heck, that is a very good point.

    I meant more of like, how societies came to view humanity as only being made up of men and women, and how there was nothing between or outside of that.

    Not every society believed this, but Europeans did and they imposed their beliefs everyone else when they colonized the world. Like, you know there are only 22 countries on Earth that have never been invaded by Britain? And, of those 22, many were invaded by Spain or Portugal? European standards have been enforced on the rest of the world for centuries.

    Like most false binaries, the the construction of gender exists to benefit those in power. The gender binary is believed in by cis people to rationalize the denial of power to trans and nb people. I don't think it's a coincidence that all three of those colonizing nations were patriarchal monarchies. We can assume: It is to the benefit of a king who derives his power from his father to insist that a man of certain blood deserves the throne, and this requires a very rigid definition of "man." What happens to patriarchy if the heir comes out as a woman, if the eldest daughter comes out as a man?

    This is not to say that it is a conscious decision, merely that the powerful have a vested interest in ignoring realities that would complicate the claim to power. Privileged people have a vested interest in believing whatever they need to believe to justify and ignore their own privilege.

    Generally, the answer to any question of "why does [false belief] persist?" is "because someone with power benefits from believing it."

  17. Who wins out, Handmaid's Tale or Angel Catbird?

    I've only read the first one.

  18. What should Chuck Philosophy change his name to?

    Chucky Philosophuck.

  19. What ever happened to that bloke who made those fantastic videos called Reading the Right?

    I miss those
    You've seen those right?

    I haven't watched them, but I'll check them out. If I had to guess where the bloke went, I'd say hourlong videos that only get 13k views don't really pay for themselves. I won't endorse his Patreon until I've watched the videos, but it's easy enough to find if you want him to come back.

  20. Just need your advice...

    Would you HIGHLY RECOMMEND Dhalgren for today's generation of young adults to read?

    My cousin who's currently working in Malaysia is planning to order the book online. I don't know why he would pick such an obscure work of fiction (and possibly relatively unknown work in the eyes of the public there) compared to other bestsellers today that are currently the top picks over there, like Crazy Rich Asians and Suicide Club

    Dhalgren is a hard work to recommend. I am very, very glad that I read it, but I've never told anyone else to read it. It's very difficult, kind of plotless, and interrogates some *very* grey morality. A lot of people hate it. I mean, you'll note I always say "I'm glad I read it" and not, you know, "it's good." I have no idea if it's good. I just found it consistently fascinating and got really attached to its world and characters.

    Also, it's a book. If you get it and don't click with it, it's not like you went broke getting it.

  21. Following from the thing about losing respect for someone: How do you feel about Joss Whedon? (Disclaimer: I can't quite remember if you've ever indicated being a fan in the first place, but I figure odds are non-zero)

    Ever since his ex-wife's open letter over a year ago, I've kind of been struggling with how I feel about it all. His work was a giant influence on me. And if it was "just" about being a shitty, cheating partner, that, in and of itself, probably wouldn't lead me to consider dumping a fandom (although it's, y'know, shitty). But the general hypocrisy, and specifically exploitative nature of the relationships described, even by himself ("I was surrounded by beautiful, needy, aggressive young women"), are fucking troubling to me. Especially when that list apparently includes not just actresses working under him - already problematic enough - but even fans, which is definitely fucked up. A year on, I still can't figure out how to reconcile everything in there. It's also opened my eyes more to shit I was deliberately overlooking, like the Black Widow/Banner scene in Avengers 2 ("She's totally complaining about being broken by the overall training, guys, not the sterilisation in particular!").

    A part of me is going "No women, to my knowledge, spoken out about being used, coerced, etc", but the rest also recognizes that as A) a low fucking bar, and B) useless in that there are a million reasons not to come forward with those things, as is shown every day.

    Um. I could go on rambling, but I'm not really approaching any kind of natural end point. So, back to the question of how you feel about it all. I'm not trying to get you to tell me whether it's right to like or not. I know we each have to draw our lines on what's too problematic. I'm just looking for input from someone else, I guess, to add to it all. And clearly just, in part, putting words (clumsily) to my concerns.

    I'm in the same boat.

    Growing up, Buffy was big for me. Both Serenity and the first Avengers are comfort movies. I always anticipated whatever Joss' next project was. So the letter made me feel pretty complicated about him, too, and I don't have a conclusion, either.

    I was already a little ambivalent about Joss when it came out. He'd done a few questionable, albeit small, things. I wasn't happy about Black Widow getting damseled in Age of Ultron. And he condemned the sexism in the preview clip of Jurassic World, and then walked it back because the (male) writers got flack for it. And he gave that speech when receiving an award for being a feminist where he said he hates the word "feminism," and you can see the point he was trying to make, but it was also a very ignorant thing to say when you're already getting an award that should *probably* have gone to a woman.

    None of these things were dealbreakers for me, and I stayed generally a fan of his work, but it meant the letter was less of a shock to me. I'd seen a few cracks in his public image. But it was the first thing that made me question whether I wanted to support whatever he did next.

    I don't wanna talk about Joss the way we talk about Mel Gibson or Kevin Spacey. What Joss did was gross and a misuse of his authority, but so far it sounds like everything was consensual. He's not a monster, just kind of an asshole and a hypocrite. But it's disillusioning for fans.

    So, yeah, I don't have much to offer but commiseration. I don't know what his next project will be, and I don't know whether I'll want to see it. I'm still debating whether to see The Predator after the shit with Shane Black. I don't know where to draw my lines, but I feel like the bigger complication is not calling myself a fan anymore. I don't really get involved in fan communities anymore, so "not being a Joss Whedon fan" doesn't change my life much. It sucks when something like this splits your community.

    So, yeah. I don't know what you should do, I don't know what I'm gonna do. Whatever Joss' next project is, I'm going to draw a line, and I still don't know where I'm going to draw it. Good luck with yours. :-/

  22. May you tell us your opinion on Bojack Horseman, please? And comment on whether it should be compared to Family Guy or South Park?

    I had a Twitter thread about it here: https://twitter.com/InnuendoStudios/status/916832566434549760

    No, it should not be compared to Family Guy or South Park. It is, in many ways, the antithesis to those shows.

  23. Ill bite. What makes bojack good?

    It's a show about how hard it is to become a better person.

  24. Is Starship Troopers the book truly fascist are just a dude going overboard with preparedness after then-recent arms limitation treaties?

    how are those two things mutually exclusive?

  25. Yeah, but are the tongue twister lines what make Bojack good?

    The tongue twisters are okay, but they are also not what make BoJack good.

  26. I think when I use the word "far left" i might mean leftists that I think are too far to the left.

    I mean, I think most people consider themselves to be the appropriate level of Right or Left and anything further Right/Left of them is Too Far Right/Left.

  27. Have any questions you've gotten on here ever sparked you to make a video, or at least to talk about a particular subject?

    About what percent of the questions you get are total garbage?

    CuriousCat can sometimes be a barometer of what's on my mind at a given moment and stuff I hash out here will often make it into videos, but I wouldn't say any videos were directly inspired by an ask.

    Usually the ratio of interesting to garbage questions is pretty solidly in the "interesting" camp, at least marginally. I've seen some of the gross shit friends of mine get, and I'm pretty lucky. Now and then the Angry White Boy Brigade gets on my ass and sends me angry, insulting messages and/or "gotcha" questions where they try to get me to say something bigoted or signal boost some pseudoscience. It rarely lasts long and I mostly delete it unless I think there's a way of answering that is either constructive or cathartic and is not destructive.

  28. have you done threads on why the gender binary exists?

    if you haven't, do you feel qualified to attempt to explain this?

    The gender binary doesn't exist.

    Question answered.

  29. What do you think about the argument that we should try to mitigate climate change because of potential damage to the economy, such as the agriculture and tourism industries?

    This argument is certainly true, though it seems fucked up that people would choose to emphasize the economic cost, rather than the effects on humanity and nature, but I'd be interested to hear your thoughts.

    Arguing that climate change will be economically disastrous is not mutually exclusive with arguing it will be morally and socially disastrous. If there are people who don't care about millions of people dying, but might care about their pocketbooks, then it's worth switching up your arguments for those people.

    We too often frame rhetoric as an either/or - "the Left should argue like THIS, or the Left should argue like THAT" - when there's no need for the Left to be homogeneous. SOME folks on the Left can argue one way, and SOME folks can argue another, depending on who they're talking to. The moral argument should probably be our foundation but we should absolutely be talking about EVERY way climate change is going to ruin us.

  30. the descriptor 'far-left' feels like it's been completely co-oped by dopes trying to draw parallels to extreme right wing ideology. do you just jettison words at some point, or is there value in trying to reclaim them?

    I dunno, maybe it's because I'm on the Left that I don't consider "Far Left" a useful descriptor. I can say "liberal," "leftist," "radical," "anarchist," etc. I find "Far Right" a useful term because there's a lot of commonality between the various groups on the far end of the conservative spectrum, and there is some commonality between leftists, radicals, and anarchists, but not nearly as much. I rarely have to refer to them under one umbrella term.

    Everyone I hear say "Far Left" is using the term to misrepresent the Left.

  31. >I said what makes it good isn't the jokes.

    Is it the sight gags though?

    I like the sight gags, but they're not what makes the show good.

    I can do this all day.

  32. Hm, what problems do you have with Bojack?

    I didn't say I had a problem with it, I said what makes it good isn't the jokes.

  33. How then can a flim or game use the story to makes it arguments then without ending up saying nothing?

    Well, the example I used was Fury Road. No one ever brings up women's rights, and yet you saw how pissed off antifeminists got, right?

  34. Is Bojack Horseman a good thing or the next South Park? Pop-culture tells me I should watch and like it, but after 5 seasons the jokes are still a mixed bag to me.

    BoJack isn't good because of the jokes.

  35. Which countries' head of states could you take in a fight?

    Trudeau kinda looks like he wouldn't fight back, he'd just take a punch and stand there apologizing.

  36. How much can a movie or video game be as forward about they message without being preachy?

    Like, whether the message is a political one or an insight on the human condition. What is the line between being subtle and smart and being obvious and pretentious?

    There's a difference between being about something and talking about something. There are no lectures about feminism in Fury Road, but it is *deeply* informed by feminism. "Preachy" is usually a complaint when the characters, rather than the story, make the arguments.

    But, also, preachiness is in the eye of the beholder. A lot of complaints that a movie or game is preachy are code for "it made an argument I didn't agree with." It's a lot less common for people to call a movie preachy when they agree with what it says.

  37. Do you know anyone on CC I can ask about books and literature? A lot of people know a lot about games, movies, and even non-fiction academic type books, but I have no one for my questions on lit.

    I follow a total of 12 people, most of them YouTubers and games writers. I'm sure there are literature folks on here, but I haven't searched for them.

  38. Do you think it's a bad idea to upload the comic dubs in their original form to youtube but the demo reel to vimeo?

    It's a dodgier copyright issue to upload them to YouTube, but no dodgier than most of what's already on YouTube. I say go for it (with attribution).

  39. So... 2001's Pulse by Kiyoshi Kurosawa is an extended metaphor on alienation?

    ok

  40. Further resource for the student:

    https://medium.com/@DeoTasDevil/how-white-nationalism-courts-internet-nerd-culture-b4ebad07863d

    you'll have to copy-paste that because CC ruined the link, but I vouch for this article, too

  41. Hello!
    I'm a college student starting to write a paper about the rise of reactionary rhetoric and recruitment efforts in "geek" communities, including the effect of the various -gates on this situation.
    Do you have any specific books or articles on the subject you could recommend for research? Anything about how reactionaries recruit from geek communities, their rise to prominence in said communities, or about their rhetorical/ recruitment methods in general could be useful.
    Thanks a bunch.

    Sure.

    Postmodern Geekdom as Simulated Ethnicity: https://www.ejumpcut.org/archive/jc54.2012/SolesKunyoGeedom/

    Media Manipulation and Disinformation Online: https://datasociety.net/output/media-manipulation-and-disinfo-online/

    The Daily Stormer's Playbook: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/daily-stormer-nazi-style-guide_us_5a2ece19e4b0ce3b344492f2

  42. Have you followed the news on Botham Jean? I knew him and I have been struggling on how to deal with it. I know I cannot expect anyone to tell me what the right perspective is or anything, but I really want to hear an outsider perspective because most of the dialogue I have seen has been within Harding University affiliates (where I knew Botham).

    I don't know that I can help you much. I only know the barest skeleton of what happened. It's more unnecessary violence from white cops afraid of Black men. I don't think there's anything I can say that puts that into perspective. It's just awful.

  43. Will I ever get my nier disc back from my friend?

    Why would you lend that game away?!

  44. Not the same anon as before, but you called out someone for not asking in good faith, and said that if someone IS asking in good faith, they don't require that preface.

    I've sent you a bunch of questions now, and all things considered, I'm asking questions because I lack the resources to find a lot of them myself, and I find myself saying "I'm asking in good faith" because it's the only real way I have (other than acknowledging the limitations of my knowledge) to communicate that to you.

    Is it bad practice? What would you recommend?

    If you're talking about this: https://curiouscat.me/InnuendoStudios/post/644822375

    My complaint wasn't that they said they were asking in good faith, it's that they pulled the "you probably won't answer this" stunt. If you don't try to reverse-psychology me then my hackles don't get raised.

    In general, whether or not a question is asked in good faith is something I'm never going to know with absolute certainty, so I just answer questions if I think answering them is worthwhile and don't worry so much about the asker's intent.

  45. Why do you think so many cis people individually come to the hypothetical of 'curing' trans people with a magic pill? Do you think it's got something to do with cissexism in our culture?

    Yes, but, again, not my area.

  46. Do you think there's a likelier chance that my work could be 'found' on youtube? That's part of why I wanted to upload it there instead of vimeo.

    Well, a demo reel isn't for getting "found," it's the thing you direct people to. When is the last time you saw someone's demo reel in your recommendations?

  47. So, in that case, do the religious right and the militant atheist right get along, due to the basic tribalism both have ingrained into their political culture, or is the divide between them religiously too large?

    I'd say it's more that the mainstream Right gets along with both of them.

  48. Do you think I need permission from the authors to upload, like, a dub of a part of a comic lasting like, 15 minutes to yt?

    I would recommend uploading anything that's meant for clients to Vimeo instead of YouTube. You get a crisper image and don't have to deal with YouTube commenters or copyright bots.

    Also, if this is a project you want to direct possible clients to, then uploading 15 minutes is sensible, but if this is your *demo reel*, it shouldn't be longer than 3 minutes. Just the best bits. You can direct them to longer work once they've seen your highlights.

  49. Will web'comic dubs' be sufficient for a demo real? Do you think I should get permission before I upload the comic dub? Do you think I should get permission before I start working on them?

    I don't know what people looking to hire an editor for YouTube are looking for right now, so I can't say, but something is always better than nothing. If you're only using segments of your dub for a demo reel, I don't think you need permission, just give credit and don't put ads on the video.

  50. My go-to response to the "being trans is a mental illness" people has usually been "dysphoria is probably a mental illness, and transitioning is the best treatment currently available." Is that a fair representation or am I way off?

    That line of thought also got me thinking: if there were a medication to cure or at least treat dysphoria, do you think closeted trans folks would prefer that over transitioning? And what would be the implications of that for people who already transitioned?

    I have no authority in this area.

  51. Why do you think a lot of left leaning people aren't religious? I'm religious and I consider myself a lefty and I'm not sure why there's a certain antipathy towards religion; I mean, unless religion was used as a weapon of abuse, then I totally get it.

    I think the more constructive way to ask this is, "Why aren't there MORE atheists on the Right?"

    Conservatism is very dogmatic. In most areas, not just spirituality, there are sets of beliefs that are not only encouraged, but enforced. Doubt is often penalized, and when it is experienced one is expected to quell those feelings by reaffirming one's faith, not pursue them in questioning one's beliefs. This is true of the evangelical movements that are common on the Right, it's true of Republican party loyalty, it's true of conservative authoritarian groups, white nationalism, etc. And when people exit conservative religions, they tend to also exit conservative politics.

    I personally believe that any belief worth having should hold up to doubt and scrutiny, but that is not the case on the Right. So I'd say it's less to do with religion itself than the specific brand of religion that is practiced on the Right - one that does not tolerate crises of faith in any arena. Even though most of the Left still trends towards some flavor of religion, it's where a lot of atheists will end up because the Right doesn't tolerate them.

    This is why conservative atheism is so interesting and unsettling to me. A LOT of the YouTube anti-SJW crowd are loudly atheist, to the point where they're making atheism itself look downright reactionary. This toxic strain of "rationalists" and "humanists" who have built a career on being antifeminist Islamophobes. It's all the dogmatism we're used to seeing on the Right - the same ostracism of dissenters, the same demonizing of The Other, the same focus on group cohesion - just flipped against religion.

    Some have argued that Richard Dawkins is a "Christian atheist," in that he does not believe in god but the tenets of Christianity are so ingrained in his life that he still exhibits Christian morality without Jesus. The YouTube "skeptic" community are basically evangelical atheists.

  52. Would I have to have existing videos either way in order to get hired for paid work?

    You'll usually at least need a demo reel, even if it's just stuff you've made for yourself.

  53. I think I have what it takes to be a paid editor for youtube videos, or maybe even independant films. How do I know if I really am this competent, and whether or not I have an inflated sense of my own abilities? If I do have what it takes right now, how do I put myself out there? Should I do unpaid work of some kind? I'm afraid of filming myself right now, so if I do indeed do unpaid work, I'd like it to be with someone else's footage. Do you have any suggestions for this scenario?

    Well, your competence is for the employer to decide, and your pay will be commensurate with how "the market" judges your skills. Don't undersell yourself - tons of YouTube videos have horrible editing, and it's the ones with horrible editing that are most likely to hire an editor. All you have to be is better than horrible when you're starting out.

    I don't really know how people get gigs as YouTube editors. My gigs either came through people seeing my work and reaching out or having an existing client put me in touch with a new one. If you don't have your own editing work online or any existing clients, I'm not sure what works. Like, the biggest freelancing site is UpWork, but I haven't used it much and never actually got a gig there. It may be your best bet for starting out - you'll be underpaid, but you won't be working for free.

    The other option is to just cold call YouTube channels you'd like to work for, I guess. Or post a resume and demo reel to Craig's List, which is... a gamble.

    If you don't want to appear on camera, you could do a short mockup vlog with a friend as the onscreen talent, I suppose. Would be a good opportunity to test out your editing skills and give YouTubers a clear idea of what they'd be buying.

    While I acknowledge that sometimes you don't get started without working for free - and I have done so myself - if at all possible don't work without getting paid. Your insecurities about your skills don't change the fact that your labor has value.

  54. I've been pondering about these 2 things;
    - what defines as a sin?
    - what is considered evil?

    I would love to hear from you

    I'm not religious and have no investment in sin.

    Evil is a philosophical concept that is defined differently by different schools of thought. One thinker - I forget which - defined evil as doing bad things for the sake of doing bad things, i.e. not for profit or revenge or personal gain, just being horrible because it's what you like. This is a very narrow definition that defines almost no one except maybe Milton's conception of Satan.

    Hannah Arendt grappled with this in Eichmann in Jerusalem, describing Adolf Eichmann as a man who DID evil without BEING evil. He had no ideological belief in the things he was doing, they were simply what he had to do to further his career and he had not qualms with that. (There is some debate over whether Arendt's assessment of Eichmann was accurate, but, regardless, it's pretty clear a lot of the Nazis did awful things for simple, personal gain.) This sort-of stabs at "being evil" as doing awful things because you believe they are right, and "doing evil" as doing awful things for extrinsic reasons. By this rubric, "being evil" means to have an ideology that says doing immoral things is right.

    This can fall into some squidgy relativism, where you're in opposition to someone who believes the Holocaust is right and you believe the Holocaust is wrong, but how do you know you're right and the other person is wrong? This is the kind of Santa Cruz beach bonfire stoner philosophy that I don't put up with anymore (and maybe made a video about).

    I tend to be pretty consequentialist about it. For my purposes, if you are DOING evil, you are BEING evil. Let St. Peter judge your motives, I will judge you by your actions.

    The common traits of most definitions of evil tend to cluster around causing harm to others, either directly or indirectly. Inflicting pain, willingly obstructing the pursuit of happiness, killing, and so on. Older definitions probably defined it more along the lines of "offending God," but that's sliding into "sin" territory and outside my sphere. So we'll leave it at that.

  55. Have you watched any videos by cuck philosophy?

    Maybe? Some of these titles look familiar.

  56. Is political violence a too that is fascist in nature or do you believe it's neutral and depends on what it's being used for?

    I believe violence can be used to productive ends, yes. I think it should generally be used only after nonviolent options have failed, but, often enough, violent oppressors will only respond to violence. They will not by stopped with diplomacy.

  57. The "have you read this yet" person(s) may have been (probably weren't) intentionally trying to get you to not read something.

    Sorry you mentioned time travel and activated my conspiracy theory brain.

    time travel comments cannot be received at this time

    try again yesterday

  58. Check out the Prequel Adventure webcomic!

    I still might.

  59. Read anything from Junji Ito?

    no

  60. (youtube question anon) holy shit. I asked because I know darksyde phil got perma-banned from ad revenue cus he openly asked for engagment with ads, or something, and i was half curious if that was the reason no one talked about how youtube works. That sucks man, I hope patreon stays a viable option for a long time!

    I mean, I dunno if they're part of a network or something that they would have a contract with, or if it's just YouTube banning people with little explanation as to why, but I don't even have ads turned on to spare me from fucking with this nonsense.

  61. is it ok to ask you how exactly useful is to hit the like or the bell button, or to leave a comment on a youtube page? I'm really curious and every youtube is very vague about the exact purpose of those, but if this answer could become a problem (As in, you guys are vague for a reason, and your contract explicitly forbids you to openly disclose how the hell those engagment tools work) i won't press

    Ha, I don't have any kind of contract. People are vague because YouTube is vague. We know these things increase our numbers, we're not sure how, and YouTube keeps tinkering with the algorithm behind the scenes so something that works one week may not work the next week.

    If you hit my bell button, it means you'll get a notification whenever I upload a video. This is in case you don't check your subscriptions tab all that often, or if you're subscribed to so many people that I disappear in the deluge pretty quickly. Also, YouTube appears to occasionally unsubscribe people for reasons we're unsure of, possibly if they haven't watched one of your videos in a while, and some of us guess that the bell button might discourage YouTube from doing this...?

    Everything else - likes, comments, etc. - is just about "generating engagement," because, near as we can tell, "generating engagement" makes the algorithm favor you, meaning you'll show up in more searches or get on Trending or appear more often in Recommended Videos.

    if this is starting to sound like divination in service of a capricious and unknowable god, welcome to every damn day of my career.

  62. Between you and a few other lefty yters I've noticed a string of incredibly stupid questions trying to get you to compromise with fascism. Is this just another targeted harassment campaign in action?

    It's not that harassing and I don't think it's that targeted. It's mostly just irritating.

  64. >To my understanding, Roko's Basilisk doesn't affect the present, it merely judges our behavior in the present to determine whether it will torture us for eternity in the future.

    Gotcha, my mistake was assuming this bullshit was intertwined with Musk-ian "we live in a simulation" bullshit.

    >So, no, this... *gestures at America* is still our fault.

    Well, crap. Guess we can't blame all of our problems on a giant AI in the sky, so we have to put our boots on and fix stuff ourselves, huh?

    The interesting question about Musk thinking we live in a simulation is: Does Musk believe he earned his fortune, or does he just think the AI likes him?

  65. Former LessWrong person here: if I had to guess why someone came into your curiouscat to claim the man was better than you, I'd guess it's because Scott Alexander is one of the people who helped push LW from being *clueless about* (and vaguely uncomfortable with) feminism and social justice to being *hostile towards* feminism and social justice. (There's a story there, but I hate the jerk and I don't think it matters that much.)

    Given that this is a community that started off with the assumption that intelligence was both real and, if pursued hard enough, the next best thing to a superpower, you can probably predict what kind of garbage they subscribe to as well as I can. I left after encountering multiple people trying to pass off James Damore's Google memo as worth reading.

    People keep accusing me of making snap judgments without giving folks a chance, and still, every time I do, people come in to confirm that, yes, my snap judgment was correct.

    It's almost like I can recognize patterns or something.

  66. Have you ever lost all respect for someone? Like you don’t hate them, but you don’t feel the need to associate yourself or say anything to them anymore...

    It feels like hardly a week goes by when I don't lose all respect for someone. Like, what the hell, Shane Black?

  67. Do you think that without the Anti-SJW community and they rise to power that the Alt-right wouldn't have as strong of a foothold as they do now ?

    How important are centrists are when it comes to Far right groups getting power and influence?

    Well, that's a little tricky, because it implies that the Alt-Right and the anti-SJW crowd are two separate groups. They are, in fact, two heavily overlapping groups, each of which contributed to the creation of the other. The modern Alt-Right would not exist as it does today without GamerGate, and GamerGate was what it was because it was spearheaded by 4chan Nazis and sexists.

    As for centrists, yeah, a lot of the establishment downplays and tolerates the Far Right, and the Far Right wouldn't hold the power it has otherwise.

  68. What's your take on politically outspoken celebrities like Susan Sarandon, who have traditionally championed left wing views and causes, but continue to insist Hilary Clinton would've been worse than Donald Trump and downplay what The Fool on the Hill has been doing?

    Is it fair to suggest they've lost their way or all sense of reason that usually comes with being on our side of politics, or would that be falling victim to No True Scotsman re: Leftists? Or is it Susan Sarandon and company who are engaging in fallacious reasoning, doubling down on their stance in some kind of sunk cost fallacy because it's too embarrassing to admit how wrong they were?

    I haven't read what Sarandon is saying so I don't want to talk shit about her in specific. For all I know her position is more nuanced than people are claiming. But there are a lot of folks on the Left claiming "Hillary would have been worse" and, yeah, I think it's self-deluded doubling down because they're afraid they backed the wrong horse. I'd also chalk some of it up to internalized misogyny in the case women and regular old misogyny in the case of men.

  69. Is Roko's basilisk the thrilling twist conclusion to the weird sci-fi novel you apparently live in? Is ...this... *gestures at America* really because we pissed off a shitty AI Big Bad in our non-simulated lives?

    To my understanding, Roko's Basilisk doesn't affect the present, it merely judges our behavior in the present to determine whether it will torture us for eternity in the future.

    So, no, this... *gestures at America* is still our fault.

  70. Re: Alt America. I'd recommend it, though I have not read many other books on the far right to judge it by, bit it came across as very well researched.

    Cheers

    I'm reading Neoreaction A Basilisk right now, and it mentions Alt America as the best summation of where the Alt-Right came from, so that's two recommendations. On the list it goes!

  71. You will never even approach being as intellectually honest or rigorous as Ian Danskin

    meta

  72. It's likely impossible for a stranger (not a friend for whom you have respect and trust that I'm acting in good faith) to engage with you usefully on this, but I think you have been Ship-of-Theseus'd into putting LessWrong and now SlateStarCodex into a box so you don't have to listen to them. Of course you only have so much time and you must decide quickly what to filter, but I think in this case you have been tricked. Eliezer isn't "a crackpot obsessed with bringing about The Singularity;" he long ago thought the singularity was probably a good idea but now thinks rushing it could wipe out humanity (if you manage to make a superintelligence and _don't_ make sure it shares our values, it's likely to destroy us in pursuit of whatever values it ends up having instead). LessWrong has some association with the effective altruism movement and some of your old answers mention a Singularity-obsessed group that called itself "Effective Altruism," but this is a non-representative group hijacking a general pre-existing term (like a baking-obsessed group calling itself "Women's Suffrage.") The effective altruism movement is just people trying to make sure their charity dollars go as far as possible.

    The Roko's Basilisk thing was mishandled, but Eliezer has publicly explained both his reaction and why it was wrong. A lot of their posts are lengthy and I get why that would stop you from reading if you already don't have confidence in them - it often stops me too, and all I can really say is that sometimes valuable ideas are complicated. There's a reason some of your videos are long or come in several parts, too. I don't know much about the "beloved by racists" bit, but I think it's like how Nazis loved Nietzsche - misunderstanding someone who says non-conformist things to try to sneak their own much worse non-conformist ideas.

    But also, the linked article was from Scott Alexander's personal blog and happened to get cross-posted to LessWrong nearly three years later. If you don't want to read it because it's long and you're busy and you don't know Scott, okay; but it scares me to see you label and lump anything touching LessWrong as crazy and worthless, apparently because someone exaggerated to you some goofy things the founder has said and done.

    If I actually were your friend, I would try to get you to read a few particular Scott essays (not starting with this one) as I legitimately think you'd find them interesting and valuable and I'd want your thoughts on them. I think that in most ways that matter you have similar goals and philosophies, but there are interesting places where you seem to disagree and in the spirit of "if you're smart, surround yourself with smart people who disagree with you" I'd want to see how those shake out when confronted. I'd expect to learn something.

    This isn't a question, is it? Okay, uh, do you think adding the rhyming in Curse of Monkey Island made insult swordfighting better or worse?

    The whole "you probably won't respond to this because you won't trust that I'm asking in good faith" reverse-psychology gambit is the biggest red flag that you are being intellectually dishonest. If you ARE speaking in good faith, don't try to goad me into responding by implying I won't.

    And rhyming added nothing to insult swordfighting. The proper way to maintain the spirit of insult swordfighting was to come up with a new idea as innovative as insult swordfighting was, not just rehash it.

    Please understand: I know enough about the AI rationalists to want nothing to do with them.

  73. You will never even approach being as intellectually honest or rigorous as Scott Alexander

    literally the only think I know about Scott Alexander is his fans are apparently dicks

  74. Have you read David Neiwert's Alt-america perchance? It touches a lot of the same concepts you have.

    No. Should I add it to the research list?

  75. Would you support the addition of cowbell solos to more pieces of music?

    It would liven up Lawrence Welk.

Anon commented:
Ian replied: