CuriousCat Archive Page 194 of 202

  1. Breaking the fourth wall in videogames. Overused cliche that needs to be shelved, or one that still has a lot of potential uses in the future?

    Both. It needs to be used less in the bad way but can still be used in the good way.

  2. "Ignoring Patterns: MRAs overwhelmingly choose conservative politicians over liberal ones, but, since a documentary said they aren't conservatives, they must not be."

    got any peer reviewed sources on this too?

    do
    your
    own
    research

  3. How do you feel about Whole Foods labeling GMO products despite there being no scientific necessity to do so?

    GMO labeling is complicated.

    On the one hand, GMOs are overwhelmingly safe, and the fear around them is unfounded. People are just cagey about science and have some vague notion that GMOs are "unnatural." Catering to this fear is a bad idea.

    On the other hand, the only reason not to put a GMO label on something is because, if people knew what it was, they might not buy it. In other words: Capitalism doesn't want people to make informed decisions about their purchases. The anxiety around GMOs, however nonsensical, is partially based in a distrust of the FDA, the fear that the people in charge making sure GMOs are safe are in the pocket of the agriculture lobby. Maybe you don't think GMOs are, by definition, unhealthy or dangerous, but if a given GMO *was* unhealthy, would you trust agribusiness to tell you so?

    What do you do in this situation? The options are to let people make informed decisions that will, largely, be ignorant, or you make the decision for them by not giving them information they want. I mean, ideally we would be to educate people so they understand what GMOs are and they make decisions that are PROPERLY informed, or we'd reform the FDA to the point where people trust it, which means decreasing the influence of lobbyists.

    I don't really see either happening, so I dunno what the fuck.

  4. "Ignorance: Trans women are one of the most frequently murdered populations in the US, claiming "trans panic" can get you acquitted of murder in multiple states, and these murders are reported regularly (trans people keep a running tally every year). But, if you haven't personally read it, you can accuse someone of lying about it instead of checking if it's true."

    Could you send links where you got this information from?

    you can google it yourself, mate

  5. You must not be following things very closely if you're talking about 2020. We're in an election year right now. Aren't you worried about control of the House?

    Fam, everything I said up until the comment about 2020 was about the midterm elections. I just added a comment about 2020 because I felt it was related to general problems with the Democrats' current strategy.

  6. So I watched your presentation and have some criticisms

    First off you conflate so many groups within the "right" and then make a paranoid strawman of "they'll help me move on monday, then take my heathcare away on tuesday". So basically "the right" is good at helping people on a base level and will unknowingly hurt people on a bigger level by voting to get rid of Obamacare, which made people pay if they didn't sign up (yes you could've just gotten a waiver)

    Then you make a huge leap of logic by saying "creationists don't get murdered" implying transpeople are murdered everyday and no one reports on it. Which is pandering and an emotional argument which I consider pretty low imo.

    At the 11:03, you make the strawman of "all republicans watch fox news" which is such a played out argument. Most people on YT (your platform of choice) don't care for fox news either and realize it is corporate news as well no matter the political choice. Look at former Fox pundit Steven Crowder.

    You seem to forget about conservatives who were killed after Hitler took power or even "socialists" like Ernst Rohm or Gregor Strasser.

    You then further conflate the "right" by including MRA's? really? So when you said this did you think of the "Red Pill Documentary"?

    You have fallen into same trap many people do, the "Electoral college scam" of one person, one vote. Which is oversimplifying. Ask yourself this question should one Californian voter have more power than someone voting in Wyoming (smallest population in the country)?

    You also use "white" as a dog whistle for "the right" which is intellectually dishonest when you consider people like Herman Cain for example (I don't like him, just an example).

    In your presentation video at the end questions portion, you say "the right in general uses alt-right talking points without knowing it" Yet you don't say that in the actual presentation conflating the tea party with someone like richard spencer or mike enoch.

    Why didn't you say that in the beginning?

    The Alt-Right Playbook:

    No True Scotsman: If someone references personal experience with a group, claim that interaction is not representative of the group and call it a strawman.

    Appropriated/Misused Rhetoric: That's not what "strawman" means, but it makes you sound like you know what you're talking about.

    False Equivalence: Rejecting Obamacare, which saves lives and millions of dollars, because it might charge some people a fee for being uninsured. By claiming the problem is some perceived flaw with the design of Obamacare, not with Obamacare itself, you don't have to admit you are OK with those people dying or going bankrupt.

    Ignorance: Trans women are one of the most frequently murdered populations in the US, claiming "trans panic" can get you acquitted of murder in multiple states, and these murders are reported regularly (trans people keep a running tally every year). But, if you haven't personally read it, you can accuse someone of lying about it instead of checking if it's true.

    Ignoring Patterns: Fox News is more popular with conservatives than any news source on the Left by a wide margin, but, because you can cite a few exceptions, you can reject any acknowledgment of this trend. (Note how this runs on different rules from No True Scotsman above: here, a few individuals ARE allowed to represent the group, because now it suits your needs.)

    Appropriated/Misused Rhetoric: That's still not what "strawman" means.

    Whataboutism: Claim someone's argument is invalid because Hitler killed conservatives, a subject that's not at issue.

    Ignoring Patterns: MRAs overwhelmingly choose conservative politicians over liberal ones, but, since a documentary said they aren't conservatives, they must not be.

    Extrapolate, Exaggerate, Distort, Dismiss (or, The Double-E Double-D Double-down): If someone says that Republicans rely on quirks of the Electoral College to win elections for uppopular politicians, extrapolate this into an entire belief system about the Electoral College, accuse them of holding this position, and dismiss them for believing it, without ever asking what their actual position is.

    Ignorance: That is legit the opposite of how the Electoral College works.

    Ignoring Patterns: Again, the only population that votes in the majority for Republicans is white men.

    Appropriated/Misused Rhetoric: That's not what "dogwhistle" means.

    Condescension: If someone doesn't make an argument you feel they should have made, imply that they knew they should have made it and deliberately left it out. Never call someone wrong when you could call them a liar.

    Ignoring Patterns: Tea Partiers and white nationalists have allied together under the same politicians, but we can ignore this if we say the comparison is disrespectful to the Tea Partiers.

    I hope this has been informative.

  7. Do you think Democrats are doing alright this election cycle are they dropping the ball? I don't mean poll numbers but their actual campaigning and electioneering.

    I'm not playing super close attention, but I don't see much of a unified strategy. Some Democrats are playing the game the way I want them to, some are still playing the "cozy up to moderates" game that I think is crap, I have mixed feelings about the frontrunners for 2020. As a whole, the Dems still seem committed to making no moves further left, even symbolically, save for a few exceptions, and I think that is a terrible move.

    But, again, I'm not following very closely.

  8. what's your favorite jane austen book?

    Haven't read any Austen.

  9. do you like blueberry muffins?

    Been a while since I had one. Not a lot of places around here make them vegan. They're good. I was always more of a poppyseed guy.

  10. Who's your pick on who would win this year's World Cup?

    no opinion

  11. Is Post Malone a good rapper?

    I think his songs are lame as fuck and he uses auto-tunes often

    no opinion

  12. Is Video Assistant Refereeing (VAR) necessary in soccer lately?

    soccer's the one with the funny ball, right? the one that looks like a hex grid?

  13. When you live tweet your research, which book are you reading from?

    If you scroll to the top of the thread, I always say the title of the book. Right now it's The Reactionary Mind by Corey Robin, but I've livetweeted a few different books and essays.

  14. How do we educate illegal immigrants that if they don't want to risk family separation they should immigrate using legal means?

    It's not like anyone PREFERS immigrating illegally, ding dong. They do it because legal options aren't available to them.

  15. What would the world look like if white people disappeared tomorrow?

    shorter lines at whole foods, for one

  16. Have you ever played Dungeons and Dragons? If so, what class? More generally, what's your favorite RPG archetype, mage/fighter/rogue/etc?

    I haven't. Might join a game based on the Fate system soon, which would be my first RPG.

  17. At this point, everyone and their pet goldfish has talked about how the Channel 4 interview of Jordy B. was "bad optics" and "did more harm than good" and what not, because the interviewer just told JBP what he believed without actually engaging him. Okay.

    But isn't that what the right has been doing since my Dad was my age? That's just H.W. going out and telling Dukakis that he's "soft on crime, soft on the Soviets, and wants to raise taxes." And, from what I've seen of Trump's twitter feed, the only difference thirty years makes is the degree of rhetorical articulation. H.W. didn't play defense, as you bring up in your video. But why does not playing defense when your on the left seem to fail?

    to make it clear, I'm not saying that was a good interview. I wish that these blatantly dishonest tactics didn't work at all, ever. But I can't help but wonder how they can work so stupendously for one side but not the otehr.

    Techniques like Never Play Defense and Control the Conversation work for the Right because they are natural extensions of the conservative worldview. To reiterate a bit of the Control the Conversation video, conservatives don't view politics as about compromise, or Americans as one diverse people who are all on the same team. They view politics as a winner-take-all competition, where you use absolutely any tool at your disposal to defeat your opponent, obstruct them at every opportunity when they're in power, and deny them any influence when you're in power. This is why the Republican Party gels so much better with white nationalists, homophobes, transphobes, fundamentalists, etc.: it preaches that the group YOU are in is the only group fit to govern, and that the only ethical course of action is to ensure, by any means necessary, that that group be in power.

    This doesn't work for the Left, because the Left (at least when it's worth a damn) is about EMBRACING diversity of thought, about compromise and coalition-building, about challenging and checking yourself. The general tolerance of different views is the definition of liberalism.

    So no, bullying and dominating your opponent doesn't play with liberals the way it plays with conservatives. All it does is affirm the conservative framing of politics as a competition, which just gets voters thinking in conservative terms.

    One reason Democrats keep failing in politics is that they're trying to play two different games at once. They're trying to beat Republicans at their own game AND they're trying to play to liberal notions of tolerance and compromise, so they just kind of half-ass both. I feel pretty strongly that Democrats need to decide what they actually stand for and then insist on framing things from THEIR perspective, where tolerance and diversity are seen as powerful and democratic and conservatives look like bullies.

  18. your face mole is weird.

    haven't heard that one since middle school

  19. I'm not really sure how best to phrase this question, but how do you feel about the whole "you can't judge a tenth century piece of literature from a 21st century ethical standpoint" thing?

    I mean, on paper I agree with the notion that you can't discuss old literature without fitting into the context of its time, but this argument is usually invoked to imply that we shouldn't acknowledge everything that was F'd up about that context. I think people have an ethical duty to talk about how culture has changed and engage critically with old literature. I'd phrase it more as "you shouldn't judge a tenth century piece of literature SOLELY from a 21st century ethical standpoint," but you absolutely should incorporate modern ethics into your analysis.

    I also dislike the streak of moral relativism in that argument, the idea that morality was different in the past than it is now. What is socially acceptable is not the same as what is right. A piece of antebellum writing that was progressive for the time is going to seem extremely racist by modern standards, but it's not like slavery was moral then and isn't now; slavery was always evil, and the fact that people weren't judged as harshly then as they would be now was part of the problem. So, yes, put shit into context, but let's not equate "society was different then" with "right and wrong were different then."

  20. whats your favorite word?

    No writer worth their salt has only one favorite word.

    But I am quite fond of "bulwark."

  21. I always assumed Mass. was a blue state, but y'all have had so many Republican governors lately. Why is that?

    As a bonus, do you think Deval Patrick has a career in national politics on the horizon?

    I dunno, I'm originally from California, and it was the same way: always Blue nationally, often Red locally.

    I don't know anything about Deval Patrick at this point in time.

  22. What advice would you give to someone who has recently left the alt right, realized the error of his ways, and who is trying to regain the respect of his peers? What should he do now that he has burnt every bridge he has ever built, made himself unemployable, and who has associated with the worst of the worst this cruel world has to offer? (uuhhh... asking for a friend)

    Narc on all your old Nazi friends, for a start.

  23. What's the best sex position that *doesn't* have a name that makes it sound like a pastry or an obscure cut of meat?

    67ing

  24. I was watching the alt-right playbook again (as well as your other videos cause they're neat. thanks for all the time and work) and for some reason I started thinking about kids. Like, I'm wondering what tactics of the alt-right if any are reaching teens and under. And are there any specifically designed to target this audience that you know of? Mainly it's on my mind because of the school shooting issue. I feel like watching your videos and reading your twitter has me wanting to do some research on this topic myself. Thanks again for your work!

    The workshop for almost all their strategies and operations is 4chan, which is full of teens. The emphasis on memes, trolling, and edginess is deeply informed by The Youth, and works to appeal to that demographic.

  25. is porn addiction real?

    yeah

  26. I cant afford to go to college, and that kinda sucks, honestly. What should I do?

    I feel you. I didn't finish college til I was 33.

    I don't know what you want to do with your life, so I can't tailor any advice to your needs. If you're just looking for a paycheck, I'd say sign on with a temp agency. Most day-to-day office jobs will require a degree from anyone applying directly, but if you start as a temp they will often hire you after a certain amount of time if you do the job well. This means a prolonged period of lower pay than you deserve and little to no benefits, but the money's OK and gets better once you get hired.

    You can always do a year or two of AmeriCorps if you want harder but (sometimes) more rewarding work, and you get an Education Award when you finish your year(s) of service that can help you go to college down the line, if that's something you're interested in. Peace Corps is an option if you're even more ambitious.

    If you want to do something more creative, teach yourself the skills you need. Online/community college courses are a lot more affordable, and Patreon/Kickstarter/Drip/etc. are means of making money without having to get hired. I'd recommend having a steady income from another source when you're starting out, since it usually takes a while to get established. Also you'd be amazed how much good networking skills make up for lacking a degree.

    Basically, the way most people make a living in this country is by sacrificing income on the front end. Either it's by spending a shitload of money on college, or it's laboring for years with inadequate pay and working your way up to something decent. It's not fair, but that's the way things are if you don't have rich parents. If you're not doing the college route, start paying your dues as early as possible.

    Good luck.

  27. I love your Alt-Right play book series, but I'm troubled by how much your conclude that the best way to go forward is to simply disengage. But, I'm even more troubled by the fact that I really can't think of any better solution. Will the Alt-Right Playback ever cover how to re-engage and continue the discourse?

    The Alt-Right Playbook says to disengage unless you know how to engage productively. The goal of the series is to (hopefully) figure out what productive engagement would be by understanding both the tactics and the mindset of the Right. I have some ideas about effective engagement, but I don't want to make any definitive statements until I finish my research. I still have a number of outstanding questions.

    If you want to hear my work-in-progress thoughts, watch my talk at Indivisible.

    https://youtu.be/j6GFKo6_sOU

  28. Not really an ask. But if you want to check out Keiko Nobumoto, I'd recommend watching Wolf's Rain at some point. It's probably her most personal project in the anime-sphere and there's nothing else quite like it.

    Oh, Wolf's Rain is already on my Netflix queue. :)

  29. Should "This Land Is Your Land" be America's national anthem?

    no

  30. who's the most pretentious person on youtube?

    me, someday

  31. can I trust you with my passwords?

    yeah send em over

  32. Is there such a thing as true centrism these days? It seems like the center between alt-right and SocDems is still decidedly right.

    I mean, again, it's all relative. Pick any two points on a political spectrum and what's in the middle is centrism. US centrism is pretty conservative by Canadian standards and is very progressive by South African standards. This is why "centrism" should never be considered reasonable by default, because it's a completely different political viewpoint depending on which two poles it's the center of.

  33. Will foreskin reattachment surgery ever be a thing?

    Reattachment? No, I don't think sewing 20-year-old baby skin to your junks is a good idea.

    You can, in fact, stretch penile skin to reapproximate having foreskin, if you're dedicated to the cause. Good luck with it.

  34. As a follow up to some recent questions regarding The Incredibles and Ayn Rand: Have you seen My Hero Academia? If so, how do you think it compares when viewed through the same lens?

    I haven't seen it, I'm afraid.

  35. how much can you bench?

    I'm focusing more on reps than weight, so I'm just using 10 lb dumbbells at the moment. Still a beginner.

  36. What did you think about Incredibles 2?

    Copy-pasted from Twitter:

    The new Incredibles is like a season of a TV show, not a movie. A smorgasbord of plot threads and ideas that complement each other but don't entirely cohere. Not the slick, efficient jewel the original was.

    Which means I kinda like it more than the first one.

  37. Is it worth it to make a youtube channel now?

    Sure.

  38. Is the Incredibles Randian propaganda?

    Oh jeez. This one's... complicated.

    Between The Incredibles, Ratatouille, and Tomorrowland, a lot of folks have noticed an Objectivist streak to Brad Bird's movies, and word is Incredibles II (which I'm seeing in 2 hours) is more of the same. They're all stories, to some extent or another, worrying that society will fail to recognize greatness in individuals and prevent them from doing the brilliant work they are capable of. Which, yeah, that's pretty Randian.

    I actually went on a tour of the Pixar campus when I lived in California. (I took animation classes in high school and went to two different colleges in Cali, so forgive me if I don't remember which class I toured with.) And one of the producers related Brad Bird's original question that inspired The Incredibles: "If I get an A on a test, but then the test is graded on a curve so that a bunch of D's become C's and a bunch fo C's become B's, is my A still an A?" And that's the Incredible family right there: forced to live as less than they could be to keep the average up for everyone else.

    The big difference between Brad Bird and Ayn Rand is that, well... Bird seems to think greatness should be employed for the betterment of all. The Tomorrowland in the movie of the same name is essentially what would happen if, instead of saying fucking off to be great by himself because society doesn't appreciate him, John Gault instead founded Gault's Gulch so that he and all the other Great Men of History could solve all the world's problems without oversight and then share their discoveries with the rest of us.

    So Bird seems to have a kind of soft, benevolent Objectivism, where he doesn't present greatness as conferring privilege on a person but as a duty. I mean, there's a reason why he explored this theme with a superhero movie, because it's the same ethos: if you have the ability to do great things, you have a responsibility to do them in service of humankind. He's just a little more fixated on humankind not appreciating the supers than most Marvel films are.

    This still suffers from all the problems of Objectivism: it divides society into a mass of normies and a handful of elites, it ignores that most great accomplishments in history have been the product of collaboration between thousands and across generations and not just a handful of Great Men, and it has the same disdain for government interference and an unappreciative public (which is a roundabout way of saying it disdains democracy). But I would say it's a more ethical version of Objectivism, because Objectivism is built around selfishness where Bird's films are built on an (albeit condescending) generosity.

  39. Do you like Cardiacs? They're a cool progressive jazz punk pop psychedelic band from the 80s and 90s

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFKg09GBFQE

    I had not heard of them before, but this was really good!

  40. do you listen to pod save america?

    no

  41. Smash Ultimate. We hype or skeptical?? Also have you seen this? https://twitter.com/theSirToasty/status/1006944836983943168

    It kinda looks like Smash 4 with some tweaks. I'd have to get hands on it to see if it's more technical, though, if there's wavelanding there must be wavedashing. I don't think they're ever going to make another Melee but I anticipate this will still be a lot of fun.

    Also DAISY DAISY DAISY.

  42. the human brain was not evolved to keep up with the unbelievable amount of news that comes out now. Everyday, more information about the corruption of Trump and Co. comes out and builds up into this gordian knot of crime. I think I've forgotten more about 45 than I've ever known about any other president.

    how are normal people supposed to keep up with all this? And, do you think media should do a better job of summarizing a story that, at this point, is mindbogglingly complex?

    I don't know that the stories themselves are particularly complex, it's that there's such a massive amount of information that it's hard to tell what is and isn't relevant. A lot of stories about Trump are petty bullshit that comes and goes, and is mostly only relevant in how it fits into his larger patterns of misogyny, racism, and xenophobia. But there's such a massive volume of it that it's easy to lose track of the more damaging and long-lasting stuff, like the record number of judges he's appointed.

    I think the only way to deal is for us to get organized collectively and specialize individually. I've kind of decided that my beat is Alt-Right rhetorical tactics. Carlos Maza over at Vox has staked a claim on the Republican news machine. Amy Siskind has gone broad, keeping a weekly log on Medium of the various authoritarian shifts we've seen since Trump took office. Folks like Shaun and Contrapoints keep us abreast of what's up with reactionary pundits like Sargon and Jordan Peterson. The Southern Poverty Law Center keeps track of hate groups.

    I think at some point we're going to have to actually organize with each other, try to find some sensible way to consolidate all this information, and figure out counter-strategies. I'm still trying to figure out what that would look like. But, for now, I think it's best to pick an area of focus and then find people you trust who focus on different areas and listen to them.

    When there's too much information for one person to follow, divvy it up.

  43. whats the worst sex position?

    rear crunt-knockling

  44. What's the best sex position ?

    crunt-knockling

  45. I often hear about how articles and videos debunking the alt right are giving them a platform by which their ideas may spread, even if they are presented in a negative context.

    But, what about when people dunk on PETA for their antics? I've never heard about giving them a platform. Or, less extreme, I've never seen sjw pwnage compilations make someone more socially conscientious. What gives?

    If PeTA's antics succeed, more people turn vegetarian, which isn't exactly the fall of civilization. If the Alt-Right succeeds, they start rounding up brown people. It's not even a comparison. Honestly, PeTA's harshest critics are vegetarians who feel PeTA gives them a bad name.

    As for why you don't see videos change people's minds, that's not really something you *see*. Most people don't have epiphanies, their minds change slowly over time. The Alt-Right knows this, which is why they produce such an endless stream of content, focus on communities that already have right-leaning disgruntled white men, repeat the same handful of arguments again and again and again; they're trying to create as many points of contact with their ideas as possible, and do everything in their power to keep conflicting viewpoints away from their targets. They're never trying to change a mind with a single video, they're in this for the long haul.

  46. Between Mad Max The Road Warrior and Mad Max Fury Road, which is the best Mad Max movie?

    For me, if i wanna see a shiny, glossy action set-piece, I might as well watch an Audi car commercial

    Oh Fury Road, absolutely. It's not even a contest.

  47. was joseph campbell a hack fraud?

    Joseph Campbell was not the end-all be-all that he's sometimes considered, but no, he wasn't a hack.

  48. but, if your name is Ian Goddamn Crosby Lexicon Barnfire Danskin, aren't you right back to not having a middle name?

    ssshhhhhhhhhhh

  49. So is there too much elitism involved in socialist movements?

    I'm not actively part of any socialist movements, so I can't say.

  50. what does Goddamn Crosby Lexicon Barnfire mean?

    Crosby's my actual middle name.

    In some conversation with my girlfriend about using big words, I said "Lexicon is my middle name."

    Upon realizing that, if my full name is Ian Crosby Lexicon Danskin, with an even number of names technically NONE of them is my middle name, we added Barnfire.

    And now when my girlfriend is annoyed with me, she uses my full name, like one's mom does, and it wasn't long before Goddamn got added to express true exasperation.

  51. "Slippery slope arguments are fallacious and we should avoid them. It's just another bullshit conservative tactic the trumpets use to do things like equate gay marriage with bestiality."

    "There's no stopping ethnic pride and nationalism. First they say 'let us congregate openly'. Then they say 'israel has a right to a homeland in palestine'. ANNNND THEN THE NEXT THING YOU KNOW ITALIANS ARE SECOND CLASS CITIZENS. FASCISM IS THE ONLY CONCLUSION OF VOLUNTARY SEPARATION FELLOW LEFTISTS."

    Are these two positions not a liiiiittle doublythought?

    If I had said either of those things, they would be contradictory. But I said some significantly more complicated stuff that you are willfully distorting.

  52. Will you consider swinging by a smash tourney in person someday?

    I go to Shine every year.

  53. any thoughts on the new super smash?

    DAISY

  54. what's your position on receiving the same question over and over?

    called it

  55. what's your position on receiving the same question over and over?

    1) delete the shitty ones
    2) post links to previous answers for the sincere ones
    3) wonder if this is a setup

  57. Fine. There are two professors who believe in a resurgence of the Soviet police state and they both just happen to be in my university. 99% of all those other self identified marxists are toootally OK with free speech. Can you just answer the important part of the question already about whether or not it’s ok in principle to assault that “totally not representative Marxist” or are we just going to keep playing this game forever?

    I don't see that two professors pose any meaningful threat to your civil liberties, whereas the fascist Right is marching in the streets and winning elections. I defend punching Nazis when it makes it harder for them to rally and recruit and be taken seriously; it impedes their ability to strip rights from others. Communists who believe in a Soviet police state but aren't in a position to bring one about are meaningless, so I see no justification for punching them.

    The "game" I am playing is to do with how you try to use transitive arguments to imply that 18% of social science professors want to institute a Soviet police state, and I don't respond to arguments where responding requires me to accept some bullshit as part of the premise. I did a video about that.

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

  58. Is there any ethical consumption under capitalism?

    Short answer: No.

    Mid-length answer: Ethics aren't exactly a binary, and there are varying degrees of ethical behavior. So, while no consumption under capitalism can be considered truly ethical, some choices are more unethical than others. Buying gasoline is always unethical; buying from local gas stations instead of the big distributors that cause most of the oil spills is *less* unethical. Buying beauty products is always unethical; buying products that have a No Animal Testing policy is *less* unethical.

    I think the "no ethical consumption" adage is most useful as a reminder that we are not and shouldn't expect to be perfect, but also we have an obligation to reduce harm as much as we are able. It's tricky, because you have to draw your own lines. Like, I don't give money to PAX because Gabe and Tycho have done too many shitty things. But I do attend PAX as a speaker, which generates ticket sales for them. But, then, PAX always sells out in the first day, so they're making the same amount of money no matter what. But, then, I am still endorsing their brand. But, then, Gabe and Tycho aren't in control of PAX anymore, they sold it to another company. But, then, their branding is still all over it, so I'm creating an approval-by-association even if they aren't directly profiting from me...

    In the end I just have to make a judgment call. Other people might call it differently, which I respect, and my decisions may change one way or the other over time. The important thing as that you consider all the factors and actually draw a line SOMEWHERE.

    There is no ethical consumption, but that isn't free reign to be a bastard, is what I'm saying.

  59. I've never watched melee, I'm interested but I feel like I need to learn 10 years of player stories, is there a way I can catch up?

    https://youtu.be/NSf2mgkRm7Q

    There are problems with this doc, but it's the best place to start.

  60. Hey. I noticed in your recent video, you included a little aside about how great the New Deal, which is great, because the New Deal was great.

    However, I wonder if the fundamental flaw of the New Deal was trying to regulate capitalism to force it to work in a quasi-socialist system. If the key New Deal provisions that Republicans (and turn-cloak corporate Dems) have gutted were reinstated tomorrow, that would be amazing and help a lot of people, but would we be right back where we are now in 40-60 years? Is social democracy destined to fail? What do you think?

    Well, the liberal Democrat framing of the problem is that the system works provided the right people are in control. The New Deal eroded because conservatives took power and started breaking it up, but, if we could get the right people back in control of the system, we could reinstate regulations, rejigger the tax system, pay down the debt, create safety nets, and invest in industry like we did in the Boom Years, and things would be good again.

    The more socialist framing is that the consolidation of wealth, the erosion of regulations, and the exploitation of workers is the natural trajectory of capitalism, and any laws you make to impede or distribute consolidated wealth is destined to be chipped away over time. The problem isn't which party in power, it's just what capitalism does, and the only difference between parties is which party tries to impede the process and which tries to accelerate it.

    I'm a lot more convinced by the second argument than the first, though I concede I'm no expert. And that paints a pretty depressing image of capitalist democracy as a government constantly at war with its own economy, always tugging the chain of industries that want to exploit their workers, trying to force markets to be fair when they want to be feudal, trying to redistribute wealth generated by the masses that wants nothing more than to be in the hands of the few.

    The reason I tend to favor regulation and reform is because I know from history that things can be better than they are if the government works to keep capitalism in check. I don't think this is a particularly GOOD solution, because, yeah, I think we'll likely be right back where we are in 40-60 years, but, of the things that can make things better, it's the most feasible. I've said before: capitalism is what I have to work with.

    The bummer is that I'm pretty sure the only reason the New Deal lasted as long as it did is because the Democrats basically owned Congress for 35 years, and modern Dems' only plan for fixing the system is seemingly to do that again. The argument for incrementalism depends on your party staying in power long enough to see a long-term project through, and not having the opposition take control every 4-8 years, shred everything you've accomplished, and set you back to worse off than when you started. Like, capitalism can be kinda-sorta kept in check if whichever party is dedicated to doing so stays in power indefinitely and never wavers on its own principles. That's not a very plausible long-term strategy.

    So: capitalism is pretty bad, I'm not a fan, and I'm trying to do my best with it.

  61. I despise David Cage and his games mostly look like trash, but I'm watching a Let's Play of Detroit: Become Human right now and the one thing I am enjoying is how the slower moments get broken up with frequent chase scenes or other action focused quick time bits. I'd hate this in any other style of game but this is exactly what I want in this type of game it seems. Anyway, I was wondering if you could ever see yourself involved in the production of an adventure game

    I actually *have* been involved in the production of an adventure game, but it's unfortunately shelved right now.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFgtTUZXM84

  62. Not a question but I just wanted to say how much I enjoy your personality as presented in your videos. You could do a video on just about any topic imaginable and I'd want to watch it just based on your energy and warmth. Just saying, thank you for doing what you do.

    <3

  63. The prior answer you gave about nazipunching demands an obvious follow up question: Doesn't that justify punching all authoritarians, not just fascists? There is an entire socialists' club at my university. I have openly communist professors, who believe (at least ideologically) in the direct overthrow of our democracy and a repeal of most civil liberties. Nationwide, 18% of social science professors poll as marxists, (edit) A SIGNIFICANT PERCENTAGE OF WHICH PROBABLY LEAN TOWARD MARXISM-LENINISM*, which is more than even poll as Republicans. Isn't punching these people a much more pressing issue than the fifty thousand or so genuine ethnonationalists there might be in the entire U.S.?

    Thanks for providing data for part of your argument, now provide data for the part I actually disputed.

  64. WIZZY TOOK A REGIONAL OVER HBOX
    20GX IS REAL

    not sure if I really have a question
    I guess just how do you feel about that?

    Called it. :)

    ...

    OK, so setting aside that that was a pretty great Grand Finals, let's talk about 20GX for a minute.

    Something I was thinking about during Smash Summit was how it looked like people were FINALLY starting to mix up the Jigglypuff matchup. Everyone's go-to has been to go Fox, because, on paper, Fox is the strongest counter to Puff of all the top tiers. And, for a couple years now, HBox's Top 8s have been wall-to-wall Puff-Fox matches. So the more formidable he became as an opponent, the more Foxes he had to play, and the more he primarily had to optimize a single matchup.

    At Smash Summit, he hardly played ANY Foxes, partly because there was a good spread of non-Fox players, but also because Mango stuck with Falco. And with HBox losing to Mango's Falco and aMSa's Yoshi in pools, I started to wonder if people were realizing that Fox wasn't the only way to challenge him.

    Wizzy has been probably the strongest non-Fox player to challenge HBox, especially when HBox is in Fox-killing mode. I think there was a Dreamhack where Wizzy almost eliminated him, and HBox said in the interview that he had to remember partway through the set how to fight Florida Falcons. So, I mean, part of me is hoping this boosts Falcon's position in the meta as people look for alternatives to Fox for taking on Hungrybox.

    Of course, the other 20GX Falcons don't pose the same kind of threat to HBox, and it's hard to imagine S2J or n0ne playing like Wizzy. I can hope. But if what comes of this is people start to diversify their character selections and we stop getting so many Fox-heavy Top 8s, I'll be happy/

    Congratufuckinglations to Wizzrobe, that boy has earned it. Next step is taking a major!

  65. Do you have any thoughts on the Dark Souls games or any of the games that have spawned off as a result of them?

    The Soulsborne games have never come out on Mac or Switch, so I haven't played them. The various critical dissections of them have been pretty fascinating. I've played a handful of games that take influence here and there - Shovel Knight comes to mind - but nothing that really recreates the experience as I understand it.

  66. Difference between masculinity and toxic masculinity?

    What's the difference between milk and spoiled milk?

  67. Should Bill Clinton have picked younger justices?

    Bill Clinton should probably be in jail, but, I suppose, if he'd had the forethought to assume Republicans would one day hold a seat hostage for over a year solely to force the Supreme Court to skew conservative, violating checks and balances in the name of party loyalty, it would have been good for him to do that. But that's expecting him to play 13-dimensional chess through a portal to the future, so that's one think I'll let him off the hook for.

  68. I know that 'diversity of thought' is just a euphemism for 'be obligated to consider my bad ideas, idiot,' but I actually do like to listen to as many sides as I can. The problem there, however, is that most conservative op-eds, takes, tweets, screeds, and the like, have become meaningless trash; either conspiracy nonsense, or blind Trump defending, or alt-lite pandering, or 'we'll pretend to hate trump for his foolish ways, but tax cuts and pollution make us cream.' None of that actually fulfills the role of an outside opinion - that of challenging your current position so it comes out stronger - because it is all worthless bullshit.

    Do you know any good center-right or conservative commentators are thinkers who actually are worth listening to?

    No. I don't know of any thinkers worth listening to who can rationalize what is going on in conservatism right now.

  69. What do you think of a potential Black Ethnostate?

    What do you think of the Easter Bunny?

  70. Please don't call me sweet cheeks

    ok hot lips

  71. Can you elaborate a bit more on your contention that the author isn't entirely dead? I'd love to hear your art theory of literature.

    Well, there's a great essay by David Foster Wallace called Greatly Exaggerated which pretty well sums up my opinion on the author. I touch on it a bit in The Artist is Absent: I do think the knowledge of an author imbuing the text with meaning is significant, even though you're never going to know the author's true intent and whatever meaning you take from the work is valid regardless of what the author meant to do. Like I say in the video, a text generated by a monkey at a typewriter (or, more likely, by an AI) will be interpreted fundamentally differently from the exact same text written by a human (provided you know who the writer was).

    I also feel a lot of feminist/race/colonial theory dissects the way a text clues readers in to how it's meant to be read, usually privileging some perspectives over others, and simply saying "any interpretation is valid" kind ignores the way authors nudge us towards white, male, Western interpretations.

    This isn't to say I disagree with any part of Barthes' or Foucault's essays, just that, like a lot of theories, in the years following you sometimes have to walk them back A BIT, because things are maybe a little more complicated than you first thought.

  72. So I watched like one video on anarchism and I've read Cory Doctorow's Walkaway (which my level 0 understanding of anarchism tells me is about anarchism), and now I want to know what my probably favourite internet person thinks about, like, anarchism in general. I basically just want to hear more opinions on it, if you got any. Thanks!

    I have no particular knowledge or opinion on anarchism. The few anarchists I've known have been kind of annoying, but I don't blame anarchism for that; most people are annoying.

  73. Are you under the impression that an ethnostate has to be one hundred percent one race in order for it to be called an ethnostate? Why couldn’t Europe or Vermont just adopt a mono-racial immigration plan and that be an ethnostate?

    [edit]

    I'm assuming this is meant as a follow up to the previous ethnostate question, as in: why not just take an already predominantly white population and start enforcing that, because then no one would have to be displaced? Well, obviously, if you aren't relocating the non-white citizens, you can damn-well expect that population will experience violence.

    People keep trying to hypothesize a world where white nationalists get their ethnostate without violence, and it just doesn't work that way. You can't expect to relocate non-whites without violence, and you can't expect to formalize a white nation without violence being committed against the ones who stay.

    And, as long as we're being realistic, if you get a population of white folks that define themselves in opposition to other races and take away the races they define themselves against, you can damn well expect that they will start shrinking the definition of whiteness until it excludes members of their state, who will then need to be displaced. There is no endgame for racism; whiteness is defined by contrast with non-whiteness. If you displaced all the Black, Arab, and Mexican people, you can expect that Italians and Irish would suddenly not be white anymore (because, if you remember, they used to not be white). You'd have people looking to reopen "the Jewish question."

    It doesn't stop. Racism NEEDS an outgroup.

  74. have you ever woken up in the morning and just wanted to Abolish ICE?

    I wake up wanting to abolish ICE. I go to bed wanting to prosecute ICE.

  75. What about the high percentage of Marxists that do, then? You’re just dodging the question.

    I tend to dodge questions that are both vague and loaded, yes.

Anon commented:
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