RationalWiki:Saloon bar/Archive447

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, (new)(back)

Create local copy of RW for offline reading

Hello everyone!

I am looking for a way to get an up-to-date local copy of all public RationalWiki pages, preferably in html format, to read offline. I did try informing myself on things and know tidbits here and there, I know of the regular dumps of Wikipedia and I know that there used to be dumps of RW as well. I know it would technically be possible to use wget or curl to download RW but I'd rather not. Does someone know what I can do to get the stuff I'm looking for? Thank you very much in advance. ULTRACOMFY (talk) 14:03, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Uh, this is a wiki site. Pages are updated on a rather frequent basis. You want an up-to-date archive, and you want it to be available offline. I… uh… I have no idea how to help you. Heck, I don't know if what you're asking for is even possible. Luigifan18 (talk) 14:43, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia does this by providing dump snapshots in various formats.[1] I do not know the "MediaWiki" details" to technically enable this. I imagine it wouldn't be a top priority to do so. (Rationalwiki is small.) "Up to date" of course is not what you are going to get.

There's apparently a site [2] that archives websites in the Zim format. ZIM is one of the main formats to get a full Wikipedia dump. Not sure how well this youzim.it site works though. BobJohnson (talk) 15:36, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Exporting_all_the_files_of_a_wiki

Have fun! KarmaPolice (talk) 16:04, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Thank you so much for sharing! The thing you sent me doesn't export to html but should work fine regardless. That makes it my first time using XAMPP and setting up PHP and MediaWiki but I think I'm getting the hang of it. Recently looked into installing my own personal, locally stored "wiki" for notetaking and essay writing so this knowledge actually comes in useful. Right now I'm pulling article revisions using the provided maintenance script, working on "A_New_Astronomical_Quranic_Method_for_The_Determination_Of_The_Greatest_Speed_C" at this exact moment in time (which means it's gone through the numbers). Not fun and also taking a while, but as far as I can see it's working and moving on at a consistent rate. Thanks again, ULTRACOMFY (talk) 01:17, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

If you don't want to do the DIY method, there have been irregular RationalWiki:Content dumps every few years. You're in luck there was one this year: apparently none since 2019. The actual dumps are now stored at the Internet Archive.[3] One that includes the Russian Language RW was done in 2019:[4] Bongolian (talk) 02:55, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Quick question: How did we come to have a Russian RW and a French RW but not a Spanish one, if RationalWiki had a North American to European ratio of like infinity back then (and arguably still does)? --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 03:16, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

The is no French RW as far as I'm aware. The Russian RW dates back to 2011 as far as I can tell.[5] The idea was that once there's an unspecified critical mass of articles in a given language, then it could get its own domain rather than residing in Category:Babel. Bongolian (talk) 04:38, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes. The French articles are here on this wiki. There isn't a separate domain for a French RationalWiki. Spud (talk) 04:48, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

I think I am going to take that. The getText script from the guide crashed at the Alt-Right glossary after revision 2562005 with "Error 1153: Got a packet bigger than 'max_allowed_packet' bytes", "Function: MediaWiki\Storage\SqlBlobStore::storeBlob" and then goes on to print out what I assume would be the content of the revision that's quite the experience. ULTRACOMFY (talk) 04:57, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

So basically, you're looking to make a personal wiki to use as a digital commonplace/note/scrap book? I'm interested in how this works out; personally how I handle the digital 'loose papers' is to have a big 'Notes' folder and now and then go through it and 'bind' them up as a PDF and put them in my 'Library' folder. KarmaPolice (talk) 11:26, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes! I like the various templates/"building block" options that, for example, RationalWiki has. Easy categorization, editing, drawing connections between topics by linking, user and permissions management for if ever I want to host it on a server for access from abroad or by third parties, great general layout (I like the general layout with the sidebar to the left), many functions like listing articles, different namespaces, inserting of references, allows inserting all kinds of files, customizable the world over and it's dynamic, ie. references are updated if the parent is changed. I think it's perfect! I have already started importing templates and functions to lay the foundation for writing things later and I am already quite happy, here is a quick excerpt. ULTRACOMFY (talk) 22:18, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

Kiwix used to be the way to do this, though I'm not sure how old their downloadable copy is - David Gerard (talk) 17:15, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I used Kiwix for Wikipedia before and it's great, actually. BobJohnson suggested to use [6] and it does things, but I tried to download the most recent content dump as suggested by Bongolian. That too does things until I realized I'm working with an .xml file, and now that I am working on my own private note-taking "wiki" and using the Import function for some templates I know what these .xml files are for. I assume I would have to import that into a new wikimedia wiki? The idea is interesting but I don't want to have to run a literal local server just to read some websites. I don't want the entire Wikimedia running, I just want a static way to look at RationalWiki. So with your input I went on Kiwix's website again and scrolling through the pages I realized that they actively promote [7], and when I went onto THAT website again I realized it says "Powered by Kiwix and Webrecorder, thanks to a Mozilla Open-Source Support Award", which means it's actually an official project, not some poorly made patch job powered by hope and love, and perhaps a few malware samples. So I'll just let it create a new, up-to-date zim of all of RationalWiki and download THAT. At this point I'm kind of running out of enthusiasm because I tried one or two too many things to get this working... HTTrack, downloading content dumps, creating manual content dumps twice over, crying a lot and waiting several hours in between because I have a 1MB/sec connection. I will take this zim and I will keep it close. Thank you all for your input(s)! ULTRACOMFY (talk) 22:18, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

The Annual Culture War of December.

It's about time that I bring this up, but what people are supposed to "say" during the month of December has been a contentious topic due to the dozens of festivals during the month of the southern solstice, as well as the desire for various people to only recognize one of them, all of them, or somewhere in between. Any thoughts and feelings on this? TheEternalOutsider (talk) 21:21, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

What I would say for this dilemma is "Happy December." TheEternalOutsider (talk) 21:21, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

I personally refer to it as “Happy Winter Solstice”, and would make jokes about going along with it when someone at my high school (when I had just deconverted and was rather tumultuously and embarrassingly just starting out on this site) complained about “political correctness”; my suburban neighborhood near Seattle was a little conservative by WA standards at the time, and was paradoxically both very homophobic and very gay. Ah, simpler times, when I had hours and hours to spend on this site --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 21:34, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

I just adapt to whatever fits the moment. "Merry Christmas", "Happy Holidays", etc. Whatever. It's a multicultural world, and the Bill O'Reilly manufactroversy (a now tired 19 year old rage with even older roots) is just a whine complaining that other cultures exist. If I ever met someone in Fox News rage mode, I'd probably throw in something "off the Fox News worldview track" (like say, the Dongzhi Festival) just to attempt to confuse them. But I've personally never met anyone that I can remember who really raged about this topic much in person. BobJohnson (talk) 21:46, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

The only acceptable answer is “Happy Honda Days”. 🎄Chef Moosolini’s Ristorante Italiano🎄^{Ask about our holiday specials!} 00:09, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

I say whatever occurs to me including "Happy Christmas", "Feliz Navidad" or whatever. I have no more problem with "Christmas Day" than I have with "Wednesday" (Woden's Day).Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 10:14, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

I've got this userbox on my Wikipedia user page right now and I'll put out a similar message on my user page here and on Facebook later. I'm quite partial to "Season's greetings" and "Compliments of the season" as catch-all terms, I use those online too. In real life, I'd usually just say, "Merry Christmas". But I'll be saying, "Happy New Year", a lot more since I'm in Taiwan, where most people don't really celebrate Christmas but they celebrate the start of a New Year on January 1 and again at Lunar New Year. Spud (talk) 05:32, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Happy holidays! "The phrase has been used as a Christmas greeting in the United States for more than 100 years." or Season's greetings! "Victorian Christmas cards bore a variety of salutations, including "compliments of the season" and "Christmas greetings." By the late 19th century, "with the season's greetings" or simply "the season's greetings" began appearing. By the 1920s it had been shortened to "season's greetings," and has been a greeting card fixture ever since. Several White House Christmas cards, including U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower's 1955 card, have featured the phrase." --Äxl (talk) 10:56, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Just wait till Faux News finds out about that one. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 21:17, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘just say, "happy hallothanksmas!" you're metaphorically killing three birds with one stone. The G (talk) 00:49, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

New book

I've just bought the Art of war by Sun Tzu, reading through it, it seems over rated to me, what is everyone else's opinion? ^{— Unsigned, by: 110.151.27.27 / talk / contribs}

It's basically the size of a pamphlet. The premise is simple; only fools attempt to win on the battlefield. CorruptUser 09:14, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Whatabout 'i would rather betray the world than have the world betray me'? (Cao Cao: other variants available.) Anna Livia (talk) 19:48, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

And it's entirely silent on siege warfare, which is a rather obvious omission. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 21:27, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

It's basically an ancient Chinese "military strategy for dummies" book. Good book for strategy game players and corporate middle managers who have no idea what they're doing.⍼ (talk)

It's a book that goes into great detail about how to conduct a war in ancient China. Unfortunately, coked up finance bozos in the 1980s decided it was a complete manual to being a mighty corporate paperwork warrior and got very weird about it - David Gerard (talk) 00:23, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Okay, now my curiosity's piqued. What the heck happened? Luigifan18 (talk) 00:29, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

In a word, Orientalism. In a few more words, people in the West got interested in various Eastern topics, did some cursory looks, misinterpreted/reinterpreted things, and ran with what they found. It's the same reason you can find "The Zen of [insert topic here]" floating around, and why "yoga" in English bears very little resemblance to the yogacara school of thought which has been around in Hinduism for over 2,000 years. (I've long considered Carvaka/Lokyata to be much more convincing than any of the other nonsense these regions spout, at least The Art of War has somewhat useful pragmatic advice) The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 07:18, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Concern troll alert (tRump's Ig Noble Award for lifetime achievement)

🤡Concern Troll Alert!🤡 Krusty the Clown finds concern trolling dull and not amusing. Imagine being on fire, running up to a firefighter screaming for help, and they hook their hands in their pockets and say, "Actually, before we start, I think you should say you're violently oxidizing. Not all oxidization is bad. I mean, some of my cells are performing oxidation right now, and I think it would be better if we ..."

That phenomenon where children come to despise their parents' ideals so much that they deliberately dedicate their lives to defying them

What I'm doing here is the RationalWiki equivalent of a YKTTW at TV Tropes, so bear that in mind. I'm putting it here instead of the to-do list because I'm not sure what the formal name of the phenomenon I'm describing is (if it even has one).

About a year and a half ago, when editing the article for Responding to Sam Burke's Argument That Christianity Entails Anti-Natalism, I went on a bit of a tangent about how children who are raised by abusive assholes would obviously want nothing to do with their parents' ideology, to the point of going out of their way to subvert it. (I have the edit marked in the mini-essays part of my user page.) The specific example I used was children being raised by abusive fundies becoming atheists (possibly even antitheists of the "religion is evil and must be completely abolished and erased" variety that can be seen with depressingly high frequency on Reddit), citing this as an example of how parents really can't guarantee that their children will be as religious as them (because trying too hard to do so could very well have the opposite of the desired result). While I didn't bring it up in the article due to the fact that it would have been off-topic (and this is coming from someone who once described himself as having about as much respect for the current topic of conversation as Genghis Khan did for the concept of monogamy), the phenomenon could also work the other way around, with a child of obnoxious antitheists finding faith just to defy what their parents stand for. Really, what I'm looking for is any circumstance where parents who go to egregious lengths to mold their children in their image hurt and/or piss said children off enough to push them in the opposite direction. I initially thought this to be the backfire effect, but upon reading that article, I found that it wasn't quite what I had in mind, and we don't seem to currently have an article describing the phenomenon. So… does anyone have any idea what I'm trying to describe? Luigifan18 (talk) 12:37, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

See this article in Vox. It describes an interesting thing where this effect practically cancels itself out on the broader-scale since parents and their children often don't even understand what each other's beliefs are. But more individually, my own beliefs are quite different from most of my family, and I think I can say I understand theirs pretty well as religious conservatism.

I wouldn't say I rebel against them so much as I've seen what it's about and it helped influence my dislike for how it plays out in practice. As a matter of fact I think the way they raised me still influences the "style" of my political presentations. So kind of "progressive in a conservative style" would maybe be the way to self-describe although no label truly fits me I feel; I've found similar presentations were, allegedly, historically represented by Magnus Hirschfeld and Helen Stöcker. One might say "culturally conservative" in the "cultural Christian" sense. But I've moved away from even this slightly/moderately. So it's not non-negotiable. On the flip side, I've seen how right-wing personalities who were assimilated by a liberal or leftist environment present themselves differently from those who grew up in entirely conservative environments. Examples might be Gavin McInnes, Richard Spencer, and Jackson Hinkle, the last two of which I observed some strange personality similarities in.

I am kind of antitheist. But that's more a personal belief and I still favor legal rights for every religion, probably along the lines of what's provided by the First Amendment. Things like Scientology do start to challenge where the line on that is, and I do wonder whether churches being tax-exempt isn't an implicit endorsement of religion by the state. Overall I have no real hopes that religion will stop being a thing any time soon so while I may criticize it here and there I'm not on some crusade. Would be folly. Anyway regarding more progressive Christianity, the thing here is that I recognize Christianity was probably progressive in the first place. So even if it's returned to those roots I can see it veering back into conservatism at any point in the future even if progressive Christianity predominates again. The same could even be said for irreligion I suppose but the difference is irreligion doesn't involve a book telling me I'm obligated to do what it says (and so giving extreme weight to whatever the latest correct interpretation is). Chillpilled (talk) 13:03, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Sorry, I don’t really have time to read what you just said, but I just realized that it would be prudent to quote myself so that people don't have to bumble through the article looking for the mini-essay I'm talking about (it's currently note 4, but I digress…):

“”In many cases, children of evangelists/fundamentalists will end up becoming atheists precisely because their parents were strict and controlling to the point of being (borderline) abusive (not to mention being excruciatingly bigoted and overall unpleasant), creating a powerful incentive for the children to virulently reject and oppose everything their parents stood for. Children who are raised by more reasonable Christian parents who emphasize the loving, warm aspects of God's stated personality and Christianity's lessons on compassion, empathy, and charity, as well as encouraging them to form their own relationship with God, think for themselves, and not regard faith as some twisted zero-sum game where one either follows their religion's holy book and dogma perfectly or is a filthy infidelic hypocritical hell-bound sinner (and yes, we do have to be vague on that last one, as there are thousands of Christian sects, each of which has their own interpretation of the Bible and various extra-biblical codes), are more likely to stay Christian throughout their lives, at least in the cultural sense, or at the very least not regard God and Christians with hostility.

As I said prior, the point I was making here was that fundie parents who go whole-hog on the fundie lifestyle and do stuff like denouncing opinions that deviate from their worldview as pure evil, treat homosexuality like some sort of depraved disease, wallop their children for setting a toe out of line, etc. tend to shoot themselves in the foot, as their domineering and abusive parenting style produces children who resent and dislike them so much that they make themselves as distant from their parents' ideology as possible. And I don't think this phenomenon is unique to fundies. Anyone with an intense ideology who has toxic behavior that harms and/or embarrasses their children is likely to end up with children who want nothing to do with the ideology that their parents endorsed — and while the effect might be stronger if the toxic ideology directly led to the bad behavior, it might happen even if the ideology and bad behavior had nothing to do with each other. (I dunno, I think it might need more research.) So, again, does anyone know what to call this phenomenon, or if RationalWiki has or needs an article on it? Luigifan18 (talk) 13:19, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Zeal of the convert is at least adjacent. But no, I don't think we have a page on this particular phenomenon. I'm not sure what we could call it, either. Chillpilled (talk) 13:32, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Just spitballing - the disinterest of the dissuaded? I always adore added alliterative appeal. Semipenultimate (talk) 21:23, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

What I'm looking at goes a little further than "disinterest"… it's more along the lines of outright antipathy. Luigifan18 (talk) 00:33, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Although it's not an exact match, Reactance Theory is the closest thing I'm aware of. Jessamyn (talk) 05:51, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

I would describe this as a simple 'action/reaction'. Until we're an adult, our parents are normally the folks we know the most about. Even more importantly, we observe their 'private' as well as 'public' faces. We notice the lies, the contradictions, the hypocrisy and the selfishness. We listen to their 'pearls of wisdom' and assay them using the scales of reality - like Luigi notes, we read the Bible, then look at your actions and find you wanting. I'm reminded here of a quote from the novel Fatherland; '[Hitler] once proclaimed he had taught the German people to think clearly. Now you turn that clear thinking on us'. You become our anti-role models; the people we do not want to be, the lives which we do not desire to inhabit. We are a net results of all our experiences to date, and if we have come to see a strong correlation between [say] 'religious folks' and 'pompous, selfish and bitter authoritarian jerkwads' there's normally a damn good reason why we got there.

This is why fundie cults love to homeschool, put a media belljar over you and discourage 'outside' friends - at best, it's an attempt to avoid 'shapes and colours' of the outside to avoid the victim questioning anything, at worst full-blown coercive control. There's a reason that after you escape and deprogram yourself you become so anti-Them to the point it can become your own crusade. KarmaPolice (talk) 22:36, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

coming of age

hey all, long time no see from me, i know. i meant to make this post a couple of months ago, but life got busy and i forgot about my page here almost entirely. i'm 18 now (although it hardly feels like it most of the time), and i have more privileges as a result. what should i do with my newfound freedom? Jake Holmes^{yell at me} 19:47, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

I don't want to encourage you do drink, but there are many countries around the world where you can drink beer right now. If you like to party, go abroad and get drunk. Other than that, yeah, nothing really changes. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 19:54, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Could you list the privileges you have obtained as a result of your age/geographical area? That way people will be better able to suggest which ones you should most exploit for fun and profit?Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 20:33, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

whatever you get as part of being an american. i can vote and drink and own a gun(?). i can also drive, though i don't own a car at the moment. Jake Holmes^{yell at me} 20:55, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

In that case you should make sure you are registered to vote.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 09:10, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

In the US, 18 is also (broadly speaking) the age you can gamble (though many casinos are 21+), buy the pornography and other "age restricted" stuff (which in the United States includes different oddities depending on the locale, such as dry ice and spray paint). You can now also do a lot of boring "adult" things (eg child labor laws no longer apply so you can work full-time and in some "hazardous" occupations; you can now do "bank" and "credit card" stuff; you can now have your own place, etc.) Of course, in the US, the alcohol is verboten for another 3 years (even though from what I remember of that time people worked around this "pesky regulation" regardless), but this age restriction is not found in the vast majority of countries in the world. BobJohnson (talk) 21:16, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm 20 so I still have to wait one more year before I can participate in the drinking game to be played whenever someone says "But I thought this was supposed to be RATIONALWiki!" Drink!. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 23:27, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

I voted for the first time in 2020 and it felt cool, actually not because of the conventional elections since every one of my preferred candidates lost in my state/area, but because I was able to vote for a direct ballot initiative that ended up passing. Even if one is excessively pessimistic about American elections I recommend voting if only just for ballot initiatives and referendums, if they exist in your state. They're one of the most effective tools we have for direct democracy anymore. As a matter of fact, Maine established ranked-choice voting in state-level elections due to a ballot initiative. I believe Alaska did something similar, too. So while it's cliché, I do find that gaining and exercising the right to vote once you're 18 is still important in this country. Chillpilled (talk) 03:32, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

It felt very good when I voted for the first time in last year's midterm election. All of my preferred candidates won, except the one for my State Senate district (but I wasn't too sad, the one who instead won is a wonderful state senator all the same). --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 06:33, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

There is something new I [think] you can do, Jake - run for office. You can also join things. Evil prevails when the good do nothing and all that. KarmaPolice (talk) 22:03, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Server bill: calling Trent

Anyone know how to contact Trent? I emailed him, but a method that catches his atteniton? Anyway, the Linode server bill's overdue - David Gerard (talk) 00:21, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Did you try his academic email address? Bongolian (talk) 01:01, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

--Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 18:39, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Trump-eting hype

There have been various web pages, and an article in the current issue of (UK magazine) The Week etc making alarmist statements as to his intents if he gets re-elected, including deploying 'usage referred to in Godwin's Law' what is the reality - as to his statements and what would happen if he were to return to the White House?Anna Livia (talk) 18:19, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

I think it's easy to see that much of the GOP currently is a "ruscism-lite" party in a similar manner to Hungary's Fidesz. (Putin IMHO is a much more apt comparison than Hitler.)

It's difficult for me to leap to the "oh noes ends of democracy!" conclusion of some commentators. Though certainly the chance of an "illiberal democracy" exists, that definitely cannot be written off (and is a reason to vote for ol' Joe). But the Trump-led GOP has shown themselves to be, repeatedly, over the last decade, incompetent at governing. Though there are sycophants, even Trump appointed judges have frowned on some of the illiberal shenanigans of Trump and various Trump-y governors like Ron DeSantis. In addition, the "Westpoint crowd" hated Trump 1.0 back in the day, and I see no evidence things have changed. This would rule out "military shenanigans", though since some of our more authoritarian police love the Trump and vice versa, there could be issues in this direction (as happened under Trump 1.0).

In addition, the United States is federalized; governors are fairly powerful. The parts of the country that actually make money tend to detest Trumpism. I can't see them bowling over to GOP illiberalism without a fight.

So, what certainly is guaranteed IMHO: A) Trump will yell a lot and generally be chaotic, even if he doesn't do much. B) Trump's an isolationist, and I think he'll certainly do some moves (eg perhaps dissolve NATO) that will ding our international clout even further than Trump 1.0 did; C) Like the Freedom Caucus is KOing the House, Trump also will clash with the "Senate Old Guard" like Mitch McConnell, with unpredictable results; D) Trump will use some sort of bully pulpit to... well, be Trump, and be the crass ol' racist sexist piggie old fart everyone knows he is, basically embarrassing every sober-minded American out there. BobJohnson (talk) 18:45, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

The Week magazine (which is 'fairly neutral, given its nature' from a UK standpoint) has a section heading pairing Trump and Fascism.

Is some version of the 'Salazar recovery "ruling in private" option' feasible? Anna Livia (talk) 19:59, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

This article? [8]

The "ruscism" crowd is not dissimilar from "old school" fascism. Trump's usage of "vernim" is close enough to the Nazi legal term "Volksschädling" (which is translated as "human pests" or "human vernim") to make the commentary outcry a "not Godwin's Law" moment.

One "issue" with trying to figure out a Trump 2.0 term is his rhetoric has definitely become way more authoritarian and sectarian. This means nothing if his "bark is worse than his bite", but it's still a wildcard in case it isn't. BobJohnson (talk) 20:47, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

Different heading. Anna Livia (talk) 00:03, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

Trump and Trumpism pretty solidly meet the 14 characteristics, or at least most of them. Remember that when fascism came to America, at least a politically relevant form of it, it didn't come with Swastikas and copies of Mein Kampf. It came draped in the Stars and Stripes with preachers at the pulpit with a Cross above their heads. Carthage (talk) 18:17, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

What are the '14 points' in this context? Anna Livia (talk) 19:45, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Here.

To give an example of how Trumpism fits the 14 characteristics, I'll list the characteristics and a few of the ways Trumpism fits these characteristics. Keep in mind the examples listed are not exhaustive, although these are the 14 characteristics.

1) Cronyism and corruption. Trump promoted members of his own family, and close associates, to positions of power they were unqualified for.

2) Demonization of academia and the intelligentsia. COVID-19 denialism is probably the example that comes to everyone's minds here, but promotion of antivaxxer bullshit also counts.

3) Subversion of the electoral process. 2020 US Presidential election and 1/6. Duh.

4) Supremacy of the military. Pardoning of war criminals, escalation in jingoist rhetoric, et cetera.

5) Uncritical promotion of nationalism. Trumpists will wave the flag, back the blue, and call their enemies "un-American".

6) Promotion of aesthetic law and order. Blue Lives Matter, anyone?

7) Disdain for recognition of human rights. I don't think I need to seriously list the many human rights abuses committed by the Trumpist regime, and how his base cheered it on.

8) Otherization. Donald "All Mexicans are Rapists" "Democrats are Vermin" "Muslims celebrated 9/11" Trump.

9) Obsession with national security. "When the looting starts, the shooting starts." "Let's build a great big wall."

10) Promotion of corporate power. Excessive promotion of the agenda of big oil, Trump tax cuts that predominantly benefited the wealthy, deregulations that predominantly benefited the wealthy plutocrat class et cetera.

11) Suppression of organized labor. The AFL-CIO released a long list of Trump's "catastrophic" anti-union record: [9]

12) Rampant sexism and promotion of the patriarchy. Donald "If she wasn't my daughter, I'd fuck her" Trump. Trans-military ban. LGBTQ+ people are groomers. Feminism is responsible for the decline of marriage et cetera.

13) Controlled mass media: Fox News, OANN, demonization of mainstream outlets as "fake news" et cetera.

14) Promotion of a theocratic agenda: Trumpism is heavily correlated with the dominance of the Religious Right in mainstream right-wing politics.

Fascism isn't so much a coherent ideology as it is a framework for power. When people call Trumpism fascist, they are not being alarmist. Carthage (talk) 20:29, 3 December 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, I've been active enough in Reddit's political subreddits to be aware of Project 2025 and very nervous about it. Not so much for myself — I live in New England, where that shit is not gonna fly — but I can't help feeling awfully worried about the people living in the rest of America while society goes to hell in a handbasket. Luigifan18 (talk) 19:00, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Trump is horrible for a number of reasons but I'm not sure why that 9/11 thing is in there. Many people did celebrate 9/11 and mourn the death of Bin Laden. You should also note that Trump's antivax rhetoric started before covid and includes the vaccines cause autism bs, which is its own level of special.Brokenglass (talk) 16:06, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

George Santos

Has finally been expelled. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 20:01, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

They should've made him a non-voting delegate. That would honestly be more humiliating and not make him a martyr either. Carthage (talk) 20:30, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

That would have been amazing, absolutely brilliant lol.Brokenglass (talk) 15:59, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

And I’ll do you one better: Hold a special election for his vacated seat (which then could be taken by a Democrat, Crooked George only narrowly won in the first place) --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 21:10, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Under New York law, they legally already have to hold a special election within 70 days. 🎄Chef Moosolini’s Ristorante Italiano🎄^{Ask about our holiday specials!} 00:11, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

He's not a martyr. His approval rating is so low, nobody will miss him. Chillpilled (talk) 23:40, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

Non-voting delegates still receive a salary (and in Santos' case the ability to steal more credit cards). The expulsion hit him where it hurts. Bongolian (talk) 04:46, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

a fairly nuanced, if reasonable objection to santos' ouster is that it happened before he was convicted of any crime, which was an unprecedented move. now, there is precedent. (a south carolina republican who is part of the "moderate" wing of the gop pointed this out, though she has a history of flip-flopping, so take whatever she says with a grain of salt.) who is to say they won't try to remove, say, rashida tlaib or ilhan omar next over their views on israel?

other than that, there is really no loss in removing santos from congress. (if anything, it might benefit the democrats, depending on how the impending special election goes.) The G (talk) 03:17, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

According to one report I saw, [10] there was a "tipping point" last minute email (particularly for Republicans) where a fellow House Republican, Max Miller(R-OH), described how Santos made several unauthorized credit card charges to both himself and his mother. Of course, this was on top of other factors such as Santos's refusal to cooperate with the investigation and the findings of the investigation itself (where he was abusing campaign funds for personal luxuries at a level even politicians couldn't stomach). So while "unprecedented", this sort of was an "unprecedented" situation, where even people on the same "political team" were getting ripped off by this swindler. BobJohnson (talk) 03:39, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Even if that seat flips, it doesn't change much in the wider picture of the House, although it's true the GOP only has a slim majority. But the GOP obviously felt the cost/benefit ratio weighed against Santos in the end. I think a part of that is how he started fraternizing with Gaetz and the rebels crowd who keep overthrowing the Speaker every few weeks or whatever it is. Losing one seat certainly won't be fatal, especially when Santos became such a thorn in their side. If anything, their calculus may have even been that removing him could help them overall by removing one of the "chaos elements". Chillpilled (talk) 04:04, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Tampons For Men - AITA?

Neutral-ish commentary... https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/a-tampon-exists-for-men-but-some-argue-its-not-enough_uk_65661742e4b03ac1cd178276

For the crappier [but more common] commentary... https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/world-first-tampons-men-insult-171617972.html

Okay, reading this I don't really see the point. Reasoning being;

1 - I don't think there's enough transmen who need this product to support it being stocked in any physical shop.

2 - Like Sparks mentioned, buying this product would out yourself as trans to everyone who knows what it is.

3 - That heavy 'male' branding will be as annoying to NBs than the current 'female' branding these products have.

4 - The 'traditional' versions are - from as far as I can tell - being increasingly 'de-gendered', even though they still reside in what I term 'the pink zone' of the shop.

The only mitigating factor I can see here is a variant of 4 - that going into 'the pink zone' can be rather nerve-wracking even if you know you're simply buying stuff which has been pointlessly gendered [soaps, scrubs and even nail files] and so having a packet or two in the 'guy zone' might make it easier. Plus, I can get some transmen won't want to go into said pink zone. But there's a very simple solution to this that I use for my stuff - buy it online.

Am I missing anything here? KarmaPolice (talk) 17:03, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Up there amongst the least pressing issues of all time. An underlying hint is the fact that it involves debating the appropriate "branding" for a consumable product. In Finland and England, wait times for gender transition appointments (and, in the case of England, medical appointments in general or so I hear...) are excessively long: now that's something to talk about. Chillpilled (talk) 17:34, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

[laughs] Yeah. If this was the most pressing issue transmen faced I'd be the first to cheer. While most normies don't get the mental stresses of having to go in and going to the 'wrong' bit of the shop [perhaps also hating the reminder of your sex/gender mismatch] but there's already other solutions to this issue.

Plus, the maker's own site [I looked] talks about it being for asexual folks too. Which any trans/NB person knows has sod all relevance to this issue. So I chalk this up to simply 'normal company tries to jump on bandwagon to make money', which is normal activity for companies, not a 'conspiracy against women' or some crud being punted by TERFs etc. KarmaPolice (talk) 18:38, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Responding to the various points about stocking/buying then in a shop - mail-order would seem to be the obvious solution.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 19:12, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

True, but in that case you can buy a pack of 'normal' tampons. Just make sure you find a brand where the inner packaging is plain/neutral. KarmaPolice (talk) 19:20, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Lobbypedia

Someone in Germany has pointed to me this website about German lobbying, thought it was really despite it being in German. [11] Thoughts. Euromec (talk) 22:21, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Looks like a good source given that there are extensive citations to mainstream media. Bongolian (talk) 01:34, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

OpenSecrets is a good source for US lobbying. Plutocow (talk) 01:55, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

@Euromec There's a short summary of Lobbypedia on the German Wikipedia, indicating that it is supported by donations and edited by registered users. It won the Grimme Online Award for journalistic quality on the internet in 2012. Bongolian (talk) 00:59, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Political commentator

Our infamous Allen jones from sky news has been accused of allegations of sexual harassment from multiple men, why am I not surprised. ^{— Unsigned, by: 110.151.27.27 / talk / contribs}

Haggard's Law strikes again? Carthage (talk) 01:37, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

To be fair, homophobes who don't break Haggard's law don't make the news. Spotlight effect and all. An Advocate (talk) 02:30, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Who the heck is Allen Jones? Luigifan18 (talk) 02:59, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Alan Jones (radio broadcaster) Chillpilled (talk) 04:25, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Congratulations one and all

To the mods we have chosen for the wiki! May you be up to thoughtpolicing and oppressing us by stomping on our faces repeatedly containing HCM in this upcoming year that just might be more climactic than the year when I was one of y'all, where I at worst had to rename a few vile usernames and get a couple long-term Conservapedian trolls banned via Coop cases- what with one of the most incendiary topics in human history on everyone's minds once again (and this time people on both sides are mighty passionate about what their TVs and phone apps tell them to think about it, believing that they "stand with [preferred side], and thus sTaNd WiTh hUmAnItY!!1!oneleventy!!one!!!" and that those who don't blindly lick the boots of one side are not only wrong but reveal themselves as monsters who now deserve condemnation), and 2024's US election cycle coming up. What fun.

But I believe in you, you'll certainly be better mods than I was (I didn't run because I don't trust myself to not get busy and disappear again). --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 06:28, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

I think we should be concerned we only had 24 voters. Going forward, we need to be friendlier to newbies to the site, and not let wiki-drama chase people away. To the second point, well, that's what we're elected to do... CorruptUser 17:24, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

I completely agree. An Advocate (talk) 17:25, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

I agree on the drama part, a big part of why I vanished for 2 years even during the school holidays was because of Oxy’s endless drama (I was unaware of the community finally sending her packing), and because I was once one of the established editors GC started screaming at with his caps lock key and wantonly promoting- and when I called him out on it everyone got mad at me and he got off scot-free. His realization that continued participation here would do his mental health no favors is another reason why I saw fit to finally un-lurk. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 17:48, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes to the above. Congrats to the winners, even though it is a demotion of sorts. Being objective can be a tough challenge, but I have confidence that they will be up to it. Personally, I prefer to express my own opinion at all times. Mazel tov!Ariel31459 (talk) 17:54, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

I'm with you on that one Goat, I was a lurker who wanted to become active, but was dissuaded from joining because of that person. Oxy is my go to example of how one user can ruin it for everyone. Too many people here could've said something, stood up for other users, and not supported Oxy's crusade against those who posted wrongthink, but didn't because of some bad belief that if someone has the same politics as you and argues for the same things you do, then their bullying is okay. Whoever is mod, I hope you don't go as easy on the next person who takes up Oxy's mantle as they were last time and remember that someone can be right 100%, but still be an asshole about it.-Ryan1257 (talk) 20:06, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Even though none of them are up to the job, no one is perfect. Good luck! I'll be watching.UncleKrampus (talk) 17:56, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

I'm not actually sure how this happened, really. I feel a bit like the Uni student who got elected an MP despite being assured by HQ there wasn't a chance of hell of that outcome happening... KarmaPolice (talk) 21:54, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

I for one am glad to now be part of RationalWiki's new Sinister Six. Plutocow (talk) 21:58, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Eh, this is one more way I disappoint a parental figure. CorruptUser 23:02, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

If you're the Sinister Six, then who's RW's Spiderman? Carthage (talk) 23:28, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

I don't know, but aren't you supposed to be getting pictures of him for your boss? CorruptUser 14:23, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

#PayRationalWikiEditors2024. Carthage (talk) 17:35, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Luigifan's mop

I considered participating in the mod voting, but I'm not sure how trustworthy I am after the drama that cost me my mop. (I'm still missing that privilege — I can think of a few highly-obstructive page edits (generally involving <div> code abuse to put text where it really shouldn't be) that get in the way of reviewing their pages' fossil records and need to be purged…) Luigifan18 (talk) 18:31, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Yeah I know how that feels, I once lost mine after going rogue and assuming bad faith on part of a more established editor, abusing my tools on them. I re-earned it after a month of community service. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 18:50, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

I lost my tools about… a year ago, I think. I'm still not sure how to demonstrate my ability to handle the responsibility and get them back. Apparently I really hurt my case by posting a music video proposing the view that the Republican Party's current crop of politicians can't die off soon enough. Luigifan18 (talk) 18:53, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

There can be a fine line between allowing constructive debate and not tolerating abusive behavior. Community Standards have changed a lot since the beginning, and particularly since 2020. I think there's a much better handle on misbehavior because of the revision of community standards now.

As for remopping, evidence of consistent constructive edits over time, and staying out of trouble generally is a good way to go. Bongolian (talk) 20:59, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

I agree, that’s how I re-earned my mop after my embarrassing first couple of months on this site. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 21:46, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

The repeat edit warring over Luigi's "mini-essays" makes me skeptical of whether or not Luigifan is mature enough to get their mop handed back to them yet. Although Luigifan has made consecutively constructive edits, the edit-warring and occasional edits that make one tilt their heads would merit a solid goat from me. That said, Luigi has taken edit ideas to the talk page recently, so I might vote for a probationary sysop period. Carthage (talk) 21:52, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Considering Luigifan had misbehaved before that promotion (I was just reading the ATIM archives), I’d say they’re not ready yet but yes, they’re getting there and seem contrite. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 22:13, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

Does there have to be a vote? Sysoprevoke promotions are the business of moderators. The article says nothing about voting. If it is required, perhaps edit the article. I see no reason for it however. UncleKrampus (talk) 23:26, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

I'm not entirely sure what is meant by "head-tilting edits"… but thanks for the votes of confidence. Oh, and I also took the liberty of splitting this sub-conversation off so the discussion of the moderator election results can get back on track. I hope nobody minds too much. Luigifan18 (talk) 00:25, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Luigifan18 was sysoprevoked by a vote, so it should take a vote to remove that. I'll say for now that while Luigifan18 has clearly made attempts at being more constructive, the biggest issue with them is their lack of maturity, which will take a while to change. Plutocow (talk) 06:58, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

The fact that rights were removed by vote is not obviously related to whether rights are to be restored by a vote. The ordinary award of sysop rights does not require a vote. The removal of those rights does. Any moderator may restore such rights if they dare to do so. At your subordinated level of authority, I suppose you assume fewer rights as moderators. Is this an act of modesty, or is it unwillingness to stick ones neck out? UncleKrampus (talk) 02:53, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘I theoretically have the right to unilaterally ban any user I want. Does that mean I should exercise that right? Just because you're a mod doesn't mean you're above the mob. Furthermore, I don't support a resysoping of Luigifan18 at this time. Plutocow (talk) 03:13, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

True. Unlike certain types of moderator, ours are not unanswerable to nobody and actually care about the mob. And hopefully have lives outside of this wiki. This is why wiki moderators are so much better than social media ones. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 03:18, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Well, you don't need Mod powers to ban people, technically. For users that can't be banned without voting first, well, I'm not sure that mods have that power unless extreme circumstances call for it, and abuse of that power is likely grounds for de-modding. CorruptUser 04:36, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Exactly. One of the things I like the most about this site is the fact that trolls seldom last longer than 10 minutes since every good-faith editor is a sysop on here (and we have a special process for taking the privilege of being one away from those who go rogue, as a good portion of active users as of the last time I was on here have done). --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 04:37, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

I don't remember the issues with JD. Oxy's issue was, well she was shoving breadtube BS everywhere and when asked very simple questions, she had absolutely no defense beyond "I have mental disabilities; if you disagree with me you're ableist!!!". GC, well, it was strange; he was normally a reasonable person but if someone disagreed with his worldview there's a chance he'd snap and go ballistic. CorruptUser 04:53, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Basically JD got banned for doxxing, and before that he lost his RMF board membership for using a cheap man’s checkuser using an exploit (against site rules). And yeah, as someone with ASD and ADHD, I definitely don’t miss Oxy making “ableism” a meaningless term by going “YOU HATE ME YOU FASCIST CENTRIST LIBERAL IMPERIALIST ISLAMOPHOBIC(TM) ABLEISTS!!!!!!111!!!SHIFT1!!SHIFToneeleventyone11!!!1!” and causing HCM every time she turned on her caps-lock key. She’s part of what drove me away for 2 years. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 17:08, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Off-topic on bad psychiatry

Very often the red flags of BPD are encrypted in complex, and sometimes ambiguous, inflammatory words like, "racist", "misogynist," "Islamophobic," and so forth. As if it is perfectly normal to be unkind to individuals, but horrible to be unkind to a pseudo-minority group like non-white people, women or Muslims. Let's be kind, eh?UncleKrampus (talk) 16:10, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

BPD? Borderline Personality Disorder, or something else? I'm not a psychiatrist, nor have I had an extended session with anyone here in MeatSpace, so I can't make a determination. However, it does seem to fit for several people here or formerly here...

Also, welcome back Circular. As mod, I pledge to get my revenge on you for petty reasons do my best to protect you and everyone else from excessive wiki drama.CorruptUser 17:29, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Sadly, trolls still stink up the bar occasionally with passive aggressive wanking. One wonders why "racist", "misogynist", and "Islamophobic" is the only focus? Surely, the same can apply to such fun snarl words on "the other side" as "woke", "liberal", "libtard", or that all-time favorite, "cuck" (and we won't even get into the more... "colorful"... dialog of places like 4chan!). So, shall we apply the BPD diagnosis to, oh, the vast majority of 4chan boards too? Nay, this is the Internet, the dickwad theory has been around since basically the Internet began (along with the alternate, probably more correct theory that a core of all of us humans are just a bunch of fuckwad asshole apes at heart). No need for fancy armchair psychological diagnostics! BobJohnson (talk) 18:14, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

"Woke", "Liberal," "libtard" are not typically found here. Passive aggressive people tend to not interact directly and express their negativity indirectly. UncleKrampus (talk) 18:56, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

BPD doesn't fit every troll. It does fit a user who constantly changes identities, has a very short and violent temper, frequently brings up un-aliving thoughts, paranoia or disconnect with reality, mentions their reckless and self-damaging behavior (drugs, promiscuity, etc), etc etc. It might not be the only diagnosis, of course; "inability to find a description of oneself in the DSM" is strong evidence for Dyslexia. CorruptUser 18:21, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

I'm too generous with myself to self-diagnose. How about emotionally incapable of difficult conversation, or EIDC. Better?UncleKrampus (talk) 18:43, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Hi there idk if any of you’ll remember me, but. Just out of retirement rq to say that I’m, really not comfortable w the discussion of BPD here. Idk if I ever mentioned this, but I actually have BPD — as in, I was fully diagnosed w the condition by a legit psychiatrist 2-3 years ago, and since then have been managing and treating it however I can (individual + group DBT, addiction counselling, medication, support from family/friends, etc). And yeah, it’s not always easy to control/manage my behaviour, and it does sometimes make me overreact, or do stupid, self-destructive, impulsive shit. But I mean… I think I’m pretty good at being kind, reasonable, and non-confrontational most of the time, and I hope the ppl here who’ve interacted w me would agree? So just bc I have BPD, doesn’t mean I’m gonna b this image you have, of “changing identities”, “short and violent temper” and so on and so on. And, honestly… personally, I really don’t think I’m comfortable with this whole thing of armchair diagnosing ppl w my actual, real condition — esp when said “diagnosis” is based on a kinda unfair and one-dimensional stereotype of “what ppl w BPD are like”. Idk like, I mean tbc I’m not like mad or upset or anything lmao, it’s nbd, and ik it’s not meant in an offensive type way or anything. I’m not tryin to start shit or make anyone feel bad or do a “Call Out Post” or whatever. I’m just sayin that like, idk, I’d appreciate a lil more sensitivity when discussin this shit ig, idk. Anyway sorry that’s all bye 💗 ASELA^ಮಾತು 💗 12:54, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I definitely remember you. And yes, you are pretty good at everything you said. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 13:14, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Hello @Asela! I remember you, how have you been? Just returned to this site a couple weeks ago myself, the disillusionment from the shit Oxy and sometimes GC were getting away with has worn off, I couldn’t help it. When I heard news of I/P reigniting like never before (remembering the flame wars that drove away many OG editors over the same issue) I thought of RW and decided to check on how y’all were holding up. Personally, I feared that Oxy would be having a field day screeching “APARTHEID SYMPATHIZER!!!!!!111!!!SHIFT1!!SHIFToneeleventyone11!!!1!” at Jewish users who even innocuously insinuate that they think their kind need a place (even if they still condemn Israel’s abusive treatment of Palestinians and to a lesser extent Israeli-Arabs/black Jews) and becoming the next Mona, and was so relieved to see that she’d finally been banished and that the discussion of the difficult topic seems to have gotten far more nuanced and (usually) civil. That, and I also unlurked upon realizing that the days of RW tolerating abusive sysops (like that one time GC promoted me and Cory, told us to “fuck barbed wire” and nobody gave a fuck) just because they’ve been around a long time and are mostly well-meaning seem to finally be over. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 17:48, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I saw our page on personality disorders, and noticed we don't have ODD (oppositional defiant disorder), and when I went to the other wiki to find where it should belong (cluster A, B or C), apparently it's not listed. What gives? Where does ODD belong? CorruptUser 16:10, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

That's because it's not a personality disorder. "Unlike conduct disorder (CD), those with ODD do not show patterns of aggression towards people or animals, destruction of property, theft, or deceit." As a diagnosis, ODD has also met some very heavy criticism. And given that psychology is facing a replication crisis, I wouldn't go about parroting claims made without sufficient skepticism (I also wouldn't armchair diagnose other users. If a user is an asshole, just call them an asshole. Don't be a dick.) Carthage (talk) 16:15, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

How did talking about my mop shift into personality disorders?!? I'm high-functioning autistic (not that autism is a personality disorder, but I digress). That doesn't justify me going into autistic screeching mode. Luigifan18 (talk) 16:20, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Welcome to the Saloon Bar. Is this your first time here? Carthage (talk) 16:21, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

My guiding principle is this; RW is not a neurodiverse safe space/support group. That while we can and should be reasonably tolerant/accepting to as many ND's as we can, the general rules of conduct still apply. KarmaPolice (talk) 16:56, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I mean, yeah. Obviously. Anyone who thinks the wiki's a safe-space has never edited this wiki. Where does armchair diagnosis fall in that? Carthage (talk) 17:32, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

And if I recall correctly, Oxy and GC would often use their respective conditions as a shield to cover their asses when they got caught causing drama and scaring people off in their anger. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 18:20, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I don’t think anyone has really argued that ND/mentally ill/etc ppl should not be held to the same standards of behaviour as others. Even within the “neurodiverse safe spaces” I participate in, the consensus has always been that your condition may explain certain behaviours, but it does not excuse them — maybe we understand why you fucked up, maybe we even empathise — but you’re still not allowed to be a shitcunt. Frankly, I feel this whole point is somewhat of a strawman — aside from sporadic instances of individual ppl using it to excuse themselves, I do not think I have seen anyone here argue that ND people should be exempt from the rules, and idk why this point is even being made

But, getting back to the actual thing I was trying to discuss — can we please just agree that it’s kinda shitty to armchair diagnose ppl with actual real-life conditions, based on reductive and denigrating stereotypes? I’m sorry, I know I’m being far more blunt and non-diplomatic than I would usually be, and I really am sorry — I don’t like being rude like this. But it’s just smth that does bother me, and I’m a little frustrated that the point I was making is kinda being ignored. Like if you disagree or think I’m being oversensitive or even that this is “proof of how insane BPD ppl are” or whatever. That’s okay, I get that there’s different perspectives and that I’m p biased here. But I just would really appreciate if ppl would actually engage with the thing I said, please.

(PS GJK, CircularReasoning, and anyone else who has welcomed me back: thank u, I appreciate your kindness, and I promise I’ll properly respond a bit later, once I’ve had more sleep and am in a better headspace. Thank u!) 💗 ASELA^ಮಾತು 💗 18:48, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Yeah I agree, it’s not in our place to make such assumptions. I was referring to Oxy saying she was neurodivergent and then asserting you are “ableist” if you disagree with her or ask questions she didn’t like, and how GC would post graphic threats to self-harm on the SB when angered or provoked, using his chronic depression and temper issues in discussions to make those he’d “temporarily” promote look inconsiderate- like he did with me here, to great effect --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 18:57, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

1) Welcome back, and 2) yeah, the whole "ASSUME makes ASS out of U and ME" thing WRGT mental health. CorruptUser 19:00, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

My general read of the issue/situation is this; much of it is mainly down to frankly, shit 'allyship'. That they confuse 'friendly place' with 'safe space' and thus, don't call out BS when it rears it's head. They also often wade into discussions with limited grasp of the nuances of it and pick a side thinking it is The Settled [and right] Opinion for the whole group and thus, any dissent must be -phobic. Naturally, there are folks out there who know this weakness and try to exploit it for their own ends. The Oxy/GC drama was a touch before my time but I have seen a couple of half-arsed attempts to pull this wheeze on me here which, to their credit I don't think anyone fell for.

But I fully agree with Asela's main point; that armchair diagnoses are not on. At least not in respect for non-public figures you don't know personally. And even then, I would do my best to write my theory in a manner which doesn't read like it's an insult. And to try to at least do a little bit of reading to see if it fits first. KarmaPolice (talk) 20:32, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

I think the big issue is that mental disorders shouldn't become the replacement for other disability-based insults, e.g., calling a person a "sperg". But, I'd also like to move on from bad users, so... anyone see any good shows on Amazon lately? CorruptUser 21:10, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I don’t know about Amazon, but I found this show on (if I remember correctly) Netflix called “Bodies”. Keep in mind, it’s one of those mystery ones where everything is very slowly revealed, so describing it would be spoiling it.

Also, I’d recommend “I, Zombie”, a supernatural police drama kind of like Grimm. It takes place in my home state, too. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 22:33, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Asela's point fully, and I'd like to add something about what I saw when I first came here, which was in 2021, before Oxy left and there was otherwise generally also more drama. And also, about something you legitimately can "diagnose" but which wasn't diagnosed enough back then, in my view: manipulative behavior.

The problem with Oxy (to pick that one prominent example, and going by what's highlighted above) was a manipulative character first and foremost, and those buying into something like Oxy's weaponization of diagnostic labels (used to excuse the self and intimidate others into shying away from criticism), were part of the problem, as such people are enablers until they wisen up. Enablers are as much of a problem in a group as the manipulators they enable, whenever both exist in a group. If a group is prone to such enabling, then it is very vulnerable and may go to crap (or HCM in RW's case) as soon as a single manipulative character works forcefully enough upon it (as can also happen on much larger scales in society, in e.g. destructive political transformations).

However, both sides in a conflict involving a manipulative character are often counterproductive, and that's often a natural result of the manipulator's activity. It drags things down to a lower level in general. This happens more, the more there are childish and/or easily-upset people for the manipulator to work. In my time here, I've sometimes been disappointed when the mob has judged both sides in such a verbal slug-fest of a conflict about equally, despite clear evidence being shown by one side that the other has lied. In such cases, I think it should be policy to judge and respond to the lying side far more firmly, as that takes into account why and how the problem erupted. But over time, I think people here have become gradually better (from my perspective) in this, and that this change may go hand in hand with the increase in civility people more generally see.

Maybe this is a bit controversial or uncomfortable, I don't really know how people here look at my own firm view at present. The big point anyway is that I think there's a more constructive focus than the disruptive presences of the past or speculating about disabilities, namely manipulation and the psychology of it. I think that forewarned is forearmed, and that being smart about it in RW terms means both less HCM vulnerability and also less happening that drives off good-faith members and newcomers. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 21:55, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

--Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 22:52, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

The oldest song known to man, about 4000 years old...

And it still references "those distant days"... --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 23:18, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

About 6000 years old? I think you got that off by a factor of two entire millennia. Carthage (talk) 23:24, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Oh crap yeah, you're right. But it's still the oldest that survives to this day, Sumer was ancient to the Greeks. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 23:32, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

This is a bit confusing, the Epic of Gilgamesh is generally presented as a poem. From another video [12] it seems like he attempts replicas of the ancient instruments based on the bits we know, but all music is improvised because no Sumerian music is notated in any way. I guess there's also a guess that poems like this were sung? "Historically informed performance" is indeed a thing, but they'll be more guesswork on this than others.

The Google tells me the oldest notated music is the Hurrian songs, which multiple people (Pringle included) also have done interpretations of as well (with obviously a lot of guesswork, hence results vary).BobJohnson (talk) 00:25, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

There's also ambiguities still left in the pronunciation of Sumerian. Carthage (talk) 00:30, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

True, that’s what happens when a language hasn’t been spoken in any form for millennia, heck today’s Hebrew (the only successful case of a dead language coming back into everyday use in a country) was technically still around as a religious language (like Sanskrit, Latin) before the 1910s, and it’s extremely far removed from its Biblical-era version; I hear that the original’s true sound has been lost to time because it had no vowels. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 18:24, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I mean, yeah, but one can still make educated guesses using the comparative method. It's not like Hebrew is a linguistic isolate. Carthage (talk) 18:33, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Fair point, from what words of it I’ve seen there are many similarities to Arabic words (Shalom aliechem/Salaam aliekum, zahav/zahab, etc.) as they’re both Semitic languages. A sad reminder of how those who are hating, killing and often wanting genocide of each other like never before right now are, in some ways, brothers. :( --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 18:49, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

List of Quakers… A bit of fun

On the list of Quakers, I thought about adding few more for a bit of fun. There are;

• Victoria Wood (1953-2010) comedienne and actress, and her former husband, magician Geoffrey Durham.
• Sheila Hancock, award-winning actress
• “Euromec”, an irritating frequent contributor to RationalWiki. [Seriously, guys I am a member of Cambridgeshire Area Meeting]

Euromec (talk) 21:02, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Is creationism still relevant?

While it's undeniable that creationism as a movement still exists and still has followers, I have noticed that it seems to nowadays be fringe even amongst the anti-science movement, which is itself fringe (although sadly not politically). This might be due to the fact that acceptance of the fact of evolution seems to be mainstream nowadays, at least here in the West. The core wedge issues of the anti-science movement nowadays seems to be a resurgence of racial pseudoscience, anti-medicine sentiment, biological determinism, and transphobia-motivated denial of a whole litany of fields, all of which intersect with one another and are, at least IMO, motivated more by reactionary politics than reactionary fundamentalism, although again the two intersect. Has anyone else noticed something similar? Carthage (talk) 19:09, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

Unfortunately, yes creationism is still relevant. The current person "in charge of" the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, is a Biblical literalist and creationist.[13] Bongolian (talk) 19:23, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

Oof. Yeah, that's bad. Carthage (talk) 19:25, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

(EC)I think it still matters but it has also passed its peak. There was this golden age in the early 2010s, when the tea party made it a huge culture war issue, but it's no longer a serious priority. In 2012 republican primary debates the presidential candidates were actually asked "do you believe in evolution" but if that came up in 2023 even diehard MAGAs would probably be confused. As Bongolian pointed out it's true a lot of the GOP power players are still YECs and they would love to shove it in classrooms if they could...but that's not the first item on the agenda and it is rarely brought up in election cycles nowadays. (Compare that to 2010-2014.)-Flandres (talk) 19:28, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

The wealthy creationists are still pushing creationism around the edges after the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District in 2005. They've been pushing "school choice" and school vouchers in part as end runs around the effective ban of creationism in public schools. Texas tried to do the vouchers as recently as this year.[14] Fortunately vouchers are uniformly unpopular among voters, even in Texas. Bongolian (talk) 19:45, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

I can see two factors playing out:

A) Since the 1970s, Christianity as an institution has declined significantly in America. Around 20-30% are now "religiously unaffiliated" these days.

B) Of those still left as "evangelicals" (the main group pushing creationism, especially strict types like YEC), a lot of them have merged with "Trumpism". The evolution / creation debate doesn't seem to be a priority at all of Donald Trump. So politically, this topic is pushed to the back-burner, even though this group still believes in such.

Based on a Gallup poll, [15] though admittedly wording matters a *lot* for polls of this type (so all the nuances aren't captured here), I do think plenty of Americans still have some form of creationist view (and many more have a theistic evolution view). But a pure evolution viewpoint is quite a bit more popular than it was in the past, even if still in the minority. BobJohnson (talk) 21:53, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

Yes of course. I'm beginning to find that all these anti-science types are a bit linked. If not literally, then because, when you tolerate the flawed methods and fallacies used by any of these others you've already let the dogs out, and don't be surprised to suddenly find the creationists hitching a ride. Though I can at least say that creationists seem somewhat repulsed by racialists and vice versa, but this is basically happenstance; their views are incompatible except maybe if they believe God made "unequal races" himself (which, some do believe, but rarely). But even so you'll see some of the same general trends (the same sorts of flawed reasoning and evidence-gathering, pseudo-history, casting as much doubt as possible on conventional scientists, etc.). This is similar to what I said in the Flat Earth section recently.

Also just anecdotally, I've run into a batch of creationists online recently without even going looking. Christianity and Islam are quite popular still, you know... Chillpilled (talk) 20:58, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

They mostly seem to have moved on to reactionary politics. Many of the Grand Old Pile would love to keep making serious attempts at pushing it in the classroom, but much for the same reason why they won’t make serious attempts at getting rid of gay marriage (25% of Americans are homophobic whereas 55% are still transphobic) they know it would completely destroy their chances of retaking the presidency next year. Especially since they couldn’t even take away abortion rights in ohio 💀 --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 23:49, 26 November 2023 (UTC)

I actually know a few atheist Republicans. I don't like them, but a few exist funnily enough. Carthage (talk) 16:49, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

I’ve heard of “Atheists for Trump”, and encountered one on a forum who strongly opposes immigration and supported Trump (this was when he was president). During his campaigning in 2016, he even had a bunch of young gay men simp him, and even gave their leader a cabinet job as his token gay. And several older US gay men of the misogynistic, ultra-dominant and ultra-masculine type are far-right, and hypocritically oppose trans rights --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 17:02, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

While it doesn't have the appeal it once did in the mainstream (and Intelligent Design didn't take off as they hoped), it will always be hiding in the rafters waiting for its time. We're currently experiencing a post-covid, anti-intellectual wave here in the west, so the conditions are right for creationism to make a come back, though what form it will take, I don't know. One thing to consider is a big part of the "school-choice" initiative is to force kids into tax-payer funded religious schools to teach them creationism among other things, and while that idea is unpopular now, we could begin seeing it in Republican states more and more (Florida would be my guess since here in Texas, public schools are still considered popular). Lastly, the current Speaker of The House being a creationist is just one example of how these people are still in positions of power and still electable. In my opinion, the main reason we're not seeing creationism in the current culture wars is because other issues, like the trans and pedo panic, anti-vaccines, and Trump worship are sucking up the oxygen right now. But who knows, maybe "yassified" creationism will be a topic trending on Tiktok.-Ryan1257 (talk) 18:33, 27 November 2023 (UTC)

I don't think creationism is that relevant right now in the USA on the simple fact it is no longer an effective wedge issue to play, thus it is not. 'Modern' creationism exists directly to justify a literal reading of the creation stories of the Abrahamic religions and indirectly as a stick to beat dirty secularised educationalists using the 'religious freedom' excuse and draw folks into supporting the right-wing/fundie nexus. Naturally, this only works on folks who are already fairly religious, which is an increasingly shrinking base and by the 10s already mainly 'in the bag' electoral-wise. Propagandists and demagogues normally employ the scattergun approach - they look to 'see what sticks' and then exploit the 'sticky point' until it falls off the wall. With the Big Public, creationism and homophobia no longer sticks but 'woke' and transphobia does, so they re-loaded their guns and went with those.

Naturally, within the fundie-cult zone creationism is still a big thing and I am sure within their own belljars they still argue à la angels on a head of a pin and maintain the delusion à la KenBot that the world is taking them very seriously and Final Victory™ is just around the corner. KarmaPolice (talk) 21:06, 28 November 2023 (UTC)

I used to believe in creationism. However, times have changed. I would argue that creationism is still relevant on the basis of it literally being taught (in my experience) to children before proper science classes. I was certainly misled in my earlier youth, and I don't know where I am now. At 16, I feel as if I've lost my faith whilst simultaneously gaining a better understanding of the world. Maturity hits different, I guess. Gang O' Shadow Wizards 🧙‍♂️^{Bore me} 17:54, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

It was disconcerting how RW started in 2007 in opposition to very particular things in US evangelism, and then in early 2017 precisely those people showed up in the Trump administration. Sometimes you don't want to be right - David Gerard (talk) 17:13, 2 December 2023 (UTC)

Of course creationists believe their Final Victory is just around the corner. These are the same people who believe that the Rapture will whisk them away to heaven at any moment while leaving the godless heathens behind to suffer horribly and then get dumped into hell. Luigifan18 (talk) 18:57, 4 December 2023 (UTC)

It is very present among Evangelicals not just in US, repeating the same PRATTs discussed here to defend for example the Flood happened (fossil sorting, non-uniformitarianism, 2 Peter 3:3 onwards, etc), claiming for example there's God science and Satan's/World™'s science (guess what theories are that), using arcane arguments from genetics (CRISPR) attempting to prove Adam and Eve existed, fine-tuning and anthropic principle arguments besides other PRATTs to defend a divine origin (theirs, of course) for the Universe, and with its proposers showing often an astounding ignorance of the most basic science even if their listeners will be as ignorant if not more.Panzerfaust (talk) 00:09, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Drink choice

What's a drink that doesn't taste like piss and is relatively affordable? Carthage (talk) 18:33, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Tap water? :)

If you mean "alcoholic drink", there's a lot of "your mileage may vary" here. Beer is probably the most affordable alcoholic beverage (it is the "most industrialized", after all). A fair number of people, of course, can't stand beer of any kind. (Don't ask my opinion, though, I'm one of those silly sorts that enjoys the IPAs that many find way too bitter. :) ) BobJohnson (talk) 18:45, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Oh? What, if anything, brought you to like the taste of bitter drinks? Carthage (talk) 18:47, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

No idea. I will say that I also like to drink my coffee without sugar or cream. So genetics, I guess.

Now, it's still possible to be *too* bitter; some IPAs are way out of balance, and I avoid over-roasted coffee (a prominent example being Starbucks).

I think the reason pilsners are genuinely popular worldwide is because it has less off-flavors like bitter hops or yeast flavors. But, if you like the "extra flavor" that, say, roasted barley (Irish stout eg Guinness), hops (IPAs), or yeast flavors (hefe, Belgian beers) bring to a beer, pilsner might "pale" as a beer category.

No matter which way you end up, I think it's easily possible to get a fairly quality beer at a price point of somewhere between $1 and $2 USD a can. There's probably some liquors that are that affordable when looking at a per serving basis that are pretty decent, though since I don't drink liquor I can't really recommend anything here (and this is a category that certainly can get pricey, same with wine). BobJohnson (talk) 19:25, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

As soon as I get home from work I neck an entire bottle of $8 Pinot Noir in under a minute. That works wonders for the price. Aceⁱ⁹ 21:34, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Can only give 'rule of thumbs' here, and it's a rather Euro-centric one at that. First, my 'inverse rule of advertising'; the more ads you see for X drink, the higher chances it's shit. Case in point; 'Budweiser', Stella Artois and Bell's Scotch - too me, thirst is preferable, while I never see anything for Budvar, Tuborg or Zubr. My next one is for you to simply 'try things out', clearly not all at once and testing only works if you're actually sober. Wine is an acquired taste [like non-lager beers like IPAs and porters], but again, it's something which requires knowledge to weed out the non-shit ones out there. Plus, you might be one of those people where the tannins simply give you a headache. Also, it's more expensive per-item which makes you developing your 'palette' [the most foodie-poncey word I'll use today] more expensive.

In this case, if you're looking for a simple drinkie and are either unable or unwilling to go through the palaver of the above, I would start out by getting your preferred soda and then using it as a mixer for a spirit. If you hit up the Superweb you will be able to get suggestions for which ones 'go with' each other; for example I'm drinking whiskey and ginger beer right now. This has two advantages; if you pair 'right' you can cover the sharpness in poorer quality booze and secondly, if you pick a-low calorie mixer you'll also be cutting down on your total calorific intake, which isn't to be sniffed at. Though this option has one serious down-side; kinda harder to take to a party. KarmaPolice (talk) 21:49, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

All you need to homebrew apple cider is apple juice, yeast, and sugar. I'm pretty sure I've brewed some by accident in the past! Plutocow (talk) 21:57, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

a) I'm thirsty now and b) the local shop has cider cheaper than how it would cost to make it. KarmaPolice (talk) 22:04, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘@Ace McWicked, did you see that the cheap reds are probably less likely to give one a headache (Wine#Red wine, not so fine)? Bongolian (talk) 01:30, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

Sake can be surprisingly cheap, it's a weird drink in that you either want really high-end (subtly flavored) or low-end (the fiery stuff you have warm), or for sweet you get nigori (which looks different). Also, I'm an IPA guy for beer, for spirits you can generally get second-tier gin for a decent price; the kind that works well enough in a martini and in a gin and tonic is my go-to (New Amsterdam green label I can also make Vespers with, American Gordon's is too low proof but good for the other things). The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 20:47, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

At a bar, just go gin and tonic or vodka and soda. I had a friend who turned 21 at Applebee's, I had been having fun at a singles bar, the friends who did not protect the guy were old teens. Generations ago. Torrent (talk) 04:18, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Ahem, drinks are always an extreme on curve, I would take and remember that being drunk is armor you honestly rarely need. Torrent (talk) 04

25, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

The Continued Scourge of Astrology

It's about time I brought it up, as the search suggestion boxes of many search engines continue to push astrological bunk whenever I try to search something, many newspapers also continue to have sections where astrology and horoscopes are pushed, and even the occasional nonsense via word of mouth I've overheard. It's quite irritating to see it again and again, knowing that people still believe that pseudoscientific bunk, and it also causes unnecessary scrolling whenever I do have to search something on an astronomical context. Many grief vampires also continue use astrology in an effort to fleece money off of the gullible (or reap ad revenue), often attacking astronomy while doing so.

So what would it take to purge the scourge of astrology off of the Internet and everywhere else, turning said bunk into a scornful taboo? TheEternalOutsider (talk) 13:37, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

The general gist I'm getting from skimming recent articles on the recent rise in astrology popularity is:

A) We live in, er, "interesting times", so people are "searching for answers".

B) For some, astrology acts as a "mostly harmless" "religion lite" that offers some of the "comfort food" of religion, without the considerable bigoted baggage of religion that has caused many to leave the church.

C) Astrology is connected to the "wellness industry", so add in all the people who for various reasons turn to alternative medicine etc.

The last time astrology was popular was, well, in the "interesting times" of the 1970s (aligned with the hippies and the New Age movement, which peaked in spirit-nonsense-babble (not commercially) during that period). So the best way for the astrology babble to die down is probably for times to become less "interesting". Good luck. BobJohnson (talk) 14:04, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I don't know... IMO astrology is indeed ridiculous. but it's harmless. It's not like other forms of pseudoscience, such as homeopathy and some forms of traditional medicine, where some governments are actually spending money on it (and as a result, spending less money on actual treatments). If people want to believe in astrology, well, then they are wrong, but it's still their right, as they aren't actually influencing public policies and/or scientific progress as far as I know. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 14:12, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

To say something that is perhaps controversial, I don't think that believing in astrology is so different from believing in the Christian God, or any other God. It's fine (even if we believe that you are wrong), as long as you don't try to force your beliefs on us. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 14:17, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

There are also people who look at astrology for fun while not necessarily believing any of its claims. In this respect, astrology is no different from tarot cards. Heck, some of my (borderline fundie Catholic) cousins were talking about amusing themselves with horoscopes this Thanksgiving (in between very uncomfortable conversations about "the scourge of transsexuality"). Luigifan18 (talk) 14:32, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I personally regard it as a 'mostly harmless' pastime, perhaps similar to say, Wicca, Dungeons & Dragons or Pokemon. The majority of human beings are fully capable of a) enjoying something and b) knowing it's a load of bullplop [qv; most works of fiction]. KarmaPolice (talk) 15:45, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Honestly, I find that there is an important distinction between nonsense that tries and nonsense that doesn't. Everyone should know that DnD and Pokemon aren't TRYING to pose as something real and true. The waters get quite murky quite quickly when you ask about astrology where facts and science are quickly cast aside as "We don't know everything" and "There are so many unexplained things". Astrology, like so many things, is trying to fuzzy the line between what is real and what is not real. YouTube skeptic "Captain Disillusion" once made a brilliant video on this problem. The link has a time code appended which means it skips to the relevant part (11:05), but the whole video is worth a watch if anyone's interested. The point is that blurring the line between what's real and what's wrong is a real problem and even if you yourself are smarter than that, not everyone is. *looks at Twitter* Yes. definitely not everyone. ULTRACOMFY (talk) 20:43, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

I sacrifice goats because I'm a Capricorn. What about you? Carthage (talk) 16:31, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I ate goat brain once. Bongolian (talk) 18:26, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

How did it taste? Carthage (talk) 18:35, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I remember hearing once that Astrology is "Yassified Phrenology". That's what I call it now.-Ryan1257 (talk) 20:02, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

The main problem with astrology is the automatic prejudice which tends to be ignored. "You should not date this person because of their birthdate" is functionally identical to "You should not date this person because of their skin colour."Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 16:06, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Given that celestial divination has been around for something like four thousand years, I would recommend starting with something easier to deal with, like knock-knock jokes.UncleKrampus (talk) 19:58, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

That we have definite records of, but there's evidence that such traditions extend far back into prehistory (we cover some evidence of such "deep cosmomythology" in our article on pagan survivals). Carthage (talk) 20:02, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Florida GOP chair Christian Ziegler and Moms 4 Liberty co-founder Bridget Ziegler

There is a big and complicated story regarding the Zieglers in the news involving a ménage à trois with a woman. Can someone explain this? Euromec (talk) 13:43, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

It's not terribly complicated. The Zieglers were engaged in a consensual threesome relationship with another woman (some details vary on how long its been going on but reportedly at least one threesome definitely occurred per police afidavit). During one planned encounter, Bridget Ziegler could not make it. So the other woman cancelled the threesome. Christian Ziegler showed up at the other woman's apartment anyways. This is when Christian allegedly raped the other woman.

Regardless of how the rape allegation plays out, it's yet another instance of Haggard's Law in action, as it's been pretty much confirmed (from what I can tell) that Bridget, co-founder of one of the most virulent anti-gay organizations in Florida, participated in some bisexual threesome action. BobJohnson (talk) 14:38, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

A rare female example of Haggard's Law, you'd usually see the husband as the one who swings both ways. Also, as I said in another case, it's good not to fall into the Toupée fallacy.

That said, I will be adding this on the Haggard's Law page. An Advocate (talk) 15:39, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

It would be best if you had an anti-gay quote or action from the person in question. Mere membership in this group could be seen as a stretch, even if it's involved in anti-LGBT actions it started out I think as an anti-mask/anti-lockdown thing didn't it? Chillpilled (talk) 15:48, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Wait, she co-founded it? And the other guy is chairman of the Florida GOP? Ok, 1. I guess what I just said shouldn't be too hard to find. 2. Holy fuck! Chillpilled (talk) 15:57, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Most of her arguments are of the "think of the children" type (ignoring that those in high school could hardly be considered children). But you can catch her in a quite transphobic T-shirt here.[16] Relatively recently, Ziegler refused to directly rebuke nasty homophobic comments (the ol' "you're gay, therefore you're a groomer!" slander) made towards a gay member of the Sarasota County School Board by some critics, some of whom have associations with the Proud Boys. [17] According to the Washington Post, Bridget Ziegler helped Ron DeSantis fashion the notorious "don't say gay!" "parental rights" legislation that restricted classroom discussion on sexual orientation etc. [18] BobJohnson (talk) 16:37, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

One can find the spot-on memetic mockery here:[19] Bongolian (talk) 18:44, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

I hate people who are too vapid to create their own mockery from scratch, don't you?UncleKrampus (talk) 20:01, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Spring UK General Election?

Context; https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67649447

Why do I get the strong whiff that 'techy finance bro' Sunak is going to try to win [or lose less] an early General Election by using the continuing malign, stupid and clusterfucky 'Rwanda immigration policy' [another Tory policy running against the 'bollard of reality'] in hoping it will be a successful distraction/wedge issue like Bozo the Clown did with Brexit in 2019? KarmaPolice (talk) 17:15, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I'd theorise that it's because it's splitting the party (though apparently not so much between disgust and support so much as support and support for an even more horrible plan????), which seems to be the worst possible thing™ for the tories. A quick election to show that it's what the voters want! /vomit Namako (talk) 10:42, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

I don't live in the UK any more - but I find it really hard to believe that anyone takes the Rwanda plan seriously.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 11:41, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

I would also theorise it's that it's the only thing which 'sticks to the wall' with the small demographic the Tories think will win them the next election - the Brexit-loving, GBNews-watching, 'I'm not racist but'-saying Rustbelt-dweller I've nicknamed 'Frank Gammon'. They're clearly planning to make immigrants the main Other of what is promising to be a pretty negative election campaign, esp as their next-term spending plans feature another heavy hit of Austerity to a state which is already starved to the point of being unable to fulfil it's core functions.

On Bob J's question... most folks appear to me to judge the whole thing as either a) evil, b) stupid and/or c) a colossal waste of money. I go out of my way now to explain the exact details of the policy to people, such as 'if their application is successful, they still cannot come to the UK' and 'for every person we send to Rwanda, they send us one back!' which if they don't accuse me of being 'woke'/lying etc, frown and and agree it's b/c. Despite it being constantly pumped out by client journalism and astroturf social media, it's still not getting to the top of people's concerns and even more importantly, even some Frank Gammons don't sound like they will vote on this issue alone. But Sunak and Co are getting high on their own supply, getting caught in a feedback loop re: their own propaganda. KarmaPolice (talk) 14:01, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

As a deterrent it's really dumb. These people are prepared to cross was-zones, deserts, closed frontiers, oceans - paying an extreme physical and financial cost. But they are going to be dissuaded by the small possibility that half-assed UK scheme will send them somewhere else? Assuming they even know the weird plan exists? It's nuts.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 19:13, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

It's so awful, and stupid, and they've still managed to spend £290M on it! It's also supposedly about 'the boats', but I suspect they're still paying the french navy to do our coastal patrols, so who knows how much they've actually spent on the boats at this point. Namako (talk) 21:10, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

My main technical hobby, an audio synthesis language

saugns is the open source program that implements it; I've renamed it twice over the years since early 2011 when I first started working on it. To my knowledge, while not quite suitable for writing music in (yet--it's far from the language of my vague dreams, and I'm not yet really a musician either), it stands out in how short scripts can produce soundscapes (quite a few pseudo-randomized FM ones can be made in less than 80 characters).

But people who don't run Linux or *BSD won't be able to test it easily. Though I've put up some examples with audio to listen to on the website (which however miss the more musical soundscapes, which maybe I'll add later). Anyway, feedback on the website itself could be useful.

The project has been on and off over the years. Early I did a lot quickly and intuitively, in recent years I've cleaned it up and slowly clarified ideas. (And made a new, featureful combination of noise generator and oscillator earlier this year.) More redesign may come ahead of adding new audio synthesis features; still lacking many conventional ones, this project may be "boring" in that way compared to alternatives with other features, and which are implemented with code several orders of magnitude longer. I don't think anyone else has explored my main underlying combination of ideas, to see where it goes, impractical as it is (taking time, and all or most of it commercially useless).

In this project, you see the basic nature of a weird nerd without a job and without a degree. I'm not sure whether being stuck in a rut as I am is more about depression or the autistic spectrum. Anyway, this project has been a main thing during otherwise heavy recent years (2018 perhaps the worst), also driving on learning about more things. While I feel less heavy this year than the prior ones, I have yet to get up the pace in life. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 18:48, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Here's the nicest-sounding little musical thing I've got out of a short one-liner script so far. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 15:41, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Non-AI computer art and music

With a discussion on "AI art" taking place below, I though of branching out a bit to the "opposite" -- other kinds of computer art, and music -- more generally. I.e. what I'm interested in. There's a lot of potential, still, in this area -- unexplored unless and until people come up with the algorithms or ways of using them, with such a large space of possibilities that it may take many centuries until there's no longer anything "new" of fairly simple nature to do.

Some kinds of computer art and music rely on humans to lay the structure, in detail -- like specifying all the times and pitches and rises and falls in level in music. Other kinds let algorithms do the job, in large part, the human having the role of deciding how the dice should be thrown. In either case, compared to all the "AI stuff" now trending, there's two larger differences: the "old way" has much more potential for something new, and it uses less to do more, many orders of magnitude less computational power and electricity in most cases. But nothing interesting ever happens until a human thinks of something and then expresses it in computer algorithms or their use, and this takes time and the unpredictable arising of inspiration; it's the opposite of how to rationalize a business by removing the need for labor and reducing production to automation.

Recently, I listened to Gendy3 by Xenakis, a 1991 piece by one of the early computer music pioneers. Later I'll probably explore algorithms more like those Xenakis used to generate music -- something he did alongside writing code to lay out what he thought of as the "architecture" of a piece. Xenakis worked out ways to create very dynamic, dramatic patterns of pseudo-random variations over time. By contrast, I've developed a flexible range of timbres or sound "texture", but the ways to arrange them are still too simple and boring. There's various tracks to explore to arrive at something more musical, including also the traditional way to do FM synthesis with some additional features. Currently I hope to combine FM synthesis with new algorithmic patterns and sound textures, but I only gradually become more of a musician and less of a "sound-experimenter". --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 15:41, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

On the plus side

It's nice to see a lot of activity here in the SB. Welcome back, everyone! CorruptUser 16:36, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Hello. It does seem more active than I remember it in 2021, my thread congratulating mods on their victories somehow turned into armchair psychiatry lol. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 20:16, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

"If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it just may be a duck," --Walter Reuther.UncleKrampus (talk) 22:26, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Garlic bread

What is the deal with garlic bread and being ace? Koafox (talk) 15:29, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

There's a deal? Kencolt (talk) 15:42, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Template:User asexual1 this: Koafox (talk) 15:51, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, it's a joke about how someone who doesn't focus their energy on sex ends up having other hobbies. CorruptUser 15:57, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Garlic bread is a hobby? KarmaPolice (talk) 16:07, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Baking is. CorruptUser 16:15, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Has anyone here ever cooked garlic bread in an air fryer? Redneck baking... Carthage (talk) 16:19, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I'd argue baking can be a hobby, but not all baking is done for hobby reasons. I'm currently baking a couple of batches of homemade 'meal bars' for the coming week which I only do because to buy them in would cost an extra £40 a week or so. KarmaPolice (talk) 16:29, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Based on Reddit [20] I think there's a running joke in asexual communities about how food is, to them, better than sex. Garlic bread is tasty, so it became "a chosen meme". Cake is also used in memes (for those with a sweet tooth, I suppose). BobJohnson (talk) 16:42, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

"Cake" and "Pie" are also euphemisms, so there could be that aspect as well. CorruptUser 19:49, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

...and now I want some garlic bread. And maybe some cake. Kencolt (talk) 21:37, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

I would also think garlic bread gives you horrible breath, so it's a way to keep people from wanting to do it with you. One of my brother's friends saw Def Leppard on their Pyromania tour and said Joe Elliott got locked out of the tour bus, he ate a jar of pickled onions and told the crowd it was so he'd have such bad breath that no one would try to kiss him (she had photographic proof of this happening). The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 06:05, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

Paranoia Comedy Show

https://youtu.be/xh7z2zkQ5DA?si=-LWQDBLfunf0Rbmf

Be ready for a laugh.

This Pro-Cryptocurrency video is one big cryptocurrency advertisement with a heaping dose of paranoia. Remember kids: Financial regulations and the Rule of Law should not apply for cryptocurrency. If it is then there's an elaborate conspiracy. --Trans Fem Agenda 20:39, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Many people use crypto explicitly to skirt around state controls of currency (there's a reason it's the preferred medium of exchange for drug dealers and kiddie porn afficionados). It's inevitable that the machinery of the state would come crashing down on the crypto scene eventually. No conspiracy needed. Carthage (talk) 20:43, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

I know one of the card collect/trading apps that I have, some people, especially those from countries like Russia, prefer to use crypto for payments. Lavalizard101 (talk) 22:41, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Don't forget, it's a favorite currency for countries wanting to skirt sanctions.-Ryan1257 (talk) 23:13, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

I didn't mean to have it sound like that there was a conspiracy. I was just being sarcastic about how people think that the rule of law is a conspiracy when applied to things that they like. Cracking down on cryptocurrencies and crypto exchanges needs to be done. It is a fact that a lot of cryptocurrency is used to finance terrorism, buy illegal goods and services, skirt sanctions and avoiding taxes. --Trans Fem Agenda 23:23, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Sanctions are really just a form of economic warfare that often cripple a country's economy (and therefore the ability of that country to effectively care for its citizenry), and I am skeptical if they really work as advertised. North Korea is probably one of the most heavily sanctioned countries on this planet but the Kims show no signs of going away anytime soon. Crypto is a tool, and tools are morality-neutral. (It also pays to remember that there is a distinction between legality and morality. There is no functional difference between a pirate and a privateer other than that a privateer's actions are legally sanctioned. Likewise slavery was legal under the laws of the early United States, and forced labor in prisons is still legal today. That doesn't make it moral.) I do support regulations of cryptocurrency because, in addition to the fact that crypto is used to avoid taxes and buy "illegal goods and services," it's a land-mine of harm to the consumer and to the environment, however. Carthage (talk) 23:49, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Crypto-libertarians, I suppose, will eventually learn the reasons why bank regulations actually emerged after finance's own wild-west period over a century ago. Until then, crypto will remain a "speculative investment".

Sometimes, you get the impression with certain conspiracy channels that they are "so close, but so far". By the titles, there are a few subjects of this Jake Tran YouTube channel that seem legit. But, again by the titles, the entire channel ruins any of its legitimate moments with an ever-present "everything is evil" motif, tinted by a Chicken Little style "collapse incoming anytime soon!" motif that makes it hard to take seriously. Secretive elites! Everything is "literally a scam!" (Including... Owning your home? College? Que? I mean, yeah, the lottery is for the "math challenged", we know that.) Every business is literally the most evil business in the world! The "make easy money at home" style junk embedded in this Jake Tran video's description is just icing on the cake. Ironically, according to a Wikitubia,[21] this Jake Tran guy is happy to have NFT scams sponsor his videos. Go figure. BobJohnson (talk) 01:15, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

If the government is what enforces the law, then religion is what tries to enforce morality. …It doesn't always work. And mixing church and state tends to bring out the worst elements of both. As for the lottery, IIRC, it's set up so that there will be someone who wins the grand prize… but that someone probably won't be you. Luigifan18 (talk) 01:38, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, the lottery (generally meaning state-run ones, I presume) isn't a "scam" (generally speaking) in that all the math is out there in the open, and they usually are run fairly. I agree with many lottery criticisms, such as how state run lotteries act as a de facto regressive tax, and are particularly damaging for those in poverty. But the Jake Tran video entitled "the lottery is literally a scam" is quite wrong in calling it that. BobJohnson (talk) 02:21, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

The Case of the "Pragmatic" Spymaster

So, I just came up with a funny thought exercise for you guys to go over.

So, let's imagine a multi-ethnic espionage task force with agents who get sent out on missions to covertly investigate and undermine threats to their nation. After this task force has operated for some time, the agents start to notice that they're being selected for given missions moreso because of their race than anything else. The baffled agents inform the higher-ups of this, and a discrimination investigation begins. Upon being questioned, the head of the task force admits that he is in fact sending his agents on missions based on their race, but that he is acting out of pragmatism rather than racism — he is sending his agents on missions based on their well-suitedness to the tasks and likelihood to succeed and come back in one piece. The investigators are understandably quite puzzled and ask for further explanation.

The task force head explains that he prefers to send white agents on missions that take place in the daytime, because their light skin coloration blends in with the light. He sends black agents on missions that take place in the nighttime, because their black skin coloration blends in with the darkness. Finally, he sends Asian agents on missions that take place at sunset or sunset, because their yellow skin coloration blends in with the sun when it's low in the sky. By sending agents on missions this way, the task force head explains, his agents are better able to remain undercover and undetected, perform their tasks, and return home without being compromised, captured, or killed.

On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being "perfectly rational" and 10 being "not even fractally wrong", how bizarre is the task force head's logic? Luigifan18 (talk) 21:33, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

To be clear, the skin of humans is not built(evolved) for stealth or camouflage in the first place. In fact, other things could go awry like the fact that skin and walls/floors tend to not be the same color anyway. The clothes matter more than the skin in many cases, as a full bodysuit would work a lot better as camouflage than skin color. TheEternalOutsider (talk) 22:52, 7 December 2023 (UTC)

Well, for one, asians aren't "yellow", they range from darker to lighter skin. Also, most missions aren't "one-and-done", they often take place over an extended period of time, so choosing agents based off of time of day would not offer any advantage. Lastly, I think you ignore the most common instance where skin color or ethnicity come into play for an agent be considered for an assignment, blending in into a population. Even if the agent is not native, isn't too familiar with the culture, and isn't even the correct ethnicity, having a skin and hair color that doesn't stand out from the general population makes it harder to be positively identified by the authorities at a glance.-Ryan1257 (talk) 02:39, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Apart from some other pretty dubious assumptions (not the least being using "yellow" to describe Asians) the logic would only work if they went about their tasks naked. Something which might not be in keeping with the whole "blending in" idea.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 11:38, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Fair enough. My idea when writing this short story was that the task force head genuinely is not racist and is genuinely trying to be pragmatic with his "skin color as camouflage" idea, but his logic is half-baked (for one thing, camouflage works on the basis of similarity of coloration to other objects nearby, not lighting conditions, and as @Bob M said, the camouflage value of skin color would only be relevant for the portions of the body which are not covered by clothing). I wanted to do a thought exercise on the idea of someone who "discriminates" not due to a belief that any race is inherently superior or inferior, but out of the idea that the qualities associated with a given race might genuinely be advantageous or disadvantageous in certain situations (with said situations not having anything to do with human conceptions of race and how they influence our treatment of one another). In short, well-intentioned, innocent discrimination. (I don't have time to elaborate further right now.) Luigifan18 (talk) 15:00, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Now, how was I going to close this again? Oh, yes, the task force leader is simply trying to assign his personnel to the jobs he thinks they'll be best at, but the fact that he takes racial qualities (like skin color) into account for this makes him look racist, even though he's not trying to be. Does that make sense? (I forgot where I was trying to go with this explanation of the scenario…) Luigifan18 (talk) 18:28, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

If he calls Asian people "yellow skinned" then he is racist. Also, apart from his spies having to work naked, they would also have to work outside - because artificial lighting would also spoil his "clever" plan. Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 17:48, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Javier Milei

I invite someone knowledgeable of Argentina and what's going on there to write an article of Javier Milei. While some of his most extreme proposals as that market of organs will (hopefully) go nowhere, it seems Argentinians will still be more FUBAR at the very least in the short term.

It's also quite ironic how economical libertarianism and far-right go so together Panzerfaust (talk) 23:18, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

"The insidious libertarian to alt-right pipeline" courtesy of The Daily Beast. Carthage (talk) 23:23, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

It's also really not that surprising. Right-wing politics is predicated on a belief in a natural hierarchy, and if they believe their place in that natural hierarchy is threatened, they will more often than not turn to far-right politics to shore up their place in that perceived hierarchy. Carthage (talk) 23:26, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

Wasn't Argentina already FUBAR on account of the Nazis setting up shop there after losing World War II?

And let's be honest — right-wing politics is predicated on extreme selfishness. Luigifan18 (talk) 00:00, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

I suspect that there is a lot more to Argentinian politics than can be explained by the influence of some Nazis escaping justice at the end of WW2.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 16:11, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Which isn't mutually exclusive with their belief in a natural hierarchy. They believe they are the ones that should be at the top of such a hierarchy, which, yes, is selfish. Carthage (talk) 00:10, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Should people just embrace AI art among other things?

People say it is theft. Though is it true or just people typically fighting technology? Wikisarecool (talk) 20:39, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

It's "theft" because of how AIs are trained. Rights only matter as far as you can enforce them, and if you're stealing content from a poor creator who because they are poor lack the institutional power to enforce those rights they were promised.... that's when it's shitty. Corporations have that institutional power. Poor, individual artists don't. Carthage (talk) 20:50, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

I have never really been on the AI hate train. AI output seems typically transformative although you can get it to put out things that aren't. The way AI is being used to fuel spam is possibly a problem. Chillpilled (talk) 21:01, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Here's another thing to consider. AI image generators are not that good with detail. If you look at those pictures long enough, you'll notice inconsistency after inconsistency. That should be a red flag, especially when they're trying to replicate a photograph. TheEternalOutsider (talk) 21:13, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Image generators are also especially bad at generating text within images, constantly misspelling words. TheEternalOutsider (talk) 21:16, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

The question has a critical incorrect assumption.

AI has zero intelligence, zero 'agency'. It does what it is told by a human. This makes them a tool, and tools cannot be held guilty of any actions committed on the human's behest. To blame 'AI' for IP piracy is similar for charging a gun for being used in a murder or the camera-maker for making the product later used in the production of child porn.

Thus, the critical issue legally is that of plain ol' IP theft, which is already a rampant crime and has been around since forever, as Carthage alludes to. KarmaPolice (talk) 21:40, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Sort of off topic but your point about guns being tools I think is worth commenting on: "guns are tools" is a common talking point, but you don't see anybody posing with power drills on their status updates, do you? If we're gonna hold the gun crowd to account by their own talking points "guns are a tool," "it's the person'culture/whatever, not the gun..." then stop treating your gun as a replacement for your dick lol. If it's a tool, and not a status symbol, treat it like one. Make sure it's locked away so little Timmy can't grab it on a whim, and stop posting those stupid photo-ops for your Facebook profile. Carthage (talk) 22:13, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

I think you missed one of the more important parts of the "guns are tools" claim, their primary function and the intent behind them is to efficiently kill something, aka a weapon. If I put a drill through someone's head, the drill is being "used like weapon" since its primary function, the intent behind its design, and its advertising doesn't include killing. A gun on the other hand is fulfilling the purpose, intent behind its design, and its advertising if it kills someone or something irrelevant of if it's an accident, murder, or hunting. Yes, a gun could be used for non-lethal activities like target practice, but that's still just practicing for an actual kill in most contexts. If guns were primarily designed and adverised for target practice, they'd have a point since it'd basically be a t-shirt cannon (though, its design would have to change to conform to this non-lethal role), but no sane person with honest intentions would claim such an idea. They may say "knives and machetes are weapons then since some are made to kill", but that ignores the fact that blades have different categories, and those that are intended as weapons are designed and advertised differently than other knives since its main goal is different from other knives. The same thing goes with cars despite killing a lot of people, especially since safety features are constantly being updated to make them less lethal.-Ryan1257 (talk) 22:57, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

That's also true, but I suspect the people pushing the "guns are tools" talking point know this. However, even if the purpose of a gun is to kill: that doesn't justify treating it like a symbol. It's purpose as a tool is irrelevant from the fact that it's a tool. The fact that it's a tool meant to kill people should only encourage more responsibility, not less. Remember, I'm discussing holding the gun crowd accountable to it's own talking points. We keep kitchen knives away from small children, we should do the same with guns. Lock your guns up, and stop posing for stupid photo ops. There's image problems for posing for status photos with knives in a way that there isn't for guns. It is very much a cultural issue, because you've turned guns from tools, admittedly tools meant for killing, into status objects. Carthage (talk) 23:05, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Getting back on topic... is it possible for AIs, in the way they learn, to even recognize letters and language in an image? Since its never learning context, I presume it'll always see lettering in an image as just mindless pixels as part of the greater image, no? Revolverman (talk) 23:17, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

GPT and as a result ChatGPT is apparently pretty good at doing that. Chillpilled (talk) 23:36, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

First generation Capatcha [2000s] used the 'words as graphic' test to weed out bots. The fact I've not seen such a test in perhaps 15 years suggests AIs are now sophisticated enough to pass them. KarmaPolice (talk) 23:46, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

It's possible to train "AI"s for several purposes, and to bundle several types of narrow "AI"s in a tool. Recognizing letters and such is one classic narrow task which an "AI" system can be trained for. A text-subsystem may not be able to deal with images at all, but an image-subsystem invoked when the user points the tool to an image may, the result sent to the former. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 14:46, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Speak of the devil. Chillpilled (talk) 02:30, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

I think that, unlike humans, machines can be taught to respect property values. Unfortunately they are being built by humans. "Good artists borrow, great artists steal." Possibly, Pablo Picasso said that, though perhaps not originally, so even that quote was purloined from some lesser-known artist. UncleKrampus (talk) 18:30, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Teaching LLMs and AI image generators to respect property values is highly problematic since UK and US laws can be different for the same work.[22] If one has deep-deep pockets like Open AI, it's far simpler just to steal everything, then force the victims to file lawsuits, drag the court cases out for as long as possible, then throw some peanuts to the masses as compensation. This scheme is predicated on Open AI eventually turning a profit of course. Bongolian (talk) 19:02, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

I think the argument that the content of what AI image generators produce is a form of plagiarism, is the kind of argument that shoots visual artists in the foot. Every visual artist that I know of uses image references for their work. My friend who has a degree in illustration was given explicit instruction to use photo references as a guide for producing artwork because human imagination and memory aren't the most reliable in remembering visual details accurately. That being said there are rules and distinctions made between referencing an image, and merely copying it/tracing it. For legal reasons, you have to be careful about using copyrighted images as references, and like even something like fanart can get you into legal trouble even if the drawing is "free-handed". Typically AI art generators are using so many different image references together that I would concur that it is "transformative" enough as not to constitute plagiarism. If it wasn't then most professional artists are guilty of way more blatant examples of plagiarism.

The problem comes in with what Carthage said, but instead of framing it as an IP issue like KP does I think it may be more apt to frame as a problem of exploitation. These tech companies at least try to make the vast majority of the images they train their ANNs on with images from the public domain, but it has been found that a few personal artworks from working artists have found their way into these databases without their permission. The problem is one of compensation for labour. Artists are producing images that are being used to accrue benefit to a more powerful class without proportional compensation in return. Going off Iris Young's characterization of exploitation from her essay "Five faces of Oppression" [23]. Another relevant type of oppression worth considering is marginalization which occurs when artists are pushed out the job market because companies find the utilization of AI more cost effective. I don't think any of this really is particularly inherent to the technology itself. These things can arguably be mitigated by a social system that values and protects the livelihood of living artists over and above images generators like this. But hey, profits over people. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 00:28, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

Dumb misses the crux of the point - IP theft is exploitation [or perhaps more technically, 'exploitation minus agreement']. There is no functional difference to the ripped-off IP producer whether it's your original content being cloned by AI, a person pirating film DVDs, a performer having their paid-for content posted on YouTube or a artisan having their designs ripped off by counterfiters on Etsy - it's all situations where the person(s) who did the labour to make the IP get no compensation for it's use. The critical issue is, as Bongolian pointed out above that most IP laws are very dependent on the victim [conned customers and/or the IP holders] being very active with the relevant orgs to press the issue and the best they can normally achieve is to plug-up the supply-line from [normally Asia] producing said knock-offs, as the domestic law enforcement either don't care, are corrupt and/or are overwhelmed. This means the net result is mainly that the 'big boys' do get much of their IP protected because they have the clout and cash to twist arms which normally give two fingers to foreign requests.

The question of threatened 'technological unemployment' is a completely different one. AIs are not just threatening obvious 'creatives' like artists, musicians, actors and designers but the much larger swathe of ancillary roles - prop/set makers, stunt performers, copywriters, extras, costumers, signwriters, proofreaders, draftpersons, post-production and similar. Yet this isn't new; a lot of these rapidly changed [and normally shrunk in numbers employed] with the computer revolution between c1980 and c2000 - if curious, ask Mr Google 'drafting before AutoCAD' and imagine how many of those folks in 'IBM attire' found themselves canned once they realised those 'microcomputers' were a lot more than a typewriter with a screen. And capitalism shall be capitalism - and that's to slash 'labour's' share of the cake and put it in their basket for y'know, just being great.

Which makes the conclusion simple; AI isn't the issue, our current system of capitalist society is. KarmaPolice (talk) 16:18, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

I think this ignores the fact IP laws don’t actually work on basis of automatically assigning ownership to the individual who put in the physical labour in materializing an idea in all cases. Very often if you are working on designs under an employment contract with a certain company, the company itself owns the work you produce and not the employee. I specifically mentioned that the definition of exploitation I was using comes from Iris Young, where an asymmetrical power relation is built into her definition. It is not every and all instances of uncompensated labour, that is too broad and basically implicates all volunteer work as exploitative. She specifies it as a dynamic between the “haves” and “have-nots”, an uneven distribution of resources where those with less resources provide the labour that those with more resources overwhelmingly receive the benefits from. I don’t think piracy on default would constitute exploitation on that basis, though I will grant that it doesn’t entails it’s absence either. Many an animator still only receive the wages they were paid during development and nothing more, regardless of the number of sales of the product they helped create. Stealing the product via piracy often only hurts the extracted benefit that the employer is receiving from said animators labour. Unless you want to say I am “exploiting” the Disney Company with a pirated version of Alice in Wonderland, but neither Young nor myself I think would want to grant that. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 23:02, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

It does not ignore this issue, because it's exactly the same as any other - ie the worker does not really benefit for the fruits of their labour due to being owned by the bunch of [normally] faceless stockholders for their benefit. The animator does not enjoy follow-on profits of their work any more than the bricklayer does from the home they helped to build being re-sold at a later date. Thus my final comment of this being 'a capitalism problem' than an 'AI problem'. KarmaPolice (talk) 23:47, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

And what of Young’s description of exploitation is being accounted for in that? I don’t think there is any disagreement on that latter claim. I think we both said as much already, but you were implicating internet piracy as exploitative in defence of an institution that is already characterized as similarly exploitative, if not oppressive by other means. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 22:13, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Taking a hacksaw to our article on Malcolm X

I am currently in the process of rewriting our article on Malcolm X, especially since the article was (and is. it's a work in progress) a low-quality hack piece without in-depth coverage of the ideology of Malcolm X and why he was and is so appealing. It also lacks citations in many parts. I've so far focused on the more secular elements of his ideology, but I plan to include his ideology when he was with the NOI and why exactly he split with the NOI in the first place. I would appreciate comments and criticism of what I've written so far. Carthage (talk) 10:21, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

On whatever-Wikia-is-now there is an 'Under construction' tag - would this be useful for such occasions? (Possibly with 'any thoughts and comments by others on the talk page (until the constructing is completed)' added.) Anna Livia (talk) 10:40, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

I prefer our articles to be "hatchet pieces"; we are to show every single wart a person has. So long as we have adequate documentation, of course. CorruptUser 14:51, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps post the new page under 'Draft', to allow it to grow before hacking down the old one and replacing it? KarmaPolice (talk) 14:54, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

I do intend to go over Malcolm X's warts, don't worry. I just would prefer our articles not be low-quality and also to be comprehensive. I'm not touching the lede right now, which contains a lot of the information about Malcolm X's antisemitism, for instance. I'll rearrange some of the lede content to their appropriate sections later on, though. Carthage (talk) 15:03, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Suspected Scam at DeviantART

I've been on DeviantART for a long time. Recently (by which I mean over the course of the past year or so), I've been getting messages in private chat from users who are apparently interested in using me as a muse of some sort and willing to offer compensation. I was initially skeptical but pleasantly surprised by this (albeit incredulous in the sense of "why the hell did you pick me for this honor?"), since I'm not all that gifted at drawing or painting and my gallery is mostly filled up with photographs I've taken. When I got a second message from a separate user written nigh-identically to the first, I started suspecting bots. By the third or fourth time, I started suspecting some sort of scam or info-gathering attempt (the one time I bothered to reply to one of these — which was the very first time, before there was a pattern for me to detect — I never got a reply). I think this might be worth discussing on RationalWiki.

(P.S. How do I ask a sysop to move a page? I meant to name my demonstration file "Suspected Scam at DeviantART", not "Suspected Spam at DeviantART", and I'd rather not upload the same thing twice.) Luigifan18 (talk) 15:05, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Done. Carthage (talk) 15:08, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Thanks! Now… any opinions on these weird chat messages? Luigifan18 (talk) 15:09, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

It's pretty suspicious. If I had to bet, I'd say "scam," but I won't. Is it notable enough for a mainspace article? Has it happened to anyone else? Or just you? Do some research first. Carthage (talk) 15:12, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Based on this it's very possibly a variation of advance fee fraud. (The current RW article is over-focused on the Nigerian "419" email scam common in the 2000s-2010s, the other Wiki shows just how varied this scam can be.) BobJohnson (talk) 15:16, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Hm. Researching this might be tricky. The messages I got were in personal chat — essentially a PM system. Thus, I wouldn't be able to directly see any messages of this nature sent to other users, regardless of whether or not they exist. I don't have a huge audience on DeviantART, so I might not get any responses if I were to post my screenshots in a journal or forum asking "Hey, have you gotten nigh-identical chat messages from random seemingly-throwaway accounts asking if they could use you as a muse for their art?". So… yeah, I don't exactly have any idea how I'd find out if this has happened to anyone else, though it appears that at least one other person has gotten these messages. (Also, I suspect that this is just a new form of some existing scam, rather than a brand-new scam in and of itself.) Luigifan18 (talk) 15:25, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

It could be anything really. There are lots of ways that people will want to scam you - investments, crypto, romance scam, etc - but they will want to make some kind of personal contact first. If you just ignore them then you will never know how they intended to take advantage of you. At least once a week I get an unsolicited contact via Telegram. I often respond by asking them if they would be interested in receiving some great investment advice or my cryptocurrency recommendations. (They don't see the funny side.) Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 17:25, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

If you ignore obvious spam, you're less likely going to be subject to repeat calls (or texts, or messages) from the same source. They pick up on engagement. Carthage (talk) 18:13, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

I have also been in DeviantArt for quite a long time, uploading there photos I take besides the very occasional drawing here and there having a very small audience (just a couple of followers, I don't care), and got something similar too. That smelled badly, so I deleted the message and reported the author. Panzerfaust (talk) 22:40, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

On the Pointless Poll and the Temporal Paradoxes it'll cause

I noticed a new pointless poll dropped today. So, I wonder how to handle the resulting time paradox as a result of your actions.

Although whether the timeline will split, be overwritten, or do something else is the other unanswered question on that. TheEternalOutsider (talk) 20:07, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

Apparently it would just create a branching reality from what I understand. In retrospect, I suppose either letting Hitler become an artist or simply stopping that priest from saving him from drowning in that swamp as a kid still wouldn’t stop him from killing millions in our timeline- just create an alternate one where the Holocaust and WW2 never happened. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 20:13, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

I kind of need the second World War to happen nearly exactly the way it did to be born, so one option was right out for me...-Flandres (talk) 20:20, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

And I needed the US to exist for my parents to meet in grad school --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 20:23, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

I think we've already surpassed the Great man theory. Paraphrasing Ian Kershaw, Hitler was a symptom, not the disease. He did have many qualities as a politician, but he was overall far less remarkable than we usually think. I personally believe that a war between Germany and France/UK and/or with the USSR was unavoidable, even if Hitler died as a baby. Maybe the holocaust would have been different, but most of history would have been at least similar. Maybe if the Franco-Prussian War was different things would have been different, but avoiding WWII by killing baby Hitler is not the best strategy IMO. So, Flandres and Circ, I'd say you guys would be safe. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 20:40, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

The analogous Killing baby Hitler section of the Adolf Hitler page discusses this at some length. It can be understood as a variant of the grandfather paradox. Bongolian (talk) 20:57, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

(EC)Even if the war had been inevitable, a different leader would have made different decisions. Invading Russia thinking that he knew better than his generals? Believing that Goring could stop Allies escape at Dunkirk? Declaring war on the US after the Japanese attack on Perl Harbor? Would another German leader leader have made the exact same mistakes? I'd say that Flandres and Circ are right to worry!Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 21:03, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

@GeeJayK (EC) WWII would still have happened but I probably would not have been born, as my great-grandfather wouldn't have to flee to the USA. If I remember my history of occupied Belgium correctly, DeVlag was a minority tendency in the context of Flemish Fascism with only a few hundred members at max until until the SS decided they liked it better than VNV for ideological reasons. If Hitler was not in charge the SS would not have become a major organ of a government, so it wouldn't have the power to affect occupied Europe.-Flandres (talk) 21:05, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

There's also an alternate timeline where Hitler became a sci-fi author. Luigifan18 (talk) 21:17, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

hey, weirdos, even if you successfully create a separate timeline you're still all together in this one. You don't travel like that. Torrent (talk) 05:40, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

True. I just added another choice that’s kind of like the “save Native Americans one” (which again, still wouldn’t stop us from infecting, murdering and brainwashing them out of existence in this timeline): Saving the entire Neanderthal species from being invaded, r***d and murdered out of existence in the Stone Age. But it would create a timeline where entire countries of people would be unborn. I’m of North Indian descent so in addition to needing America to exist so mom and dad can meet in grad school, I also needed the Neanderthal speciecide to happen to exist since one of my great (x64) grandmothers was most likely a Neanderthal victim of us space orcs being space orcs. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 10:07, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

How much evidence is there for out and out conflict between Neanderthals and modern humans? From a skimming of the literature the evidence for Neanderthal conflict is rare and localized to a few incidents. This could be an artifact of preservation, but it could equally not be. There's also, from what I've seen, no evidence for warfare between Neanderthal and modern humans. Evidence for warfare in the Paleolithic in general is pretty weak, but we must caution this does not mean it was nonexistent. The claim that warfare has deep evolutionary roots is a questionable one too. You can pinpoint to chimpanzees possessing organized inter-group conflict, but chimpanzees have had six million years of divergent evolution and their social groups are not thought to be equivalent to the social groups of archaic humans and early hominins.

Comparison of modern hunter-gatherer groups to ancient Paleolithic human societies is also a questionable standard when one considers modern hunter-gatherers live a very marginalized existence (that because the default of human social organization in the Paleolithic was the hunter-gatherer model) that modern humans in the Paleolithic didn't, and IIRC there are problems with the studies proclaiming the Yamomami to be incredibly violent (also taking one group and applying that as a general standard is also very dubious. Many other hunter-gatherer groups actually forbade warfare and violent conflict, like the Moriori, and instead had other, more ritualistic, means of conflict resolution.) Carthage (talk) 10:16, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Oh. So it was just us slowly winning the numbers game for the most part (and maybe a few diseases we brought from the savannah, or whatever biome East Africa was back then, especially since it seems our species keeps getting older and older; though long believed to be only a few 100K years old, now we know H. sapiens to be at least a million years old (heck maybe the neanderthals were a subspecies, since they could produce fertile offspring with us), and during that time period East Africa’s climate has completely changed many, many times. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 11:26, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Common Seth MacFarlane L

Someone needs to stop him.He's a racist fascist. /sThe Krusty Krab (talk) 17:45, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

What? I haven't heard of this person before!Koafox (talk) 18:07, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Can someone catch me up? Koafox (talk) 18:08, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

The creator of a bunch of once-funny, now dross trash like Family Guy and American Dad. Carthage (talk) 18:11, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

This is probably either someone coincidentally also named Seth MacFarlane, or a fake account. Seth MacFarlane is definitely not a MAGA Trumper (quite the opposite), as seen by his pre-Musk verified [24] Twitter feed. [25] BobJohnson (talk) 18:45, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Dude's Musk verified. He likes Hitler, anyone with or without eyes can see that. This is my opinion, plz respect it. The Krusty Krab (talk) 16:44, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I'm pretty sure that that was not the Seth MacFarlane you were looking for. See this for example.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 20:42, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

And the Brian Coxes are not each other (even if they have caused confusion at meetings/in hotels etc). Anna Livia (talk) 20:49, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

This whole post seems like the trolling is coming from inside the house.-Ryan1257 (talk) 06:14, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

The dogpiling on people without sufficient, or indeed any, investigation is kinda depressing.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 14:58, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Paramilitarism, woo, and narco-militias

I know there is a big difference between the narco-militias (the cartels aren't mere "street gangs" or even "cartels" anymore, they're full blown belligerents in a war) and the LARPer wannabe paramilitary assholes in the United States, but there is also significant woo to be found in cartel (going to refer to them as "cartels" for ease of shorthand) culture as well as a ton of bullshit being spread about the cartels. Should we have an article on cartel woo? (If one would want to make an article on organized crime woo, I'd argue for there to be a distinction. Cartels have a distinct culture and are, again, not mere "street gangs" but full blown illegal corporations with their own paramilitary units.) Carthage (talk) 07:02, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Cartels are a major issue. I think that an article here would be beneficial as cartels are frequently used as talking points during the never-ending debate regarding the border. Gang O' Shadow Wizards 🧙‍♂️^{Bore me} 16:14, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

A lot of the guns used by the cartels are sourced either directly or indirectly from American sources (a lot of the guns are either smuggled from the US or from further south in Latin America from the many, many guns the US gave to reactionary dictatorships down there in the Cold War). A lot of these guys were directly trained by the US, for example many of the founders of Los Zetas trained at Ft. Bragg. This article details the heavy involvement the US has played in regional instability. Carthage (talk) 03:09, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

So, just more blowback from American imperialism, then? Luigifan18 (talk) 17:14, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, that pretty much sums it up. Chickens coming home to roost and all that. Carthage (talk) 17:16, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

list of goats

we should have a list of goats! I made a draft. Koafox (talk) 15:10, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

It's not going to be missional for mainspace. Just make one in funspace. Bongolian (talk) 17:30, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Mascot goats? Luigifan18 (talk) 20:56, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

How relevant would Argan tree goats and the goat/eats chlorophyll' ditty I remember from somewhere be? Anna Livia (talk) 00:12, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

bahaha haha, ha... No because that's hierarchy. Torrent (talk) 05:21, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Torrent - to whom are you replying?Anna Livia (talk) 14:12, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Fundraiser

I set a goal of $3000 to start with. Our monthly server bills are reportedly $244 a month, so $3000 should cover us for about a year. This is mostly an emergency fundraiser to hurriedly cover our server costs now that Trent is no longer covering them. Now that we can no longer count on Trent pay our bills for us (which, to be clear, should never have been the case in the first place), we ought to hold these fundraisers more regularly—which, again, to be clear, we should have been doing in the first place. This site is a proper nonprofit business entity now, and Trent should never have been left to bear the burden of it alone. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 00:19, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Apparently I can't donate from New Zealand - both PayPal and Credit Card options come up with a warning to that effect and won't let me complete! Aloysius the Gaul (talk) 01:10, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

I wish I could donate, but I have a very tight budget. ☹️ Luigifan18 (talk) 01:36, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Will donate with my next paycheck, what can I do without my favorite repository of anti reactionary talking points. 192.222.197.180 (talk) 03:30, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Tried on two different browsers but PayPal does not like me. "Sorry, we weren't able to complete your payment at this time. Please try again later." Could not get credit card option to work either (which also goes via PayPal) "Sorry, we weren't able to complete your payment at this time. Please try again later." From Spain.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 07:47, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

There are some credit cards that only work in the country in which they are issued. Bongolian (talk) 08:36, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Some banks have online options for toggling whether their cards can be used in different regions, no idea if this applies for you. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 08:52, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Worked fine for me in the UK. Though remember that PP will skim off an extra 4% in 'foreign transation fees'. KarmaPolice (talk) 09:20, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

It might have been my VPN as PayPal just mailed me about a new account login in from a different location. But even with VPN off still not working - and they probably now have my account tagged as suspicious. I'll try again tomorrow, if it doesn't work I'll contact them directly.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 09:30, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

How long do we have? Koafox (talk) 16:46, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Three or four days left at this point. The good news is we're very close to our fundraising goal. We still need to transfer the money to our server provider, though. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 17:07, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

We did it despite the challenges. The Krusty Krab (talk) 17:29, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

has the fundraiser raised 260 or 2800? Koafox (talk) 17:37, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

On my screen it's $2880. The Krusty Krab (talk) 17:47, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ We did it RationalWiki! --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 17:58, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Phew! That's a relief! Luigifan18 (talk) 18:03, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Good thing someone had a couple thousand burning a hole in their pocket-Ryan1257 (talk) 18:45, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Can someone get rid of the banner? Koafox (talk) 19:14, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

I think fundraisers typically ran for at least a few days or even a few weeks, but it could at least be shortened by removing the part referring to an emergency (modeling after the 2019 fundraiser maybe). Chillpilled (talk) 19:37, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Just letting everyone know: (1) Trent reappeared and paid the overdue server bill. (2) I hooked our server account up to draw from RationalWiki's official debit card from now on, so this issue shouldn't arise again. (3) I am extending the fundraiser so we can continue to be financially independent and stable for the foreseeable future. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 21:14, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Rationalwiki is (NOT) about to be switched off

This section is pinned and will not be automatically archived.

{{subst:DNAU}} Does anyone have e.g. a phone number for Trent? Linode want their bill fucking paid - David Gerard (talk) 13:32, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Just found his work number, will call when the working day starts in NM - David Gerard (talk) 13:41, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Phew. We’re saved. Now copy that shit to your phone contacts. When I saw this topic my blood turned to ice for a second. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 16:00, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Same here… I'm still planning to push "What would RationalWiki do" on the fundies, dang it! This site is an excellent place to research what reality is actually like and refute fundie and denialist nonsense. Luigifan18 (talk) 16:28, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

I was wondering why we haven't seen any donation campaigns for the last 2 years... -- Techpriest (talk) 16:33, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Lol we're not saved, I left a message on his work phone. Dunno if anyone else can contact him. I can't currently just pay our server bills (currently $244/mo) out my pocket. I could probably do this month but I'd be begging RW to cover it. Setting up an ad-hoc shadow organisation would not spark joy in any regard and I think we really don't want RW being run by a UK org and not a US one. jfc this is not a problem I want to have. Linode have given us an extension for 1 week, but anyway. Have you seen Trent, like ever? If so, please ping him. Thank you - David Gerard (talk) 16:53, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

He's in the discord, I've given him a ping there. The only other means of contact would be on Wikipedia, but idk enough about WP policy to contact him there about it. -- Techpriest (talk) 17:47, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

244 bucks every month is... Quite a bit. I'm worried that maybe Trent doesn't care anymore, and the site is actually going down unless someone else pays for the server bills. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 18:11, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

It's quite reasonable for our setup - varnish, apache/php, separate image store, search server, database. Config was by Tim Starling, aka the guy from Wikimedia and MediaWiki, and literally the most knowledgeable person in the world about MediaWiki site setup and rightsizing. The usual issue is that Linode's way of doing things is to move you to a bigger box and keep you at the same price; so every now and then Tim's dropped us down a tier - David Gerard (talk) 20:29, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Isn't this an issue which the RMF members should be aware of before us plebs are? KarmaPolice (talk) 18:53, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

My advice is to run adverts on this website, you can make a lot of money. 178.128.172.142 (talk) 19:40, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Being only 'general usage technological' - how easy would it be to download RW offline? (Ensuring that 'all individual pages and their talk pages' and archived talk pages etc are saved on several actual computers apiece, and then uploading them again, is one thing; but 'the whole caboodle including programming etc' would be another.)

It would also be useful to keep an eye on the relevant pages on WP and CP. Anna Livia (talk) 20:33, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

It's possible to download the wikitext source code of wikis using tools like WikiTeam (I've done it myself for several wikis in the past to archive them) and then use a dump viewer or import the dump into MediaWiki, but sadly those tools aren't the most intuitive for non-technical users. 2A02:C7C:6C23:EB00:414A:928F:F5B3:FB17 (talk) 22:22, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

@KarmaPolice That presumes the board has been actually doing it's job over the past 3 or so years. We've been electing board members but as far as I can tell the last meeting that was held was solely to kick Dysk off the board. -- Techpriest (talk) 21:07, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, a few including me (new this year), Shabidoo, and DuceMoosolini have argued it's about time for a meeting, but others have failed to respond so far. A month ago I argued, "It would be good to see some general signs of life rather than the organization, who knows, maybe just waiting to fall apart." --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 21:09, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Is there any reason the RMF can't have a meeting minus a member or two? KarmaPolice (talk) 21:20, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Could work, but there needs to be more than just 1 or 2 RMF member available at a time where we try to organize (on Discord), that's the inertia prior to the current crisis. And if Trent remains missing, that's a setback. @David Gerard would be good to have along in a meeting as a stand-in for an operations manager then. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 22:12, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, working out what a RMF quorum is will be important, as well as any blocks on 'minority capture'. It may also be wise to have someone who is familiar with the back-office functions to be a stand-in if the primary is unavailable. KarmaPolice (talk) 22:27, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

...there is such a thing as the bylaws. The only rule for quorum is a majority of members present. With the current board that would be at least 3 people. (5 elected + Trent as operations manager makes 6). -- Techpriest (talk) 22:50, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

I had some contact with him when the project first kicked off - but I can't find any contact info now. Any more old-guard around?Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 21:23, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Last I chatted with him (January this year), Trent wanted to run a fundraiser since he'd been paying for RationalWiki out-of-pocket by himself for quite some time. I did successfully set up a proper bank checking account and business-class PayPal account, and hooked them together, in preparation for the fundraiser, but I haven't heard from him since. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 23:23, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

@Stabby the MisanthropeDo you still have the mechanism in place and could it be used with an emergency fundraiser?Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 07:20, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Yes. I just checked, and the accounts are still valid and working. But I'd still need someone to go into RW's Linode account and switch it so it draws from the bank account. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 06:52, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

I am utterly flabberghasted at how hard it is for a board meeting to materialise. I've been on the board over a year and have done absolutely nothing (despite wanting to do something). My last question, to a long standing member of the board, and recently re-elected moderator, was simply ignored. ShabiDOO 00:20, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Are you on the Discord? If not (you're wanted there), with you we could have a good chance of enough people there (3+) for a chat meeting. At this point I assume a meeting would probably miss 1 or 2 persons at best, but it could still go ahead... --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 00:32, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

It's almost 1am here, so I gotta get to bed. But I'd be happy to schedule a meeting for Wednesday or Thursday (maybe around 22.00 UTC?) or next week? ShabiDOO 00:41, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

There's no clear time yet, but there's always a chat room open for board members, those on RW:Discord and given that role. A meeting could in principle just be a more formally significant chat exchange. @DuceMoosolini plans to try to round up more people next week. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 00:48, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps the funding of $240/month itself is not the problem. There used to be periodic fundraising when funds were needed to pay bills. I can't remember a fundraiser happening in several years. The problem it would seem is that the mechanism for fundraising and paying bills seems to be vested in one person with no alternate. Bongolian (talk) 02:20, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Someone mentioned advertising above. Seems like a good fallback if fundraising ever fails (I mean, it's better than the site suddenly going away), but not something to hop to before trying fundraising again. But yeah, this seems more like a process problem. Chillpilled (talk) 07:54, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Is it even possible to eliminate all of the dubious and crank advertisers from the mix? I can imagine gold bar ads on our gold bug and gold pages, crypto ads on our crypto page, chiro ads on our chiropractic page, etc. It's would compromise RW's stated purpose. ^{— Unsigned, by: Bongolian / talk / contribs}

Yes, I think (may require a lot of extra policing), though again that's a can of worms to open another time. Chillpilled (talk) 08:26, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Many years ago we had advertising right at the start and, yes, we had homeopathy ads on the homeopathy page or whatever. But maybe controls are better now.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 09:42, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

This is where targeted advertising has a plus - it's showing you stuff based on your search history, so it would only show say, homopathy ad if you'd actually been looking at it before reading our homeopathy page [and in that case, you can say it's your own damn fault]. Google AdSense also allows you to block individual ads, companies and/or ad category, so if we went with them we'd be able to choke off the vast majorities of the 'unwanteds' [I assume other providers allow you to do this too]. At least in theory...

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘As to the advertising suggestion, there is one more problem. I was looking back at the site messages for the last time there was a fundraiser (2020), and I saw that this is part of the text that Trent posted in the notice, "We will never allow ads because we must remain independent."[26] Bongolian (talk) 21:21, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

The question is; is that a principle that RW is willing to die on? Y'know, if begging-bowls are insufficient and we can't find a sugar parent? KarmaPolice (talk) 22:06, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

I'd be interested in the breakdown of that $244/month server cost. I'm guessing (based on the situation) that nobody has really monitored the nuts and bolts (traffic/DB usage) of the site for a while. So perhaps this could be reduced.

Nonetheless, even if this amount is what is necessary... well, $3K "or so" of costs sounds pretty feasible to raise, to me. I'm not really keen on the "resort to advertising" talk. I shudder to think what "SEO optimized Rationalwiki" would look like... BobJohnson (talk) 23:36, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

As for Apooft's point... yes, I think utilising the RMF chatboard a lot more would be a good idea. There is nothing stopping the majority of topics being thrashed-out there, leaving 'meetings' when it's truly needed [such as formal voting]. However, this does make the assumption the board hasn't met for so long because of schedule conflicts between members. KarmaPolice (talk) 14:42, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Targeted ads might stop me being offered a homeopathy add - the problem would be some random visitor who might have an interest in the stuff and was coming here for information.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 15:05, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

I suspect it's possible to avoid that eventuality. KarmaPolice (talk) 15:18, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Guys, we only have one week to do this shit. Let's make up a quick fundraiser right now, and just send all the money to David. MayGodSaveUsAll (talk) 17:47, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ @David Gerard Any luck contacting Trent? -- Techpriest (talk) 18:23, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Not a peep yet.

If I need to pay the server bill I will tell you all and ask for your $$ to cover it.

I will set out all numbers and so forth, and like I'm famous enough to be on Wikipedia (David Gerard (author)) and my phone number is on my website, so this may slightly reduce the likelihood I'll cut and run to a non-extradition country with all the RW bucks. Probably.

Stabby, you are an American in the US, you bothered setting up some shit for this. How do you feel about making this your ongoing maintenance problem while we try to get the legal stuff back if Trent is no longer in a position to run things going forward? - David Gerard (talk) 20:51, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Not at this very moment, but yes, I can start up a fundraiser within the day. The challenge will be hooking up Linode to the bank account, since I don't have access to our Linode account. Also, need to convince people to use our shiny new ~business class~ PayPal account, rather than just dumping money into the old one. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 21:55, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

If by tomorrow you still don’t hear back, just assume he forgot this site and e-beg away. We’ve been around for 16 years, we’ve survived recessions, flame wars, that one time Armondikov and Nx caused HCM-0 by promoting everyone, Oxy, the CP trolls, Mona’s brigade, etc. It’d be so dumb if this is how it ends. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 21:35, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Even if disaster is averted, think we must take this as a warning call. It's not right the Board didn't see this coming and it's really not right that [if what above is correct] Trent was paying the bills out of his own wallet for ages without anyone else being aware of this. KarmaPolice (talk) 21:59, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Assuming we resolve this, I'll probably start getting really pissy in noticeboards and the like to get the Board to do it's duties.

Okay not great that we can't contact Trent. I'll echo CRs statement - if you (David) don't hear anything by tomorrow, please... I dunno, work with Stabby to get a fundraiser set up. I recall you had access to the Linode to spin up a cache server a few years ago? I presume those details still work. re: @KarmaPolice Assuming we get this resolved, I think it's time I start actually kicking the board in it's shins to get their duties done. The entire RWF is far too dormant and while that worked fine enough for a bit, we're clearly at critical breaking point. I know I technically have no power but I suspect the dormancy of the board is a vicious cycle where not enough members are willing to expend much effort for a meeting, resulting in meetings just not happening and that resulting in things being let go. For starters; @Shabidoo and Cosmikdebris could you two consider joining the discord? I know it's unofficial but that would at least re-establish a single point of communication for the board again. -- Techpriest (talk) 22:40, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

From my little bit of experience, I think what is needed is a seperate 'secretary' role - one person who has the remit of a) keeping an eye on the finances, b) bringing up 'topics for discussion' in the RMF noticeboard, c) kicking Board members arses into a meeting when it is required and lastly, d) documenting the vital bits of info 'just in case'. KarmaPolice (talk) 23:14, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

I registered on the discord many months ago. I am not sure which is the room for the board. The only thing that seems right is the "star board" but that hasn't had any much activity. ShabiDOO 23:17, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

We don't have a starboard. My guess is that you joined either Dysks "RMF" discord or the old RatCord. Can you try joining the invite on RW:Discord? -- Techpriest (talk) 23:24, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Ahhh yes I must have been on one of the others. Im on Rationalwiki support chat though it is late and must hit the hay. Ideally, we would have some advanced planning to meet as xmas time is a busy time. Happy to set time aside if planned in advance, though being continually available hoping for an ad hoc meeting nearing xmas time is unfeasible unfortunately. ShabiDOO 00:12, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Alright, I have approved your account. That just leaves cosmik. -- Techpriest (talk) 00:48, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Okay, I can now confirm that the entire board is on the Discord. That means we have a communication channel at least. Doesn't resolve the ongoing crisis but this is at least a more proceeding step than we had before. -- Techpriest (talk) 00:53, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Good, keep us posted. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 02:07, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

@Shabidoo I'm very sorry for ignoring you. And I appreciate you not directly naming me. Again, the answer to your question is "Yes." I will say the start of November was a particularly stressful time for me. I had just found out that my contract wouldn't be renewed after December 31 and I had to find a new job and a new flat. Both of which I have now found, although I've just had another very stressful day related to the bureaucracy of getting a new work permit in Taiwan. Spud (talk) 09:13, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘So now we're 3 days in. @David Gerard Any updates from Trents side or should we start routing around Trent for the time being and get a fundraiser set up with @Stabby the Misanthrope. -- Techpriest (talk) 19:23, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Can't hurt to start early, ehem "early", and even just 4 days are 2 months less than ideal. ULTRACOMFY (talk) 20:20, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Not a word yet. At this point I'm worried if Trent is OK actually.

But yeah, if Stabby can get things in order at his soonest leisure that'd be good. The upcoming bills are this one, which I can make sure is paid this week, and then first of January (and first of each month going forward).

Also in touch with the board about doing all of this in a manner that isn't a legal mess or at least not a mess that a competent person couldn't untangle if any of us ever transmute into one. This is the sort of time a board needs to do things. Fortunately, they are. Also, they are us, and that's a delight because everyone understands RW.

We'll be fine, probably. It's just a bit messy. Also, gonna be begging your cash - David Gerard (talk) 20:29, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

It sounded before like you may have had access to the Linode account — do you? Chillpilled (talk) 20:40, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

I do, that's why I got the email :-) I think I can add Stabby's CC, or indeed my own to pay it this week. And hopefully I can add Stabby as a billing contact too - David Gerard (talk) 20:51, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

If I'm going to run a fundraiser, I need edit rights to MediaWiki:Sitenotice and RationalWiki:Fundraiser. If someone could give me Staff userrights, that'd be appreciated. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 21:00, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

@Stabby the Misanthrope I've given you staff perms for this. The sidebar also has a donate button. -- Techpriest (talk) 21:15, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Thank you! Unfortunately, it seems RationalWiki:Fundraiser and Template:Fundraiser are both modlocked, and I also need to edit those. Would someone with the appropriate magic powers unlock them (at least, enough so I can edit them), please? Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 21:36, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Temporarily lowered both. -- Techpriest (talk) 22:16, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Good, so it seems you guys have a plan to at least buy the Board more time to find a more permanent way to keep us afloat. We got very lucky that Stabby had this other account thing set up and decided to unlurk at just the right moment. I'd suggest bringing back those yearly fundraisers that cover the cost of all 12 months of the next year, I remember those from the last time I was here and they'd sometimes fill up in mere days. I don't think we should put ads on here, lest we get ads for homeopathy on Homeopathy, links to Muslim blogs explaining why apostasy laws are a good thing in Atheism faq, ads for Ken Ham's Creation Museum on Evolution, or pro-Trump attack ads on Donald Trump. We'd become the very thing we swore to destroy --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 23:04, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

I suggest someone(s) on the Board look into whether it's actually possible to have ads while avoiding the 'bad' ones. While personally agree that RW does need to avoid ones for shite like crypto/woo/political exremists etc as well as ones which somewhat 'dodgy' [say, vaping and gambling]. Would also suggest anything overtly political should be verboten too. Look, I don't like the idea, but if the choices are 'ads or no RW' I think we should bite the bullet and accept the ads for new shoes. Depending on how much we get, it's possible we might [in combo with fundraisers] fill up the bowl sufficiently to provide us with a bit of a fiscal cushion to stop shit like this happening again. KarmaPolice (talk) 09:09, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘i'm starting to wonder whether trent is even still live, at this point. The G (talk) 01:51, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

My goodness, $626 already? They love us!! - David Gerard (talk) 08:01, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Reminds me of the fundraisers I saw when I edited on here between classes in high school, it would fill up within less than a month- and I joined only a few weeks after the HCM-1 drama over The Conflict That Must Not Be Named that cratered our community had all died down. My atheist-sympathetic Christian mom even surprisingly agreed to set her account to donate monthly like she already did for WP (which it likely still does). --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 08:23, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

While I disagree with some of the wiki's content, the wiki is a vital resource to educate people on bullshit and authoritarianism. Carthage (talk) 09:23, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

I like to think of RW as 'The Wiki that says what Wikipedia doesn't' with a focus on everything cranky with GOAT and snark s(r)easoning. There have been some "wait, what?" moments for me here and there and some articles focus a bit too much on smack talking people rather than actual talking points, but that is minimal and in no way minimizes the significance that RW has. RW is perhaps the best starting point for research if one wants to gain a perspective on all the bullshit floating around on the internet and beyond. ULTRACOMFY (talk) 09:57, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

we do important things like destroying Twitter - David Gerard (talk) 13:32, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

RW is saved! --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 18:35, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

@David Gerard @Stabby the Misanthrope So unless I can't read, I think this means we cleared the fundraiser? Can you two get in cahoots to get the payment stuff connected on Linode? -- Techpriest (talk) 18:37, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

that's the idea! Dec bill is paid, we now have a pile of cash, a paypal and a bank account, and have to hook it into Linode - David Gerard (talk) 19:24, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Suggestion/discussion part 2

As the initial target has been reached up the figure - perhaps to $[current number of RW pages] (and when reached rethink). Anna Livia (talk) 18:55, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Bill paid!

And I didn't have to pay it myself either. Now helping stuff get sorted out on the back end (and hopefully not involving myself too much in the process). And we have $3k which will fund a year's hosting right there - David Gerard (talk) 19:18, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Now another thing: is someone other than Trent able to renew the site's domain? It doesn't expire until *2027*, based on WHOIS, but that's an eventuality. Even if he does show back up, this has shown that there ought to be at least a couple people we can rely on for core things like this at any given time. Chillpilled (talk) 19:54, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Linode is now hooked into the Foundation's debit card! So right now we're set for over a year now on the financial front. I agree with Chillpilled that we should also set the domain name account to use the the RMF debit card. We got it for a reason, which is to cover all of RW's bills without Trent having to pony up. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 20:41, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Good; another day, another lease on life for this site. I can imagine all the trolls wailing and moaning right now after declaring the death on of rankings on a search engine starting with G for atheism, evolution, bAlD sIcKeNiNgLy dIsHoNeSt AnTiWhItE bAlD scHiZoPhReNiC aNtEaFuHs, banned loose-cannon users nobody gives a shit about anymore and our irrational cabal who OS FUNDIG AND CONTROLLING YOU for the 800th time. How embarrassing, we sure showed them we aren’t going anywhere. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 08:15, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

TITS to become reality

A couple of years ago, Elon Musk joked that he would found the Texas Institute of Tech and Science (TITS). But now, Elon seems to be following through... he is in the beginning phases of starting a small school in Austin. It has yet to be named, but given Elon's history (Tesla models S 3 X and Y, anyone?), it's indeed a real possibility. It all depends on whether people actually want to enroll in this school and whether the education will actually be worth anything; a certain former president founded his own scam university, after all. CorruptUser 19:49, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Personally, I'm more of an Austin School of Sciences guy myself. CorruptUser 19:56, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Elon Musk is an immature manchild. Tell us something we don't already know. Luigifan18 (talk) 20:57, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

An "issue" that I see, potentially, in Austin Tech, is found in certain articles like this. [27] Reportedly, states that are implementing good ol' "Christian fundamentalist" school/reproductive policies are experiencing a "brain drain" of sorts. Particularly, teachers are avoiding states that implement crude "Don't Say Gay" style education restrictions. Restrictive reproductive laws also are causing a drain of OB-GYN, obstetric care, and other related health fields to states with more favorable laws.

Now, I don't know how much of the articles is "cherry-picking anecdotes for their core audience". But some of this makes sense. What I do know is, at the moment, Texas is in the news for Kate Cox, a woman whose fetus was diagnosed with Patau syndrome, which is almost always a non-viable fetus, and which non-abortive means of removing the fetus (C-section) was a risk to her health. Although a lower court judge ruled that Kate Cox could have an abortion, once again, the corrupt shithead attorney general Ken Paxton and the Texas Supreme Court showed what side of the fundie Kool-Aid they are on, by forcing the woman to have an abortion out of state. (Paxton even threatened any hospital that provided assistance to Kate, even before the Texas Supreme Court ruling, with first degree felonies.)[28]

Elon Musk is the ultimate man-child 13 year old boy, true. But IMHO, Texas' continued descent into Religious Right Jesusland is probably a bigger threat to Austin tech than any childish name Elon Musk could come up with. What young tech professional (particularly women) would want to attend college in a state that whitewashes their textbooks to suit the fundies and is so hardcore anti-abortion, even r/Conservative on Reddit is pissed? BobJohnson (talk) 21:01, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Sam Houston Institute of Technology for the win. (Well, it was funny when I was in high school… in the 70s.) Nowhere Man (talk) 21:08, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Elon was the smart kid who achieved a lot of success, was likeable enough for other nerds to be attracted to him and his success snowballed from there, but never once in his life did he have to take a REAL loss and so he became super-arrogant to the point of being unable to conceive of the idea that he was doing something wrong. CorruptUser 22:26, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

I turned down a job offer at this place back when it was called Transworld Institute of Technology partly because its website was www.tit.edu.tw Spud (talk) 00:24, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Are the UK term 'tits up'/'Tough titty' appropriate? Anna Livia (talk) 14:12, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Spud - Transworld Institute of Technology = is Twit (as in '[Z] is a right twit.') applicable? Anna Livia (talk) 20:03, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

remembering fondly when the Western Australian Institute of Technology very nearly changed its name to Curtin University of New Technology - David Gerard (talk) 19:22, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

@Anna Livia Yes, I always thought it would make more sense to abbreviate Transworld Institute of Technology as TWIT. If their website had been www.twit.edu.tw, that probably would have made me more likely to work there. I could have had some good, clean fun joking about that at future job interviews. "Yes, I was a TWIT teacher for 5 years," I could say. But it's official abbreviation was TIT and seriously, not wanting to have referees on my future CV with email addresses ending in @tit.edu.tw was one reason why I didn't take the job. Spud (talk) 04:43, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

sleeping fox

I made a story based off of "sleeping beauty" called "Sleeping fox": A baby fox falls down a hill into a swamp and is cursed to sleep for a long time. Over a long time, the swamp turns into a forest. Later, the fox is found by two foxes who want to raise a baby fox but can’t find one. The foxes find the sleeping baby fox and try to wake her up. After trying for a while the baby fox wakes up and the foxes are a happy family! The end! How does this compare to the original sleeping beauty? Koafox (talk) 21:06, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Needs a well-animated fight scene with a fire-breathing dragon.

On a more serious note, what is the story a metaphor for? The original Sleeping Beauty fairy tale (not the Disney movie) was a metaphor for how... *checks notes*... wait, that can't be right. What's with the rape and cannibalism?! Who the hell wrote this?! CorruptUser 22:23, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

A live action version of Sun, Moon, and Talia would indeed be a bit too... "spicy"... for your Moms for Liberty types. (To say nothing of what a modern audience would think of Talia being overjoyed at seeing the married king that raped you in your sleep. Revenge of the Nerds, y'ain't got nothing on this!)

(The moral of that version of the tale is: "Those whom fortune favors / Find good luck even in their sleep." Shorter, less flowery version: "You lucky duckies!") BobJohnson (talk) 23:58, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Pseudoscience on the Streets: Chiropractors and More

One thing that has been bothersome for me for a while now is the fact that chiropractors continue to operate out there with impunity. It's quite annoying seeing those quacks' shops out while merely passing by in a car on the streets. Anything more to corroborate on pseudoscience out in the real world while driving, and how we can put an end to them? TheEternalOutsider (talk) 10:48, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Live and let live Argument, Christianity

Hello everyone. I consider my self some sort of soft anti-theist. This means that I consider religion detrimental to such a degree that it is not worth having. However, I don't go around trying to convert people and I think that the problem will solve itself over time with people getting less and less religious. When discussing religion and whether it is worth keeping, I have often heard people posit a premise: "Some people also do good in the name of their religion". The implicit premise is then, because it also does good, it should not be discarded. If you could give only one answer, what would it be? I usually give a thought experiment: Let's say an ideology does 50% good and 50% bad. Is it worth keeping? I think that any ideology or belief that demonstrably leads to a decent amount of suffering can be replaced by something better. The same benefit of doubt is usually not granted to ideologies that are unequivocally considered bad or evil like (Godwin's law here we go) Nazism for instance. Yet you could make the same argument about a hypothetical good Nazi which then sounds quite ridiculous: "Some people do good in the name of Nazism therefore we should keep it." Am I being an ass? There is probably a better way to go about it^^ Cheers NastyNugget (talk) 11:00, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

How do you quantify "good" or "bad" in a way that would hold up to academic scrutiny? Liberalism is often hailed as being the ideological underpinning of human rights, but it would be denialism to claim that liberal ideology has not been used as a justification for atrocities (Pinochet is often defended as "bringing free-market capitalism to Chile", and support for reactionary dictatorships during the Cold War by liberal powers was defended as "defeating communism"). This also ignores how early liberals used political violence (see the actions of the Sons of Liberty during the American Revolution as an example of this) as a tactic to enact their political programs when liberalism was an anti-establishment movement (for a contemporary example of liberal political violence, the insurgent National Resistance Army in Russia also identifies as liberal: see here. To my understanding elements of the Burmese opposition in the Burmese Civil War are broadly liberal, but the opposition as a whole seems to be more big-tent.) Carthage (talk) 11:06, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

If we say that we even had a way to make sure our religion does exactly 50% good and 50% bad things then this means that it is a net zero contributor. From a pure, strong utilitarian perspective it doesn't really matter then, but I would say that if it really is net zero then at the very least the religion assumes some pro-active control over who gets to get good things and who has to suffer, and the debate over whether the religion has that kind of right to decide for/over other people is muddy, very muddy indeed. (What I'm saying is that if it doesn't change the amount of good or bad in the world, it at least redirects existing goods and bads, and that is very difficult to argue in favor of, because where does the religion take that kind of authority from?) ULTRACOMFY (talk) 12:42, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Of course, if you take the point of view that if some phenomenon causes anything bad, it should be rejected or revised. You can also reject moralism as an analytical tool entirely, which is what I tend to do. Not entirely, but I am more in favor of analysis of power. That does not mean I am a moral nihilist, however. Carthage (talk) 12:45, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

I guess any ideology/religion might (under sometimes strange circumstances) produce "good" - so that's not really the metric. A better question would be "does it have a sound basis?".Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 13:47, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

As a fellow soft antitheist, it's still extreme. You have to position religion as being wrong. And if what you're wrong about is the fundamental nature of the universe, that's bad, but if what you're wrong about is whether genocide is okay, that's unimaginably worse. Whether the former makes the ladder more common, it's really not so easy to say. ikanreed ^{🐐Bleat at me} 16:17, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

The immediate question, concerning the flourishing of religion, is whether human nature may be altered to be independent of the mythologies typically preceding the instantiation of a religion, and chiefly produced by religious zealots. Are there enough anti-psychotic drugs to deal with such people? Naturally believers must see substantial good in believing, while unbelievers do not. What influence do unbelievers have upon the faith of believers? For any religious cohort, Like the Amish in central Pennsylvania, their beliefs are probably immutable. To the question, will Christian belief itself largely pass away? I think so, as every social practice does seem to pass from practice to memory only, and then to a kind of social oblivion. Does criticism of religion hasten the process of diminishing its influence? I don't see how it can.UncleKrampus (talk) 17:12, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

Since everyone seems to be putting their 2 cents into this, I guess I'll give it a go. I don't fully agree with your position on the matter. While religion obviously has its "goods and bads" (as you outlined in the 50/50 good and bad ideology argument), I don't think that religion is detrimental Enough to be better off without it. Religion tends to outline "moral rules" that are then commonly applied as law in scripture, along with reinforcing the standard human belief or right and wrong (Do note that "standard" is relative to the culture and upbringing/experiences of individuals). These moral rules appear to influence societies and their behaviors, serving as a "guideline" for individuals. This somewhat assisted in "bringing together" individuals (for better or for worse) and uniting them under a common umbrella. Of course, this doesn't mean that the world needs religion to be functional, as religion isn't the end-all of someone's morals. I guess that I'm trying to say that religion can be applied as more of a moral outline, while an ideology is defined as "a system of ideas and ideals, especially one which forms the basis of economic or political theory and policy" (-Oxford Languages). Now, this doesn't mean that the two aren't related, as the comparison can be drawn. I'm saying that perhaps they differ on the basis of religion being focused on self and moral expectations vs. ideology being more focused on the workings of economy and government. You have a valid point regardless. Gang O' Shadow Wizards 🧙‍♂️^{Bore me} 18:15, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

I agree with moving past religion (actually I think it's kind of an inevitability at this point on a societal scale although I think there will always be religious people), but because of the central role religion has played in society for thousands of years, there are going to be big problems if we can't replace it with a series of other things achieving the same social purposes. Nietzsche wrote himself into a panic attack trying to figure this central problem out or so I hear. And that was over a century ago. Chillpilled (talk) 21:51, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

I find the very framing of the issue a bit misleading. I think you would be hard press to find any institution or collection of ideas that has not been used to do some significant amount of harm to any great capacity. I am comfortable identifying myself as an atheist because I deem the notion of a omnipotent, omnibenevolent, and omniscient being to be logically incoherent, and I am committed to reality itself necessitating a certain degree of logical coherence. That being said I am not sure how one can commit oneself to being anti-theist in any meaningful capacity without engaging in a cultural imperialism of a type. If you identify yourself as anti-theist but oppose intervening on people's religious beliefs what exactly is the opposition being expressed? I am not even sure if it can be meaningful called "opposition" in any practical sense if it is reserved entirely to one's personal attitudes. That being said, if the use of an ideology, set of spiritual beliefs, or institution has been used to commit widespread harm is enough to propose negating it's existence...well...I am not sure if that can be consistently held without opposing science, considering everything from chemical weapons, to the atomic bomb, to scientific racism, the inspiration of eugenics, biological warfare, etc. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 00:46, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

I think it would not be the love of philosophy and scientific knowledge itself that engenders the kind of abuse to which you have pointed, but rather a society with the convictions of purpose, populated with technicians and scientists competent to effect the will of populist movements that are both idealist and fatal. Something always replaces religious exhaustion. Russell wrote something like one must avoid the philosophical extremes found in the superficiality of British empiricism and the madness of continental idealism.UncleKrampus (talk) 02:05, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

OP Response: You guys made some really interesting points. Too many to answer in fact, so I will just keep thinking about them for a while and see what I can get out of em for my own intellectual growth ;) NastyNugget (talk) 14:21, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

I think that you also need to separate two quite distinct questions:

1. Does/do God(s) exist?

2. Is/are religion(s) a generally good or bad thing?

It is really easy to assume that these questions are similar - but they are really utterly different.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 18:48, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

RMF Board

So as the newly appointed Chair of the Board, I’m here to let you all know that we just finished our meeting this morning, and we should have minutes posted by tomorrow. We have a date for our next meeting, which is 18 February, and we have agenda items to work on in the interim. I’m happy to announce that the Board hiatus is over. It took a bit of a crisis to kick us into gear, but we’re here and ready to set things in motion. Our Treasurer, Stabby, is also preparing and filing our tax documents with the IRS as I’m posting this. We’re back, baby! 🎄Chef Moosolini’s Ristorante Italiano🎄^{Ask about our holiday specials!} 17:57, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Great to hear guys.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 18:18, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Yeah! Bongolian (talk) 19:18, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Stabby has submitted the tax documents. We are officially in Uncle Sam’s good graces. 🎄Chef Moosolini’s Ristorante Italiano🎄^{Ask about our holiday specials!} 19:21, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

So can someone update the Foundation page? Carthage (talk) 19:40, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Good, so the feds won’t come bursting through the walls for you. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 20:20, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

The foundation's web server admin function is giving me 503 errors. As soon as I can get one of our admins to fix the sick web service I'll get those pages updated. Also, the meeting minutes are out for review and should be ready for posting here soon. —cosmikdebris ^talk stalk 20:37, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

COP28 has been a shit show

I think the greatest takeaway from this years conference is that having it in countries whose economies are oil based is a mistake since it'd be like having a COP conference sponsored by Shell. Also, it's that OPEC isn't given enough criticism or blame for the role it plays in discouraging climate change solutions whether it's making oil and gas cheap in order to discourage more investment into alternative energies, promoting climate change denial (or at least dismissing fossil fuels in the conversation), and blatantly using the COP28 conference to land oil and gas deals. We often seem to focus most of the attention on the actions of their customers, which yeah, they aren't pumping that oil for the fun of it, but OPEC is not some hapless victim forced to pump oil for its customers, they do it for the same reason Shell, Exxon, and other oil corporations do it, to make as much money as possible. The difference though is that rather than having the problem we do where oil lobbyist try to influence national policy, these countries often have state-run oil companies, so oil company policy is national policy which makes it harder to dislodge.-Ryan1257 (talk) 23:11, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

"Saudi Arabia is an oil corporation with a navy and an army." Carthage (talk) 23:50, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

It's a family-owned business as well.-Ryan1257 (talk) 00:42, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

I hear they're considering building a very plausibly designed dystopian nightmare masquerading as a city, which the media is hailing as dA FyOoChUr oF uRbAn pLaNnInG!!!!!!111!!!SHIFT1!!SHIFToneeleventyone11!!!1! And those poor enslaved South-Asian migrant workers, imagine having to build such a massive vanity project in one of the world's most searing deserts, for years on end. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 01:08, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

Seems like the the petrostates are tired of making promises that they don't intend to keep, and they're going to run the show from now on. Azerbaijan will be hosting COP29 next year after Russia backed their bid (both states are petroleum exporters).[29] Bongolian (talk) 02:41, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

Not to mention being somewhere in between authoritarian regimes and outright dictatorships run by corrupt oligarchs who personally profit from their raw material fuelled economic models by siphoning off some of the profits for themselves and by using the hard currency generated from oil exports to buy loyalty from other local elites. Something that all three countries have in common.

But I do wonder if John Kerry is going to laud the Aliyev dynasty representatives in the same way he has laughably been sucking up to the current COP hosts and praising their “constructive” approach. ScepticWombat (talk) 10:18, 10 December 2023 (UTC)

One wonders if Azerbaijan wasn't a petrol state if there would be active sanctions against that country. Evidently the fact that Azerbaijan is committing another Armenian genocide hasn't stopped that bastion of liberal values the EU from signing a deal with the fuckers. Foreign policy is such a fucking farce. Carthage (talk) 10:52, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Hold up, another Armenian genocide?! What the fuck?!? Luigifan18 (talk) 18:10, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

You're not aware of what's been going on in Artsakh and Armenia? Carthage (talk) 20:06, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘I’d call it needlessly hyperbolic to call this genocide, and especially comparing it to the Armenian Genocide of WWI. Ethnic cleansing by way of driving out particular ethnic groups is not genocide. I wouldn’t call the Germans who were driven out of Central and Eastern Europe victims of genocide, nor would I designate the victims of the “population transfers” between Greece and Turkey in the aftermath of WWI as victims of a genocide.

It should also be remembered that Armenia wasn’t particularly worried about driving out and preventing the return of Azeris during and after the First Nagorne-Karabach War when it was Armenia that held the upper hand militarily. This, of course, doesn’t justify the current actions by Azerbaijan, but simply highlights the stark difference between the situation today and that of 1915 in terms of power, numbers, and, most importantly, the number of people being killed (whether directly or by neglect). It’s the difference between getting driven from your place of residence and being sent on a death march. ScepticWombat (talk) 09:01, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

Guliani will be in some serious debt

https://www.axios.com/2023/12/15/rudy-giuliani-georgia-damages-trial-election-workers?fbclid=IwAR0xRAmAKMH0DDOrWKPKuseCH0M7djf-sj3J93vyErNVvTJr9TiJLvdJW6w

A judge ordered him to pay over a $100 million to Georgia election workers in a lawsuit. I wouldn't trust checks or credit cards from him. Cash only. --Trans Fem Agenda 23:49, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

How much is Giuliani's net worth? If he's a billionaire, or multimillionaire with over a hundred million, then either that's a drop in the bucket or he'll still have enough left over to live comfortably. I doubt he's a billionaire, but I don't know his exact net worth. Carthage (talk) 23:59, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

BBC/CBS says his estimated worth is about US$50M. —cosmikdebris ^talk stalk 00:18, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

This order is going to ruin him then. Assuming he pays it. Carthage (talk) 00:22, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

Good. 🎄Chef Moosolini’s Ristorante Italiano🎄^{Ask about our holiday specials!} 00:48, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

Actually he can't worm his way out of it by filing for bankruptcy either. Apparently the specific fine he got is considered exempt from being lowered by a bankruptcy filing. To put it simply - he's gonna pay it for the rest of his life or he's gonna spend time in the clink. -- Techpriest (talk) 01:04, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

He could try getting a job at Burger King or a Starbucks to pay the debt? I doubt that he could get a good job. --Trans Fem Agenda 01:57, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

B-but aren't Republicans against raising the debt ceiling? He couldn't owe that much! MayGodSaveUsAll (talk) 06:14, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

I must admit that I thought that Fox News would simply ignore this - but their story is more-or-less factual. surprising.Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 15:57, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

Although I doubt their website is a bastion of reliability, the most egregious part of Fox News has always been the insanity of their cable shows. Chillpilled (talk) 17:16, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

"Tough on crime" mayor known for his application of the broken windows theory during his mayor term commits multiple crimes, gets first tough sentence of what might be many. Good. Meanwhile, places that loved the "broken windows theory" like the Manhattan Institute currently are whining about universities, and have an article from Christopher Rufo praising the criminal Richard Nixon. How these doublespeak babbling two-faced politicians and activists sleep at night, I'll never know. BobJohnson (talk) 18:11, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

They only think of their own personal short-term well-being, that's how. Luigifan18 (talk) 19:55, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

It's funny you bring up the Manhattan Institute again. I was just on the City-Journal site a second ago to check out articles by a certain fellow of theirs. Found he wrote about the "COVID lab leak" just earlier this year (and, significantly, M.I.'s Nicholas Wade was a big promoter of that too). I'm beginning to think I should, maybe, finally hop to creating an article about the lab leak thing here. It would be an undertaking though. And the other thing is, somehow, I feel Wikipedia actually handled the subject alright. Which is maybe a little bit shocking. Chillpilled (talk) 20:11, 16 December 2023 (UTC)

Inheritors of Rome and Greece?

I find it especially ironic when people from England, France, Spain, or even Italy claim to be the inheritors of the Roman emperors and Greek philosophers who a) lived thousands of years ago, so therefore honestly taking pride in the accomplishments of people dead for literally thousands of years who also considered your ancestors to be your pond-scum is nonsensical, and b) your ancestors were much more likely to be the numerous peasants, slaves, and laborers who the Roman and Greek elites trampled upon to maintain their lives of leisure, or the many groups the Greeks and Romans considered to be culturally and racially inferior. Do you really think that the people the Romans viewed as barbaros (which has inherent connotations of inferiority and literally means that the languages they spoke were incomprehensible gibberish)... that these Romans would consider them and their descendants to be their equals or "inheritors"? No, that's stupid. Carthage (talk) 10:02, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

The Romans also hated Christians. The word "cretin" literally comes from the Latin word for Christian. MayGodSaveUsAll (talk) 10:44, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

They adopted Christianity as state religion later on. The Romans are a lot of the whole reason Europe became Christian since they oppressed pagans later on. Chillpilled (talk) 11:20, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

Obviously the true heir of the Roman Empire is Kansas. 🎄Chef Moosolini’s Ristorante Italiano🎄^{Ask about our holiday specials!} 14:22, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

I honestly don't get the point Carthage is making. Italy arguably is the closest descendant of the Roman Empire, and the Italian peninsula was both the origin point of Rome and the nexus of it's power. I don't really know where to start with the rest of the post, but the rest of it is either a gross oversimplification or just plain wrong. An Advocate (talk) 00:36, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

So are you not likely to be more descended from a barbarian or a slave/peasant/laborer despite them being much more numerous than the Roman and Greek elites? Did the Romans and Greeks (ignoring modern Greece) not all die out thousands of years ago? (And if you say "Rome (the city) and Greece (the ethnicity/country" are still around, that's a strawman of my point.) What exactly is wrong about my post? I specified the Roman and Greek elites for a reason. A lot of white nationalists like to imagine themselves as the descendants of Plato, when they're much more likely to be the descendants of the slaves clipping Plato's toenails. What I am criticizing is the tendency to mythologize these places as glorious utopias when for many of the people living in these civilizations, most of whom were more likely to be your ancestors than not, it wasn't that great a place to live. We either tend to ignore slave uprisings like Spartacus' or fetishize actual genocides like Caesar's genocide of the Gauls. Carthage (talk) 11:03, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

For some reason (?), the Classical Christian education movement in America has made Greco-Roman civilization (along with the European Renaissance core) as its historical central paradigm. (This is what made it funnier when one of the schools associated with this and Hillsdale College got in a tizzy over the nudity of Michelangelo's David.) Apart from that, not sure what Carthage is referring to. BobJohnson (talk) 00:56, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

I think maybe these people speaking of inheritance mean the cultural inheritance of Greek and Roman civilizations. The Romans built roads and developed governmental systems enabling the possibility of large nations. The Greeks developed philosophy, mathematics, literature and scientific speculation. The Europeans do own the physical culture, ancient architecture, roads, aqueducts, bridges, all that junk. But the Greek stuff is important inheritance, that we all can claim.UncleKrampus (talk) 03:07, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

The actual inheritors of the Romans are the Sentinelese --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 04:31, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

By that same token, cultures in the Middle East and North Africa can also claim to be the inheritors of the Greeks and Romans. It pretends that European civilizations are much more united than they actually ever were. Can the Scandinavians (Rome never reached Scandinavia) and Irish also claim to inherit the physical artefacts of Rome? Carthage (talk) 11:03, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

I think what's happening is certain person(s) are reading figarative as literal. European post-classical cultures/states had a combination of intimiatation, awe and cultural cringe towards the classical world - a feeling that they were a 'golden age' which the currents could never match. This 'cringe' increased as the Renaissance started to kick off, as they tried to recover and recreate such things. But by the time Europe hit the 16th century, there was a feeling that 'the pupil had become the master' aka had surpassed the classics in every field. This feeling was seen in the main powers of the day, the English/British, French and Spanish. Thus, they were the 'inheritors' of the torch of civilisation [yeah, gotta love the Eurocentric reading of things]. We saw this later on with later 'empires' such as the American and Russian - the latter in fact billed themselves as the 'Third Rome' - aka the inheritor of the torch which had gone from Rome to Constantinople and finally to Moscow. [History buffs shall know Constantinople was the capital of the Byzantine Empire, which was in fact 'the Eastern Roman Empire' which survived intact until 1204, and it's direct successor until 1454.] KarmaPolice (talk) 14:01, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

If you're referring to me, I clarified above that I'm critical of the mythologizing of millennia-old empires for your (generic you) own ends. The Irish (or the Danish) laying claim to Rome is like Afrocentrists laying claim to Ancient Egypt IMO. It's meant to create a grand narrative that has little to do with the actual realities of these ancient polities. Carthage (talk) 14:49, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

There's a distinct difference between claiming to be a 'spiritual successor' to an older entity and a literal successor. The 18/19th Century British might have seen themselves as the 'inheritors of Rome's mantle' but it never went on arguing that literally, the whole map of the Roman Empire at it's height was destined to be theirs [unlike say, Mussolini's imperial dreams]. KarmaPolice (talk) 15:10, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

Real or figurative, there is still mythologization and fetishization going on either way. I question how relevant of a criticism this actually is. Carthage (talk) 15:55, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

The Pharos blog[30] is a good resource for refuting the mythologizing of Classical history. Bongolian (talk) 21:49, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

We have templates for countries and US states

Should we start making templates for, say, Canadian provinces or Mexican states as well? Carthage (talk) 13:23, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

And perhaps Brazilian ones too which also have significant geographic, political and cultural differences; they also have most natural biomes, you have the Florida/Alberta-like far-right Bolsonaro country, the California-like gay-friendly urban ones (Brazil beat America to nationally recognizing gay marriage by two years), and then there are the far-left ones. Also the Indian states- most with their own languages, and even in the Hindi ones the accent and word for “friend” changes every 50 km- that have flags (though admittedly most don’t) --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 13:51, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

I'd also argue that we should include flags of indigenous and other ethnic groups. (For an example, the Wiphala is a flag commonly used to represent the indigenous peoples of the Andes). Carthage (talk) 14:26, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

@Carthage We've got them for all the Canadian provinces already, using the same sf template as for American states. Look. Here they are Spud (talk) 14:58, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

I wasn't aware of that, thanks. I'll keep that in mind going forward. Carthage (talk) 15:00, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

The great emu war

should we make an article about the great emu war? Koafox (talk) 16:33, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Not sure it's really 'relevant'. Plus, what's wrong with the WP version? KarmaPolice (talk) 16:37, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

So not a good funspace article? Koafox (talk) 16:39, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

Possibly combined with 'We are not at war with the fish' and similar. Anna Livia (talk) 20:47, 12 December 2023 (UTC)

China had a similarly ill-conceived 'war' under Mao's reign (Mao Zedong#Mao Zedong and the dark era of sparrows). Bongolian (talk) 02:31, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

During the First World War, Brazil fought a battle against a shoal of porpoises. Unlikes Australia, however, Brazil did win the battle, slaughtering about a dozen of poor porpoises. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 15:23, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

They mistook the porpoises for German U-boat periscopes. Maybe this would be a case of collateral damage. Kencolt (talk) 04:43, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

It turns out that defenseless herbivores are no match for guided missiles. Luigifan18 (talk) 14:16, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

America’s schlong is currently at war with lionfish and pythons (they pay you to kill both)- and they’re losing. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}CircularRasoning^{See my latest prototypes} 02:43, 20 December 2023 (UTC)

Genocide in Gaza? (reposting)

According to Article II of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, genocide is defined as the following:

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

Israel has killed 18k Palestinians in Gaza: [31] (for context that's roughly double the number of people killed at Srebenica, which is considered an act of genocide, and the number of deaths does not seem to be stopping anytime soon)

Of these fatalities, there are 7,875+ children killed: [32]

there are 6,130+ women (see above link for children killed)

there are 678 elderly people killed ([33])

300 medical staf killed (see the source for the 18k Gazans killed)

and 133 UN staffers killed ([34])

Israel deliberately targets civilians or intentionally neglects to limit civilian casualties([35])

Israel has deliberately withheld all supplies of food, water, and electricity to the Gazan civilian population:

[36]

Prominent Israeli politicians have called for genocide ([37]) and have used dehumanizing language to refer to Palestinians ([38])

Other genocidal language includes calls to "erase Gaza" that have been floating around in the Israeli public discourse ([39])

Gaza is also a ruin. Israel has been deliberately targeting hospitals and schools, and is also targeting civic infrastructure: [40]

There is also growing evidence of ethnic cleansing being undertaken in the West Bank and Gaza: [41]

Regardless of whether or not you agree what Israel is doing in Gaza is genocide (and, IMO, if you were intellectually honest you'd say that the case that Israel isn't conducting a genocide by the definition offered by the Convention is very thin and arguably denialism), at the very least it is clear it is a crime against humanity and is morally and legally indefensible. Carthage (talk) 09:32, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

I heard Omer Bartok, Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Brown University,[42] speak this past week on BBC Newshour about whether genocide is being committed in the conflict.

There is certainly a reasonable legal case that genocide is being committed by Israel. The important legal consideration would be connecting intent to actions, which is perhaps not so clear insofar as Israel has repeatedly stated that they have attempted to give civilians clear instructions for evacuation to minimize civilian casualties. On-the-ground reports in Palestine have repeatedly said that instructions are unhelpful and unclear. Further complicating this is the murky international legal concept of proportionality, of minimizing civilian casualties in proportion to the value of the military target. The Israelis have repeatedly claimed that they have used proportionality, but this claim has been undermined by the revelation that almost half of the bomb they've used were 'dumb bombs' (lacking in GPS guidance).

Despite the proportionately lower number of Israeli civilian casualties compared to Palestinian casualties, the case against Hamas committing genocide is very strong because of the clear link between intent and action. Bongolian (talk) 19:11, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

Right, the number of victims is arguably irrelevant as outlined by the UN definition. Srebenica saw "only" eight thousand dead. October 7th likewise "only" saw roughly one thousand dead. "Intent" from a legal perspective about Israel's actions is murkier, I'll give you that. There's room to make a reasonable case, certainly, but not a concrete one. Those leaflets give them plausible deniability. The same cannot be said for Hamas. Carthage (talk) 19:21, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

The way it looked to me was that Israel was attempting to drive the Gazans into Egypt as a prelude to an extended occupation and settlement of the Strip. Kinda like a Nakba II. Problem was, Egypt didn’t fall for it, and Israel really hasn’t found a long term strategy to deal with that. They probably know that Gaza’s population will be uncooperative during the occupation, but they haven’t done anything to account for that. They’re just bombing shit aimlessly. I think this was an ethnic cleansing attempt that went sideways, and now Israel is trying to get a feel for how much killing they can actually get away with. 🎄Chef Moosolini’s Ristorante Italiano🎄^{Ask about our holiday specials!} 21:35, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

Egypt didn't let any Palestinians stay during the border explosions 15 years ago when 500,000 entered the Sinai. Heck, when Egypt occupied Gaza until '67, Gazans were all but forbidden to enter Egypt. Why would Bibi think things would be different now? CorruptUser 17:59, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

I've heard Egypt has other huge problems right now and allowing such a thing would probably have straight up caused the Egyptian government to be toppled. But that's just rumor — though partly rumor I've heard from people who live in the area. Chillpilled (talk) 18:06, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

Not sure if it would be toppled, but it'd be yet another headache. If Palestinians were to, say, set up refugee camps in the Sinai, any rocket attacks would likely end up in a chain reaction where Israel and Egypt were forced into a war against each other, which is A Very Bad Thing for numerous reasons. Again, forcing all the Palestinians into the Sinai would be a terrible idea for Israel for that reason alone. CorruptUser 19:59, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

There are claims of deliberate destruction of Palestinian cultural and heritage sites, museums, archaeological sites, schools and universities, even graveyards (which are important places of memory), and possible targetting of academics, artists, and journalists.[43] This definitely looks like an attempt to extinguish Palestinian society and culture, in addition to displacing most of the population and killing a significant part of it. --Annanoon (talk) 11:13, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

According to The Guardian 100 journalists have been killed and 400 imprisoned during the extent of this "war." According to eyewitness testimony the IDF point-blank executed displaced Palestinians in a school-turned-military-center: [44] Also according to local Gazan journalists the IDF have bulldozed Palestinian refugee tents, reportedly "burying dozens alive": [45] I think it's safe to say this is not a war, but a crime against humanity and arguably a genocide, although I don't expect this to ever be brought up in court. Carthage (talk) 12:17, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

No one is forcing Hamas to keep holding hostages. And Hamas intentionally dresses as civilians, which is a war crime in itself. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 12:50, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

Hamas' own war crimes do not justify Israel's war crimes, nor do they cancel them out. Carthage (talk) 13:14, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

If they're dressed as civilians, it's pretty clear Hamas wants that to happen, so Hamas is the root cause of it all. And again, the proximate cause of all this is their holding hostages; Hamas can end this by releasing them. They have not. If I could think of a way to resolve this that wasn't going to involve horrific warfare I'd suggest it, clearly nothing wasn't the right answer. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 14:08, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

Does Israel not have agency? Carthage (talk) 14:25, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

They do. And Hamas is the proximate cause of them killing civilians, by intentionally putting them in positions to be killed. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 14:43, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

How does that translate to Israel intentionally cutting off all shipments of food, water, and fuel? Israel has also deliberately loosened restrictions on minimizing harm to civilians. (Before you ask for a citation for this, I included it in the OP.) If we're going to ignore history (like how Netanyahu propped up Hamas for years or just everything to do with the Naqba) then Israel's conduct in this war alone is not reducible to "Hamas is ultimately responsible for all the civilians that Israel kills." Three hostages were killed by IDF soldiers while waving a white flag (and while shouting for help in Hebrew). Two Christian women were shot by an Israeli sniper at a church. Gaza is also extremely densely populated (in large part by the descendants of the people Israel ethnically cleansed to found their Jewish state). Even then, Israel's past conduct in warfare did not see such extremely high civilian casualties as we are seeing now. Carthage (talk) 14:54, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

Just saying, but I'm still scratching my head over why an area smaller than the Isle of Wight is getting so much attention for the past 70 years, while an actual genocide/ethnic cleansing in Artsakh gets no press at all...

My take is, I'm not too bothered because (I know I will get flak for this) the whole of the Levant has been a rather backward place for some time now. (Ya you could argue it's our job to clean up since we triggered that slide into backwardness, but seeing how Dubya's and Blair's "attempts" ended up, I'd rather not.) Artsakh, on the other hand, seems much more important to me since the Armenian people, already pushed to the cliff, are now teetering on the brink of extinction. Meow^Purr 19:12, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

I don't know why it needs to be a contest. What's going on in Palestine and what's going on in Artsakh are both crimes against humanity. As for the "Levant has been 'backwards' for a while now," how long did it take for Europe to get its shit together? It's not impossible. Carthage (talk) 19:20, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

It's because of what Israel represents for a lot of people, Left and Right. For the Religious Right, depending if you are Christian, Jewish, or Muslim it's one of the signs of the End Times, an ancient promise beginning to be fulfilled, or a living contradiction and thus anathema. For the Left, it represents the failure of several Leftwing ideas, whether that's Anarcho-Socialism, Internationalism, or just Multiculturalism. CorruptUser 21:18, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

I don't think many leftists care about Israel's supposed leftist past. They see an ongoing act of settler colonialism, and so oppose it because of that. The Irish stand with Palestine because of a shared history of colonialism and partition, for instance: [46] Likewise many non-Palestinian Arabs oppose Israel because they see Israel as an act of Western colonialism infringing on the Arab world. Carthage (talk) 21:31, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

The "Arab world" was largely created through its own violent conquests. The Irish, though, are probably as indigenous to Ireland as a people ever can be to a land. Unless there's some other people who came before them I don't know about. Chillpilled (talk) 22:45, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

Is Israel committing an "act of settler colonialism"? Or was that land a Jewish state to begin with? And if Israelis are the settlers colonizing, where are the settling from? Where are they supposed to return to? And didn't this whole mess reach a new level on October 7? Who attacked who?Brokenglass (talk) 23:00, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ By the UN's own definition Israelis are not indigenous:

Indigenous communities, peoples and nations are those which, having a historical continuity with pre-invasion and pre-colonial societies that developed on their territories, consider themselves distinct from other sectors of the societies now prevailing on those territories, or parts of them. They form at present non-dominant sectors of society and are determined to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations their ancestral territories, and their ethnic identity, as the basis of their continued existence as peoples, in accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institutions and legal system. - [47]

As for violent Arab conquests.... do you think that those populations were magically vanished away when the Arabs came rolling in? No, there's significant cultural and genetic continuities between pre-Arab populations and post-Arab conquest populations, including for Palestine: [48] Zionism was also envisioned as an act of colonialism from the get-go:

You are being invited to help make history,” Herzl wrote to Rhodes. “[I]t doesn’t involve Africa, but a piece of Asia Minor; not Englishmen but Jews… How, then, do I happen to turn to you since this is an out-of-the-way matter for you? How indeed? Because it is something colonial… [Y]ou, Mr. Rhodes, are a visionary politician or a practical visionary… I want you to.. put the stamp of your authority on the Zionist plan and to make the following declaration to a few people who swear by you: I, Rhodes have examined this plan and found it correct and practicable. It is a plan full of culture, excellent for the group of people for whom it is directly designed, and quite good for England, for Greater Britain…. [49]

In order to establish the Zionist state, they had to get rid of the Palestinian presence. This was quite clear, and established through the Naqba. As for present day Israeli settler-colonialism... look at the West Bank. They're literally called settlers. It can't get any plainer than that. They're stealing Palestinian land as we speak lol. Carthage (talk) 23:09, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

There is also two separate definitions of "indigenous people." One is just referring to place of origin, another is about power dynamics. Palestinians have a demonstrable connection to the people who inhabited Palestine prior to the British Mandate (as well as possessing demonstrable genetic continuity with the pre-Arab populations but let's just ignore that). There's a reason no one calls the Spanish or the Japanese "indigenous" but we call the Basques and the Ainu "indigenous." Carthage (talk) 23:12, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

As for "where would they go..." well why can't they stay there? The problem is with having Israel be an ethnostate, which is usually considered a bad thing especially because in order to maintain an ethnostate you need to do some pretty oppressive things to the people who lived there before you. I've said it before and I'll say it again: why can't a Bosnia and Herzegovina style situation work? Carthage (talk) 23:17, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

The executive summary as I see of Israel's creation is as follows: The Ottoman Empire (of which Israel/Palestine/Jordan/etc. was part of) collapsed in WWI; various allies took over management; Britain got management of the current Israel-Palestine part; parts of British government were favorable to the Zionist movement (Balfour Declaration); this ultimately led to the creation of Israel in 1948; war between Arabs and Israel began that year, and has basically continued since that very date.

If you look at the History of Palestine, that area has never had any independence in recent history. However, my understanding is that under the 400+ year occupation by the Ottoman Empire, there was considerably more autonomy and federalization, hence greater stability than at present.

In fact, I would think a federalized / two-state-plus solution, with considerable local autonomy, might work even now. However, this would involve working out some sort of power-sharing and division. Which ain't gonna happen at the moment. At this time, the various Arab Palestine governments are weak and in some cases prone to using terrorism. Meanwhile, Israel's choice is between being a full-fledged democracy that accepts some multiculturalism, or a Jewish apartheid state. So far, it is drifting much more towards the later, enough for various human rights organizations like Amnesty International [50] and Human Rights Watch [51] to declare such. The more radical and sectarian Israel's right wing becomes, the more it will look like such. BobJohnson (talk) 23:30, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, although I think it's pretty obvious after 75+ years of fighting (I include the plus if we include the civil conflict in Mandatory Palestine) that there is no military solution to this conflict. Any resolution would have to be met at a negotiating table. Carthage (talk) 23:34, 19 December 2023 (UTC)