Slicing the Americas in half is brutal, took me a minute to figure that out

Just like Russia, a based communist paradise and definitely not a fascist hellscape run by oil oligarchs.

I feel like most of those things are not accurate, or are not good faith criticism. It's worth remembering that until the whole trans thing, the Harry Potter series was seen as very liberal to the point where some conservatives boycotted it.

-Harry isn't a "cop", like hes not walking the beat arresting people, hes a dark wizard catcher. Which is perfectly rational given dark wizards killed his parents and they're pretty explicitly fascists.

-a pretty huge part of the books is devoted to how good people can do bad things and bad people can do good things. Barty Crouch Sr is a whole character who is there to show how the good guys can end up being nearly as bad and brutal as the bad guys because they think the ends justify the means and in times of crisis people are willing to compromise their morals.

-Hermione is ridiculed for sticking up for house elves but she's also right, as Harry starts to realize by the end of the books. It's worth noting that the two most steadfast supporters of house elves are Hermione and dumbledore, aka Rowlings "always right about everything" characters

-Seamus is pretty yikesy in the movies but 90% of the stuff isn't in the books. Idk I thought he was a little racist, although still ultimately a good guy. Cho Chang has a stereotypical name but so what? I don't think it's racist in itself. I literally work with a guy named Ying Yang.

-I don't think obesity is used as a failing, gluttony is used as a failing, as in a favorite expression among leftists, the "fat cat". There are plenty of other overweight characters that are good and righteous like Ms Weasly, Slughorn (kinda), and Hagrid.

-I'm not sure who you're referring to with regards to describing teenage females as unattractive but that seems kinda cherry picked. Harry ends up with Ginny who in the books is described as a tomboy. The biggest female villain is arguably Umbridge who is very stereotypically feminine

I'm not defending Rowling as a person at all, or her statements about trans people, but the criticism of Harry potter feels very much like going back and reexamining them with an agenda. You can do the same uncharitable thing with any fantasy series. Hell, off the top of my head I can think of much worse criticisms of lord of the rings or game of thrones but people don't seem to want to nitpick those the same way.

I'm not saying this fact about penguins isn't true, I don't know, but this isn't a real wikipedia screenshot like it acts like it is. In fact, searching for "homosexuality is common in penguins" only returns results for transcriptions of this meme.

That can't be right though... 1000 people isn't nearly enough to drag the average income down 5k BELOW the median income in a nation of over 300 million. It should still be higher due to the long tail on the high side of incomes.

Proof: Average income in top 1% is 819k https://www.unbiased.com/discover/banking/how-much-income-puts-you-in-the-top-1-5-or-10#:~:text=To%20be%20in%20the%20top%201%25%20of%20earners%2C%20you',earn%20an%20average%20of%20%243%2C312%2C693.

Solve the weighted average:

819 * 0.01 + x*0.99 = 74.5

Where x is the remaining average. X≈66.3k, and that's excluding the ENTIRE 1% which is over a MILLION people at least, depending on how you count it. America is big.

Yeah, down with the violence of the state! Although, to prevent bad actors and armed gangs we do need to have some sort of militia to protect the vulnerable from the greedy and cruel, human nature being what it is. And to prevent said militia from turning into the very thing it was supposed to protect us from, we need some sort of oversight, preferably from a democratically elected body, that tells the militia how to act and prevent them from violating the rights of the people. Oh wait I just reinvented violence of the state hehe.

People in Somalia hearing that America has a 1.8% homelessness rate: "wow. Things are really just as bad over there."

"New study confirms that my worldview is correct"

...yeah that's not a real photo

So I sent this article to a friend I have who works in fishery management and she made an important clarification. These fisheries have been removed from the overfishING list. But that does not mean that they are not overfishED. Not overfishing means we are not actively making the problem worse; it does not mean the fisheries are healthy or have recovered. It's still good news though.

I'm not going to say police in the US are flawless but this is horrific stuff, I've never heard of US police officers molesting and then beating to death an underage girl who was already bound and gagged. And if evidence of such an event were to come out there would absolutely be consequences. Meanwhile in Iran this shit is institutionalized. The documents show the guards straight up admit to everything happening to their superiors, knowing they won't face consequences.

The answer of course is that the IRS doesn't know how much you owe, and it isn't feasible for them for figure out exact numbers for everyone with the tax code as complicated as it is. So, they audit a fraction of Americans every year to keep everyone honest. It's a bad system that taxes are so complicated but it's not a conspiracy.

-Very skilled songwriter. I don't necessarily like all her stuff but I legitimately think she's the best songwriter (meaning, composing music and writing lyrics) of her generation. Probably since Bruce Springsteen or Billy Joel.

-Very attractive and a good performer

-Well connected in the music industry let her get an early start/inside track

-obsessed with being popular. I don't mean that in a negative way, but her primary objective with her music is to please as many people as possible. I think the documentary "Miss Americana" on Netflix explains that very well-at one point she straight up says "I just want people to like me" or something like that. That means her music/career has always focused on mass appeal as opposed to making more... limited-appeal music like most artists do at some point in their career

-she's kept a remarkably clean image even through being famous for close to two decades. It's very telling that the worst thing her haters can say about her is "but her plane uses a lot of carbon!" This means parents let kids listen to her, brands love her as a sponsor, nobody boycotts her, etc.

-one last thing, I think people love her songs because they feel like they're true. Her songs have a very intimate, almost confessional quality that a lot of artists strive for buy often comes off as fake.