GenZedong

cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/8465523

My Mom talked about this place and wants to travel to here when she returns to Egypt.

It looks like a worthwhile marvel compared to other architectural fetes, such as the Burj Khalifa in Dubai.

But a cultural center? I say bring it on.

I wish we had something like this in the USA, though Egypt is... not really a place in emulate in general LMAO

cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/8464302

Still not sure what to think of this show.

It was well-made, but I didn't like the way it portrayed the Jedi, admittedly.

It seems like no matter what, when the Jedi are on screen, we have to "deconstruct" them.

I 'member.

In the Warring States period, the state of Wu had invaded the state of Yue, and carried off its duke Guo Jian as a prisoner with them.

Guo Jian was held for three years by the state of Wu until he was released back to his home. When he returned, he started planning his revenge.

For seven years he ruled with benevolence and generosity, making a reputation as a wise and virtuous ruler. Accordingly, he assembled his loyal forces on the eight year and attacked Wu, swiftly beating them.

The king of Wu had to flee, but hurt as he was, fleeing on foot and alone, it was only a matter of time before the forces of Yue would catch up to him. Fearing the worst after running all night, he quickly sent ambassadors to Guo Jian when the morning came, begging for mercy.

The ambassadors reminded the duke of how he had been treated as a prisoner of Wu. That even though he was under their grasp, the king of Wu eventually allowed him to return home unscathed. Our king now asks to be granted the same favor, the ambassadors said.

At these words Guo Jian's prime advisor, Fan Li, intervened. He said: "My lord, when heaven gave the duke of Wu the grand opportunity for gaining power he did not take advantage of it and so he is a fugitive today. Should you fail to accept what fortune has now given you, you may be driven from your state, and then all the years of hardships you have bourn will have been endured in vain."

Hearing this, Guo Jian agreed with Fan Li and sent back a message saying that he would not grant any mercy. When the king of Wu received the news from his ambassadors, it is said that he gave up all hope and committed suicide.

(adapted from a story told in the 36 Stratagems)

So last year while I was in China, all my vpns were super busted, so I spent a long time watching bilibili. And I was able to soak up quite a bit of knowledge about the average user there by doomscrolling the comments.

Contrary to what one might think, the average Chinese person isn't actually an expert in Marxism-Leninism and dialectical materialism. Most people, as in the west, don't care much about coherent ideology and just go off vibes. And as anywhere, that can lead to some pretty wacky beliefs. In this tierlist, I'll go over some of the more common ones I've seen/heard about, and rank them based on their wackiness and stupidity, and place them in a tier. Keep in mind I'm approaching this mostly as an outsider, and apologize in advance for any mistakes or oversights, and welcome any corrections. With that being said, let's get into it.

F tier

First we have the conservative westhaters. As you might imagine, these people hate the west, which is good. They also hate gay people, trans people, feminism, etc., which is... not good. Despite the existence of the firewall they seem to have somehow gained access to jordan peterson, and proceeded to mental gymnastics themselves into a maga position, but from the standpoint that America is bad precisely because of 'wokeness'. Granted, they're not as hyperfixated on minorities as western rightoids are; it's more of a casual thing, but can still be annoying. They get a 7 in stupidity, and 1 in wackiness. Pretty basic stuff.

D tier

D tier is where things get a bit more interesting. We start off with a kind of lib that may be familiar to many of us, of the thermonuclear variety. Chinese ultras are every bit as insufferable as western ones, and pretty common. They cite statistics such as the top 2% in China owning 98% of the wealth, without ever giving a source. Quite convenient how 98 and 2 add up to 100 for the dramatic effect, doesn't it? In contrast to western ultras, these don't really fixate on Albania or Catalonia as much. Mostly they just bash China and talk about how shit it is for the poor farmers in the desert and how everything the government does is just self-interest of capital. I hate them so fucking much but they're pretty boring honestly. I give them an 8 in stupidity and 3 in wackiness.

Next we have western bootlickers. Now believe it or not these are actually quite rare; I've almost never seen one in the wild. These people are basically run-of-the-mill bootlickers who say that the west is great, china bad, in the most generic sense. They seemingly mostly died out a decade back and have never recovered since. Good riddance. 6 in stupidity, 0 in wackiness.

C tier

The first entry in C tier are mingcels. These people love history, kind of like western crusadebros. Similar to crusadebros, mingcels love the Ming empire and think it was the best thing ever, and they hate the Qing dynasty for ending it and, in their opinion, ruining China. Unable to let go of beef that's almost 400 years old, you can still find them angrily screeching in comment sections of any qing-related content to this day. 5 in stupidity, 7 in wackiness.

The second entry for C tier are professional Japan haters. In China, the public consciousness of the European holocaust and Japan's crimes are flipped, so while many understandably harbor a distaste for Japan given its history with China and refusal to offer any sort of apology, some take it a step further and essentially make hating Japan their entire personality. The closest analogy I can think of is professional pedophile haters. Obviously, pedophiles and japan are bad, but... dial it down a bit, geez. These people support showing nsfl war crime documentaries to children in order to ingrain hatred for Japan (and ptsd) into the next generation so they can nuke it to dust. I get the idea but the execution here is just... not great. Stupidity 5, wackiness 0.

B tier

Finally, B tier, where things really get going. All of these are super funny, so I had a hard time ranking, but I had to make a decision in the end.

First entry in B tier are the conspiracybros. While some conspiracies are mostly apolitical, such as brains being extraterrestrial parasites, others are significantly more out there. For instance, the existence of japanese technical schools in China is irrefutable evidence to these people that there's some sort of Japanese Great Replacement plan to... replace Chinese people with Japanese people? Yeah it doesn't make that much sense to me either. They also may believe that GMOs are a western plot to poison Chinese people. Honestly this is just generic conspiracyslop with an anti-west spin, and it's really just sad once you get past the novelty. 7 stupidity, 6 in wackiness.

Next we have han nationalists. While pretty rare, I have seen one in the wild. There are some truly bizarre flavors of ethnonationalism given the sheer volume of internet-using people in China, and these are perhaps exemplified by the very real belief that China should like, un-annex every territory that's not a han homeland. This is so unfathomably stupid I can't even put it into words. They don't seem to rag on about minorities as much as save europebros do, but they do really hate black people for some reason. 9 stupidity, 7 wackiness.

A tier

We start off A tier with one of my personal favorites, sarcasmbros. I've never really known a counterpart in the west to these people, and while they're pretty far from being an 'ideology' per se, they're definitely noteworthy enough to be included here. If I had to say, they're like personifications of the 'erm akshuwually' soyjak. I'm not even kidding, they talk exactly like the stereotype, but in Chinese. They also really love using the doge emoji, though not related to musk as far as I'm aware. They generally don't seem to like China very much, and they make this clear to everyone by sarcastically hinting at how China is actually terrible because of [insert nonissue here]. They're super super insufferable and have the most milquetoast ultra takes. It's like if anarchists spent way too long moderating discord and reddit and tried to model themselves after the strawman smugjack, I really don't know how else to describe it. They get an 8 in stupidity, and a 4 in wackiness.

S tier

Finally, S tier. We have the king of all wacky ideologies, the undisputed most moronic and absurd of them all: Chinese fascism.

Remember when I said in China, public consciousness of the Holocaust and Japanese atrocities are flipped compared to in the west? And you know how some people in the west will simp for imperial Japan and overlook or even glorify their crimes?

Yeah.

Chinese fascists, disturbingly common (though still very minute in quantity), slurp up 1930s German propaganda about price-inflating Jews in complete earnestness, and still believe the US is controlled by the Israeli Jewish shadow government. They also came up this bizarre fanfiction about Hitler where he was saved from drowning by a Chinese guy, and he then vowed to share the world with China after he finished conquering it because he loved Chinese people so much and owed them such a great debt. They actually believe this stuff, too, which is just...

Don't write wet dream fantasies about your favorite fascist dictators please...

They also think that Japan somehow loved Jews and wanted to make part of China into a Jewish homeland, which doesn't make sense even in the context of their ideology. Is the axis your brave anti-semitic vanguard or is it a Jewish shadow plot? And the answer is neither, because their entire worldview is just nazi fanfiction they made up in their head while gooning to fascist boat women in azur lane. Needless to say, these people get 10 in stupidity and 10 in wackiness as well.

That's all for this tier list. Again, please correct me if I've gotten anything wrong.

Hvly fvcking bvsed mr pedophile in chief sir i kneel

Incentivizing SNAP Fraud

The Mass Shooter Subsidy

Handouts for Chinese Steel Companies

Tax Breaks for Puerto Rican Rum

A Tax on Gambling Winnings

Really cool documentary, popped up in my feed randomly. Greatly recommended :)!

cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/8423327

I'm thinking of wordsmithing myself. I have an unfinished work that I just want to publish online.

Well, what do you all think of the video?

I agree especially with the point about analog and physical media.