I live really close to Minneapolis. My wife and I have friends who live there. It could have been anyone. It’ll probably happen more. I’m so shaken over this and it’s all I’ve been thinking about since it happened. Minnesota was supposed to be one of the “safe” states.

I don’t have anything meaningful to say about the article other than everything is so messed up.

I don’t have an opinion about Hasan one way or another. Influencer culture (and broadly celebrity culture), and the phenomenon of people using influencers and social media in lieu of news, is disturbing and influencers only have power because we give it to them.

I wish fewer people would opt to empower celebrities via attention and worship, followed by disappointment and scorn when their actions come into conflict with their brand image. They’re just people, and we never knew them, not really.

So true. Infrastructure issues aside, car insurance companies are horrible and need to be taken down a peg. I hate being legally required to buy insurance on a beater car I’ve already paid off because American health insurance is terrible and has shifted responsibility in collision-related healthcare to car owners.

I have the DT 770 Pro X and love them. Not only extremely durable, but super comfy after hours of wearing them. The company sells some replacement parts, and they work with a third-party company in America to do more complicated repairs.

That being said, the 770 and 990 aren’t very portable at all, so that’s something to consider. I use a pair of Shure IEMs when I’m away from home. The OEM hard carrying case for the 770 does have a caribiner clip, so you could get around space constraints by clipping it to a backpack or travel bag.

This problem won’t stop until law enforcement starts treating deepfakes of minors as possession of child pornography with all the legal ramifications that come with it. Young boys need to understand that their actions have consequences.

In the meantime, no one under 18 should be on social media. I wish AI, deepfakes or in general, could just be illegal, but laws aren’t catching up and people are being victimized.

Such a beautiful tradition. Stonehenge is captivating.

Happy Yule! How are we celebrating this year?

Isn’t this already covered with extensions, though?

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In America, even if you live in a city with good public transit, there’s frequently no way to get from one city to another. Greyhound routes are extremely limited, Amtrak seems to just loop around major metropolitan cities extremely slowly, and the price of a rental car has gotten out of control after COVID.

So even if you live in a city with strong infrastructure, you still have to buy a car unless you’re willing to be stuck in that city 99.9% of the time.

Sometime in my lifetime, I’d like to see America catch up with the rest of the world.

Individual Christians are okay, but I don’t approve of their immoral lifestyles.

Maybe one of the senators in California who are actually doing the work should run for president, then.

You don’t need to “purge” 37% of the population under anarchy. If one trade union or labor syndicate goes fash, the others will just stop providing resources to them until they either realize being fascist isn’t sustainable or become powerless after being cut off. There’s a much more ethical way of dealing with authoritarians already accounted for in the theory, no violence required.

Counterpoint

Folks on r/goodyearwelt and r/nps_solovair have been saying for the past couple years that Solovair’s quality has gone downhill. It could just be a vocal minority who have had bad experiences, but that might be the explanation. Because that’s a really short amount of time for the soles to wear out on a pair of Solovairs.

I observe Yule, but overall I have good associations with Christmas since most of the people I’m close to celebrate it. I know it justifiably gets a bad rap as a consumer and religious holiday; the “war on Christmas” stuff in America is just exhausting. For me it’s just a way to spend time with the people I love and enjoy delicious baked goods. I enjoy the sentimentality of the gift-exchange aspect of the holiday when it’s not overdone, there’s a few Christmas songs that are really catchy, and I read Gift of the Magi every year because it’s adorable.

But that’s about as far as I take it. I was never brought up believing in Santa Claus, and I hated the long sermons I was dragged to as a kid. I think if no one in my life observed Christmas, it would just be another day for me, honestly.

Thanks ☺️

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Maybe I’ve just had bad experiences. After my Blackberry finally gave out, my next phone didn’t have a headphone jack, and I couldn’t find an adapter that was reliable.

If it helps, I think the people telling you to “Go on TikTok or Google it” are giving you bad advice anyway. I tried that for years and never got anywhere. Social media can be a really toxic place where there’s always someone prettier to make us feel insecure. I’d go on Pinterest and find really cute outfits the influencers were wearing, spend hours upon hours trying to track down their outfits at clothes stores, and inevitably get sad when I couldn’t find anything that was close enough to the reference, or even that actually fit. It didn’t help that I’m tall. And then when I could finally recreate an outfit, it would be Shien fast-fashion garbage that fit poorly, felt bad on my skin, and just didn’t look the same on me as it did for the Pinterest models. I wasted so much time and money on clothes back then, and social media had me chasing a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow only to find cornflakes. I think this is something all women, cis or trans, have to deal with to some extent in the modern era.

I’ve learned the hard way not to rely on other people to create my aesthetic. I’ve figured out which brands fit my body well and are high-quality, and I’ve built a wardrobe I’m proud of around those constraints. Sure, that means I’m not the perfect image of a goth girl or #darkacademia or whatever subculture is trending on Instagram these days, but goth is just whatever black clothes you have, makeup, and the right state of mind. I don’t have to be perfect or compete with actual models to be pretty or feel comfortable in my outfits and skin.