vzq

vzq , vor 19 Stunden

It didn't. It's a two-round system. It's one thing to win a plurality in round one, it's another to win a majority in round two.

This is exactly how it's been going for the last N elections.

vzq , vor einem Tag

Thinly veiled misogyny has entered the chat.

vzq , vor einem Tag

Here’s a gold star ⭐️

vzq , vor 21 Stunden

Is it?

vzq , vor 19 Stunden

I'm sorry that was a bit glib of me, allow me to elaborate.

I'm of the opinion that basically any version of this meme that is not misogynistic would not be recognized as a meme by a modern audience.

First of all, the meme does not exist in isolation, it remixes images, ideas, esthetics already in the meme ecosystem. The bare-chested black and white image is a clear callback to the chad and old school cool archetypes, both quintessentially masculine. In fact, I'm not sure there is an image that you could present to modern meme audiences that stars a women and would immediately say "uncompromising cool artist - gender neutral". That is in and of itself in indicator or pervasive misogyny, but that's not surprising because the misogyny is often overt.

Which is my second point. The "black and white bare chested man cool, women and twinks and gender-nonconforming people not cool" is not an accident of the image choice, it's a feature. A lot of standard meme templates are just vectors to enforce the norms of patriarchy by shitting on "soy boys" and "simps" and other men deemed unworthy. The misogyny is baked into the format.

The third issue is that nostalgia memes are inherently misogynistic, even by meme standards. They aspire to RETVRN to the (often imagined) good old days when men were men and horses were horses and patriarchs traded women among themselves like cattle.

The medium is a message, and this medium really fights you when you try to transmit the gender neutral version of this message.

That said, I'd love to see a version of this meme with Bikini Kill as the top picture and commercial manly men losers as the bottom row. I just don't think meme audiences would get it.

vzq , vor 9 Tagen

… and my axe!

vzq , vor 9 Tagen (Bearbeitet vor 9 Tagen)

Now we have a choice: focus on identity issues, or do what is right for everyone. Good luck, world.

The trouble with that statement is that it’s always the people in power deciding what “benefits everyone” and what is “identity issues”.

For example, you can make an extremely solid argument that a focus on disability rights benefits everyone, since most people are various kinds of disabled at various points in their lives and adaptations benefit everyone now (curb cut effect). Also, we are still experiencing a global health event that is leaving random people with serious long term health issues.

However, the discourse around it in the media absolutely not that. Why? Because power, that’s why. The people that pull the strings want to spend the money in other ways, so disability rights are framed as extravagant luxuries that only benefit a minority. Meanwhile they keep systems in place that lock disabled people in government enforced poverty while the companies that pay them below minimum wage get tax breaks.

vzq , vor 9 Tagen

SMRs are DOA. They have been “there next big thing” for decades now. They need to shit or get off the pot.

vzq , vor 9 Tagen

My good friends Xenon and Samarium.

vzq , vor 9 Tagen

Sorry to report, hydrogen is also hopeless. It’s cool tech, but making it work in practice is hopeless because it diffuses straight through every container you try and keep it in, and achieving reasonable energy densities requires cryogenic storage.

Also, developments have been stalling out relative to electrical solutions because of this and because of the heavy investment in electrics.

I can only see it really working in practice in niche applications where you will be close to cryogenic facilities.

vzq , vor 9 Tagen

There are a bunch. But solar panels have gotten a lot better in the last decades, whereas thermodynamics has remained the same. They are not worth the investment anymore.

vzq , vor 9 Tagen

Technically? Yes. Well enough anyway.

Politically? Only if you live in Finland.

vzq , vor 9 Tagen

The good safety of nuclear in developed countries goes hand in hand with its costly regulatory environment, the risk for catastrophic breakdown of nuclear facilities is managed not by technically proficient design but by oversight and rules, which are expensive yes , but they also need to be because the people running the plant are it's weakest link in terms of safety.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/646230.stm

Unless you are in Britain, where they manage to have a costly regulatory environment and poor safety outcomes because THE PEOPLE TASKED WITH KEEPING US SAFE JUST STRAIGHT UP FALSIFY RECORDS.

vzq , vor 9 Tagen

They made the hard choice of where to put the waste and stuck with it long enough to build the facility. They call it “Onkalo”. It’s a creepy marvel of engineering.

vzq , vor 8 Tagen

Locking hydrogen up in ammonia is what the industry looks to be moving to to avoid the problem you describe.

I believe we’re still using more hydrogen to make industrial ammonia than that we produce from green sources, so I guess even if we only switch over ammonia production without worrying about fuel cells or hydrogen vehicles or power generation, we still come out ahead.

Then there’s the hydrogen used in oil refining that, iirc, is still mostly sourced from methane, but I’m hesitant to suggest we replace that with green hydrogen since if you want to be carbon-negative the oil refining will have to go down A LOT anyway.

Anyway, I guess my point is that hydrogen is an important commodity for all sorts of things. Before we start burning it for energy it’s easier to use it as is in industrial processes. The methane we save that way (that would be used to produce industrial hydrogen) we can burn as is in existing gas power plants.

But this is the kind of pragmatic common sense thing that gets no one excited.

vzq , vor 15 Tagen

Usually when there’s a labor shortage wages go up. This sounds like there’s no labor shortage, just a bunch of people eager to extract additional value for free.

vzq , vor 17 Tagen

Suddenly I’m reminded of David Cameron.

vzq , vor 25 Tagen

Sometimes I think of that one sequence in the Chernobyl series and I get really sad knowing that today it would have several additional scenes.

vzq , vor 25 Tagen

It’s important for ICC to gather evidence and pursue cases against individuals even if the odds of extradition seem low.

First of all, because the only way to combat accusations of partisanship is to bring cases against all provable war crimes and crimes against humanity. Second because you never know what will happen in the future. For the longest time we thought Milosevic would never see the inside of a cell. But things can change.

vzq , vor einem Monat (Bearbeitet vor einem Monat)

No, you need a bit more than a percent to get a seat, given proportional representation:

https://www.europarl.europa.eu/infographic/meps-seats/index_en.html

I’m not sure how the apportionment of remaining seats is performed in Germany and whether it’s a EU standard or up to the states, but in NL you need at least one full seat to be eligible for additional ones based on fractional seats.

https://www.rijksoverheid.nl/onderwerpen/verkiezingen/vraag-en-antwoord/hoe-werkt-de-zetelverdeling-na-de-verkiezingen

I couldn’t find an equivalent German page.

vzq , vor einem Monat

I like Lemmy but there’s like a few dozen of us. We’re politically less relevant than mumsnet.

vzq , vor einem Monat

Monsters Inc but all the apostles are Mike Wazowski.

vzq , vor einem Monat

I hear you, but also fuck coins.

vzq , vor einem Monat

I generally loathe cash. But coins in particular.

vzq , vor einem Monat

Oh no! An opinion I don’t agree with! Oh no! Our arrow buttons are useless! Quick! Insult him!

vzq , vor einem Monat

Are you suggesting I engage in fraud and theft of service?

vzq , vor einem Monat

I mean, sure. But I’m not going to lug around cash like it’s the 1970s. Doesn’t even fit in my wallet. That I never take with me.

vzq , vor einem Monat

Fuck coins. They actively make the world worse.

vzq , vor einem Monat

Oh no! I am being berated by an internet stranger that sounds like a nineteen nineties “do you know where your children are” special. What will I do?

vzq , vor einem Monat

Most people are as evil as they want.

That is to say, not a lot.

vzq , vor einem Monat

Is this a meme from 1999? I can’t remember the last time I’ve seen a pay phone.

vzq , vor einem Monat

And still we’re at 4% market share. They don’t seem to be doing a very good job.

vzq , vor einem Monat

If the West keeps escalating, at some point Russia has to respond to not loose credibility.

They have ZERO credibility left. They have been whining for over a year without doing anything substantial.

vzq , vor einem Monat

Making emotional appeals on how evil the enemy is, is not a great way to deescalate a situation.

Are you joking? This invasion is a textbook example of the crime of aggression, the second worst thing you can do in international law. And there are credible indications we’re dealing with the worst one too.

It’s not a matter of emotion.

vzq , vor einem Monat

I don’t think it’s morally bad to be pragmatic in that sense, if trying to punish Russia leads to nuclear annihilation.

No it doesn’t. They have had plenty of time to push the button. They threatened and threatened and threatened. But they didn’t and they are not going to. The right move now is to squeeze them as much as we can, slice the salami nice and thin with a series of small escalations that by themselves don’t justify a nuclear response, but together meaningfully change the trajectory of the conflict.

And apparently Estonia understands this because it’s exactly what they are doing. Now we all need to get with the program.

vzq , vor einem Monat

Dude. You tipped your hand here a bit.

vzq , vor einem Monat

Rest in peace comrade Petrov.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanislav_Petrov

vzq , vor einem Monat

Remember last time? You guys got pretty close to an actual real life coup d’etat. How many more constitutional crises do you think you can dodge?

You bet your ass the next VP candidate will be vetted to “do the right thing”.

vzq , vor einem Monat

I’m almost 50 years old and I’ve never used a check in my entire life.

What is this old timey bullshit? Why not a burlap sack of fucking pieces of eight?

vzq , vor einem Monat

I used bank deposits. First through the mail, then through electronic-but-not-Internet payment systems and finally online and mobile banking. Also bank authorizations.

Checks were never big here, but they had been phased out completely in the 00s. I haven’t actually seen one since the nineties. I have never owned a check book.

vzq , vor einem Monat (Bearbeitet vor einem Monat)

In ye old days I would fill out a slip of paper and mail it to the bank.

Deposit is probably the wrong word. It’s more a transfer order? Deposit is what came up when I translated my local term, but it’s not like I stuffed cash in an envelope or anything.

vzq , vor einem Monat

I probably messed up the translation. I mean a kind of bank account to bank account transfer order.

vzq , vor einem Monat

Not homeless, just Northern European.

vzq , vor einem Monat

Yeah, it’s an order to take money out of my account and put it in someone else’s. The number on it tells the recipient what bill it’s supposed to pay.

They looked like this:

https://www.vvponline.nl/nieuws/acceptgiro-blijft-langer-bestaan

vzq , vor einem Monat

I feel “the only fascist regime is X” does a huge disservice to a lot of fascists around the world that are hard at work making everyone’s life crappier every single day.

And that’s without going into particulars about the identity of X.

vzq , vor einem Monat

All these groups fighting climate change materialized as we blew past our agreed reduction deadlines without doing anything?

Yeah. A complete mystery.

vzq , vor einem Monat

Genocide is the original Final Solution.

vzq , vor einem Monat

What is suburban rail, and how is it different from light rail?