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2 yr. ago

  • There's a Craig Ferguson interview, where he says one of the secrets of some(!!!) of the most attractive Hollywood actors, is that in real-life they look like bug people. You know, weird looking, big eyes, huge head, tiny body. Looks great on camera and in 2d, not so much in the flesh. Probably also why IRC some Hollywood insiders call actors lollipop people. Stick with a big head on it.

  • Sorry to reply to an older comment, but you are correct. Feeling alienated from (capitalist) society or the fake mediatised and commericalised reality we're often fed is indeed different to derealization.

    I've experienced the latter, and it's more like an out of body experience. Like you're floating a few centimeters above your body, or like you're watching yourself in a movie. Like you're experiencing something that feels like very vivid deja vu or like you're in a dream. Which can of course lead you to make very bad decisions.

    It’s a product of this warped system of capitalism. Unite over it. Don’t pin it to your lapel.

    I sometimes wonder if it isn't sometimes a deliberate attempt to individualise societal problems. Pretend the syptoms are the problem, rather than adress the cause: a sick and profoundly unfair society that is in seemingly terminal decline. You're sad about climate change? It's your fault for not taking anti-depressants. You're angry about industrial pollution? You didn't put the yogurt pot in the wrong bin, it's your fault.

  • Obviously this sucks, but it's also quite interesting. They call themselves American Banderites. Banderites were far right Ukrainian nationalists, but since WW2 the term has mainly been used by Soviet propaganda and by the Putin regime:

    In propaganda the term has been used by Soviets after 1942 as a pejorative term for Ukrainians, especially western Ukrainians, or Ukrainian speakers; under Vladimir Putin-ruled Russia the term was used by state media as a pejorative for Euromaidan activists and Ukrainians who support sovereignty from Russia ... Today, in Russian propaganda, the word is used to refer to all in Ukraine who back the idea of sovereignty from Russia; Ukrainian nationalist collaboration with Nazi Germany is also emphasized

    This is why Ukrainians sometimes call themselves Judeo-Banderites, as a joke about how many Jewish people support the supposedly Nazi regime in Kiev and its Jewish president. Obviously, Ukraine does have a far right, but they're incredibly marginalised:

    Ukraine does have a far-right movement, and its armed defenders include the Azov battalion, a far-right nationalist militia group. But no democratic country is free of far-right nationalist groups, including the United States. In the 2019 election, the Ukrainian far right was humiliated, receiving only 2% of the vote.

    This was a bit of a tangent, but it sounds like these kids may have been influenced by Russian propaganda. Certainly interesting how the far right is divided over Ukraine, with some supporting Russia and some supporting Ukraine, despite the whole Jewish president and relatively pro-LGBT thing.

  • I'm honestly surprised that Stephen King's obsession with including child abuse and rape in his books hasn't caused more waves in the age of twitter. Certainly a bit weird how Stephen King is often recommended to young adults.

  • Here's what I found:

    Over the past year, numerous dissidents across Russia have found their Telegram accounts seemingly monitored or compromised. Hundreds have had their Telegram activity wielded against them in criminal cases. Perhaps most disturbingly, some activists have found their “secret chats”—Telegram’s purportedly ironclad, end-to-end encrypted feature—behaving strangely, in ways that suggest an unwelcome third party might be eavesdropping. These cases have set off a swirl of conspiracy theories, paranoia, and speculation among dissidents, whose trust in Telegram has plummeted. In many cases, it’s impossible to tell what’s really happening to people’s accounts—whether spyware or Kremlin informants have been used to break in, through no particular fault of the company; whether Telegram really is cooperating with Moscow; or whether it’s such an inherently unsafe platform that the latter is merely what appears to be going on. ... Elies Campo, who says he directed Telegram’s growth, business, and partnerships for several years, confirmed this general characterization to WIRED, as did a former Telegram developer. In other words, Telegram has the capacity to share nearly any confidential information a government requests. Users just have to trust that it won’t.

    https://www.wired.com/story/the-kremlin-has-entered-the-chat/

  • Ugh. Short term thinking.

    There's a reason the BBC often has a lot of good stuff. They give some talented nobodies some money, tell them to make a show, with no expectation it'll be a big hit. Sometimes it turns out to be a cult classic like Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, often the talented nobodies learn the ropes and their next show ends up being great.

    Nurturing talent isn't profitable, but you do it anyway because at least some of that talent will make you money a few years down the line.

    Bit of a tangent, but go on the BBC sounds website. You'll find loads of (science fiction) dramas from authors and actors you've never heard of. I suspect the amount of people who've actually ever listened to some of them is miniscule, bu itt's a cheap way for the BBC to give new talent an opportunity to write and act in something, to develop their skills.

  • I mean, Biden absolutely is wishy washy.

    But he also reversed Trump's policy of saying West Bank settlement is legal, and sanctioned violent Israeli settlers.

    Obviously Gaza's really bad, but what's happened and happening in the West Bank is also arguably ethnic cleansing. Chasing Palestinians off their land. Trump's a fan.

  • You're may be right. I assume most of them are 'useful idiots'.

    They realised western media were often biased, so they switched to 'critical' media, spent more and more time in internet bubbles, and ended up uncritically parroting Russian, Chinese or Iranian propaganda instead.

    Same thing happened after 9/11 and Iraq. A lot of people were angry about how biased CNN was, so they switched to channels like Russia Today because it was critical of the US and did genuinely have a lot of good journalism. Of course, that doesn't mean Russia Today isn't propaganda. A lot of these people are forever lost, I don't think you can deprogram them.

    Also if people use a lot of slogans like "cultural marxism", "Fuck Brandon" or "genocide Joe", without being able to articulate a nuanced position, it's likely they've succumb to newspeak. Newspeak uses an impoverished and simplified vocabulary, to prevent people from critical thinking.

  • It's at least in part Russian propaganda. They don't want people to vote for Trump, they do want democratic voters to not vote at all, which will help Trump get elected.

    Look at the people pushing the 'genocide Joe' thing. Invariably they're anti-NATO and make excuses for Iran, Syria and Russia. Not that they're doing it deliberately, but plenty seem to have bought the propaganda and are acting like useful idiots by spreading it.

  • I argue that the act of ethnically cleansing the Palestinian people is comparable to the Holocaust.

    Your comment above:

    if you don’t care about the fact that a Holocaust level genocide

    Maybe you misunderstood my criticism, but I wasn't disputing that what was happening was genocide or ethnic cleansing. I was disputing the level or scale of what was happening. Clearly what is happening in Gaza (and the West Bank) is on a smaller scale. 17 million vs. 30,000 in Gaza.

    This doesn't make what is happening ok. It just means that it is on a smaller scale than the holocaust.

    Please don’t create another straw man to argue over, the number of casualties was never the point

    This is not another argument. The number of casualties was my argument from the beginning. The number of casualties may not have been your point, but it was mine when you said that what was happening was on the same level or scale as the holocaust.

    This is also not a strawman argument. I am literally adressing something you said in your comment.

    On a more general note, this is why comparisons to the Nazis or the Holocaust are rarely helpful, and partly why Godwin's law is a thing.

    For example, just because someone isn't Adolf Hitler or a Nazi, doesn't mean they're not a fascist. Calling someone like Ben Gvir or Smotrich a Nazi might feel good, but it allows them to say "Aha! But I don't believe x, y, z. Also, the Nazis hated Jews. I'm a Jew. So you're wrong." It undermines your argument, even if they are quite similar to Nazis. Call them a fascist or racial supremacist, based on things that they actually said and did, and it's far harder to deny.

  • The comment I replied to said:

    a Holocaust level genocide is taking place

    30,000 people have died. 17 million people died in the holocaust. That is not on the same level and it is not on the same scale. 30,000 is a significantly smaller number than 17 million.

    If you support the Palestinian cause, pretending otherwise is a home goal.

    I get that it feels right, because people are understandably angry about all this, but it's not a winning argument. Quite the opposite. If you're provably exaggerating the scale of what's happening, it allows supporters of Israel's far right government to sow doubt and claim you might also be exaggerating about the very very real war crimes and ethnic cleansing they are engaged in.

  • I’d argue if you don’t care about the fact that a Holocaust level genocide

    17 million people died in the holocaust. IRC the population of Gaza is roughly 2.4 million of which just over 1% have died. That figure includes Hamas militants. The Gaza Health Ministry does not distinguish between combatant and civilian casualties in its reports.

    It is possible to criticize and condemn Israeli war crimes and ethnic cleansing, which are without doubt horrific, without distorting the facts.

    In fact, it actually makes your criticism more convincing and harder to discount by supporters of the current hard right Israeli government. The fediverse is a bubble on this conflict, but we should be aware that hyperbole does not serve the interests of the Palestinian cause or win the argument outside of this bubble.

    Maybe you'll be the exception, but I say this knowing full well that some will call me pro-Israel for this comment. But if anything these extremists are useful idiots for Israel's far right government and its supporters, as they allow them to paint any criticism as anti-semitism or disingenious.

    e: this comment already had downvotes within seconds of me posting it. This is not long enough to finishing reading it...