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[Opinion] Biden Must Resign
  • So it's a bad idea because it's a bad idea. Got it.

    Personally, I think it's the only way to have any real chance for positive change on Capitol Hill. Nobody's really voting for Biden; they're voting against Trump. Give the disenfranchised masses a candidate they don't hate, one who takes a clear stance against genocide, is under 70, and is mentally able, and the many, many voters who threw up their hands in a chorus of "why bother?" will suddenly have a reason to care again. All Trump's rhetoric about how old and dementia-ridden his opponent is would suddenly get thrown back in his face.

  • Getting the Skyrim itch again... Any mod recommendations to freshen it up?
  • If you really want a fresh experience and don't wanna spend more time modding than actually playing, I cannot recommend more strongly Wabbajack. It's a fully automated modlist installer with a huge gallery of available lists.

    Some of the available modlists are foundational, giving you just the essentials (Engine tweaks, HD assets, community bug fixes, etc.), and some are total conversions, turning the game into a fully-realized modern third-person action game, with controls, animations, and graphics as good as any modern game.

    It does everything for you, from installing Mod Organizer 2 to creating game launch shortcuts, and everything in between. All you have to do is log into Nexus (and whatever other mod sites your modlist of choice might use). It's worth getting Nexus Premium at least temporarily to speed up the process.

    Here is the Skyrim Special Edition modlist gallery.

  • Neo-Nazis Are All-In on AI
  • Sounds like something an AI-loving Nazi would say!

    Seriously, though, yes. This was exactly my first thought. There are plenty of reasons to be apprehensive about AI, but conflating it with Nazis is just blatant propaganda.

  • Experience: I gave birth to my granddaughter
  • Cute, heartwarming, yay modern science, all that. But that name. Ekko.

    Unique names do not guarantee unique children. If anything, they reduce the chance your kid will be unique, 'cause they already feel special due to their name and so won't strive to differentiate themselves from the crowd.

    Not like it really matters compared to the importance of good parenting; I'm just annoyed with this trend of making up silly names for kids, especially ones with unintuitive spellings. That kid is gonna have to spell out their name for people so many times in their life. And they'll definitely get made fun of for it in school.

  • Tobacco-like warning label for social media sought by US surgeon general who asks Congress to act
  • What an absurd, ignorant notion. Of course social media has a negative impact on developing minds, but forcing sites to display warnings would have zero positive impact. Browser extensions would immediately pop up to hide those warnings, and if anything, the presence of such warnings would increase kids' use of social media, since the danger is something even adults had a hard time understanding and kids love to rebel against oppressive systems. The warnings would turn into memes.

    The only answers to this problem are to break up and ban social media companies (not possible) or get parents to actually be parents and teach their kids about the pitfalls of social media.

  • Starfield will get at least one more expansion after Shattered Space, Todd Howard says
  • I hate to say it, 'cause Bethesda has been very influential throughout my gaming life, but it's too little too late. Starfield is entirely unsalvageable without a complete overhaul and re-release using an upgraded engine that can actually handle the scope of the game.

  • Pronouns and tribal affiliations are now forbidden in South Dakota public university employee emails
  • English is my primary language, so yes, I'm aware of the historical use of they/them as a non-gendered pronoun for hypothetical people.

    I'm also aware of the fluid nature of language. I'm still salty about "literally" becoming its own antonym, but I have to accept it because it's now part of English.

    That being said, it's never been socially acceptable to use they/them for a known person of a binary gender, and I'd argue that it's even less acceptable now, thanks to the common adoption of they/them as a personal pronoun for known persons of nonbinary gender.

    It'd be much less confusing if there was an entirely new pronoun for enbies. Or, better yet, if there were never any gendered pronouns to begin with. But this is the world we live in, and we all have to find the best way to navigate our own paths without kicking up dirt onto others'.

  • Pronouns and tribal affiliations are now forbidden in South Dakota public university employee emails
  • I completely agree. Gendered pronouns are not helpful and at this point only confuse things. I'm just glad English doesn't have gendered nouns, too, like Latin-based languages.

    Anyway, the fact is that they/them has become "gendered" in the sense that it's now a preferred pronoun for a lot of people, mostly androgynous enbies, so its implicit meaning has changed. Sure, it's still used as a non-gendered pronoun for hypothetical people, but when used for a real, known person, it has the same implication as he/him or she/her - that they appear to be a certain gender, enby in this case.

    I'm a clearly masculine person - I've got a beard and I wear masculine clothes. I personally wouldn't be offended, but I would think it very odd if someone saw me and thought they/them was an appropriate pronoun for me. If masculinity was as important to me as it is to most men, I could see myself getting offended at someone implying that I appear androgynous. Same as if an enby was referred to as he/him or she/her. Cisfolk's emotions are just as valid as valid as enbies'.

  • Pronouns and tribal affiliations are now forbidden in South Dakota public university employee emails
  • Please don't do this. This is just misgendering by default. The vast majority of people are exactly the gender they appear to be on the surface, and if they aren't, they'll let you know. I've only known one person who wasn't the gender they appeared (a very masculine-presenting enby), and they weren't offended at all when I misgendered them at first; they corrected me, I apologized, and that was the end of it.

    However, if you call the wrong clearly-masculine "alpha male" or clearly-feminine "queen bitch" they/them, you're likely to get a violent reaction.

  • Tchia updated to improve text on Steam Deck plus performance improvements
  • Good! Tchia is a phenomenal, Breath of the Wild-esque, family-friendly game. My only complaint was its performance on the Deck - at medium settings, it gets 30-50FPS with occasional hitches. Performance wasn't enough to turn me off from it, but I very much welcome an improvement.

  • NSFW
    Obesity is morally wrong and should be illegal in my opinion
  • There's no doubt that obesity is nothing but bad for one's health, but your opinion on the matter is irrelevant. Obesity is a measurable state, and a man simply not having visible abs is not necessarily obese, or even overweight.

  • Finding Myself Led to Finding a Community

    Just something I've been thinking about lately:

    Having been a straight-passing (I'm bi) white male in the U.S., I was part of the country's "default" community. Because of that (and because I've never really identified with classically masculine interests), I never really felt like I had any real community to call my own. I was a bit of a hermit, only interacting with others when I had to.

    But now that I've found myself as nonbinary and started presenting as such, for the first time in my life, I feel like I belong. I've never felt such a deep, intrinsic connection to strangers as when I meet another trans person. I've never felt such love and acceptance as when I first came out to my trans friends.

    So, thank you all for being who you are, and thank you for accepting me for who I am. I love each and every one of you. 💖

    3
    Introductions and the Exorbitant Cost of Wardrobe Expansion

    Hi all! I recently had a personal renaissance regarding my gender, then I found this community. So, let me introduce myself:

    I'm nonbinary demigender. My pronouns are whatever makes the most sense to you at the time. I identify as a man as far as being a dad (with an amazing daughter), but otherwise feel no connection to any gender, and I'm most comfortable balancing my masculinity and femininity. I like to be bearded and beautiful.

    To me, my beard and bald head are enough to exemplify my masculinity, so I'm really focusing on expanding my wardrobe to fully incorporate feminine attire. I especially love skirts and dresses.

    But it's so. Damn. EXPENSIVE!

    I can fit into a few things that my amazing, supportive partner lets me borrow, but I can't just be the younger sister, forever relying on hand-me-downs.

    Does anybody have advice for how to get a good start on my wardrobe that won't break the bank? I'm average AMAB size, but with a barrel chest and a slim waist. Women's L & XL usually fit me.

    Edit: Looking back, this request for advice was a flimsy premise for an introduction post. I mostly just wanted to join this community, and I didn't want to do so silently.

    5
    My Story

    Wall of text incoming. TL;DR - Love (and cannabis) can change the world

    This isn't something I'm proud of, but it's important not to deny who we were, lest we lose sight of who we are.

    I very recently had an awakening that started with self-reflection and has continued into what some might call spiritual enlightenment.

    Go back a decade or so ago, and you'd see a version of me much closer to who I am today. Somewhere during that decade, I got heavily into conspiracy theories. This put me into a very negative space, as it caused me to see everything with a suspicious eye, always looking for deeper, hidden meaning and not just accepting the chaotic nature of reality.

    Despite this, I found love. I became a husband and a father.

    Then COVID hit and all my hair-brained theories and predictions started to come true, as far as I saw it.

    The Internet started to shun people like me, putting us in the same group as bigots and far-right extremists. More proof I was always right. I was effectively forced out of Reddit and into far-right forums, as they were the only places not censoring the conspiracy theory content I wanted.

    This pushed me into a much, much more negative space, as now I had my conspiracy theory discussions in the context of forums filled with bigots.

    I spent nearly every waking minute in those forums, desperately trying to find meaning in the chaos.

    Even though I still considered myself liberal-minded, and even though every person in my life was a positive, progressive influence, I started to agree with those bigots in the forums. By the end of COVID lockdowns, I was a fully-fledged transphobe, believing that the wonderful societal progress we've seen these past few years was actually a conspiracy to weaken humanity in preparation for The Great Reset.

    I couldn't discuss my theories with the people in my life for fear they'd reject me. I began to alienate family and friends, removing the last few positive influences in my life, which only pushed me deeper into my delusions.

    It took the indiscriminate love of strangers (and, admittedly, a lot of cannabis) to put me into the right state of mind to finally turn my overanalytical, cynical eye inward, and I didn't like what I saw.

    I went all-in on my first-ever Tarot reading, desperately trying to find meaning in the chaos within, and I came out the other side a new man.

    It took the unconditional love of a lifelong friend who'd recently come out as trans (and, again, a lot of cannabis) to bring me back into that receptive state of mind, and during a deep conversation with them, everything fell into place. I came out of that conversation a new nonbinary individual.

    Now I look back to the person I was, and I barely recognize him. He was filled with hate, though he thought it was love. His mind was closed, though he thought it was open.

    He was the worst version of me.

    I can't deny who I used to be. I can only learn from my mistakes and surround myself with the love of family, friends, even coworkers and strangers on the internet.

    10
    Gender Identity Scale

    I've recently begun going through a bit of a personal renaissance regarding my gender, and I realized my numbers-focused brain needs something to quantify gender identity, both for myself and so I can better understand others. I also just don't like socially-constructed labels, at least for myself.

    So, using the Kinsey Scale of Sexuality as inspiration, and with input from good friends, I made up my own Gender Identity Scale.

    • Three axes: X, Y, and Z
    • X: Man (not necessarily masculinity), 0 to 6
    • Y: Woman (not necessarily femininity), 0 to 6
    • Z: Fluidity, 0 to 2
    • X and Y axes' numbers go from 0 - not part of my identity to 6 - strongly identify as
    • Z axis's numbers go from 0 - non-fluid to 2 - always changing

    Example: The average cis-man is 6,0,0, the average cis-woman is 0,6,0, and a "balanced" nonbinary person might be 3,3,1, or 0,0,0, or 6,6,2..

    Personally, I think I'm about a 3,2,1 - I don't have a strong connection to either base gender, but being biologically male, I do identify a bit more as a man. I also feel that I'm somewhat gender-fluid, but not entirely so. I honestly don't fully understand gender fluidity yet, so the Z-axis may require some tweaking.

    Does this make sense? Can you use this to accurately quantify your own gender identity? I wanna know!

    51
    Diablo IV disappointment

    I got Diablo IV last week and played a lot over the weekend. After 40+ hours (thank you, four day weekend), I realized I wasn't enjoying myself, and was just trying desperately to justify the money spent.

    I intentionality avoided news about it, hoping to enjoy finding things out for myself. I now very much regret my willful ignorance. I definitely would've passed on the game if I'd known beforehand that it was effectively an MMO. Forced multiplayer, an open world with too many activities, content balanced for groups of players, endless side quests, and cookie-cutter dungeons. But hey, it has horses! And dodging!

    My disappointment is immeasurable and my week is ruined.

    On the bright side, it reminded me how much I love Diablo 3. I've been playing that the last couple days to get the bad taste out of my mouth.

    0
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    BumpingFuglies @lemmy.zip
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