CuriousCat Archive Page 19 of 202

  1. (Diff anon) but China isn't communist tho. Arguably, never was. Maybe that's not as bad an argument, as you think?

    in response to OK, but at what cost? How many innocent people will have to die to replace capitalism? Capitalism can't be THAT bad to risk the lives of millions. And before you bring up the climate crisis and how many people die each year from hunger, #1: poverty has been going down at a steady rate for decades. The country with the most reduction is China, but that only started AFTER Deng's market reforms basically made China state capitalist, and #2: the state can take care of mitigating climate and the planet's resources if it needs to, but only if market solutions don't work.

    we're not here to No True Scotsman communism. I don't think modern China exemplifies the ideals of communism. a lot of communists do. I also don't think we can throw out China without also throwing out Cuba and the Soviet Union, and I think it is more fruitful to say "China is not the direction I believe communism should go" than debate what does and doesn't qualify.

    I think it's undeniable that China's ability to tackle climate change so aggressively (as well as handle COVID so much better than the West) have to do with its political and economic differences from the US. call those differences whatever you want, but trying to implement them here would see cries of "communism!!!" from conservatives. any way you slice it, there are capitalist impediments to dealing with societal issues that are lesser in China.

  2. Dada or Cubism?

    I like the aesthetics of cubism more, but dada is far more conceptually interesting to me

  3. There haven’t been mass protests around the world about Darfur and Xinjiang as there are for Palestine.

    in response to Do you think antisemitism is the reason people care about the Israel-Palestine conflict much more than other atrocities happening now? There's are genocides happening in Darfur and Xinjiang right now and they don't get nearly as much attention.

    to my understanding, the international community actually intervened in Darfur and over $16 billion has been spent on peacekeeping there. the UN has also publicly condemned the treatment of the Uyghurs and keeps demanding access to the region. (not gonna argue the UN's "sternly worded letters" are sufficient or anything, I'm just saying there is a response.)

    meanwhile the US has blocked UN intervention in Palestine and Israel has targeted and killed international aid workers without consequence.

    the means by which Darfur and Xinjiang are handled by the international community are being blocked in Palestine because the US is Israel's patron. and so protests happen to try and force the US to act differently.

    protest isn't a thermometer meant to tell you how important something is. it's a political tool. it is being employed aggressively now because, in this situation, the tool is needed. there is an active crisis and very little can be done until the US reverses its position, and pressuring politicians during an election year is (unfortunately) one of the only tactics we have when they ignore us.

  4. Maybe any that don't make the cut could have their notes posted up?

    in response to How many parts do you think your Protagony series will have?

    you need to understand, when I say "notes," I mean unstructured rambles spread across a text document, a google doc, and a handwritten notebook, the relationships between which are only obvious to me. it is... not publishable.

  5. lots of talk on Reddit and Tiktok and a little bit in real life (though not much there because I don't have a social life because I'm a narcissist). this man's a narcissist, narcsissists can't be cured, this person has NPD because he ignored his gf. Remember West Elm Caleb? then go search "npd ableist" on Reddit, you'll see mods promising to ban people who try to stick up for people who suffer from NPD, people insisting that NPD is an uncurable personality difference that's inherently evil. General perception is that narcissists just hurt women (and men too but mainly underprivileged groups and particularly women) and belong in prison or otherwise squirreled far away from society. no discourse among the left like "hey I'm a narcissist, I need to change". all of the discourse about narcissists on the left revolves around devising ways to get revenge by torturing them emotionally (the manosphere calls similar techniques "dread"), either that or identifying a narcissist so they can immediately decide to stay far the fuck away. dr. ramani. trump stuff. friends are reluctant to accept that I am one because they know that they would have to hate me.

    in response to no and it’s just I don’t know how to process the left’s unwavering hatred for people who have narcissistic personality disorder (wrote F by accident)

    sorry for the delay in responding to this, got buried in the onslaught of Israel apologists.

    I don't really know what's up on Reddit and TikTok. "narcissism" is a tricky topic because it was a term that meant "toxic selfishness" and then got medicalized when a disorder was named after it. a lot of people talking about "narcissists" are really just talking about selfish, abusive people, and not necessarily trying to armchair diagnose a person with a disorder. but I've seen enough people go ahead and decide, yes, this person is CLINICALLY NARCISSISTIC, and try to analyze them through a lens of (often poorly understood) diagnostic criteria. and there's a lot of fuzzy conflation there where it's not always clear whether a person is calling, like, Donald Trump an abusive, selfish asshole, or an actual NPDer.

    in my own life, I haven't seen it go as dark as you're describing - the seemingly eliminationist rhetoric - but I'm not plugged into the communities you're looking at. in any case: you don't deserve to be assumed dangerous or abusive, or to have every awful person labeled a part of your diagnostic cohort, or to be treated as a lost cause who barely deserves to live. that is unconscionable ableism and people can't just declare certain brains unworthy of society. (I've gotten some arguments on this very website that people with antisocial personality disorder should be legally prevented from having children, which is partly why I find your experience plenty credible.)

    the only thing that concerns me is I've started to see the rhetoric flow the other way. that blog post I mentioned (the one saying I'm "getting more reactionary") essentially argued that discussion of abuse tactics (like lovebombing or gaslighting) are REALLY just coded terms for people with NPD, and therefore using them is actually ableist. the writer went so far as to say, since I used the word "narcissistic" in my Cornetto Trilogy video, I was diagnosing the character with NPD, and also I hate all people with NPD and probably think they don't deserve to live. (and, you know, given the state of the discourse, I should probably retire the colloquial use of "narcissist.")

    since I categorically reject that everyone with NPD must be an abuser, I'm also gonna reject that any discussion of abuse is a discussion of NPD. I don't believe everyone with NPD is a gaslighter, which is why talking about gaslighting is not ableist. and I will call out any TikToker who conflates abuse with clinical narcissism.

    which is all to say: I don't want you dead, and I hope you don't read that into anything I say. I get wary of these conversations because I've seen people try to minimize abuse, but I don't want normal-ass people just trying to manage the brain they were given getting thrown under the bus in the process.

  6. How many parts do you think your Protagony series will have?

    I have notes for 6 total, dunno if all of them are interesting enough

  7. Why doesn’t utilitarianism apply here?

    in response to What do you think of that recent trolley problem post on X about the election?

    it's not a question of whether it applies. you can make the argument that, in utilitarian terms, we may have to accept that there is no outcome without genocide in Palestine, and try to work with what good can be done in spite of that. that is a difficult but real argument - arguably a necessary argument.

    but maybe don't talk about the horrifying reality of being forced to fund genocide no matter who you vote for with a fucking meme meant to scold people who don't want to? maybe??

  8. OK, but at what cost? How many innocent people will have to die to replace capitalism? Capitalism can't be THAT bad to risk the lives of millions. And before you bring up the climate crisis and how many people die each year from hunger, #1: poverty has been going down at a steady rate for decades. The country with the most reduction is China, but that only started AFTER Deng's market reforms basically made China state capitalist, and #2: the state can take care of mitigating climate and the planet's resources if it needs to, but only if market solutions don't work.

    in response to Are you 100% sure that capitalism isn't the best system we can have? Like, is there at least a 1% chance you might be wrong?

    yeah, buddy, if your argument depends on ignoring the extinction-level crisis capitalism has created and continually fails to address (I'm sure the state will step in ANY DAY NOW) and requires calling a communist nation TECHNICALLY not communist, maybe consider it's a bad argument.

    "poverty has been going down" - poverty could be zero. there could be no poverty. we could put everyone in homes, give everyone food, give everyone clothes and heat and clean water. that is entirely possible. so why don't we? because every capitalist will tell you: giving every unhoused person a house would ruin the housing market. giving every unemployed person a salary would tank the economy. feeding every hungry person would break the food industry. and what do they call universal housing bills, basic income bills, food security programs? "that's communism."

    capitalism is the reason we can't just end poverty, and you know it.

  9. Do you think antisemitism is the reason people care about the Israel-Palestine conflict much more than other atrocities happening now? There's are genocides happening in Darfur and Xinjiang right now and they don't get nearly as much attention.

    Americans care about the genocide in Palestine because their taxes are paying for it

  10. What do you actually think of Hayek?

    Salma? queen.

  11. Do women actually have better orgasms than men?

    I mean, I've gotten no complaints...

  12. Hypothetically, how would you explain that men can get pregnant and have periods to an elderly person who has been told the opposite is true all their life?

    in response to Do men have periods?

    look, I'm forty, and I've known about SRS my whole life. my boomer mom from the midwest explained to me that trans people exist and are valid. trans people have been plot points in movies for decades, even as their depiction has evolved from punchline to tragedy to Oscar-bait for cis actors to (occasionally) actual humans played by actual trans people. trans discourse has existed longer than either of us has been alive.

    elderly people may not understand or respect trans people, but they are not unfamiliar with the concept. it will not blow their mind to hear that many trans men still have a functioning uterus. the idea that no one has ever explained it in simple enough language is simply incorrect.

    so the question isn't "what is the phrase that will get through to them," but "why are they resistant, and am I someone they would listen to?"

  15. Is life getting better or worse?

    yes

  16. Why listen to new music?

    I mean, why listen to any music? why do anything? I like music, and it's nice to know that I will never run out because people are always making more. and you can always find good new music if you dig a little.

  17. I'm your biggest fan
    I'll follow you until you love me
    Colin
    Colin Mochrie

  18. Is there evidence that the IDF as a whole is intending to target Palestinians and not just Hamas?

    are you fucking kidding me right now

  20. How many cavities have you had?

    well let's see, there's my mouth, ears, eye sockets... does the nose count as one or two?

  21. Does evolution disprove religion?

    religion, by its nature, isn't really something that can be proven or disproven

  22. Do men have periods?

    in response to Can men get pregnant?

    I feel like you're having trouble with this

  24. What do you think of that recent trolley problem post on X about the election?

    fucked up argument

  25. What if we all stopped paying taxes?

    some of us would go to jail

  26. Dude, please DM Brianna Wu and get her together; she’s going down the reactionary right wing pipeline sooo fast.

    I am very confident people with more influence than me have contacted her by now

  27. If capitalism/socialism just determine who gets paid, how is it supposed to affect the climate crisis?

    when I say "capitalism didn't build the iPhone, labor built the iPhone, capitalism just determines who got paid," that is a contextual "just." I do not claim the only difference between capitalism and socialism is who gets paid, that would be a very silly thing to say.

  28. What features do you think social media platforms should have that you've not seen before

    in-built systems meant to limit the amount of time you spend on the platform

  29. Something I can’t stand about a lot of this discourse is that physically attractive people are making offensive jokes all the time for fun and no one really cares. Bieber was caught on video saying the N word for example. The social legislating is only for people who look a certain way or maybe have certain mental disorders. It’s like a way of using shame to keep them out of the dating pool while the attractive ones have more freedom.

    the racial politics of Justin Bieber have been heavily discoursed for much of his career, I think maybe you're just not plugged into anti-racist circles?

  30. (diff anon) The *Jews* were being marginalized for centuries before there *was* a Palestine.

    in response to atheists aren't a historically marginalized group

    [CW I'm gonna read this one the riot act with specifics about Israel's war crimes]

    that really the moral framework you wanna go with? you prepared to say Africa can genocide the entire rest of the world? you ready to say Korea can genocide Japan? the rule is "genocide is okay so long as you genocide someone less historically marginalized than you"? c'mon, fucko, you don't actually believe that, you're just improvising your way through different moral arguments in the hopes you'll find SOMETHING that makes the genocide of Palestine okay and you not a monster for supporting it. you're not going to find it. genocide is wrong, it's always wrong, it's one of the very few things about which I can confidently say there is no grey area. it is wrong to kill 30,000 people in six months. it is wrong to shoot children in their parents' arms. it is wrong to pin young women to the walls and take selfies with their corpse. it is wrong to provide food and then shoot people trying access it. it doesn't matter what happened to your fucking ancestors, you can go "well, hurt people hurt people" about mass death. fuck you.

  31. Why were there Red Scares but not "White Scares", fear of fascism and corporatism taking root?

    there was, it was called the labor movement, the Red Scare was the backlash against it

    see also the backlash against the Black Panthers

  32. I can see how the first two points reduce demand for abortions by reducing unwanted pregnancies (which iirc was the context of the I Hate Mondays video) but is there a link between the last two points and reducing unwanted pregnancies/demand for abortions? Or are they just good things that should also be taught?

    in response to How should we improve sex ed in the US? You mentioned comprehensive sex ed in your I Hate Mondays video, but what does that involve?

    mostly the are just good and moral things to do. but stressing the value of pleasure and the existence of people who don't enjoy sex or don't desire cis-hetero sex can reduce the number of people having sex they don't want to have, which can indirectly reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies.

    but you do it because it's good, not because it happens to maybe prevent a few abortions.

  33. How is all of history supposed to be the history of class conflict? The fascist worldview that history is about ethnic struggles seems more plausible than the Marxist worldview. How were events like the Rwandan genocide about class and not about ethnicity?

    I don't actually agree with Marx on that one. "history has long ignored the way it is steered by class" and "it is almost always useful to view history through the lens of class struggle" I can get with. feel like he was overcorrecting there.

  36. And are men and women also able to Not get pregnant if they want?

    in response to How 'bout women?

    yeah, I'm not get pregnant right now

  37. you support jews until they have national interests, then they're the enemy. bro just say you hate jews, it's fine, there are levels to this shit anyway. it's not like you're saying hitler was right

    you support atheists until they oppose genocide, bro just say you hate atheists

  39. How should we improve sex ed in the US? You mentioned comprehensive sex ed in your I Hate Mondays video, but what does that involve?

    the big things are sex ed that foregrounds consent, supports safe sex rather than pushing abstinence, acknowledges the importance of pleasure, and talks openly about queer and trans and ace identities

  41. How 'bout women?

    in response to Can men get pregnant?

    outlook good!

  42. BOYFRIEND AIN'T HAD PERIOD SENCE HE GOT PREGAT

    in response to Can men get pregnant?

    you can tell when a men has been pargnet before if he has starch masks

  43. (Diff non from Ukraine) a guy I know, who serves in infantry, once said "when you sit in a trench under the artillery fire, you very acutely feel that the rifle in your hands is about as good as a stick". I often think about this, when someone starts talking about overthrowing tyranny with guns.

    in response to This is like saying it's impossible to make everyone 100% equal, therefore we shouldn't try to make ourselves even a little more equal.

  44. "Borrowed observation #4, we are what we pretend to BE"

    "The far right does the same, hoping they WON'T"

    "If someone tries to force you to play defense, you don’t have to PLAY"

    in response to You have any bets on last word?

    I said I like it, not that I always do it

  46. I'm sure the replies are going to be interesting.

    in response to Can men get pregnant?

    can u get pregante

  47. YOU BOUGHT A PHYSICAL COPY AND YOU NEVER PLAYED IT???/?/?

    in response to what would it take for you to try resident evil 4 or its remake

    I got a GameCube from an old housemate several years ago and he gave me a bunch of his games, never got around to that one. too busy playing Melee.

  48. So if the government becomes tyrannical we're fucked?

    in response to This is like saying it's impossible to make everyone 100% equal, therefore we shouldn't try to make ourselves even a little more equal.

    so if you wanna overthrow a tyranny you're going to need a different strategy than "have guns." you need the military or the cops to take your side, or you need to use general strikes to economically starve the leaders, or you need support from foreign nations. "have an AR-15" is not a strategy.

    I feel like the people who defend the 2nd Amendment because "what if we need to overthrow the government" should be the MOST opposed to the overfunding of the military, the militarization of the police, and the tendency for cops to shoot Black people who have (or even APPEAR to have) guns. if that's what the 2nd Amendment is for, all those moves by the state make citizen militias less viable. but, oddly, the pro-gun lobby overwhelmingly DEFENDS all those things and are actually the most rabidly patriotic people in the country.

    so, yeah, they actually only want guns for the things they tend to use them for: taking the law into their own hands when they feel threatened by poor/Black people. they want guns so they can play at being cops.

  50. Are you 100% sure that capitalism isn't the best system we can have? Like, is there at least a 1% chance you might be wrong?

    look, there is a chance I am wrong about human nature, about incentives, about collectivism, about power structures. it is possible one or another criticism I have of capitalism is faulty. I may be wrong about the viability of socialism. I may be wrong about the organizational feasibility of revolution. I can own any one of these possibilities.

    but do I think there's a chance that humanity has already discovered the best possible form it can take and it's capitalism?

    no. 0% chance. this is not as good as it gets.

  51. If I send you a 5 minute PragerU video will you give your opinion on it?

    I can tell you in advance my opinion is low, unless this is a gotcha and you're gonna send me that first video they made where they actually criticized racism

  52. First word of your "Who's Afraid of Modern Art" companion essay?

    I haven't written it yet, they gave me the official go-ahead quite recently, when the pre-orders came in. I know some of what I'm gonna say (among other things we will be discussing a short story by Nick Hornby called NippleJesus), and, knowing me, the first word will probably be "I."

  53. what would it take for you to try resident evil 4 or its remake

    I actually own Resi 4, so what it would take is pulling out the GameCube

  54. no and it’s just I don’t know how to process the left’s unwavering hatred for people who have narcissistic personality disorder (wrote F by accident)

    in response to I feel like I have to be honest about having NPF or else I’m an even bigger butthole but it also seems like the left really dislikes people like me and wants everything short of their death.

    hmmm, you're the second person to bring this up to me recently. I'm sure lefties are guilty of ignorance and ableist microaggressions, but can you tell me what's happened that makes you feel like we hate you nearly to the point of wishing you dead?

  56. Can men get pregnant?

    yeah

  57. do you like pumpkin

    yeah

  58. What’s wrong with the argument that civilians need guns in case they need to overthrow the government or to keep it in line?

    because the government has tanks

  59. How do you balance personal responsibility with desiring systemic change?

    can you elaborate on what the conflict is there?

  60. How far are we from making a real Iron Man suit?

    12 yards

  61. Do you still have any Long COVID symptoms?

    I don't believe I got Long COVID

  62. I feel like I have to be honest about having NPF or else I’m an even bigger butthole but it also seems like the left really dislikes people like me and wants everything short of their death.

    are you the person who wrote that article about how I'm getting more reactionary?

  63. Requiring the American people to collectively "consent" to reparations is the reason reparations haven't been paid. The reason Native Americans haven't gotten their land back in any significant way is because no one can agree how or even *if* such a thing should be accomplished. In the case of Israel, that decision being made by a third party at the very least *got shit done*. Admittedly with an immense human cost, but that can be placed at the feet of the deranged fascist ideologies of Hamas and Netanyahu's government, not at those who gave the Jewish people their land back in the first place.

    in response to On Second Thought this is so much worse this is so much worse then I thought. I want to hear you say that the state of Louisiana doesn't owe indigenous people jack shit because the land was stolen by like the Spanish and French Empires. I want to hear you say that the state of New York doesn't own indigenous people jack shit because the land was stolen by the fucking Dutch Empire. I want to hear you say it! A white american who is living on stolen land keeps benefiting from the theft that they did not commit and the responsibility is put on them and their children and their children's children forever but a Palestinian who is living on stolen land can say "What do you want from me SOMEONE ELSE stole the land!"

    what your describing

    is colonialism

    it is simply a repeat of the crime you are saying should be made right for the Jews

    also the Nakba had nothing to do with Netanyahu or Hamas

  64. What does the H in Jesus H Christ stand for?

    Hoobastank

  65. If we're comparing Israel to hypothetical reparations for Black Americans (which we shouldn't?), a better comparison is probably Liberia, a state (over-simplifying) created by early abolitionists for freed slaves--notably, it did not have a great impact on the indigenous population of the region, and you could reasonably look at it and conclude that "doing colonialism somewhere else to give an oppressed people a state" is not an effective approach to reparations

    in response to You wouldn't say the same thing about the U.S paying reparations to the descendants of African slaves, would you? Why not?

  66. Favorite state of matter outside the "main four" of solid liquid gas plasma?

    in response to favorite liquid

    Helium II

  67. Why anti-racism over colorblindness?

    because colorblindness cannot address racism. colorblindness seems like a solution, but only if EVERYONE opts into it. if there are still people doing racism, colorblindness cannot address it; it can't even RECOGNIZE it. it can, at best, scold. you cannot actually OPPOSE racism without anti-racism.

  68. When you are old, what do you think children will ask you to tell stories about?

    in my experience, children ask you to summarize movies they haven't seen

  69. (Diff anon)Israel's argument is literally what South Africa's argument was, the areas where black south africans were placed were considered seperate, you can't claim it's not a part when you occupy and control it

    in response to Israel argues that the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank are not citizens of Israel so it’s not apartheid. That is a bit different from apartheid, but I will agree that it certainly has a lot in common with apartheid.

  70. On Second Thought this is so much worse this is so much worse then I thought.
    I want to hear you say that the state of Louisiana doesn't owe indigenous people jack shit because the land was stolen by like the Spanish and French Empires.
    I want to hear you say that the state of New York doesn't own indigenous people jack shit because the land was stolen by the fucking Dutch Empire.
    I want to hear you say it!
    A white american who is living on stolen land keeps benefiting from the theft that they did not commit and the responsibility is put on them and their children and their children's children forever but a Palestinian who is living on stolen land can say "What do you want from me SOMEONE ELSE stole the land!"

    in response to (diff anon) I can't believe I have to say this, but the Jewish nation of Israel had *their* land taken from them by the Ottoman Empire *centuries before* the mandate for Palestine. Which was "made right" by the establishment of modern Israel as reparations for the Holocaust.

    you are drawing these comparisons because you still fail to see Palestinians as human beings. how do you see reparations being paid to the indigenous peoples of New York and Louisiana? do you think Spain or France or The Netherlands are going to swoop in and give those states back to the Lenape and the Chitimacha? "sorry we took that land from you, here, displace the people who live on it now"? you know full well the only way those reparations get paid is if the USA decides to do it. if the people who live there now consent to it. and, you know, the Americans who live there now may not have been the FIRST colonizers, but they committed ample crimes against the people native to the region once they took control. they have plenty of reparations they owe as well.

    the Palestinians did not take the land from the Jews. they did not displace the Jews. they did not inherit the wealth of the Ottoman Empire. they were ALSO COLONIZED BY THE OTTOMANS. and then their land was handed to the Israelis because Europe decided to pay their reparations out of someone else's bank account.

    you are arguing about whether or not a debt is owed to the Jews, but seem to think whether or not Palestine should be the ones to pay it is irrelevant. because you don't see them as mattering. because the colonization and displacement and history of subjugation of the Jews matters, but not those of Palestine. you aren't opposed to colonization, you just think it should benefit one group and not another.

  71. Israel argues that the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank are not citizens of Israel so it’s not apartheid.
    That is a bit different from apartheid, but I will agree that it certainly has a lot in common with apartheid.

    in response to (diff anon) Since you're intent on being smug about this, here you go: "The term “apartheid”, an Afrikaans word, derived from the French term “mettre à part”, literally translated to “separating, setting apart.” Apartheid is a policy that is founded on the idea of separating people based on racial or ethnic criteria." Now that you have the response you're looking for, how's about engaging with the argument that Israel's treatment of Arabs *doesn't* fit the definition of Apartheid?

    I would recommend seeking another source on the definition of apartheid than an apartheid state

  72. favorite liquid

    ferrofluid

  73. What do you think of people who are "socially liberal, fiscally conservative”?

    those are pretty much always Republicans

  74. You wouldn't say the same thing about the U.S paying reparations to the descendants of African slaves, would you? Why not?

    in response to (diff anon) I can't believe I have to say this, but the Jewish nation of Israel had *their* land taken from them by the Ottoman Empire *centuries before* the mandate for Palestine. Which was "made right" by the establishment of modern Israel as reparations for the Holocaust.

    ...because the US is the country that stole them from Africa. why is it hard to understand that the country that committed the crime would pay the reparations?

  75. I kinda feel bad for not-quite-ready-to-question-his-assumptions-about-power-structures-and-race-anon even though they're a little weirdo holding water for colonizers. If they ever make the big tough leap to "get it" there's still a lotta growing pains coming.
    Well anon, I'm rooting for you to pick your head outta your own butt.

    in response to (none of these anons) The idea that the creation of Israel was reparations for the Holocaust is rather odd to me, considering that AFAIK nobody in Palestine was involved in the planning or execution of the Holocaust (at the very least, not to the extent that people in Europe were).

Anon commented:
Ian replied: