DefinitelyNotAPhone

joined 4 years ago

The long-term damages will be more relevant for Israel as a sizable portion of their population is now going to wonder if they have enough of a spine to squat on other's land when the other side starts shooting back in earnest. The average Israeli wasn't alive for the last time Israel was in a peer war and has never dealt with a real military raining ordinance down on their heads, and a tremendous number of them have multiple passports and can leave whenever. Iran doesn't have that problem.

[–] DefinitelyNotAPhone@hexbear.net 12 points 10 hours ago

Harris was literally calling for Iran's blood not 8 months ago while talking up how having the "world's most lethal military" was one of her top goals if she was elected.

If you'd like me to stop shitting on the opposition for being warhawks, maybe find some opposition that don't want to glass Tehran just as much as the Republicans.

[–] DefinitelyNotAPhone@hexbear.net 10 points 12 hours ago (7 children)

I'm sure the second one will magically be more potent than the first. If anything, the Dems will probably start clapping like seals for how 'presidential' it is for Trump to drop bombs on brown people, just like they did when he assassinated Soleimani in his first term.

No no no but see, the real issue with bombing other countries is that we didn't follow da rulez while doing it!

[–] DefinitelyNotAPhone@hexbear.net 44 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Oh cool, we're at that stage of open fascism where the state and private industry amalgamate into an unholy blob.

[–] DefinitelyNotAPhone@hexbear.net 26 points 4 days ago (3 children)

While there is something understandable about partially wishing for it, I don't think anyone is going to lead a genocidal strategic bombing campaign against the United States to level every manmade structure taller than knee height before promptly having 95% of the planet embargo them for 75 years, so I doubt the US can emulate the DPRK's economic situation too well.

[–] DefinitelyNotAPhone@hexbear.net 8 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Additionally, historically the capitalists have been quite good at class solidarity between one another, even between factions that are unaligned in their own self-interests. You don't get to the point of ruling over hundreds or thousands of employees and making millions or billions off of their surplus labor value without realizing that if you let those same workers ever figure out that they don't need you and outnumber you 1000:1, you are beyond fucked and it is worth it to ally with anyone in the same boat as you to keep that from happening.

[–] DefinitelyNotAPhone@hexbear.net 11 points 4 days ago (4 children)

The non-billionaires are part of the capitalist class. They're on the same side as the billionaires; there isn't some magical divide that pops into existence once you cross the threshold from eight to nine digits in your net worth. The problem still remains.

Yeah there's nothing evil about the palantir inherently, just the fact that an evil demigod is currently shoving his malice through them at all times.

[–] DefinitelyNotAPhone@hexbear.net 19 points 4 days ago (6 children)

Reading through your positions, your heart is very much in the right place but you seem to miss the most important detail: who actually holds power in our society, and how does that power manifest itself?

If we lived in an actual democracy, these changes wouldn't be worth discussing because they would've already been put into place ages ago; it's intuitively obvious to anyone paying attention that there is no world in which it makes sense for a handful of people to own something like 90% of the wealth a society creates. If government policy was driven by sound reasoning and a desire for the greatest possible outcome for the most people, all of this would already be in place. If the media were free to put forward information about key issues that affect everyone and the best paths forward to resolve those issues, you wouldn't have to type any of this out.

None of those statements are reality, nor are they anywhere near it. Our society (speaking specifically about the US, though this is applicable in any western-aligned nation) is, has always been, and will continue to be dominated by those with wealth. This country was founded by plantation owners who sought to exist in a society with zero oversight on them, driven by factionalism between them and their British counterparts and fear of a rising sparks of abolitionism within the British government. When that first attempt at as true of a laissez faire society fell apart in the face of slave revolts and antagonism from the former soldiers they failed to pay for their part in their revolution, they circled the wagons and created a stronger central government completely bound to their wills. You don't even need to read between the lines, they flat out admitted in the Federalist papers they were terrified of true democracy because the "mob" would overrule their enlightened perspective.

Our modern society is even more consolidated under their rule. They unilaterally own TV, radio, the internet. A single individual writes a check to bribe a senator that outpaces what ten thousand smaller donors can scrounge together collectively. Judges are drawn from billionaire-funded think tanks so regularly you could safely bet money on who the next Supreme Court justices will be. And most importantly of all, the means by which 99.9% of the population survives is, without exaggeration, a dictatorship by their bosses, the very people you're opposing. Any resistance to the status quo will inevitably result in the relevant workers being blacklisted from society and left to starve to death.

A political movement whose objective is to place a wealth limit on the people responsible for the above system would only succeed if that movement amasses enough influence, organization, manpower, and popularity with the common people that they can overthrow the entire system. This is where I think you're wrong: if you can reach this point, why would you treat the symptom instead of the disease? Every compromise the capitalists have ever given the rest of us will be and has been undone; the vast protections given to workers through mass unionization has been eroded, civil rights have been rolled back, and wages have stagnated as the existing real threat of socialism disappeared at the end of the Cold War. This same trend has occurred all across Europe and Asia, it is not a fluke but rather an inherent and obvious action of capitalism.

Don't settle for half-assing it, break the system that allows for ten people to dominate all of society and build a more equitable world instead.

[–] DefinitelyNotAPhone@hexbear.net 5 points 5 days ago (2 children)

Every now and again Roborocks will go on firesales for like $200, which is an absolute steal if you can afford it.

This is what they deserve for loving such an unnatural sport for their climate /s

 

"My estimation, as of this morning, somewhere between $500 to $700 billion worth of market capitalization that should be delisted, taken off the exchanges, add further pressure on the Chinese to come to the table," O’Leary said on "Mornings with Maria" Friday.

You're fighting a trade war built on top of the idea that China has to come to the table to negotiate because they're interlocked with your economy. If you delist all their companies and divest Chinese investors of American assets, you're literally gutting your own argument in favor of gobbling up a short-term gain, dipshit.

"I'm an investor. I take companies public on NASDAQ and the New York Stock Exchange. I pay millions of dollars each year in compliance. I have no choice but to be compliant and transparent and abide by [Generally Accepted Accounting Principles]. And right beside me, issuing shares without any guidance at all, are Chinese companies," O’Leary started.

"I'm competing for that dollar. I'm investing in our markets and being compliant, and my Chinese competitor, same bank I'm using, is going to institutions the same day on a road show and raising money for what's called a shadow share," he expanded. "It's not even a real share. They don't even have any rights. And they're taking my dollar."

Literally complaining he can't make effortless profit because a Chinese investor comes in, makes a deal with an American exchange or investment firm, and purchases a share with zero rights attached. This is a blackjack player complaining that someone else sat down at their main lucky table to play.

I can't tell if American capitalists are just entitled babies or if this is some ploy to shock doctrine half a trillion in domestic investment opportunities so they can snatch it up for cheap.

 

Mulaney took the opportunity to point out the irony of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs focusing on AI and the future in a city where thousands of humans struggle to live and maintain basic living conditions. “Let me get this straight,” Mulaney said. “You're hosting a ‘future of AI' event in a city that has failed humanity so miserably?”

Mulaney even compared the event attendees to himself and his son playing wiffle ball. “We're just two guys hitting wiffle balls badly and yelling ‘good job' at each other,” Mulaney said. “It's sort of the same energy here at Dreamforce.”

Still a piece of shit for cheating on his wife, but standing in front of Jensen and telling him that his work makes the world a worse place is full critical support.

 

galaxy-brain

 
 

The best version of Skies of Arcadia, including having the villain be a mirror universe TERF.

Just remember, we are thousands of feet in the air.

 

I had this pop up in a news feed and just laughed at how tone-deaf the whole thing was:

In 2021, the Body Shop gathered a group of Gen Zers who are passionate about the climate to critique the company and provide insight into how to be a force for good at the United Nations’ COP26—what could go wrong?

“The activists that were working with us were pretty critical of commerce,” Davis says, adding that there’s a cohort of extremists who think that all businesses are bad from an environmental standpoint. “We live in a world of trying to balance profit and principles. It’s not so straightforward.”

Although the conversation was colorful, he quickly learned that in order for criticisms from a board comprising bright young minds to actually be constructive, they’d need to be less radical.

“It wasn’t just a question of getting young people who are interested, who are smart, who care about the world, who want to make a difference—that’s actually not enough. On top of those things, you’ve got to bring people in who are on the side of wanting business to succeed,” he says, with the caveat, “but succeed on sustainable terms.”

With a vested interest in the company’s success, Davis imagined their feedback would err on the side of constructive criticism, rather than the company just being “slammed.”

"Sure, we could have a moment of introspection when even the labor aristocracy we surround ourselves with as underlings want our heads for lighting the planet on fire for profit, or we could just ignore that and find sycophants to keep telling us we're doing great."

Still a good sign that the kids are at least a little alright.

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