• 20 Posts
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Joined 4 years ago
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Cake day: April 1st, 2022

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  • Judging by the two-party system and the past Democrat governments, I don’t think there’s a significant possibility of getting more than one those in the next decade. At least four of them run directly in contradiction to the groups with enough money to systematically sponsor and corrupt politicians (no matter which party), own mass media and control other relevant institutions.

    These kind of things only happen when people have the power to pressure the government into supplying them.


  • Two things can be bad. These are not sports teams where one side wins and the other loses.

    Yes. I completely agree. However, it’s important to dispel false equivalence. Every country spends money on military, that doesn’t imply they’re all bad or neglecting their citizens.

    Why is the US spending so much on military? Why is China spending so much on military? Why does the US routinely invade countries in other regions? Why does China suppress Uyghur people in the Xinjiang conflict? Like you said, two things can be bad, but it’s also negligent to imply the two situations are comparable.

    China is #2 in military spending after the USA.

    I don’t believe they have another option, given the USA’s military and aggression.

    It’s telling how limited their spending is - consider China’s disproportionate economy, size and population, and their borders. According to Wikipedia, they only spend 1.7% of their GDP on military - that’s alongside the Netherlands, Czechia, Italy and Spain.



  • Absolutely. This regime has shown how fragile the relationship is, and how untrustworthy the USA is as a partner.

    once the democrats are back in power

    This little phrase reminded me: I find it interesting how this is just assumed by many people as an eventuality when we’ve already seen a failed coup attempt last time an election ousted the Republican regime. There is this underlying faith in the liberal democracy of the US, since despite its huge flaws, it hasn’t failed in over a century. Similar with all the people who call for impeachment, police arresting ICE and other legal mechanisms.

    It’s silly to trust government institutions to save one from an openly, brazenly malicious government.







  • Find a physical activity you enjoy and do it at least three times a week. Either join an organized religion or specifically curate a group of people you do a weekly activity with who will come check on you if you suddenly stop showing up.

    I managed to get both these with sport teams. (At least in my area), the local sports competitions are actively looking for players, and if you have skills or enjoy a role others don’t, you can even just volunteer (instead of pay fees) in a few teams before joining one you like. And one foot in the door will likely get you invited to other teams and competitions when someone’s team needs a substitute player (or you can just ask, “Does anyone have a team that play on Thursday nights?”).

    In my favorite team, I became de-facto captain of because I showed up most reliably and was the remaining member of the original team as people left and joined. One week I forgot to tell them I would be away for the match due to travel, and the next day I wake up to a couple of check-in messages just to make sure I haven’t vanished or had a bookshelf fall on me. And it’s a reassuring feeling to realize you’re part of a community that cares about each other.




  • Celebrating on the 24th. It’s not even a long historical tradition in my own family or local culture, we adopted it after my grandparents celebrated a few Christmases with a Central European immigrant family in the neighborhood who start celebrating at midday 24th December and realized it enabled those of us who were married/etc to celebrate the next day with our other families. It’s much more relaxing like that, I’ve heard my friends complain after trying to fit in a breakfast, lunch and dinner at three different Christmas parties in one day to avoid offending anyone.