Krono @ Krono @lemmy.today

Posts

0

Comments

217

Joined

2 yr. ago

I think you don't understand how broken American democracy is. I would suggest you look into Princeton's study on Democracy, the largest ever study of electoral inputs and outcomes.

Their results are rather shocking, including one of the most haunting charts I have ever seen:

This gigantic, years-long study shows that if 10% of Americans support a bill it has a 30% chance to pass, and if 90% of Americans support a bill, it still has that same 30% chance to pass.

Tldr: the opinion of the voters in America have no influence on its government. Votes don't matter, only money counts. Your civic duties go much further than a mere vote.

equal access to resources like healthcare

This type of "access" rhetoric has historically been used disingenuously to mean "healthcare for everyone who can afford it" while still trying to capture the vibes of the more ethical "healthcare for all" position.

I don't know this woman's political position, but her neoliberal "access" language is a tool that functions to deny people healthcare.

Olive trees take up to 6 years to start fruiting, and they reach full production at 12-14 years.

What is destroyed in a day will take a decade to rebuild.

If there were any justice in this world Matt Miller would be tried for aiding and abetting a genocide, convicted by a jury of his peers, and hung from the neck until dead.

The RAF claims there was £7 million in damages, including complete replacement of both engines valued at £2.5 million each.

Palestine Action destroying those RAF jets was one of the coolest moments of 2025.

More, please.

I don't think it's comforting at all.

If you remove the top 1%, the remaining wealth is concentrated in the top 10%. This group of people is highly invested in the status quo; their wealth and power is usually used to prop up the current system.

These people are reffered to by many names: petit bourgeoisie, professional managerial class, small business tyrants, etc.

Your heart is in the right place, but I think "no regrets" is an insane take.

As a fellow unemployed CS grad, I once thought software engineering was my best shot at a middle class life.

Now after 5 years of unemployment, the financial reality is setting in. I will never be able to afford a home. I will never be able to afford a family. I will never be able to afford retirement. I will never be able to afford a vacation. I will never be able to afford most things that make life worth living.

I thought I was going to be an engineer. I thought I was going to be a professional. Now I'm fasting at the end of every month bc food stamps always run out, and the electric company is threatening to shut off my power.

Choosing CS is deeply regrettable.

Most American millennials I know have the same retirement plan as myself : a bullet or shotgun shell to the brainstem.

Why? The reasons vary:

American optimism gave us big dreams, but the American economy crushed them.

The open internet made us realize that we are, in fact, the baddies on the world stage.

A decent retirement for millennials will cost $6-10million, a feat most cannot achieve without inheritance.

Climate change is making our only planet uninhabitable, and our nation is leading the effort to make it even worse.

Lol well I guess it's easy to get confused. I was submitting job applications to write computer applications.

I was submitting app apps.

Over the years I have tried a handful of subfields.

I always felt particularly adept at assembly language programming, so I had a couple projects doing that, and applied to every relevent job I could find.

As a math nerd I enjoyed data science and machine learning, I had quite a few projects like a neutral network from scratch in Matlab, and many data analysis and computer vision projects in R. I was always aware this field is very competitive and my chances were low here.

I had a friend get a job in the biomedical field, so I tried to follow that, I have Python projects doing basic gene sequencing and analysis, even a really cool project that replicated evolution.

Another friend landed a government job, so I followed his advice and got some security certs.

I also had smaller projects and attempts at databases, finance programming, and video games.

There was even a class action suit against UW for their negligence during covid. I guess the case is already settled, so I'm looking forward to my meager restitution check.

And I actually feel lucky that most of my serious classes were complete before Covid lockdown, bc the quality of education during covid was absolutely pathetic.

I'm not sure I was misled, what you said was explicitly taught to us at University. I think my degree is the #1 thing on my resume, but of course I also had projects, a few certificates, and multiple attempts at more specific fields.

Back when I was applying, my GitHub activity was pretty solid green.

You're right that my time was wasted, and knowing the outcome, I wish I could go back and do more project work before trying to enter the job market.

But I don't think that is a financial possibility for most Americans. Going to school drained my savings, when I graduated I had almost nothing except for school debt, medical debt, and high rent. Saying "I'm gonna take off and work for free for a year" never really seemed like a possibility.

And as for my apps, the 3000 were not shotgun, they were all personalized, custom cover letters, keywords, etc. It only averaged out to 3/day. I did not track the apps where I used AI to submit them- the AI ones were definitely shotgun.

I fled from the Midwest because there were no good jobs outside of the oil and gas industry, and ended up in the Seattle area. Saving up and moving cost 2 years of my life, Im not sure I could do it again.

...and I did apply to some jobs on the west coast, although most of my apps were around Seattle.

But please tell me, where should I have went instead of Seattle?

No I have a spreadsheet with 3200 lines of submitted applications, which includes both entry level positions and internships. Many with customized cover letters.

When you do the math its not even a strong pace, only about 3/day over 3 years. On a good day I was submitting 12-15.

I even applied to some famous ones, like the time Microsoft opened up 30 entry level positions and received 100,000 applications in 24 hours. It is rumored thet they realized they cannot process 100k apps, so they threw them all away and hired internally.

Whether they actually threw them out or not, that one always sticks with me. Submitting 100k apps is literally a lifetime of human work. All of that wasted effort is a form of social murder in my opinion.

The destructive forces of deregulation and financialization have destroyed so much of what makes life worth living in the modern west. And there is no end in sight- no political movement has the power to compete, the political system is fully corrupted, not even a heroic Luigi to put fear into our financial oligarchs.

So my question is this: where does this end up? Technofeudalism? Revolution? Sci Fi dystopia?

I graduated with a degree in Computer Science and Software Engineering from the University of Washington in 2020, during the height of Covid.

After over 3000 handcrafted applications (and many more AI-written ones), I have never been offered a job in the field.

I know of multiple CS graduates who have killed themselves, and so many who are living with their parents and working service/retail.

I think the software engineering rush of the early 2000s will be looked back upon like the San Francisco gold rush in 1949.

I think the strongest argument is this:

Before Oct 7, Gazans had been living in a concentration camp for 17 years. Israel regularly bombed, cut off food/water/medical supplies, prevented the Palestinians from fishing or having an airport, tortured prisoners, killed hundreds of peaceful protesters, etc etc. While Gazans endured these 17 years of horror, Israelis normalized it. The world was ok with it. While the Arab populations stand with Palestine, Arab governments were making deals with Israel, normalizing the slow genocide of Gaza.

There was no future for Gaza, no hope for Gaza, only slow genocide.

By taking hostages, the slow genocide has become a quick one. But now, at least, the eyes of the world are on Palestine. Instead of dying quietly, their deaths are headline news around the world. When fighting for their freedom and humanity, Gazans had 0 bargaining chips. Now with the hostages, they have 1.

Tens of millions of people did.

There was a time when Rush Limbaugh was one of the most politically influential voices in the country.

Not to mention the huge number of evangelical propaganda AM stations.

I think it's safe to say that telecom deregulation and the subsequent AM radio boom is one of the core reasons why American adults above 50 are rightwing/fascist.