RationalWiki:Saloon bar/Archive282

Cops, abuse reports, etc
I legit went to the police about death threats I was receiving on Facebook over some political crap during the election (not over trolling on my part), and they said that unless the person had means and intent (the person was in another state; I had his apparent real life identity), it's not a crime. Calling someone mean names is less serious than death threats. Of course, you "could" file an abuse report, but T-Mobile won't do anything about it anymore that they would over someone calling people c*** and f***** on an animae forum I am a mod on (if you're wondering, this is where I get my ideas from). They have said they have no way of tracking abuse. On the other hand, my university, CenturyLink, or Comcast probably would, which is why I won't be trolling from there anymore. KylieN (talk) 23:52, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Boys and Girls I think we hit a little too close to home for this troll's comfort. Comrade GC (talk) 23:56, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * How true. Regards, Cosmikdebris (talk) 23:57, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * So are you just doing this because most colleges haven't started back up and you're bored, then? 00:09, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Wow, turns out mentioning that we had seen their IP was all it took? Honestly, I'm not entirely sure why we don't have checkuser. IPs aren't that big a deal. —Kazitor, pending 00:24, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I think it's because Conservapedia admins went crazy with huge swaths of IPs being banned because of checkuser and we don't want to be them, but yeah, I'm not sure either. 01:21, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * "Let's not be Conservapedia" was the impetus for all our bad policies. Unfortunately, all the successful wikis also do the things Conservapedia did, just without gutting their own community and content.  This has left us quite a few pieces shy of a full tool set.   06:09, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * CheckUser will just get people into witchhunting campaigns, trying to find IP connections between past trolls and new users. Unnecessary and counterproductive. 16:40, 5 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Forensic experts say that people who make threats over social media are generally harmless. Those capable of doing real harm will never give you cause for suspicion. Just block them. But since you publicly engage in anti-Trump polemic I suggest you conceal-carry at all times. Gewgtweg (talk) 13:19, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

I have heard people ask, "What is it like to have autism"?
I have a counter question, "What is it like to not have autism"? I honestly have no idea. I have autism and I have wondered that. --Rationalzombie94 (talk) 14:39, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Imagine being a human being with a myriad of flaws, but none of them are specifically caused by hyper-sensitivity to stimuli and/or strong obsessions with the details of specific things. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 15:41, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm a congenital anosmic, so I can ask a similar question in "What is it like to have a sense of smell?" I can only imagine it's like "tasting the air with your nose, only it's like hearing in that you can't ever make it stop, unless you get congested". Which frankly sounds horrifying to me. Point is, it's hard to imagine perceiving or experiencing a world a different way from one you've known since birth and know will never be able to experience like everyone else. --CoyoteSans (talk) 20:47, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm thinking that must some "what's like ..." questions must be unanswerable. What's it like to be a snake? If the snake could answer - would we understand the response? Could the snake put it in language we could understand? Our frames of reference simply don't overlap.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 21:47, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The only ones that can be answered are things like "what's it like to be in a cult", where people exist who've been in the situation the question asks about but are so no longer. Christopher (talk) 21:50, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

searching archived pages
is there a way to search archived pages? there is something i remember from an old coop case that would be useful to illustrate a point about checkuser? i dont fancy looking throw each and every page should it be necessary AMassiveGay (talk) 17:08, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I tried these linux commands, but they don't seem to work. Presumably some anti-scraping mechanism are at work, although you should ask staff for permissions before a full out scrape:
 * $ wget -r https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/RationalWiki:Chicken_coop/
 * $ grep -r "search term"
 * Issue: I get an WTF is even a 443 response code? Also, what point were you try to make? 17:49, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Use the search bar to the top right on the CC page. 18:19, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * i see. thanks AMassiveGay (talk) 19:47, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

User:Joaquín Martínez asked for it


This is a svg(raphic), much of the information is linked in it and can be viewed by mouse-over. To enjoy the full experience, you have to look at

https://rationalwiki.org/w/images/b/b7/Action-RationalWiki-2017-40.svg

Happy New Year, larron (talk) 23:29, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Jfc, Bigs. 23:50, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't have a problem! 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 00:28, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Fuzzy Cat. 22:28, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * thank LArron, not me, I don't understand his SVG magic 22:45, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Er, thanks ! Can you explain how you made the chart? 00:19, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I looked up the revisions of 2017 using a perl script
 * The svg was created via R rather tongue in cheek: pie-charts are much maligned, but I think they can display some interesting information
 * --larron (talk) 00:35, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

Hear the cries of White Nationalism and Men's Right Movement..
BEHOLD Modern Educayshun..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKcWu0tsiZM&ab_channel=NeelKolhatkar

a short film Neel Kolhatkar and received praise from Bullshit websites konbini.com thedailysheeple.com InfoWars and fringe conspiracy sites and Alt-Righters alike, The film is known to attack Political Correctness and cry "an act of censorship and forcing people to confort to their beliefs" potraying feminists, gays, latinos and blacks as EVIL..

feel free to check out his shitty Anti-PC https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XM-HJT8_esM&ab_channel=NeelKolhatkar https://www.youtube.com/user/neel30394/videos

Yup, we live in a world where any shitlord will cry "PUBLIC SCHOOLS ARE INDOCTRINATION CAMPS FOR SJWS AND FEMINAZIS" as they worship Trump, form Alt-Right cults on dA, Facebook, Tumblr and YouTube, and BUILD THEIR OWN COMPETITORS to Mainstream Sites. Yes! its true. 24.247.116.207 (talk) 12:49, 6 January 2018 (UTC)Annoymous


 * Bet they were smoking crack when they made that garbage. --Rationalzombie94 (talk) 15:30, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * @Rationalzombie94, tell me about, That film should get itself a RationalWiki article... ever heard of webshites like Daily Sheeple? These Sheeple Wakers love that Alt-Right shit Neel Kolhatkar makes. and yet they despise us because we are SJWs, Gays, Lesbians, Latinos, Muslims and hate the color red according to these alt-right shitheads. 16:13, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm not surprised that dorks like these people would think education is indoctrination from the left, because typically, some of the stances the left takes such as those based on science (hack cough global warming) are education-based. Also, they're the same type of people who would want to cut funding for education anyway. These people also don't realize they're not being anti-PC at this point, they're simply being assholes, that's all. 16:26, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Either that or they're rabid partisan ideologues who simply don't care as long they hurt "the other group". Comrade GC (talk) 17:09, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

@BabyLuigionFire tell me about it, these fucks are the same guys that bitched about Star Wars: The Last Jedi... dear lord, I been sending something new to The Fun Page of DeviantART.. I can tell idiot commenters are going to be [|PISSED AT US] 24.247.116.207 (talk) 17:02, 6 January 2018 (UTC)Annoymous

Watching It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
I think the episode "Sweet Dee Has a Heart Attack" is a pretty good parody of people who take supplements. This has been Random Half-Baked Thoughts With RoninMacbeth. RoninMacbeth (talk) 06:38, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

Crossword help
Suck on the observer everyman crossword.

2 clues:

3d Strain without opening lock (5) i got T_E__ maybe T_E_E or T_E_N depending on 10a

10a Sign changes, losing volume (5) i got A_I__ maybe ARISE as its an anagram of Aries (sign changes) dunno about the losing volume part or maybe ALIGN as its its an anagram of signal (sign changes) minus the s (losing volume?)

AMassiveGay (talk) 15:48, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * TRESS and ARIES I think. CowHouse (talk) 16:12, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * yes i see it now. thanks. i dont normally get anywhere near as close to finishing. thanks AMassiveGay (talk) 16:16, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

Moderator elections (sticky)
Judging by my calendar, we're about due to start another round of moderator elections this week or next. This sound good? 18:16, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Sure. Though didn't the Avenger-Ballot-Stuffing controversy last year prompt some reforms? We should probably go over those as well. RoninMacbeth (talk) 18:23, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Good, let's agree on election rules before the election, especially given last year's attempted election hack. Bongolian (talk) 04:30, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

Yay

 * 1) Sure. 18:31, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * 2) I look forward to this election. GrammarCommie (talk) 18:32, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * 3) Not going to run, but will finally be allowed to vote. RoninMacbeth (talk) 20:49, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * 4) Assuming you don't have to be 18, I may run (and lose). —Goat-Emperor Bigs (Words of Wisdom/Achievements) 21:28, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * You don't have to be 18, IIRC. And I plan to nominate you, so best of luck with the campaign! RoninMacbeth (talk) 01:09, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * 1) (comment expressing support pending)—Kazitor, pending 04:25, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * 2) Go for it. Regards, Cosmikdebris (talk) 14:20, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * 3) - 05:17, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
 * 4) Nerd (talk) 02:20, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

Nay

 * 1) Things are fine, move along please.Ariel31459 (talk) 19:26, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

Goat

 * 1) Anybody heard from Aging Hippie lately? Alec Sanderson (talk) 04:53, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Too pure for this sinful wiki. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 17:19, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * OK, cool. Alec Sanderson (talk) 22:42, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

Elections
So, did this change anything? It'd be good to discuss this, given the shitfest that last year's election became. RoninMacbeth (talk) 19:00, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Re: Changing voter requirements: AFAICT it's not easy to add a "has edited X times within last Y seconds" limiter to the "eligible" usergroup. See . The only extension does not appear to be applicable. As such, the only other option is to increase total edit counts. I don't think it's worth it to restrict voting rights unless we think fraud is likely -- if the field of candidates is all good, then this shouldn't be a problem.  19:40, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Don't you (let's be honest, you do everything and will probably end up sorting out the mod election technicalities) see who's voted for who when you look at the file containing all the votes? It should be fairly obvious that something dodgy is going on if a bunch of accounts with the minimum number of edits who last did anything in 2013 all vote for one or two candidates. Christopher (talk) 19:50, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * No -- each vote is appended a user id # that can be looked up in the user database, which I don't have access to. 21:49, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * One of the more noteworthy, but still open, proposals was to block sysoprevoked users from being nominated. This might have been a good idea last year, but most of the users here are either blocked or gone. RoninMacbeth (talk) 20:37, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Based on the straw poll, that we conducted then, of the 5 proposals, only "No BON/un-autoconfirmed nominations" passed. This is a rather weak rule for the elections in my view. Bongolian (talk) 04:30, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * It might have been useful last year, when we had Avenger almost win through shenanigans. But since that's unlikely to happen again, we probably don't need it this year. RoninMacbeth (talk) 14:01, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * I don't think assuming it won't happen because Avenger appears to be gone is a good idea. This was a systemic problem that Avenger exploited. Bongolian (talk) 19:33, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

New Rules
In order to avoid the problems encountered last year, we should go over some rules. Currently, the eligibility requirements for franchise are as follows:
 * Have been registered for 3 or more months
 * Have 75 or more edits

I believe there are no problems with the eligibility requirements, but there should be more requirements for candidacy.

Now, I personally believe we should add the following rules: I support the above reforms. RoninMacbeth (talk) 19:17, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * 1) Candidates for Moderator must have greater than or equal to 150 edits.
 * 2) Candidates for Moderator must have spent three months on the wiki by the date of the vote (e.g., If the vote is on January 1, they must have registered no later than October 1, 2017).
 * 3) Candiates for Moderator cannot be in sysoprevoke by the time of voting.


 * They make perfect sense to me. GrammarCommie (talk) 19:22, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * I also support these rules. Bongolian (talk) 19:33, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * They have my support. —Goat-Emperor Bigs (Words of Wisdom/Achievements) 20:00, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Sure, but I think candidates for moderator should have spent 6 months on the wiki-3 seems too short to me.- 05:14, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
 * I agree with . Nerd (talk) 02:25, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

I think the total editcount for moderators misses the point: Oppose the editcount requirement. 20:16, 30 November 2017 (UTC) I oppose it. If a candidate is popular, they shouldn't be disqualified on a technicality. Christopher (talk) 20:36, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * 1) In the past, some moderators have run a platform of inactivity -- usually in defense of a particular "Old Guard" ideology that moderators shouldn't exist/be active.
 * 2) What we're really interested in is a pattern of consistent, recent activity. Ideally, we'd want something like "average of 1 or more edits per day for the past year, maximum of 7 consecutive days with no edits".
 * If they're popular enough, then they can go to the coop or the basement asking for removal of sysoprevoke. RoninMacbeth (talk) 20:44, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

Noting that I have been around since 2010 or something, and approaching 276 edits, but I’ve only recently started to make some minor contributions again after a 5+ year hiatus. If we want to use edit counts or time since registration as a criterion for the franchise, that makes some sense because bots and sock-puppets are less likely to swing an election. They make a lot less sense when setting criteria for a candidate, because in that case you presumably want to look for active community participation, and these ”lifetime” stats don’t have much to do with that. Or if you don’t care about the kind of community involvement that is captured by edit counts, why bother? Quantheory (talk) 04:24, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

I think another requirement should be "must have edited sometime in the last month" and the edit of nomination doesn't count.- 05:22, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Eh, it'd still be easy to just make some pissy change somewhere and call it a day. —Kazitor, pending 05:52, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
 * OK, since it doesn't look like we're getting anywhere near consensus on changing rules, can we at least put up a caveat message for future voters that election results are subject to forensic examination to assure that there was no ballot stuffing, vote rigging, etc., so as to deter such behavior? Bongolian (talk) 07:46, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Sure.- 05:38, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

Techs
Tech positions haven't been handled very democratically recently. Instead, they've been given out by mods as mods see fit. This is particularly worrying to me for three reasons:


 * 1) Techs have more influence: The editfilter (blocks edits with certain words/patterns) alone probably has affected RationalWiki more than any "moderator" activities (asking people to be less dramatic).
 * 2) Techs have all the community management powers (eg, user-rights) that moderators have, and when they use these user-rights powers people don't usually call them out on it.
 * 3) There are a lot of techs: Special:ListUsers/tech. Only ~6 were elected.

TLDR: Techs are mini-mods. I suggest that we [1] combine mod and tech positions and increase the number of mods elected (from 6 to 8 or so) and [2] remove community-management powers from appointed techs. It doesn't make sense to have "moderators" without tech powers or "tech" users with community management powers.

I'd be happy to hear alternate suggestions or responses. 20:35, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Techs shouldn't have the powers of mods when they're not. They should only have rights related to the edit filter and servers, and we should reduce the number of techs to 2-4, and these should be elected. RoninMacbeth (talk) 20:44, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * How about we just strip techs of community management powers, and transfer editfilter rights to the mods? Anyone skilled enough should get the role. —Goat-Emperor Bigs (Words of Wisdom/Achievements) 20:55, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Well, moderation should be the job of the coolest heads, those who have demonstrated themselves to be trustworthy and adept at keeping discussions nice and tidy and have had the trust of the community placed in their hands as a result. Tech-hood should be for those who have experience with editfilters, servers, etc. and can keep the technical part of the wiki under moderate control. Sometimes these skills do not coincide, so it's best to keep the two positions separate. RoninMacbeth (talk) 23:27, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Exactly why they should be separate. But still, strip them of community management. But they should still keep the editfilters. —Goat-Emperor Bigs (Words of Wisdom/Achievements) 00:13, 1 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Wait, didn't you say mods should have editfilter rights? If you're not saying that, then I guess we agree on that. I still think we should elect techs, though. RoninMacbeth (talk) 00:24, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

So here are the questions: 01:27, 1 December 2017 (UTC)
 * 1) Should tech exist as position independent of moderators?
 * 2) If so, what rights should techs have and what should mods have?
 * 3) If so, should techs be appointed (by moderators, as we do now) or elected?
 * Yes.
 * Techs should only have rights for technical work (nothing for moderation), while mods should have rights for modding.
 * Status quo.
 * —Goat-Emperor Bigs (Words of Wisdom/Achievements) 02:00, 1 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Can anyone point to any actual problems with tech behavior that their membership or rights should be addressed at this time? If not, let's concentrate on the moderator election. Bongolian (talk) 08:22, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

One question, is it particularly difficult to use powers tech's normally have? FuzzyCatPotato implies that it is not particularly difficult. Also, the argument that mods are trusted because they can solve their way out of a conflict while techs should handle the technical stuff... But by giving techs some power to edit MediaWiki pages, isn't that the same idea, that the potential tech is competent and cool headed enough to wield some power? I am not sure if the power division is really needed, especially if FuzzyCatPotato accraretly describes the low-key work, if you even call it that, that techs do. Again, is tech work particularly difficult and demands special knowledge of web function or MediaWiki stuff? 09:01, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

Responding to FuzzyCatPotato's questions:
 * No. As far as I've seen, the actual work techs do are low-key and don't seem to be highly technical. This isn't particularly different from the bureaucrat rank in other wikis I go to, where they have access to MediaWiki pages they can edit and also contacted for settling disputes. If it's assumed a mod is competent enough to keep things in order, I think it's not far to assume mods are competent enough to use tech tools too. I don't think the power divide is ultimately that necessary. This is all based on what I've read what FuzzyCatPotato has said about techs and from my own experience at editing small things like mediawiki drop-down text and using the "edit strings to edit multiple articles" function.
 * Does not apply.
 * Does not apply.
 * 00:27, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

Stabby's hot take
Oh hey, I'm not on the board anymore, so I'm free to be a rude piece of shit! So here's my hot take: the community can keep its fumbling little pseudo-anarchist hands off of techs. Techs have access to more tools in the toolbox because that's how websites work. This isn't a traditional organization, where the IT staff's powers can be neatly separated from HR (or whatever the hell moderators are comparable to). It's a website—everything is tech-related. Every feature is related to a tech's duties. To even pretend you can separate those duties from other institutional powers on a website is utterly moronic.

Also: You already have your democracy. That's what the board elections are for. Now, the board—whom you elected—gets to decide who is or isn't a tech, and what powers they have. The fact that they haven't is because they make a point of being hands off with the community (and also they're lazy as hell and not relying on autopilot for something would entail, like, effort on their part), but that is entirely up to them.

Did you hold an "election" to make someone a tech? Sweet! The board can overrule that and say "no, we have enough" or "no, we don't trust them enough" if they want. Are you going to hold a referendum to strip techs of certain powers? That's great! Then the board can create a new user group (suggested name: "These people possess expertise, which they use to keep the wiki running, and they get access to whatever tools they need to do so"), give them all the old tech powers, and tell you all to go stuff yourselves. (Or, more likely, not say anything for a month, then explain only when pressed by a community member who wants to know what the heck is going on. Oh snap I got hot takes on the board too!)   02:10, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

P.S. Techs seem powerful compared to moderators because RW's moderators are exceptionally weak compared to mods on pretty much any other functional internet community out there. The answer to this is not "hamstring the techs because my trashbag principles demand consistent fecklessness in all aspects of site management". 02:10, 1 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Duly noted. RoninMacbeth (talk) 02:34, 1 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Should we just keep the status quo? —Goat-Emperor Bigs (Words of Wisdom/Achievements) 03:10, 1 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Stabby overstates the role of techs. They aren't usually editing our software or ensuring the servers are online -- 95% of tech activity is just editing the edit filter or fiddling with MediaWiki-space. Yes, they should be competent. Yes, mobocracy is less important than competence here. That doesn't mean that techs shouldn't be elected, or that techs and mods shouldn't be merged. 06:05, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

Should we even change anything?
 Yes No —Goat-Emperor Bigs (Words of Wisdom/Achievements) 19:01, 3 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Thoughts? —Fake News™ (talk/stalk) 21:37, 6 December 2017 (UTC)
 * I don't know. At this point, I really don't care if the election changes. RoninMacbeth (talk) 23:14, 6 December 2017 (UTC)
 * The status quo for techs is fine.  04:32, 7 December 2017 (UTC)
 * I have to agree. The elections start in less than two weeks and I really don't care about tech rights at this point. —Fake News™ (talk/stalk) 12:35, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

When do they start?
Is it the 19th like last year? 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 14:44, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

Alert
When's it happening? Did we miss it? 04:03, 22 December 2017 (UTC)
 * If things go the same as last year, it should've started three days ago. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 04:31, 22 December 2017 (UTC)
 * RoninMacbeth (talk) 17:39, 22 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Alert alert!- 04:25, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

If everyone is happy with the results above, we can start doing nominations for a week. 19:28, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Nominations started yesterday. Bongolian (talk) 19:53, 25 December 2017 (UTC)
 * To nominate, go here: RationalWiki:Moderator elections/Nominations. Bongolian (talk) 19:56, 25 December 2017 (UTC)
 * This still need to be sticky? —Kazitor, pending 21:49, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

Is there a term for this?
I saw this image today, it reads:

Is there a term for when people assume they are hated because of their sex, race, etc. when it's not actually the case. 18:38, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I believe it's usually referred to as "playing the race/gender/age/etc. card". On a more basic level it's a form of deflection. (Defense by) Association fallacy, maybe? 98.110.112.28 (talk) 18:56, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I saw that image as well, it’s a rewording of a Blaire White tweet. Christopher (talk) 19:08, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Can’t find the tweet, just a bunch of screenshots. Christopher (talk) 19:12, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Interesting ... I do agree with the point that there's times when the race card is misapplied, but I'm sure Blaire White's Tweet's intention was to undermine racism. 19:17, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The technical term for believing that "X is caused by Y" when, in fact, "X is caused by Z" is "being wrong".Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 20:17, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

Have a politics WIGO?
I do believe we discussed this before, but why don't we re-brand the election WIGO as the politics WIGO? The election WIGO, as it stands, sees sparse usage. 21:30, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I say merge elections into world entirely, what's the point of having them separate? Christopher (talk) 21:33, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Perhaps try to re-brand the Elections WIGO and if that fails merge it into the Main WIGO? Comrade GC (talk) 21:36, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It seems like a good idea though does WIGO:Elections draw as much attention as WIGO:World? It seems like WIGO:World already fills what WIGO:Elections is supposed to accomplish and doesn't do a shabby job, seeing that people constantly post politics-related stuff into WIGO:World. WIGO:Elections HAS seen more use, just look at November 2016. Maybe it's that sort of thing where it doesn't see much use outside of U.S. election years but sees a spike in use during election years. Anyhow, just my two coins here. 21:36, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * If it were folded into WIGO:World, many of the posts made there wouldn't fit many are related to gubernatorial and senatorial elections in the US, which really don't affect the world that much individually. I think rebranding it as WIGO:Politics would be a better idea. Was the two coins a reference to Mario? If so, I approve.  22:54, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes. :) 23:04, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I proposed renaming WIGO:Elections to WIGO:Politics a while back; after the 2016 clown car election the page went really quiet. The community didn't want to do it then, but I still think it's a good idea. Regards, Cosmikdebris (talk) 23:13, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * If all the political entries from World and Blogs were enfolded into a Politics WIGO, it would probably see more traffic than any of the other WIGOs. The problem is that we'd have to train the community to go along with this change in the local culture. - Smerdis of Tlön, LOAD "*", 8, 1. 02:41, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * the vast majority of WIGO are political anyhow. Seems rather pointless moving them to a specific 'politics' wigoAMassiveGay (talk) 23:39, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

The Attack of David Gerard’s 50ft troll farm and the RationalWiki hustle
http://archive.is/yE1jx As a pro-science progressive, Southern California and Los Angeles native and activist myself – I can definitely say don’t let RationalWiki’s ideologies fool you. They are doing far more harm to the responsible communication of science and social politics than any “Russian troll farm” or conservative could dream of.

The reality is that RationalWiki somewhat exposes how corrupt and irresponsible these individuals are when it comes to publishing, and just like “click bait” and political trolls – both of them are using reactions from political and cultural divisions to viral toxic market their own platforms for attention and fundraising.

Fundraising specifically – Trent is upfront about their metric for success being the number of “threats of lawsuits” coming from those who supposedly they expose. “Over 35 legal threats this year!” claims Trent Toulouse which he adds are “coming from people who do real-world harm” ending with a “thanks to you!”

Trent probably doesn’t want to tell his fundraisers that RationalWiki’s own editors are impersonating targets making some of those legal threats, or intentionally harass a target until a legal threat is the only thing they can do to protect themselves from online harassment. It takes two 2 tango (talk) 23:37, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Wat. 23:41, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Someone just collapse this as per usual business. Reason I can't do it now is that I am typing from mobile. 23:50, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 01:05, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I thought no one edited Rational-Wiki from their phone, ? 172.58.11.33 (talk) 15:13, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I do from time to time. A huge pain in the ass, though. 20:19, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

So this happened
Like, even if it wasn't racist, what did they think the public reaction to that image would be?! 00:12, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Obviously, it's an unfortunate coincidence. No well-known company would promote racism; it's bad PR. Anti-sodomy. Yeah. Racism? No. I'm more surprised that the black model didn't catch it. 00:37, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I take that back. Given the cranks I see on rationalwiki, I'm not giving people credit for having common sense. 00:42, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Rule of thumb, CBF: Anything described as "common" (decency, sense, etc.) usually isn't. RoninMacbeth (talk) 00:46, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Eh, they apologized and removed the picture. Don't see the need to continue dragging this further than necessary. 02:18, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * You don't understand. In today's society we have to look for offensive material that disgusts us and continue being offended about it for a very long time. If there's a time when someone is not getting offended about something, I start to get really worried that there's something wrong with our society. Not only does H&M have to feel really sorry about it, they have to be severely punished for it and feel stupid for it on social media. 23:32, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

How I drank poison and survived.
I just diluted the poison a bunch then drunk it over a couple of days. Still alive without going to poison control. —ClickerClock (talk) 07:12, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Did you... actually do that? (pedant in me insists that even if you did, you didn't actually drink the poison, but duh) —Kazitor, pending 07:20, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * By accident with sheer incompetence. Luckily it was very diluted. Reminds me of this one comic by The Pigeon Gazette. —ClickerClock (talk) 07:45, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Depends upon the poison - 'some people' would call alcohol poison (and Vin Mariani more so), and dunking a bitter almond in water is unlikely to affect most people. Anna Livia (talk) 14:05, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * "Acute Alcohol poisoning" is a not-uncommon cause of death on death certificates. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 15:27, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I need more context. Why would you do this? 23:28, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * What was the poison? Depending on how diluted it is and your body weight diluted poison could still have an effect. Christopher (talk) 15:47, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Actually, it's probably more effective if it's diluted. 23:39, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Welp, get your affairs in order.- 05:04, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

Your thoughts on the retweet Huffington Post article from the Ratwiki Twitter
https://twitter.com/RationalWiki/status/950404533422870535 ShiningSwordofThoughts (talk) 04:20, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Please sign with four tildes, not three. —Kazitor, pending 05:29, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That sure is an article discussing the conclusions of experts in a field. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 15:54, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Is it already covered in the entertaining Talk:Racialism archives? --Gospatric (talk) 17:12, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Iranian protests
As we all know, the theocratic regime is not popular amongst Iranian youth. And as the protests seem to be showing, they've finally snapped. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 06:47, 30 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Looks like the wheeling and dealing the ayatollahs(?) did during the nuclear deal to get sanctions lifted and secure their regime has been for naught. Comrade GC (talk) 15:02, 30 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Yeah... I'm going to need some real citation on the claim that the Ayatollahs are extremely unpopular. That seems to be little more than propaganda amongst people in the west, dangerous thinking along the lines of "Saddam is so resented by his subjects that they'd love anyone who took Saddam out". CorruptUser (talk) 23:20, 31 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Al Jazeera, for example. Americans don't want to invade Iran and would revolt at the prospect of doing so.Ariel31459 (talk) 15:09, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * why they need to? trumps ,made clear on numerous occasions he'd happily nuke a country for the slightest provocation. and thats without the destabilising effect sanctions are having while telling the world the word of the US cannot be trusted. AMassiveGay (talk) 15:35, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Just my opinion, but nobody is blowing up anything on Trump's say-so, not now. The world and the US military does not trust DT. Hopefully soon-to-be President Pence will not gamble with nuclear war. Ariel31459 (talk) 15:43, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * you reckon?AMassiveGay (talk) 02:10, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * yeah, the Guardian is panic-stricken bunch. Congress has to authorize spending to create weapons. Trump would be long gone by the time any new weapons come on line.Ariel31459 (talk) 04:44, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

Idea to prevent that cheerleader troll (probably Grawp)
If you can block usernames with regular expressions, then this should work to prevent him from signing up using that naming scheme again:. I ran it through some tests with current users and there didn't appear to be any false positives, but it'll also prevent anybody from signing up if their name involves the word "cheerleader" or an abbreviation of it. There may be a way to prevent that; I threw the expression together quickly so it's probably not perfect. 21:45, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Unlike restricting length of user names, I feel this one really is pointless. If we restrict this word, this guy will just find something else, extremely easily, to troll about. 21:47, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I just blocked the IP for 9 hours. They'll move onto a different target eventually. —Kazitor, pending 21:48, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I agree with BL, unlike the character limit this seems a bit pointless. Comrade GC (talk) 21:51, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 172.32.0.0/11 is T-Mobile USA, which is commonly used by the troll. The client IP address is apparently very easy to change on this network so just blocking the one address usually does no good at all. MediaWiki supports blocking IP address ranges only from /16 and up so it is impossible to block all T-Mobile traffic with a single block command, but short-duration /16 blocks (i.e., block 172.58.0.0/16) may slow it down for a bit if it gets really out of control. Regards, Cosmikdebris (talk) 22:01, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I see your point, though we could also turn it into a regex treadmill, which would be fun. I like writing those things. 21:53, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * If you come up with an idea for stopping trolls, it's probably best if you don't post it in the saloon bar where the troll can see it. Our current, incredibly poor, troll filter is private for a reason. Christopher (talk) 21:56, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * And he stole one of my sock account ideas... Comrade GC (talk) 22:03, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * , which one are you referring to? I can rename it. Christopher (talk) 22:04, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The one Spriggina mentioned below, "Holy Science Book". Comrade GC (talk) 22:09, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I are stoopid. Anyway, they've moved on to using unrelated usernames (just permabanned "Holy Science Book"), so my idea wouldn't work out. I think this is the same troll from a while back who vandalized pages related to Pensacola Christian College (and appears to be from there), given that both have an obsession with cheerleaders and that the IP you just banned traces to Florida. That person may or may not also be Grawp. 22:05, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Done. Christopher (talk) 22:14, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks . which site did you use? Comrade GC (talk) 22:32, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * This and another site that I can't remember. It doesn't trace to a city very close to Pensacola, but since my IP address often traces to a city that's pretty far away from where I live, I figured it was still a possibility. 22:35, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

Some thoughts

 * 1) Why haven't we been reporting his IP addresses to law enforcement? Rhetorical question. The privacy policy says so. But seriously, this cyber harassment has been going on for nearly an entire decade and cyber harassment is illegal.
 * 2) I know is going to object, but besides "philosophy" from trolling Conservapedia, there's literally no reason to not ban IPs. Hell, we already do ban IP addresses because we use a spam filter for editing and for when a user signs up.
 * 3) Why do we not have whoisuser? Rhetorical question. Because of 's "philosophy".
 * 4) Isn't anyone sick of this troll? TEN FUCKING YEARS this troll has been going at it. 22:50, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * What's this '"philosophy"' you refer to? I do agree that we probably want some more definitive action. —Kazitor, pending 23:05, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * He is getting a tad boring. Comrade GC (talk) 23:07, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Because we don't know that these trolls are all the same person, and his IP address is extremely fluid, since it's on a cellular network. I'm not sure if cyberbullying is illegal in certain jurisdictions, and wiki-based harassment might not be considered to be real cyberbullying by law enforcement given the anonymity here compared to somewhere like Facebook or even Twitter, where many list their real names. Not a legal expert, though. 23:12, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * If you look at my talk page, you'll notice that this troll pulled exactly the same coop joke on me on March 10, 2016. I did a short-term IP range block on 172.58.0.0/16 then and it went away for a while. I did the same thing earlier today but was reverted by another sysop. Regards, Cosmikdebris (talk) 23:55, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
 * There are rare cases where drastic measures be taken. This isn't a troll who's made a couple sockpuppets. They've made countless accounts IIRC. Block the range. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 02:03, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The problem is that that'll block every T-Mobile user unless we somehow manage to get the IP of their PC, and T-Mobile is a pretty large network. Also, it seems like they may be done. Hopefully. 02:23, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * A couple of points: (1) Almost no one edits the wiki on their phone.  Only the most dedicated users ever bother doing it, and it's a gigantic fucking pain in the ass.  And that's all a block does: prevent you from editing, and maybe registering if you tick the option.  You can still view the site normally.  (2) The number of people using T-Mobile's network to edit using a laptop or tablet (via expensive hotspot plan, which is the only way you can do that) who are also RationalWiki editors is effectively nil.  The objections are based on exaggerations of shit that won't happen, while the actual downsides of blocking T-Mobile's entire IP range are negligible.   04:13, 5 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Wikipedia and Conservapedia blocks T-Mobile because of other trolls, why don't ypu do it? However, I can almost just as easily reset my CenturyLink modem and get a new home IP to evade blocks, it's just a pain in the ass going through the setup walled garden everytime, and unlike T-Mobile, they can trace that if you ever install checkuser on me. As for being bored with school out, yup, I'm there, and so is J. Zoia, who I know off-wiki. She lives in another state now where she is a middle school teacher (and coach, of course), and that is not her real name (nor is Bryant her real mame). She is Church of Christ (as she has said on here before, somewhere) and I am Independent Baptist. Neither one of us are your friend. I told her vandalizing Wikipedia is wrong and she should vandalize this liberal atheist land instead. Since school is probably almost back in session for her, she is probably done trolling, but who knows, you'd have to ask her. This is all stuff she has publicly posted on tbe internet, so it isn't "dox." (I will say she privately told me on Facebook that it's funny to see chaos over her involvement in the elections and that her true intentions were to get RobSmith or that Mexican from Conservapedia elected as a moderator.) Me supporting genocide of her type of people? Screw that, I just say random crap to annoy you. If someone were to really hurt one of those types of girls, I would want to hurt them. Have a nice night, assholes. KylieN (talk) 03:41, 5 January 2018 (UTC)


 * I'm not particularly inclined to take your word as very strong evidence of J.Zoia being a troll, given that you're a much more obvious one (and I find it hard to believe that you're friends with her or actually like cheerleaders based on the awful text of those usernames that you posted on her talkpage, as well as your persistent trolling about cheerleaders and like nothing else that's gone on for months at this point), but the evidence is certainly stacked in favor of that being the truth regardless and this just adds another small layer of it. So would it be reasonable to permaban her at this point, or at least a 3.14 months block, sysops? Also, I'm like 99% sure that Joaquin Martinez on RW is not actually Joaquin Martinez. 03:54, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * No way. See my messgage below \/. —Kazitor, pending 03:56, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm autistic, I can say things I don't really mean (of course I feel bad later and have to pray over it). That's the magic of the internet's anonymity. And why exactly I don't want anyone knowing anything close to who I am, yeah, I don't want the girls that I know from school to see what I say and tie it to me, because it would hurt them (except Jenn because she knows I'm just babbling to offend you rats). Please do prevent me from editing, that way Satan can't tempt me with this place anymore. Autism Speaks (talk) 04:04, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * AAAAAAAAAAA DON'T HURT ME 04:07, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

So yeah, if "Jenn" and I ever seem like we're working together but aren't the same person, there's a reason for that. KylieN (talk) 03:46, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Wow, I'm so convinced. —Kazitor, pending 03:53, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * you folk are pathologically incapable of not feeding the troll. AMassiveGay (talk) 04:05, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

Blocking T-Mobile / highly abused IPs
I am creating a vote to see if users support the idea of banning T-Mobile IPs / highly abused IPs. This poll is not really definitive or has any authority because I'm not an admin. It's just to see everyone's thoughts, and perhaps give admins the push to take action. 06:29, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

Yay

 * 1) I'm tired of -y trolls. Just don't block Tor users from editing. 06:29, 5 January 2018 (UTC)


 * 1) We need a firmer (but not abusive) policy on repetitive trolls. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 06:41, 5 January 2018 (UTC)


 * 1) The reward appears greater than the risk, thus my vote is yay. Comrade GC (talk) 14:07, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * EDIT: After some thought on the matter I am withdrawing my support and sitting this vote out. Comrade GC (talk) 17:33, 5 January 2018 (UTC)


 * 1) Yes. Spud (talk) 15:05, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

Nay

 * 1) Really? banning everyone on t-mobile? get a fucking grip AMassiveGay (talk) 12:07, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 2) Like fuck 16:34, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 3) For fuck's sake, is this what we have come to? We've ALL been harassed by Grawp, and it's never been more than a couple minutes' inconvenience. Also, has it occurred to anyone that this is EXACTLY what Grawp wants? Drama? Chaos? RoninMacbeth (talk) 17:04, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 4) I am opposed to any permanent bans on IP addresses. It will not achieve anything because IP addresses can easily be spoofed by malicious actors. Bongolian (talk) 19:00, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * No, just no. Christopher (talk) 19:03, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 1) This was a dumb idea. 19:29, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 2) No support at this point. Maybe I can still work to get checkuser implemented. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 20:50, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 3) Permabanning T-Mobile? Absolutely not. Cosmikdebris (talk) 20:54, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 4) Per all.- 04:16, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 5) Are you TK in disguise? Boredatwork (talk) 13:37, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * No, hell no. ScepticWombat (talk) 03:18, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Add checkuser to the wiki
I am creating a vote to see if users support the idea of adding checkuser to the wiki. This poll is not really definitive or has any authority because I'm not an admin. It's just to see everyone's thoughts, and perhaps give admins the push to take action. 06:29, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

Yay

 * 1) I'm tired of -y trolls. 06:29, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 2) Sounds fine to me. —Kazitor, pending 06:32, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 3) We need a firmer (but not abusive) policy on repititive trolls. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 06:41, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 4) As long as regular sysops don't get it, given how many we have, mods (and possibly techs, seeing as they already see people's IPs under certain circumstances) should be the only ones to have it. Christopher (talk) 10:57, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 5) Yes. Spud (talk) 15:06, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

Nay

 * 1) we have repeatedly resisted checkuser. whats changed now? Nothing. AMassiveGay (talk) 12:04, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * i was a little worried there that my vote was looking awfully lonelyAMassiveGay (talk) 16:55, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 1) Per AMassiveGay’s comments below and above. Christopher (talk) 15:55, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 2) It's will achieve nothing. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 16:12, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 3) Absolutely not. Trolls who waste minutes of your time are not worth overturning 10 years of anti-mod-abuse precedent. 16:34, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 4) No. Absolutely not. It would do absolutely nothing, so far as I can tell, and it betrays a decade of precedent. RoninMacbeth (talk) 16:50, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 5) This was a dumb idea. 19:29, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 6) No. The potential for abuse outweighs any benefit. Cosmikdebris (talk) 20:03, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 7) Per everyone else. 23:27, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 8) It's certainly not worth this much drama. —Kazitor, pending 23:53, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 9) Per everyone else.- 04:12, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 10) Fuck it, no-one else supports it. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 17:54, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 11) Just block on sight. It's like two or three clicks, if that's too much to ask, you shouldn't be a sysop. Boredatwork (talk) 13:40, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 12) Absolutely not. ScepticWombat (talk) 03:19, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Goat

 * 1) I was considering raising this after the mod elections. —Kazitor, pending 06:33, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * sounds like something to raise before AMassiveGay (talk) 12:11, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Well I did it and regret it. At least I had the courage to make a poll about it before the voting started. 02:47, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 1) While this privilege being restricted to Mods appears to be a good idea I have reservations, namely that in the past individuals such as MC have been elected to Mod that should not be allowed to possess checkuser. Comrade GC (talk) 14:25, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Sorry if this seems stupid, but who is MC? 23:29, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * , MarcusCicero. He was a troll who became moderator (due to joke votes or socks). Christopher (talk) 14:41, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * , Go through the edit history for his talk page alone and you'll see why I wouldn't trust that guy with a penny let alone my IP address. Comrade GC (talk) 14:46, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * >HEY, NUTTY ROUX, DO ME A FAVOR AND GO FUCK YOURSELF, HYPOCRITICAL CUNT.
 * RW was a... different place in 2011. 18:47, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Sounds the same to me. :P 18:56, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * >"You have won the 'RW's Most Abusive' award for 2010! Ha-ha!" 20:50, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

these votes are arse about face
We voting on (ive no clued about how binding this is supposed to be) implementing something with no idea on the policy of its use. the policy should be proposed first as you might be voting for something you did not agree to. Also, we are in the midst of a moderator election. the people likely to be have check user right. is this not pertinent to that vote? some of the nominees have been here barely a year, some even less. is this time enough build up the required trust needed to give someone the tools to violate my privacy? with no policy proposed, to boot? AMassiveGay (talk) 15:24, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * In my mind, it would be best to have administrations to only have access to it (not mods or sysops). IPs are sensitive information. 15:47, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Write a policy change suggestion on CS or somewhere similar. Proposals have to be concrete. 16:35, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Here it is. 16:56, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

Include what part of the world the news piece is relevant to in WIGO
Because this website tends to be USA-centric, I was thinking that we could at a flag icon next to each news piece in WIGO to signify what part of the world a piece is relevant to. For example:

Sessions terminates U.S. policy that let legal pot flourish

North Korea has now resumed talks with South Korea with the apparent goal of taking part in the Winter Olympics hosted there.

Love it? Hate it? 21:49, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Assuming that WikiMedia Commons already has an icon for every flag, it would be fairly trivial to write a template that uses two-letter country codes, like {(cf|de}} or —Kazitor, pending 22:00, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * What would we do when multiple countries are affected and one isn't obviously more affected than the others? Having multiple flags would look awful. Christopher (talk) 22:03, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Either have all the flags or just include an arbitrary one. There's no good solution to this issue I can think of. 22:10, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Three or so flags aren't too much of an issue, but what about news about climate change or anything else that affects the whole planet? You can't include all 195/247/whatever other number is actually correct flags. Christopher (talk) 22:18, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * For 3+ countries, maybe use a global flag, e.g., the UN flag. CorruptUser (talk) 22:21, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Same idea as the one above for things like climate change. Comrade GC (talk) 22:40, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'd be happy to work on a template for this if it's an idea that we like. The UN flag is a good idea as well. 22:46, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The UNO flag maybe?. 195.235.239.102 (talk) 22:49, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't see why not. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 00:01, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I added the flags to WIGOITW's January entry. Check it out. 02:36, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * link. Looks good! —Kazitor, pending 02:44, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Somehow, the entry about North and South Korea got referred to the UN and Slovakia. - Smerdis of Tlön, LOAD "*", 8, 1. 03:05, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Fixed. —Kazitor, pending 03:12, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Uh, isn't the obvious solution to use no flags in that case? It isn't called "What is going on in the world" for no reason. —Kazitor, pending 01:49, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Nerd (talk) 02:13, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Per. I like the flags, though I question the choice of UN flag. It makes it seem like it's a UN-related event. My first impression of the UN flag was confusion, so not good. Not ALL events should have to have a flag attached to it. Climate change and solar flares, those fun things, they can probably posted without any flag. Either way, I really like the flag idea. 05:27, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm not convinced that the flags really work for the blogs and clogs pages. It makes more sense for the elections and world pages. CowHouse (talk) 07:14, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Taiwan isn't in the United Nations but things that have an impact on the entire world still have an impact on Taiwan. So I say no UN flag. But I do really like the flag icons on the WIGO page.Spud (talk) 07:48, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

whos going to bother putting in flags in when they add a wigo? or even bother finding a suitable flag? AMassiveGay (talk) 12:40, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Guidelines have been added. Click "Edit" and you will see.
 * I'm converted, you guys. Flags look great. However, as others have pointed out, they make more sense in the WIGO and Election sections only. I think we should add another "flag" that is an icon of the Earth, in case a news item affects multiple country but is not related to the U.N. Nerd (talk) 14:12, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I think an icon of the world is better than a UN flag. But i'm not sure it's necessary. Spud (talk) 14:29, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * We do have the 18:01, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * A small picture of the earth would be the most easily recognisable, I'm sure there are appropriately sized pictures of each continent available for if something only affects a particular region of the planet (although the EU flag could replace the Europe continent under some circumstances). Christopher (talk) 18:06, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * You really should pay more attention before saying these things. Adding a flag is literally eight characters to type. Two (and ctrl+backspace) if you use the text insertion. —Kazitor, pending 21:05, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * still dont think i would be arsed. AMassiveGay (talk) 23:48, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It doesn't matter; someone can always just add a flag for you. I still don't think a picture of Earth is necessary, but whatever. 20:17, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

Do we need a world flag?
If an event applies to the entire world, should we use or leave it blank? —Kazitor, pending 06:07, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

Nay (leave it blank)

 * 1) —Kazitor, pending 06:07, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 2) Until the time when there is an official Earth flag to represent us to the extraterrestrials, I say leave it blank.Spud (talk)
 * 3) 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 15:21, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 4) No need. Christopher (talk) 15:52, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 5) I don't see the point. If the story is outside the US, the country gets mentioned anyway. It could also mean people having to hunt around for the right flag when its initals aren't obvious. Boredatwork (talk) 13:44, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

Goat (some contrary opinion)

 * 1) I'm strongly opposed to having any flags for WIGO:Blogs and WIGO:Clogs. They do not work at all on those pages. CowHouse (talk) 06:21, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 2) Oh yeah, I don't look at those pages so I didn't know it was happening. That is definitely bad too. —Kazitor, pending 06:51, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

Well, the results are rather conclusive. Unless something rapidly changes, I guess I'll go about removing that world flag from the WIGOs. —Kazitor, pending 03:05, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

If you responded to this this Quora thread what would you say? (trigger warning)
https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-most-brutal-death/answers/67189994?share=38246335&srid=hywZ3 I also seem a ratwiki user who understands Arabic (didn't ask which type) and has read the Quran. ShiningSwordofThoughts (talk) 05:08, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Referring to the person's post or the question "what is the most brutal death"? 05:24, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm reffering to Which leads into a disscution about context. ShiningSwordofThoughts (talk)
 * The comment itself, which is a half-assed poorly thought-out dreck, with no specific references as to what aspect of the Quran explicitly tells people to kill nonbelievers, is it trying to exonerate the violence or is it a poor jab at religion? Both? P.S. I added a trigger warning since the link contains images of violence, particularly a woman with a bloody face. 19:52, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That's a valid excuse? Damn, I'm going to start a religion that says world governments must give me $100,000 each or I must assassinate their heads of state without intervention nor legal action. This'll be great! —Kazitor, pending 06:10, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

Why do you think Farkhunda Malikzada was killed? Because the US invaded Afghanistan perhaps? She was accused of burning leaves of the KoranAriel31459 (talk) 17:43, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Vote: Who is the sexiest male STEM Professional?
Eye candy for straight ladies, gay men and pansexuals! —ClickerClock (talk) 07:43, 9 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Here's Neil deGrasse Tyson is his wrestling duds. You can all go home now. LongLostLegend (talk) 12:30, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

Poll
 Cédric Villani
 * And bi ladies! And bi men! To be honest, though, I don't like the hairstyle. 14:44, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * he does have shit hair AMassiveGay (talk) 14:46, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * what with there being only one contender, i feel this poll may be a little...skewedAMassiveGay (talk) 14:48, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * plus STEM professionals are hardly a group of people who need their egos massaged. AMassiveGay (talk) 14:54, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Go to visual SF stories (TV, film etc): those characters which suffer most (not being thoroughly nasty guys getting their comeuppance) in fanfic are likely to be considered highly attractive STEM characters by at least some authors and readers. Anna Livia (talk) 19:37, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Wtf is up with his hair? 23:26, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

I think the hair makes him look like Shakespeare. Spud (talk) 12:53, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * did Shakespeare have lank, unwashed hair also? AMassiveGay (talk) 16:01, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Hmmm. Based on this picture (which I'm well aware wasn't published until 7 years after his death and was accompanied by a poem by Ben Jonson that said it wasn't a very good likeness), it looks like Shaky took better care of his barnet. Make that "Shakespeare on a bad day". Spud (talk) 06:29, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Is he wearing a giant louse pin on his lapel? - Smerdis of Tlön, LOAD "*", 8, 1. 04:15, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Wait, is he? If so, I very much approve. 04:52, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

This person here is a great mathematician, a Fields Medalist, no less, known for his work on statistical mechanics. If you haven't done so already, check out his TED talk. Nerd (talk) 21:36, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Name checks out. 04:52, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Ken Ham or Kent Hovind are def the hottest male STEM professionals. 71.215.85.103 (talk) 02:52, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Nice attempt at trolling.- 06:53, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It seemed more like an innocent joke to me. Not everyone's a troll, and don't forget snark. —Kazitor, pending 07:42, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Guys! Stop complaining about his hair! You wanna see more hair like that? I suggest you look up Rene Descartes, Isaac Newton, David Deutsch or Robert Brandenburger, to name but a few. Nerd (talk) 20:48, 12 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Also, I don't think it is very proper for us to talk about other people as eye candies. Anyway, just my humble opinion. Nerd (talk) 20:51, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

When conspiracy cranks claim natural disasters are caused by the supposed "New World Order"
It got me thinking. How did the NWO bring the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs (I know there is some debate about it)? How about the Lake Toba eruption 75,000 years ago, did they use a geological weapon? No, I do not actually believe the NWO bullcrap. I might have paranoid thoughts (thank you mental illness!) but I am not that insane. --Rationalzombie94 (talk) 21:31, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * They got aliens or Satan to do those. Comrade GC (talk) 21:32, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * new world order was invented to be flexible and to fit their whatever made-up narrative. it's like creating liquid shit in the shape of a puzzle piece to fit the puzzle. 21:33, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * They used the time machine/portal/thing built by the Montauk project. Totnes Bicycle 21:41, 9 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Is it weird that I keep track of almost every variation of the NWO conspiracy solely in order to make fun of its adherents who know less about their own bullcrap than I do? Comrade GC (talk) 21:35, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * do you spend time refuting all of them? 21:38, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Not really, I mainly enjoy poking fun at them by building overly elaborate conspiracies of my own. Comrade GC (talk) 21:43, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Those never happened. The answer is that the world is only 6,000 years old and Gawd made the world to look like those events had happened. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 22:02, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * They made Hurricane Harvey and California wildfires to rig the World Series so Mayweather would donate prize money to Hurricane relief that was a false flag to inter people in FEMA death camps so the chemtrails (also used to create the hurricane) could have their mind controlling effect. Oh, and individual plays in the ball games -> drones.  Invisible drones.  I'd love to say I made that up, but I've actually read that.Antigem (talk) 23:57, 9 January 2018 (UTC)


 * @User:Antigem I though you did to be funny. Until you mentioned someone else did. That crazy guy from Michigan using a Smart Tablet
 * Bear in mind this is from a thread with multiple people and the conspiracy "hive mind" taking over where nobody tells anyone else they're being stupid. Now to really blow your mind.  The one thing that started to make that all come together.....is.....wait for it........34.  Don't ask.Antigem (talk) 01:12, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

As long as you can blame natural disasters on NWO conspiracies and divine punishment for gays, you can ignore Global warming. AMassiveGay (talk) 02:04, 10 January 2018 (UTC)


 * When the oceans rise and the ice caps melt, climate change will conclusively proven (unless more data is dug up before hand. Not meaning to sound like a climate change denier). Weirdos can say, "Evil Jewish Atheist Communist Democratic Anti-Christ Alien Pagan Satanic Gay New World Order Conspiracy" did it. But when sea levels rise, buildings sink and storms destroy their homes, they will ask scientists and government people for help. --Rationalzombie94 (talk) 02:04, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

Toxic masculinity
I saw this video by Laci Green about (Ignore the ending, there's a man who struggles to even get his ideas across.) Isn't it just the negative impacts of male gender roles for men? 22:45, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I didn't watch the video, but yeah, that's basically what it means. I tend to use it as describing the acts of somebody who tries to follow those roles and hurts themselves or others in the process rather than just the roles. I'm not sure if that's the correct or common definition. 22:51, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I suppose this is greatly related to the #MeToo movement. Why aren't people discussing about ways to get rid of the male hypersexuality stereotype? 21:24, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * What makes you think that any general "stereotype" of human behavior can be eliminated or even modified? Some kind of pharmaceutical treatment, perhaps?Ariel31459 (talk) 21:42, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I suppose the stereotype is a taught through parenting, pop-media, and porn. For example
 * a father teaches their son that hypersexuality is okay, and the father might even brag about his sexual accomplishments to his son.
 * sitcoms perpetuated the idea of male hypersexuality and female objectivity (e.x. ).
 * movies usually have a token female who is needlessly sexualized. In addition, porn focuses way too much on the female being a sexual creature. There's way too much porn of women.
 * Men probably learn to be hypersexual from the media they watch. Simply changing the media may teach men to be less hypersexual. Bad parenting is unavoidable, people don't chose their parents. 22:17, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * yeh, its all media. couldnt be the fact that from age 13, hormones make it so you get hard when the wind blows, and they'd happily fuck a hole in the wall if left to their own devices. AMassiveGay (talk) 22:26, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I have no clue what is was like for you but for me and as far as I know all my high-school friends never felt the desire to have sex with inanimate objects. Vorarchivist (talk) 16:56, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
 * obvious hyperbole to make a point, though clearly you are unaware of the existence of glory holes and i bet your high school friends dont generally discuss their wanking exploits. men, of all ages, are motivated to take dubious action by their sex drive, a powerful motivator. i can tell some grim stories about cottaging, but heres probably not the place. addressing the hypocritical mixed messages on masculinity in the media, hollywood blockbusters in particular, will not change that. AMassiveGay (talk) 17:30, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm starting to think that you don't know what a glory hole is and sadly I did get told my friends wanking exploits (they were disturbing).Vorarchivist (talk) 00:25, 12 January 2018 (UTC)
 * hahahahaha i assure you, i know what a glory hole isAMassiveGay (talk) 00:36, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Seriously I don't think males are really such horn-dogs that they can't control themselves. Well ... at least I think so..? 04:17, 12 January 2018 (UTC)
 * yes. yes they are. particularly when they have no outlet. then are shamed for entirely natural urges and become ripe for the picking by mens rights groups. just a clarification - this is not a justification for rape or abuse of any kind. AMassiveGay (talk) 10:49, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

RationalWiki to thank for shutting down conference attended by racists and paedophiles
Lots of stuff in both national and local papers today about Emil Kirkegaard and John Fuerst who RationalWiki first documented and exposed as far-right extremists and paedophile-apologists: university-investigates-racist-eugenics-conference http://londonstudent.coop/news/2018/01/10/exposed-london-eugenics-conferences-neo-nazi-links/ Shamed Toby Young ‘attended secret eugenics conference with neo-nazis and pedophiles’ http://londonstudent.coop/news/2018/01/10/exposed-london-eugenics-conferences-neo-nazi-links/ https://jezebel.com/university-college-london-launches-investigation-into-s-1821977857 https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/ucl-launches-investigation-secret-eugenics-conference https://www.theguardian.com/education/2018/jan/10/ucl-to-investigate-secret-eugenics-conference-held-on-campus SkepticDave (talk) 22:58, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The person who wrote those RationalWiki articles sent a tip-off to some newspapers. The story now has national coverage.SkepticDave (talk) 23:07, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

See my comment here, I guess we should add some of these links to his article. The eugenics conference he attended should be covered. Asian dude (talk) 23:14, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

I don’t think we’re responsible, none the of the linked articles mention us. Christopher (talk) 19:42, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Moderator elections started January 8?
Did I miss something or did we get shortchanged on how long the voting will last? The elections page says, "Voting will run: 08 January – 14 January 2018", but I only noticed the actual voting as of today. Bongolian (talk) 07:36, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * If I am not mistaken, voting started three days late. The end of voting has been adjusted accordingly. —Kazitor, pending 09:09, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I think it started five days late. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 11:38, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * yeah, I only got it up then, sorry. (Turns out that being a b*tc**n pundit takes up a lot of time.) - David Gerard (talk) 11:58, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It occurs to me that we need a system that more than one person here understands. So, going along with the ancient principle that anyone who mentions a problem has volunteered to help solve it, what do I need to learn to help run these elections? Wilder Bicycle 18:43, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It probably needs to be in the hands of someone who 1) been sysop for more than a year (i.e., not you) 2) is not running for moderator (i.e., not me) and 3) has Tech (?) permission. Bongolian (talk) 19:29, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Voting started on January 11, so it was only three days late. Most people didn't realise they could vote until a few days later though. CowHouse (talk) 02:24, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Extreme Skepticism Impossible
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kzZdps9PG4

I watched this video through to the end and he seems to end up butchering the concept of Skepticism just to fit in his own ideas and to give them some kind of validity, it's the most disingenuous video I have ever seen.Machina (talk) 06:03, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * What was his main point? I'm not watching a 1 hour 16 minute YouTube video. Christopher (talk) 11:33, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah, that's a problem for most people.Ariel31459 (talk) 14:27, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

An epidemic complementing the flu epidemic
The epidemic of placebo. It goes by the names of Airborne and Zicam. Saw plenty at Mejier department store. --Rationalzombie94 (talk) 02:44, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

Faux News Personality claims Trump defeated ISIL
ShiningSwordofThoughts (talk)
 * Bullshit, from what I've read the Iraqi military did most of the heavy lifting in the final push against ISIS. Trump just sat on his fat ass and mouthed off like he always does. Comrade GC (talk) 04:25, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It's nice to hear that tax money was spent on getting rid of a hardly threatening group. God forbid the US ever stops having a scapegoat group. Who's next, Russia again? 04:35, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Nah, according to the White House the US and Russia are friends now.
 * A "hardly threatening group"? I think the people living in ISIS controlled territory would disagree, or did you mean hardly threatening to Americans (I don't want to be too insulting, but that's an awfully selfish way of looking at it). CowHouse (talk) 04:46, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The Syrian government and Russians have both killed many more Syrian civilians than ISIS although describing ISIS as "hardly threatening" is taking it a bit far. (Even if they're better at threatening than actually attacking western targets.) --Gospatric (talk) 09:51, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That's not an accurate view either, while ISIS has never made a 9/11 style dent in the US in regard to their international activities they've been plenty active in Europe according to the news reports. Comrade GC (talk) 12:46, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The impact they made in Europe is negligible. There were only 34 deaths from all terrorism in the UK (according to Thein 2017, 525,048 deaths total (in 2016, 2017 stats not released yet). Christopher (talk) 16:49, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That's the issue. ISIS and terrorist organizations get unreal media coverage; new anchors already assume ISIS is the source of a terrorist attack when evidence is inconclusive. There's countries with nuclear weapons that could start WWIII; ISIS only has rockets filled with poison chemicals. My point is, terrorism is a relatively small threat that is overblown. 20:32, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * that is so much arse. ISIS were a major threat in Iraq until very recently. A genocidal one. One that the US and british helped create. the fact they werent much of threat elsewhere is irrelevant, though still arse - the paris attacks, and various truck/car attacks in europe by self described ISIS supporters were major events. they are bound to be reported on and people are bound to be worried by them, no matter the rarity of them. there were two attacks within 5 minutes walking distance of my flat in the last year in places i regularly visit. id be more concerned with with chemical weapons, which have already been used in syria, than worrying about countries with nuclear weapons that could start WWIII but wont. as for 'The Syrian government and Russians have both killed many more Syrian civilians than ISIS' - so what? its not a numbers game. Genocide is still genocide AMassiveGay (talk) 11:35, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

People claim Oprah is running for President
04:20, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * "You know what the solution to the shitty reality-tv-star president is? A shitty reality tv star president who isn't a racist ass"  -- way too many fucking people.  ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 15:39, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm with you there the voting public really needs to get a clue when it comes to elections or they'll have to learn the hard way why Rome fell. (Hint:It had something to do with the quality of most of their leaders.) Comrade GC (talk) 16:11, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Rome fell because of [insert modern cultural element current speaker is not a fan of] is not a good look on you, GC. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 16:45, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * because of gays according to a chap at work AMassiveGay (talk) 16:52, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * According to the history I read Rome fell because they over-extended their military in their rather rampant imperialistic pursuits and also because shitty leaders, that and invasions. Comrade GC (talk) 16:59, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * PS: The "Rome fell because [insert random shit here] thing is still a thing? Really? Comrade GC (talk) 17:02, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * yes. see my comment above AMassiveGay (talk) 17:42, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Many reasons why Rome fell. The loss of the Empire's North African breadbasket to the Vandals was a major blow.  But Rome didn't so much fall as it became irrelevant; when Odoacer decided he could rule Italy without pretending to make do with the legal fictions surrounding the Western Emperor or the Roman Senate, that was the 'end' of the Western Empire, but the culmination of a long historical process. - Smerdis of Tlön, LOAD "*", 8, 1. 18:50, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The reasons Rome fell are myriad, and due to about 1600 years of conflict, we may never know them all. RoninMacbeth (talk) 18:22, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

As I said, Donald Trump turned the position of presidency into a real joke. 20:20, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah, it seems like literally anyone can be President so long as their IQ is above 80. 20:24, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * "In politics, stupidity is not a handicap", - allegedly Napoleon Bonaparte. As long as you say things people want to hear, you'll win an election. 20:28, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It was a fake joke before. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 19:55, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

this is obviously a derail
Rome never "fell". Turns out people just arbitrarily decide when a heap of sand is no longer a heap when there are bigger heaps around, not some specific amount of sand removed. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 18:03, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * My apologies, I'll stop on it now. Comrade GC (talk) 20:12, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Oh, I wasn't trying to shame you, I was just saying it's a derail and started a subsection(everyone else just kept talking in the above section because anarchy). You did nothing that warrants an apology, and I apologize for any tone that indicates you did.  ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 21:01, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

Did Rome fall or was it pushed? And Emperor Zeno of Byzantium/Constantinople was still around (and given Rome's imperial insignia). Anna Livia (talk) 19:28, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Person claims other person notes trend of Saloon bar topics without further context
—Kazitor, pending 09:39, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

Person expresses annoyance of a user posting things without context
𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 01:40, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Person expresses annoyance at the saloon topics becoming a quagmire of infinite regress
Comrade GC (talk) 01:46, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Person expresses regret over feeding into a horrible trend
—Kazitor, pending 02:16, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Person joins bandwagon to annoy Kazitor
- 02:19, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Person wonders what this button does
Anonymous User (talk) 04:53, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Person wonders what three equal signs do
- 06:52, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
 * in javascript it only returns true if the two variables are both equal and have the same data type. Vorarchivist (talk) 17:12, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Person came here by mistake
Sorry, wrong thread. Wilder Bicycle 20:03, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Person wondering when we're getting back to the perennially sexy subject of Roman decadence
Smerdis of Tlön, LOAD "*", 8, 1. 04:41, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * plebians to rome: #Me tooAMassiveGay (talk) 12:25, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Person getting back to the perennially sexy subject of Roman decadence
Thoughts on the Roman slave trade? RoninMacbeth (talk) 15:34, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Person getting away from the perennially sexy subject of Roman decadence
Mwahahaha!- 18:31, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Person wondering why the perennially sexy subject of Roman decadence is so perennially sexy
Anyone? RoninMacbeth (talk) 19:18, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

Person simply stating the obvious
Obviously the haruspices were poking around in the guts of blemished goats, hence the unavoidable decadence. Anonymous User (talk) 01:10, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

Tide Pod Challenge: What the fuck is wrong with people?
I have heard about it- ingesting Tide Pods laundry Detergent. I am sure many of you other users had. It is beyond stupid. I have mental problems and I have an older brother with a severe learning disability but even we know better. I cannot believe that people considered normal (who make fun of the mentally challenged) are actually doing this! I just needed to express my anger about this contest. Then again, when I was in 6th grade (2006-2007 school year) when a trend called "Quarters" swept the school. It was a game where you take quarter coins and grind them into your knuckles. Everyone who did that in my class was not developmentally disabled. Okay, okay, rant over. --Rationalzombie94 (talk) 01:57, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Behold Social Darwinism in action!!! Watch as these morons kill and/or maim themselves into infertility!!! On a slightly more serious note I now know why James Randi favors IQ tests for breeding and other such views. Comrade GC (talk) 02:51, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Has there been any report about this happening or is it an internet joke?Vorarchivist (talk) 16:04, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

It was talked about on the local news here in Michigan. It seems to be a real thing. This is the work of the New World Order- Michigan Branch
 * Some idiots eating poison isn't a good reason to start advocating eugenics. Christopher (talk) 11:34, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

its no different to the stuff jack ass used to do. the only difference is its on youtube and anyone can do it. AMassiveGay (talk) 12:19, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * On one hand, I am rather surprised that some common precautionary measures, such as not ingesting random chemicals, is not practiced by certain people. On the other hand, no love is lost here. They are effectively imposing eugenics upon themselves. Nerd (talk) 14:57, 14 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Thinking about it- Natural Selection at work, not joking. --Rationalzombie94 (talk) 02:06, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

some perspective - no one has actually died or incurred serious injury through this. its as if no one is actually stupid enoughto chomp down and swallow something so disgusting that it makes you gag, knowing that its not wise actually swallow the stuff. people do idiotic things all the time. we all do idiotic things all the time. in youth, you get caught up in a moment. in dares, peer pressure, just for a laugh. you do things you know are stupid, but what the hell, everyone is doing it, your mates are doing it - they'll think your a pussy if you dont, its a human bonding moment, and besides its just a bit of fun. whats the worst that can happen? pain for a brief while? vomit on your shoes? its all over in an instant and at least you can say you done it. freshers weeks around the world are filled with such things. rarely someone is hurt. rarer still, an ambulance is called. even rarer, a death. why get all superior? dead after a moment of madness. think of all the stupid shit you've pulled over the years. could just easily be your death folk are laughing at if things had gone a different way. AMassiveGay (talk) 04:50, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I never did stupid shit like this, not when I was a teen, not now that I'm an adult. Comrade GC (talk) 04:57, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * yes you did. you either dont remember, are lying, or not human. ive never eaten laundary deterent for a dare, but ive done stupid shit could have maimed or killed me if i was unlucky.  i bet everyone has if they are honest. AMassiveGay (talk) 05:35, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * CowHouse (talk) 05:41, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Should we have an article on that, or is it worth a single line on list of cognitive biases? That page could possibly also have an anchor for each item (sounds like work). —Kazitor, pending 05:58, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * you really think that the idea that everyone who has ever lived has done something idiotic is some kind of delusion? that everything you have ever done has been so perfectly reasoned and considered, so perfectly correct, that you can happily laugh at, rejoice even, when someone hurts themselves doing something stupid? you've never climbed a tree without safety equipment? never crossed a train track anywhere other a proper crossing? never ridden a bike with no hands? always stuck to the speed limit? never tried out drinking your friends? never done drugs? the specifics are local, but the bravado, the one-up-manship, the feeling of invincibility you have as a youth - these things are universal. we do things that are patently idiotic all time, whether we recognise them as idiotic or not. we think we can manage and usually we pull them off or there is no lasting damage, but if you fell from a tree, overdosed on your first e, lost control of your speeding car - people reading the postmortem would think 'fucking idiot' AMassiveGay (talk) 06:21, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It's funny, because I have done none of those things, except the first one. And there are certainly more dangerous things you could do than climb a tree. —Kazitor, pending 07:06, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Climbed a tree as a kid, then climbed back down. Never gave into peer pressure or engaged in dick waving contests though, if that excludes me from humanity so be it. Comrade GC (talk) 12:44, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * well done all in missing the point entirely just so you can feel superior to some internet numbnuts doing something stupid (none of whom have died or been seriously injured). never ever succumbed to peer pressure or engaged in dick waving contests? my, you are sublime. i am sure you have never littered or told a lie either, and help little old ladies cross the road everyday. what strong character to be such a saint. truly, jesus has arisen. AMassiveGay (talk) 14:36, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * To answer your (rhetorical) question, yes but not anymore, yes, and no, why would I do that? I'd also like to point out that I understand that you're trying to say that everyone makes mistakes. However my point is if you consume a product that expressly warns you against its consumption on the packaging, that's stupid, no ifs ands or buts about it. Comrade GC (talk) 14:46, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * i dont think any one is denying that this is idiotic. what i am saying is you should not condemn people for one idiotic mistake. you would damn us all. AMassiveGay (talk) 15:21, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

around the world, various cultures have rituals to establish manhood. feats of strength, bravery, endurance, pain resistance. some were depicted, i have no idea of how accurately, in the film 'a man called horse'. sitting on a sofa with a lap top they often seem horrific or barbaric, but i guess growing up in those cultures its par for the course. in our own comparatively easy and convenience filled worlds such rituals exist but much less defined. some are old traditions like running with the bulls. some are ridiculous like stealing a policemans helmet. some are impromptu tests of nerve like this tide pod thing, unique to some small group if not for the amplifier of social media. some are probably personal to an individual. they can dumb, idiotic, dangerous, barbaric even, to the casual observer. all variations of things we have all done to varying degrees. lets not be so quick to condemn people we know nothing about except this one idiotic thing. lets not conjure justifications for eugenics and lets not hope for deaths and injuries just so we can say 'i told you so'. even in jest. lets not. AMassiveGay (talk) 15:21, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * just to nullify the sanctimony in the above post, i will be calling for people to die in a fire for the slightest infraction later to today. AMassiveGay (talk) 15:30, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

There will always be stupid stunts that go viral. See goldfish swallowing craze of the 1920s. It's part of human nature. Leuders (talk) 17:55, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

I just want to laugh
We now have a soap company doing please use our product responsibly ads a la a fucking whisky advert. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 18:47, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

Archivist's back!
Guess I don't need to do any archiving today, or ever :D —Kazitor, pending 04:41, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Our puny human brains are incapable of doing Archivist's job. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 05:10, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Automation is a beautiful thing. One heck of a cleaning job it did. Nerd (talk) 16:13, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It took only about 20 minutes after a month-long absence. Damn! I hope that wasn't too much of a drain on your time, . Nerd (talk) 16:17, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * did I speak too soon? Guess I'll archive this page again tomorrow. —Kazitor, pending 09:25, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I thought crontab was configured, fuck. I'll work it out no need to do manual shit 09:33, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Alright, thanks —Kazitor, pending 10:19, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

The moderator election thread was archived, despite being sticky. Not sure about others. Not putting it back because the elections are pretty much done. —Kazitor, pending 03:33, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * sorry to bother you yet again, but the bot hasn't run today. —Kazitor, pending 05:05, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Controversy showing how divided GOP really is
After the "shithole countries" controversy, it's quite clear that the party has no idea what it's doing, with very different responses from the various factions. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 12:08, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * you'll find thats the case with every political party ever AMassiveGay (talk) 13:26, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Americans are hardly exceptional. Regression to the mean, anyone? Nerd (talk) 16:12, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

How is this any different from any other President. I swear any President has made some insult along those lines. Most likely in private, out of public view. Anyways, other nations have made similar and worse insults. Come on, Russia is a shit hole, I said it. --Rationalzombie94 (talk) 02:51, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I think the biggest problem with it was that he said something about preferring Norwegian immigrants to African immigrants, not the shithole comment itself. 02:57, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, he should have kept his views private. His use of profanities made it worse. Frankly, I have little interest in those countries he lampooned, as insignificant as they are, but I am critical of them for seizing the opportunity to receive attention from the international media. This is merely an opinion, albeit a controversial one. He signed neither a bill into law nor an executive order that could affect them. Nothing of substance here. Nerd (talk) 21:26, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * hes the president of the US. his views are rather pertinent. its just unfortunate he has the views of a racist imbecile who speaks like a child AMassiveGay (talk) 06:31, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * For those wishing to see how Trump's comment has affected his hotel business, take a look at this video 😉. Bongolian (talk) 03:11, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah, sure whatever. They're stupid goddamn idiots, but they're stupid goddamn idiots who work in unison with each other and commit to their stupid goddamn decisions that will fucks us all for decades.  (speaking of, the us military is relocating large numbers of assets to the korean peninsula this last weekend)  ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 20:17, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

John MacArthur
I caught who's behind the BS spewed in one of those Evangelical stations, one that calls itself "Friendship radio" while loving also to recite those parts of the Book of Revelation where everything and everyone disliked by the "good guys" goes into the Lake of Fire.

Calvinist, YEC, Biblical literalist, against gays and feminism, pseudohistorical BS... a really nice guy. Panzerfaust (talk) 11:25, 14 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Sounds like many of the churches around where I live. A good example is the "Mount Hope Church" about 6 miles from where I live. When I was trying Christianity again, I went there once (Just to talk to the Pastor, I wanted to know what the church) and their Pastor was a creationist, sexist, homophobic jerk. He didn't like the fact I was Bisexual. --Rationalzombie94 (talk) 20:40, 14 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Here's the bullshitter, complete with the same attempts to interpret Revelation as a future war against Israel started by Russia and all that jazz of End Times. Seriously. Panzerfaust (talk) 15:36, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'll grab the popcorn and soda. Comrade GC (talk) 15:37, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

This Quora answer puts the terror in isim,and provides sources mind helping me debunk this?
https://www.quora.com/How-scared-are-Europeans-by-the-increasing-number-of-terrorists-in-most-of-Europe/answer/Jaime-Morris-7?share=09c53b05&srid=hywZ3 better yet the comments are disabled. The irony is that he's giving the terrorists what they want fear. ShiningSwordofThoughts (talk)
 * Are people more likely to lie awake at night worrying they will never get a girlfriend/job/meaningful existence, or that they'll be killed by terrorists? Here's a survey that says British people's biggest fear is ... public speaking. This survey says heights. There's no consensus. Although only one of those two will kill you.
 * You get different results when you ask what their concerns are; maybe they're the things people think they should be worried about rather than the things they actually fear. This is a fairly typical survey: immigration, the NHS (health service), the economy, defence, poverty/inequality, housing, education, EU/europe... What are people concerned about when they say "immigration", is it losing their job to cheaper competition, or being surrounded by people they can't understand, or not feeling at home any more, or being forced to eat Halal meat, or Asian men sexually abusing their children, or pork/alcohol/Christmas getting banned, or is it terrorism? Fear of immigrants is certainly not fear of terrorism, and people were concerned about immigration long before Islamic terrorism was an issue.
 * And fearing something is distinct from making a rational judgment that you should be concerned about something (I know I should pay my credit cards because it's financially advantageous, but that isn't the same as being afraid of being in debt), although in either case, you may or may not do anything about it. --Gospatric (talk) 16:32, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

The Russian RW
Our Russian-language version appears to be in absolutely awful condition. I've gone in and reverted some vandalism from the past two weeks, but it's very difficult because I don't understand anything. Does anybody here know Russian, and if so, are they willing to try to fix all the vandalism there? 03:31, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * edits both here and on the Russian RW. Bongolian (talk) 06:15, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I can't speak Russian, and my ability to read it is very poor, but I will be glad to help in any way I can.--Кřěĵ (ṫåɬк) 07:51, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm led to believe the correct term is "RussianalWiki". —Kazitor, pending 10:20, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That isn't technically what it's called, but pretty much everyone (including me) does call it that. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 00:16, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I want to help out but I'm still in the beginning stages of learning the language; I've only just learned how basic verb conjugations work. 19:56, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

List of former moderators
Is there a list of the users who have been moderators in the past, similar to the list of board members? As far as I can work out, you can only search for the current list of moderators. Sorry if this is a stupid place to ask this question. CowHouse (talk) 08:10, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * You could probably search the user rights logs somehow 09:35, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * You could also use the archives of RationalWiki:Moderator elections/Results as a start. Regards, Cosmikdebris (talk) 12:56, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I looked through the election archives and user rights log and made a list of mods. CowHouse (talk) 02:21, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

Thanks
Just a quick note before I turn it into a rant. After a year of suffering near infinite irrationality it's nice to immerse myself in an atmosphere that has people that can present logical viewpoints. (Being snarky is a happy bonus.) I expect you don't get a lot of compliments, so thanks all for just being you. That is not sarcastic.Antigem (talk) 11:30, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Glad you're here you're not too bad yourself. We need  or one of the cutesy types to offer you a hug.  13:28, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * At the same time, be wary of calling people you agree with "logical", we're all still quite good at being full of shit here. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 17:22, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

2017 Community Survey Results: Finally Here!
Hi everyone: If you want a snapshot into the demographics of RationalWiki, check out Forum:2017 Community Survey Results. 18:30, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Very nicely done, I can see why it took so long. —Kazitor, pending 20:57, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks! I’m surprised at how much more men than women we have, I knew it wasn’t 50/50, but ~80/20? Christopher (talk) 22:13, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I thought it'd be at least 60/40.- 03:26, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Feel free to move this if it's in the wrong section
I propose we add "insulting Goatishness" (as a parody of Article 301) to the joke block reasons. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 01:31, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * You and your goats... goats really aren't that funny. —Kazitor, pending 01:35, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I didn't invent that joke. Nobody knows who did. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 03:01, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I do. Comrade GC (talk) 03:37, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Who did? 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 03:39, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The ultimate source of the Goat meme is.... PalMD!! Comrade GC (talk) 03:44, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Uh, if I had to wager, and sadly I do, I'd guess that the goat thing comes from the way the history of christianity disparages goats as independent, while praising sheep as staying with the flock. Given rationalwiki's roots, I'd say such iconography appealed to people.  Also goats are a cute mascot.  ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 15:32, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I was led to believe it had something to do with godspeed->goatspeed. —Kazitor, pending 21:10, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Well obviously you didn't, but you're one of its (if not its) biggest advocates. —Kazitor, pending 04:45, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * no. painfully unfunny. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 15:30, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

I wonder if Prophet Alex Jones has anything to say about last night's meteor?
I am sure many of you here in the U.S have heard about the meteor over the Great Lakes region, it caused a 2.0 earthquake. I have to wonder what shit Alex Jones will spew about it. It would make a good comedy movie. Well, his entire website would. Grab the popcorn and Moutain Dew, the conspiracies will be classic. I know I am probably ranting at random with this. --Rationalzombie94 (talk) 01:49, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I haven't heard about it, strangely enough. I'd like to see Alex Jones's reaction documented here if he does make one. 18:23, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Why would anyone considered this as an answer to this question from Quora
https://www.quora.com/What-are-some-politically-incorrect-opinions-you-hold/answer/Julian-Frank-5?share=f524b960&srid=hywZ3 This isn't politically incorrect ShiningSwordofThoughts (talk)
 * "Attracted to anybody except for cis men because of their naturally oppressive nature." That's quality. Sort of off-topic, but I've found that when people outright claim their opinions to be "politically incorrect", they tend to also be wrong. —Kazitor, pending 03:07, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Sorry forgot the link
ShiningSwordofThoughts (talk)
 * you forgot the link. Do you just like to read Quora and post anything vaguely interesting here without contributing yourself? —Kazitor, pending 05:03, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * looking at their contributions they only made 5 non saloon posts and they all seem to be posting linksVorarchivist (talk) 05:50, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * whats your point there? AMassiveGay (talk) 11:01, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm confirming to Kazitor that this person defiantly mostly posts Quora and other links without talking about it themselves.Vorarchivist (talk) 16:45, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * again, whats your point there? AMassiveGay (talk) 17:14, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Sorry forgot to link the thread ShiningSwordofThoughts (talk)
 * ... and you still haven't. —Kazitor, pending 04:14, 19 January 2018 (UTC)

A formulaic representation of Godwin's law
As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1. I did the maths, and determined that $$P(Hitler) = \frac{length}{a+length}$$, where a is some parameter determining how likely a comparison is (large a means less likely). —Kazitor, pending 12:23, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Godwin's law is such a pre-nazis everywhere idea. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 15:50, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
 * They’re more prominent than they were but I’d say “everywhere” is a bit of a stretch. Christopher (talk) 19:22, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I still think it applies today pretty well. 19:27, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I have not seen an "invocation" of godwin's law in an argument that didn't turn out to have an actual "let's genocide people" nazi making it in 2 goddamn years. It's over.  ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 20:39, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Huh, this actually posted; I thought it timed out. Anyway, I realised that a just happens to represent the "tipping point", that is how many comments are required for the chance of a comparison to reach 50%. —Kazitor, pending 21:28, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Only if you view the formula as representing the chance of any post so far containing a nazi comparison, rather than the chance of the next iterative post, which was also a possible interpretation of the formula, as it's not expressly clear in either the equation or the law, such as it is.
 * In addition to that there's no real reason for the relationship to be linear. $$\frac{length^2}{(a+length)^2}$$ would also exhibit the specified characteristic asymptotic behavior while not being mathematically analogous to the equation you presented before.
 * Unexamined assumptions abound! ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 21:51, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I wouldn't call it linear, but squaring is definitely nice, how dy/dx is 0 at the base rather than 1/a. I was considering trying to emulate that behaviour, and you've gone and done it! Also, this brings the 50% tipping point to a(1+sqrt(2)). Wonder if I could mess around with it to make a represent something useful again... —Kazitor, pending 22:34, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, that was simple. $$\frac{length^2}{(\frac{a}{1+\sqrt{2}}+length)^2}$$ —Kazitor, pending 22:43, 19 January 2018 (UTC)

Enough about "Shithole Countries"!

 * Rant ahead...
 * Enough about the damned "shithole countries" comments from Trump already.
 * 1) His entire "brand" is "I'm an asshole who doesn't beat around the bush, I say it like it is".  The countries producing refugees?  You aren't producing refugees when things are working right.  Of course they are shithole countries; does anyone actually want to insist that Somalia and Syria are merely the poor victims of a smear campaign?  Every time the media brings up the comments, all they are doing is reinforcing the idea that Trump does indeed "say it like it is", rather than vomit lies.  The countries my family came from?  They were shitholes; that's why we fled to the US.  The media should stop all the nonsense about whether or not he called the countries shitholes, and more on the whole "let's not let any of these people in" part.
 * 2) The comment that ALL of Africa was a shithole was out of line, but whose fault is that really?  You want to know why Trump and his supporters think Africa is one giant crap-heap?  Because that was what the media has been spoonfeeding us.  Go ahead, name three serious movies that depict Africa in a good light.  Show me 3 news pieces from Africa that depict something good.  Can't, can you, in spite of Africa being 50+ very, very distinct countries?  Because the media has been forcing down our throats this idea that Africa is the dungheap our ancestors learned to walk just to run away from.  Never mind that places like Nigeria, while indeed filled with problems, are experiencing massive economic growth.  Never mind that a number of countries for the first time, are turning back the tide of HIV.  Never mind that Madagascar, in spite of the poverty and worse, the French-ness, is actually one of the more awesome countries.  It's YOU, media, YOU are the problem, not Trump.
 * 3) And let's not leave Africa out of this.  Not all of Africa's problems are external. CorruptUser (talk) 05:34, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * as others have already said, its not (or shouldn't be) that he said these places are shitholes, but that by extension that the people of these countries are shit (some might argue shit=not white) and worthy of sullying the blessed US.

RSamys (bla) 15:30, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I have have also suggested elsewhere that the reasons for this countries being shitholes in the first place is due to the complicity of of the US - Cold war politics and US imperialism has fuelled wars, governmental corruption and economic exploitation for years. They are certainly not the only ones responsible for this, but if you are going to complain about the state of something, you cant really ignore own responsibility for it. AMassiveGay (talk) 13:49, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That sounds like a fun challenge! I mean, nothing beats American movies in how great everything is, so I would ask you if you can name 3 films that depict... Europe nicely. Just to see what I can put on my watch list. How about Lion King, Madagascar and Tarzan depicting parts of Africa as a paradise for animals? Now, I admit, movies from Africa... those I don't know enough of. The occasional, obsucure sci fi with neither a positive tone or a negative tone comes to mind... anyone want to recommend me some?
 * "Show me 3 news pieces from Africa that depict something good." All these are on the front page of BBC News Africa: New homes for low-paid Zimbabweans African Biennale of Photography in Bamako Success stories for migrants from Africa Some kind of soccer achievement Inside Ethiopia's rock churches Nigeria training soldiers in multiple languages And more ambiguously: Why African millennials can't get enough of Bitcoin It seems more upbeat than the current news from the UK. --Gospatric (talk) 17:00, 17 January 2018 (UTC)


 * IRL, I can't just accept that "ignorant asshole" is Trump's brand and not complain whenever he shows it. The US deserves better than an orange-skinned President Camacho. - Leuders (talk) 19:25, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Trump is supposed to occupy a professional position, so he's expected to act that way. The "talk it like it is" serves only to demean people and show little consequence for words he barely coherently vomits out. 19:35, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * And I think it's clear this is not about OMG he said shithole, or OMG he said pussy. It's about his obvious disrespect for the human beings he demeans with these words. Leuders (talk) 20:08, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That's absolutely not true, if you look at any centrist/liberal talk show all of them are whining that he said pussy, rather than talking about he basically admitted to sexually assault, probably because presidents being disgusting creeps isn't really a new phenomenon, the only thing Trump did different was to brazenly brag about it. 'Legion what do you want from me  20:18, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * If someone thinks use of the word pussy is the problem and not his treatment of women, then I would have to agree with you. I'd like to see a link to an example of a talk show that espouses that view. Leuders (talk) 20:27, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

I guess that the lack of any real dictionary definition of a "shithole country" may be a problem. Lacking this, it's just a generalised insult meaning "place I don't like very much".

But one thing that I find odd from the man who "says it like it is" is his reluctance to really own his own words. Has he actually owned up to saying it? I thought he was sort of pussyfooting around whether he said it or not. Another version of "locker room talk" I suppose.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 20:35, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 1) I do admit that the US, Russia, Europe and in recent years China and so forth have screwed over and continue to screw over Africa. Especially Europe, which treats parts of Africa like a literal toilet, i.e., illegally dumping toxic waste.  However, at some point, many of these African countries need to "own" their problems even if they didn't create all their problems.
 * 2) Most Americans don't read BBC, and I'm sure Trump doesn't. He, and we, consume the schlock on CNN, ABC, Fox, MSNBC, or worse, and if they never show Africa as anything other than that place where bad shit happens, well, you get one single story.
 * 3) In regards to the above, the problem of the One Single Story really really REALLY needs to be repeated. The "liberals" who constantly remind us of Africa's problems, whether or not they are the fault of foreigners or local Africans, in many ways they are part of the problem.  Not the biggest part, but part.
 * 4) There are plenty of movies where Europe is presented as awesome in some way. The Princess Diaries, Amelie, Waking Ned Divine, virtually every James Bond movie.  Hell, we could limit it to Academy Award nominees and winners.  The King's Speech, The English Patient, Midnight in Paris, etc.  Africa?  Not so much.  And no, the movie about the talking lions doesn't count.  Once again, One Single Story...
 * 5) I know that Trump is a racist. Focus on the racism.  Forget the part where he called places like Somalia a mean name, focus on how he's saying "no more Somali refugees", or focus on how he doesn't know that Nigeria has a booming economy.  I'm not upset the media is being "harsh" on Trump, I'm upset they are focused on the wrong things.
 * 6) Yea, you can be upset that his "brand" is "asshole without a filter", but "asshole without a filter" is what endears him to a third the country. If you want to reach these people, you can't say "well, he's obviously an asshole without a filter", because the response will be "damn straight he is, snowflake!" CorruptUser (talk) 23:49, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The problem with criticising Trump is that the very act of criticising him endears him to his core supporters. They like him BECAUSE "the left" or whoever the "other" is in their minds don't, so if he's doing something to piss "them" off, then he's doing something right. My fear when he was elected (or rather when he started gaining momentum in the first place) was that his opposition either wouldn't recognise this and treat him as they treat any other politician, or they WOULD recognise this but still treat him like any other politician anyway because they don't know what else to do. And that's what they keep doing, and it's really not helpful. They keep throwing accusations of... basically of "being nasty" at him, the kind of stuff that would tank any other career politician, and it does not faze him in the slightest, or even seemingly damage his support base. He does some "guy in a bar at 2am chatting shit he knows nothing about but 'knows' everything about" talk, the opposition goes "You can't say that!", Trump goes "I just did!" and his supporters go "Yeah he did! Whooo!"... and the opposition again just says "...but you CAN'T SAY THAT!". And it's getting ridiculous. People who genuinely want to challenge his position really need to start doing something other than pointing out when a man who got elected for saying nasty things say nasty things.
 * As a side note, I've seen some people here and there suggest that he's aware of this and is doing it deliberately. Stoking controversy in order to gain support with his own crowd. Personally, I don't think he is doing it deliberately, I think it's kind of like social evolution in action. He has stumbled across a sequence of events that work out, so he repeats them, not having any deeper insight than "I did this last time and it worked out, Imma do it again!" X Stickman (talk) 00:27, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * So what do we do if a man says nasty things? How do we approach this? Because it seems like whatever we do, even if we explain with every inch covered on why Trump is wrong, the Trump supporters are not going to listen, and it'll just reinforce why they like Trump. These people are a hopeless cause. On the other hand, the media has got to stop profiling Trump supporters; I think I've had enough of their opinions on every little thing that happens. I've also had enough of whatever coverage they give to every thing Trump says; this was a problem before the election and I think the media helped Trump get elected with this much unneeded publicity rather than focusing on melting ice caps or, as said before, Africa. 19:10, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

Help pls
IDK shit about Morocco, so could someone who does improve the article? 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 03:22, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Why did you start an article on something you know nothing about? Wilder Bicycle 20:00, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

Merging Iron Chariots Wiki
Older RatWiks may know that RW merged in EvolutionWiki, a wiki dedicated to documenting evolution science and debunking intelligent design / creationist arguments, after that site became inactive and lost the funds to host itself (see EvoWiki and RationalWiki:EvoWiki).

Iron Chariots Wiki appears to be on route to suffer the same fate. Iron Chariots is an explicitly atheist wiki dedicated to documenting arguments for and against god and about atheism in general. The site hasn't had any edits since September 6 -- two months ago. The forums are offline. The bottom of every page proudly displays two PHP error messages. Relevant links:


 * List of administrators (many of whom are on the Atheist Experience podcast)
 * The only active editor (and only active admin) in the past 3 months
 * The site doesn't appear to have explicitly copyrighted anything

In short: the site has gone Citizendium'd. Do we want to try to contact Iron Chariots Wiki and merge in their content? 14:07, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
 * I would have no objections. SpacePriusIs always watching 15:49, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
 * My opinion is irrelevant but I'd say yeah. Christopher (talk) 16:57, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Same here. We are legion, for we are many. Nerd271 (talk) 17:13, 6 November 2017 (UTC)

Copyright
Copyright is the issue. Everything is born "all rights reserved" by default. If it wasn't under any licence, we have a problem unless we get permission from each individual contributor. (We sort of arsed it through with EvoWiki ...) - David Gerard (talk) 17:15, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
 * It appears to be licensed under Creative Commons but it's an earlier version (2.5, we're 3.0) theirs and ours are compatible though aren't they? Christopher (talk) 17:38, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
 * It looks like copyright isn't a problem. OK. Merge them into us and salvage anything useful from them. Spud (talk) 18:00, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks for finding that. The Iron Chariots Wiki license is CC-BY-SA-2.5, better if anything than EvoWiki's CC-BY-NC-SA-1.0, and definitely compatible with our CC-BY-SA-3.0. 19:10, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
 * It seems like a reasonable merge to me and can follow the strategy used for EvoWiki. What we did with EvoWiki was to move EvoWiki onto our server then have it exist there for the duration of the porting process. Editors who were interested would take non-stub pages and convert them into RW style within RW and include a category link indicating that it was ported (Category:EvoWiki ports). After the port was complete, the EvoWiki page was replaced with a redirect to the corresponding RW page. knows the details of this better than I do. Bongolian (talk) 19:15, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
 * If the copyright issue can be solved (and it looks like it can) this sounds like a decent idea. Boredatwork (talk) 19:48, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Soounds good to me! RoninMacbeth (talk) 20:17, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Let's do it. —Goat-Emperor Bigs (Words of Wisdom/Achievements) 23:52, 6 November 2017 (UTC)

Comment from TimSC
I'm glad there is interest in this getting done. I was the main contributor to IronChariots over the last few years. I have not had any response from the server admin Russell, my main contact, on updating Mediawiki software or getting more disk space, which I suspect is the underlying problem. They don't seem to have the time to commit to the project although Matt Dillahunty occasionally plugs the site. I'm still wondering what my involvement will be or what will happen to the site eventually. I will consider continuing to work on this within RationalWiki but the tone of RationalWiki is a little different :) TimSC (talk) 21:50, 7 November 2017 (UTC)
 * You're welcome to stay here, good sir. RoninMacbeth (talk) 22:55, 7 November 2017 (UTC)
 * If the site owners have no issues, go ahead.

Issues
There are a few issues. The first, and most obvious, is whether the current owners think such a merger would be appropriate.

The second is the fact that RW is not explicitly an atheist site. To all intents and purposes it is, but we have historically avoided describing ourselves as such. I'm guessing that would have to change if we incorporate Iron chariots.

There is the question of the differing tone of the two sites - though RW's tone seems to be rather less jokey these days.

Finally there is the question of the work involved in incorporating the material. Saying "let's do it" is fine, but are those who are in favour also volunteering to do the work incorporating the articles? Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 11:10, 8 November 2017 (UTC)


 * There may be a plurality of non-believers on RW, but it is by no means an atheist site. There are other users here with a variety of religious beliefs. It should also be noted that some religions are not incompatible with atheism (e.g. Hinduism). I think that regarding the tone difference between the two wikis, it would be worthwhile,, to compare the tone in our Category:Logic pages, which I think tend to be more in line with those at Iron Chariots (lower levels of snark). Bongolian (talk) 21:38, 8 November 2017 (UTC)


 * I had similar thoughts, but we do actually have pages for a lot of the same topics as Iron Chariots already. They fit in with RW's mission in the sense that these arguments often invoke pseudoscience or questionable logic. (There are also already some pages on RW that seem to exist primarily because people here are interested in atheism and apologetics, rather than because they directly relate to RW's "mission" regarding crank ideas.) With some tweaks, we could absorb much of Iron Chariots without making RW any more atheist-leaning than it already is.
 * I think that the real problem is that the TAE folks probably wanted Iron Chariots to be viewed as a somewhat "scholarly" resource, and RW's snark would undermine that image. So even if they're OK with content being copied over, they might not want Iron Chariots to be swallowed whole by formally merged into RW. Quantheory (talk) 00:13, 9 November 2017 (UTC)

I have IronChariots (and RationalWiki) pages linked in several easy copy pastas I give to people to refute certain categories of arguments or teach them the underlying logic; IC sometimes covers thing in greater depth than RW and for my purposes I IC's tone is much better. I suspect many others share my appreciation for a "scholarly" go to resource to refute theistic claims; on RW you're always two clicks away from goat jokes. Lord Aeonian (talk) 23:26, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Decided to actually have a look at it, and there seems to be some good info. I think our main issue is lack of organisation, no doubt most of their pages are similar to ours [http://wiki.ironchariots.org/index.php?title=Common_objections_to_atheism_and_counter-apologetics but look! It's so organised!] —Kazitor, pending 11:14, 11 November 2017 (UTC)


 * I have no strong interest in atheism, myself. But given that we appear to have reasonably congruent articles on most of the subjects they cover, it might help just for the sake of priorities to make note of articles they have that we don't. - Smerdis of Tlön, LOAD "*", 8, 1. 01:52, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

Aww
Your little atheist playgrounds can't survive on their own? What ashame. :P 73.91.2.168 (talk) 03:49, 6 December 2017 (UTC)
 * The size of one's fanbase does not necessarily correlate with how correct they are. ΛίνΡ (ομιλία) (συνεισφορές) @ 03:54, 6 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Never said it did, but remember that next time numbers are in your favor. 76.3.172.194 (talk) 03:58, 6 December 2017 (UTC)
 * They want a resume in order to edit it. No wonder they are practically dead. Good riddance, one less cesspool on the internet. 76.3.172.194 (talk) 04:06, 6 December 2017 (UTC)

Let's archive this
The last time any real discussion about this happened was November. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 15:02, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I think the problem is nothing has come of it. We didn't decide "Yep, let's go for it!" nor "Nah, this is a bad idea." It's just... stagnated. —Kazitor, pending 22:18, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * nobody w/ control over ironchariots has gotten back to me, sadly 21:16, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

Jews and Fundies
Given the BS spewed by some dispensionalists about Israel being attacked by a Russian-Arab-European coalition, that mixed with Satan and the Second Coming -and wih those of them who survive the ordeal accepting Christ as their Messiah, how people from Israel see to be in the middle of all those things? -I guess some'll like the aid sent by US-.

As an aside, why non-Israelites/Jew people should care about that jazz?. Everything turns about that small part of the world showing the truth behind that book. Everything else is as if it did not exist. Panzerfaust (talk) 22:52, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Could you rewrite that into something that makes sense as a question? CorruptUser (talk) 04:22, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * If anyone does work out what it means and can provide an answer, could they improve the article Christian Zionism as well? --Gospatric (talk) 10:04, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'll try to repost it: a dispensationalist is basically mentioning that Israel will have a very hard time when the Antichrist appears, being attacked by a Russian-Arab(-European) coalition and defended by US. Once dust settles in and after two thirds of its population have been killed, Christ will return and the remaining Jews will accept Him as their Messiah. Or something alike.
 * I wonder why non-Jewish people should care about that, as except collateral damages (which can be a lot) would only affect them, and what have to say Jews about that kind of Fundie-sponsored BS, as they do not see Jesus as their Messiah, as we know. &mdash; Unsigned, by: 195.235.239.100 / talk

From the alt-right to moderator of a left-wing wiki
I was once part of the alt-right before finding this wiki. Yes, really. Ask me anything. 05:08, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * What is your favorite cheese on a burger? Regards, Cosmikdebris (talk) 05:59, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Do both have tendencies to manipulate you into joining via a sense of community? 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 15:51, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Swiss cheese. : The alt-right tends to be more manipulative with false facts and distorted views of reality. 18:16, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, I'm glad you found rationality. How did you find the alt-right and get drawn into it? 16:31, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * No one chooses their parents. 18:17, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Did you admire/agree with actual self-admitted neo-nazis in the confines of your head or insist even to yourself you were merely fighting for white people’s rights or something? Christopher (talk) 16:41, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * No, actually. But I thought nazi jokes were funny. Just like 4chan, I was part of communities where it was hard to tell jokers from actual people who meant what they said. 18:16, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Wow, an excellent opportunity to ask this question: what specific arguments or realisations or whatever caused you to leave the alt-right - assuming you did? Bonus question: How much did your political views change, and what are your political views now?- Greenrd (talk) 16:48, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I realize that alt-right people hardly put thought into their views. I am now a liberal. My political views changed drastically over the past three or so years. 18:16, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * What did you like best about the alt-right? What did you like worst? Leuders (talk) 18:54, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Saying whatever the fuck you wanted. Saying whatever the fuck you wanted. 19:25, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

Did you ever lose friends for changing your political stance? What made you realize they "put little thought into their views"? Maybe it's from how they're a little too happy to scapegoat minorities rather than explore other explanations? And also... you're friendly to me, what kind of views on women did you have before? 19:02, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I never had friends. You could say RationalWiki saved me. I thought women rights was BS. 19:25, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * You're talking to a girl right now. How does that make you feel. 19:33, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I treat people equally. I don't really care about the gender of people, unless someone discriminates because of it, of course. I'm a bisexual after all. 19:35, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * But alt-right is about being a boy's only club that hates icky girls, right? 19:44, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Brittany Pettibone is part of the alt-right. And women can be anti-feminists, like Shoe0nHead 19:54, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Women can betray their own gender. I mean normal women, not those cuckoos. 20:07, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * There have been misogynistic women as long as there’s been people, there was a women’s only society dedicated to opposing women’s suffrage. Christopher (talk) 20:40, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Alt-right hates "not masculine enough" men too, so honestly, alt-right hates pretty much anyone who disagrees or doesn't fit in their fantasy of the perfect white man or isn't Donald Trump. Oh again, any statements you remember that made you think "wow, there's little thought put into those views"? 21:24, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

I'd like to ask about the article Alt-Right in this wiki. The term alt-right has been used in a variety of ways. I have come to think of it as a buzzword for people who profess ideas rightward of what most of us consider comfortable, tend to dismiss women's issues, and prefer to focus on white identity politics. If that sounds vague, yes I think so, because it could well describe a large percentage of white Americans. So, my question is: would you be willing to have a look at the article? Maybe bring it into line with your perspective.Ariel31459 (talk) 00:29, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * In my view, the alt-right is a group of far right individuals who hardly put any thought into their way of thinking and a group of people who wold fringe far-right beliefs. A sect of the group adopts beliefs not because they actually believe it, but to be unique. It's called the alternative-right for a reason. Check out this article called "People Who Believe Conspiracy Theories Just Want To Be Unique, Say Psychologists". While it's about conspiracy theorists, a lot of alt-right people believe in conspiracy theories. It's no coincidence that many alt-right figureheads complain about mainstream media and adopt stupid fringe beliefs. Also, take for instance the quote on the 4chan article:
 * Any community that gets its laughs by pretending to be idiots will eventually be flooded by actual idiots who mistakenly believe they are in good company.
 * Sure there are literal white supremacists on the website, but some are masquerading as them because they think it's funny. Of course, this attracts actual white supremacists. tl;dr: The alt-right is filled with parodists and actual people who believe what they say. 01:08, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I have a friend who reads /pol/ for fun. He says it was a parody board taken over by genuine alt-righters, but the parodists are regaining control. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 03:56, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * honestly how would you tell? I mean from what I can tell from people talking about pol it said the same stuff up until the organized like a year ago.Vorarchivist (talk) 05:03, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * /pol/ and /b/ are notorious for being the cesspools of the Internet, even in the early 2000s. 05:35, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * What's the best way to pull people away from the growing alt-right? -Xbony2 (talk) 14:17, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Probably RationalWiki, if CheeseburgerFace's original comment is any indication. 17:13, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That's what turned the previously mentioned friend away from it. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 17:44, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Derek Black, son of Don Black, left the Klan after "having grown past my bubble, talked to the people I affected, read more widely, and realized the necessary impact my actions had on people I never wanted to harm." So, in CheeseburgerFace's case RW was the bubble piercing. Regarding "alt-right people hardly put thought into their views", I've noticed that some racists will both deny the holocaust and make threats about creating another one. Bongolian (talk) 20:13, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That reminds me of how Smoloko News simultaneously denies the Holocaust while saying it's the right thing done for the Jews. 21:21, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes, I think that's what I was remembering. Bongolian (talk) 04:04, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

This is probably not the most worthy question, but I was wondering about it after seeing the fashion sensibilities of people like Scottie Spencer; would you say there is intersection between the alt right and certain subcommunities of hipsters? It would tie in with the hypothesis that people identify with the alt-right out of a desire to feel unique. Samstr (talk) 22:14, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I already elaborated on this with the response "A sect of the group adopts beliefs not because they actually believe it, but to be unique." 03:43, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

A new brand of climate denial
So I've noticed lately that rightwingers and climate deniers have been using a new tactic to try and discredit climate science. They've been using videos from Prager "University". Prager's videos have spewing all sorts of nonsense and pseudoscience like "What do scientists really say?" and claiming that fossil fuels are the greenest energy source, among others, and the climate deniers have been using the videos to persuade the uninformed. Would anyone on this wiki be willing to post refutations to the videos? We do have an article for Dennis Prager but it doesn't go into much detail about that. 98.207.211.99 (talk) 00:52, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Aside from "fossil fuels are the greenest source", any other specific points? I don't really want people to view the video, might be better if someone can make a transcript or a quote run-down. 01:18, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Would posting some response videos/articles be ok? 98.207.211.99 (talk) 01:22, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Oh go ahead, that's what I'd recommend instead if I knew response videos exist... they exist, right? 01:23, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Here you go:
 * "Fossil Fuels, Climate Change and Stupidity with PragerU" :https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScugV3GnB30
 * "PragerU's Anti-Climate Change Propaganda DEBUNKED || PragerU Debunked": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=loEpgp_Q-SA
 * And this is a blog by a Republican who believes in climate change tearing apart one of the videos: https://bbickmore.wordpress.com/2016/04/21/dick-lindzen-prager-u-and-the-art-of-lying-well/
 * I'll give these a watch. Thanks! 01:33, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks for sharing, I've expanded the article a bit, but I'm not done because I'm off to eat. 02:11, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Thank you. If someone could also refute their denial about the 97% consensus that would be great. 98.207.211.99 (talk) 21:30, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Thank you. If someone could also refute their denial about the 97% consensus that would be great. 98.207.211.99 (talk) 21:30, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

Checked out the videos, they are fairly sound but come from a couple of lovely Freeze Peach types. So, salt people! 00:15, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

Why can't I take a break and relax?
It seems that every time I go off to play a game, read a book, grab a drink, or do anything else that involves leaving RationalWiki alone for more than an hour results in in spontaneous vandal sprees by our local troll(s). Why? Am I not entitled to a break? Comrade GC (talk) 17:56, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * My theory is that Grawp only exists because you take breaks. If you would stay on RW 24/7, then we wouldn't have this problem. No pressure! 19:13, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Are you implying that Grawp is a manifestation of my subconscious, my Id as it were?
 * PS: You try being the chief vandal catcher, it's hard work. Comrade GC (talk) 19:16, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't doubt that. I'm often in class at the most high-traffic times, so I can't catch as many as you. 19:44, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I can't help but notice you failed to answer my inquiry. I'd also like to take a moment to note that Grawp fails to grasp that this thread semi-humorous in nature, pertaining a series of coincidences that I happened to notice. Comrade GC (talk) 19:52, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Funny, I've noticed the same sort of thing. Sometimes it feels like I'm the only doing things. Odd. —Kazitor, pending 21:15, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Either way, Grawp doesn't care. 21:37, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I really wish he'd go back to his roots and insert HAGGER all over pages instead of harassing users. It's easier to revert and isn't as disturbing. 22:02, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I think that's exactly why he's not being a spammer Hagger. 22:22, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I wish he'd at least stop with the personal attacks due to their rather boring and childish manner (i.e. Insulting my lack of a sex life, rape threats, etc) Comrade GC (talk) 22:48, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Well yeah but there's not much we can do about it for now. You have to learn to grudgingly deal with it. 02:13, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Fair point. 23:56, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

I highly doubt the PCC obsessed harasser you’re all talking about is the same person/people who occasionally came along and insert Harry Potter related spam to random pages in 2008, the harasser may fo it occasionally, but I think they’re largely different people. Christopher (talk) 15:42, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * For all intents and purposes, they're the same person. 19:59, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

Who is that who GrammerCommie accused me of being?
You know I can't edit the thread now? KyleButler (talk) 21:33, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Judging by this post you apparently can. Comrade GC (talk) 21:35, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes you can, and he accused you of being Grawp (who may or may not be more than one person), the most prolific and long-lived troll to ever disgrace this wiki. 21:37, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't want to devolve this into a witchhunt. Just discuss this at the Chicken coop. 21:38, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Fine by me, I've already weighed in there. Comrade GC (talk) 21:41, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

It's best not to accuse people of being trolls especially if the only thing the person has done is "made sexist edgy comments that aren't relevant at all to the topic". Point posts out for their low-quality. Please don't post more about this topic. 21:47, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Update: you're good now to accuse this person of being a troll.

US vs Norway.
Trump recently asked why the US didn't get more immigrants from Norway.

So I've been glancing at this, this this and finally this.

A few highlights. Average wages are higher in Norway. Personal debt is lower. Crime is lower. Drug taking is lower. Homicides are lower. Risk of poverty is lower. Life expectancy is greater. Healthcare is better. The final article states that Norway scores number one on a global happiness scale and the US scores number 14.

So maybe that goes a little way to explaining why he's not seeing so many Norwegian immigrants.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 18:53, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * So... the short version is Norway rules and the US drools? Comrade GC (talk) 18:58, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Well it's interesting. Looking at the most recent PISA scores (which look how education systems compare internationally) Norway is only slightly ahead. I would have expected Norway to be much higher as Scandinavian countries usually do very well on that.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 20:14, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Interesting that the USA is quite consistently *just* out of the "above OECD" range. I wonder if its population skews the mean at all? —Kazitor, pending 20:19, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't know. Now looking at courruption. Norway is in sixth position (with first being "least corrupt") and the US in eighteenth. Another win for the northerners. Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 20:25, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Looking at a variety of methods of comparing countries, New Zealand always seems to do really well. As long as Aus continues to rank higher than the US though, I'm happy (because we all know that ranking and comparing are better than the actual values themselves). —Kazitor, pending 20:28, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The whole "U.S. is the best country in the world" statement has always stood to me as inane and no facts to back it up maybe aside from GDP; quality of living begs to disagree. 01:04, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, given that the U.S. has the third largest population in the world, and that she is an industrialized country, it is no surprise that her GDP is the greatest. It makes more sense to look at GDP per capita, but that number is a little less meaningful if income inequality is too high. Nerd (talk) 01:16, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Even then, I think it's canceled out by its disgusting ecological footprint. 01:40, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Relax! Progress is being steadily made. Yes, I know it is not as fast as you would like. But the invisible hand of the free market clearly favors renewable energy. There are some technical difficulties to be resolved, but people are working hard on them as we speak. Besides, people are becoming increasingly aware of the potent threat posed by global climate change. Nerd (talk) 02:04, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That and the CEOs are getting younger, hence they don't have the older stuffier generation's excuse of "We'll be dead before that happens, fuck the rest of you!" Comrade GC (talk) 05:00, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Nerd (talk) 14:41, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

norway or us, norway or us... its a tough one. one country has affordable healthcare the other has really cheap meth. these types of questions keep me up at night. its like sophies choice. AMassiveGay (talk) 04:09, 15 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Having never taken meth, I can say which I'd prefer. Also, is your shift key broken? —Kazitor, pending 04:47, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * i sometimes let out a big sigh when it seems someone has responded to a flippant comment as if it were deadly earnest, and then i am wracked with self doubt as to whether i am doing the same thing. as for my shift key - it works fine. its now 5 in the morning and i havent slept after another weekend of very poor life choices. correct capitalisation for chit chat in the saloon bar does not seem like a pressing issue AMassiveGay (talk) 05:14, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

My point here was not to have a dig at the US. It was to point out Trump's total lack of knowledge. On virtually every per capita social and economic measurement Norway scores better than the USA. Yet he can't understand why people aren't queuing to move from Norway to the USA. But he does wonder why there are so many people who people who live in in countries with objectively worse social conditions (in his words "shithole countries") who want to come. Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 11:37, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * In pretty much any discussion that vaguely mentions a negative aspect of the USA, I am bound to leap on it. That's my fault, not yours :) I would say the reason he thinks Norwegians et al. would move is due to American exceptionalism.—Kazitor, pending 12:00, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Perhaps paradoxically, the decline of American exceptionalism may well give rise to an American renaissance. After many years of dormancy, Americans are becoming more and more aware of the problems their country now faces and the possible solutions. It is no coincidence that the most popular elected government official in the U.S. right now is an advocate of social democracy. Nerd (talk) 14:41, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * i dont know if this is american exceptionalism per se, but how endemic is the whole 'america is the greatest, USA no. 1' type mentality? from various media, i get the impression its a fair bit, but i have no idea how accurate that is. its not a sentiment that i see echoed anywhere else in the world. i dont see russians, chinese or anyone claiming their country is the 'greatest' the way i see americans do. is this true or am i just oblivious crass jingism of non americans. i know everyone does it but not the extent that the US does AMassiveGay (talk) 15:51, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Living in the US, it's really easy to see how jingoist we are. However, I'd like to get opinions of other people from other nationalities if it's the same thing here or if they see the US flaunt their egos noticeably more. 01:16, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * If you traveled or lived internationally or read widely, you would realize that while cultural and societal trends may vary from place to place, human nature remains the same. Americans get singled out because of their huge footprint in the international media. You will find sexists, racists, jingoists, anti-intellectuals, and other unpleasant people anywhere. Nerd (talk) 22:02, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * i realise this. but as a non american i see in the media, in the news, everywhere, americans chanting U S A, U S A, in a way i tend not see elsewhere out side of a football match. it seems to be cranked up to eleven. plus, American sniper, american hustle, etc. who else does that? AMassiveGay (talk) 22:25, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It goes back to what I said about media footprint. The de facto language of the United States is English, which happens to be the lingua franca of the world as we know it today. So an American film is more likely to be widely distributed than say, a Chinese one. Nerd (talk) 02:55, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * that really doesnt answer the point i am making. also this. compare to this see a difference? show me the french equivalents. or the chinese or russian or british. these are all countries with a film industry, and all countries that are keen to promote their cultural identities. take a stroll round your neighbourhood. how many us flags do you see? in the uk you would be hard pressed to find any. harder still to see one not owned by a football fan and/or racist (or tourist with some 'i heart the uk' tat if in london). AMassiveGay (talk) 15:53, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

Is the concept of property a myth?
https://www.actualized.org/articles/...ception-part-1

Skip to the 55 min mark.

It's part of the video, but it got me thinking, is the concept a myth? How can someone truly own another piece of reality? What power does a piece of paper have?Machina (talk) 00:38, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * One piece of knowledge my father passed on when he was doing a law degree is: "Property is a delegation of state power" —Kazitor, pending 01:22, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Oh, also, looks like the link got truncated. —Kazitor, pending 01:23, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Property is definitely a social construction, just like the US dollar is a social construction. Too many people seem to equate that status with 'mental figment'. - Smerdis of Tlön, LOAD "*", 8, 1. 03:12, 22 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Here is the actual link, again start at the 55 min mark.


 * https://www.actualized.org/articles/self-deception-part-1


 * The beginning was something about the mind being some kind of deceiver and then more about self deception.Machina (talk) 03:58, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I hear people use loaded words to describe social constructions a lot (e.g. "Race is an illusion"). I wish people would stop doing this. 04:04, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Rights themselves are social constructs. If a bear eats your face, the heavens are not cleaved open and divine judgement is not rendered unto the ursine sinner.  But, social constructs exist, and more importantly, we have the ability to decide what those social constructs are.  So is property real?  Depends on what we decide. CorruptUser (talk) 04:26, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The idea of the social construct is a useful meta-concept that is sometimes used as an argument or retort, e.g., "It's just a social construct," carrying the implication that the thing called a social construct could be easily changed. I think this is a form of the nominal fallacy.Ariel31459 (talk) 15:53, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * A nation is a social construct with an army. Other property is similar, although the defence is contracted out in various ways. --Gospatric (talk) 16:59, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * you could just go out shop lifting and see how real property rights are when you get caught. AMassiveGay (talk) 17:58, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * No. It's a social construct.  Real things that only continue to exist because we all believe them are not "fake" or "myths" or anything similar.  ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 18:37, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I think of it like money. Despite just being a social construct, it is necessary for it to exist. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 19:50, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I guess any concept which exists because we have a society to perceive/use/identity it is arguably "social construct" at some level. Work, Mariage, Religion. It's almost a tautology. Is there something which is socially important which is not "socially constructed" in some way? Or to put it another way: is there a sociologist or anthropologist in the house?  Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 20:47, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Property is tied up with power. Whether or not you believe in it, as long as somebody with power believes in it, if you try and take theirs, you'll get shot or jailed. That makes it different to something like virginity or God or beauty or honor or objective truth, where if you stop believing in it or acting as if it exists, there are no real sanctions. --Gospatric (talk) 09:54, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * "Property is tied up with power." Yes, but it is not really top/down power. The term "power" is usually used with respect to ideology. There may be an instinct to occupy and defend territory. Many animal species do it without philosophical motivation.Ariel31459 (talk) 14:38, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Fun little tidbit. In nature, animals take property rights extremely seriously.  Violating an animal's territory is a great way to get mauled.  While I'm not using that as a justification for property, just pointing out property is hardly unique to humans. CorruptUser (talk) 00:38, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Eh, I think that's a farcical comparison. There's a staggering amount of work that goes into making modern aviation available to the masses (airplanes, airports, airliners), and it'd be kind of dumb to bring up "well birds fly, too" as a point of comparison.  But that's more or less what the "animals do it too" analogy is trying to do.   03:11, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Animal analogies are useful to a point in shedding light on human behavior. And territoriality and sleeping shelters are things humans do share with animals.  But most animals don't speculate in Bitcoin, spend much time at the BMV, and apparently are ineligible to own copyrights, so there are limits to the ways animal territoriality intersects with human property. - Smerdis of Tlön, LOAD "*", 8, 1. 02:54, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

Pervert doctor at Michigan State University
Dirt bag got what was coming to him. 175 years in prison and still has another sentencing coming up. How many lives did that freak destroy? That Undead Schizophrenic with Bipolar Disorder living in Michigan. I am insane. Tacos


 * Are you referring to Larry Nassar. Darthmaul (talk) 20:56, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't think he could be referring to anyone else with that comment. 21:53, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

I was talking about Larry Nassar. --Rationalzombie94 (talk) 12:26, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

Global warming
Hey, it's been a while since I've visited good ol' RW, and I wish my comeback in quite some time would be more productive than this. However, lately I've been doing a bit of research in global warming and climate change and, oh boy, was that a mistake. So, from my findings I, well, it's just disheartening. It just seems futile to do anything about it apparently. There seems to be 90% that the tipping point will be reached by the end of this century, basically it seems that we are fucked as a planet (Source: independent) and by about half way through the century it's very likely that the Paris agreement of 1.5C will be exceeded (source: independent). The cherry on the cake is Frank Fenner (A notable scientist who helped wipe out small pox) said that humanity will go extinc in about 100 years due to lack of recources, overpopulation and climate change and apparently there's no stopping that (Source: The Australian). Well, as if that isn't the most positive set of news to receive. After researching and finding stuff similar to this, I just want to give up, if it's all a direction to one unfortunate future what's the point. I have this constant melancholy feeling in my chest, that just won't stop. It just feels hopeless and, I don't want to live through it. I've become more hostile to friend and family, I've started to drop down in regards to college, sometimes i even skip just because I don't have the motivation to do anything anymore. Any time I want to do something I just think "What's the point." I don't want to do anything but just lie and wait for my demise. I don't feel like living anymore if the future of the planet is just so hopeless and bleak, especially considering this is ought to happen just towards the end of the century. I'm sorry about this post, I just don't know anymore what to do. I tried to ignore the thoughts and that didn't work, I tried to reason with myself that maybe there's still hope for earth but it's hard to argue against evidence and scientists. I guess I resorted to going back to rationalwiki with this. I'm really sorry about this post and how this is the first thing I posted since my hiatus and I'm sorry that this may seem- I don't know. I'm just sorry that this post exists but I hope, whoever reads this, will understand where I'm coming from.-WMS (talk) 21:58, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
 * OK, I was hoping someone else would respond because I don't think I'm very good at this.
 * In the long run, we're all dead. That's true from an individual perspective, a planetary perspective (envelopment by the sun), and a universal perspective . Make the most of your life, you're only certain to have the one you've got now: try to enjoy life, try to be nice to other people, try to make the world a better place.
 * If you're depressed, see a medical doctor for anti-depressants.
 * If you're mildly depressed, try coffee.
 * If you're suicidal, take a look at our suicide page for help on suicide prevention.
 * The most dire predictions about global warming (human extinction) are not necessarily the right ones, they are predictions after all not facts.
 * Bongolian (talk) 20:08, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The Independent is borderline fake news owned by a Russian oligarch. I don’t know about the Australian though. Christopher (talk) 22:18, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Thank you very much you two, thanks Bongolian for the advice and encouragement, it's probably best if I look into my mental health more. And yeah, they're only predictions and not necessarily right as they're not facts. it's comforting hearing that as my mind works like "worst case scenario=truth" which causes all sorts of personal problems. And thanks Christopher for letting me know that not everything on independent is always correct, I guess just blind anxiety got the best of me. Again, thank you two for responding, it has helped talking with someone about this. Thank you.--WMS (talk) 19:11, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * You're quite welcome, . Bongolian (talk) 20:40, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Do you have any evidence of this "borderline fake news" by The Independent, ? The site Media Bias/Fact Check actually rates them has having a hihg level of factual reporting. Bongolian (talk) 20:54, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * ”borderline fake news” was too strong s term, a few Google searches only turn up one incredibly misleading headline. Christopher (talk) 15:50, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah, as far as I’ve seen, The Indie’s “classic reporting” stuff is pretty good.


 * It also gets point in my book for employing Robert Fisk as its Middle East correspondent (though he can get a bit repetitive/long in the tooth at times, he is actually living in the region, being based in Beirut, and has done so for decades, has an insanely large network of sources and contact and an eye for the “longue durée” perspective).


 * The Indie also runs it’s fair share of “human interest” stories that are as uninteresting to me as other media’s.


 * It also hasn’t been completely above the Corbyn bashing (note, this refers to the manufactroversy and general badmouthing, not to reporting actual blunders and ineptness and silliness that has at times characterised Corbyn’s leadership), though The Indie has never been nearly as hostile to Corbyn as The Grauniad. It seems that the Indie’s Corbyn bashing is mainly due to its Chief Political Commentator, John Rentoul, who can always find a negative angle on anything to do with Corbyn and even he has been far less shrill than commentators on The Graun; and his pieces are of course commentary, rather than “classic reporting”.


 * It has some of the typical left(‘ish) wing media problems (i.e. it can be prone to environmental/health woo), but doesn’t seem to be particularly bad in this aspect and some of these stories might be more due to (i.e. sloppiness) than to bias. An again, it’s own, longer reporting pieces seem to generally be solid.


 * Hence, The Indie is one of my go to sources for UK news ahead of The Graun (can be a little too smug) and the BBC (good but is often short on the “long reads”/background/analysis stuff that I look for, rather than “telegram style” news flashes). ScepticWombat (talk) 09:27, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

Managing translations
Wikipedia has a sidebar on the left with different languages to choose from for an article. I think RationalWiki should have this. Thoughts? 19:08, 21 January 2018 (UTC) RSamys (bla) 12:08, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * We do have French and Spanish articles lying around in the wiki without a sidebar and Russian does have a language sidebar that you're talking about. Pretty sure it's mostly because RussianalWiki is established while the other languages are not. 19:12, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That would require moving them to their own sites, like RussianalWiki, which would mean even less people would notice and improve them. Christopher (talk) 19:20, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * There really isn't enough quality content in enough languages yet. Bongolian (talk) 21:19, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Could there be a 'RationalWiki also has an article in (language)' tag (and an equivalent to WP's 'Can someone translate something from the longer(another language)WP article' tag)? (I don't have 'the technicals' to devise the tag). Anna Livia (talk) 22:20, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * ar, br, de, eo, es, fr, el, hu and ru already exist. —Kazitor, pending 23:41, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Should these be being promoted more? And should there be/is there 'a list of articles in (other language) not yet in English' (though a proportion of such articles are likely to be of limited interest to English speakers - just as the proverbial Bramble Bank is unlikely to be of interest to those not interested in cricket/the relevant bit of the Solent).
 * Sometimes alternative strategies can be more useful in alerting people to such unknown unknowns. Anna Livia (talk) 00:08, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Currently, all articles in other languages have equivalent articles in English. We've only ever had one user (who turned out to be an anti-Semitic git and a complete arsehole) try to create lots of articles in another language that didn't have equivalents in English. Most of those had sod all to do with our mission and I deleted a lot of them on sight.
 * I think that it might be time to redesign the templates for linking to versions of the page in other languages to make those templates slimmer. That would then allow adding links to more translations without making the page look too crowded. Look at Homöopathie. The three language templates at the top of the page take up rather a lot of room. Spud (talk) 06:01, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes, that's a good idea. Bongolian (talk) 08:00, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Perhaps there should be a trawl for 'other-language RW contributors'? Until then some means of alerting people that 'this topic has an article in (language X)' might encourage people (possibly with monitoring of newish users and IPs therein to avoid 'problems'). Anna Livia (talk) 16:39, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * does this site have a large enough user base to even consider all this? what sort of quality control can expect if its just one and his dog editing in a particular language? i am reminded of the problems we had when the lone portuguese editor turned out to have something of an axe to grind. AMassiveGay (talk) 20:37, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I should maybe add that the German articles are, so far, only created by me. As a consequence, I'm trying to respect the language guidelines by limiting the articles to translations of cover stories. As it stands right now, I have no interest in building up a separate, semi-independent language project. Although expanding the articles to reflect the situation in German-speaking countries might be worthwhile.

Speaking of this, I'm currently working on our first Swedish article, but I'm nowhere near fluent and probably don't grasp some grammatical intricacies. If anybody does happen to know enough Swedish to help out, that'd be nice. It's too bad that RBP appears to have LANCBed, since he's an actual Swede. 22:16, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

Submissions please
Any favorite piece of literature, famous movie line, joke, meme, or just downright random bullshit you post in this topic will be translated into the earliest form of Indo-Hittite. That is, if its readable. So by all means make your contribution. Darthmaul (talk) 23:14, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Let's try something simple: "Thank you so much for-to playing my game". 01:16, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * "Before the Beginning there was this Turtle. And the Turtle was alone. And he looked around, and he saw his neighbor, which was his Mother. And he lay down on top of his neighbor, and behold, she bore him in tears, an oak tree. Which grew all day, and then fell over, like a bridge. And lo, under the bridge there came a Catfish, and he was very big, and he was walking, and he was the biggest he had seen. [Fading] And so were the firey [sic] balls of this fish, one of which is the Sun, and the other, they called the Moon…" (The Firesign Theatre creation myth) Smerdis of Tlön, LOAD "*", 8, 1. 03:52, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Seems legit. 04:17, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

Here you go Mario, Koró túdo, pos tú medo únʔu dʱè Darthmaul (talk) 05:35, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 05:36, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * My own favourite line/quote is Robert A Heinlein's "A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects." Daev (talk) 06:39, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * No need for the translation, I just like sharing the line. Daev (talk) 06:44, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 'Jack of all trades and master of none' springs to mind - and how often does one need to invade anywhere? :) Anna Livia (talk) 16:16, 23 January 2018 (UTC)

Here is the The Firesign Theatre creation myth.

''Xenti gúnʔu₁ ʔeru bʱìdé xusu₉. bʱìdé sú ʔu. Pérì ùku sú, sú súdo peri, súdo mama, ùku ku. Ni lèɡì sú peri sen ku, ùku! Si to xeᵑkuru₂ kom gunʔu, xigi. Xigi ɡʱòri uduri₃ usu, ni pulo₄ ku, lige bʱèru. Ùku, bʱèru n̥dʱèri gum kéttudʱùɡù, sú m̥geɣe xu ku, dʱèᵐbè₅ sú ku, sú m̥geɣe uduri ʔeti sú ùku ku. Su bʱùlu pù dʱùɡù épò ku, sú bʱùlu pù súlu, sú tere bʱùlu pù ku, tí sú mèʔuiⁿdórosú neme. Darthmaul (talk) 19:42, 23 January 2018 (UTC) Here is the jack of all trades, mon uduri uruge ne mondo póti ku Darthmaul (talk) 19:55, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * You've given me far too much power so: "Some humans would do anything to see if it was possible to do it. If you put a large switch in some cave somewhere, with a sign on it saying 'End-of-the-World Switch. PLEASE DO NOT TOUCH', the paint wouldn't even have time to dry."Vorarchivist (talk) 01:33, 25 January 2018 (UTC)

This is the translation. Peɣu mon uduri dʱé ulu dʱè su tí ibè tí ᵐbele do dʱédè uku. Su, tú m̥geɣe situ duiɡò kuʔu ni peloɣe, uri eⁿde ʔu to sen ɣuku, to situ duiɡò ɣuitu, ʔeru bʱùru. Me tú gʱèdè, ne tege dʱè!, pikiuⁿdu ʔeti ne din terisu bʱù. Darthmaul (talk) 05:32, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Out of curiosity, what are you using as a point of reference for this? 04:31, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

Mass Shooting Victims
Have you ever noticed that after a mass shooting the news always describes the victims as being friendly, outgoing, nice to everyone, caring, smart, etc? They never say "she was a self centered bully" or "he was a loner with no friends?" Do assholes never get killed, or do they just sugar coat what these people are actually like? KyleButler (talk) 12:05, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That line of logic heads in the general direction of victim blaming. Does it really matter how nice or mean a victim of a school shooting was? The act is still malicious, horrifying, and despicable. If you're thinking that the shooter may carried it out due to being bullied, it's an understandable motivation, but doesn't justify it in any way. In that case the bullies are guilty of their own crimes, but murder wasn't a rightful punishment. 2600:1002:B119:B12A:CAEB:F7BE:C1CF:25BF (talk) 13:16, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It's called Don't Speak Ill Of The Dead. Seems quite popular in some circles. Boredatwork (talk) 13:17, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It's always bothered me too, if only because it's not really newsworthy in a way. "Mother claims dead child was really good" isn't really worthy of a headline, from an objective point of view: of course the mother thinks their child was great, there's nothing noteworthy about that. 'Mother claims that murdered child probably had it coming, was total prick' would be a headline worthy reaction. X Stickman (talk) 16:34, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Boredatwork, so you are basically saying Bailey Holt was actually a bitch and Preston was actually and asshole, but people don't want to say that because, like Adolph Hitler, they are dead? Also, Rachel Scott and Casie Bernall were actually bitches too? And BoN, I am not saying they deserved to die, I am honestly curious why the shooters would always pick the nicest kids to kill when there are asshole Republucans everywherw they could kill instead. KyleButler (talk) 18:46, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Suggesting that "asshole Republicans" should be killed is not okay. You're treading a very thin line with that comment. 18:54, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * You putting words in my mouth, not even Trump deserves to die, but if they going to kill someone why kill the nice ones? KyleButler (talk) 18:58, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * You said, and I quote, "I am honestly curious why the shooters would always pick the nicest kids to kill when there are asshole Republucans [sic] everywherw [sic] they could kill instead." This is both an overgeneralization of Republicans and a clear statement that killing Republicans is better than killing non-Republicans. Even if you had just said assholes, it's still a crass and awful comment to make. 19:53, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * My answer to this question would just be: this is the victims' loved ones speaking unconditional love for them and espousing their grief. Nothing wrong with that and not "sugar-coating", at least not in a "self-delusion" sense. Would you say the same thing if your daughter was killed in a shooting? I know I would. 20:27, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I would only want one child if any at all, and I would want a son, so if I had a "daughter" I would have her aborted. KyleButler (talk) 21:04, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * You're missing the point. Would you say the same thing if your sole kid was killed in a shooting? 21:09, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Kids are annoying. If I had a son or a daughter who was less than perfect, I would take him or her to 7/11 in a bad neighborhood and leave them. KyleButler (talk) 21:22, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Is that you Grawp? Comrade GC (talk) 21:25, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Ooo, so edgy. 21:30, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Gotcha, you don't want a serious discussion. Bye. 21:32, 24 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Learn it, love it. RoninMacbeth (talk) 00:04, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Sorry if talking about abortion and finding kids annoying was a bit over the top. Back on topic, I can see why people that care about them would think highly of them, and there's nothing wrong wrong per se with "unconditional love," but the existence of such unconditional admiration doesn't mean that someone isn't a bitch. As a matter of fact, I think your acknowledgment of the unconditional nature of these feeling supports my theory that Bailey Holt, Rachel Scott, and Casie Bernall were actually bitches. That doesn't mean they deserved to die, but they probably not nice people, and for people not close to them to think otherwise is silly. As a matter of fact, some of the Columbine survivors acknowledge what horrible slime they were before the incident, and credit the incident with a changing of their lives for the better (and some of them add religious hooey in with it). Thoughts? KyleButler (talk) 15:22, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

Moderator elections
Hey all, I just want to let everyone know that I will be standing in the next moderator election and I will be offering REAL change to this wiki. As my user page states I will drag this wiki kicking and screaming from the clutches of the liberal left and spread the conservative message. Watch this space. --Right-wing RationalWiki (talk) 14:21, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * You might not be aware of this, but you actually need people to vote for you to win. Additionally, you don't have a monopoly over the POV as a mod. In order to change the POV of RW, you'd need all the mods and a huge portion of the userbase on your side, and that ain't happening. Sorry to burst your bubble. 14:25, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Underestimate me at your peril. Soon you and all the other lefties will be forced to submit to the will of the conservatives or you will be banished from RW. --Right-wing RationalWiki (talk) 14:28, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm pretty sure many think of me as too far to the right to be mod, so you don't stand a chance at winning. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 14:34, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Is that so? I believe most of the anti-endorsements were specifically due to age and prior conflicts with CheeseburgerFace, not your political stances. 14:41, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Wait, is right-wing? Comrade GC (talk) 14:46, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * No, but by RW's standards, I am more right-wing than the typical user. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 14:57, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

@User:Right-wing I have some right wing views, but no way in hell I would vote for you. Go back to Conservapedia. --Rationalzombie94 (talk) 17:21, 26 January 2018 (UTC) UTC)
 * I think you overestimate how left wing we are, and I doubt your politics had anything to do with your lack of modship. Maybe it was just your age? Christopher (talk) 19:55, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I've mostly learned people's views from the Discord tbh. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 20:29, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I have been completely convinced by Right-wing RationalWiki's cogent, convincing and compelling arguments and will be voting for him, her or it when the time comes.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 20:57, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

Hey RWRW, I think you forgot a “Muahahahah!” somewhere in your posts, just to make the cartoon villainy crystal clear. ScepticWombat (talk) 21:02, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Oh hey Right-wing Rationalwiki, you're back. Where'd you go? —Kazitor, pending 21:06, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Thanks guys, looks like I'm already gaining support (I'll let you work on my campaign). I've just been busy but I'm back now and ready to get to work. --Right-wing RationalWiki (talk) 12:01, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That's nice dear. Wilder Bicycle 13:20, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

"Mini Poll- Right-Wing Rational Wiki or Captain Levi from Attack on Titan" 

RWRW Captain Levi

Here we go, a fundamentalist trying to make the world great again. What beliefs are you trying to spread, you can't simply slap the vague label conservative on a lunch box and keep it there forever. What is under that label.Darthmaul (talk) 01:16, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Right-wing RationalWiki is a troll/parodist. It's no drama. —Kazitor, pending 01:26, 28 January 2018 (UTC)

Matthew 27:52-53
According to this passage, the death of Jesus caused graves to break open and the dead to rise and go to Jerusalem. Are there any independent sources that can corroborate this? I can’t find anything so I thought I’d ask the Internet for help. Because, y’know, if some dead people got raised to life you’d think some third parties woulda noticed. Anyway, I’m mostly concerned with steel-manning Christianity and fighting that, so I want to see if we can’t find other accounts. If we can’t, Matthew is the only source and it’s another nail in Christianity’s coffin.

I don’t have high hopes for this one, but if you guys wouldn’t mind having a quick look around, I’d appreciate it. Thanks. Fareeha A (talk) 04:05, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

I came across many writings about this, and none of them give secular sources concerning the resurrection of many saints. Here are the links. This book says that these verses you list are often disregarded. Some websites I ran across are [1 ] [2 ] The first website is an answer to skeptics concerning the chapter. Darthmaul (talk) 04:38, 26 January 2018 (UTC)


 * RW discusses this under the unobvious subheading Zombies. --Gospatric (talk) 10:54, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * There's a little information there, but someone could add to it. Or find a more sensible place for it. --Gospatric (talk) 10:56, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Here's one from the Jerusalem Enquirer dated Friday 7 April AD 30: "A man named SHEMU'EL whilst tending his sheep reported several dead souls come to life walking past him". (Seriously, it would prove nothing if you found some "eyewitness account" that claimed they saw some supernatural thing happen. See alien abduction and ghost. Leuders (talk) 18:57, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

A wonder if any of the church fathers suggested that this was because Jesus's typical see that you do not tell, Matt 9:30, Mark 1:43-44. But if that was true, how would these saints keep their resurrection secret, would they just be strangely unrecognized like Jesus was by his own disciples? How would Matthew find out to write it down? Darthmaul (talk) 19:10, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

ive never really seen much point in highlighting inconsistencies outright ridiculousness in the bible or any religious text for that matter. it doesnt matter what people believe or how they interpret the bible, what matters is that non believers are not obligated to follow any of the rules laid out in the bible. you argue to the toss of some archaic line in the bible with a true believer all you are doing showing them the bible matters to you. argue for your rights not what jesus is supposed to meant. AMassiveGay (talk) 19:55, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

I didn't know I was arguing with anyone to be honest with you. And what do you mean argue for your rights. Darthmaul (talk) 01:24, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

The poster says: "According to this passage, the death of Jesus caused graves to break open and the dead to rise and go to Jerusalem. Are there any independent sources that can corroborate this?" This is a bit like asking for independent sources which confirm something in The Lord of the Rings.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 12:50, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The odd thing is that it appears just in that gospel and nowhere else, but it's not the first time that happens. Panzerfaust (talk) 13:10, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The really odd thing is not that these multiple resurrections were not noticed by anyone else, nor is it the fact that the earthquake also went unrecorded. He really odd thing is that nobody else in the world outside of the author's imagination recorded a totally unexpected eclypse.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 07:52, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah, this is why I said "nowhere else". And it's just one of many other similar examples. Does someone know if it has been justified why the four Gospels have so many differences or attempts to unify what appears there (better in both cases from the Catholic Church, that had many centuries to think about that)?. Panzerfaust (talk) 11:09, 28 January 2018 (UTC)

The state of the Left
At the moment the pointless poll is "What do you want for Christmas?" and 40 people voted for Donald Trump's impeachment and only 11 voted for no more world hunger. Is this not a perfect example of how deranged the Left is that they would rather satisfy their hatred with Trump than solve world hunger? --Right-wing RationalWiki (talk) 16:30, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
 * How do you know it was leftists who voted for impeaching Trump? Maybe it was Nazis who want a president further to the right than him. 16:34, 28 January 2018 (UTC)


 * joke


 * dʒəʊk


 * noun
 * 1.
 * a thing that someone says to cause amusement or laughter, especially a story with a funny punchline.
 * "she was in a mood to tell jokes"
 * synonyms:	funny story, jest, witticism, quip, pleasantry; More
 * Christopher (talk) 16:36, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 17:21, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Next year, let's add "for Grawp to finally leave us alone" to the poll. And no, I am not suggesting RWRW is Grawp, but I really wish Grawp would stop. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 18:45, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
 * No, see the pointless poll is a very serious survey of not just a bunch of bored RW users, but the entirety of the extremely nebulous political left. You can tell it's a very serious matter because we specifically named it the "Pointless Poll". It tackles very serious topics such as what type of fantasy elf "leftists" want to be, or what condiment they believe goes best with peanut butter. 98.110.112.28 (talk) 20:45, 28 January 2018 (UTC)

I suppose it suggests the cold practicality of American people. They know Congress cannot pass a law abolishing world hunger. On the other hand...2018 elections.Ariel31459 (talk) 19:32, 28 January 2018 (UTC)

Ariel that is an extrodinarily accurate statement. Methinks it is a gem in this topic. Darthmaul (talk) 20:16, 28 January 2018 (UTC)

The alt-right is still obsessed with locking Hillary up
I've been reading from alt-right news outlets that the FBI supposedly deleted five months worth of texts from a Clinton investigation. Any debunking on this? 05:47, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I don’t know if it’s the case, but it might just be straight up PIDOOMA. It’s not like that sort of thing is beyond the pale for InfoWars. ScepticWombat (talk) 11:17, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
 * By the sound of it, it may be the stuff recently briefly summed up by Trevor Noah, in which Noah played a clip with Wolf Blitzer in a breaking news segment saying that the (now formerly) missing data had been recovered. Though it related to the messages during the Trump investigation, I suspect that it may also be relevant to the earlier batch of messages. I haven’t dug more into this as my patience with paranoid right wing conspiracy theories and their never ending Clinton vendetta is rather limited. ScepticWombat (talk) 11:24, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It is possible that either Hillary or the FBI may have done something wrong in the past. (I know I have.) But, so what? This is like the whole Creationist or Anti-global warming crowd trying to throw something/anything at either evolution or the science of global warming in the belief that anything which shows their opponents to be wrong in the minutest detail means that their own position is absolutely correct.
 * What the Trump camp needs to do is demonstrate that he is not an utter (please insert your favourite explicative.)Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 12:59, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The thing is, the Trump camp doesn't see him being an [insert expletive] as a problem. Often times, it's why they venerate him. Trump's supporters don't feel the need to prove he isn't an asshole, because they wear the fact that he is as a badge of honor. Their usual response to that line of questioning is "That's Trump telling it like it is/sticking it to the establishment/draining the swamp/making America great again, and if you disagree with his actions then you're just a triggered libtard/SJW/cuck/deep state agent/[insert ethnic slur]." 174.200.1.178 (talk) 22:35, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Maybe the Left should adopt the same stance, unapologetically telling it like it is, no matter who it offends. Certainly the Right would applaud their refreshingly honest and candid attitude. Oh, maybe not. Leuders (talk) 20:21, 29 January 2018 (UTC)

The J Source
For those of you who know what the Documentary Hypothosis is, here's a scenario. What do you think creationists would do if the actual J Source was found, like the Dead Sea scrolls, hundreds of copies all on tablets or parchment. And better yet, with other gods mentioned in the text alongside Yahweh, and highly extravagant cosmic battles. Darthmaul (talk) 01:40, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I've always held out hope for someone discovering a copy of The Book of the Wars of Jehovah. Just the title makes it sound like that one rocks. - Smerdis of Tlön, LOAD "*", 8, 1. 02:23, 28 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Shrug? Let's say the actual J Source were found. It would probably be possible though textual analysis to figure out that the new documents were probably the original source, and that the Old Testament texts were probably extracted and edited versions of them, but there'd be no way to actually prove that. The J documents might just as well be secondary documents that extracted and heavily edited text from the Old Testament. Christians have been dealing with apocrypha since the beginnings of the faith. It's just not an issue for most Christians, creationist or otherwise.66.57.238.234 (talk) 19:04, 29 January 2018 (UTC)

Point Man
Does any one know of terms for soldiers who go in front of their squad mates, or a killjoy commando type. I already know of point man and the classic bad ass. Darthmaul (talk) 08:00, 30 January 2018 (UTC)


 * In an online game, that's the tank. - Smerdis of Tlön, LOAD "*", 8, 1. 07:15, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
 * If they're griefing, they're kill-stealing. If not, they're a tryhard. EIat10s (talk) 16:57, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
 * They're called recon or scout units if I remember correctly. Comrade GC (talk) 17:37, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Shock trooper is the term that comes to my mind. But context is important: is this a real-life military unit being described, or are we talking about the character archetype used in a story, or is a particular kind of player in a video game? 174.200.19.249 (talk) 20:03, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Whoever made this topic needs to put a link in their sig. Christopher (talk) 20:46, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Darthmaul made the original post in this topic. Cosmikdebris (talk) 21:29, 29 January 2018 (UTC)

Sorry about that, oh and yes i mean a real military unit. Darthmaul (talk) 08:00, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * There have been a number of designations - the British army in the napoleonic wars had "forlorn hopes" leading assaults on fortifications. Before them Grenadiers led assaults throwing grenades,  Landschenckt mercenaries of the 14-1500's had "double pay soldiers" who volunteered to fight in the front ranks for double pay (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doppels%C3%B6ldner).  These days scouts and recon elements lead the way - but they are for gathering information rather than being stupidly brave.....Aloysius the Gaul 23:43, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

BREAKING: TRUMP COLLUSION PROVEN
Clear evidence has emerged that Trump did collusion and conspiracy. We've proven collusion to obstruct justice by closing an investigation due to massive bribes! The payday loan industry gave $1,250,000 to Trump's inauguration, they're having their expo at one of his hotels (violation of emoluments clause) and according to the parties involved it's not even "the appearance of corruption". It's a clear quid pro quo, and the Democratic leadership hasn't said anything about it yet for 7 days. 13:21, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Yeah, obvious corruption stopped being prosecuted in the US. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 16:16, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * FAKE NEWS! You're a fool if you believe it! --Right-wing RationalWiki (talk) 16:25, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I hate to agree with RWRW, but can't we get a more reputable source than the IB Times? RoninMacbeth (talk) 19:01, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Local source, national source. Are those good enough? 19:42, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Sure. They're certainly better. RoninMacbeth (talk) 21:05, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

Ugandan Knuckles and Racism
New user, found this site and lurked for a bit, and now registered because I have a question. Forgive me if this isn't the proper place to ask. For some frame of reference, I've recently read through RW's series of Gamergate articles for information, after having believed the movement held any water. I've since changed my mind, and I did a lot of self-reflection afterward on my thoughts and actions.

So, the Ugandan Knuckles meme. When it came out, I loved it to death. It was hilarious. I watched the original video what must have been a hundred or so times. It didn't immediately come off to me as racist, it just seemed completely benign and silly, if somewhat absurd (though my humor is largely absurdist). Come now, a month later, and we have instances of the meme being banned from websites and even a physical, real-world location because of racist accusations. I don't fully understand why, though. Internet media outlets are espousing the meme as racist and hateful: Polygon, The Daily Dot, and now Kotaku. Finding more articles didn't prove helpful in really explaining how the meme is racist, even though the last one attempts to. Comment sections haven't been helpful, of course, and neither has KYM really. It's here I hope to find meaningful discussion and answers that I can hold reliable. I'm open to discourse and generally work against my own racial biases.

As I understand it, the meme is not a "mocking" of Ugandan culture, as the articles paint it. It seems more like a playful imitation, the accent no more harmful than any other impersonation. In fact, in the original video, the players refer to Zimbabwe more than Uganda, two countries that I'm sure are completely different. (I could imagine getting them confused is the racist part, but that's amicable?) The clicking is absolutely hilarious to me, especially due to my academic background in Linguistics. The references to ebola are just because ebola is a funny word, isn't it? To me, the references to Satanism/devil worshipping is more a factor of bizarreness than a direct remark on African spiritual beliefs and their stereotypes.

The only concession I can imagine is (and I fear that) that the meme may be on the same path as Pepe the frog in being co-opted by alt-right gamers and internet denizens, but that's hard to imagine with this being more of a VRChat/video game meme than a chan meme and I haven't really seen it being used in an overtly racist way. That said, I'd greatly appreciate some assistance... some enlightenment, if you will. EIat10s (talk) 18:37, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * While you don't see it that way, I do understand why some people may take offense to it. I honestly think how you described the meme bothers me ("tribes", "Ebola"; "devil worshipping") though it may be in the same sense that people without good background understanding of memes can get offended for misguided reasons. I also don't think it should be banned, and banning might encourage far right twalt-right to adopt it as a symbol for racism. I'm also aware that when people are having fun, they tend to downplay the racism, particularly this quote from our article
 * So I think if people are bothered and uncomfortable you should also respect their wishes. I don't find Kotaku to be all that reliable (their language can be a little... weighty and emotion-filled rather than meaningful). All in all, I'm mixed on this, but I don't think this will be something I'll support. 20:23, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * So I think if people are bothered and uncomfortable you should also respect their wishes. I don't find Kotaku to be all that reliable (their language can be a little... weighty and emotion-filled rather than meaningful). All in all, I'm mixed on this, but I don't think this will be something I'll support. 20:23, 24 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Granted, out of politeness. The meme isn't something I've repeated except to the few friends I regularly meme with anyway. The meme itself involves other innocuous ("searching for the queen") or bizarre, inexplicable things (sniffing other avatars with far more enthusiasm than necessary) that don't really contribute to the purported mockery, I think. There's also a significant lack of any slurs used, at least in the videos I've watched. The original has a kid who shouts "Just a prank, mah n*gga!" though he's obviously trying to troll the trolls with a different meme. I acknowledge something can be racist without any slurs, but, it adds to the innocence of it, to me. That's just what it seems. Honestly I'd be kinda disappointed to realize the meme that made my day several times was actually horrendously offensive.


 * Other than that, I'll think about framing it outside of a gamer perspective and see if that brings me anything. I don't believe I'm legitimizing offensive material because it's a video game, but... EIat10s (talk) 22:07, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Personally, I don't think it's that funny. I know it's done in a light-hearted way that's probably not meant to offend anyone but...it's simply not funny. The stereotypes, if used properly, can make really funny jokes but in this case, it just looks lazily offensive and it's probably used by people who don't have any understanding about Uganda and its problems. I think it's fine if you and your friends within your little clique use it, but not publicly online with many other people where you might actually offend someone because they took it the wrong way, and with the way this meme is written and how it uses the stereotypes, it's very possible for that to happen. I'm not going to call out people who do use the meme, I'll just roll my eyes and just move on. I do think a ban on this dumb meme is too drastic. It's just a dumb meme, no need to ban people over it. 22:11, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It would be nice if we got perspective from people of Ugandan and similar African descent, it would help us to worry less. I also don't want another "Sombrero Mario removal" (actually was moved to the back of the box, not outright removed) incident where most Mexicans really don't care and nonMexicans are getting worked up over what's really nothing. 22:16, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Just to answer you, the Ugandan studio behind the movie that partially inspired the meme seems to love it, based on the retweets and some posts. EIat10s (talk) 22:36, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Glad to see that they like it. 22:44, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That's really nice to know. I've seen retweets that defend the racist allegations of Ugandan Knuckles too and they seem reasonable. To be more fair, though, I don't want this being a Friend argument or something similar. Anyhow, I think it really depends on how the meme is used, ultimately, but I have my doubts this meme is on of itself racist. 22:50, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * my two cents is that the context is really important: white memers imitating a ugandan accent or making jokes about impoverishment and warlords is a little dubious. I'd say it's a little like harambe in that some people are using it innocuously but some people are using it in a racist way- the people who are using the n word or using it as a way to insult black people and Africans.&mdash; Unsigned, by: HeadlessDenise / talk / contribs
 * That is a good point. I have seen it be used plenty for racist aims. But like anything else, does that make it racist itself? EIat10s (talk) 16:59, 29 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Al Jolson Jazz Singer.JPG This should help you understand. Probably taking caricatures of other races and laughing at them is something you should not do. Fucking white males. CR (talk) 16:03, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * That's a pleasant false equivalency atop all that simplification. How does a deformed Knuckles represent a caricature of Ugandans? The only credence to that is when some people dress him up in "tribal" attire, like headbands and spears and such. But on the same token, he also gets dressed up in t-shirts and New Eras just as often. Most often he wears nothing, and the meme even had him colored blue to be Sonic instead.
 * Acting in a manner that's caricature-like is definitely questionable, but it's not terribly clear how different it is from a mere impersonation or imitation. It's not really focused on race anyway, in that case. It's an imitation of the action from a movie, which is meant to me comical because the movie was purposely over-acted with ungrammatical speech.
 * Hurt me more, since you seem more concerned with being accusatory than communicative. EIat10s (talk) 20:24, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Not sure if this is relevant, but Knuckles in the video game was characterized to be like a black person. His stages had all rap songs. His main theme song was also a rap, with the line "I'm doing this for my race". The songs were all composed by the black rapper Hunnid Pacent. 04:50, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I like more sources beyond "music choices". Because Knuckles doesn't seem to be voice acted by a black person. After all, they could be just going for a particular theme that stands out. But again, my strength lies in some other franchise, not Sonic. 15:59, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

Translation to Greek
Hi! I would be really interested in translating some articles of RationalWiki into Greek, seeing that there have not been any translations yet. As per what I've read here at How to create a new language project Ι am supposed to come by at the Saloom and propose my project. So, here I am! I would like to inform you though that I am only one, contrary to your preference of at least two people working on a given language. While I can imagine why you are taking such precautions, I dont have any other credentials of trustworthiness besides my word that I'm not a troll or vandal or anything toxic. So am I allowed to proceed with the translation even though I am alone, or do I need to get permission from a moderator? Thank you!
 * I would like to see a Greek project. I know a bit, and Google Translate does too, so I can review your contributions to make sure nothing bad is in there. Just create an article in your draftspace like with my Swedish article on Sweden and work on translating it, then you can move it to mainspace when it looks ready. By the way, please sign your talk page/Saloon Bar comments with four tildes ~ so we can identify you. 22:05, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * We do already have a category for articles in Greek that already has one article in it. I'm not going to link to the category directly because its name is in the Greek alphabet. If I tried, I'd just get it wrong five or six times before shouting and swearing at my computer and giving up. So here's a link to the Babel category. You can see that Greek is already one of the languages included. Anyway, that means it's not a new language project. It's an existing one. So go ahead and add as many more translations as you like. Spud (talk) 11:54, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I do remember seeing something in Greek, but I thought it was a translation of the Greece article. I couldn't find it by typing in Ελλάδα and figured it had been deleted, but I think I must've been remembering wrong and I probably saw the Ελληνικά category. 14:12, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

SotU terrifies me
Nothing in it was not fascist-as-hell. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 16:45, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The content struck me as vintage Republican. The delivery was sedate (or maybe sedated). What terrified me personally was the obvious Republican enthusiasm and unification around this guy. Whereas only a few months before, it seemed a good number had doubts about him as a president. Now it's as if they have decided, as a body, "we can use this guy". Leuders (talk) 17:11, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Lol, we're gonna have a dictatorship, it'll be hilarious. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 18:05, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

I was up really early so I actually watched part of the livestream; Paul Ryan's hilarious "I died inside a long time ago" faces and reactions were amazing. Lord Aeonian (talk) 18:37, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

Ancient atheism
Atheism was apparently somewhat popular in pre-monotheistic society. The reason was likely that monotheistic religions had/have a unified doctrine, while polytheistic ones tend to be open to interpretation, meaning it's much harder to enforce absolutely. 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 00:12, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Wasn't Socrates killed for nor recognizing official dieties?Vorarchivist (talk) 21:53, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I've heard Anaxagoras and probably Aristarchus too got into trouble due to their experiments and ideas, in the case of the former for having suggested the Sun was basically a huge red-hot rock (what about Helios, Sun's deity then?). As for the rest, even with that in mind and things being very different to during Christian times I doubt priest(esse)s liked someone questioning the existence of the gods Panzerfaust (talk) 23:52, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

Dumpster dive
As it stands, updating the dumpster dive is a pain. Every Monday, someone has to post a new article of the week. Possible solutions: 04:43, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 1) Create a bot to maintain the page
 * 2) Revamp the system
 * 3) nuke the dumpster dive
 * I'd support the first option but then again I don't actually know how much work goes into creating a bot. Comrade GC (talk) 04:47, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I propose we:
 * Make a bot to maintain it
 * Have it show up on MediaWiki:Sitenotice when something else isn't using it.
 * Thoughts? 𝔊𝔬𝔞𝔱-𝔈𝔪𝔭𝔢𝔯𝔬𝔯 𝔅𝔦𝔤𝔰 (𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡𝔰 𝔬𝔣 𝔴𝔦𝔰𝔡𝔬𝔪/𝔞𝔠𝔥𝔦𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔪𝔢𝔫𝔱𝔰) 04:58, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It sounds like a good plan, though we'll only know for sure if we implement it. Comrade GC (talk) 05:01, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Does anyone actually contribute to the dumpster dive? It'd be a shame for it to die so soon, but if nobody's using it I don't see the point in doing more with it. Personally, I've never worked on those pages because making significant contributions to articles isn't really my thing. Just minor corrections, mostly. —Kazitor, pending 05:26, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I worked on them for awhile (check my minor contributions to the Uber article) but then I got distracted by other things. Comrade GC (talk) 13:54, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I've added some articles and paragraphs here and there, the problem is that sometimes the topic ends up being very specific like a person without internet presence so it gets hard to add to. Vorarchivist (talk) 04:56, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I've just taken a look at previous DD entries and nearly all of them had hardly any improvement during their week in the spotlight beyond adding a few citations - and two (FactsCan and Fad diet)) don't even exist anymore. I'm not entirely certain that, give the aforesaid faff about maintaining and updating the page, it's worth the effort. Sorry. Wilder Bicycle 16:37, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

Should we nuke the dumpster dive
And remove it from Template:Useful Links? 17:43, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

Yes

 * 1) Never used it and it doesn't seem to be having much impact.  18:39, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 2) It was a nice idea, and I don't like to diss someone for trying to improve mainspace, but sadly it hasn't worked out in practice. Wilder Bicycle 18:45, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
 * 3) As I said above. —Kazitor, pending 21:35, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

Goat
Nuke? Normal practice in the past was for projects like this to be mothballed and laid gently to rest. See RationalWiki:Projects for instance. Wilder Bicycle 22:16, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I think the fact that Article of the Weak died should have been an early warning. —Kazitor, pending 22:27, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I think nuking is a bit harsh but it definitely isn't working the way it currently is.Vorarchivist (talk) 03:12, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Article of the weak was great at first but its complex approval process (there was a maze of subpages you had to go through) eventually put people off contributing to it. Wilder Bicycle 10:01, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
 * The page needs substantial retooling (e.g. maybe it's too optimistic to have an article of the week), but I like Fuzzy's idea of an extra category of Articles requiring attention. Cosmikdebris (talk) 22:38, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Better awareness of that category (perhaps just more prominent placing) of that category might be all that's required. How about a navbox that lists a random sample of articles in the category? Wilder Bicycle 19:22, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes, article of the week was a good idea on paper. It would have been better if it was automated by a bot. MediaWiki has an extension called Extension:FeaturedFeeds which may be the solution. 20:15, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

Historical note
The goal of RW:DD in my mind was to have a 4th alternative in RW:AFD: delete, keep, merge/redirect, and improve or else delete. Many keep votes would say something like "this article sucks but the topic is good". 19:14, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
 * One feature that I didn't implement was that, at the end of the week, the article should have a straight "keep or delete" vote. 19:15, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Perhaps we could reimplement it with that idea? That seems fair enough in my opinion. But maybe rather than one article each week, we could just have a collection of articles that will be deleted after a week (from the AFD resolution) that people can work on as they choose. —Kazitor, pending 04:54, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
 * , : I created a proof of concept on my userspace. 20:25, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
 * That could probably go as some sub-page of the to-do list, since cleaning them up is something that needs doing. —Kazitor, pending 22:55, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Actually, I've realised another alternative: once that draft namespace I suggested is implemented (currently waiting on someone to act on the pull request Christopher made), we can just move poor but missional articles there. Then, if you want to improve something, browse the draft namespace. —Kazitor, pending 04:22, 3 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Bring it! Wilder Bicycle 08:53, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

Your thoughts on the BBC documentary about Blackburn made 10 years after the last
https://www.reddit.com/r/Documentaries/comments/7sek5y/white_fright_divided_britain_2018_in_2007/ ShiningSwordofThoughts (talk)