“It’s a big club and we ain’t in it,” but Trump and co. don’t feel the need to put up the facade anymore.

Bingo. Instead of “hiring” (paying off) politicians, they’re just doing it themselves. They’ve lost any and all care about keeping up appearances. After all, what are we going to do? Sue them?

We stopped?

Of course, they’ll be able to do tremendous amounts of irreparable damage to society.

The amounts of copium in this thread are extinction-level.

Everything you just said is 100% valid and you are simply correct.

The thing is, it’s not a measure of a healthy mind to thrive in a profoundly sick society where the worst of the worst have won long ago.

There’s this thing called depressive realism which posits that depressed people, by and large, perceive reality much closer to how it really is than neurotypical people.

Essentially, “normal” people have an (innate or learned) positivity bias. Which is usually a good thing. People like us are the outliers.

But positivity bias in a world where it’s actually harmful is another thing. The majority of people are walking headlong into their own extinction while going “Ehh, it’s not so bad”, while we should ALL be positively irate and picketing the homes (not companies) of our owner class 24/7.

But it hasn’t happened yet and at this point I don’t know how bad things need to get before people realize what’s going on.

Touché.

I meant clearly easily attainable by others. If I start comparing myself to them, well, it’s like comparing a '97 Pinto vs a 2022 EV.

I will, thanks! No matter how long it takes, I will never give up on him.

Quantum awkwardness. I for one am in a permanent state of possibly awkward.

A “good” thing from a bad thing: my 6 year old computer monitor decided to croak today. As it’s currently black friday deals, I managed to order a new one fairly cheap-o.

No thanks.

That’s the approach we’re trying to take. He has a psych appointment today as well. I only hope he “gets” it before he does something really damaging.

Apart from that I constantly offer to hang out, play games with him or whatnot (he used to love playing Subnautica together) but nothing seems to interest him at all. As someone who also suffered a lot at that age, it pains me so much to seem him go through similar and getting thrown so many helplines and not taking a single one. I would’ve moved heaven & earth back then for even one of them.

People with depression often fall into this trap. You set a standard you can’t possibly reach and then get upset you aren’t reaching said impossible standard.

Nah, plenty of us set teeny, tiny, attainable goals and then still consistently fail to reach them for decades. It’s called being totally inept or an idiot. Unfortunately there’s no cure except switft application of lead suppositories.

I’m firmly in your boat, except I was never rich to begin with or had any kind of financial success. My son loathes me because I can’t afford the things he wants. As a family we try to focus on things that don’t have to cost a lot of money, but it falls on deaf ears for him.

I can only hope it’s puberty wreaking havoc, but so far he’s making it clear that we’ve failed him as parents because his material needs aren’t met to his standard.

“Yes human, you may gaze upon my eternal glory.”

Man, mandatory voting in my country was never popular, but am I glad we have it. We still elect right wing nutjobs, but compared to their American counterparts they’re positively benign.

We might simply get saddled with one of his failsons or his sex do-uhh, daughter.

It’s just extremely humbling to realize that in this lifetime, I will never have enough time or money to even rise to a middling position in the field. It doesn’t diminish my genuine love for the subject or my personal drive to collect and learn what I can, but at the same time some millionnaire could start in my field tomorrow and have surpassed me in every way including knowledge in just a few months, and that makes me… not envious but just sad. I’ll always be just the dog getting table scraps while the “real” players feast at unimaginable, unattainable hights in perpetuity.

Slow, buggy, annoying interface, hogs extreme amounts of resources locally, can be used to spy on its users.

What’s not to like? It’s basically how Elon envisions X, an “everything app” that is actually good at nothing specific.

I’m trying my best but it’s so goddamn hard. I went to two trade shows past weekend and actually talked to someone new (well, the same person twice, but still). But literally every other person there had a much more extensive collection and knowledge than I do, after 5 years of obessessing over the subject.

I will always just be a very lightly informed amateur without real skills in any field.

I hope you’re right, but AFAIK there hasn’t ever been a candidate who quite literally said he’d end democracy if they voted for him the way Trump did.

Bold of you to assume you’re going to get to vote in 2028, or that there will be any oppositional candidates left by then.

Trump has made it crysal clear he intends to establish a dictatorship, and dictators aren’t known for voluntarily stepping away from power.