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Joined 7 months ago
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Cake day: May 1st, 2024

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  • They didn’t lead to the apathy - they pointed out the existing apathy would cost Dems the election.

    You’re exactly right about people being excited for Trump and lukewarm on Harris, but that’s entirely on the Democrats for picking the platform and strategy that lost to Trump in 2016.

    Harris had a notable and surprising lead when they announced Biden was out - then they changed nothing else. People didn’t just not like the candidate, they didn’t like the policies. They only changed the candidate and thought Trump was a big enough cudgel to bully people into voting even though that demonstrably doesn’t work.



  • You’re definitely on the right track.

    The only actual job of the police is to file crime reports.

    They do not prevent crime. Protect innocents. Make people show up for court etc. They have no obligation to stop a crime in progress or protect someone being hurt, even if they’re standing right there and could stop it.

    Anything in the justice system that you value is either done by someone else, or actually isn’t done at all.



  • The concept of the tragedy of the commons existed centuries before Hardin. He just uses that concept to justify an unsound conclusion and the concept would exist whether he wrote his paper or not.

    Every time someone references it, they’re referencing that concept that really does affect communal resources, and probably have no idea what argument Hardin ever made based on it.

    The beginning of the paper lays out the idea very well and I use it to teach people to treat shared resources respectfully, but tell them not to bother reading the conclusion.


  • Something like “I don’t like to chat at work”.

    The other suggestions seem far too inviting for follow-up or could be perceived as sidelong attacks.

    That phrasing is hard to follow-up on, though not impossible, and focuses only on you. I suspect you also don’t chat with others, so they probably can’t say something like “But you chat with Johnny?”

    Talking about what they’re doing that annoys you opens a conversation about them feeling attacked or maybe trying to find alternate ways to talk to you etc. You don’t need to explain why you don’t want to chat because that will open other conversations. They probably will try to follow up or redirect, but calmly insisting that you prefer not to chat may work.

    HR is generally a bad place for employees to take issues since their stated job is to protect the company from liability their employees might incur. If you have a union or some other third party resource go to them first, then go to HR if they advise it. Since HR is interested in protecting the company from liability created by employees you may be able to aim them at the other employee, but you need to be sure that’s what they’ll do before going to them, otherwise they may view you as the liability.

    EDIT: And you don’t need to wait for them to ask if you’re OK. If your issue is that they’re talking about non-work and that’s not why you’re there, just bring that up immediately.

    And also be clear they can still talk to you as long as it’s work related, and that you’re not refusing to work with them. Otherwise you become an HR problem.


  • Harris chose to do something immoral because “it was the law”, or it benefited her, or whatever - and you can expect her to continue doing that.

    You still have to vote for her, but you also have to be realistic about who you’re actually voting for.

    Republicans are the party who holds their candidates up without criticism - and Dems put up Kamala now exactly because Democrats were criticizing Biden - and even though she’s one of the worst candidates they’ve put up in years, she’s still far more electable than Biden.

    So yes. You need to both vote for and criticize Harris. It’s the least immoral choice.








  • I have left-hand threaded fittings on a few things and always say to myself aloud “This is reverse-threaded” before I attempt to turn them then still fuck up first turn. It doesn’t stop me from fucking it up the first time - it just helps me remember why.

    When I train new people on this equipment I tell them to say it aloud, show them, still fuck up the first turn, then they laugh.

    Then I have them do it in front of me including saying it aloud - and they fuck up the first turn…

    When you’ve been doing something unconsciously for decades it’s really hard to break.







  • Apparently it’s not just an American thing, but maybe other countries have more sense not to do it anymore.

    They’re usually in “high end” restaurants in big cities like Las Vegas. The ones I recall usually have the sinks somewhat separated from the stalls with a partition or turn, but they’re not wholly separate rooms. The motivations are probably more needing money, access to a fancy place, and being an extrovert than perversion - more windshield wiper gig than peeping Tom.

    I think it’s a combination of a holdover from another time that maybe was useful when they had an expanded role - they probably actually used to keep the bathroom clean, and some guys will shine shoes etc. - and tip-based service jobs they gave to poor people. I think they do get an hourly rate, but it’s probably below minimum wage for the same reasons waiting tables is.