Stepos Venzny

You asked how to defuse the tension, I’m telling you how to defuse the tension. If that’s not what you want to do then I can’t help you.

You called her a karen five times in the space of this post. That framing doesn’t help you. You don’t know that she’s an innately unreasonable person, you just know that she’s unreasonable in a specific moment where several people have failed her in a serious matter.

does it really help to simply stay next to my colleague, letting her do the talking while I do nothing but looking at the karen in the eye?

Staying quietly next to your colleague does help your colleague but this sustained eye contact sounds like an escalation. Try to express condolence instead of contempt.

what if, each time the karen opens her mouth I repeat ‘calm down’ ad nauseam till she either tires, shuts up or walks away?

That is an escalation of hostility. Any time you find yourself thinking “maybe this will shut them up”, that’s you looking to defeat an adversary. The goal here is to make her feel better, not even more hopeless.

what do you say or do to support your coworkers while they’re being verbally abused that somewhat defuses the situation?

Redirect. Gently point out that the coworker isn’t to blame for the problem and suggest focusing on how to proceed from here.

what if avoiding conflict is a trait of mine to the point that I let people walk all over me?

how do you resist the urge to walk away? Situations like this trigger my fight or flight response.

All there really is to do is practice.

what if I have to do this with a man and it gets physical? If somebody strikes me and I strike back, and I can guarantee you I’m striking back, I’m as guilty as the first aggressor.

This is one of the reasons it’s nice to have coworkers standing by your side. If it does get violent, a third party can split that up easier than a participant.

Broad strokes, make it clear that you would also prefer that her father get his scheduled treatment.

Democrats and independents have about reached where Republicans used to be on this sentiment.

I have that, too. Recently had a medical issue that was essentially a month-long open wound that obviously needed to be dressed the whole time. Absolutely brutal on the skin.

Tegaderm is less bad, I learned. Significantly more expensive but absolutely worth it for that situation. Showed up to the doctor with that on and was told “absolute overkill, stop using that” and then when I showed up the next time after following their instructions and using large Band-aids they took one look at my back and said “you should switch back to Tegaderm.”

“Fragrances.”

Boy do I ever wish ingredients lists would specify what fragrances they’re using, then I’d be able to learn which scented products are okay for me to use without testing them individually.

It’s very mild but fuck is it ever inescapable. Everything I use can be hypoallergenic if I put in the effort but take one step into any building other than my home and it’s being cleaned with scented cleaning products and pumped full of air fresheners on top of that.

Also I’ve got seasonal allergies that are stronger than my fragrance one(s), so the outdoors often doesn’t function as an escape, either.

At the computer desk where my desktop computer already is.

Think about the end of the movie. Our protagonist is being crucified. A whole field of people up on crosses with him. And this happens on this scale regularly. There’s a tradition of sparing one and only one person out of these groups by request so as to pacify the citizens by giving them an illusion of power. And the citizens, rather than even trying to save one life, prioritize laughing over and over at a speech impediment.

But against all odds, our protagonist is chosen through that process to be spared. But he isn’t, because Rome cares so little about any of this that they make absolutely zero effort to verify who they’re sparing. Not that the guy they let down deserved to be crucified, either.

And a rebel group shows up to maybe save these people from, and I can’t stress this enough, being crucified. And instead they too die pointlessly. By their own hands. On purpose. And the movie ends on a jaunty musical number about how terrible everything is and frankly maybe it’s better to die than to be a part of this world.

When I look at the scene you’re talking about in the context of the rest of the movie, it looks less like “Rome is good actually” and more like “why are these the freedom fighters we have?” Whether being conquered by the empire also comes with perks isn’t the point and it’s meant to be frustrating that they chose this ineffectual argument.

The only issue I might have is that some of the bigotry might start coming after me for associating. I’d like to think I’m the sort of person that would stand strong against that shit but I recognize that’s easier said than done from a position as relatively comfortable as the one I’m in.

Who am I kidding, though? I’d never think through the question as long as I did being asked it as a hypothetical. I’d date her and then maybe regret it later for the tangential reason.

Nothing smart technology promises over dumb technology is something I ever wanted in the first place.

I just want phones to be phones, TVs to be TVs, and glasses to be glasses.

Five people call out to you to save their lives with the simple pull of a lever and you shout back to them “No, I am too principled. Perhaps if I had the abilities of Superman I could save you all with this lever and then also save that person with my hands but I recognize my limitations and will therefore choose the outcome where more people will die rather than fewer.”

They’re all so proud of you for those next five seconds.

I’m angry enough that people made me get a smart phone, I’m not gonna actually use it like one. All off.

The bad guys in Black and White were Pokemon rights activists and your heroic allies were watching them speak being like “everyone knows Pokemon love being captured and made to fight each other, these guys are a bunch of nutjobs!”

Then later it turns out the Pokemon rights thing was just a cover for something nefarious because nobody could actually believe what these people are claiming to.

Absolutely no idea.

20% of the AI isn’t crawlers.

You talk like those fire alarm levers don’t exist.

Fresh air has kicked my ass harder than any virus ever has. Allergies have straight up bruised my ribs from the force of my own coughing.

Make sure fresh air agrees with you before you make any rash decisions about how much to get.

An extra six percent isn’t really the difference between a big purchase and a small one, so it’s pretty much just background noise for me. I know to leave some wiggle room if my budget is tight but don’t make the effort to calculate my technical maximum. Worst case scenario I get one less item than I planned.

I am colorblind, so no.

Magenta

Cyan

Yellow

Cyan

Red and blue are tied in this image but in darker shades the answer is always red.

Reading how it works, it sounds nightmarish. I only have the myopia so I only know bifocals in theory but it sounds like they’re replacing something dependably consistent with something that’s constantly trying to guess what I want it to do. I don’t like that in any technology but I extremely don’t want it applied to an entire sense.

Put a button on the side that manually toggles between a preprogrammed close mode and far mode then I’m into it.

An adult dressing like an adult feels completely appropriate to me.