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Yet another round of “Get back into the office!” whining CEOs[edit]

It’s been a steady chorus and particularly loud from especially US and UK CEOs: The “Get back into the office!” (with not-so-subtle tones of “you lazy bastards!”). The latest round of whining/haranguing comes, courtesy of the BBC, from a former Marks & Spencer and Asda boss claiming that ’ Working from home is creating a generation who are "not doing proper work"’

Curiously, while these CEOs claim that working from home is supposedly very bad for productivity, they seem very, ahem, tight lipped when it comes to actual facts to support this assertion; not to mention that any drastic reduction in productivity would leave them the rather obvious option of just firing these “underperforming” workers. It’s also worth noting that these CEOs themselves seem not exactly to follow their own advice, as a lot of their own “important work” is not taking place in traditional offices (and even when it is, those offices are quite different from those of their employees), but I digress.

While a large part is clearly about naked power (“I can force you to be at this particular location at these hours!”), it seems to me that the US and UK CEOs are particularly loud in this clamour for people to “get back into the office” and I can’t help wonder if this is connected to these two countries being very much at the forefront of the pseudo feudalist approach to work and management.

This means that work is increasingly being framed as a moral duty, rather than an opportunity for personal economic improvement (especially as the prospects for inter generational economic improvements seem to decrease). At the same time, management fetishism is rampant with managers (and especially senior managers of large corporations) being considered with the same kind of deference that was once bestowed on the aristocracy and a belief that “proper management” can somehow fix any problems.

It also means that workers and managers are judged according to two different kind of performance: One is the kind that looks at results (or at least some kind of measurable output), but the other kind of performance is the kind one thinks of when considering the theatre, films etc.

I think the problem with working from home is primarily about the latter (the “stage performance”) and this is where I return to the pseudo feudalist implications: If part of the conception of work and management is about the sort of obedience and deference similar to such bygone rituals as the lower classes doffing their caps to their betters, then not having workers around to ritually reinforce this relation by open displays of obeisance hits management very hard.

If there is something to David Graeber’s notion of bullshit jobs, then the push for more in office hours also makes sense, because some of these bullshit jobs almost always require physical proximity (especially the “flunkies” and “goons”, but arguably also some of the others, such as “taskmasters”, at least to some extent). Several of these bullshit jobs, as Graeber himself noticed, also have something about them of the “retinue” and “pomp and circumstance” of the feudalism of the past with its focus on creating a spectacle to signal status and emphasise class differences, rather than each member of the lord’s retinue necessarily having to serve some rational, productive purpose.

I personally find it even more grating to hear these CEOs whining about getting back into the office to do “proper” work, when they have for decades pushed for the kind of large, open plan office spaces that make it exceedingly hard to do any actual work that requires concentration, but is very good for cutting office space costs and even better for managers’ options for checking/surveilling/controlling the workers. Curiously, you never see a CEO or any manager beyond the most junior level working in anything even remotely like these open plan offices.

In short, the “Get back into the office (you lazy bastards)!” movement seems to me to be a clear sign of a decaying and increasingly unsound and irrational business management culture, which is becoming more concerned with creating particular impressions and upholding specific, cultural hierarchies, regardless of whether this actually makes sense in terms of productivity, let alone broader, societal concerns (such as issues of work/life balance, reducing the need to commute and also potentially reducing pollution from commuting). ScepticWombat (talk) 00:11, 21 January 2025 (UTC)

Pretty much agree with everything that was said. My public employer has multiple sites within the city which need to be maintained, an increased demand for customer space, and a very tight budget - being starved for funding by the ruling conservative government that wants to privatize it. A great many base-tier office managers and staff say their work could easily be done from home, with significant benefits for the staff themselves as well as the organization (more space available for customers, less space overall needing to be maintained), but upper-level executives and the ministry refuse to allow it declaring that return to office for all staff is a must. A nonsense argument thrown around by some is that it "wouldn't be fair" having some staff working from home with obvious perks while others are forced to be in-office due to the nature of their position; I'd counter-argue with the organization still likely saving money from total cut office space even with providing additional incentive pay for staff that must be on-site.
At the core of it, the psychopaths who claw their way to the top to become "leaders" desire a return to office because of the psychopathic feeling of control it gives. Impiricism (talk) 02:22, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
I have some sympathy with some of the 'bosses' [not the one quoted]. There are times where full homeworking was a sub-optimal solution of which has declining effectiveness the longer it's gone on. Not everyone likes it; some folks don't have the home situation for a 'proper office', do better in a 'physical environment' and/or feel having the clear work/home division better for mind and soul. There has been some worries that the 'homeworkers' in orgs might find their careers/progression stall because 'out of [physical] sight, out of mind' and that is more likely to hit folks such as those with disabilities, women, folks with caring duties etc than young white able-bodied guys. There's also security concerns; having lots of folks accessing The Company's systems from external locations is seen to be 'riskier' than a situation where 'all those accesses' are coming from inside the office building [an exaggerated risk due to technical ignorance but not entirely untrue]. There's concerns about lack of 'esprit de corps' in the teams - now anyone who's been a cubicle-slave knows 80% of this is total BS [like the teamwork awards given to the office flunky] but even then they do have some point that it's harder to build a rapport with other people you've never actually physically been in the same room as [it's the way we are wired]. Lastly, sometimes homeworking is not that great for external users; for example my local council office mainly works from home but they do [I assume a rota] have a few customer-facing folks in the building to deal with the ones who would prefer to deal with it in-person [I did once; because I needed to show a stack of documents which would have been an hour online sorting out or 5 mins me pointing to stuff in a office and I was passing by anyway...]
Anglo execs are the forefront of this 'get back to work, slaveys!' call because 'Anglo management style' is pretty hierarchical and autocratic. Micromanagement has the core ethos that 'the drone cannot be trusted' and if they aren't constantly supervised they'd either fail the task or goof off. In this world of performance metrics and corp spyware it's actually a lot harder to hide being bone-idle at home [esp if you were running at 'half-steam' in the office in the first place] than it's assumed, which is why it's seen more as a 'Boomer Boss' trait [though a lot of the worst culprits I've seen are older Xers; part of this might be their ingrained 'this is what work is' happened before the online world became so big]. Simple incompetence, I think is an even larger reason - that a lot of bosses don't know how to 'manage people' without quite literally, prowling the cubes and staring at people and homeworking showed up their incompetence. Other bosses quickly came out against homeworking not because of the drones 'being at home' per se - more that the homework tech was showing the boss was no longer needed ['they can simply Zoom with the GrandBoss!']
However, I think the critical issue here is inflexibility. From my experience [something touched on in the article linked] is that the vast majority of 'Lord Roses' of this world also oppose/resent hybrid working [ie a mix of home and office work] as well as concepts such as 'flextime' [that within limits, you can shunt your workweek about to suit your life better], paternity leave, job-shares, the right to 'turn off' [work, that is. You turn off your personal life at work, though!], any 'reasonable accommodation' for disabilities, restrictions on excessive overtime or not being suited/booted like it's 1992. It can be basically put; 'we learned the Right Way To Do Things in 1998 and I see no fucking reason to change now!'. Another for the 'wall of crappy British bosses' - Boss of Brewdog whining about the concept of work/life balance.
KarmaPolice (talk) 13:26, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
Brewdog's James Watt has been known for this for quite some time: being a totally lecherous arse, being a hypocrite who tries to cosplay being a "punk", and being a shitstain on the craft beer community.
The biggest change that has occurred since the 1990s days of Dilbert and Office Space lore is globalization and how this has affected certain knowledge jobs in particular. What sense does it make to trudge yourself into the office when your direct report is overseas and much of your job time is spent on Teams/Zoom/whatever? Not any that I can see, apart from the whole control aspect above. Furthermore, I've heard of several instances where (because of the above) offices actually didn't have enough space for all the "return to office" workers; after all, globalization already has caused the "local knowledge" departments to be hollowed out over the last two decades or so. It shows how haphazard and cargo cult-ish the CEO class has become.
What I hear happening a lot as a result is two things, depending on the career path. Some younger talent are flat out quitting when faced with the return to office mandate. Older talent closer to retirement sometimes just ignores the mandate completely, daring the company to fire them. Remote work is still rather available after all. Some of the RTO mandates are a "shadow layoff" in practice and like "downsizing" before, it is the better talent that will tend to leave. Like excessive downsizing in the past, it's kind of a sign of a company that will prioritize metrics over innovation in the future, methinks. BobJohnson (talk) 15:53, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
'Stealth downsizing' for quite a lot, yes - all the signs I'm getting from the exec class is another '1998 view' is that the labour market is still loose and if they lose staff 'well there's more where that came from' which means they can hire lots of new people cheap [except these folks don't really exist like they used to] and while the frontline managers pull their hair out 'cos they're running at 35% under-staff but they can't ever find folks to fill those berths because the T/Cs are too shit for their demands. I also suspect a lot of these execs believe/plan to a) hire homeworkers from say, India or Vietnam instead for pennies and/or b) 'get AI to do it'. KarmaPolice (talk) 16:16, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
Lots of good points and I agree that flexible and choice is the key words here, but I’m struck by CEOs claiming that remote work is not “real work”, when they themselves do a lot of such work (e.g. conference calls, meetings elsewhere etc.).
Ironically, in my neck of the woods, I’ve actually encountered the opposite problem: That people who wanted to work in the office were forced into particular numbers of fixed remote working days. Again, this was due to the exact same kind of cost cutting that gave us those dreaded open plan offices.
This time, the employer simply realised that they could significantly reduce office costs by only having enough office space to fit some of the staff, doing away with fixed positions/cubicles and instead having the employees taking whatever work stations were available on a given workday, while also mandating certain days as remote working days for all employees.
This was met with a lot of complaints, partly due to employees not being physically placed in fixed places and thus not necessarily located alongside the organisational units they worked within, meaning that getting help or feedback from colleagues could easily become a more complex and cumbersome problem.
The other type of complaint was from employees who preferred to keep work and private life clearly distinct and thus spend all of their working hours in the office, while being truly “off” when at home, as well as from those who didn’t have good options for creating a “home office” (though it should be noted that here, by law, employers have to pay for the private residential space that such home work stations take up when requiring staff to work from home). ScepticWombat (talk) 17:29, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
I wonder how much of the RTO push is caused by bosses feeling like they aren't getting their money's worth out of their office space [1], or at least getting the sense that their office space isn't getting used as much due to having less of their slaves minions employees physically present at any given time. Gabaghoul 🥩 14:10, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
I doubt it. A lot of crap that the 'exec class' pulls have nil to minus actual economic utility so forking out for office space they don't use much wouldn't really bother them. I am sure, however there is a subset of bosses of the 'Rees-Mogg type' who did with a forlorn air wander the 'underused' cubes leaving passive-aggressive notes on desks and were merely waiting for the climate to change enough to wave the big stick. More have pulled shit like Sceptic describes; demanded 'everyone back in' and defined 'hybrid' as 'well, you might be allowed to do a few hours here and there from home on occasion' but the drones came to realise they've started a shitty hotdesking policy and have 'densified' by about 20% too. KarmaPolice (talk) 10:38, 24 January 2025 (UTC)

"What Really Makes You Ill? Why Everything You Thought You Knew About Disease Is Wrong"[edit]

Has anyone ever heard of this book? What Really Makes You Ill? Why Everything You Thought You Knew About Disease Is Wrong. I recently came across this bizarre alternative medical book. The authors, who have no background in medicine, claim that basically the entire medical establishment is wrong about everything! Germ theory of disease is totally unproven, STDs don't exist, vaccines have saved no one and actually only cause harm etc.

There website: https://whatreallymakesyouill.com/

Apparently their book has gotten quite a following with over 1,300 reviews on Amazon (almost all 5 stars). Looking around Google I found basically no mainstream medical responses to the book despite the surprisingly outsized impact their work seems to be making in quack circles. I feel like a good debunking of this is needed, which Rationalwiki is primed to do, although I am not qualified for such a task. Books like this aren't just wrong, their dangerous and need to be confronted head on.

Neo Stalinist (talk) 06:38, 21 January 2025 (UTC)

Written by two engineers. Sigh.
The web page has "germ theory: a deadly fallacy" plastered pretty prominently on it. No wonder there's no "mainstream medical response" -- that's enough to make me darkly smile, close the page, and wish all of the followers of this bullshit good luck. They're gonna need it. BobJohnson (talk) 14:34, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
I was given this book 'Your Body's Many Cries for Water' by a friend, paperback, really surprised to see it [2] in this format. I guess it's only the back cover, what a letdown, but I can assure you It's nonsense. Drink water, you can just do it, you can just drink water guys, you don't need a book.Torrent (talk) 05:28, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

Will AIs kill homework?[edit]

'About a quarter of American teens use ChatGPT for schoolwork, which is double the percentage from 2023.' [From our very own WIGO]

Theory: LLMs such as ChatGPT shall destroy traditional 'homework' for schoolkids because it's becoming increasingly difficult to stop kids simply getting the 'puter to do the shite work which the teach has told you to do.
Bonus theory: This might actually be a good thing because the vast majority of homework is either minimal to minus effect on students. That even when it could be positive [for example, showing the teacher where a student's weaknesses/holes are] they rarely if ever 'get round' to filling those holes.
Bonus bonus theory: Some smart kids might learn how to get a different LLM to paraphrase the work from the previous LLM so it's harder to spot the 'cheating'. Esp if they give the second LLM samples of their writing style beforehand and tell them to emulate it.
Bonus bonus bonus theory: The fact that some savvy kid manages to crank out an LLM-produced B- minus paper and get away with it is a well deserved B-. They learned how to use the tools available to maximum efficiency! Kid, I want you in the office; for you work smart and not hard.
KarmaPolice (talk) 22:33, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
More broadly, it adds to the motivation to revisit the understanding of 'knowledge' and 'learning', and 'testing' for such. And maybe create a new kind of standard for education. Which is good if it happens, but may take decades if it does.
The current approach to education is really quite primitive and inefficient. And what's the goal? If simple memorization is the goal, then teaching students memorization techniques (the types used by 'memory masters' who compete) would allow the students to learn several times more with the same time and effort. But if 'understanding' and 'mastering the subject' less superficially is the goal -- then more research is needed to figure out how to measure that better, and there would be plenty of academic debate concerning the key concepts involved and different views on them. Currently the crudest possible kind of measurement by proxy, which goes back millennia, is used. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 22:58, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
But why bothering to hire someone to "work smart and not hard", when one can just hire a bunch of AI bots (No healthcare or other benefit expenses! No HR department!). At least that's the theory put forth by one AI CEO ("Stop hiring humans. The era of AI employees is here.").[3] Bongolian (talk) 23:29, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
Because the bots will still need to be told what to do, when to do it and for a human to be able to step in and manually correct when they fuck up. The likes of Wall St get massive hardons whenever they think they've 'found the magic' of being able to make production without any labour [ie the profit is all capital's] but as we saw with the previous 'labour obsoleters' such as the Internet, computerisation, electricity, mechanisation etc the 'getting rid of all labour' never works. Plus, LLMs are fairly expensive to get/run, which means there's going to be plenty of situations where 'the old fashioned way' of doing X shall remain the most cost-effective. KarmaPolice (talk) 00:56, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
I'm still waiting for all those self-driving cars all of those tech futurists promised us in the 2010s. :p Articles like this 2015 one are fun. Of course the real purpose of that concept was to get rid of humans as well. It's harder than the capital class thinks it is, but they keep throwing money at the idea. And there will always be over-promoting carnies that promise a future of no pesky employees. Therefore, I look forward to the inevitable future automation scandals, where bad automation kills a lot of people. (I mean, we already have Boeing as an example here.)
You can use LLM AIs as a tool to help you look up things. If you treat it as gospel, you will often run into trouble. ChatGPT fucks up a lot so anyone using it write their homework takes a chance if they aren't reviewing it. Personally, I think as long as classes teach how to use ChatGPT critically, things will be fine. Knowing how to critically look at machine output is a skill that will be far more important than any rote bullshit assignment you get.
As a developer, I do use ChatGPT every now and then. I find the idea of AI replacing employees funny in this case. ChatGPT code can be helpful at times, but it often isn't that good. And most of my job isn't cranking out code anyways -- I'd be happy if it was better. A lot of the job involves translating "human" to "computer" (e.g. design). Other parts involve debugging bad code, which "AI" isn't terribly helpful for at this time. I have a feeling that there's going to be a lot of bad AI generated code out there in the future, so... BobJohnson (talk) 02:54, 19 January 2025 (UTC)

I mean…on the one hand homework was always mor busy work and didn’t really help with retaining the material. But on the other hand having a computer do everything for you is bound to weaken your cognitive faculties.2600:387:1:805:0:0:0:58 (talk) 06:11, 19 January 2025 (UTC)

Is everyone aware of the current 'Will water freeze at 27 degrees' Google search? Do it yourself, I just did. It doesn't just say 'no, water freezes at 32 degrees' it takes a bigger swing and claims the water would still be liquid at 27 degrees. It's ok, kinda, to say water might still be wet at 27 because it should have frozen by then, but the limit of water as pure H2O turning solid is 32. It does make an attempt to say water doesn't always freeze at 32 but doesn't competently or forwardly reference something like salinity, which keeps water as a solution wet past its normal freezing point. The problem is taking the first answer and not using it as a guide. Which, of course, how could you if you know nothing about a topic and just trust the answer? AI isn't ready to tell people what to think, and more important, how to think. It's more like a really clueless librarian. It can find so much relevant information, but it has a really stupid method of drawing ing conclusions. Nobody has really ever asked 'does water freeze at 27 degrees?' Because by the time you learn that water freezes at 32 you probably understand that water freezes below. It's a unique question, because it is inane, and AI doesn't have a book about why water freezes at 27, but it may have a couple reasons why water stays wet at 27. Torrent (talk) 06:40, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
If you ask it 'Why doesn't water freeze at 27 degrees' you get extra sections. 'minerals and impurities blah blah blah' much better question when an AI gives you something that you assume is false. Also Supercooling, I have seen first hand. Bottled water in a garage, brought into the home, one shake and the whole thing iced up. 27 degrees water isn't always ice. An AI answer isn't always correct or incorrect. It's a clueless librarian, you have to know what you're asking if you want the right direction. Torrent (talk) 06:55, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
Also I think assigned homework is stupid. I had this conversation with a few teachers in high school. What is homework intended to do? Prepare us for a test. Did I score well on the test? Yes. Did I do the homework? No. I also always participated in class and really made an effort to learn the material. I got away with not doing it with a lot of teachers, but homework where everyone gets to get creative I did no questions. I got caught one time, and was.threatened with failure in high school. The homework was filling out a daily American history worksheet homework binder, public school we had to provide our own binder or folder to fill with these dumbass worksheets full of sentences pulled directly from our book with one or two words missing. It was fill in the blank homework and we were required to have a binder of some such. And the teaching was to read directly from that book during class. And the testing was questions that exactly matched the book and the homework. teacher would go around and stamp completed worksheet homework, with the threat that if you didn't have a fully stamped folder at the end of the semester you'd fail. We're all 13 or 14 years old at this point, So one time my teacher took a closer look at my homework because she caught me scribbling in nonsense answers, which weren't coy, I was filling in spaces with things like Michael Jackson, Kissing, limbo party and lost her shit on me like I was disrespecting her. But don't send me home with a worksheet to fill in the blanks of the chapter we read out loud in class if I'm the guy taking turns reading in class and scoring 100s on the tests, that is phoning in teaching. She ultimately was not allowed to fail me, and I think some other teachers cut me more slack on things like rote homework because of it. My math teachers were always baffled by my inability to do math outside of Trig and just general proofs. I was in AP stats, and my teacher said 'I am confident any of you can score a 4 or a 5 on the AP exam', and I said 'Anyone, mrs. ******' Sarcastically and she looked me dead in the eye and said 'Well, almost anyone' Oof, I was both ready and not ready to hear that. I passed my math classes by doing the homework in earnest, usually wrong and just failing in a spectacular incalculable way. I passed my AP stats class by a tenth of a percent no lie, which if I learned anything from that class, must hqve been a kindness from my teacher. I will say I scored a 33 on the ACT, so I'm not big dumb, but math without multiple choice, I'm prone to working past the solution. Torrent (talk) 08:56, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
My theory is that 'homework' was a wheeze of extending the curriculum without actually increasing the 'teaching hours'. By the time I was a teen I was [or was supposed to be] doing homework which effectively elongated my 'school lesson time' from 23¾ hours a week to between 30-37 a week. A younger relative recently told me they only get 30 mins of break a day; this means the school has 'found' another 2½ hours for 'more curriculum' than I had in the 00s [which pushes their week up to 26¼h over my 23¾]. That 'getting LLMs to do my homework' is nothing more than a new iteration of the 'copy/pasting of Wikipedia' of the 00s/10s, 'copy/pasting from Encarta' from the 90s or the classic 'cribbing from books' earlier than this. I call this the 'auto-adjuster'; where humans react to the 'increasing of load/tempo' with various wheezes to then bring the dial back towards them; there's not much functionally different from your kid using ChatGPT to 'cut corners' on their rising level of homework to office workers who react to the upping of work-weeks by padding out their normal work with 'personal stuff' like doing their Amazon/grocery shopping on the company's time via their phones.
The problem is that a decent % of parents think heavy homework loads are 'important'. Not just the educational equivalent of presenteeism but also the 'just work harder/longer' mindset. I remember seeing the outline of an experiment I think done in Massachusetts - a school slashed homework to the minimum [or none] and one of the results was a lot of the middle-class parents decided in their wisdom to take the now-empty 'homework time' and fill it with crammer schools or tutoring instead. KarmaPolice (talk) 17:05, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
if school kids were not given homework to occupy their time, then they would only get up to mischief. idle hands are the devils play things. they'll be masterbating and sniffing glue and questioning pronouns if we had your way. school is preparing children for life. what could prepare one better for a souless and joyless life of constant nagging stress and endless monotonous drudgery than an ever increasing workload of pointless busy work? its about time we dispell this harmful idea of childhood being a carefree existence, a time of unparalleled joy and wonder. if school forever held up as the best times of ones life then is all down hill from the time you leave, before life has even got started. its no wonder everyone is so fucking depressed. lessen the jarring shock of transitioning from childhood to adulthood by easing off the joy and wonder and the optimism of youth. get in early with the misery before they know any better. manage expectations is what saying and you will eat the shit sandwich of life and like it.
now go read chapters 4 through to 10, and write a 5 page essay while on the bus to school the morning its due AMassiveGay (talk) 23:13, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
The elitists of this world don't want the masses of the world to be able to compete with them, so they suppress the masses with busy work so people don't have time to think. In school it's homework, in adulthood it's economically forcing most people to work overtime hours until they're too old and tired to compete with them (whether that's through keeping prices high in capitalist economies or just forcibly making people work ridiculous hours in communist or primitive economies). 71.215.77.16 (talk) 16:04, 24 January 2025 (UTC)
My worry is whether the understanding that “No worry, the LLM will just give me the right answer” is a particularly useful lesson. I’ve seen students in higher education using LLMs and the most clueless and/or lazy students seem not to realise that LLMs will still just make shit up, which is a problem, when you work in areas such as law (especially non US law).
My guess is that we’ll end up with the same kind of result as with internet searches: It provides extra options for those who want to use them, but it will also mean that some will just copy/paste mindlessly without any kind of source criticism, critical thinking or due diligence more broadly.
The good thing about LLMs is that they are pretty decent when explaining primary education level stuff and can easily tailor these explanations and examples to particular interests etc. and LLMs don’t get tired explaining the same topic over and over in different ways, either. ScepticWombat (talk) 23:25, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
There is of course also a certain likelihood, especially in the short to medium term, of “recursive LLM homework” in which pupils hand in LLM written homework that teachers grade and feedback on by running it through an LLM… ScepticWombat (talk) 23:29, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
I actually think 'LLM markers' is in fact a good use of them. Get the spawn to do a timed test online, the LLM then marks it and then tells the teacher where each person's knowledge-holes and/or weaknesses are. Normally, human teachers simply don't have the time/energy to do such things [which is one of the reasons middle-class kids do better; either their parents and/or paid tutors do this and go and backfill the holes]. KarmaPolice (talk) 23:50, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
I'm not sure the concern is new. If Wikipedia was the worst thing to happen to high school research then Encarta was also a big bad. But I got an Encarta CD as a kid and the whole thing was fun, using a computer instead of a library. I used to get taken to a library and told to be quiet and figure out what I wanted to read, and I was helped by a computer system where I could type something as simple as 'wolf' and get directed by the Dewey Decimal to the books that talked about animals. Taking me and my brother to the library and telling us to just shut up, behave in public, and figure it out for a while was probably a pro strat from my mom, who was working full time. There are always going to be loads of people who've never been taken to a library, let alone know how to use one. I guess I'm lucky. Will say, I could not.get past the first scene in Ghostbusters until I was about ten, ghost granny librarian was a real terror. I think the best teaching method now is to embrace and explain LLM. And that is asking a lot less from the teachers now versus those who said 20 years ago 'Wikipedia is not a source' Torrent (talk) 04:47, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

Trump, oil and Ukraine.[edit]

So no surprise that Tramp did not "end the war in Ukraine in 24 hours". I assume that even his supporters put this down to his usual weird boasting.

But yesterday, when talking about the oil price he claimed, "If the price came down, the Russia-Ukraine war would end immediately."

On the face of it this looks to be in the same league as "ending the war in 24 hours". But this time with someone to blame when the war goes on. But I've seen no analysis on this (though I might not have looked hard enough). But could this have any basis in fact? Russia must already be selling at a substantial discount - it's difficult to see a change in the price of this commodity producing an "immediate" end to the war. It would obviously have a lot of other economic and environmental impacts though.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 19:08, 24 January 2025 (UTC)

I think it's cover for his 'drill baby drill' policies. To try to tape together the idea that getting cheap petrol and 'ending the war' is one and the same. The thing is that there is just enough on this concept to make it stick a bit; Russia is basically financing her war with hydrocarbons going to predominantly India and China which means if crude prices fell back from $75 to $45 [what is was during Orange v1] or even the $20s [what it was in the 1990s (inflation adjusted)] Russia would be fairly crippled.
However, it would not 'end the war' because if that situation happened Russia still has a lot of 'capital' she could burn to continue it. They could sell off assets to foreign [ie Chinese] bidders, they could introduce a full-blown war economy, they could confiscate private wealth-hoards [ie the oligarchs], they could be more free/easy with tech to get supplies [more nuke tech for Kim the Fat for ammo] and so on. Yes, this would drive the Motherland into an even deeper dive of decline but Putin simply does not give a fuck about any of those things.
Thinkpiece: https://www.reuters.com/markets/europe/russias-reserves-dwindle-fiscal-safety-net-could-last-years-2024-02-15/ KarmaPolice (talk) 16:47, 25 January 2025 (UTC)

TikTok ban ramifications[edit]

So, it's official now. TikTok has been banned in the United States. When you try to open up the app now, it'll say "Sorry, TikTok isn't available right now." Under that it also says "We are fortunate that President Trump has indicated that he will work with us on a solution to reinstate TikTok once he takes office." I'm sure it'll be back online within his first week, perhaps under ownership of Elon or Zucc. Remember it was originally Trump who floated a TikTok ban back in 2020; he signed an executive order demanding the app be sold or be banned, which the Biden administration reversed only to sign the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act which received bipartisan support in congress.

People may say good riddance to TikTok but one has to realize that despite first Amendment, the federal government has banned a platform from operating the states. This should be worrying to everyone living in America: The government can now ban apps it deems as a "national security threat." We should be especially alarmed as the imminent administration will be stacked with idealogues ranging from right-wing authoritarian to actual fascists. They can and will look at this precedent that has been set, and try to push it further. They could ban a website or a news outlet or anything they deem to "undermine American national security" or other bullshit excuses such as "undermining American sovereignty" or even just straight up "unamerican." Not even Joseph McCarthy supported government-sanctioned banning of material he deemed unamerican, but the modern day GOP would. If a piece of media contains LGBTQ+ representation they could ban it for being "pornography." and if you don't think they would, some Red States have already banned The Hub. Remember the GOP defines porn as any neutral or positive depiction of LGBTQ+ so games like Baldur's Gate 3 will be on the chopping block, not to mention the numerous sites where LGBTQ+ people convene. RationalWiki certainly won't be safe. This may be a worst-case scenario but the Trump MAGA cult are known to push boundaries further and further, as much as they can. They'll see how far they can go to eliminate all media and online content they find objectionable.

Another thing they may try to do is get TikTok bought by Elon or Zucc or some other filthy rich Silicon Valley techbro. If that happens especially with Silicon Valley's sudden rightward shift, I wouldn't be surprised that the new owner would tweak the algorithm to only show nothing but MAGA propaganda with all other content, especially anything left-leaning, becoming shadowbanned & not shown. Yes, currently TikTok is mostly dances and AI narration over kinetic sand being cut or sped up footage of pressure washers cleaning driveways. Yes, I know it's not good for the brain or the attention span, but most content on TikTok I see is apolitical, neither left or right. Add an overt political bias to the algorithm, suppress left-leaning and boost right-wing content, and TikTok could be used to radicalize tens of millions of young people. Young people with less media discretion and easily influenced. Why would MAGA pass up such an opportunity to get an even bigger megaphone to an even younger more impressionable audience. That's what I believe is the goal here. They could try to pull the "sell or be banned" thing on other apps as well, so that they can fall into the hands of right-wing techbros. apps like BlueSky. It doesn't matter if it's American app, they'll still try to claim "national security threat" because MAGA is disingenuous like that. They desire total control over the media and flow of information. 2001:67C:2628:647:11:0:0:27B (talk) 08:08, 19 January 2025 (UTC)

You're mischaracterizing the situation. The ban law was bipartisan, and it was signed by Joe Biden. It wasn't a GOP or MAGA thing. In fact, Tianjin Trump has been pushing against the ban, possibly (probably) because the Chinese have bribed him somehow. The unanimous SCOTUS ruling that this isn't a free speech issue was always a foregone conclusion. The feds proved to the Court's satisfaction that TikTok was a national security threat, and the Court has held multiple times before that national security concerns represent a special circumstance in regards to free speech. Additionally, the Court pointed out that the law gave the Chinese company ByteDance ample time to sell the app, meaning that this wasn't an outright ban of anything. ByteDance and TikTok's refusal to comply, citing that the Chinese somehow just run the app better, is rightly considered suspicious. Pizza SLICE.gifDuceMoosoliniYour friendly RW dictator moderator 14:16, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
ByteDance could have also simply spun off TikTok as an independent company based in the US with full US oversight. Hell, even a TikTok operating under say, British/EU/Canadian oversight may have been enough water away from Pooh-bear to avoid being banned [BD operates a 'Chinese TikTok' called Douyin for the home market]. But from what I've seen they've chosen not to do any of these things. We need to remember this is nothing new; Meta/X/YT has been banned from China for the best part of 20 years now so in some respect this is more than a belated quid pro quo.
The Orange One is wavering on this ban [apparently], however it's a) questionable that he could lift this off his own order and b) there's gonna be a lot of folks in his court who are supportive of the ban. Why is he suddenly kinda friendly? Well, seems there was quite a bit of pro-MAGA shit on TikTok during the election and BD said nice things about him. But we also need to remember c) the Orange One is slightly senile and very capricious. A smile today can very well be a hissy-fit and death-stares next week. KarmaPolice (talk) 17:33, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
they should probably go ahead and ban twitter and facebook while they are at. they are doing/have been doing all the things tik tok is supposed to have done albeit not for china. cambridge analytica anyone? AMassiveGay (talk) 17:45, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
The TikTok ban law was possible in large part because the First Amendment does not apply to foreign corporations, and they do not have free speech rights. Facebook and Xitter are both American companies. Pizza SLICE.gifDuceMoosoliniYour friendly RW dictator moderator 22:07, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
The problem with citing "national security" as an excuse to abrogate free speech restrictions is that what counts as "national security" is determined by political interests. The problem is with the precedent this sets. The OP has the right of it. Carthage (talk) 20:09, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
True - this risk is quite real [here in the UK 'national security' is literally defined as 'whatever the Govt of the day says it is']. However, it's unlikely to have been done in this case because SCOTUS's ruling was unanimous. If it was split along partisan lines or not heard at all, then yes my 'eyebrow rating' will be much higher than it is right now on this topic. KarmaPolice (talk) 20:16, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
This doesn’t really set a precedent. The Court has pretty much always held that national security is a valid reason to suspend free speech, at least to a certain degree and in specific circumstances. For example, see Schenck v. United States, a case from WWI. Pizza SLICE.gifDuceMoosoliniYour friendly RW dictator moderator 22:11, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
Essentially all commercial social media is spyware; that's how they make money. TikTok is different because its wholly-owned by a potential military adversary.
If TikTok were a business and not an intelligence operation — and if ByteDance were an independent company and not a wholly-owned government subsidiary ultimately answering to Xi Jinping — then ByteDance would have sold it and pocketed hundreds of billions of dollars.
—Jonathan V. Last[4]
Bongolian (talk) 22:15, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
Or, get this: BtyeDance believes that they could get more money by not selling TikTok, than selling it. But of course The China Hawk:tm: believes that anything even remotely related to China is an intelligence operation directly under the control of the Chinese Communist Party. Now I'm not denying that TikTok definitely sells information to the Chinese Government, that would be foolish and idiotic, but I believe that pretty much every social media, including the 'Patriotic' ones all sell their user's information, and that information ends up in the hands of many unsavory actors, for example Twitter is openly cooperating with Saudi Arabia, the government that imprisons and executes you because you mildly criticized the sauds that one time. A somebody. (talk) 00:23, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
Many countries also have rules regarding foreign ownership of 'sensitive assets/areas' - and 'media' is a classic one. After all, it's the reason Murdoch became an American citizen - because he wouldn't have been allowed to have Fox and recently here in the UK a takeover of the Torygraph was blocked because the main shareholder was a Gulf Sov Wealth. KarmaPolice (talk) 22:30, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
Citing Schenk v. United States as precedent that the United States government has cited national security to shut down speech it doesn't like in the past isn't exactly reassuring, you know. Carthage (talk) 22:48, 19 January 2025 (UTC)

────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────It wasn't really meant to be. It was just a fact that helps explain SCOTUS' reasoning in regards to the relationship between national security and free speech, as well as noting that this decision establishes no precedent. The other factor behind the Court's decision was that the justices rejected the idea that this even really was a proper First Amendment case because no part of the ban law made any reference to the actual content on TikTok (the Court called the law "content neutral") and the law made no effort to regulate what kinds of content would appear on TikTok. The law's only measure was against Chinese ownership of the app, which the Court found reasonable.

The Government also supports the challenged provisions with a content-neutral justification: preventing China from collecting vast amounts of sensitive data from 170 million U. S. TikTok users. 2 App. 628. That rationale is decidedly content agnostic. It neither references the content of speech on TikTok nor reflects disagreement with the message such speech conveys. Cf. Ward, 491 U. S., at 792–793 (holding noise control and sound quality justifications behind city sound amplification guideline were content neutral). Because the data collection justification reflects a “pur-pos[e] unrelated to the content of expression,” it is contentneutral. Id., at 791.

The above quote is from the Court's decision, which you can read as a PDF here from the SCOTUS website. Pizza SLICE.gifDuceMoosoliniYour friendly RW dictator moderator 22:55, 19 January 2025 (UTC)

Seems like Tiktok is restoring access and complimenting Trump. — LunaAHHHHH 02:25, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
Because Shandong Don is in their corner now. Pizza SLICE.gifDuceMoosoliniYour friendly RW dictator moderator 03:20, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
It's amazing that Trump has decided that he can ignore Congress and the Supreme Court and people in power are just letting him do it. Carthage (talk) 06:56, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
I think this will be a "fun" case to watch, given that Trump is also aligned with the Silicon Valley "tech bros" these days. On the one hand, I'm sure that there's a part of that scene that would love to see TikTok either wiped out or somehow brought into their "circle". Much of American oriented SV social media (at least what's in Trump's circle) has developed into either being for "the old farts" (Facebook) or merely for unprofitable neo-Nazis (the remains of Twitter). TikTok has a reputation for being the "Gen Z" hangout, something which Silicon Valley at the moment doesn't really have. On the other hand... there definitely was a lot of "Gen Z" targeted brigading on the socials the last election cycle, and it appears that Trump has warmed up to the subsequent flattery on there. And I'm sure that certain GOP elements would love to have even tighter "brigading" control.
Yes, Trump can't (in theory) ignore the bill passed in Congress, and there has been some Words posted by Republicans like Tom Cotton stating that what Trump is doing has "no legal basis". So will such move beyond words? Maybe -- in Trump 1.0, recall that there was a continuous shitshow circus between the dictator-friendly Trump and security hawks (many of them Republican), of which Cotton is an excellent example. So who knows... BobJohnson (talk) 13:13, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
It's worth noting that despite the SC's claims, several politicians have noted that they supported the ban because too many kids on there are critical of Israeli war crimes [5]. Furthermore, the claims about "Chinese spying" were largely hypotheticals and not made public, not even during the SC decision [6], and the bills were hurried though the houses by being attached to an Ukraine funding bill. The Russians actually interfered in 2016 by simply manipulating Facebook and buying user data from US firms. Of course a better solution is to introduce better data protection laws ala EU countries, and penalize those who break the law, but of course, that would make it harder for US social media firms to sell your information.LucasGeorge (talk) 06:31, 27 January 2025 (UTC)

Trump's policies are some of the most inflationary I've seen (except for money printing)[edit]

Tariffs, immigration crackdowns, tax cuts, and now he is "demanding" lower interest rates. According to the most accepted theories at least, the only way to avoid a surge in inflation would be through substantial economic growth. The problem is, the American economy is already operating near full employment, and without a significant leap in productivity, such growth seems unlikely. In fact, if other countries retaliate against the US with tariffs (as they likely will) and the US is forced to reallocate resources to produce goods it currently imports, economic efficiency could decrease, further straining growth.

Yes, it's possible (perhaps even likely) that he won't manage to implement these policies at the scale he envisions. Still, it's ironic that some voters supported him to lower prices when most of his proposed policies are likely to push prices higher. Seriously, I won't be surprised if he does something like the Nixon shock in a couple of years and tries to freeze prices. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 20:00, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

The 2024 election was evidence that reality didn't matter much but propaganda was the thing that clinched it. Presidential age mattered a lot… until Biden dropped out. Inflation mattered a lot… until it didn't. Egg prices mattered a lot… until the election ended (egg prices are still high and Rump said he can't or won't fix that anyway), election integrity mattered until Rump killed that office. Bongolian (talk) 20:24, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
I won't be surprised if a recession happens. TheOneAndOnlyCirrusMan (talk) 20:29, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
Personally I don't think a recession will happen mostly because expansionary fiscal and monetary policy tend to boost the the aggregate demand in the short term, (there is still some debate on this subject, but it would bore you to death), but I wouldn't rule it out either. Stagflations are sometimes (but not always) caused by structural problems, and I think Trump's policy can weak the American institutions to a point that expectations will be really low. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 20:59, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
The main recession risk, as I see it, is if Trump starts slapping heavy tariffs left, right and centre (as he has already threatened to do), because that’s likely to start some form of major, global trade war. That could mean some rather unpredictable and severe consequences for global trade with knock on effects in several major economies, incl. that of the US. ScepticWombat (talk) 22:40, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
@GeeJayK I know you didn’t mean anything disparaging by it, but when you reply to individuals that you won’t go into details because “it would bore them to death” that can actually be a bit inadvertently insulting. Not talking on behalf of Cirrus here, but just speaking generally. It can suggest (presumptively) that the person you are talking to has no intellectual curiosity about the subject and couldn’t possibly find it interesting. The subject in question may very well be genuinely dry, but many folks are interested in subjects that are commonly seen as “boring”. I am one of those people, none of my friends are as interested in the applications of set theory as I am!
That is to say, I think it would be genuinely of value if you went into detail about why you think a recession is unlikely. It’s absolutely okay to simply not do so because you simply do not have the time to do so. Don’t assume though that people will find something boring unless they tell you though, just as friendly advice. Talking in that kind of way can be perceived as patronizing, even if you genuinely just feel the topic is dry. If you are willing, please tell us more. I think a number of us would genuinely appreciate the opportunity to learn something of value from you. :) - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 22:53, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
The production possibilities frontier curve. Point A is below full capacity, and when expansionary fiscal and monetary policy work better. The American economy is already close to point B, C or D, and point X can only achieved by technical progress, lowering waste, etc.
@ScepticWombat That is indeed possible. Many people think that the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act and the retaliations from Europe were a major cause of the Great Depression, but thisprobably not the case, since, despite disrupting trade, the American economy wasn't as integrated as most people think.[7] One hundred years later things are indeed different, but I'm not sure if it would be enough to trigger a recession.
@OnlySortaDumb You're actually right and what I said to Cirrus was condescending, perhaps even mean. If you or anyone else want to read about the controversies I mentioned earlier to Cirrus, one of them is the Ricardian equivalence, but in my opinion, just like the Laffer curve, this situation is only valid under extreme conditions. Regarding your question, I don't think that a recession will happen (but I'm not stating it won't) if Trump manages to implement all these policies because, in the short term, they tend to boost the aggregate demand. They probably won't bring too much economic growth since the American economy is already close to it full employment (see the image I posted), but they won't let the economy to falter either. If you're interested at understanding why these policies boost the aggregate demand, it's not hard to explain: when it comes to fiscal policy, by cutting taxes, people have more money to spend (I'm assuming here that he won't cut spending a lot, from a mathematical perspective spending more tends to boost the economy more than cutting taxes, but I don't have the time to explain why right now). On the other hand, when it comes to monetary policy (an area where, fortunately, his influence is limited since the Fed is an independent central bank), it's also easy to see why his proposals could stimulate short-term growth: lower interest rates mean cheaper borrowing, which encourages people to spend more. Now, explaining why I don't think these policies work in the long term would require too much time and energy, something that I don't have now. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 23:55, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
Ah, okay. A lot of that make sense. Thank you for explaining what you can at the momment! You are of course at no obligation to do so but it is appreciated. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 04:29, 24 January 2025 (UTC)
I think GeeJay's comments are generally sound; that in short all this coming shit is most likely going to help 'perk up' the short-term but damage the medium/long term prospects of USA.Inc. His desired 'cutting the green crap' [for example] may help reduce costs a little right now [continuing with current economic models always is cheaper] but places significant risk that it shall allow foreign competitors to steal a march on American companies, who become ever-more dependent in taking the 'soft option' [hiding in the home market and appealing to politicians for protection] than actually innovating and going toe-to-toe with foreign rivals. The textbook example here being the 'fall of Detroit'; the American auto industry deciding to retreat deeper into their 'easy' home markets and outdated tech while the Germans and Japanese came after them but I could off the top of my head also cite the British failure to shift from steam to electrical/oil power in the 1900s and the Japanese failure to make the leap from 'analogue' to 'digital' electronics in the 2000s.
All the signs are that China is fully planning to 'win' the coming sectors she believes shall dominate this century - such as EVs, AIs, green energy and biotech, while trade wars might end up with such actions as US-owned subsidiaries being reclassified as 'foreign' and getting tariffs slapped on them. A good example here is 'Ford of Europe'; not only have they not got that we don't want fucking bloated SUV-style cars [a sign that Dearborn has all but given up listening to their British and German execs] but is also dialling back on EVs [right at a time where Europe is throwing a huge % of her investment funds into renewable electricity]. If the EU then also decide to put [say] a 20% tariff on the remaining blue ovals, it very well might be the end for this arm of the company. KarmaPolice (talk) 10:17, 24 January 2025 (UTC)
The above (and many other reasons -- I've mentioned military tech power before for instance) is exactly why the decades long assault on education and science by Republicans has never made sense to me. I'd seriously like to know what the fuck the ruling class was thinking on that. Still are thinking, as a matter of a fact. I actually can't think of even a global reactionary movement in developed nations that is as openly hostile to education as Republicans are. (You do see hostility to education in super-fundamentalist religious countries that believe that Invisible Sky Thingy is more important than science, as well as some sectarian / racial hostility in other places hampering education because Oh No We Can't Educate Those Others. Both of which play a factor in the US education hostility, frankly. But those examples around the world should be signs to *not* follow in that path.)
I also see the sudden concern of certain Silicon Valley execs of "wokeness" and other culture war bullshit as a bad sign for those companies in question. I don't think they'd be this nakedly political if execs still thought they were capable of innovating their way to dominance. Usually when I see execs -- particularly those in monopolistic type companies -- seeking shelter in "the law", I see it as a sign that they fear something's coming down that would change their comfy corporate position. (Part of the Trump suck-up, in other words, might be because TikTok came in and kicked their ass at their own game...)
At any rate... short term, I tend to concur that unless Trump's tariffs are too bigly, a recession is probably not too likely. In fact, if by "economy" you mean "the Wall Street class", barring the tariff thing again, or another "black swan" event like COVID-19 (because one thing Trump can't do is lead), I actually think that economy will do pretty good. That being said, I can also see Trump's policies further exasperating inequality. Meaning: the "working class" will be hit harder by these inflationary policies due to them spending a higher percentage of income consuming. Social safety nets might be hit (to what degree I don't know, due to the narrow margin in the House and the Senate); it's also unlikely that minimum wage will be adjusted no matter how much inflation occurs. Any "tariff war" will target perceived "red state" industries, just as it did in 2018. Any tax cuts will target things like income tax, which will largely benefit wealthier people as well. The push against immigrant workers is very possibly going to drive up food prices -- something also more of a concern for poorer people then the well-off.
While a lot of the rubes really want those Others to experience those liberal tears or something, among the "professional class", my anecdotal observation is that the sentiment is more "sigh... welp, they voted for this, hope they enjoy". At the core, so many of the rubes in question do seem willing to get fucked by the ruling class (and there's a good deal that suggests that this will happen to some extent), as long as they believe that the ruling class is fucking the Others even more.
Regarding propaganda: It certainly was a darkly bemusing factor. The bots, shitposters, and pundits (including within much of the supposedly liberal mainstream media) were *extremely really concerned* about lots of things in November 2024 (of course, it was all the Democrats fault, even when contradictory -- vote for an inflationary president when one is supposedly concerned about the price of eggs? OK.) It's funny how so much of that shit died down by January 2025. So it goes. BobJohnson (talk) 15:39, 24 January 2025 (UTC)
I wasn’t talking about tariffs in general causing recessions, but the kind of global trade war that Trump seems willing to risk being a major potential calamity, considering that, despite some moves towards “friendshoring”, global supply chains are clearly a major factor in today’s economy (as demonstrated by both COVID and the 2021 Suez Canal obstruction incident).
Sure, the US is not as exposed as small, export oriented economies, but even the US is tied into a complex global web of supply chains and fucking with them to the extent that a Trump induced global trade war involving all the major trading blocs is going to be very dicey — especially considering the haphazard approach of The Donald.
But what might (also) really fuck over the US economy in particular is if Trump really does begin mass deportations on the scale he has threatened during his campaign (i.e. numbers in the hundreds of thousands or even millions). That would likely wreak havoc on the US economy, specifically, since, pretty much by definition, it’s not going to be carried out in any kind of rational or carefully calibrated fashion.
Furthermore, several sectors of the US economy will probably be hard pressed to function, at the very least in the short term, without this cheap labour supply. It’s certainly going to hugely impact both prices and the overall economy due to the sudden increases in the cost of and demand for labour in particular sectors, as well as the overall reduction of the labour force and reduced demand more generally (since you’re basically deporting consumers). ScepticWombat (talk) 18:23, 24 January 2025 (UTC)
It's been proven time and time and time again that MAGA supporters are proud and willing to be rawdogged by their own elected officials and then happily ask for seconds. Unfortunately it appears most of America drank that Kool Aid at this point. Doesn't help that a South African Apartheidist (and now an open Nazi) bought one of the largest social media platforms and turned it into a fascist propaganda machine. Gonna get even worse with Meta now kowtowing and TikTok also being bought by President Musk. I wouldn't be surprised if Trump's "honeymoon" holds for the full four years, maybe longer. Trump has proven he's made of polished teflon, a little economic instability won't hurt him a bit.2001:67C:2660:425:29:0:0:179 (talk) 08:12, 25 January 2025 (UTC)
I'm kind of doubting that. The past five days have been an onslaught of bad press, Trump is getting his executive orders shut down left and right, he's even pissing off the security forces (the cops were not happy about the Jan 6th pardons), and his policies are actively inflationary in a way that no amount of media spin will cover. His electoral win was by far not a landslide. He doesn't have a popular mandate. He and his cronies are really engaging in overreach. Carthage (talk) 08:34, 25 January 2025 (UTC)
RE: 'Drinking the Kool Aid'. No, 'a majority of Americans' haven't. Only a third did in November, and of that perhaps 80% would have drunk it regardless. An important difference, esp as Orange Cultists are doing their darndest to imply 'the majority of Americans' are 100% for all the Orange shitness.
RE: 'Not giving a fuck about education'. The answer is fairly simple; we are talking of the class of business leader who expects to be spoon fed [which unfortunately is a big % of them]. The production of technically/scientifically trained persons for my workplace is 'someone else's problem' and therefore I don't have to devote one iota of energy or resources to solve it myself. Poor infrastructure? Lack of 'suitable' labour? Lack of demand for products? Whine whine WHINE. Lazy fuckers who constantly expect 'someone else' to sort out shit, even if it's clearly in their interests to do so [qv: retail/fast food workers forced to organise their own cover during illness].
This 'spoon fed whiners' view really hit me when listening to an old UKGov minister talking about the lorry driver shortage and the minister had tried to 'sort it out' but the businesses simply refused to do anything - basically they expected the Govt to organise and pay for the drivers and then deliver them for cheap employment. I could hear the annoyance in the ex-minister's voice and the fact it was a pro-capitalist Tory was perhaps the most telling.
In more immediate realm; our execs intend to simply takeover promising startups with the tech they need and gut them for the IP. I can't say this is a stupid plan because you have quite a few countries [esp the UK] who are fucking dumb enough to allow this to repeatedly happen. However, it is quite possible that if America starts hurting them [ie slaps tariffs on UK, is a bullying shit] they might grow so fucked off they actually stop the constant bleed-out of IP to the US and re-route it into their own future 'national champions'. KarmaPolice (talk) 16:04, 25 January 2025 (UTC)
It's pie in the sky idealism that if we can control our own manufacturing we can control costs. The costs the business class aspire to incur are wage labor costs of the least developed countries, because they don't actually care how much an egg or an appendectomy costs, global power isn't cooperative, it's dumb fuck adversarial. And fuck the US I guess,prove we're willing to go Hulkamania and screw everybody and be just as weird and cruel about expansionist drives as Russia and China have been to demand Greenland like Ukraine or Taiwan? Get ready to be treated as poorly as the citizens of Russia and China, just to prove a point, I guess. Torrent (talk) 05:12, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

Washington Post on cut baltic sea cables[edit]

WaPo reports both US and EU intel thinks it's accident, not sabotage citing anonymous sources talking about secret intelligence. That's concerning all 3 long-stretch anchor-dragging incidents since 2023. This is very starkly at odds with basically all European media reporting prior, which focuses on the idea of sabotage (with recent news including Finland finding the latest ship, Eagle S, was about to cut more cables when stopped). There's not much in the way of European reactions to the WaPo reporting yet, mostly just reporting on that it's been reported. But the Finnish investigator who heads police rather than an intelligence agency as such strongly disagrees and says he wasn't contacted by WaPo (Finnish, Swedish).

I wonder what's up with this reporting. Is there really a top-secret consensus that it's all accidents, held by intel agencies but maybe not by other organizations involved in investigating (i.e. what WaPo calls "some critics of Russia" who disagree), or is that nonsense from dodgy "anonymous people", or even worse nonsense editorial work? We'll see what other media reporting follows. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 12:40, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

i read on wikipedia that about 200 such cables worldwide are cut and/or disrupted annually usually attributed to accidents. is it not possible that an accidental severing of cables in the baltic, at the same time a major conflict in which many european countries are invested in, to varying degrees, lead people to be convinced it is sabotage, convinced its too much of a coincidence not to sabotage, jumping to a wrong conclusion? i read such cables can be severed by merely dragging a ships anchor across them by accident. how would one distinguish sabotage via the same method as accidental from accidental? either case is just as plausible as each other, but as noted in the WaPo article, sabotage of this nature is incredibly difficult to prove. perhaps heightened tensions and paranoia make us more certain of sabotage than we should be. AMassiveGay (talk) 17:13, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
Proof of intent or foreknowledge can be gained by interviewing the ship's officers and crew, who are in Finnish custody. The crew, especially, probably have no skin in the game, and can probably be convinced to testify. Bongolian (talk) 18:30, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
We'll see what follows. The WaPo article suggests an explanation for what I'll mention next, which has often been mentioned as being very suggestive of sabotage. Apparently the crews of the 3 ships over the past years doing these things are exceptionally ill-trained and prepared, and their ships were in exceptionally bad conditions. Otherwise, it's often been mentioned that it's impossible for a crew to fail to notice that they're dragging anchor for 100 miles / 160 km, as in the case of the 2nd ship, the others also doing very long anchor drags. It throws the ship off course and slows it down greatly, and is very noisy too. "No properly trained personnel could do that by mistake", according to many commenters in the industry, but now we have the explanation that they could simply be record-breaking incompetent, the crews of much of the whole Russian shadow fleet. In that and more ways, the actions by the crews are very very strange, but maybe the crews are very very strange in a non-malevolent ways. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 20:08, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
ultimately if these really are sabotage but with nothing to prove the russians were behind it, or in fact genuinely accidents, Russia still cannot just ruled out as being to blame and protection of undersea infrastructure would have to continue or be stepped up regardless. I guess it is also possible the Russias are behind it all, that everyone is fully aware that the Russians are behind it all, but we pretend we have no proof and cannot say for sure to avoid having to escalate in response to what would be in effect an attack on NATO. Plausible deniability works both ways AMassiveGay (talk) 21:54, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
If it is accidents due to these ships being awful including awful crews, then indeed that would also need to be protected against since it means very high risk of further incidents. There's also separate concerns about how the bad shape these "shadow fleet" ships are in could cause other kinds of accidents as well, including potentially large oil spills. Earlier in January Germany had to tow one oil tanker that lost power. As for the ship Finland has seized while investigating cable cuts, it's been deemed very unsafe (various violations of standards) and also unable to handle an icy sea so it's been detained and will surely remain in Finnish custody for months at least. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 22:27, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Some news. Nothing in English yet that I've seen, but from Sweden and Finland with mentions of Nordic countries in general agreeing. In short: 1) Swedish government skeptical about [WaPo] cable cut claims: ”Too early” to draw conclusions. 2) Jukka Savolainen, of the European Centre of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats, accuses WaPo of spreading fake news and of skillfully combining a truth (no evidence yet found to conclude sabotage) with a falsehood (that it's enough to conclude innocence and that that's been done), promoting a pro-Russian agenda. 3) Finnish government branches agree with Swedish ones that accident seems unlikely, even though more investigation is needed to be able to conclude sabotage firmly. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 13:39, 22 January 2025 (UTC)

So now there's a 4th incident, and Sweden seizing a ship after a Sweden-Latvia cable was cut.[8][9] AP reports on the 11+ Baltic cables in 15 months in general, and these "anonymous intelligence officials" saying it's all accidents have apparently spoken to AP as well. So if it's questionable -- Swedish and Finnish governments and Nordic government branches in general question the accident idea, and the Hybrid CoE organization considers it fake news -- it wasn't originated by WaPo but instead by some mysterious nameless people who now speak to more news agencies. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 19:01, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

David Low cartoon[edit]

There are several updated versions of this cartoon featuring Trump and Putin - can either old or new versions fit somewhere on RW? Anna Livia (talk) 20:24, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

That was a lousy link. No image. Here. Spud (talk) 09:42, 29 January 2025 (UTC)
First wikiverse entry on the list.
The original cartoon is 'generally familiar to the broadsheet reading public.' Anna Livia (talk) 17:13, 29 January 2025 (UTC)

Trump's transphobic executive order has a funny side effect[edit]

If you haven't heard, the Trump administration has signed an executive order which basically erases trans and non-binary people, which fucking sucks, however, as if out to prove our point that transphobes don't know as much about biology as they think they do, this very executive order has a funny unintended side effect.

The executive order defines gender as equal to sex, and defines both with the genitals an embryo has around conception, which happens a few days around ovulation; However, something this executive order fails to account for is that, for the first 6 or 7 weeks of pregnancy, all fetal genitalia are the same, meaning that, technically, in the United States, there is now only one gender. TheOneAndOnlyCirrusMan (talk) 21:22, 21 January 2025 (UTC)

I'm not seeing that anywhere in the executive order. Section 2, part (d) and (e) are close. e.g. (d) “Female” means a person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the large reproductive cell. But it says nothing about genitals or embryos anywhere.
It suggests that a congenitally intersex person probably will have a defined legal sex other than what they appear, but a person genetically unable to produce gametes needs to have one of these immutable biological sexes, by (a), but does not meet the definition of either (d) or (e). Namako (talk) 02:42, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
The issue with that definition (besides the intended discrimination) is that gamete production is not something established at conception. People assigned male typically won’t produce any gametes until the onset of puberty. “Sex” isn’t determined at conception. Sexual differentiation doesn’t happen until well into prenatal development and is usually given direction via the presence or absence of the SRY gene. This also assuming all genes regulated by the expression of the SRY gene is present. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 03:38, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
The 'facts don't care about your feelings' were never interested in any of that. They are much more interested in feelings, and hid behind that a decade ago because they are liars. You can't science a liar out of 'facts.' The problem is, most people who get the science don't know how to communicate it to someone who really doesn't want to hear it. Bill Nye tried with some ice cream metaphor to at least break it down to 'some people like chocolate, some people like vanilla' and it got taken up in arms that Nye just worked on airplanes and wasn't qualified to talk about sexual orientation (forget the fact anyone might have been writing the script). Now we have Matt Walsh, who did a movie called 'what is a woman?' And instead of accepting the idea that it's societal and personal, frames it as a harmful grasping for identity, which it can be, especially when binary is the "solution." But Walsh never got an engineering degree, so... his era, I'm inundated by, I remember when self identifying as an attack helicopter was the height of conservative meming. there is no logical argument that stops a populist sprint. I worked with a kid who was in high school, was both Very smart and very 4chan edgy back in like 2014, and he used the printers we worked with to print out stickers that said 'Hitler did nothing wrong' and intended to paste them all over his school. I think he only told me because I was fine with his jokes for the most part and people at the job enjoyed his silliness, but I and a couple other guys told him that shit isn't funny. I think now, 10 or so years later, whatever community he was part of is big and stupid and happy to be wrong as a chaotic meme. like the type of person who would watch Gran Torino and think 'you know what, casual racism IS funny, and minorities ARE dangerous'. Which, if you've seen Gran Torino, woof, that is kinda the message. Torrent (talk) 04:57, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
@PnlySortaDumb Don't get me wrong, I think this order is stupid and their defintion mean, flimsy and unhelpful. But you need to throw out what YOU think 'sex' means (temporarily, I hope!) to read it, because it is a legal document defining 'sex' (presumably overriding previous legal definitions if they even existed, I'm not sure on how executive orders interact with common law). Call it "TrumpGender" or something and do a search and replace if you like.Namako (talk) 05:47, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
"Government insiders know that often these [executive orders] are basically press releases, edicts with little real authority." — Michael Waldman, Brennan Center for Justice.[10] That's not to say however that his henchmen appointees won't try to implement transphobic government policies. Bongolian (talk) 07:42, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
So apparently Trump thinks he can change reality by virtue of badly-written executive fiat? Be interesting to see how that works out for him. (It's obviously miserable for transgender people in the interim though.)Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 10:51, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
Sex is defined as the "immutable biological classification as either male or female", which then goes on to define "female" as "the sex that produces the large reproductive cell" and "male" as the small one. So the social media meme revolving around gonads is... technically incorrect. Still, the obvious problem here is that biology isn't 100% immutable; even with those qualifications, this definition basically classifies rare intersex conditions like ovotesticular syndrome as sexless. This also makes sexless those who, for whatever reason, cannot produce "reproductive cells" from birth, which is probably a more common condition.
I'm not going to quibble about the social media faux pas, because regardless, the XO is badly written from a biology point of view either way. But this executive order is not meant for those who look to reason and science. It is cover for the transphobic base to help them get their excited little hate-filled dopamine hit, while the ruling class Republicans prepare to fuck them over in so many other ways. BobJohnson (talk) 13:05, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
This is just performative cruelty for the rubes. Trump does not give a flying fuck about this topic whatsoever. And even if he did actually care, he is the kind of shit boss who would stroll in, tell you to do [unachievable thing] and if you pointed out the impossibility, will stamp feet, lecture you on 'being proactive' and 'that's your fucking job to do so go do it!'. Also be aware that this might also be 'dead catting' - throwing shit on the table so everyone goes 'fuck me, that's a dead cat on the table!' while the throwee picks your pockets. KarmaPolice (talk) 16:47, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
Both determination and differentation have specific meaning in developmental biology. In species with genetic sex determination system, you can say that sex is determined at conception. Also word "produces" doesn't mean active production, it means "being source of something". Sex phenotypes can be classified using different operational definitions at different development stages. Prospective categorization can also be made. MichaelG (talk) 20:48, 24 January 2025 (UTC)
“Determination” is a bit loaded as far as language goes, because it is suggests a direct causal relation. It is easier to have a general model whereas the presence or absence of a given gene “determines” the development of a trait, but that still inevitably is an simplification of what is happening physically in an actual biological system.
There is the obvious issue of specificity too. In the vast majority of cases with human beings, the presence of the Y chromosome will result in phenotypically male development. The reality is that even in removing the presence of the Y chromosome does not guarantee that a male will not develop, because it is not the entirety of the Y chromosome itself that is the most causally relevant but specifically the SRY-gene (and the cascading relevant gene activation/inhibition that result from the SRY’s expression) that manipulate the relevant molecular factors that result in phenotypically male development.
Now one could say that the relevant determining factor is the SRY-gene and not the Y chromosome per se. But you could present another causal narrative that there is a collective set of co-causal variables that only collectively can be said to be truly determining to the development of phenotypic sex. For example, if a certain protein-receptor for a specific androgen in the fetus doesn’t develop or is misfolded for whatever reason, the cells may not respond to the appropriate androgen signalling, and the presence of SRY-gene doesn’t result in the fetus developing into a phenotypical male. With have to be careful not to mistake the map for the territory here. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 07:02, 29 January 2025 (UTC)
That development biology meaning of "determination" is different that colloquial/philosophical meaning doesn’t make it a loaded term. Note that EO doesn’t even use this term. If you suggest that “at conception” is not needed there and maybe even misleading that I would agree.
Sex is determined by genes (not chromosomes) and epigenetics. SRY gene doesn’t even need to be present to have female to male sex reversal. And all of those factors are already known at conception. Can other factors (mutations/environment) also influence outcome here? Sure, but this is clear for anyone who knows how those processes work. We almost never use “determined” in a strict sense. In practice, for real world applications, it almost always means something like “predicted with very large confidence”.MichaelG (talk) 12:33, 29 January 2025 (UTC)
What do you mean by “known”? Known by whom? I don’t think anyone knew my complete genetic make up at conception. That’s a bit absurd. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 22:31, 29 January 2025 (UTC)
I mean that this information is contained in zygote itself. You don't need to study any aspect of reality beside zygote to figure out those facts. MichaelG (talk) 09:07, 30 January 2025 (UTC)
My sister has a bunch of frozen embryos. All of them are younger than 2 weeks, but due to luck, all 100% are male. If what you're saying were true, how would the doctors know this?
Yes yes, developmentally the male genitalia diverge more from the original embryonic... thingy... than do female genitalia, but this is a stretch that requires obscure definitions that no reasonable person would use and is clearly not the intention nor wording of the law. You might as well say a ban on GMO organisms means banning all humans because of some obscure scientific discovery that humans actually descend from mushrooms and frogs (horizontal gene transfer)... CorruptUser 16:23, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
If what you're saying were true, how would the doctors know this?
Because despite the Executive Order defining it solely in terms of genitalia, there are other ways to determine the sex of an embryo? Come on, Cory. TheOneAndOnlyCirrusMan (talk) 17:29, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
Yeah; if it was genuinely to 'restore biological truth' [coughs] they could have centred it on XX/XY chromosomes and left talk of wangs and muffs alone. KarmaPolice (talk) 17:52, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
it is impossible for an egg to be gendered, it happens after a sperm imparts its y or x chromosome. Embryos are generally not frozen? Am I just wildly misinformed about modern fertility treatments? Can we freeze and implant Embryos? Torrent (talk) 06:23, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
The first human born to a frozen embryo was Zoe Leyland in 1984 (frozen for 2 months). The record-longest freeze that resulted in a birth was frozen for 27/28 (the cryopreservation page says 27, the page on Molly says 28) before being born in 2020. Since 2009, human embryos have been allowed to be stored for 10 years in the UK.
Even if the embryo is not frozen to be stored for significantly later implantation, many are still frozen in order to not be implanted in the same cycle as the eggs were harvested due to the ovarian stimulation drugs interfering with that cycle's implantation chances.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embryo_cryopreservation
Daev (talk) 08:41, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
I wasn't expecting this thread to bring back someone who's been inactive for 6 years! TheOneAndOnlyCirrusMan (talk) 18:31, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
Heh, yeah. Had some troubles that kept me unable to internet for a while. Doing much better over the last year and remembered RW, so started lurking again a week or so ago. Surprised it has been 6 years though, I'm not the most active bt thought I had still been chiming in here and there through covid. Daev (talk) 23:37, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
There is nothing reasonable about this executive order either, Cory. Also, have you considered that people are attempting to cope with a cynical transphobic policy with humor? Carthage (talk) 12:54, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
The sex of an embryo prior to implantation is established by a process called "Preimplantation Genetic Testing".Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 14:08, 23 January 2025 (UTC)
Very cool answer, glad I asked. Torrent (talk) 06:39, 24 January 2025 (UTC)

──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── I don't like the "this is just a distraction" line of rhetoric. Trans people are being actively harmed by this rhetoric, and these policies, right now. For the trans community, Trump's policies and rhetoric are not distractive, they're an existential threat. Carthage (talk) 01:50, 29 January 2025 (UTC)

Trump would not be in power if there were not a lot of people who are as hate filled as him. The problem is that this rot runs really deep in American history (hell, a war was fought over similar shit a century and a half ago). I can certainly blame the billionaires like Trump for *exploiting* the rube hate (and if I had to guess, such exploitation will be a "pyrrhic victory" for both the haters and the billionaire idiots giving away America's soft power right and left, so there's always that "fun" resolution to look forward to). But I can't blame them for the "root cause". Other phobia is and always has been a cancer of America (and, well, a lot of other places).
Until the Republican rot clears (if it ever does, as it has only gotten steadily worse since the Southern Strategy was conceived), I think many people in marginalized communities should really consider moving to a "blue state" (if they can, I know many can't sadly), particularly if the local flavor of Republicanism is hate-filled and full of idiocy. (Note though that even in shithole states there are pockets of tolerance, so "your mileage may vary" even in times of Trumpism). Heck, I'd say the same for something as simple as "if I had a kid" (due to Republican's views on public education and the War on Science) or "if I had a vagina" (due to Republican's views on women's health) the way things are going. It's hard to know what else to say. We're no longer dealing with "left vs. right" in a traditional sense, we are dealing with neoliberalism vs. an anti-intellectual hate-enabled oligarchy-friendly authoritarianism, a worldwide problem but one of more significance here due to quirks of the US political system. And trans are a "convenient target" for fascists, they are only a small part of the population after all. Most of the haters probably have never met one, ever.
The one "bright light" I see is that a lot of the MAGA hate is "elder heavy", and the Religious Right (much of which was fueled on racism and hate) also looks like they are "time limited". The youth are far less transphobic from what I can tell. And it's pretty clear that Trump is far more interested in blowing up government for his billionaire friends. Maybe at some point, Trump's oligarchy-friendly bullshit will cause enough pain points to make even the haters reconsider what they've done. BobJohnson (talk) 02:49, 29 January 2025 (UTC)
If there's one thing both sides can agree on, it's that America is rotten. When you butcher a carcass, and you notice rot, how do you deal with that rot? Dismemberment. The Democrats bungled this during Biden's term by failing to aggressively prosecute Trump and his cronies. And now the fascists hold the knife. Carthage (talk) 04:23, 29 January 2025 (UTC)
While I do agree regarding the wimpy Trump prosecution, the real issue to keep in mind is that the "rot" really extends well beyond Trump, so it's important not to focus on just him. Trump is the figurehead and cult of personality that is the "driving force", so to speak. Project 2025 is but one example of where the rot is at the federal level. And that rot now extends to several state and local US governments, as well as a large part of the American business community leadership (right, "tech bros"?).
The question is whether or not the rot withers and dies once the cult of personality is gone. I am not fully positive here. In some places, there is a long history of this shit. But, America is a place with (for now at least, but I see this as very hard to change) strong separation of powers. I don't agree with the statement that all of America is rotten. The national political circus is a joke, as is the case of some states and towns. But zoom in on some other locales and its not too bad at all IMHO. BobJohnson (talk) 13:29, 29 January 2025 (UTC)

What will it take to get Trump impeached a third time and removed in disgrace for real?[edit]

Been thinking. And honestly the best course of action is to get Trump impeached and removed for real. And we simply don't want him to leave quietly but to leave in such open disgrace that will set a precedent and send a message to Republicans that they will not dare to repeat the actions again even if a Republican is in office. Found one article on a group working to get him impeached but is there any way to get it about? Throwawayuseraccount (talk) 07:20, 25 January 2025 (UTC)

You'd find more success selling parkas in hell. No way the Senate can reach the 2/3 majority required for impeachment even if 2026 midterms were best possible scenario for Dems. Too many Republicans lick the bottom of Trump's dirty boot and ask for seconds. The concept of shame & disgrace is dead in the modern Republican party. Every time Republicans are foiled, they don't back down. Instead they double, triple, quintuple down. Not to mention impeaching Trump would mean having to deal with President Vance.2001:67C:2660:425:25:0:0:179 (talk) 07:59, 25 January 2025 (UTC)
I don’t know if Vance has the same swaying power or rallying point that Trump has. Patty Pat 12:25, 25 January 2025 (UTC)
I think any normal expectations can be completely dropped at this point. Americans re-elected a guy who's a thief, rapist, and fascist; Trump's former military general (Mark Milley) even said the last one himself. A week into office and already Trump has casually mentioned annexing other nations. I think Trump is just a (potent) figurehead of a larger problem though, which is the Republican Party; the party which thousands of Americans still support even with the recent events of them proposing a third-term for their Fuhrer and the erasing of marriage equality. If majority of Americans truly don't agree with what's happening, then I sincerely hope they get off their asses and onto the streets before non-Americans like myself have to start shooting them when they try to invade. Actually come to think of it, I wonder if folks from the Middle East have tips to share from their experience... Impiricism (talk) 14:56, 25 January 2025 (UTC)
The Orange Cult looks monolithic from the outside, but it has significant fissures within. I would guess the biggest gap is between the 'MAGA-cult' and the more 'regular Republicans' and the latter is basically keeping quiet and riding the coat-tails. This means the moment them coat-tails quit transporting them is the moment they knife the coat-wearer. Personality cults are odd things; they often can weather hurricanes which should have destroyed them with nay a scratch but then collapse spectacularly during a drizzle. A good case in point here being Boris Johnson. Therefore, the moment the Orange cult shrinks back to it's core base is the moment the 'mainline' Republicans shall start to turn, esp as it's hugely fucking unlikely a third term would happen and the '28 picks are not that great [Vance or Orange Jr not really up to snuff in my opinion]. KarmaPolice (talk) 15:39, 25 January 2025 (UTC)
One thing that Trump does *not* do very well is "herd cats", e.g. do the back-burning wheeling and dealing to get votes in times of conflict. This is a skill that many previous House and Senate leaders have (Nancy Pelosi and Mitch McConnell are two that I think were very good at this). Some presidents were very good at this as well. Not Trump. His motif is to try to bully his way through an issue if possible. This doesn't always work. Trump is at his meekest on issues where there are genuine fracture lines that he can't just raise his voice and solve. Just look at how Trump has fumbled issues like abortion and the H1B visa brouhaha. In the near immediate future, there are going to be very likely be intraparty conflicts on the debt ceiling, the SALT limit, and other things related to Trumps no-taxes bigly-spending style. My guess is, Trump says nothing on these things and will be too lazy to do any wheeling and dealing. Thus, brouhahas will continue to go on in the House and/or Senate with uncertain outcomes on what actually passes through.
As before, too, I would caution into reading too much into what Trump says. He is an extremely "hot air" filled politician, far more than others. Trump 1.0 was a whole lot of jaw jaw and... not that much else from a "big picture" perspective, other than tax cuts for the well off and (true to his shitty actual leadership) fumbling a global pandemic hard. I see no evidence yet that things are any different yet. Except that, since Trump is getting up and years, he seems quite a bit less lucid than he used to be.
Yes, it's sad that there are a lot of Americans that do seem to truly yearn for an Authoritarian Fuhrer to save them, many of them from Others that they've built up in their head. But from what I can tell, this actually is "par for the course" almost everywhere globally. Especially since the neoliberalism consensus is dead and oligarchy and/or authoritarian capitalism (who are happy to use "culture wars" for their own benefit) is taking its place. The true majority vote in America is apathy and "both parties suck". That's a whole other problem to worry about. BobJohnson (talk) 18:37, 25 January 2025 (UTC)

Point is not to appeal to any kind of honor in Republicans but to send them a message that they cannot just do what ever they want and get away with it. Trump already is the first president on history to be impeached more than once and if we can make him the first to be removed in disgrace following impeachment, it will show the Republicans they are not above the law and therefore will not dare to go this far again whether it be Vance or anyone else who succeeds Trump. What we need is a precedant that no one will simply forget. Throwawayuseraccount (talk) 17:30, 25 January 2025 (UTC)

I don't think anyone is bothering 'appealing to honour' to Republicans anymore. They know it no longer exists. KarmaPolice (talk) 17:35, 25 January 2025 (UTC)
As they say, "There's no honor among thieves." Bongolian (talk) 18:56, 25 January 2025 (UTC)
The Democrats and the establishment have turned Trump into a political martyr who gets stronger with each attack upon him. People don't like the establishment so their attacks upon Trump make him a more sympathetic figure. Among his base external threats increase internal solidarity. Instead of attacking Trump, the Democrats should focus on the general welfare of the American public writ large and become better at delivering on their promises. Trump's ability to market himself makes his political teflon armor thicker than Reagan's. So rather than focus on making Trump weaker, Democrats would be better off making themselves stronger. Chcalpine (talk) 19:26, 25 January 2025 (UTC)
There's an argument that's been made that the apolitical nonvoters don't actually want their lives made better with things that are too abstract too understand under a deluge of propaganda. The Obamacare/ACA didn't stop tRump from getting elected the first time. Biden's wide-ranging Inflation Reduction Act (poorly named in a futile attempt to appeal to GOP reps) failed to keep tRump from getting reelected. The apathists will have to understand on a personal level how much worse there life has gotten since 2024 to have any chance of motivation. Things will have to get a lot worse before they can get better. There are a lot more Senate Republicans up for reelection in 2026 than there were in 2024, which offers some opportunities if things turn to shit by then. Bongolian (talk) 20:24, 25 January 2025 (UTC)
it's a dangerous argument, Now if ever to say in a couple years the Democrats will see the Overton window swing back, because the Democrats have been outed as a corporate party. And I agree, it's very stupid to vote Republican because you don't like corporate influence in politics, but the Democrats have lost a zeitgeist And have been losing it for 4 years. Th replacement is wacky, but of course people who didn't feel a change from a Democratic leader who fucks off explaining inside executive action is now being proved as a poor leader against a president going nuts over WWE style 'tell me what I'm signing' performative action, like, it's what people have been thirsty for and Democrats can't do it, and I don't think, of anyone in the techbroligarchy, Mark Zuckerberg's politics could have possibly changed, so what musta he caught wind of?
Most competent leaders don't say 'Tell me what I'm about to sign' publicly, I feel like I'm crazy for thinking that is the opposite of what I want to see in a president, because people. Fucking. Loved it. Shadow government and rubber stamp just right in our faces. Torrent (talk) 05:57, 26 January 2025 (UTC)
I don't actually hold that against the Orange One. Leaders end up having to sign off a lot of stuff and a good leader should double-check. Might have been speaking about several in-transit decrees earlier and thus, might be a bit hazy on which one this is. Whether he actually fucking understands what he's signing is a completely different question - for example Truman later admitted some of them he didn't and with hindsight wouldn't have [such as the abrupt ending of Lend-Lease in 1945].
Anyway, I want to cover the mysterious red account's point quick re 'martyrdom'. Let us read between the lines; 'oh don't call out Trump for shit, media stop bothering covering shit and clearly don't 'attack' him'. Who the fuck thinks this would be 'better'? Unless you want it to be better for the Orange One, because the American people would be unaware of how shit he is, the opposition would never highlight his shittiness and even when he breaks the law he will not be prosecuted because 'that would make him a martyr'. I don't think 'it made him stronger', because it limited the growth of his cult [however, having the side-effect of making existing cult members double-down]. KarmaPolice (talk) 15:55, 26 January 2025 (UTC)
I've seen a lot of criticism of the last election cycle that the supposed "liberal" mainstream media really did a lot to help Trump out a lot this time. In the name of "balance fallacy" (along with direct evidence of billionaire class interference), there was a lot of "sane-washing" of Trump's babble, a lot of suspicious double standards (like Biden's old fart age mattered huge, but Trump's old fart age didn't much), and a lot of platforming of rather idiotic pro-Trump propagandists in the opinion section.
At any rate, now that Trump's alignment with the billionaire class is clearer these days, I'm not sure he's quite the martyr suspicious red account seems to think he is. Sure, suspicious red account is still wearing the pom-poms and cheerleading the GOP, but there are some clear obvious fractures that have pissed some MAGA figureheads off. And Trump's only been in power for a week! As mentioned above, since Trump can't lead and only can bully, it will be "interesting" to see what happens.
Torrent: As a general rule, from my perspective the American tech scene tends to lean either professional-liberal or "libertarian". This "tech libertarian" always has had edges of fascism in it, as the neoreactionary movement showed a long time ago. Certain tech spaces have never been a good place for women or minorities or actual people with moral scruples (I'm looking at you, certain toxic open source spaces even back in the "good old days"). So what happens when these sort of tech leaders get lots of money and power? You get out of touch with reality. So now things like the homeless population in San Francisco get transformed into dangerous crime-committing junkie caricatures. Others, basically. Seeing this side of tech, the "Trumpism" turn of some SV CEOs or VCs makes perfect sense to me. This hasn't affected every CEO/VC but it sure has affected some of them hard. BobJohnson (talk) 17:17, 26 January 2025 (UTC)
I don't think 'they've lost touch with reality' on the main - I say they quite consciously and deliberately removed themselves from [our] reality. But the truth is this; in hierarchical capitalist societies like the USA and UK you're only really aware of 'the reality' for your own group and perhaps a little bit of the groups adjacent. For example, I was fairly into adulthood until I realised that no, a lot of folks don't know almost to the penny how much is in their current account and hoard tons of random shite in the vague possibility it 'might be needed again'. KarmaPolice (talk) 00:52, 30 January 2025 (UTC)

Parliamentarism[edit]

Honestly, I'm not sure if the US should impeach Trump, at least not so far. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. The majority of Americans knew that they were doing, and now I think people should face the consequences. Now, some people, especially minorities, that mostly didn't vote for Trump, will suffer a lot, so there might be a case for an impeachment in the near future. But not now IMO. I do think, however, that ousting leaders from power should be easier. One solution that I think that the US could consider is adopting a parliamentary system. Honestly, the only place where the presidential system worked well was in America, but it's clearly not the case anymore (perhaps it used to work in South Korea too, which I think further strenghts my point). What do you guys think? GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 15:31, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

Beginning with Silvio Berlusconi, I think Italy is a case in point that a parliamentary system can't necessarily stop populist semi-fascists and/or clown shows from rising in power if that's what a lot of people want. BobJohnson (talk) 16:44, 26 January 2025 (UTC)
A “parliamentary system” would require overhauling the Constitution, which not possible as things stand. It’s a pipe dream. Pizza SLICE.gifDuceMoosoliniYour friendly RW dictator moderator 16:46, 26 January 2025 (UTC)
Yes, I meant as a long-term goal. Regarding Berlusconi, I don't think there's much we can do if the majority of the population wants this kind of government, but at least it's easier to oust these morons from power as you don't have to wait four years. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 17:15, 26 January 2025 (UTC)
Boris Johnson. KarmaPolice (talk) 17:17, 26 January 2025 (UTC)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't he fall rather quickly? Also, we're seeing Stammer's fall as well. Not saying that his successor will be better, just that being an unpopular PM is paying its price. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 17:23, 26 January 2025 (UTC)
About 2 and a half years of an utter shitshow - and he was only gotten rid of because literally, he couldn't find enough MPs to run a government! And I really want to know what you're smoking if you think Starmer is falling too. KarmaPolice (talk) 18:39, 26 January 2025 (UTC)
Actually, I think the ability of a country to convict a former head of state under the rule of law (List of former heads of democratic countries charged with crimes), without it devolving into civil war or chaos, is a sign of democratic strength: South Korea, France, Italy and even Brazil have shown themselves to be better in this regard than the US. Meanwhile the US has had three criminal scofflaw presidents: Nixon (Logan Act violation, conspiracy to commit burglary), Reagan (Logan Act violation), Rump (too many to list). — Unsigned, by: Bongolian / talk / contribs
Basically the one thing that might "defang" MAGA-after-Trump is that there's nobody who has that level of charisma in the GOP. Trump is the "right" mix of utterly empty for business interests to take advantage of, bullheaded enough to play the populist and commit to the bit and is at least aware that there's some risk of him going too much on the Icarus end of things. Like, let's say that in 2028, Trump respects his term limits and leaves (I'm 50/50 on him not trying for a third term/forcing a third term and SCOTUS allowing it), or alternatively, he kicks the bucket in office (would be worse since Vance is just worse than Trump on almost every metric, in that Vance believes in something and what he believes in is horrible). Who is next? The GOP just... has nobody else that isn't utterly milquetoast compared to Trump, or if they are on Trump's level of inane bullshit, they're either too much of a fucking Nazi to be palatable by the general public or are utterly unlikable. -- Techpriest (talk) 21:55, 26 January 2025 (UTC)
@KarmaPolice Well, 2 and a half years are still much less than the four years that America will have to stand Trump. I also think that we should remember how Liz Truss fell in a matter of days, something unimaginable in most presidential systems (there are some exceptions, like Argentina in 2001, but that clusterfuck is the exception that proves the point). Regarding Stammer, I remember seeing a popularity poll suggesting that he's already losing support. I'll see if I can find it tomorrow if you wanna see it. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 23:13, 26 January 2025 (UTC)
Actually Truss was PM for six weeks - but it doesn't make a lot of difference.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 14:19, 27 January 2025 (UTC)

Do not confuse the Orange One with the Orange Order. Anna Livia (talk) 11:56, 27 January 2025 (UTC)

-Would anyone confuse the two?
-The major issue is that while we 'only' had Bozo for 2½ years 3 years he was in a position which is a lot more powerful than the Orange One - in which he was head of the executive and the legislature without a formal constitution to block him in and an ancient/dying Head of State who very well might have let shit slide simply because they simply couldn't be fucked to have an argument. It's why some experts quip we are an 'elective dictatorship'; in which as long as the PM can keep a voting majority in the Commons they can pretty much do what the fuck they like [for example; Minsters just get appointed, no bollocks about hearings and confirmations]. What's more, we don't have term limits; PMs can 'just go on and on' - if Thatcher had not fucked up over the Poll Tax and humiliated a couple of her key allies she very well could have won 1992 and gone up to 1997 which would have had her run two days shy of ruling for 19 years.
-I'm not renowned for the accuracy of my political predictions, but I was on the money with Truss. That Trumpian economic policies [slash tax on the rich and whack it on the tab] simply could not wash with the UK [in short; you have the USD and we don't] and that if Truss wanted to do this, she'd basically have to cut immediately Govt spending by about 50% which meant immediate political death and mass riots until Truss was bounded out in a coffin. Truss jumped because it was either that or be pushed because the money-men had pulled the plug - in this case, the world of finance and gilts moving quicker than mass protest organisers or blockhead Tory MPs.
-Starmer's polling is fairly poor, though it has to be remembered he won his crushing victory last July on a stupidly low % of the vote [34%]. However, while he is not popular [and never really has been], the anecdotal mood music I'm picking up is that outside of the hard-right/left segments and the eternally stupid [perhaps 30%-35% of the total population] there is a 'weary resignation' that a) the country is in a shit position, b) there are no easy solutions to get out of the shit and c) it's the Tories fucking fault we're in the shit upto our waist. The British 'mood tracker' is holding steady and when it comes to personal ratings the 'winner' by a wide margin is 'none of the above' / 'don't know'. KarmaPolice (talk) 14:57, 27 January 2025 (UTC)
I think that another important difference between BoJo and Trump is that the former actually had a cabinet that largely knew how to move the bureaucratic levers of power, whereas the members of Trump’s second cabinet, bar a few exceptions, are inexperienced toadies who aren’t likely to be very effective in running their various portfolios.
Still, a dysfunctional government will also likely create havoc, because it will have difficulties maintaining basic services. And we’re already seeing that with Trump’s pronouncement of a hold on federal payouts pending “reviews” (yet another blatantly illegal move, as he can’t just refuse to spend money appropriated and mandated by Congress, though I wouldn’t bet on the SCOTUS not to flip flop on this too). Btw, that might be a factor in potentially triggering a recession, if things drag out, though I doubt even Trump will let things slide that badly. ScepticWombat (talk) 14:42, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
Bozo and Trump selected ministers on the same criteria; ie personal loyalty over everything else. In this case, Bozo was luckier in the respect he had to fish in a pool which had been at least somewhere near power for a decade by this point [ie Tory MPs] so would usually be intelligent enough to not to fuck up so obviously and immediately. However, Bozo would not have had this advantage if he's won the 2019 election as leader of the opposition and the Tories hadn't been in power for years - for example, Blair in 1997 and literally one 'minister with previous experience' while Cameron in 2010 returned with only two [Starmer is relatively well-stocked with experience having six, though none of them were first-rankers under Blair/Brown]. The advantage of the American system is that it's easier to for 'outsiders' to crash it; an incoming President is perfectly allowed to 'fish' for ministers from the military, state level, private business etc which to some extent a British PM can't [though we do have the work-around solution of either a) finding them a safe seat and then instantly promoting them or b) dumping them in the Lords]. KarmaPolice (talk) 16:00, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
One factor here IMHO is that America has a much bigger culture of brainless wingnut welfare than the UK. That is, a culture of the more clueless set of billionaires (and hanger-ons) who like the smell of their own farts, get "high on their own supply", and believe (among other zero brain cell tedium) that Government And Taxes Are Bad no matter what, in all cases, period (all principles of business and finance and a lot else be damned). It's not that this culture doesn't exist in the UK (see Liz Truss), but it's much more of a force in the States dating back decades (I mean, Ayn Rand, natch) and, from my stance, well integrated into the Republican party in a way that is not seen in the Tories.
If there's a consolation prize to Trumpism nonsense, one only has to look at Kansas. Thanks to Sam Brownback and his disastrous implementation of the oligarch's wet dream of supply side economics, the very conservative Kansas has had a Democrat governor since 2018. BobJohnson (talk) 16:55, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
I personally think the UK does have this 'brainless millionaire class' in spades too only that the UK simply does not enjoy the cakist possibilities of slashing taxes [mainly on them, nach] while keeping govt spending high ['cos of corp welfare/medicare/social security/military] - a lesson driven home by Truss' 44 day argument with the bollard of reality. However, in places like the UK a) a lot of our brainless folks reside in nearby tax havens [Channel/Man etc] and b) a lot of our most brainless have already decamped to the USA/Caribbean/UAE etc. KarmaPolice (talk) 17:42, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Just wanted to say that moving to a tribal autocracy (that's the term that Wikipedia uses to describe the politcs of UAE) just because you don't want to because you don't want to pay taxes sounds like an awful thing to do. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 19:13, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

Correction; 'pay no taxes and generally be allowed to do whatever the fuck we like'. Just do all your whoring/drinking/snorting etc behind closed doors, like the ruling family does. KarmaPolice (talk) 19:16, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
Aaand Trump has now reversed course on the (stupid and calamitous) policy of immediately freezing federal grants and loans. That probably speaks volumes about just how economically hazardous that proposal actually was. ScepticWombat (talk) 19:17, 29 January 2025 (UTC)

Shitty legislation 2025 edition[edit]

In Missouri there's a bill in the works that makes illegal immigration a crime punishable by life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, which coincidentally also makes undocumented immigrants a source of legally sanctioned forced labor. In Oklahoma there's a bill in the works that would criminalize production, distribution, and possession of adult pornography with a sentence of up to ten years. This "slate of legislation" also seeks to prohibit no-fault divorce and children's drag shows. Carthage (talk) 19:49, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

The Oklahoma performative art piece comes from Dusty Deevers, a Southern Baptist pastor, anti-vaccination idiot, and culture war blowhard. He tried this last year too (OK Senate bill 1976) and it went nowhere.
All par for the course for a Dominionist. What I find ironic is that Mr. Deevers also introduced a bill promoting Bitcoin. Mr. Deevers clearly has not been around the community of Bitcoin, and their general "libertarian" worldview, very much. BobJohnson (talk) 20:08, 26 January 2025 (UTC)
I can’t help wondering if Deevers’ weird, pedantic specificity in his proposal when it comes to all the things he wants to prohibit should induce Haggard's Law vibes, or just be put down to him being, well, a joyless, fundamentalist pedant. ScepticWombat (talk) 18:35, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
They're a Southern Baptist pastor. 'joyless, fundamentalist pedant' is basically a core description of successful applicants... KarmaPolice (talk) 18:45, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
In the anti-porn bill text [11], page 6 section E makes it clear that Mr. Deevers already knows that what he is proposing is unconstitutional.
One notable feature is that the bill outlaws any performance / scene where anyone is engaged in "sexual intercourse which is normal or perverted". Nothing is mentioned about the level of explicitness depicted of such. So, if implemented, bye-bye, any romance movie that is even slightly steamier than a Hallmark Channel flick.
It's very likely not going to happen, of course. But coming from a person of the religion where sex abuse scandals are rife, this is rich. BobJohnson (talk) 19:24, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
I think he'd hate Hallmark anyway. I recently saw one and it had a gay couple in it [not the main, obs] and nobody hated them for it and they appeared to be relatively normal people! KarmaPolice (talk) 00:34, 30 January 2025 (UTC)

Anyone know why the website was done yesterday?[edit]

The website had an error 503 yesterday. does anyone know why? Koafox (talk) 17:52, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

Might've been a DDoS, but I don't know. TheOneAndOnlyCirrusMan (talk) 18:10, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
I thought it could be a DDoS, but didn't those stop in 2023? Also, who would do this? Koafox (talk) 18:41, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
Far-Righters, probably. TheOneAndOnlyCirrusMan (talk) 22:33, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
I had it 503 erroring yesterday and today on both my devices. Lavalizard101 (talk) 19:01, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
I communicated with David Gerard about this while it was ongoing. He suggested that it was DDoS (503 error can be caused by this). After that and shortly before the full return of the website, I noticed some sluggishness with response time, which would be characteristic of DDoS attacks. The actions taken previously to prevent DDoS attacks are not absolute, they merely work by limiting the number of page or image loads per IP address in a given unit of time. It presumably could be overcome by sufficiently increasing the number of IP addresses corralled by the attacker. Bongolian (talk) 23:51, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
I think the RMF needs to have a chat regarding upping our defences. My gut says we're gonna need it. KarmaPolice (talk) 00:35, 30 January 2025 (UTC)

Political Language[edit]

Nobody calls Donald Trump 'The orange one' you absolute dorkasses. How fucking disconnected do you have to be from American politics, you absolute relics. This could be a big benefit for anybody on any side of the political discourse, but NOBODY has called Donald Trump the orange one since like, 2019, and if I'm the one telling you guys you're old, woof. Torrent (talk) 06:56, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

What is this in reference to? - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 08:25, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
Quite right. From now on I shall refer to him as 'His Excellency Trump the Greatest POTUS in history'. KarmaPolice (talk) 14:08, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
It was a British person saying "The Orange One," so they have a pretty good reason to be disconnected from US politics. Pizza SLICE.gifDuceMoosoliniYour friendly RW dictator moderator 14:14, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
Google tells me otherwise. :) That and "cheeto" are still reasonably common insults of Trump. Of course, it refers to Trump's penchant for bronzer, of such that at times it looks a wee bit too fake.
(A perhaps fairer criticism is that I do think makeup use among politicians, particularly positions such as the American presidency that have way too much Hollywood theater in them, is quite common. The best makeup jobs are the ones you don't notice though.) BobJohnson (talk) 14:19, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
Google says nothing about me as AL - and I was making a distinction from the Bowler Hatted Ones. Anna Livia (talk) 19:16, 30 January 2025 (UTC)
In a UK context, isn't Orange more suggestive of the Lib-Dems? KarmaPolice (talk) 20:23, 30 January 2025 (UTC)
or you've been tango'd. or the cast of towie. folk of a certain demographic in essex. i have heard many acquaintances compared to oompah loompahs. spray tans are very popular with essex chavs. context and the company you are in removes any confusion. as suggestive of the lib dems, i suspect only to the lib dems. AMassiveGay (talk) 23:11, 30 January 2025 (UTC)
How dare you insult the Dickinson! Anyway, back in '16 I did call Trump 'Tango Man' for a little bit; dropped it because it was too niche. KarmaPolice (talk) 01:01, 31 January 2025 (UTC)
Speaking of makeup on politicians, here's a quote from the National Press Club about how makeup on JFK quite possibly changed American history:

Makeup artist Lillian Brown ... is best known for her role in the 1960 presidential debate. Sen. John F. Kennedy, the Democratic nominee, relished the idea of becoming the first TV president and gladly accepted Brown's makeup assistance. But Vice President Richard Nixon, the Republican standard-bearer, refused makeup. The next day Kennedy was deemed the winner of the debate by people who watched on TV, which was becoming a more important medium. The difference, many believed, was that makeup gave Kennedy a more robust appearance.

Pizza SLICE.gifDuceMoosoliniYour friendly RW dictator moderator 14:27, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
'TV makeup' made a lot more sense when a) the cameras were black/white and b) they couldn't handle greyscale well. For example, I've seen pics of BBC performers in the 1930s [ie the first years of TV broadcast] and their makeup is almost comical in the way they're exaggerating the difference between hair/skin, or lips/cheeks etc. Old-school TV lighting was also pretty unflattering; looking at stills from said TV debate I would have advised Nixon for a) a bit of blush to soften his nasolabial folds, b) a bit of blush to soften the eyebags and c) a neutral lip-gloss to increase the contrast. The Orange One's orangeness [which has increased; do a compare/contrast between 2024 and 2016] and the truth is easy - darker skintones disguise excess weight better and it's plausible he's got some old facelift scarring to hide as well as the simple fact he's a pasty white guy in his 70s. The contrast is perhaps the worst; he wouldn't appear so fucking orange if he'd stuck with the 80s solid-brown hair [I think he is a natural light mouse which is 'hard' to work with] however my money is him abandoning it in the 90s because said contrast was showing up how much of said hair was illusionary/suggestive than actual. Similar for his suits; part of the 'outsized' nature is old-school 80s power dressing [like the spray-tans and the utter inability to admit a head losing it's follicles] but it's also what I call 'the fat person fallacy'; that 'baggy clothes' hides the excess weight but in reality, makes them look even heavier than they really are [part of the issue is huge shoulder-pads trying to balance out the gut and wide flappy-trousers to disguise doughy thighs]. And the shirts... man, ditch the crisp white for at least an ivory or cream because it throws even sharper contrast with the tan, widen your tie-knot and loosen your collar a touch to minimise your fatty turkey-neck. But back to the original point.
a) It is also better than the various other terms I could call him. b) Almost everyone either knows instantly how it's referring to or can work it out within moments, which means it's a good name. c) it's getting worse and d) if I read him right, a derogatory nickname would piss that geriatric vainglorious, mountebank podsnapper! KarmaPolice (talk) 15:12, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
I got a few hits on a Google looking for recent news for "Trump 'The Orange One'" - though all the ones I found were from international media rather then local American news sites. I'm not sure what - if anything - this might tell us about international views on Trump as opposed to local American ones.
Is he held in greater contempt by international media?Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 15:57, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
@Torrent You could just berate @Anna Livia instead of berating all of us. Spud (talk) 16:03, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
'As a Brit' Orange as a political term is associated with the bowler-hatted ones, so making a point and I am excused. :) Anna Livia (talk) 18:32, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
Well, most of those are loud, overweight, angry and red-faced... wait... KarmaPolice (talk) 18:36, 28 January 2025 (UTC)
I will be the first to calm down. Does anyone here think I support Trump? It's also a linguistic and rhetoric battle. We're down bad here in America, and your eyes should roll just as hard when criticism is outdated. Before you refer to one of the worst actors in business as the orange one, recognize that will kill your argument. It's bad rhetoric now, it's what everyone is used to hearing and has become ineffectual. I can admit I'm frustrated. Sorry for calling anyone a dorkass, I am a dorkass myself. Torrent (talk) 08:57, 29 January 2025 (UTC)
Often I would simply refer to them by surname, but Trump has made a career by making his surname into a brand and his first name became well-known via shit like the MAGA Reddits like 'TheDonald'. Therefore, I'm refusing to play along with this shite [I did similar with Boris Johnson; I always refused to call him 'Boris' or 'BoJo' because that was part of his branding]. I don't intend it to be an actual insult, more a 'vague description' - after all he is orange, fleshy, kinda sour. Lastly, I don't think any rhetoric is going to defeat them; I personally suspect quite a lot of Americans who voted for him also find Grand Cheeto comical/stupid/gross/whiny/rambly but for various policy reasons still went for him. KarmaPolice (talk) 22:51, 29 January 2025 (UTC)

Looking in from outside...[edit]

American Airlines crash: 'Numbskull' columnist booted off show over wild Donald Trump claim

The 'booter' in question was Iain Dale; a evening talk radio host who is a known long-term supporter of the Conservative Party [and occasional candidate]. For the record, he was one of the last 'mainstream' broadcasters who defended Boris Johnson for all the Bozo-related crappiness and has generally nice things to say about Toad.

Just remember someone asking vaguely of how the rest of the world is watching the Orange v2 clusterfuck unfold. KarmaPolice (talk) 23:29, 31 January 2025 (UTC)

Kurt Schlichter! I know that guy! He’s the hack author who wrote People’s Republic, this conservative fantasy dystopian novel where a rugged special forces guy (totally not a Schlichter self-insert) has to go on a mission to the Democratic states that have “collapsed under the weight of their politically correct tyranny”. I remember laughing about that a few years ago. Pizza SLICE.gifDuceMoosoliniYour friendly RW dictator moderator 00:04, 1 February 2025 (UTC)
"When you choose people because you're checking blocks, whether colour or sex or, for God's sake, severe psychological disability, you're going to get losers." -- given Trump's penchant for hiring sycophants and ass-kissers, those with the "right" "ideological purity", nepotism, and even complete nutjobs... oh what an ironic statement this is! BobJohnson (talk) 01:27, 1 February 2025 (UTC)
When I see folks like Schlichter slither into view I suddenly realise [again] why Toad loves America and MAGA so much; compared to them Farage is like the second fucking coming of Churchill or something. Couple with the 'English' accent I suspect they rate his brains even higher.
In other news, I was with company when we caught the Trump press conference on TV where he said he knew it was 'diversity' that caused the crash 'because I have common sense'. The person next to me [who is non-political to an almost extreme level] shook their head and said 'you fucking moron' to themselves. KarmaPolice (talk) 01:39, 1 February 2025 (UTC)

Scientists use genetic engineering to create mice with two male parents[edit]

Source

Honestly? I hope we can save many species with this technology. And I find the idea of gay couples having their own children amazing. What concerns me is the fact that it comes from China. I can easly see their government using it in an unethical way, especially now that their population is declining. What do you guys think? GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 13:49, 1 February 2025 (UTC)

This will be how LGBT shipping fanfics become real life. Pizza SLICE.gifDuceMoosoliniYour friendly RW dictator moderator 19:40, 1 February 2025 (UTC)
Presumably a female with a working uterus is still required for incubation, which might raise some dystopian possibilities if it ever is done with humans. Bongolian (talk) 03:51, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
Yeah, if you read the paper it mentions in utero development to bring the pups to term. I'm more concerned by the 12% survival to birth, with 50% of those born not surviving to adulthood - as well as the sterility and pervasive developmental disorders that read to me as analogous to severe down's syndrome. Still, it will be interesting to see how this approach develops over the next decade or so. Daev (talk) 04:00, 2 February 2025 (UTC)

Fundraiser[edit]

Did something happen or is this just a precaution for any future lawsuits? Also, I think there's a typo ("2025 RadionalWiki Fundraiser"). — LunaAHHHHH 19:01, 3 February 2025 (UTC)

a) It also seems larger than the last 'normal' one, b) I thought we raised loads for routine stuff [three years worth of server or something] after we had the great 'RW server crisis' in Dec '23? I think someone is going to need to say somewhere [perhaps the RMF page] of why we need that much cash and what it's going to be spent on. KarmaPolice (talk) 19:08, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
It’s for the Oregon Plan. Specifically, the Board intends to bring on legal counsel and whatever assistance is then also necessary to reincorporate the RationalWiki Foundation in the state of Oregon. Our Treasurer lives in Oregon, and Oregon has strong anti-SLAPP laws. This is our plan for nullifying the frivolous lawsuit threat, and it also has the benefit of allowing us to simply reincorporate under the RationalMedia Foundation name, thereby accomplishing an objective many years in the making. This won’t happen quickly, but moving to Oregon is our long-term plan. Pizza SLICE.gifDuceMoosoliniYour friendly RW dictator moderator 20:00, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
I think this page needs updating with that and perhaps re-doing the wording making it clear this isn't simply for a server bill but a one-off 'pump-priming' fundraiser. KarmaPolice (talk) 20:10, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
Alright, how's this? --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 01:31, 4 February 2025 (UTC)
So the cash is for wagon parts and ammo, eh? Oh, the typo that Lunah pointed out is still present. KarmaPolice (talk) 10:22, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

World’s first trillionaire?[edit]

Why does musk have access to sensitive information and federal budgets as a private citizen? Phantasmagoria (talk) 21:09, 2 February 2025 (UTC)

That's another area where the lawsuits are going to fly, methinks.
I don't think there's a clear answer yet to what Musk's goals are, but there's some speculation. One is his business -- the US government is pretty entangled with his SpaceX business, so I'm sure that he'd love to have "competitive advantage" material on other payments.
The second is more dangerous. We've all known for quite some time that the Republican Party is now fashioned in the name of oligarchy "hybrid regime" capitalism (with Hungary being probably the clearest model), half abandoning any democratic pretenses. We also know that Silicon Valley has entertained with some of the most bizarre authoritarian dreams I've heard of (neoreactionary movement). We also know that Musk (along with a lot of SV CEOs and VCs) have become incredibly radicalized, in a fascist direction, in the last few years. I have no idea why people still invest in the sort of companies that have gone Muskian, frankly... it's pretty clear that "woke" is an "enemy" that lives rent-free in their heads, and these CEOs are over-focusing on culture war shit to a fault. We also know that fucking up government just because taxes blah blah blah has been a Republican trust fund baby's goal for quite sometime. Project 2025 isn't the first think tank document in that direction.
Overall, if Musk succeeds at taking a wrecking ball at US government internals (note: this is far from guaranteed, what Musk et al are doing seems quite illegal, but it's a possibility one must consider), I feel that this will be a very serious dent to the United States. There is a lot of technical competence employed by the government, as well as a lot of research projects, that currently might be affected by Musk bullshit. One should keep an eye out on potential brain drain (although from what I can tell, a lot of US government employees are fighting back at the moment, and I'm sure there will be a lot of "legal churn"). The "wrecking ball" style reminds one of what Musk did at Twitter, and unless you are a fascist it's hard to say that this was a success story. Twitter's value has been severely reduced. It did take a while for a "brain drain" to happen at Twitter due to network effects, but it's clearly happening now that Musk has gone full Trump and Bluesky has emerged as a credible competitor. (Note that as an additional factor, for those watching Project 2025 style shit, some recent analysis also indicates that Dominionism style abortion policies are *also* causing a brain drain, from state to state for now.)
If Team Trump 2 re-makes the US into a Hungary-style (or even Russia style) oligarchy, it will likely be a very dumb one. BobJohnson (talk) 21:56, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
I think Musky wants to be the 'Grey Eminence' of the coming/present/growing MAGA-dictatorship, possibly with the ultimate goal of having the natural-born citizen clause repealed and him becoming God-King personally. I also suspect that like Sly Moorcock in the old novel Stark, he believes Earth is doomed and it's time to pillage the resources needed now to settle Luna/Mars, again with him as God-King. I also suspect that we are seeing elements of Trotsky's prediction about fascism playing out - that in a situation where economic inequalities have rendered democracies unstable the ruling class will prefer to jettison democracy rather than surrender any level of their money-bags or power.
As for 'why are people still investing?' I think a lot of the 'big faceless money' doesn't really give a fuck past P/E ratios and Twitter shall shuffle along until it's truly dead because the banks who lent for it's takeover have their balls in a vice and to pull the plug means said balls get ripped off. Therefore, I predict they'll continue to rollover the loans until Twitter can no longer afford the interest payments and then it'll collapse - then at that point, chances are Musky simply will buy it out of bankruptcy at a fraction of it's value with his own personal wealth. [But good news is; the banks will be very wary of doing business with Musky again any time soon. Well, at least not at the T/Cs he enjoyed before.
I'm not one to share stuff I find on Reddit [though I'm not on there much at all] but the 'Open letter to Elon Musk' was interesting. Even more interesting if actually true. KarmaPolice (talk) 23:07, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
It's interesting regardless of "the truth factor" because, per Snopes, the post is indeed from NeuroVigil CEO Philip Low. It's pretty easy to verify that Musk invested in NeuroVigil but was fired a few years back. It's also easy to verify from his Facebook and his LinkedIn that his anger actually extends to Mark Zuckerberg now. If nothing else, it shows that even in "Silicon Valley scene", not every CEO/VC guy is happy with the recent "techno-fascism" direction. It may not be 100% true due to the usual factors you see in personal dramas, but I bet it's far more true than what Musk wants you to believe he is.
(If true, btw, that saucy story about Musk's ex-wife in the Snopes article is... something else. Hunter S. Thompson would have had a field day with what Silicon Valley has become.) BobJohnson (talk) 00:35, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
Interesting, that Facebook post was available 3 days ago. The original posts on Facebook and LinkedIn are now unavailable. I created an Internet Archive copy at the time, but both the original posts and the Internet Archive copy are unavailable.[12] The archive.today copies are still there, which I guess is an advantage to being a faceless multi-country organization. Philip Low, a multibillionaire by his own account, basically dared Musk to sue him ("He will probably come after me, and I am completely fine with that. I am a self-made multibillionaire with an armada of lawyers — literally — and most importantly, I know who I am and who I stand for, the people and their freedoms, whatever happens. He can send his dumb Proud Boys and Oath Keepers after me and they will be butchered on sight. Either way, I would rather die with honor than live as a coward.") The posting is well-worth reading in its entirety. Bongolian (talk) 02:07, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
It would appear it has become time for us to start installing/making use of screengrabbing software to archive online shit has arrived. Has IA become that unreliable? KarmaPolice (talk) 03:04, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
I popped the links Snopes used for their archive.today copies into IA. They showed up "okay" when I checked. Facebook: [13] Linkedin: [14] The Linkedin copy is far more readable, you get popups and crap for the Facebook copy.
Regardless of censorship concerns, I have been finding that the Internet Archive is not handling "walled garden" social media very well these days. Archive.today and Ghostarchive are more reliable for these sort of sites. The problem here is these sites are sort of "grey area" Internet -- the owners are secretive and there is nothing behind them comparable to the institution that props up IA. Mind you, I don't blame the owners one bit for keeping a mask on for obvious reasons (archive.today in particular is a massive paywall bypasser). But it also means that the future of these sites could be questionable. (You could say similar for IA, though!). BobJohnson (talk) 03:37, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
Speaking of Musk’s intentions, I’ve suspected for some time that one of his more sensible (but still despicable) goals with the whole DOGE brouhaha is not only to take a chainsaw to federal organisations and try to interpose himself in their processes, but to scrape and attempt to monetise the vast amounts of data locked away in various federal IT systems.
I’m not sure how (or even if) this might work, but quite apart from getting a lot of personal details on federal employees and citizens, Musk might also be able to use DOGE to get important information on other companies, as well as procurement decisions and be able to capitalise on all of that, separately or in combination. ScepticWombat (talk) 05:43, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
As for Musk’s personal wealth mentioned by KarmaPolice, I think it’s worth recalling just how fragile its foundation actually is, as almost all of it is based mainly on a hugely inflated meme stock (Tesla) and in a smaller part on government contracts/subsidies (SpaceX, obviously, but to some extent also Tesla).
Tesla’s inflate stock price (and some goodwill value due to his public subsidies) is what he has then leveraged to fund all of his other activities and it’s a very shaky foundation for a fortune, as Tesla’s market position slips, while he has simultaneously dumped so much (borrowed) money into Twitter/X that he’s very unlikely to see any meaningful direct, monetary return on. However, his indirect ROI on Twitter/X has been his (direct) foray into the US politics and government and I think that was, economically, more a move of desperation, than him playing 3D chess.
Musk desperately needs a steady cash flow to keep his creditors happy and he now potentially has four years (or until he falls out with Trump) to try and finagle as much money, contracts and data out of the federal system as he can, thus shoring up his finances with several income streams from the public coffers. This could probably bolster his finances enough to insulate him from a crash in Tesla’s stock prices, which would otherwise risk hitting him hard as he would have to scramble to find equivalent collateral to replace the Tesla stock value underpinning his many loans. ScepticWombat (talk) 06:08, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
Yes, I'm able to see those two Internet Archive links. I think I made the wrong assumption because the link that I tried to archive and a question mark in the URL. Bongolian (talk) 07:30, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
That is true; in economic terms, the only bits of the Musk empire that 'pays' is Tesla and SpaceX - and the latter's is hardly coining it [RoR of about 4%] while the vast majority of the stated wealth is concentrated in shareholdings ['What is three million times by zero? And don't tell me it's zero!']. On Tesla, they seem to have finally hit scale [1.8m produced in '24] to achieve long-term viability as an independent company but signs are that their sales are starting to be hit - recent stats say American sales are down 1% while Euro sales down 40% [though the latter was already pretty small]. Slightly more worryingly [from a business POV] is that sales are only being held up by 0% finance deals, offers of free charging and most ominously discounting [they've never done these before]. However, the day Xitter finally hits the skids my theory is it will be such a rotten shell of it's former glory it's 'scrap price' could be within the double-digit million which is affordable personally to him. KarmaPolice (talk) 15:37, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
There's a few other "interesting Tesla wrinkles" out of the current story timeline.
A) The auto industry is more affected by "Trump tariffs" than other segments. By most analysis I'm seeing, this pain will include Musk's Tesla. Apparently investors agree at the moment -- Tesla's taken a fair bit more of a hit than the rest of the market today.
B) Canada and Mexico's governments are not counteracting with blanket export taxes. Instead, they are being selective... choosing things that maximize "red America" pain and minimize local pain. I expect a similar pattern if the EU or China is targeted heavily. Because Elon Musk is such a visible part of the Trump administration, this makes Tesla itself a "tempting target" for counter-action if it is convenient. (Edit: Ontario's Doug Ford, who I understand is a conservative blowhard himself, just reportedly did that today by cancelling a Starlink contract.) BobJohnson (talk) 16:00, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
I guess there's one more angle I see being bantered around a bit:
C) Are Musk's actions illegal? Is he putting himself at some serious legal risk? Much of this depends on details that we don't know about yet. If illegal, will he "get away with it" (like Trump has so many times)? Or will he become more of a "fall guy" like Rudy Giuliani? Hard to say. But Tesla's valuation is very dependent on the cult of personality of Musk. A Musk in credible legal jeopardy probably wouldn't help that. BobJohnson (talk) 18:36, 3 February 2025 (UTC)

────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────There was a lawsuit launched against DOGE's abuse in the Treasury department that was launched today. Musk and DOGE are not named as defendants, but rather the enabler organizations are named. In principle, that could change after the discovery process.[15][16]

Looks like we have the first (temporary) block against DOGE "comb through all the computers" activities just now. The judge earlier threatened a temporary restraining order (by plaintiff request) if this didn't happen. Another judge has also temporarily blocked the DOGE employee buyout. Not unexpected here, Musk's DOGE shit (and several Trump EOs) are blatant abuse of separation of powers, and thus a constitutional crisis. (Even Brian Riedl from the fucking Manhattan Institute, of all things, agrees with this take.) Much will depend on the judiciary to neuter the abuse. BobJohnson (talk) 18:50, 6 February 2025 (UTC)
It will also depend on Trump’s willingness to “play nice” and actually follow judicial verdicts, rather than just ignoring them. Remember that he has a hard on for Andrew Jackson and some of his allies have cited Jackson’s blatant disregard of even SCOTUS rulings with approval. And that’s without factoring in the SCOTUS majority basically claiming that the unitary executive BS is indeed how things should be run in a presidential monarchy constitutional republic, which would largely make all of Trump’s mangling of the federal bureaucracy a-okay. ScepticWombat (talk) 21:59, 6 February 2025 (UTC)
Certainly, all part of the constitutional crisis -- if Trump or Musk ignore the court, the crisis deepens. My impression is that Trump has been backing down a little when push has come to shove on the most egregious stuff, like having Marco Rubio come and play clean-up after Musk/DOGE/Trump tried to completely shut down USAID by executive bullying. I do think Musk is at greater risk here should any wrongdoing pop up because that whole "unitary executive" BS might not apply to him as much as a "special government employee". He's powerful and extremely rich and that (sadly, from an egalitarian perspective) will be a big shield. But Trump has used and destroyed other powerful rich people after he's gotten them to do the "dirty work".
As far as past presidents go, Trump's actually been babbling more about William McKinley more lately, perhaps due to McKinley's bigly tariffs. But perhaps it's also a "tell" in another sense. McKinley was the presidential candidate of the Gilded Age "robber barons". A lot of the side of Trump's base that are authoritarian are more of the Christian nationalist variety. Except for the shared Other bashing, if they were actually paying attention, I would normally predict that they will be disappointed with Trump 2.0. (However, they are probably too busy self-congratulating themselves for "owning libs" to notice.) BobJohnson (talk) 02:10, 7 February 2025 (UTC)
I think Rubio’s shenanigans are mainly about (pseudo) constitutionalist optics, rather than substance. Trump doesn’t formally have to shut down USAID to destroy it, just make it completely dysfunctional and make it haemorrhage staff and knowledge, which he has already achieved. Then he’ll let the Congress critters have the empty shell as a sop to not formally having exceeded his authority by officially shutting it down. Rinse and repeat with other departments and agencies he doesn’t like.
Trump is moving fast because I think that he knows that, in all likelihood, he will become a lame duck quite early. Thus, if he wants to wreak serious havoc (and he clearly does), he has to do it within the first 6-12 months while his electoral victory is still fresh and before the Congress critters are heavily engaged in midterm electioneering and thus need to deal personally with the fallout from Trump savaging the governmental apparatus and its ability to deliver crucial funds and services to their constituents. ScepticWombat (talk) 06:46, 7 February 2025 (UTC)
One thing that was pointed out somewhere is that while Musk might be putting himself at legal risk, the *real* big legal risk should "shit hit the fan" is to those young Musk sycophants doing Musk's bidding. They are "pawns" after all. One of them already "resigned" due to racism reported by the Wall Street Journal; but the other thing you can see with his archived posts (aside from the fact that he kisses Musk's ass a lot) is that he's one of those asshole programmers that thinks he's a 10X "rock star" ninja or something. Musk has his fans, but I struggle to think who actually *likes* arrogant douchebro programmers who think they know everything in the generic these days. A rather convenient "fall guy", in other words, should the time come. BobJohnson (talk) 15:02, 7 February 2025 (UTC)

DeekSeek or DadGpt?[edit]

If DeepSeek and ChatGPT were roommates, who would forget to do the dishes? KSH (talk) 16:01, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

????Pizza SLICE.gifDuceMoosoliniYour friendly RW dictator moderator 16:02, 4 February 2025 (UTC)
a funny question, you don’t like it? KSH (talk) 16:04, 4 February 2025 (UTC)
No. Carthage (talk) 16:16, 4 February 2025 (UTC)
They would both hallucinate and claim that the dishes were allready washed or that the dishes were really cutlery and thus didn't need washing. (This may reflect my lack of faith in LLM)Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 16:53, 4 February 2025 (UTC)
LLM)Bob haha, nvr trust LLM to do dishes. They’ll overthink or make up excuses else they’ll try to sell you a philosophical essay on the existential crisis of dirty plates. 😂 KSH (talk) 19:15, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

Are hobbies dying?[edit]

Once upon a time in a land far far away... there was a place where folks had these things called 'hobbies'. They collected stuff because they were genuinely curious about them, did things just for the funsies. They'd spend hours doing utterly 'unprofitable' activities or throwing effort into things which were clearly 'uneconomic'.

That doesn't seem to be the case anymore.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not some old fart looking back on Ye Good Old Days and thinking all those hours of 'Dad' woodworking and 'Mum' baking was 'hobbies'. That more than anything else was because they were tight bastards - woodworking was him attempting to lash-up old MFI flatpacks into new stuff to avoid disturbing the wallet-moths while the baking was a continuous experiment to see how low you could get the unit price of fairy cakes without resorting to chipboard scrapings as filler. But... they were in a world where a lot of folks seemed to be 'doing stuff' which wasn't work/chores/school/church. And before you ask, no I'm not like 95 years old or something.

Now... I just get the feeling that folks simply don't give a fuck anymore. That all hobbies are at best 'holding steady' or at worst spiralling quickly towards the death zone. Perhaps I'm being picky; I don't count 'passively watching output' or 'passively buying collectables [*coughs*]' as hobbies. And nor if you're doing it because there's no other real option - 'baking cakes' is a hobby if you're doing it despite knowing full well there's a tenner in the wallet and a cake-seller nearby. Lastly, it isn't a hobby if you don't enjoy it; so no, for most folks fitness/gym is not a hobby.

And I get that there's always been folks who have had fuck all hobbies. Those Dad/Mum combo I listed above had pretty much zero hobbies/interests, for example. I also get that quite a few hobbies simply aren't going to survive at current levels; tastes change [taxidermy?], require far too much spare cash [private flying?] free time [golf?] physical space [model railroading?], feel kinda pointless/obsolete [ham radio?] or a combo of all the above [hunting?]. I also get that a lot of folks get pressured to turn those hobbies into damn 'side-hustles' which is a quicker way to suck the joy out of it than if you'd stuck a dementor to your face. I recall a quip from Orwell about writing; that basically a lot of writers had got into it because 'they felt they had something genuinely to say' but had ended up becoming a classic jaded hack because it had become their bread/butter and well, we all need to eat.

I also think this decline is relatively recent. Old-school hobby/interest forums were still 'holding their own' somewhat into the mid 10s but then they fell off a cliff [similar is now seen in many subreddits]. Now, folks blame 'social media' for this but I'm not so sure - social media is very ephemeral in nature while forums aren't - which means the latter is fuck loads more use if you're actually looking to chat about particulars of your hobby [because if nothing else there's sufficient space for rambles like this and is accessible after the event]. Now, some of these folks might be getting their advice off YT videos and others might be 'isolated hobbyists' with nay a soul to chat to but my increasing suspicion is that a lot of those hobby sites died because people quit those hobbies.

Thoughts? Comments? KarmaPolice (talk) 03:02, 1 February 2025 (UTC)

Hobbies are still around it's just they went off the internet (if they ever went on); it seems like they're dead but they're just hidden. The internet dominates communication nowadays, but it is nowhere near as welcoming as it was a decade or two ago. If I want to post about my hobby on the internet, where do I post to? There are countless websites dedicated to it all of which try to take my data or sell me things, and the users on the websites are elitist gatekeepers and judges... or people I simply just do not know, not really. None of it feels particularly genuine. When I do my hobbies, I want to relax and easily chat up a person I know, trust, and who can join me in doing it... the internet doesn't readily allow for these things. Impiricism (talk) 06:44, 1 February 2025 (UTC)
That's a common argument. Everyone has encountered variants of the 'Comic Book Guy issue' aka gatekeeping old farts [or young farts in training] who in RL can be spotted in those weird hobby shops which seem to have almost nil real customers save perhaps a dozen or two other farts who treat it like their clubhouse and how bloody dare you intrude [and before it's said; you can and do have female farts too].
Developing this idea further; the 'who pays for this' hones into view sooner or later. You bitch about '[hobby] websites try to take my data or sell me things' but what do you expect? Running a forum isn't free [in time or money] but we've been groomed over ~30 years to think it should be. That back in say the 80s folks would be chipping in [inflation adjusted] £100-200 a year on their hobby club but good fucking luck getting folks to pay £10-20 a year for a hobby forum [and I don't mean a donation pot; I mean a proper subscription/freemium model]. A forum in some ways is harder to do than a physical club because the latter has relatively set times while a forum is 'always on'. Similar can be said about 'The Android's Dungeon'; that traditionally a lot of these had a 'clubhouse' feel about them because they were/are clubhouses to some extent - in that the operator isn't relying on it for a proper income stream and the bills are paid by a relatively small clutch of regulars buying fat-margin products. KarmaPolice (talk) 13:39, 1 February 2025 (UTC)
What kind of hobbies are you thinking about? Stuff like RC cars, planes, and blacksmithing are definitely dying. I also think that people are less interested in playing sports and instruments today. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 13:58, 1 February 2025 (UTC)
Isn't gaming a hobby? Or watching porn? Engaging in social media? Hobbies are changing certainly - but peoples still do stuff in their spare time.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 14:04, 1 February 2025 (UTC)
There's a difference between "hobbies dying" and "hobbies on the Internet dying". The later, yeah, I can definitely see that for some things, although my "old fart age" is a barrier here for having a complete perspective.
To name one example: the "Internet of music" was (to me) quite a bit livelier 20 years ago. A lot more tiny spaces dedicated to actual music and whatnot. Several subgenres of pop music are actually quite tied to Internet phenomenon of the time (Myspace and emo, Soundcloud and electronic music, or Datpiff and hip-hop, to name a few). Now that everything's in one centralized shitty place, you have much less of such. The main "old school" style music forums that "survive and thrive" today are (not coincidentally) the ones trying to shill you gear. A lot of the sites I mentioned above are either dead, or have been taken over by various entities and have been ruined by enshitification. Some replacements might happen on the side (I know of Artcore, for instance, that recently rose up to try and take advantage of the enshitification of Bandcamp). But my guess is between this and the well-bandied about "decline of the third space" phenomenon in "real life space", the hobby of music (which I'm sure will always be around) won't be quite the same culturally, and will likely be quite a bit more offline (or if not that, as far away from centralized Web 2.0 as possible). Not dead, but "it ain't the same".
There are a couple of hobbies though that I think are doing "just fine". (Er, sort of.) One is the "hobby" of traveling and tag-along hobbies (photography in particular). Here, the Internet has a legitimately known negative effect; the "Instagram phenomenon" drives hordes of tourists to certain "viral spaces" in order to take that viral Instagram selfie. As such, the most popular of the places are "loved to death" and thus have imposed quota restrictions and other rules to try and manage the crowds. Still, tourism has some positive effects for the destinations; the money tourists spend is good for economies, and subsequently provides some "protection from the asshats" for the environment and for various cultures / heritages.
Also my perception (surveys on this are scant) is that COVID-19 provided a significant boost to cooking and baking hobbies, and the boost to such hasn't declined yet. (What helps here too is that restaurants have become quite a bit more expensive of late, so there is more motivation to cook at home these days.)
I would indeed consider video games a hobby too. By most metrics it seems like gaming is growing. There does seem to be an "enshitification cycle" going on in some parts of the industry (like perhaps the so-called "AAA" games) though. BobJohnson (talk) 17:40, 1 February 2025 (UTC)
Yeah, plenty of hobbies going strong, from various kinds of cooking, over sports, outdoor activities, arts and crafts, to video games to board games, with a boom in board game cafés over the last decade or so being one visible sign.
Looking at the younger generation in my closest family (mid to late teens) all have at least one hobby, so do their early 50s parents and their mid 70s grandparents. And this doesn’t seem particularly unique, either, at least in my personal experience.
Btw, I’d also consider people who read up on history or another topic in a more systematic way to potentially be hobbyists (such as “hobby historians”) and those don’t seem to be much in decline either.
To the extent that there has been a decline in hobbies, I’d suggest that “the grindset” and precariousness is mainly the issue. It can be hard to devote the extra mental effort to a hobby, if you can barely make ends meet, or have been inculcated with the notion that you should not spend any time on such “frivolous”, “unproductive” activities, if you want to get ahead in the rat race, and that if you don’t get ahead, you’re likely to be plunged into a societal abyss of abject (and deserved) poverty. ScepticWombat (talk) 19:12, 1 February 2025 (UTC)

i dunno about 'in decline' but i would say the referring to ones leisure activities as hobbys is probably. maybe. people whio sunday league football are hobbyists but i bet none ever refer it as a hobby. learning an instrument for fun is a hobby but i bet a lot of will consciously never refer to it as a hobby. if you paint with oils, no real commercial talent, just for fun, you are a hobbyist, if you create 'art' with meaning and passion (you tell youreself) your are an artist and your probably mediocre unintentionally abstract pieces are is an expression of your soul, you are an artist and your workk is nothing so frivilous as a hobby. hobbys are wholesome activities for nerdy awkward children, or the activities of weird lonely obsessives whose stamp collection is a physical manifestation of the socially awkward and sexless, whose neighbours are either convinced they are a harmless weirdo or they have have bodies unxder thier floor boards. what ever cool sex having folk do for fun is never frivilous enough to be hobby or something it would be odd and weird to to take seriously. and if its an activity that involves joining a club its a hobby. i think maybe everything is marketed these days as a passion, or calling of some kind. if it marketed as a hobby, something you for fun, it somehow makes the pursuit of said activity as meaningless, or worthless, or waste of time and when looking for something to do in the downtown, folk to convince themselves of it worth because time is precious and heaven forbid one does anything as unproductive 'for fun'. AMassiveGay (talk) 19:56, 1 February 2025 (UTC)

Video gaming doesn't count? Doubtful. I also happen to know someone who is an avid cinephile, and while you gatekeep hobbies that are "passively watching things," I would call his passion a hobby. Carthage (talk) 20:11, 1 February 2025 (UTC)
i would say they are all hobbies. my point is there is an aversion to calling them hobbies AMassiveGay (talk) 20:16, 1 February 2025 (UTC)
Sorry, my response was to KP, not you. Carthage (talk) 20:20, 1 February 2025 (UTC)
Several things that can be "hobbies" do fall into the category where one can be an amateur, but still get a little bit of cash for what you do. That does muddy the waters. This certainly apply for things like music, photography, craft work (woodworking, sewing, metallurgy, the sort of thing that was sold on Etsy until that became enshitified too), and art. Sports and video games too. Maybe "social media-ing" counts too. Some actual business sectors actually started from hobbyist roots (see craft beer, which largely started from the homebrewing community). Most of it is usually "pocket change" until you hit a certain point, but it's not just farting around at home either.
I still think of this more as "hobby", but today people like to call this sort of thing "side hustles". Meh. BobJohnson (talk) 20:59, 1 February 2025 (UTC)
This a stubborn take. How does one commodify their hobby? Because just busking on the street doesn't pay out for much. Either business, which takes a lot of capital accepts and guides the quality takes over or you work really hard for nothing that wins your time, or not many other versions of your hobby pays. You can't just commodify everything, some efforts must be left up to enjoyment of downtime, which is being ruined by the idea that all downtime is wasted time. if you can't afford time off to work whatever you're hobbying, do you deserve to have the hobby? Torrent (talk) 08:12, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
In my book, while all hobbies are pastimes, not all pastimes are hobbies. My dividing-line is between a) 'passive' and 'active' participation and/or b) an actual 'output'. That a genuine hobby needs one of these. I will select 'football' as an example.
  1. Playing football? Obvious Hobby - active participation and an output [improved fitness, sweat etc]
  2. Watching football in person? Hobby - active participation as you went to the effort/cost to go and see it.
  3. Reading about football? Hobby - passive participation but an actual output [learning more about subject]
  4. Watching football on TV? Pastime. Passive participation and no output.
Therefore, no I don't count 'TV', 'films', 'computer games', 'social media' or 'reading' as hobbies - at least, not by itself. Now, if you were watching documentaries on TV, writing amateur reviews of films, making mods for computer games, creating content for social media or reading non-fiction then yes, I say you've crossed the threshold into 'hobby' - because you're doing more than simply consuming and then 'oh that was nice' and moving on like nothing had happened [much of the TV/books would be more subject-hobby based than medium]. Lastly, a reasonable amount of time has to be spent on it; I would argue minimum doing 'something' monthly. I'm not saying the above things are anyway bad [I enjoy all the above!] but I wouldn't call all them hours on my IronWoman Skyrim game, watching old series boxsets or checking out a clutch of social media folks 'hobbies' anymore I would describe 'current events', 'fitness' or 'personal finance' as such either. Might as well describe 'having diabetes' as a hobby. So strip out the above, are hobbies really growing?
I draw a similar line with collecting. That I don't class 'collecting Funkos' or whoever as such because all you do is buy it and then put it on a shelf. You didn't actually do anything to get it save paying [hell, you don't even have to leave the house]. Online shopping has [in my opinion] destroyed collecting; that it's removed the 'thrill of the hunt' and the [perhaps artificial] scarcity of stuff. It's why I've effectively closed my collections [save 'one last bit' purchases to make it good, like a replacement SNES power pack] and I'm not allowed to buy online any new entries to my curio cabinet. [Though 'collecting selfies' is to some extent a viable hobby because it takes active participation to get them].
I also agree that a lot of traditional hobbies were bound to shrink over time; due to changing tastes [taxidermy?], excessive costs [private flying?], requiring oodles of time [golf?], physical space [model railroading?], technologically obsolete [ham radio?] or a mixture of all the above [hunting?]. I mean my place isn't that small but even then I've had to make quite serious compromises of what is in/out and by how much. If you're in a rented room on minimum wage, yeah your hobby choices are going to be a lot more limited when you think it out.
I do think the entire grind/hustle culture is strongly to blame here. I sorta got a preview of this back with 'Mum'/'Dad' [think 'puritan work ethic'] in that while we weren't banned from having hobbies they were to some extent discouraged ['wasting time'] and woe fucking behold ye if you had something 'important' to do first. Only 'hobbies' which were kinda allowed [as in, the wallet-moths would be disturbed for] were a) classical musical instruments or b) organised sports - and I bet with hindsight that was only because for a 'it will look good on the CV' kind of thing. Yeah, one person's hobby is another's job [the historian spending their Saturdays making cakes while the professional cake-maker is teaching themselves about history] and from what I've seen often the hobby/work dichotomy is quite wide [indoor work/outdoor hobby, active work/sedentary hobby etc] which makes me suspect for some it's 'scratching the itch' on the other side of you.
Like BobJ says, I have spotted a fair amount of 'hobbies on the internet' dying in the last decade but I'm not seeing a corresponding rise in old-school physical meetups etc. I can speak with some confidence here; as in I recently moved to a new, smallish town [~20k] away from my old groove and I've been looking for shit to do in-flesh partly in the hopes of meeting future friends [having reached the age where they don't spring out of thin air]. But I'm finding that outside of a) organised sport, b) religion or c) support groups the only shit I can do is model railroading [nah], the local history society [which I might do out of desperation] or a running club [ditto]. Thus my suspicion; hobbies are dying online because they're dying in reality. KarmaPolice (talk) 21:52, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
Bloody world! Keeps changing! Out of curiously, I looked up "Victorian Hobbies". I found: cemetery picnics, fern collecting, anthropomorphic taxidermy, seaweed scrapbooking and seances among others.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 15:35, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
I gotta say Karma, I don't think I agree with you on the definition of hobby.
My copy of the OED has one of three non-obsolete meanings being "An activity done regularly in one's time for pleasure." And the online Cambridge dictionary lists it as "An activity that someone does for pleasure when they are not working."
So to me; reading fiction, watching a favoured TV or film series/genre, meditation, playing Skyrim, Civilisation or even bloody Smite are just as valid a hobby as restoring old vehicles, chip-carving toys or playing an instrument.
Daev (talk) 16:12, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
Hey, Victorian cemeteries are cool. That's partly because they were designed to be [with professional landscape designers etc] unlike the modern ones which all too often have all the charm of a car park. And there are some 'new' hobbies [urbex, parkour, selfie-collecting, geocashing, escape rooms] while some are variations or revivals of old ones [board games in coffee-shops and pubs, blogging] while others clearly deserve to die out [bear-baiting?].
In this case I don't give a damn what the OED says as a definition because it's so wide it's meaningless. I mean, by that definition 'napping in a hammock', 'having baths', 'watching EastEnders', 'drinking lambrini', 'cyberstalking on social media' and 'eating bags of crisps' are all hobbies. Therefore, every human being has dozens, perhaps over a hundred of them. However, I seriously doubt these are the sort of things life coaches etc are thinking of when they say 'you need to get a hobby or two'.
Thinkpiece: https://www.michigandaily.com/statement/the-rise-and-fall-of-genuine-hobbies/ KarmaPolice (talk) 17:51, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
I find it interesting that the definition of hobby used in the thinkpiece you linked is "What do I choose to actively do for fun, with no social, economic or otherwise measurable reward involved?"
This seems much closer to the dictionary definition than your earlier metric of requiring 'active participation' and/or 'actual output'
On that note, you do not get to introduce a topic using a common word/term (Hobby/Hobbyist) which has a standard, long-term, and consistent definition and then later introduce your own definition/metric in contradiction to that term. That would be moving the goalposts, and possibly a variant of no true scotsman.
With regards to the examples above, apart from eating chips/crisps I would class those as hobbies - so long as the people taking part in the action were gaining recreational enjoyment and doing them regularly. True, they mostly aren't great hobbies, if all you are doing is (say) taking baths regularly for relaxation rather than hygiene. But many people talk and connect, and engage with like minded people, using their hobbies. Sharing bath bomb recipes, talking about what is going on in their latest soaps (operas, that is), the results of the last game and internal politics of their league for example, the last good book they read (fiction or non-fiction). You seem to have cut away a large chunk of what many people would call a hobby and have claimed it to be not-a-hobby, purely because it is not a craft or a sport.
Daev (talk) 19:35, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
I 'cut it away' not because 'it's not a craft or sport', but because it's almost entirely passive. The thinkpiece didn't seem to consider 'TikTok' a hobby, though apparently you do. What's more, there is no single definition of the term 'hobby' so you can't say 'I am moving the goalposts' as they are not in a static position in the first place. Watering down the definition of 'hobby' to basically be 'anything I enjoy which isn't work or a vital function' is as pointless as watering down [say] 'fascism' to mean 'something I do not like'. The fact 'it can be a topic of conversation' doesn't make it a hobby, otherwise 'having diabetes' has become a hobby. The fact that something is 'relaxing' doesn't make it a hobby by default either, otherwise you've now excluded most sports from being hobbies. And just because some people do things frequently doesn't make it a hobby, otherwise 'eating crisps' is a hobby.
However, you do start to touch on what I would class as 'active participation'. 'Sharing bath bomb recipes', for example has an element of creativity about it [as if it's a recipe you're making it yourself] which I would say if they're trying out different recipes etc has straddled into 'hobby territory'. Similar to the sport one; if you're talking about the politics and strategies chances are you have started to actively study it, which is more than simply passively watching the match on TV. KarmaPolice (talk) 21:39, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
>I 'cut it away' not because 'it's not a craft or sport', but because it's almost entirely passive.
Consider an avid reader of genre fiction; should they happen to not be regularly discussing it in a book club or similar (maybe no one around them likes that genre) - would be almost entirely passive in your usage, would it not? Are you claiming that such a pastime, performed regularly, would not be a valid hobby?
>The thinkpiece didn't seem to consider 'TikTok' a hobby, though apparently you do.
I know bugger-all about TikTok. Never used it, so I'm only aware of such things when something goes viral and gets on the news for some dumb reason. But by my understanding, much of the use outside of "twerking for the views" or "showing off my body" is along the lines of trying to form memes, performing dance routines, original shortform music and the like?
Regardless of the quality of the content of such; I think that even a small amount of research, study, practice and rehearsal (even if just how to set up autotune, lay down an insipid dance track and capture the result on AV gear) towards such a goal would constitute a hobby if performed regularly for the enjoyment of the work/sharing the work.
>What's more, there is no single definition of the term 'hobby'
Every dictionary I have checked gives a primary meaning near identical to the two I quoted earlier, with the additional meanings of "a small horse or pony" and "a type of migratory Old World falcon." The definition does seem to lack the component that I consider to be engagement with the activity or with likeminded people and that you refer to as active participation. But there does indeed seem to be a single definition of the term.
>so you can't say 'I am moving the goalposts' as they are not in a static position in the first place.
See above - you started the thread talking about the decline of "hobbies". A common word in the English language with a longstanding definition, consistent across multiple sources.
Responses objected to your thesis by pointing out that the many, many forums of 20 years ago got mostly swallowed up by social media platforms before both consolidating from smaller groups merging and enshittification leading to people leaving the platforms - resulting in many of the more traditional hobbies having a less visible presence online(*) and also bringing up such hobbies as video games and cinephiles which are either still going strong or growing. Then you give an expanded metric of what you consider to be a hobby (must possess active participation and/or actual output) and make a distinction between reading about sport and watching a match (and presumably listing to the commentary?) - counting the first as a hobby but the second as not a hobby because learning about the subject from a text is an output, but any learning about the game through the commentators discussing strategy and plays (in realtime with examples no less) is not an output. and using that to discount those examples at "no actual product" or too passive.
For reference - "...an informal logical fallacy in which previously agreed-upon standards for deciding an argument are arbitrarily changed once they have been met"
(*) Even then, there are an absolute shitload of Foodie, DIY, woodworking, arts and crafts, etc, etc channels on youtube - hundreds of channels (before I got sick of scrolling) dedicated to Kite Flying of all things (okay, many with less than a few hundred subscribers but about one per page with 10k+).
>Watering down the definition of 'hobby' to basically be 'anything I enjoy which isn't work or a vital function' is as pointless as watering down [say] 'fascism' to mean 'something I do not like'.
'anything I enjoy which isn't work or a vital function' is more or less the definition of recreation. Add in "do it regularly" and you get the dictionary definition of hobby. I'm not broadening the term, your restricting it after the fact. And even though we use somewhat different terms, I more or less agree that the dictionary term could be improved by adding a a secondary definition including a requirement for engagement or result (be it physical, intellectual, social, or emotional) - I maintain that if the last person alive on earth spent their days reading through each primary school library he came across for no other reason but to pass the time in something other than boredom or survival-mode, he would still possess a hobby.
>The fact 'it can be a topic of conversation' doesn't make it a hobby, otherwise 'having diabetes' has become a hobby.
One does not recreationally "have diabetes", nor does a normal person have it for the pleasure of having it. Nor was what I described merely 'a topic of conversation' but the use of a shared enjoyment of a recreational activity to engage and connect with both the activity and likeminded people.
>The fact that something is 'relaxing' doesn't make it a hobby by default either, otherwise you've now excluded most sports from being hobbies.
I didn't claim relaxation as a necessary prerequisite for a something to be a hobby. I the example of regularly taking relaxing baths for enjoyment could be considered a hobby (with an implied "by the dictionary definition" from context); expanding that it would definitely be a hobby if you engaged with others on paraphernalia related to the core activity. Sporting activity gains its enjoyment from an entirely different source and I did not discount that source of enjoyment as valid in my argument.
>And just because some people do things frequently doesn't make it a hobby, otherwise 'eating crisps' is a hobby.
I make a distinction between "I eat crisps regularly because I get peckish and like eating crisps" and the hypothetical foodie-who-only-eats-crisps-when-they-eat-purely-for-pleasure that you seem to be describing. The latter I would class as a hobbyist, maybe even a connoisseur - even if one with an extremely narrow focus.


>Similar to the sport one; if you're talking about the politics and strategies chances are you have started to actively study it, which is more than simply passively watching the match on TV
I'm not sure how the sport-watching culture differs in other countries than mine (Australian, btw). But is there truly a significant portion of people who literally just watch the game itself, without at least somewhat passionately following a favoured team, also watching at least one sports analysis or news show, discussing and debating plays/win-loss records/championship hopes with friends, colleagues or just other blokes at the pub?
I wouldn't call those simply passively watching. Outside those poor sods in a nursing home or similar that just get parked on an armchair and pointed at whatever the nurses put on the box.
Daev (talk) 23:47, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
Consider an avid reader of genre fiction; should they happen to not be regularly discussing it in a book club or similar (maybe no one around them likes that genre) - would be almost entirely passive in your usage, would it not? Are you claiming that such a pastime, performed regularly, would not be a valid hobby?
-I would guess our reader would expend some effort to get hold of these books to read, may collect physical copies of these books [I know someone who does this with vintage fantasy] and if asked about it could be capable of holding a discussion about it. I am aware that my definition of 'hobby' does get stuck in a 'I know it when I see it' fallacy in the edge cases but there's a level of commitment the former has that the reader who only gets through one/two bestsellers a year on holidays doesn't have.
I know bugger-all about TikTok. Never used it, so I'm only aware of such things when something goes viral and gets on the news for some dumb reason. But by my understanding, much of the use outside of "twerking for the views" or "showing off my body" is along the lines of trying to form memes, performing dance routines, original shortform music and the like? Regardless of the quality of the content of such; I think that even a small amount of research, study, practice and rehearsal (even if just how to set up autotune, lay down an insipid dance track and capture the result on AV gear) towards such a goal would constitute a hobby if performed regularly for the enjoyment of the work/sharing the work.
-The author in the thinkpiece wasn't doing that. All they were doing was surfing it, finding 'funny vids' and then showing their friends. I also said above that if you were creating content for social media [or just online space in general, like reviews, blogs or RW articles] it was a hobby because well, you are actively creating something.
Every dictionary I have checked gives a primary meaning near identical to the two I quoted earlier, with the additional meanings of "a small horse or pony" and "a type of migratory Old World falcon." The definition does seem to lack the component that I consider to be engagement with the activity or with likeminded people and that you refer to as active participation. But there does indeed seem to be a single definition of the term.
-I think there's been a huge slippage between 'hobby', 'pastime' and 'interest' to the point some folks use them interchangeably; I think partly due to things like CVs and partly using all the above to basically define 'what's all the shit you do when you're not at work/school or doing chores?'. I mean, I have seen CVs where 'socialising' was listed as a hobby. Okay... so if I don't list this as a hobby now it means I'm some friendless orphan who hates people? Take food; almost everybody is 'interested' in food, even if it's at the level of 'what's for dinner?' I mean, if we don't draw a line we end up with this sort of situation...
KarmaPolice: So, what's your hobbies?
GutLord: Beer.
KP: So, do you do homebrew and stuff?
GL: Nope.
KP: Do you try different beers?
GL: Not really.
KP: Do you like reading about the history of beer, seeing breweries and all that?
GL: Nah.
KP: So how is beer your hobby?
GL: I usually buy some on the way back from work at the offie.
KP: So your hobby is getting the same beer each time, then drinking it.
GL: Yeah.
See above - you started the thread talking about the decline of "hobbies". A common word in the English language with a longstanding definition, consistent across multiple sources.
Responses objected to your thesis by pointing out that the many, many forums of 20 years ago got mostly swallowed up by social media platforms before both consolidating from smaller groups merging and enshittification leading to people leaving the platforms - resulting in many of the more traditional hobbies having a less visible presence online(*) and also bringing up such hobbies as video games and cinephiles which are either still going strong or growing. Then you give an expanded metric of what you consider to be a hobby (must possess active participation and/or actual output) and make a distinction between reading about sport and watching a match (and presumably listing to the commentary?) - counting the first as a hobby but the second as not a hobby because learning about the subject from a text is an output, but any learning about the game through the commentators discussing strategy and plays (in realtime with examples no less) is not an output. and using that to discount those examples at "no actual product" or too passive.
-I outlined at the start I wasn't considering social media/TV ['passively watching output'] etc as a hobby in itself. It's because I didn't want to have a discussion directly about social media. Want to be a pedant? Fine. Are hobbies which does not revolve around passively watching a screen or simply 'relaxing' dying? Are there going to be edge cases? Always. But if you don't even try to draw a line somewhere you end up with my 'GutLord' example above. Part of this question was in fact prompted by RW; as in I had noticed that the amount of active editors seems to be waay down from the 10s - I then began to dig and found similar in all niche/hobby zones online. Throw in my recent 'experiences in meatspace' and my habitual people-watching started to ring bells.
To elaborate my theory a bit further; looking back to the pandemic, I think some of the folks who fared worst were the ones who had zero hobbies. That is, my definition of hobby. Hypothesis; the folks with hobbies [or quickly developed them] had 'ways to fill their unexpected free time' which helped their mental well-being [something also said for interests/projects like fitness, DIY and gardening] while the ones who didn't quite often reached out for 'relaxation' crutches which have harmed them - like folks binge-scrolling social media and ending up conspiracy theorists [seen this happen personally]. This can be expanded; imagine how the political situation in America would be right now that if less seniors had retired to an armchair to mainline Fox News or OANN and instead had filled those hours with genuine hobbies?
'anything I enjoy which isn't work or a vital function' is more or less the definition of recreation. Add in "do it regularly" and you get the dictionary definition of hobby. I'm not broadening the term, your restricting it after the fact. And even though we use somewhat different terms, I more or less agree that the dictionary term could be improved by adding a a secondary definition including a requirement for engagement or result (be it physical, intellectual, social, or emotional) - I maintain that if the last person alive on earth spent their days reading through each primary school library he came across for no other reason but to pass the time in something other than boredom or survival-mode, he would still possess a hobby.
-I think part of the terminology slippage may be due to 'hobby' being used as an euphemism. That it might partly be down to our old Protestant work ethic; that the idea that we are simply 'relaxing' after a day's work is seen as somehow a 'waste of time'/'being lazy' and so we prefer to dress up said relaxations as actual 'productive' activities/hobbies. Classism might also be a factor; that the concept of 'hobbies' started out in the aristocracy [as conspicuous leisure] and moved into the middle class in the 19th Century; you had to be middle-class to have a hobby then, because working-class folks were too busy/tired/poor to have any. And that as a culturally middle-class lifestyle is now considered the norm we almost scramble to label anything 'a hobby' because it's become socially awkward to say we have zero hobbies [similar to saying you don't have a job].
KarmaPolice (talk) 10:59, 4 February 2025 (UTC)
I think that by defining hobbies in such a way that they match your initial assertion you may be slipping into no true hobby territory. [BobM]
Well, how would you define 'hobby', then? KarmaPolice (talk) 13:13, 4 February 2025 (UTC)
I enjoy learning as much as I can about stuff, but I don't always have the time or capital to get good, like REALLY expert at it. I am a decent backwoods camper, I can make a poor man's gourmet broth, I can join a song on a guitar or pound out a 4 on the floor drum beat. I can talk about movies, maybe a little better than you can. For example, I didn't love

the new Nosferatu, but I did look around after I saw it and found an Indian film called Bramayugam, which I at the very least enjoyed a lot more. But I only passively watched these films, and if somebody was to say new Nosferatu was great, I would be fine with it. What do you think must be the end result of a hobby? I like watching American football and hockey, and could explain a lot of the rules if you ask me. I played American football in middle school and physically didn't measure up. I played one game of sticks and skates hockey in college, and an eager friend hip checked me, I landed on my face, broke my glasses and got a concussion. I am not the type of sports fan to criticise the abilities of the players or the outcomes of the plays or games. But I have learned the rules of the games and enjoy watching the players play. I do not gamble, as think sports betting is foolish. Would I have to devote myself to analytics and make real predictions of the outcomes of games to call it a hobby? I'm honestly not trying to be pedantic here. What do you enjoy learning about and working on? Torrent (talk) 12:36, 9 February 2025 (UTC)

The tax of all time[edit]

Like seriously who benefits from these tariffs? Phantasmagoria (talk) 14:30, 2 February 2025 (UTC)

As everyone knows, I am against these new tariffs, but it would be reckless to assume that they exist only to benefit plutocrats. There are two "good" aspects of these tariffs. First, they help maintain jobs in the U.S., especially for people with fewer qualifications (although they may also prevent the creation of jobs). The second is that, since the American economy is huge, at least part of the tariffs will have to be paid by other countries, as they have little choice but to sell to the U.S. (monopsony power). This can help Trump to reduce the public deficit. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 14:48, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
In case you want to know more, check what I wrote at free trade#Arguments against free trade, on the "free trade and jobs" and "terms of trade argument" section. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 15:09, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
Quelle surprise, I somewhat disagree with GeeJay. Why? I got to experience a somewhat similar event first-hand - Brexit. And I can tell you how this is gonna shake-out.
It's 'ability to retain jobs in the US' is doubtful. Will some American plants/businesses 'get more orders' due to the 25% price-rise of external competitors? Sure. But there shall be a corresponding loss of orders from Canada and Mexico due to the reciprocal 25% tax. Guess what Canada's main import category is? Advanced manufactures such as precision milling machines, cars, aeroplanes, power plant parts etc. Aka some of the best 'value added' exports you can fucking get for jobs. If America's not careful, they might find Canada/Mexico gets on okay without American manufactures long-term due to rival substitution [British? Euro? Japanese? Chinese?] and they've re-orientated their exports away from America.
Some of the tariffs don't even make sense. For example, 'sweatshopped' textiles. What, you think the inhabitants of Lowell, Woonsocket etc are gonna turn out to work the machines to make $5 t-shirts again like their grandparents did? Or the population of California are gonna march out into them fields to pick them tomatoes at a rate which allows WalMart to sell them for $4 a kilo? Like fuck they will. In fact, the only way America could do this is if they 'onshored' the sweatshops with de facto slaves.
The tariffs are de facto higher than 25%. This is because there is gonna now be more 'invisible' costs - mainly bureaucracy. Importers/exporters are now gonna have to declare everything, keep even more meticulous records etc. USA.Inc is going to have to either spend more money to increase their customs services or accept longer delays in crossing borders. The last one poses a risk that trans-shipping via truck will become even more expensive because companies will factor in the price of an extra 'day' sitting dealing with 'customs shit' rather than an hour or two. This is particularly critical in the respect of perishables; here in the UK we have seen a partial 'Euro boycott' of stuff like fruit/veg because due to the delays at customs they can no longer realistically get the stuff to our shelves in a sellable condition anymore.
The companies which have 'have little choice but to sell to the U.S.' will simply pass those tariffs on to their consumers as 'an extra cost of doing business'. Guess what; a lot of 'American' manufactures have parts from those other two countries; for example Ford [if I remember right] gets engines and semi-assembled machines from Canada, engine parts from Mexico and plastic moulding and textiles from China. What, you think fucking Dearborn is going to swallow them tariffs and keep the price of a Mustang the same? If you believe they will, I'm a Nigerian prince who just needs help unlocking $3.2m from a particular account...
There will be debates on how and where the tariffs are charged. Using Ford again; will the Mexico plants have to pay the 25% on entry to the US and then after assembly be charged another 25% from the Canadian assembly plant? If done 'wrong', our 10%/25% could rapidly hit 40%+ in 'extra tax'. What if those Mexican parts were made with Chinese steel? POL [Petrol, oil, lubricants] is in a similar position; Canada exports crude to the USA for refining and then is then exported back to the Canadian market. These tariffs very well might spur the Canadians to expand their own refining capabilities [less demand for US refineries] and send those orders for refinery parts to Japan, Germany and the UK [lost orders for US manufactures].
Speaking of which, it's very possible the likes of Ford will use said tariffs to lower American profits [putting tariffs as an expense] and thus reduce the American tax paid while piling up the extra profits in the overseas arms, for later use or waiting for another Orange One's tax-reduced 'repatriation' scheme. So the public deficit very well might see less gains than anticipated.
It is true that American industry is less dependent on the visible export trade than other nations. But it's more dependent than you think; for example, imports of raw materials. But you know where Uncle Sam's balls are? Invisibles. IP licencing. Banking. Insurance. Foreign subsidiaries. Creatives [film, music, video games]. Well, fuck you. Welcome to the 50% 'Hollywood tax' on all American-made media and a 25% 'repatriation tax' on American-owned subsidiaries trying to send profits home. You know why this is critical? This account runs at ~25% surplus and that covers about a third of your 'visibles' deficit.
Lastly, beware of 'unintended consequences'. The fact that the Orange One has tied these tariffs in about 'drugs and gangs' sets a worrying precedent - because it leaves others to do similar in future. You know what I'm thinking? 'Green tariffs' from the EU on American products 'because they do not conform to the regs combating climate change'.
KarmaPolice (talk) 16:33, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
One of the biggest issues I see with these tariffs is that there literally is no reason for these tariffs. It's a giant pile of dumb. If it wasn't clear before (it was to me but whatever, not to a lot of voters for some reason), it's a sign that Trump has lost any shred of mental faculty and now is just an orange ball of incoherent, incompetent rage. The 2018 tariffs were by pretty much all accounts a disaster for certain American businesses (particularly those retaliated against; I remember Trump had to bail soybean farmers out in particular) and were a disaster for the "consumption class" of the economy (in effect acting as a defacto tax on them). Those who actually voted for Trump because of "the price of eggs" are going to get fucked. Long term, too, this signals that the United States is a more politically unstable nation than the stereotype currently has it; not that 2018 didn't prove this point already, but any supply chain discussion will factor this in even further. People voted for this shit.
I actually am kind of curious whether these tariffs, if they linger, will also affect Canadian politics. As aware folks know, the CPC has a huge lead in the current polls since Justin Trudeau is extremely hated. However... Pierre Poilievre of the CPC has sort of embraced a wee bit of Trumpism in his "politician persona", and Trudeau is no longer the face of the LPC. Who know what will happen, but it would be rather ironic if "Donald Trump in action" ends up killing (or even just neutering) what would have been a guaranteed Canadian conservative blowout if the election was held today. BobJohnson (talk) 17:19, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
I've always been something of a cynic and even I've been surprised by the whirlwind of stupidity that has been the second Trump administration. It's only been two weeks! Carthage (talk) 17:33, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
I obviously can't speak for all Canadians, but since the American election the anger and disgust I've developed for the United States I would not have fathomed just a year ago. Even being from the Prairies which have long been considered conservative strongholds, many people that I interact with in my community are expressing disdain and shock over the events. Danielle Smith is a traitor. Scott Moe might be one too. With Poilievre, I find it most concerning that Republican fascists seem to be eagerly endorsing him. Impiricism (talk) 21:42, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
I can see Poilievre using this to gain votes by arguing that 'only he can talk to Trump' and 'get a Good Deal™ for Canada'. Evidence: this is basically is the shite that the Toad is arguing right now here in the UK [to the point GB News was 'suggesting' Farage be made ambassador; I cringed a bit when Mandelson (the actual new ambassador) didn't tell him politely to go fuck himself - I'm seriously hoping in reality any of Farage's suggestions get filed under 'forget it' and aren't even read]. Anyhows, I could see this backfiring; that if he gets to be seen too much as 'Trump's crony' and it riles up Canadian self-respect [but then I'm filtering this through a British lens].
Anyway, I'm a little bit more sanguine. As a major US competitor in manufactures, biotech and aerospace we might be able to get more exports to Canada while if the finance gnomes get spooked enough they may smile more at UKGov gilts and London listings. KarmaPolice (talk) 17:44, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
It seems like the retaliation in Canada is far more aggressive than last time (which makes sense, because the tariffs are more slapdash stupid this time too). For instance, Ontario's liquor control board (along with British Columbia, but Ontario will have far bigger impact) immediately pulled a hard stop on all US liquor, clearing the inventory and de-listing all US products. That's pretty huge. I don't remember there being much of a "nationalism effect" the last time Trump tried to do a tariff war.
My guess is also that the tariffs are rather legally problematic (recall that in "normal process", it is Congress that sets up tariffs). From my understanding, Trump is trying to use the International Emergency Economic Powers Act as a way to impose tariffs without having to deal with Congress. But his reasoning is very flimsy from my perspective, and probably open to legal challenge. I wouldn't be surprised if some companies effected by these tariffs are talking with lawyers now... BobJohnson (talk) 19:01, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
I foresee the 'companies talking to lawyers right now' to be many. One thing people 'learned' during the whole Brexit fuckup was that *shock* many large companies treated the UK/Ireland as effectively one market [which makes perfect sense] which meant putting a bleeding trade wall in the middle really hurt. I would not be surprised one bit if a lot of American producers treated Canada almost as their 'home market' with the only functional difference being the metric system, Can$ pricings and perhaps the need for French in Quebec.
And if the booze boards are pulling stuff like Jack Daniels, it sounds like the perfect time for the Scotch Whiskey Association to get a case of samples and fly off to Toronto... KarmaPolice (talk) 20:58, 2 February 2025 (UTC)
Some of the above language is imprecise and hence plays into the hands of the idiot who ordered the tariffs. Tariffs are payed by the company importing the product (hence it's a tax passed onto the consumers), not by the exporter. The exporting country only "pays" in the sense of reduced sales, not increased costs. This was billed by the idiot on a tax on other countries, which it is not. Now that consumers are screwed by the election, he's telling them that there will be 'some' pain. Tariffs initially sound great to unthinking people, but they often engender retaliatory tariffs by the affected countries. The case in point is the retaliatory tariffs implemented by other countries following the US's tariffs brought on by the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act of 1930. These tariffs are widely seen as making the Great Depression substantially worse (except for one crank economist in particular, Great Depression#The Smoot-Hawley Tariff and government intervention). If you want to know where the smart money is on the issue, look no further than hedge fund managers who are betting that US stock prices will soon tank, at least in some industries.[17] Bongolian (talk) 01:49, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
I find it slightly interesting that the Orange One hasn't threatened tariffs against the likes of the UK, Japan or the EU yet. I think the UK one might have been staid by pointing out we run about 'evens' [we seem to visibly export more, but that's made up by an deficit in US invisibles] but the EU is the #2 and Japan #3 debtors [coming up us about 65% of the China bill between them]. The 'balance of trade' might be the main reason; all three the 'American trade' is between 20-10% or below our totals [which means in a pinch we all can say 'fuck you'] but Mexico and Canada is about 75% and thus, 'reaching a deal' [the sort Don Corleone would offer] is much more possible. KarmaPolice (talk) 03:25, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
He's claimed that the EU has treated the US "terribly" and suggested tariffs may come, but not announced any yet. In response the EU has announced that they'll respond firmly if the US launches the tariffs. It seems likely but not certain that those tariffs will come too. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 03:40, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
The 'EU trade deficit' all depends on how Euro subsidiaries of American concerns are evaluated; for example a quick search tells me Euro Ford made $340m profit last year and Euro Amazon made $287m. Part of the dirty deal with the USA when the EU was formed was that US-owned subsidiaries within the bloc would be counted as 'European' when it came to tariffs etc [this deal goes back to the 1930s when American subsidiaries within the British Empire counted as 'Empire Made' when we abandoned free trade]; however this very well could work the other way - I vaguely guestimate [figures are a bit hard to come by] that Mercedes-Benz USA might have netted $1bn profit last year. Anyhows, in most respects the EU is the main competitor with the USA in respects they sorta make the same kind of shit; okay the American exports have more weapons and biotech while the Euro exports have more luxury goods and precision machinery but to some extent a lot is kinda interchangeable. China is kind of the 'third child' of the game; in which we both outsourced a lot of the mid-level shit to [say, consumer electronics] and now they're trying to bite both our arses with high-end gear. Now the Kissinger within me tells me 'should I really pick a fight with Europe when China is the real rival' but the Orange One doesn't have anyone in his court who would be worthy of shining Kissinger's glasses. KarmaPolice (talk) 04:58, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
The assumption seems to be that affected countries/regions will themselves impose tariffs on the US. But is this really wise? The tariffs really represent a wide purchase tax on imported goods. Payable by American consumers. This will stoke general inflation - which also reduces spending power. And the Fed will then respond with higher interest rates. I'm reading that as a medium to long-term triple whammy.
Is the best response to say, "Ya. Boo. We can be stupid as well!"?
(I understand that these taxes might give some short-term help to inefficient American producers as far as local sales are concerned. But it certainly won't help them exporting stuff - because if they could export their stuff then they would be.)
OK, so politicians will be expected to do "something" - and counter-tariffs certainly are "something". But are they the right "something". And does "something" really need to be done?Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 15:25, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
Because if they didn't counter-tariff they'd basically be giving the Orange One what they want; aka 'encouraging domestic producers while still being able to export to us tariff-free'. I think the last country which allowed that situation to happen was the British Empire up to 1931. Since the Second World War, the general agreement has been that 'free trade' is a quid pro quo between two economic units [be it blocs or nations] - most nations have a 'global tariff system' in which you can then negotiate to have reduced/eliminated. No self-respecting statesperson would simply turn the other cheek on this. KarmaPolice (talk) 19:23, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
But the situation at the moment is that the US exports to (for example) the EU tariff-free (or whatever the current agreement is). So no counter tariffs would leave EU producers in exactly the same position as they are now internally and in the rest of the world. I agree that they would be worse off in terms of US pricing. But counter-tariffs wouldn't change that.
But, on the other hand, counter-tariffs would mean that EU consumers would be facing the same problems that Trump has given to US consumers in terms of inflation, interests rates and whatever.
It looks very much like political posturing to me.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 20:17, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
I very much doubt that it’s just political posturing and the effects of the counter tariffs will depend on how they’re implemented. Sure, if they’re applied across the board, European consumers might face increased prices on those products (incl. those made with US raw materials and semifinished goods etc.) that can’t easily be substituted.
However, I doubt that the EU would resort to such a blunt instrument. Instead, we have a very clear template in the guise of the EU’s reaction last time Trump sudden slapped a tariff on some EU goods during his first term, which is quite likely to be repeated. That means very targeted tariffs on the kinds products that will hurt the US more than the EU and in particular hurt the constituents of Trump and his supporters.
Last time around, the best example was that the EU specifically targeted bourbon, thus hitting Mitch McConnell’s own constituency without really hurting EU consumers. I fully expect a similar kind of “surgical strike tariffs” to be what the EU will resort to, because there’s likely already a list somewhere of the kinds of products that could give the EU the most leverage with the least amount of self harm. ScepticWombat (talk) 18:42, 4 February 2025 (UTC)

Furthering relations among other countries?[edit]

The previous Trump presidency, the EU made free trade agreements with both Canada and with several South American nations. Now EU countries are looking at striking further agreements with more countries, e.g. Sweden with India and Malaysia among others, and we'll see what happens in the next few years at the EU level.

At the military solidarity level, there's also a closing of ranks among other Western nations in the face of Trump's rhetoric concerning Greenland and other things. And there's debate about following the old example of France in NATO matters and growing a stronger EU authority and self-reliance in such matters.

Economically and otherwise, maybe Trump will bring the rest of the Western world more closely together -- including renewing debate about undoing Brexit -- in an age of otherwise ever-greater populist agitation and growing rifts? It may also change relations between much of the West and other parts of the world, making Western diplomacy less about the US and maybe new things growing as the "old West" cracks with the US leaving it. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 03:38, 3 February 2025 (UTC)

I once listened to [I believe] an ex-Canadian trade negotiator; his precis was basically 'we're happy to talk trade but you've got to always remember, Uncle Sam is the one fucking us' - aka when it comes to industry standards etc Ottawa would always take Washington's side and basically, you can like or lump it. Which tallies with an interview with [I think] Stephen Harper; that the Canadian public 'got' that when it came to economics, there was only so much the CanGovt could do in the face of American pressure.
As for 'undoing Brexit'; forget it. Starmer is too fucking scared of Toad and has installed 'Gammon Man' to be the focus group at Labour HQ and he's saying that Brexit is great, Brexit is beautiful and if you dare sully her good name by suggesting better relations with 'them Europe' he'll throw his pint glass at your face and run off and join Reform. I fucking wish he's say boo to this goose [not rejoin the bloc but at least get a decent working relationship with it] but I honestly don't think he will. KarmaPolice (talk) 03:53, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
Regardless of the unlikelihood of Brexit being undone, it does seem that members of the EU are holding an emergency meeting today, in what appears to be largely focused on informal "what about the US?" strategy discussions. And Keir Starmer will be there... a first for a UK leader since Brexit. And Latin America leaders planned to meet last Thursday for similar reasons (edit: it was called off apparently, but one can see things like this happening in the future). Who will be Trump's actual geopolitical allies be this time around, one wonders? It's only been two weeks, and Trump's only "skill" seems to be raging and pissing everyone off. As long as this continues, I do see some geopolitical "closing of ranks" and "anything but US" manuevering happening for... well, practically everyone else.
Even the Wall Street Journal warned a few days ago that the "dumbest trade war in history" seemed fueled by Trump's desire to remake the US as isolationist autarky, which per the WSJ "isn’t the world we live in, or one that we should want to live in, as Mr. Trump may soon find out." (It was nice to see in the bits and snippets of archived comments that so many were calling Rupert Murdoch's propaganda machine out. You *made* this monster, Mr. Murdoch. Enjoy your creation!) BobJohnson (talk) 13:07, 3 February 2025 (UTC)
Tariffs, sanctions, and embargoes are all war tactics. None are good for any citizen. Trump has some really old... Vlogs, where he misunderstands things, says throw a small country against the wall and war crime steal their assets, to the victor go the spoils. Then he started calling other countries shitholes. And now he is convinced Canada needs an overhaul. As if Canada is not doing pretty well as far as standard of living. America is going to be his weird ass proof of concept, guided by Elon Musk to just prove a broken version of meritocracy is the American ideal. Work for who to get ahead, A d work as hard as the people in power to gain what? These people find any reason to kick the ladder out from underneath them because they think that is how society works, but they have silver nets and golden parachutes to catch them and sycophantic capital to put them back on their bullshit Torrent (talk) 13:53, 9 February 2025 (UTC)

Now MEGA[edit]

Thought MAGA was bad? Welcome to MEGA: Make Europe Great Again - obviously inspired by Trump and Musk some of the most horrible examples of the European far right have got together in Madrid.

Don't know whether to laugh or cry. Probably cry.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 14:29, 8 February 2025 (UTC)

Surprised this didn't happen sooner. I hope Europeans know better than to vote for them.
Also, do these people have a single original idea? First Trump stole from Ronald Reagan, and now they're stealing from Trump. It's like a telephone game. ミ★ LunaAHHHHH 16:54, 8 February 2025 (UTC)
Sadly, the far right is growing in many many European countries. The only saving grace is that, in the past, each one saw themselves as the most important country which was menaced by immigrants from all the rest - and thus they had problems working together. But with the example of Trump that may change.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 20:12, 8 February 2025 (UTC)
Once the Trump tariff wars start for Europe, I hope these far-right leaders enjoy "having their face eaten by the leopard", as the online meme goes. BobJohnson (talk) 17:17, 8 February 2025 (UTC)
On the subject of the Trump tariffs - and according to the mad Spanish politician, Santiago Abascal, - the tariffs they need to fear are "Green Deal of the European Union" and the confiscatory taxes of Brussels and the left-wing governments."
Which gives a good idea of his grasp of reality.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 20:12, 8 February 2025 (UTC)
I think it's important to note that the vast majority [perhaps all] of the parties attending hate the EU; a plank of their retort against the Trumpian tariffs etc most likely will be to blame Brussels for 'bad negotiating' and/or [as Bob M alludes to] blame 'woke left wingers' for scuppering a Great Deal™ from being found. KarmaPolice (talk) 20:48, 8 February 2025 (UTC)
I also think it's worth noting that the tariffs the Orange One is levelling on Canada/Mexico is despite the re-negotiation he did with them last time around. To some extent this shows that any 'deal' signed with him is liable to be revised or scrapped almost on his whim. KarmaPolice (talk) 23:18, 8 February 2025 (UTC)
Apart from being anti-EU - and based on what I know of Vox in Spain - they are also anti-women's rights, anti-abortion, anti-gay marriage, global warming denialists, anti-voluntary euthanasia, anti-immigration. They are pro -strong central government, religion, and private gun ownership (though not to US levels on that one). OK - no real surprises given that they are called "far right" - but it's a flavor of what we might see growing.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 16:38, 9 February 2025 (UTC)
Another MEGA spin (sheesh…) on the Trump tariffs could be that the MEGA brain trust understands and/or are better at standing up to Trump than some sclerotic, faceless Eurocrats and that they thus represent a vigorous “New Europe” (TM) that will usher in a glorious future. This might allow them to paper over their notorious infighting tendencies for a little while, though even that is doubtful, once they actually have to do stuff in concert.
It’s no coincidence that the far right groups in the European Parliament have seen constant changes over many years both in number and composition and is also why there are currently three European Parliament groups to the right of the Christian conservative EPP, while there are also four European level political parties to the left of the EPP. In short, it usually doesn’t take long for internal squabbles, the inherent ideological contradictions and big egos to derail any systematic collaboration between these parties.
Still, this inability to cooperate systematically and effectively across borders doesn’t mean that these far right parties won’t enjoy electoral success, mind you. ScepticWombat (talk) 09:11, 10 February 2025 (UTC)
I think the only realistic element of the above argument is 'MEGA-emissaries are more capable of sucking Trump off and by that, might get a bit better a deal'. But the problem is; my read of the Orange One is that while he 'wants to be liked' and appears susceptible to love-bombing he is also very fickle. Therefore, it's very possible that any assurances the MEGAs get from him while they're rinsing their mouths out only last a few hours before he turns on OANN or Fox and starts ranting about 'going to crush Europe' and shit again like nothing had changed.
Expanding this, I actually think the only 'stable policy decisions' [apart from the ones where he's got skin in the game] are the ones where there is an 'emissary' of the cause who literally, gets to see/talk to the Orange One every day to re-press the policy into his mind. KarmaPolice (talk) 17:33, 11 February 2025 (UTC)

Public Transport vs Walking[edit]

Happy Sunday, everyone. Just an idle question on what people's viewpoint/rules of thumb are on walking vs taking a bus to a destination? I ask because while I'll generally walk unless it will take me more than 40 minutes, today I found myself gratefully waiting 10 minutes for a ride bus ride that I would normally walk in 5 or less. Just got me curious about what people's threshold for this was. Daev (talk) 05:49, 9 February 2025 (UTC)

yeah. That's why 15-minute cities are actually a good idea. You don't even need much in the way of public transportation. Totemtrained (talk) 11:20, 9 February 2025 (UTC)
this is a question of city design. Can you walk or ride your transit to your desination, and what does it cost to ride that transit? A 15 minite city is a city built on the idea of small centers that can be reached by driving yourself, not walking or taking public transport, but it Also requires having a vehicle and cuts local responsibility. A 15 Minute city is fine, but it's not a neighborhood or a borough, and if you're asking about riding the bus versus walking to get somewhere, I cannot help you.of you're asking about ubers or lyfts, gig taxi work, that is not public transportation. Torrent (talk) 12:06, 9 February 2025 (UTC)
I live in a town that has bus service to the nearby city (as well as internal town bus service). I walk to wherever I need to go in town and take the bus out of town. It takes me about seven minutes to walk to nearest bus stop, so I try to leave my home about ten minutes before the bus is scheduled to arrive at my stop. If a bus will not arrive at a stop for over 20-30 minutes, I might walk down the street to another stop and catch the bus there.--Cms13ca (talk) 14:43, 9 February 2025 (UTC)
I almost never take the bus; not that I hate them or something, but simply due to quirks of routes etc I can 'beat the bus' by walking [part of this is due to a few walking 'rat runs' which exist to allow more direct routes; I think we'd draw if I had to stick to the roads]. What's the point in taking a method which both costs more and takes longer? However, I am youngish/active/fit enough person which means a half-hour walk is okay. And more importantly, I have the kit; decent shoes, coat, rucksack etc. Walking a couple of miles can be 'fine' or 'a complete pain' if you switch my hiking trainers for shitty fashion ones, my waterproof coat with a Primark hoodie, make me lug my shopping home in a plastic bag cutting my fingers off than my nice rucksack and then tell me to go home in a cold/windy/wet February afternoon [I have noticed how many Brits these days don't seem to own such staples as a 'decent winter coat'].
Anyway, my personal issue isn't distance, but time. I can and have made two-hour round trips on foot... I did so yesterday, in fact. But my life is too busy to accommodate hours of wandering about. Plus, UK buses must be assumed to be unreliable as fuck unless it can be vouched otherwise. If I need to be at the train station at 9.25 and I know it takes 35 mins to walk, I know I must be 'out of the door' at 8.50. Sure, I could take the 9.10 bus with 5 mins margin [so leaving the house at 9.05] but if your 'connection failure rate' is above 10% I will [and have in the past] give up on you.
Torrent seems to be a bit confused of the concept of '15/20 minute city'; the idea is that a lot of 'everyday services' [think local grocer, post office, community hall, doctors etc] are in local hubs which you can walk to, not simply 'shorter driving distance'. The 'local hub' is meant to become the core of the neighbourhood, the 'sub/urban village'. The other allied part of this is to re-jig local plans etc which makes walking/cycling more attractive; from simply putting in actual fucking pavements to the provision of cut-through paths etc [case in point; if my council cut a gap in a 2m high fence by mine and laid down ~10m length of pathway on the corner of a field it would suddenly make the local nursery school 'walkable' for us and slash the traffic snarls around it]. KarmaPolice (talk) 17:43, 9 February 2025 (UTC)
I think we are talking about two different cities. https://youtu.be/qbI1NC7XbRg?feature=shared Ideal cities can't be built from the ground up anymore, city planning is a whole mess. I'm not against your idea, that's not what I'm saying.
If you really think it can work, go for it, my man. A tale of a hundred thousand cities, make it happen in yours. Torrent (talk) 08:51, 11 February 2025 (UTC)
As I currently lack the time and ability [YT is blocked] to watch what you're linking, could you either find a written variant or simply explain to me here the issue? KarmaPolice (talk) 16:17, 11 February 2025 (UTC)

Communist glossary[edit]

A reverted inartful edit in the Communist glossary got me thinking about how Engels' term 'Communist glossary#Social murder' actually has a similar concept in US civil law. The epidemiological estimate of Years of potential life lost is often used in US law to calculate compensation that negligent or criminal defendants should pay to the deceased's family as compensation for the death caused by the defendant.[18] Bongolian (talk) 18:13, 10 February 2025 (UTC)

Trump wants the US to literally take over Gaza.[edit]

And it didn't sound like it was his usual off-the cuff rambling - he seemed to be reading a prepared text.

He said “The US will take over the Gaza Strip, and we will do a job with it too. We’ll own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous unexploded bombs and other weapons on the site."

So he wants to carry out some ethnic cleansing and then take over. Turn it into a holiday resort or something making it the "Riviera of the Middle East".

There is so much wrong with this - morally, practically, legally - that it's difficult to know where to start.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 07:37, 5 February 2025 (UTC)

So, another war is upcoming? I don’t think Hamas will accept this; this is what they’ve been fighting for. Sigh. KSH (talk) 08:43, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
People in Trump's circle, like Jared Kushner, were babbling similar remarks about this topic a year ago. People voted for this shit. It's awful, but there shouldn't be surprise. BobJohnson (talk) 11:24, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
So he wants to economically destroy Canada so that they'll beg to become part of the US. He's prepared to invade Panama. He's prepared to invade Greenland, thus triggering a war with every member of NATO, an organization he'd presumably have withdrawn the US from first. Now he wants a colonial empire in the Middle East. He'll be talking about retaking Cuba, the Philippines and Okinawa next. I hated Trump during his first term, but he didn't scare me then. He does now. Spud (talk) 13:26, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
@Spud Worst comes to worst, I think you have a very good reason to be scared that the rest of us don't: if Trump does half of what he's saying he'll do, the rebels in Beijing Mainland China will have a very good excuse to invade Taiwan. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 13:40, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
For a lot of this, I'm waiting to see if: A) Trump actually follows through (see below), and B) if he does, will the American military bends over to Trump's fascist fantasies? That's a big key to watch. Hot air is hot air. (Though yes, American chaos will mean that other despots will have freer reign even if Trump is just babbling. That part was obvious from Trump's nominee list.)
I do also think, regardless, that he's doing a super job of pissing much of the world off. Methinks we are at minimum looking at a massive national self-own, with Trumpism pissing away much of America's remaining soft power that we previously had for no good reason. There may be some financial impact too -- it seems that there is a lot of "boycott US" talk floating around other countries' social media. Sometimes this is a nothingburger, but sometimes it isn't.
Wall Street is a moderating factor here. The stock market threatening to tank is probably a big part of why the Trump Canada and Mexico tariffs were quickly "paused" with pretty much zero concessions (not that the propaganda fed to MAGA framed it as anything but a bigly win, but it really was nothing). I doubt Wall Street would like most of Trump's military adventure fantasies either. BobJohnson (talk) 13:56, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
I feel like he's doing this in part to own the libs: most of them disagree with what Israel is doing on Gaza? Let's double it down! A considerable part of his electorate don't seem to care if they are worse off as long as people that disagree with them are also suffering. I also don't see the point of annexing Gaza other than using it as an outpost for more land grab in the Middle East (I doubt that Saudi Arabia will like it either, heck I can even see them becoming friends with Iran). I mean, even the Romans, the Mongols and the British Empire didn't invade and conquer places only for the sake of conquering. GeeJayKWhere all evil dwells Where every lie is true 14:01, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
It is not even sparkler level of rocket science (is there a better diplomacy related term?) to deduce that 'everybody' in the Middle East is more than happy to let the proverbial someone else willing to do so to handle the UXB-removal?
Not being a finance expert - now might be a good time to invest in 'reasonable stable places' in the middle of Africa and the middle of Asia. Anna Livia (talk) 14:07, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
Trump has made sure that he has surrounded himself with sycophants who presumably spend their time licking his behind and telling what he wants to hear. So might he actually have been telling the truth when he said, "Everybody I've spoken to loves the idea of the United States owning that piece of land, developing and creating thousands of jobs ...".
Can he really be so hip-deep in brownnosers that not one of them said, "You might just want to think again about that."?Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 14:20, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
I personally think we're hearing from 'Donny the Real-Estate Mogul'. That he thinks just like constructing a new tower/resort he can simply 'move on' the current inhabitants, throw the UXBs in a dumpster, dump a fuck-load of concrete, mulch and grass over the place and then throw up a load of buildings using illegal labour. That the only difference this time is the scale of the 'development' and the investors who will be fucked over this time is Uncle Sam itself. What's more, I do think we are seeing the leaves that Kushner and co planted ages ago [I don't think the Orange One is listening to them so much now] that 'there's no such thing as Palestinians' [meaning that Gazans are merely 'Egyptians' so why can't they 'go back to Egypt?'(sic)] and that it's Israel’s Manifest Destiny™ to have some more Lebensraum - I for example have heard Israeli colonialists arguing the former and then the 'Bad Stewards' argument - that Gaza when it was occupied was 'beautiful' but Gazans/Hamas [to as much as they see a difference] turned it into 'a shithole' [and therefore don't deserve to keep it]. I would dig out here an old Nazi propaganda film showing the feckless 'Slav' farms and then the glorious 'Aryan' colonies in 'the East' but I'm not sure I really have to.
I am aware of the fact they've been talking about it being 'temporary' [at least for some], but do you know what was also 'temporary'? The refugee camps set up after 1948 in Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt and Gaza. The Palestinians will believe [with good reason] that 'temporary' means 'permanent' and as such won't want to go. The nearby Arab states shall think along similar lines; it's why Egypt was cuntish by not allowing refugee flows since Oct '23. So their chances of accepting it is somewhere around zero too. The ultimate issue is that this is not a problem the USA can solve by itself because it is not judged to be an impartial mediator.
In this respect, I think Congress shall veto it. For something this large there's no way they'd be able sneak around Congress using current funding etc. I also fully expect the military brass to be fully against this on many grounds - for example logistics [the only bases I can think of that could be used are either a) Israeli or b) the British in Cyprus and I'm 97% sure we'll tell you to go fuck yourself quicker than you told us to fuck ourselves during Suez] and realising within moments they're going to be called on to basically be an occupation force to a people who I suspect will hate them like poison. In short; I can't see any department saying yay to this to the point I think this is just another performative dead-catting.
Anyway, despite all the above crap, my own mind has been thinking a little near the Orange One's on Gaza - as in 'what is the long term plan for it'? Because currently the best you can hope for from it is to be a 'Bantustan' in which it's main economic output is dirt-cheap labour for Israeli farms/factories. As an isolated exclave of what used to be the West Bank [though these days it's all but been Bantustan'd too] economic integration is impossible at this time. It's too small/dry for agriculture and has no natural resources [why the hell do you think they were allowed to keep it to this point?] and Egypt has zero desire to possess it. My thoughts are perhaps to turn it into a 'free city' along the lines of say, interwar Danzig where the UN does the security stuff etc, build it a massive seaport and turn the place into a tax-free export zone - in the hope that over time, Gazans can 'make a living' out of port facilities, export factories and perhaps shipping. But this is a pipe dream; Israel has made it clear they would never, ever allow any such a facility exist unless they controlled it all forever. KarmaPolice (talk) 14:56, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
It’s also worth remembering that, even if we take Trump at face value and believe that he has thought about the implications and problems it entails for more than two seconds, Trump’s style of business is to spew out oodles of pie in the sky ideas and slap his name on them to lure in investors. It doesn’t have to be realistic or even feasible, as long as enough schmucks are roped in and Trump can slink off with some of the money. He’s a con artist, so none of this actually has to work. ScepticWombat (talk) 16:50, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
I've heard it floated that the Orange One hankers after a Nobel Prize and as his upcoming autobiography [Trump: greatest American of all time] might not snag the Literature slot and his business brilliance is unable to be submitted under Economics the Peace one is the one to make a play for. KarmaPolice (talk) 17:09, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
>> My thoughts are perhaps to turn it into a 'free city' along the lines of say, interwar Danzig where the UN does the security stuff etc...
Kinda reminds me of reading the first third or so of Tom Clancy's "The Sum of All Fears*" (though they weren't characters in the book, it was set concurrent to Israel under Herzog and Rabin, I think) and thinking, "Jeez, I hope some staffer reads this and they at least talk about trying it."
* The book, not the movie(?s). Fuck the movie. Daev (talk) 17:13, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
I think he's planning on relocating all the Palestinians elsewhere. Ignoring the whole moral question of ethnic cleansing for now, practically speaking, nobody is willing to take in 2m Gazans. In part because many regions are too war-torn to handle more people, in part because the Palestinians have a, well, let's just call it a "reputation", and in part because they want the US and Israel locked in a forever-war so they don't want it solved... CorruptUser 17:49, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
I think there's the whole issue of 'ethnic cleansing complicity' too. Accepting refugees is one thing, accepting expellees is quite another, esp if the one doing the expelling is going to be the United States of America [if you're so fucking desperate to 'clear Gaza' for rebuilding, fucking resettle all of them in the USA].
Let's take this and put it how it is.
The United States of America is to invade a foreign country, expel all 2m inhabitants of it [who will conveniently vanish somewhere/anywhere] and then... rebuild it. Ooh, I wonder who will end up living there. Would it so happen to end up being Israelis?
I want to know how much the Orange One has been offered by Bibi for this 'service'. KarmaPolice (talk) 18:14, 5 February 2025 (UTC)

──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Did anyone else have "return to classic 19th century-style imperialism" on their 2025 bingo cards? I didn't. Carthage (talk) 19:01, 5 February 2025 (UTC)

What part of 'Canada should join the US', 'Panama Canal should be ours' and 'we want to buy Greenland' did you miss? Anyway, as I said I think that if this 'deal' went through the Orange One would try to flip Gaza by 'clearing it out' and then selling it on to Israel. KarmaPolice (talk) 19:29, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
None of it, obviously. It's just that if you told me only a few months ago that we would be going on a Manifest Destiny reunion tour I would've been fairly skeptical. I mean, Greenland doesn't surprise me. But the anti-Canadian jingoism definitely did. Carthage (talk) 20:07, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
Wowwwww Orangeball out here playing Civilization IRL and treating Gaza like it’s a prime beachfront property on Monopoly. “ ill take Gaza for $200 bibi, and throw in a timeshare in Greenland while I’m at it.””
But seriously, turning Gaza into the ‘Riviera of the Middle East’? What’s next, a Trump Tower with a view of the Mediterranean and a gift shop selling ‘I Survived the Gaza Makeover’ t-shirts?
Also, can we talk about how Jared Kushner’s probably drafting the architectural plans as we speak? ‘It’s gonna be yuge, folks. The best resorts. Nobody builds resorts like we do. Believe me.’
And let’s not forget the military brass trying to explain to Trump that occupying Gaza isn’t like flipping a condo. ‘Sir, we can’t just evict 2 million people and call it a day.’
Honestly, at this rate, I’m just waiting for Trump to announce he’s annexing the moon. “🌙 We’re gonna build a space wall, and Mars is gonna pay for it” smh 🤦 —KSH (talk) 20:09, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
Note that the Orange One said beside Bibi that he supports 'the Biblical right of Israel'. That is code within Israel for 'supporter of the Zionist-suprematist settler movement'. Anyhows...
'That, children was the first definite sign that Trump had dementia, thinking Gaza was just another piece of 'valuable real estate' in Atlantic City with a problematic sitting tenant. Perhaps if this decline had been taken seriously at the time, we wouldn't have had the near-war with the British later that year when during a state visit to Britain he demanded that King Charles 'sign over Canada' to him and when he refused, attempted to set his Secret Service on the monarch to 'teach him a lesson' like he was dealing with a holdout owner in New York in 1978...' KarmaPolice (talk) 20:16, 5 February 2025 (UTC)
I thought Trump "promised" to stop US involvement in long interminable overseas wars....... so wtf?? Aloysius the Gaul (talk) 05:43, 6 February 2025 (UTC)
But hey, if the Orange Ball can pull off world peace, maybe we should also ask it to explain why Trump thought “stopping overseas wars” meant trading one conflict for another. Maybe it’s all part of his master plan to turn the Middle East into a luxury golf resort. 🏌️‍♂️🌍 𝕶𝕾𝕳 🐅 13:32, 6 February 2025 (UTC)
Orange One now says 'no American boots as it will be clear'. I think he believes someone else will 'clear' it first. No. They can't. They won't. I know Bibi and co have pulled a massive amount of shit over the years but this is my own personal 'It Can't Happen There' block [with Bach's English Suite No. 2 in background]. I don't believe descendents of people who were subjected similar repeatedly in history to that would pull that fucking shit on others... KarmaPolice (talk) 19:39, 6 February 2025 (UTC)
And now he says Gaza “would be turned over to the United States by Israel at the conclusion of fighting”. Which is fractally absurd.Bob"Life is short and (insert adjective)" 20:59, 6 February 2025 (UTC)
Ah, so Orange bald🍊 plan is to have Gaza delivered to the US like a pizza🍕 extra cheese, no boots. And Bibi’s just gonna hand it over with a bow? Sure, because nothing says “diplomatic genius” like treating geopolitics like a real estate swap. What’s next, a two-for-one deal with Greenland? —𝕶𝕾𝕳 🐅 21:13, 6 February 2025 (UTC)
Bibi would definitely “clear out Gaza” — if he thought he could get away with it in practice. The reason it (probably) won’t happen is twofold.
First off, the Palestinians in Gaza will do everything they can to return, because they know that if they agree to “temporarily” take up residence in some sort of refugee camp, that’s very liable to become permanent (cf. Nakba and the camps in neighbouring countries that have existed since 1948).
The second reason is that if Israel is seen blatantly ethnically cleansing Gaza, this will probably mess up all of the “normalisation” agreements that it has managed to achieve with the important Arab states, Saudi Arabia and Egypt chief among them. This would magnify Israel’s regional difficulties and likely break up the anti Iranian coalition Israel has worked on for years, which would be to the detriment of its own national security goals. ScepticWombat (talk) 21:48, 6 February 2025 (UTC)
Third: I think some, perhaps significant numbers of IDF troops would refuse to do it. If nothing else, parts of the job would look very' like modern editions of 'SS clearing out ghettos' c1942. I also expect/hope that the 'less nuts' parts of Bibi's coalition would instantly pull the plug because pulling this kind of shit is the sort of thing which could very well turn world opinion against them forever. KarmaPolice (talk) 22:39, 6 February 2025 (UTC)
Israel was literally founded with an act of ethnic cleansing. They were certainly very happy to do it then. No amount of "moral reservations" stopped the IDF from conducting a 15-month campaign of genocide in Gaza, either. Carthage (talk) 23:08, 6 February 2025 (UTC)
Only if you think that act was teh attempt by Palestinians and other Arabs to defeat the UN Partition plan, leading to the 1947-48 "civil war" before independence - which started mainly with Jewish communities defending against Palestinian and various external "Arab legions" attacking them, the siege of Jerusalem and so-forth, before going on the offensive after about 4 or 5 months. This led the Arab states to believe they could destroy Israel, then the 1948 War with the stated purpose of destroying Israel. If that war had not been started then who knows what might have happened in the next 50 years. Which of course isn't to say that Israel hasn't become and enthusiastic apartheid ethnic cleanser since then - both sides have - there is no good in this struggle IMO - jsut marginally less evil or utterly evil! Aloysius the Gaul (talk) 02:33, 7 February 2025 (UTC)
There's a significant difference between 'driving people away' (people forget about 20% of Israeli population are Palestinians - ie the descendants of the ones who didn't flee in '48/'67) than literally, going through a whole territory looking to remove every single man, woman and child to put onto trucks to be shipped off to 'who knows where'. Making a little scan of Israeli media it seems that the idea is [alas] more popular than I think we'd hope but not as popular as to make it a serious contender. KarmaPolice (talk) 00:00, 7 February 2025 (UTC)

Also wants to take over Canada apparently[edit]

Per the recent Wigo World item. I guess we will be shooting American-fascists in the future as they try to invade. Or maybe making Canada into a puppet state will be the method... Poilievre still seems set on becoming next PM, and there was the other Wigo item where at the end of the article it chillingly mentioned "Trump’s CIA will have a greater focus on the western hemisphere". Impiricism (talk) 18:36, 7 February 2025 (UTC)

Referring to the CIA thing, pissing off the security forces like this seems like a really stupid move if the end-goal is to create a lasting dictatorship. Carthage (talk) 19:08, 7 February 2025 (UTC)
A full-scale invasion and annexation seems unlikely to me - not because I doubt Trump would invade an ally of the U.S. but because it would be so bad for optics that no government official who isn't a complete flunky and/or moron (that is to say, those who are actually good at their jobs) would work with him on that. More likely, he'll get the CIA or some of his billionaire oligarch pals to pull the strings in the background to get Canadian politicians sympathetic to his agenda into positions of power. Gabaghoul 🥩 19:26, 7 February 2025 (UTC)
Here's another reason for "no full scale invasion": Canada (like Greenland) is a member of NATO, so invading Canada immediately triggers "Article 5". I cannot think of any NATO member that would stay on the US's side if Trump chose to do an unprovoked invasion. BobJohnson (talk) 20:03, 7 February 2025 (UTC)
It's like War Plan Red Redux. Because any American attack on Canada would trigger the British having to declare war on the United States too. And trying to 'impose' any MAGA-Canadian puppets unless done very deftly is most likely to cause a huge backlash to the point the result might be even more intransigent. There is no evidence [yet] that Poilievre would be happy to drop Canadian undies to let the Orange One fuck them either [simple patriotism overriding 'ideological agreement'; similar to the Euro right-wingers who turned on Putin due to the Ukraine War]. KarmaPolice (talk) 20:14, 7 February 2025 (UTC)
Actually, I don't see Trump trying "boots on da ground" in Canada unless it was somehow already a fait accompli. He wouldn't want to be facing a resistance, but a welcoming nation that was for the most part eager to become the 51st state.
He's not looking at Germany invading Poland, but Germany annexing Austria-- at least in his mind. Kencolt (talk) 20:53, 7 February 2025 (UTC)
You know who else thought they were performing an effective Anschluss? Putin in 2022. Why did he think that? Because like all 'bad bosses' the Czar had run out of 'honest advisors' who had the capacity to tell him he was wrong.
Who are the Orange v2 'honest advisors'? Because I don't really see any. Project 2025 is quite literally a plan to remove anyone, anywhere have the power to oppose policies etc which are stupid, corrupt or plain old insane and replace them with MAGA-hats or at least spineless careerists who'll simply accommodate anything. KarmaPolice (talk) 22:41, 7 February 2025 (UTC)
He's not going to invade Canada or Denmark. He's doing what he always does: mouthing off until the target country gets tired enough of him to offer something and then taking that offer and declaring victory. We're just still at the mouthing off stage. Nothing will happen. Pizza SLICE.gifDuceMoosoliniYour friendly RW dictator moderator 22:48, 7 February 2025 (UTC)
I think that is a profoundly dangerous viewpoint. Experience has told us to date that Trump has a 'give it a try, see what sticks' philosophy towards everything. If he doesn't have enough pushback towards his imperialistic dreams, he very well might end up in a position where yes, US forces are in a firefight in Greenland or an USAF aircraft is shot down over Halifax.
Anyway, Trump believes that he has 'all but won' on the domestic front; that apart from some lawyers and 'woke moaners' Project 2025 is in the bag - there is a segment of right-wing opinion who thinks control of SCOTUS and the Presidency means everyone 'must snap into line' and follow the march into the Randmaid's Tale and would be an act of 'utter perfidy' if they dared to say, disagree with the 'eternal truth' of the Constitution as laid out by Clarence Thomas or the gloriousness of the President and obey without question ['Accumulator' being a good example of this]. Now, do you know in history what usually happens after strongmen have 'secured the home front'? They go on the external offensive. If not prudent and/or lucky, this could end up becoming a shooting war. KarmaPolice (talk) 00:05, 8 February 2025 (UTC)
Can I add Moresnet, the Spratly Isles, and Bir Tawil to the alternatives to Danzig? And are there alternatives to Bramble Bank which could be used as places where negotiations could take place?
And if Trump invades Canada how soon would 'Central and South America start sending 'large groups of persons' crossing the border (whether or not with cheques and postal orders) - 'we're doing the same as the US, after all', and some Panamaxes wedge into position to provide crossing points? Anna Livia (talk) 00:06, 8 February 2025 (UTC)
There are a few factors working against a "Trump invasion" though. The first is that Trump's mandate is rather weak; if I recall, he has the second lowest approval ratings of an incoming president in modern polling times (with only Trump 2016 being lower). I would actually think that he would need a hell of a lot more political capital to call up troops. The second is that Trump's style is driven by chaos and ass-kissing; he has appointed inexperienced sycophants as military heads. This bodes ill for actually planning a full fledged invasion, suggesting that if it happens, it will be done in a very incompetent manner. The third is that the American military brass actually would need to obey; from all accounts I'm seeing, Westpoint types hate Trump and might resist any seriously outrageous orders. And yes... the fourth is that Trump is far more full of hot air than action.
I don't think this is a complacency argument; personally, I'd *encourage* citizens and governments of the Trump jaw jaw targets to hit back at the United States as much as they can. Particularly via the wallet, since one of the things that might stop Trump's tariff war dreams is if Wall Street goes negative. Sometimes the best way to deal with bullies is to give them a solid "punch back", to let them know that they will be hurt too if they continue to bully. Most bullies are honestly wimps and often back down when they experience personal pain (something we've seen with quite a bit of with Trump 2 already).
There's a lot of Trump that is quite different than most political leaders of the "fascist / semi-fascist / whatever" strain I can think of -- the sheer narcissism, the simple-minded bullheadedness, the constant hot air, the need for complete kiss-ups, etc. I actually had trouble thinking of a good example with similar characteristics. Via the Google, I came across some people suggesting the Roman emperor Commodus. Which was... interesting. It's not a perfect fit, but it seems like (first glance) better parallels compared to a lot of other leader comparisons that are floating around. And if history "rhymes" in a similar manner, well... BobJohnson (talk) 02:28, 8 February 2025 (UTC)
I had the Orange One pegged as a kind of late-stage Henry VIII myself. Anyways... I think the key issue is regarding the following three questions; that we cannot really make remotely reliable guestimates without them.
1/ How much of his own lies does he believe?
2/ How aware he is of sycophancy? and
3/ How severe has his mental decline been?
This is important because, for example a 'little/very/little' rating bodes relatively well; for it suggests much of this is, as Duce lays out it's nothing more than a 'crazy like a fox' act to get something he's not supposed to get normally and is aware of stuff like the risk of Wall St pulling the plug, military insubordination and his relative unpopularity. The dangers are if he is getting high on his own supply, is unaware he's surrounded by toadies and/or his mental faculties are on the slide. KarmaPolice (talk) 14:31, 8 February 2025 (UTC)

(Reset) Is a reference to 'Orange Agent' appropriate given his intentions with regards to Palestine, and/or the Bowler Hatted Ones? Anna Livia (talk) 19:37, 8 February 2025 (UTC).

Look, I get it, I'm dumb for saying calling him the orange one is trivial and useless. Maybe it works for you. My concern is nobody calling him anything less than what he is clawing at; the power to use executive order without the need for judicial or oversight, is going to get anything done. Xi Jingping looks like Winnie the Pooh, saying it made him mad I guess, but what has it helped? If you give sycophants an easy reason to discount criticism, they will take it and use it against legitimate criticism. Torrent (talk) 10:12, 11 February 2025 (UTC)
Well, what the hell are we supposed to call him, then? And for a bonus question; you really think 'name calling' will bring him down or something? KarmaPolice (talk) 15:51, 13 February 2025 (UTC)