CuriousCat Archive Page 190 of 202

  1. I kind of want to find every leftist in the Anglosphere who doesn't vote out of principle and ask them if they think politics is just a fucking game with no real consequences, but think it might take a while and be a bit impractical. What do you think?

    I think "leftists who don't vote" is a population too small to meaningfully affect an election. We may find them philosophically offensive, but it would be better to focus our efforts on Black and brown people who want to vote but are being denied the right, you know?

  2. Should firearms be banned?

    Firearms should be rigorously regulated.

  3. Do you see yourself as a thought leader?

    Not presently, no.

  4. What do you think of California now?

    I heard the rent in San Francisco is insane.

    Gentrification is a motherfucker.

    I don't have a huge attachment to any state in particular, except maybe Rhode Island. I care about The Bay Area because there are people I love there and a lot of my favorite restaurants. The skyrocketing rents that are pricing a lot of people I love out of their homes, and displacing most of the non-white population, are deeply troubling.

  5. What do you think of Malcolm X and his anti-semitic attitudes?

    All faves are problematic.

  6. Any thoughts on Ocasio Cortez?

    She seems cool.

  7. So you think the blue wave is still coming?

    I've never assumed a blue wave is coming.

  8. Why did you leave California?

    Felt like it.

  9. Are American liberals too conservative or too liberal to talk about racial self-identification by people like Rachel Dolezal/Nkechi Diallo? Do you think it is even worth talking about?
    It feels like it's not really even a topic liberals can entertain the idea of without falling into either trans or racial insensitivity.

    Don't say "liberals" when you mean white liberals.

  10. are you happy for france winning the world cup?

    A majority of the national team consists of immigrants from african and muslim nations mixed with French nationals

    Sounds like a real swell hockey team!

  11. I just wondered your thoughts on something:
    Scottish comedian Frankie Boyle once spoke about offensiveness on a podcast, and he said:
    "We live in quite an immoral society; so part of our taxes go towards killing people, towards helping companies export arms to Saudi Arabia, to building nuclear subs, all this stuff. We don't have a particularly moral society, so we've pushed our morality onto our *taste*. So we think "how do I become moral? well, I watch these good movies, not these bad movies like you. I watch the good shows on BBC 4, not the bad shows on BBC One. You like The Stone Roses, where I like The Smiths, I'm better than you.It's not to say somethings are more worthwhile than others, but morality isn't involved."

    This opinion is crap.

    The idea that taste is morally-neutral is crap.

    The idea that people who criticize media do nothing else to better the world is crap.

  12. By any chance you've seen this:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6eAcFOSOY0

    Goes to show how influential John Carpenter really is and how movie making today is very contrived especially The Last Jedi ;)

    You know the plot of Star Wars: A New Hope was taken from Kurosawa's The Hidden Fortress and the Death Star trench run was a nearly shot-for-shot remake of the ending to The Dam Busters, right?

  13. what is it about robert mckee that you're not a fan of? Is it his storytelling principles? or his die-hard followers who strictly follow robert mckee's principles like David Koepp?

    After Aristotle's Poetics, I think robert mckee's books are essential for both audiences and future filmmakers

    Which makes me wonder why would Charlie Kaufman want to make fun of robert mckee in Adaptation and suggest to audiences that stories need not necessarily follow storytelling fundamentals and conventions. Seems pretty tasteless to me

    When did I say I didn't like Robert McKee?

  14. I don't like Sacha Baron Cohen, and I don't deny how his past work has been racist and xenophobic, but I don't understand how anyone can not laugh when you see former and current GOP congressmen endorse Kinderguardians® and First Grenadiers™. And by laugh, I mean the half chuckle half cackle that you instinctively employ to protect your psyche from inconceivable despair.

    My question is: do you think the fetid rot in our political culture that allowed GOP congressman to say they supported kids with guns because they thought is sounded like something they should support (Fmr Rep Joe Walsh even admitted he didn't even know what he was saying!) is irreparable, or is there hope that this is just a low point from which we may return?

    Well, if we assume it can't be fixed, we won't fix it. If we assume it can be fixed, we might. So I keep assuming it can be. If I'm wrong, it's not like I'll be *more* fucked than if I didn't try.

  15. As a progressive, I often feel pressure to avoid posting opinions on social media unless they feel genuinely new to the discourse bc that's "slacktivism"--but conservatives seem content to repeat each other forever (I heard someone say verbatim "Michael Brown was no angel" last flipping month). Do you ever deal with this kind of pressure/do you think it's common among progressives? & do you think there's value in repetitive messaging?

    Frick, that's a good question, and I don't know. I don't feel much pressure to say things that have already been said - I feel the complete opposite, in fact. It's not that I consider repetition slacktivism, more that I just get frustrated with the way a lot of conversation on the Left never seems to get past the 101 course. Like, I don't need another video telling me what the Overton Window is, I need someone to tell me how to stop it from drifting Rightward, and it seems like no one is ever talking about that.

    If there's something I believe but I feel people are already saying it, I tend to just retweet/reblog/share their words on social media instead of writing something new. If I have an opinion that I haven't heard someone say, I'm more likely to just say it myself unless it's something I'm the wrong person to say. (As in, if there's a trans* issues, I'd rather actively seek out a trans* person talking about it and share that than throw yet another cis voice into the mix.)

    I do think the constant repetition on the Right serves a kind of mantric purpose. They constantly reinforce the same handful of beliefs and use it to shut out other arguments. I don't think the Left is going to get anywhere by trying to outplay the Right at that game; I think we've got to demand that people think critically and make some goddamn sense with their arguments.

  16. You too a bit sad leftists are yass queening SBC even if Brüno proved he's an inveterate opportunist who will punch down at queer and black people when Rethugs don't hold the WH?

    I never saw Brüno, but I saw the Borat movie. Baron Cohen's shtick always seemed kind of bullshit, pretending he was exposing something about America by revealing the shocking truth that some people are ignorant racists and then calling it a day. If he's pointing his talents at a worthy target and actually revealing something worth revealing, then I'd count that as a win. It is a worthwhile thing for someone to do. I doubt he'll keep clear of shitty behavior going forward, so I'd advise against praising the man, but the *work* is a net positive.

  17. You hate those memelord movie videomakers (I refuse to call them critics or even reviewers), but how about RLM?

    Well, not enjoying someone's work and being critical of their politics != hate. I haven't even *watched* most of them.

    RLM is something I sort of enjoyed a while back but the edgy, rapey jokes really wore thin for me. I know people who like them anyway, though none of them defend the icky parts, but I don't deny there's still value to be found in their work. I have no idea if they've improved since last I was watching them. I'm not super invested in having an opinion on them right now.

  18. What is a good counterargument to "saying there is link between race and IQ isn't racist because Asians have higher IQ."

    Counterarguments aren't going to work on their own. If you want to engage with them, you're going to have to dig deeper into why they believe that IQ is a valuable measure and why they're attached to having scientific proof of a difference between races. Racism isn't rational, it's ideological, so you have to combat the ideology, which first means understanding what it is.

  19. Is "all your faves are problematic" saying that my faves shouldn't be my faves because they are problematic, or is it saying that it's okay to have faves that are problematic if you acknowledge their problematic aspects?

    The second one, or, more accurately, it's okay to have faves that are problematic but you probably need to draw the line somewhere, it's up to you where you draw that line, but you have to be willing to accept that others may draw the line differently from you. There ARE faves that are problematic to the point where I don't think they can be consumed ethically. Acknowledging that there is no purely ethical faves doesn't mean all faves are equally unethical; there is a spectrum.

  20. Regarding everyone telling you to watch alt-right critic YouTube, as someone who accidentally fell down a rabbit hole of watching ralphthemoviemaker, I Hate Everything, and some others a bit back before realizing that they were alt-right and awful, I can say pretty honestly that you're not missing much. About the only thing that is interesting about them is the subtle ways that their fashy beliefs creep into their film criticism, and even then it's just because they often do a pretty decent job of disguising those beliefs.

    I don't feel like I'm missing much.

  21. This may just be me, but I think evangelicals are underanalyzed, at least from a critical perspective. I have seen more videos dunking on religion than I ever needed, but I think evangelicals need to be reexamined because of their overwhelming support of Trump, since they essentially elected him (along with white people, though there is significant overlap. Do you know anyone who's talking about this?

    I've seen people talking about it in long-ish Twitter threads - Dan Olson has discussed the way evangelical doomsday-ism is a big part of why we won't deescalate wars or deal with the environment, Casey Explosion has discussed how TERFs are deeply tied to evangelical movements - but I haven't sought out any longer-form writing/videos on the subject. I don't know that it's under-analyzed so much as the analysis that's happening is under-appreciated?

  22. audible or e-book or real books?

    Real books, but mostly out of habit.

  23. I fully support the rights of sex workers, but at a gut level I still react negatively to people who hire sex workers & would never do so myself--is that a moral contradiction?

    Yes, but you're not in control of what your gut tells you. You didn't ask to be raised in a culture that stigmatizes sex work and it's unavoidable that some of that thinking would be embedded in your brain. You *are* in control of what you do with those feelings, and whether or not you're working to unpack them.

  24. Ask yourself if you think it's OK for a company to fire an employee, without warning, for being racist on their personal Twitter. Set aside what constitutes "racist" just ask if that's OK. The employee is not in the office, they are not on the clock, they are not operating in any official capacity; they are on their own Twitter telling off someone they feel was disrespectful to them who happens to be a public servent. Do you think that should be a fireable offense? Would you be OK with your employer reading your Twitter and firing you if they felt you weren't not racist enough? If so, do you think that policy is applied across the entire industry? How many of your favorite comedians would be out of work if they got fired for snarking at people on Twitter? How many of your favorite TV shows would be worse if people were fired for this regularly? Ask yourself if it's appropriate for a company to explicitly say that the person was fired because a mob of angry viewers demanded it. Set aside whether you think they had a right to be angry and think purely about how harassment online works, and whether that statement from the company will lead to more harassment of the employee (hint: it will). Ask yourself if this will have a cooling effect on how open your favorite comedians will be about their work on Twitter if this might get them fired (hint: it will). Ask yourself if other employees that this collection of angry veiwers dislike are going to get mobbed with demands that they be fired (hint: they already are).

    Ask yourself, irrespective of whether or not Rosanne Bar was in the wrong, if any of this is good for TV or TV culture.

    The fact that you think calling a customer a rando asshat and calling a Black person a monkey are comparable is everything wrong with whiteness.

    Yes, TV culture is better off when we don't give TV shows to racists. How is that even a debate?

  25. Enjoyed watching Tropic Thunder? Especially when it shows a white dude playing another dude playing a black man?

    Would you re-watch Tropic Thunder today?

    I thought that kind of edgy humor was funny at the time. I don't now.

  26. how do I come out to my postmodernist parents as a neomarxist?

    stop coming out and clean your room, lobster

  27. how does it feel to be the only person on this site that gives good answers?

    You should be following Shannon: https://curiouscat.me/plentyofalcoves

  28. "I don't have a version of socialism."

    You're too modest. In all seriousness how should we show solidarity with the Paestinians?

    I don't weigh in on Israel because the more I learn about the situation the less I know what to do about it.

  29. Do you feel the same way about David Crosby?

    I'm mostly curious whether I'm related to David Crosby.

  30. So what do you think of indie films with big hollywood stars in them?

    Am I supposed to have a unique opinion on them as opposed to indie films without stars or Hollywood films with stars? I tend to say "moves are movies."

  31. are twitter arguments worth it?

    A small fraction of Twitter arguments are productive.

  32. So do you like Neil Young?

    Not especially.

  33. What do you think of abortion?

    It should be safe an legal and freely available.

  34. How in your version of socialism will we tackle the issue of Israel, in a non racist way?

    I don't have a version of socialism.

  35. Hi sir, any chance of doing an Innuendo Studios vid regarding the whole Price, Fries, ArenaNet, gamedevelopment at large and harassment vs women+minorities events recently?

    I don't have anything new to add to that conversation, and discussing the issue while the events in question are so recent will likely increase the harassment of Price et al, so probably not.

  36. Ahh yes!

    I also forgot the glaringly obvious example.

    Lefty youtube, as it is now, grew from attacking the Skeptic community for cherry picking and responding to the same people over and over.

    Yet they are falling into the same trap and using the same "usual suspects" like Sargon, Dave Rubin, and now Elon Musk to prove their points, in addition to the others I named before.

    Isn't hypocrisy grand?

    Hi, I'm only responding to this one of your 5 questions, anon, because it's the one with the least racist bullshit in it. I'm not going to signal boost it.

    The primary reason I don't watch the YouTubers you're defending is because people like you like them.

  37. Why are people (like anon) so obsessed with pundits and not arguments? It really doesn't matter who you respond to since the right is a cesspool of borderline plagiarism. It's like one pundits gets owned, and they move onto the next one.

    Yeah, there aren't that many interesting ways to say "the Jews control the media, feminists are destroying masculinity, and interracial marriage is genocide." I don't know why I need to respond to each new phrasing of the same handful of arguments.

  38. "Well, it's not like they have anything better to do."

    That's a two-way street my friend, it shows you have nothing going on either, or you are hiding from your polyamorous relationships which are suffocating you.

    That was a long road to calling me a cuck, bro.

  39. What is you least popular opinion?

    Seems to be that Kubrick isn't that good.

  40. Are you pro-buttclenching or anti-buttclenching?

    Context-sensitive butt-clenching.

  41. Re:XKCD; You're right, it wasn't a question, but I felt uneasy asking you to justify what you like or don't like. But thinking about it, it seems that 1) you get way more intrusive questions than that and 2) you actually said it stopped being good. So, my questions are: In what areas do you think the quality has dropped? Around what time ?

    I think the Golden Age ended around 2009? I'm not saying it isn't still funny sometimes, and most of his most interesting, high-concept stuff has happened since then. But the day-to-day comics just haven't been as funny or clever, on average, as when I first started reading it. Sometimes I can point to something specific that doesn't work - I think Randall has a tendency to belabor the joke in ways he didn't when he was starting out, and as his audience has grown he's let himself get more self-referential with recurring characters and motifs that can feel less like jokes and more like references to jokes he already made - but usually it's less specific. I just don't laugh as much, or find as much insight, as I used to.

    I still think it's a fine comic, and obviously I still read it religiously, so I'm not trying to preach to anyone. I just read it more out of habit than anything these days.

  42. " You're burying the lede here, but I guess your answer is that you've watched Shaun, Contra, and Three Arrows, and some smaller YouTube channels. (No statement as to how MUCH you've watched, which was the actual question, but you do you.)"

    I have watched 12-15 hours of their videos, if you want to get anal retentive about it.

    ok

  43. "I know enough about these people to make an assessment of whether I want to spend hours consuming their material. Daddy has things to do. If you want to call that bias, feel free to write back listing how many hours of leftist YouTubers you've watched before passing judgment on it."

    I have and I will, #leftyyoutube responds to the same 4 people Lauren Southern, Stefan Molyneux, Styxhexenhammer666, and Black Pigeon Speaks. They choose to attack these 4 primarily. I am referring to Shaun, ThreeArrows Contrapoints (yes she responded to the golden one as well amongst others), and other smaller channels.

    Yet Three Arrows, that symbol comes from Social Democrats in the 1920's which sold the communists out, has never discussed the Cologne rapes in his own country of Germany. Interesting.

    This is just one example.

    Hoo-ee.

    a) You're burying the lede here, but I guess your answer is that you've watched Shaun, Contra, and Three Arrows, and some smaller YouTube channels. (No statement as to how MUCH you've watched, which was the actual question, but you do you.)

    b) You're not commenting on what any of these folks' beliefs are, or even sharing what your judgment is, other than to say "they only critique these four other YouTubers." This kind of implies that you don't meaningfully engage with leftist rhetoric, you only watch to see what they're saying about YOUR people.

    c) Contra has expressly said she's not a full-fledged leftist.

    d) Your "one example" is a completely unrelated topic about Three Arrows being unable to criticize the Alt-Right if he doesn't blame the Cologne rapes on immigrants, which is such a fusion of moving the goalposts, whataboutism, and racist dogwhistle that I'm almost impressed by you. Almost.

  44. It feels like the word bias is thrown around as a way of stating someone's opinion in a way that implies that opinion is invalid.

    "Man, you sure are biased against tomatoes"

    rather than

    "Jeez, you sure don't like tomatoes"

    Is this something you have noticed? Does it seem like a recent trend?

    Seems like there was a big uptick in that linguistic phenomenon during GamerGate.

  45. In that last question you mentioned that you didn't like a lot of alt-right types on Youtube, but the list the asker had included people like IHE and RalphTMM. I see why the other ones are a bit alt-right-y (especially Peterson, yikes), but what about those two leaves you with a bad taste in your mouth? Or are those just dumb examples on his part?

    I don't know, maybe they were just listing people I've said I don't watch.

    Honestly, the biggest red flag about IHE and RalphTMM is that people keep recommending them in the same breath as Jordan Peterson and Sam Harris.

  46. You sound like you have a bias against personalities like Jordan Peterson, Ethan & Him from h3h3 Productions, YourMovieSucks, Sam Harris, Ralphthemoviemaker and I Hate Everything...

    Why can't you just listened to what other people are suggesting you to try and watch rather than ignoring them?

    No wonder all your point of views about the Alt-right movement and euphemism is so contrived and ignorant

    When I was 20, a friend of mine who was a big Anne Rice fanatic told me I was biased because I said I didn't like Anne Rice but I'd never actually read her. She gave me a copy of The Vampire Lestat and told me I couldn't criticize Anne Rice until I'd finished it. It was around 3 or 4 pages in, when Lestat described himself by saying "my mouth is always sensuous" that I decided I wasn't going to read a 500 page book just to prove a philosophical point to a friend.

    So I'm certainly not going to watch hours of videos from Alt-Right types just to prove a philosophical point to a stranger on the internet.

    I know enough about these people to make an assessment of whether I want to spend hours consuming their material. Daddy has things to do. If you want to call that bias, feel free to write back listing how many hours of leftist YouTubers you've watched before passing judgment on it.

  47. I think this XKCD thing is the first time I vigorously disagree with you.

    that is not a question

  48. Joe Rogan or Jordan Peterson?

    no

  49. In the 90's you were Team Nintendo or Team Sega?

    The Console Wars were a bullshit marketing tactic that asked you to invest your identity in brands that there was no rational reason to have to maintain fealty to, and much of the tribalism in gaming that exists today can be traced back to them.

    ...but I was Team Sega.

  50. what do you have in your clipboard?

    your phone number

  51. What do you mean, XKCD jumped the shark ?

    It stopped being good.

  52. Has anyone ever told you that you look better in profile?

    No, because I absolutely look worse in profile.

  53. Have you ever been called a "race traitor"?

    I mostly don't read the comments on my political videos, so I can't say for sure. I haven't seen that one firsthand, but I wouldn't be surprised. Certainly not as common as "cuck" and "soy boy" though.

  54. how do I stop watching porn?

    Don't. Watch better porn.

  55. Have you ever been called a "soy boy"?

    I'm a male feminist on YouTube, what do you think?

  56. >Can you elaborate on how you feel it discredits Jessica

    One of the things Jessica said in her interview was that she regrets telling women to work for Arenanet, suggesting it's a bad company for women to work at. This thread seems designed to push back against that claim.

    I mean, she's also said that there are a ton of wonderful women who work there who are largely responsible for Guild Wars being what it is. I don't think elevating the work women at ArenaNet do is necessarily claiming the company is good to it's female employees. I don't know anything about Samantha Wallschlaeger, so I can't say whether this is meant to back up one thing Jessica has said or rebut another, but I wouldn't assume the latter without more context.

  57. Do you have any opinion on this thread? https://mobile.twitter.com/StillNotSam/status/1017476070574940160

    She never directly contradicts some of the things JP has been saying about Arenanet, but she indirectly discredits them. It also kind of reads like a hitlist for anyone wanting to disrupt the lives of female games devs, so I'm not sure how to take it.

    Can you elaborate on how you feel it discredits Jessica?

  58. I mean, blind jingoism definitely seems like a virtue for conservatives. It just seems like conservatives are always going on about how much they love America, but never actually seem to like anything about it and in fact just complain a lot. Seems pretty weird to me.

    What they like about America is it's the country where the "right" people can be in power.

  59. Do you think Scarlett Johansson actually learned anything from this Rub n Tug thing, or do you think it's purely a damage control PR move?

    (As a side note, if it's the latter, It's at least good we can now do enough PR damage to warrant damage control, as opposed to a couple years back with Ghost in the Shell)

    I'm unlikely ever to meet Scarlett Johansson so I'll never know whether she's learned to be respectful of minorities or just learned how to save face. From my position, as a consumer, the two are indistinguishable. So I don't worry too much about what's going on in the hearts and minds of celebrities and just count this as a win that a bullshit performance isn't going to happen.

  60. should krystal from star fox adventures be in smash?

    Krystal, Katt, Amanda, and Lucy should all be in Smash.

  61. I have three books with me this weekend. Should I read Red Dragon, Fahrenheit 451, or I Am Legend?

    Don't read books, do crimes.

  62. Hello! I noticed the ask about what comics you've read, and you mentioned that you had problems with the ending of Y: The Last Man; given that it's my favorite comic, like, ever, I was wondering if you could expand on that a little more? I'm curious as to what you thought of it, in general.

    [SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS]

    Two things, primarily:

    1) The murder of 355 didn't seem exist for any goddamn reason other than the GOTCHA of laying out a happy ending and then refusing to give it to you. It's a plot twist for the sake of plot twists, emotional torture for the sake of not seeming soft. There is no argument I can think of for why 355's death enriches the comic's themes that isn't something about deepening Yorick's character arc, and killing off one of the most powerful and interesting women in a comic just to make a man's story more dramatic is THE DEFINITION of the Woman in the Fridge trope. I've been mad about this beat for 8 years.

    2) I am fine with a comic where everything with a Y chromosome dies at the same time and it's never explained why. I am not fine with a comic that devotes pages and pages to detailing theories for why all the men died - almost an entire issue is just Dr. Matsumori explaining his theory - and then never tells you what happened. If it's not important, it's not important. If you spend the entire comic insisting it *is* important only to reveal that the comic stands without resolution, well, that's some JJ Abrams Mystery Box shit. It's similar to 355's death: going to great lengths to make you care about something only to deny it to you, near as I can tell because it's a cheap way to provoke a reaction. There's no SUBSTANCE to these denials, it's just empty frustration and shock.

    The comic is good enough that cheap tricks are beneath it.

  63. what is life to you exactly?

    Exhausting.

  64. Is it 'virtue signaling' when conservatives go on about how much they love America?

    Is blind jingoism a virtue?

  65. What's your predictions on the midterm election?

    I don't make predictions.

  66. Is there anyone on the right that you respect?

    Ha.

  67. How did you tell your parents that you're straight?

    I did have this exchange with my sister on at least one occasion:

    ME: Kids at school pick on me because they think I'm gay.
    SISTER: It's OK if you are.
    ME: Oh, I know, but I'm not.
    SISTER: OK.
    [brief pause]
    SISTER: ...but it's OK if you are.
    ME: I know, but I'm not.
    SISTER: OK
    [long pause]
    SISTER: ...but it's OK if you are.
    ME: I know... but I'm not.
    SISTER: OK.......
    [extremely long pause]
    SISTER: ...but it's OK if you are...

  68. I want to ask about the Jessica Price case. I promise there’s no agenda; my desire to learn is genuine. I respect your views and have no doubt you:

    1. Are more informed than me about these subjects as a whole.
    2. Do your best to be fair.
    3. Think hard about the subjects you discuss.

    The tweet that made me search about the case was this one: https://twitter.com/SavedYouAClickV/status/1016981220327075841

    After reading the original tweets, I agree. I mean, the way I read it, the man tried to tiptoe and be supportive to *not* get into a fight (thanking for the insights at the beginning and end, emphasising “slight” disagreement, apologising after the first reply).

    I absolutely agree women get a disproportionate amount of shit and that is not OK. But isn’t this a case of someone frustrated with a group (mainsplainers?) taking it out on someone who showed no sign of being in it? He seemed to not having wanted that to happen and trying to defuse the situation, and she just kept piling on.

    She mentions on her public Twitter profile that she works for that company and tweeted about her work, which is in a creative field and thus subject to interpretation. Someone had a different interpretation and offered it in a respectful manner.

    Bottom line, I see nothing in the guy’s tweets that makes me think “if it had been a man, he wouldn’t have said anything, or would have said it differently”. If anything, he might’ve tried to be extra soft on the approach exactly so this shitstorm wouldn’t happen.

    Am I wrong? Do you disagree? What am I missing?

    Here are two things that are true:

    1) It doesn't matter whether Jessica Price did anything wrong.
    2) Jessica Price did nothing wrong.

    I'm going to address the first thing, because people will always debate me on the second.

    Ask yourself if you think it's OK for a company to fire an employee, without warning, for being rude to a customer on their personal Twitter. Set aside what constitutes "rude," just ask if that's OK. The employee is not in the office, they are not on the clock, they are not operating in any official capacity; they are on their own Twitter telling off someone they feel was disrespectful to them who happens to be a customer. Do you think that should be a fireable offense? Would you be OK with your employer reading your Twitter and firing you if they felt you weren't courteous enough to people who tweeted at you? If so, do you think that policy is applied across the entire industry? How many of your favorite developers would be out of work if they got fired for snarking at people on Twitter? How many of your favorite games would be worse if people were fired for this regularly? Ask yourself if it's appropriate for a company to explicitly say that the person was fired because a mob of angry gamers demanded it. Set aside whether you think they had a right to be angry and think purely about how harassment online works, and whether that statement from the company will lead to more harassment of the employee (hint: it will). Ask yourself if this will have a cooling effect on how open your favorite developers will be about their work on Twitter if this might get them fired (hint: it will). Ask yourself if other employees that this collection of angry gamers dislike are going to get mobbed with demands that they be fired (hint: they already are).

    Ask yourself, irrespective of whether or not Jessica Price was in the wrong, if any of this is good for games or games culture.

    Whenever there is a debate like this, people get entirely fixated on "did the person transgress or didn't they?" They completely lose sight of whether the response is appropriate, proportionate, or fueled by misogyny. The conversation devolves into "if you do something wrong, you get punished," with no thought to what kind of punishment is fitting.

    No matter what you think of Price's comments, her firing, and the firing of her colleague who did nothing but cordially agree with her, is unconscionable.

    If you want a proper explanation of how Deroir's comments can be "civil" while still being both performative and insulting, here's a long thread on the subject: https://twitter.com/beaglerush/status/1017050472681598978

    (Also, no, it's not a "different interpretation," someone with no qualifications offered a solution that wouldn't work to a person who has been dealing with these problems for a decade. That's not a difference of opinion. That's mansplaining.)

  69. Who is your least favorite leftist you tuber?

    Probably Innuendo Studios. He takes too long between episodes.

  70. Do you have any tips for adult virgins?

    If you are a virgin by choice, keep at it.

    If you would like to stop being a virgin ASAP, hire a sex worker and treat them with respect.

    If you're waiting to have sex under certain conditions (marriage, loving relationship, what have you) keep putting yourself out there.

    Pretty basic.

  71. Do you keep up with Hbomberguy's video essays? I just watched his essay about CAD and it hit on some of the beats you've expressed on here about gaming culture.

    Oh yes, I know Hbomb. He's... he's kind of a big deal. :)

  72. Hey im the chunky rice anon. Thank you for the answer, i thought it was kind of a dumb question and i wasnt expecting such a sincere answer. You're a good dude <3

    <3

  73. Back in 2013 there was this song called Blurred Lines by Robin Thicke, Pharrell Williams and T.I along with their music video of it...

    If it was released now, I think it'll be all of our worst nightmares coming to life...

    I can't believe back then in 2013 everyone from Left to Right seem to over-hype this song and totally casual and liked a piece of music that implicitly solicits rape culture

    And the majority still fail to learn a lesson or two till this day when they still go doe-eyed over the likes of G-Eazy and Kendrick Lamar's Humble while willfully ignoring the blatant misogynistic lyrics

    I dunno what parts of the Left you were hanging out in in 2013, but The Discourse was all over the consent issues in Blurred Lines.

  74. Tired: Women in combat
    Wired: End Imperialism

    Imperialism is probably not going to end without combatants.

  75. Re: comics, and this is going out to be very convoluted, so sorry. You mentioned craig thompson. I used to love his work 10 odd years ago and recently i reread chunky rice and it left me kinda lukewarm. My edition had a first draft of the story, where chunky rice leaves because his friend died, and an interview to thompson where he basically said that his girlfriend didnt die but just broke up with him. I rolled my eyes more than i like to admit. Im 31 now and ive gotten more and more cynical i guess, and i do notice that attitude spikes with depression, for lack of better terms. Have you ever experienced this? How do you stay open to melancholy and softness? Or am i actually right to find a little over the top a twenty year old writing of his girlfriend dying bc he broke up with him lol (admittedly, not the final version of the story)

    I do try not to hold a 20-year-old's writing habits against him; I shudder to think what I would have produced if YouTube had been what it is today when I was 20. Thompson does have a navel-gazing streak that becomes more and more grating the older you get. He released Carnet de Voyage 5 years after Chunky Rice and it's a beautiful book if you can look past how insufferable he gets when he's sad. But it seems he's growing out of it same as me, as his later books have been less autobiographical and far less obsessed with love and sadness.

    And, yes, how insufferable you find his melancholic tendencies may correlate not only to age but to depression.

    Now, if I could tell you how to make your depression symptoms go away, I would patent that shit; I'd be a much richer and happier man. As it is, I don't know how to keep myself soft when I start feeling cynical about anything sincere. All I know to do is keep as a solid an idea of how I usually behave in mind so I can recognize when I'm acting differently. I notice, "I am not responding to this the way I usually would," and, rather than judge the work or judge myself, I try to be patient. I've been to this rodeo many times, so I try to trust that it will pass and I will get all mushy about Craig Thompson being emo again soon.

    It's like anything when you're depressed, I guess: Don't want to get exercise because you don't care if you're healthy? If you can, do it anyway. Don't want to spend time with friends because you don't believe you deserve community? If you can, do it anyway. Don't want to experience anything that's aimed at your feelings? If you can, do it anyway. Sometimes these things aren't doable, but, if the problem is that they simply don't seem appealing, it's good to do them anyway. You have to give yourself opportunities to feel things again. Sometimes depression lasts longer than it needs to because you've surrendered to it.

    Anyway, I have no idea how transferable this advice is, but it's all I know how to do.

Anon commented:
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