Based 😼

Go on, name the leftists doing that. That's liberal shit.

Furthermore how many mass shootings are committed with hand guns? Mass shootings are the target of 'assault weapon' rhetoric, not gun violence. And any one with a more than surface level knowledge understands how silly the framing and blaming on AR style guns has been.

But to call that 'coming from the left' is insanity. The media if staunchy neoliberal, the politicians are too. The dems pushing that gun control are just as right wing as the 'moderate conservatives', they are reactionary liberals all the same bud. Reactionary liberals are the types who call for such extreme bans (books, guns, abortion, contraception).

Every leftist I've ever met is completely for the right to bear arms. Other than the ones who realise that against the advanced military might of nations in 2024 owning your own gun of any capacity is meaningless (against state tyranny).

The state has a monopoly on violence bud, owning a high capacity rifle will not protect you from state tyranny, neither will a hand gun. But a hand gun is a far more effective self defense tool for home defense than an AR15. So if it's not for state tyranny, and its not for self defense, it's either pure gun fetishism or you have a purpose to unload the high capacity ammunition rapidly (that could be 40 wild hogs or you know 40 wild schoolchildren).

That being said, I still think you should be able to get them. Its called 'gun control' you know, background checks, ensuring safety. Not 'ban all guns'.

Responsible owners are no problem in my book, nor does banning a gun platform make sense. Curtailing the constant terrorism against our children and minoritys should be a high priority for anyone though. Left or right, its not simply 'a fact of life'.

Anyway brain dump but main point is y'all mfers need to stop conflating centre libbies with the left. Its fucking mind numbing.

Apologies for the long comment you were fully within your right to haphazardly essentialise about the state of affairs, sometimes we just want to complain. Its just about the audience really, and it can be so difficult to distinguish between bad-faith actors and those who are being snobbish in their response to you when you have the wrong audience for your rhetoric.

It really depends on your audience, unfortunately the majority of people you speak your rhetoric too will not have 10% of the basis in knowledge required to make a consistent logical leap between neatly packaged concepts. Especially when many of those concepts have been prepackaged to the audience as inherently deserving of ridicule. Whereas the core ideas of most of those concepts are agreed upon across the political spectrum.

Its far easier to argue against the Friedman Doctrine, the idea that "The Social Responsibility of Business Is to Increase Its Profits", than it is to argue against capitalism itself in an optics sense.

Again its easier to argue against the current state of things, often colleqioully known as 'neoliberalism' and 'late-stage capitalism', than it is to argue against capitalism. Even if that implies the same as what you said (that capitalism tends towards or has tended towards inevitability), it will be received much more graciously as an observable fact of the current state of affairs.

The Trump camp argues against the current state of things very effectively, despite intentionally identifying the issues incorrectly and pushing them in the worse direction. Because most people can identify the current system is broken, and most want to believe they can help to make it better. If they are given the right framework, debunking common misconceptions, blaming 'late-stage capitalism' for example, corporate elites, info about PACs and lobbying (how capitalism undermines democracy through bribery), then they would hopefully come to the conclusion themselves.

My point being, while its not always your responsibility to meticulously articulate (some of) the core fundamentals of your ideology; if you hope for effective praxis then approaching people where they are at is necessary. Otherwise you risk appearing out of touch and facing (however (un)justifiable) pre-prepared ridicule potentially harming the ideology further through vibe association.

When your audience is non-leftists (liberals), argue against corporate greed and for real social responsibility for wealthy and corporate actors, who should be providing their fair share to society first. Then argue for state ownership of public services, some services should not be ran for profit and instead for maximising public good (public transport, healthcare, energy, water, etc.). Argue against nestles actions in flint for example, or healthcare costs. These are all easy wins, argue against the big monopolies making us pay more for worse services, argue they should be broken up to allow competition.

Like I say though, you are within your right to complain and not explain, just don't be surprised when you have stinky libs acting smug and being arbitrarily obtuse.

Also, don't be dissauded by the humiliation, that is their strongest tool in making us powerless.

I'm reminded of a quote from Yuri Bezmenov:

“I realized that the purpose of propaganda was not to persuade or even to deceive, but to humiliate. When a person hears lies of the most absurd kind, and can say nothing in return, eventually he will be emotionally spent and conquered, and will not feel that he has any right to say what is true, or that there is no one who will care. Once this has been achieved, liars can move on to action, to do whatever they please without a whimper in response.”

Definitely a much better tone.

My mate had a game of pool with him at a local pub, I think he said he seems pretty down to earth, although since he ate the bacon sandwich all goofy like maybe he's truly despicable - who knows.

Add netenyahu to that list if you're going to act like you want to play fair.

I understand the hesitation completely as I also dislike the shonen reincarnation plots but I do think it differs quite a lot in that one piece is and has always been about inherited will, and that hasn't changed at all with the sun god reveal.

Luffy has the inherited will of Roger, not nika, I would argue that in terms of blood line nonsense luffy has a special bloodline from when we find out his father and grandfather? So far before the new world. Literally as far back as logue town. But even then, its again actually about inherited will, since luffy inherits Rogers will from Shanks, completely fucks off his grandfather's will. And isn't even aware he has a father, he acts of his own accord, the will of nika doesn't manifest until awakening. As far as I'm concerned, devil fruits and haki are all expressions of willpower in one piece. Also it was never about ordinary people, there are specifically 'ordinary people' on the crew within the first five members to contrast with the rest of the crew being clearly insanely superhuman from episode one. The characters are chosen by fate by having inherited will from those that they idolise and emulated at the right time. Which is more or less exactly how real life (narritively) works anyway.

Sorry for rant or w/e but 'the chosen one' trope I agree gets boring but... Idk it doesn't fully apply to Luffy. But I won't pretend there aren't some elements that apply to Luffy, Zoro, Sanji, Nami, Usopp, Robin, Franky, Brook and Jinbei. I mean listing the main crew they are all fitting of those archetypes in different ways and always have been?

If we talk of 'the special one' that applies to any and all exceptional people real or fictional. So avoiding that you would just be writing a story about unexceptional people doing normal things. Which is all well and good, but don't be surprised when you don't find that in shonen manga. 😅

Having just returned from Stockholm to the UK I have to say it was seriously impressive in comparison, atleast in Stockholm greater area I had nothing but good experiences with public transport. The cost of travelling within Stockholm unlimited for a week (£35) on busses and trains is around the price to take 1-2 trains in the UK. And they're so frequent and run for better hours. Not saying this to detract from your message tho, just interesting to see a different perspective ... it's likely theres valid case to improve funding for maintenance and lay new tracks

I agree wholeheartedly with what you are saying; when you expand on what you mean past just 'there are too many people' and actually suggest realistic meaningful solutions like you have here, I highly doubt that most people would 'accuse you of all sorts of things'. It's just that when you simply post 'there are too many people' this implies there should be less people, to most people they would interpret that to mean in an immediate sense, aka unaliving them.

Now that you've expanded on what you had to say I can see that clearly isn't what your intention was to convey. I would just like to say though that considering human population level is not a factor we can control without death or reducing birthrate, and birthrates are already reducing globally, you should be able to see why many would assume you are advocating for the other option.

Apologies for not having seen this until now, if you are still wondering and haven't found the tool yourself, you can launch it by opening a windows terminal as admin and typing

irm christitus.com/win | iex

as soon as chocolatey is installed a gui will launch allowing you to easily install common software, uninstall bloat, apply tweaks (such as disabling telemetry), and control windows updates. It's a great one stop shop for setting up any fresh/existing windows install, and is continuously updated with reliable and transparent documentation.

If you would prefer a video about the tool, the latest one is here: https://youtu.be/GQBRrVGgB_Q

They make em just as compact with the UK plug too 😀

Please do not trust modified windows installs based on old (22H2) update packs, you're much better off debloating your fresh, up-to-date, already licensed install using some powershell wizardry...

Chris Titus has made a gui for this that you can access with a single powershell command. He also has made a guide on which settings he recommends to debloat a fresh install.

This way you aren't entrusting your OS, privacy and data to some random unsecure repack. I can find the link for you if you would like :)

I don't think it undermines anything to liken people who parrot 1-to-1 nazi rhetoric to nazis. Especially if you're referring to maga republicans which have taken many steps past dogwhistle and into stochastic terrorism and promoting violence against minority groups. Yeah, of the 200 or so house republicans, only between 5-10 of them are 'actual nazis' in the sense that people mean, but those are also the current face of the republican party, who people actually know the names of.

It really isn't so absurd to compare a group of people actively working against the rights of women and minorities, who actively staged an insurrection attempt, who want to install a christofascist dictatorship with their 'red ceasar' in the coming years to the nazis.

Yeah most of them aren't literal members of the nazi party, only a few have been found with memorabilia, but at what point is the difference still worth fighting over? When all our rights are gone and we have no means with which to fight back?

If a group of people speak like nazis, act like nazis, plan to act in future like nazis, and are supported heavily by open nazis who demonstrate using literal nazi symbology... Then what is it you're trying to prove by saying that they aren't?

What you are saying almost seems to be like when racist people get upset at being called racist, not because they are or aren't, but because they see it as some sort of grave insult instead if a description of their presentation.