CuriousCat Archive Page 77 of 202

  1. What vegan variants on popular foods do you think are flat out tastier than the non-vegan variants?

    I've been vegan for 18 years, so the taste of non-vegan food isn't terribly familiar anymore, but:

    many ice cream flavors taste better with plant milks; salted caramel made with cashew milk is INCREDIBLE, and things like peanut butter or chocolate hazelnut benefit from the nuttiness of soy, and I can't see any reason to make any coconut-flavored ice cream with anything but coconut milk at this point

    also I am a heathen who thinks seitan tastes better than meat

    there are some things where it's less that [non-meat] tastes better than [meat] but more that you can assume the average vegan version of some meals is better than the average non-vegan version, just because a lot of fast food is pretty cheap and gnarly and most vegan food is serving a more health-conscious audience. so, like, the average cheap hamburger is often a bit worse than the average cheap black bean burger, regardless of whether the BEST black bean burger is better than the BEST hamburger.

  2. Did you ever come to a consensus regarding whether or not the left should have stemmed some of the pool of angry gamers and nerds that the Alt right tries to recruit? You said a while back you were on the fence.

    I dunno that I was on the fence so much as I feel it's a good thing to do but am not sure the best way to do it

  3. A while ago I got into an argument with my coworkers about how wanting to educate children about lgbtq and gender isn’t pushing an agenda, they say that they don’t care if people want to decide as an adult, but these arguments always devolve into how they’re not being sincere and what’s morally right; which you can’t just accuse people of not being honest nor can you just say what is right or wrong. Have these arguments been designed to boil down to this?

    If you get down to it, they're essentially saying that their agenda should be pushed rather than yours. Like, the reason they worry about kids being told about LGBTQ stuff is because they know kids will just kind of accept things adults tell them. It means they know there's nothing *innate* about gender norms or presentation, kids aren't BORN knowing these things, they learn them. And they want to make sure kids learn heteronormativity first, and have it fully internalized before they're exposed to queerness.

    But I don't know that pointing this out will win you the argument. But it might pose some interesting questions to ask them.

  4. you are a pinko

    how'd you guess

  5. Your dad could beat up my dad

    in response to My dad could beat up your dad

    even if he could, he wouldn't

  6. What do you think about Michael Moore's documentaries?

    I'm not a big fan. He has righteous anger about the right things, but he's another example of a liberal who's clear in what he's against and vague on what he's in favor of. Like, did anyone come away from Bowling for Columbine with a clear idea of what causes gun violence? He's got a lot of stunts that point out Republican hypocrisy, but there's no thesis. As a person who makes arguments for a living, that chaps me, and I don't think this kind of muckraking accomplishes much.

  7. Why are you polyamorous?

    feels good, man

  8. What *would* be the utopian counterpart to restorative justice? Ressurrective Justice?

    in response to Care to elaborate?

    I feel it would be *utopian* if we thought preventative intervention could end all crime or something

  9. What could you spend the whole day talking about?

    I have gone to multiple video game conventions, where one talks about little else

  10. If you had to spend a million dollars, what is the first thing you would buy?

    my way out of debt

  11. My dad could beat up your dad

    your dad is a bully

  14. When we see someone who's doing things like spouting Qanon talking points and other conspiracy theories, is it too late for them? Aside from keeping the door open for them in case they ever decide to deradicalize, is someone repeating that kind of disinformation beyond helping?

    I don't think anyone is BEYOND help but, if they're a stranger, you're probably not the one who can help them.

  15. Care to elaborate?

    in response to What do you say to the notion that restorative justice is a utopian ideal?

    the idea that restorative justice is somehow beyond our abilities when it is, in practice, just a good idea with pros and cons that is much better than what we've got but still messy and imperfect is just... so, so limited. dream bigger, people!

  16. How do people pronounce "!!!" when speaking?

    chk chk chk

  17. Top 5 band names (whether or not the bands are good)?

    Machine Gun Fellatio
    Porno for Pyros
    These Arms are Snakes
    !!!
    Thao and the Get Down Stay Down

  18. What do you say to the notion that restorative justice is a utopian ideal?

    I say think bigger

  21. Why do some online communities lean one way or another in general? Like, why is it a meme that having an Anime Avatar means you're a right-wing troll while conversely furries are known for being one of the most progressive and accepting communities out there?

    in response to Think you've any good educated guesses on the most common first steps?

    Any community that has

    1) a large cishet while guy population
    2) whose niche interests allow them to feel vaguely marginalized, and
    3) who are not used to progressive critique of said interests

    runs the risk of either developing a Nazi problem organically or being targeted for infiltration and recruitment.

    Furries fought this off probably because they are queer and trans as fuck.

  22. By community, you don’t just mean online community right? You are also talking about in-person communities too? If so, is that likely one reason why so much much of small town and rural America swung so hard to Trump in his elections? Their neighbors pressured many who weren’t sold on Trump to vote for him.

    in response to Think you've any good educated guesses on the most common first steps?

    Yes, but it's not so much "pressured" as it was the organic community consensus. People care about what their friends and family care about. Breaking out of this is why urban areas are liberal strongholds - you can't maintain that kind of influence over a population of hundreds of thousands, so people are going to interact with many different views and lifestyles, which skews people towards liberalism because it has room for variety.

  23. Any shows or films ye like despite them bein' meant for audiences you're not really part of?

    I'm a big fan of The Outs even though it's clearly targeted at gay men

  24. (different anon) I'm just saying, as a patron of yours and also someone who watches "debate bros", I think there is nothing for you to be gained by weighing in on this discourse. It goes back a few months and involves a lot of Creators (e.g. Vaush, FD Signifier, Professor Flowers, Noah Samsen, Xanderhal, etc.), some of whom have, I'd say, a little "overzealous" fan bases.
    Not to say that there isn't anything interesting to be said here, but this will propably devolve into unnecessay drama for you.

    in response to Where do you stand on the Video Essayists v Debate Bros discourse?

    I'm not saying I'm gonna weigh in, I just don't know what we're talking about.

  25. Think you've any good educated guesses on the most common first steps?

    in response to How many people on the right's first step towards the right were people on the left being cruel to them for some perceived non-offence?

    Well, I kind of made a video about it, but to sum up the first segment of How to Radicalize a Normie:

    The first step is osmosis. Being in community with people on the Right, or people who are edging in a rightward direction. Overwhelmingly people end up with conservative politics because they adopt the politics of their community.

    Like, make no mistake: conservative communities police each other's language and behavior *more* than the Left does. For ever soapboxy SJW on the Left there's a conservative pastor who kicks you out of the church for dating a Muslim, a parent who disowns you for being bisexual, a forumgoer who doxes you for saying something feminist. When people say they don't like the way the Left acts, they are not rejecting people who try to control your speech and behavior, they are *choosing* one pattern of control over another. And the only reason to make that choice is if you either agree with the logic behind them or find the community worth the sacrifice. It doesn't *seem* like a sacrifice because it's what they're already used to.

  26. What about Martha's Vineyard / Nantucket?

    in response to You ever been to Cape Cod?

    not yet

  27. Where do you stand on the Video Essayists v Debate Bros discourse?

    is there specific discourse you're referring to, or do you mean "who is better"?

  28. While your definition may vary, I meant: now that daily cases are back down to where they were before Omicron exploded

    in response to I read on your Patreon that you were super bummed out because of Omicron, so how are you feeling now that the surge is over?

    I mean, yes, I'm glad the numbers have gone down and I can be out in the world a little more. But the thing bumming me out was more how Omicron made it clear the pandemic was not going to end in the foreseeable future. While it's nice to be between surges, I have no doubt we are just waiting for the next one because our government has given up on actually ending this thing.

  29. You ever been to Cape Cod?

    yuh

  30. Which of your vices or bad habits would be the hardest to give up?

    what vices?

  31. Why did you choose to stay on this website after it died for several days, surely the curse had been broken

    honestly? I've settled into a groove with CC that isn't too unhealthy. I only forward answers to my Twitter occasionally and no longer link it below my videos, so I don't get TONS of questions here anymore, and people who just wanna be assholes don't come by very often. and I have my appblockers on most of the day so I don't disappear down rabbit holds and have arguments like I used to. mostly it's a decent place to kill time and occasionally have some interesting conversations.

  32. Are you at all nervous that Putin might be deranged enough to actually use Nukes?

    I've been low-level nervous about nukes since the early 2000's

  33. I read on your Patreon that you were super bummed out because of Omicron, so how are you feeling now that the surge is over?

    define "over"

  34. How many people on the right's first step towards the right were people on the left being cruel to them for some perceived non-offence?

    zero

    this is not to discount the very real way that parts of the Left delight in making scapegoats of transgressors, or how other parts love an opportunity to soapbox, but this is never the first step

    it may, in some cases, be the last one, but not first

  35. Hugs are a renewable resource, and should be subsidized

    in response to How might we redistribute hugs?

    hugs belong to the masses and should be collectivized

  36. Based on the research you've done on past revolutions, do you think there's a realistic chance of an anti-fascist revolution occuring in Russia?

    I haven't done research on revolutions yet, I'm still researching the Alt-Right

  37. Do you have any recommendations for other interesting Curious Cat accounts to follow?

    literally everyone I follow here has stopped posting, I'm the last of my kind

  38. How conspiracy theory brained is it to feel like Ukraine could turn into a scapegoat to distract from local US problems

    anything and everything will be used to distract from something, that doesn't mean it isn't an issue in its own right

  39. Missed your adventure game AMA but I meant to ask, what do you think of Grim Fandango? I wanted to love it but the puzzles killed it for me

    I mean, I love Grim Fandango, but, no, the puzzles in that game are not good

  40. How about beforelife?

    in response to Do you believe in an afterlife?

    presumably I was there but I don't remember, so either it doesn't exist or I was blackout drunk the whole time, which means it's either sad or awesome

  41. What's the funniest joke you feel you've ever made in one of your videos?

    I'm fond of the dick joke I snuck into Bringing Back What's Stolen

  42. Don't you think that OP has actually made up their mind about you and your contemporaries, and using your (justified) silence on this matter as confirmation bias? Are they really unaware of the fact that most people have no clue what's going on, except that it's bad and depressing, and since we all know that, there's no point repeating it and adding to their doomscroll?

    in response to We literally have an ultra nationalist dictator invading countries in Europe and you guys have nothing to say, not even a peep? So much for the "anti-fa" label? Like it ever actually stood for something?

    this is a case where I'm trying not to make assumptions about who's messaging me, because I've gotten a few similar comments from people I know are fans

  43. We literally have an ultra nationalist dictator invading countries in Europe and you guys have nothing to say, not even a peep? So much for the "anti-fa" label? Like it ever actually stood for something?

    I get that you're upset, these are scary times. I get that chewing out a content creator feels like something you can do when stopping the invasion of Ukraine is out of reach. I get that this is something the world needs to be talking about and I make a decent enough avatar of the failure to do so.

    I try not to wade into geopolitics when I haven't done the reading. even issues I know slightly more about, like the Arab Spring or the Syrian refugee crisis, I didn't talk about much on social media. people have been asking me for years to weigh in on the Israeli-Palestine conflict, but I don't have much to say other than that Israel are the bad guys in that conflict. even issues leftists like me are pretty invested in, like Venezuela or Cuba. the world does not need more uneducated takes, and I've been neck-deep in researching how fascism got its foothold in the US. these things are worth knowing, worth researching, worth discussing, but I can only know and research and discuss so much. sometimes I wish I could cover everything.

    I don't cotton to the idea that "tweet about it" is some sort of civic duty. doomscrolling is unhealthy enough without making it my job to fill other people's doomscrolls with Talking About The Thing You're Doomscrolling About. it may increase the proportion of your feed that is discussing the Ukraine to the amount you feel is appropriate (though, I'll remind you: you curated that feed yourself). but is it actually doing anything?

    I talk when I feel I have something of value to say, and I share when I see something of value someone else said. anything else is performance, and I won't waste your time with that.

  44. Your fav skill in Disco Elysium?

    I mean, obviously Shivers.

  45. How might we redistribute hugs?

    hugs are not a finite resource, abandon the scarcity model, FREE YOUR MIND

  46. Do you believe in an afterlife?

    I'm not fully convinced the nowlife is real

  47. Say for the sake of argument I were to cash app you 10k to fart on a sheet cake and record it, would you do it?

    I don't even have to eat the cake? hell yeah gimme that cash.

  48. Is there anything from your early alt right playbook videos that you would change if you were making them today?

    fixing typos and rephrasing things here and there, mostly. if anything, I wish I were still as succinct as I was in the beginning. I do wish I could bring the art up to the standard of the series now.

  50. Any movies or tv shows you've seen lately? Or you're currently in a slump?

    I'm keeping a movie log on Twitter! https://twitter.com/InnuendoStudios/status/1480367194743750663

    So far this year I've seen:

    If Beale Street Could Talk
    Copshop
    Memories of Murder
    Mansfield Park
    Encanto
    A Most Violent Year
    Nobody
    Sense and Sensibility
    In & Of Itself
    The Hitch-hiker
    Kimi
    Never Been Kissed
    Heathers
    and Pickup on South Street

  51. Who closes the door once the bus driver gets off?

    Satan

  52. So how do you approach a lady you're interested in? (Any useful advice?)

    in response to What kind of opening message do you write to a lady in the DMs

    I'm a YouTuber with 50,000 Twitter followers, "sliding into the DMs" isn't appropriate for me. I flirt with people in contexts where flirting is deemed by all to be of interest: dating apps, parties, or people I actually know.

  53. What kind of opening message do you write to a lady in the DMs

    I don't slide into people's DMs

  54. So now that I know what other people mean by "pegging", I need a new term to refer to having sex with Simon Pegg. Do you have any suggestions?

    pegggging

  55. Do you believe in the great man theory of history?

    I believe in the shit men of history

  56. To be clear, you believe that the backlash against vaccines and mask mandates boils down to the fact that the right cannot make concessions to the left? That doing so would be acknowledging trump lied and liberals were correct?

    I think that's why the thought leaders on the Right are against them, yes. Most of the public that is pushing back against them is just following what they've been told.

  57. Have you seen any films by Yasujiro Ozu? If so, what do you think?

    oddly enough I have not, where should I start?

  58. How should liberals interact with those leftists? Ignore them? Learn from them? Fight back against them?

    in response to Who hates liberals more: fascists or progressives?

    liberals should become the not-shitty kind of leftist

  59. What’s the best game you absolutely hate?

    in response to What's the worst game that you absolutely love?

    the issue here is when I hate a game I think it's genuinely bad. like, Broken Sword? Still Life? I don't care how big the fandoms are, those games are shit.

  60. Who hates liberals more: fascists or progressives?

    I mean, there's a certain brand of leftist whose entire politics is just "I hate liberals even more than fascists," but even they don't want to put libs in front of a firing squad the way fascists do.

  61. I mean, not all of these I've heard of but I still might want to watch them later. Especially since I wouldn't know when I would end up watching them and to what extent the spoilers would be. If whatever parts of those movies you show are enough to be included in a potential spoilers list, then I assume they must spoil *something* that you think is worth putting a warning in the intro about.

    Looking at the list in the intro though I already see some movies I know I want to get around to at some point: A Nightmare on Elm street, Aliens, the Avengers films listed, Baby Driver, Die Hard, Goldeneye, Halloween, The Hills Have Eyes, Matrix Reloaded, The Princess Bride, Skyfall, Terminator 2, Titanic, Top Gun, etc. That's not even all.

    Admittedly, I actually haven't even seen a Mad Max movie yet. I wanted to watch this series because I've liked your political videos and I've watched all the other videos you've made that are about movies/games I've already consumed. Would I be ok just watching Fury Road?

    in response to How am I supposed to watch your Bringing Back What's Stolen series when I click on the introduction video and see that there's spoilers for 50+ movies I haven't seen?

    I just listed every movie I used clips from because I talk a lot about plot construction and the context *could* give away some stuff. But the only movie you listed where you might deduce major plot points is Halloween. The rest are just a shot or two here and there and some discussion of narrative tropes that don't give away more than the average trailer.

    It *will* spoil the entirety of Fury Road so you should probably watch that first!

  62. How am I supposed to watch your Bringing Back What's Stolen series when I click on the introduction video and see that there's spoilers for 50+ movies I haven't seen?

    I mean, most of them aren't very big spoilers. how many of those movies are you planning to see?

  63. What's the worst game that you absolutely love?

    first that comes to mind is Hyrule Warriors, but there's probably something worse than that

  64. hello I saw your tweet asking for recs of 'hardcore metal with synths', and my rec is Home Invasion by Steven Wilson, around the 3 minute mark it even gets *funky*

    I'll add it to the playlist

  65. Okay so yeah this was definitely a useful perspective for me to hear and I'm glad I asked. Thank you!

    in response to Okay so I've been wanting to ask you this question on curious cat for a while now, and I keep worrying you'll up and delete your account before I get a chance lol, so here's the day I finally ask... Is "leftist" a useful political identifying term? Obviously, using the words "left" and "right" as shorthand for progressive and conservative has some utility, but in the U.S., most have become so politically disengaged that these are the only terms they can grasp, and they pretty much exclusively think of them as indicators of social attitude towards like, queer people and such. More specific words that speak to the economic goals of "the left" have been so thoroughly demonized that most Americans don't even stop to consider what they mean. This isn't to imply that the terms socialist, communist, anarchist, etc. are de facto better just by virtue of being more specific because they certainly have their own list of cons, but I can't help but feel like we'd be more organized and thus closer to some sort of working class revolution if more understood and embraced these terms. What do you think? Is it worth it to start shifting away from "leftist" as an identifying term or is there something I'm missing? All thoughts appreciated

    woop woop

  66. What is scientifically the best meme?

    it is and has always been Luigi Death Stare

  67. Does progressive (in general vernacular) refer to both economic and cultural leftism or merely cultural leftism?

    in response to Okay so I've been wanting to ask you this question on curious cat for a while now, and I keep worrying you'll up and delete your account before I get a chance lol, so here's the day I finally ask... Is "leftist" a useful political identifying term? Obviously, using the words "left" and "right" as shorthand for progressive and conservative has some utility, but in the U.S., most have become so politically disengaged that these are the only terms they can grasp, and they pretty much exclusively think of them as indicators of social attitude towards like, queer people and such. More specific words that speak to the economic goals of "the left" have been so thoroughly demonized that most Americans don't even stop to consider what they mean. This isn't to imply that the terms socialist, communist, anarchist, etc. are de facto better just by virtue of being more specific because they certainly have their own list of cons, but I can't help but feel like we'd be more organized and thus closer to some sort of working class revolution if more understood and embraced these terms. What do you think? Is it worth it to start shifting away from "leftist" as an identifying term or is there something I'm missing? All thoughts appreciated

    I'm not sure there's consensus on this, I think different groups use it different ways.

  68. You and most other leftists talk a lot about the distinction between liberals and leftists. That distinction is useful, but there are times it is useful to talk about both of these groups together, especially because American conservatives believe they are the same. Is there a good term for liberals and leftists collectively? I can think of the left half of the political spectrum and maybe progressives, but do you know of a better term?

    in response to Okay so I've been wanting to ask you this question on curious cat for a while now, and I keep worrying you'll up and delete your account before I get a chance lol, so here's the day I finally ask... Is "leftist" a useful political identifying term? Obviously, using the words "left" and "right" as shorthand for progressive and conservative has some utility, but in the U.S., most have become so politically disengaged that these are the only terms they can grasp, and they pretty much exclusively think of them as indicators of social attitude towards like, queer people and such. More specific words that speak to the economic goals of "the left" have been so thoroughly demonized that most Americans don't even stop to consider what they mean. This isn't to imply that the terms socialist, communist, anarchist, etc. are de facto better just by virtue of being more specific because they certainly have their own list of cons, but I can't help but feel like we'd be more organized and thus closer to some sort of working class revolution if more understood and embraced these terms. What do you think? Is it worth it to start shifting away from "leftist" as an identifying term or is there something I'm missing? All thoughts appreciated

    I mean, I tend to use "The Left" inclusively. And, yeah, "progressive," though I usually use that when referring to social justicey folks on the Left. I don't consider class reductionists progressive, for instance.

  69. Okay so I've been wanting to ask you this question on curious cat for a while now, and I keep worrying you'll up and delete your account before I get a chance lol, so here's the day I finally ask...

    Is "leftist" a useful political identifying term? Obviously, using the words "left" and "right" as shorthand for progressive and conservative has some utility, but in the U.S., most have become so politically disengaged that these are the only terms they can grasp, and they pretty much exclusively think of them as indicators of social attitude towards like, queer people and such.
    More specific words that speak to the economic goals of "the left" have been so thoroughly demonized that most Americans don't even stop to consider what they mean. This isn't to imply that the terms socialist, communist, anarchist, etc. are de facto better just by virtue of being more specific because they certainly have their own list of cons, but I can't help but feel like we'd be more organized and thus closer to some sort of working class revolution if more understood and embraced these terms. What do you think? Is it worth it to start shifting away from "leftist" as an identifying term or is there something I'm missing? All thoughts appreciated

    I use "leftist" because I haven't picked a specific -ism, so it's useful to have an umbrella term for the many flavors of anticapitalist, non-hierarchical, collectivist politics. There is some push from (certain corners of) the Left to have everyone declare an -ism, and I'm not too fond of that. On the flipside, I think the push to use "leftist" even if one has a specific -ism may stem from a mix of a) avoiding words (communist, anarchist, socialist) that are even more taboo, and b) stressing desire/willingness to form alliances between many flavors of leftist, i.e. "I and the anarchists may have different visions of the future, but we are comrades."

    I don't think there's any need to shift away from the term. People don't hate the Left because of the words they use, they hate the Left because they're capitalists.

  70. How do you notice these things about movies? Like ideas and themes?

    you read/listen to enough people noticing things about movies you start to notice things yourself

  71. Do Juggalos get a bad rep?

    they've got a pretty damn good rep these days

  73. What was your last dream about?

    I dreamed my dad was working part time for the mob

  74. I had the craziest idea - why not answer curiouscat questions on livestream? Might make it profitable, plus *Content*

    that sounds deeply parasocial

  75. what do you think of people who don't follow ideology but most of their principles just happen to be left wing?

    I would say a person whose principles are left wing *is* following left-wing ideology, they just don't know that's what it is

    I think left-wing people need to stop defining their ideology by who has the right -isms/quotes the right thinkers

Anon commented:
Ian replied: