I have no idea why people think late-term, abortion-as-contraceptive abortions are a thing.

Have they never known a pregnant person? Seen all the gross and painful shit pregnancy puts someone through? Do they really think people are subjecting their bodies to that for six months… just because???

What a cute husky! Surely he has done nothing wrong to any Norwegians anywhere.

The purpose of my jellybean thought exercise was to show that “I don’t know” and “I don’t believe” are not mutually exclusive. Basically:

I do not believe [x] != I believe [not x]

I don’t believe in String Theory. String Theory may be correct for all I know: I am not a physicist, and my understanding of String Theory is cursory at best.

Because I do not have enough evidence to warrant belief, I cannot say I believe in String Theory. But that same lack of understanding means I must also say I don’t believe that String Theory is false.

Say you have a jar full of jellybeans. We know that the number of whole jellybeans in the jar must be either even or odd.

If someone asks you if you believe the number of jellybeans in the jar is even, you can and should say “no” if you haven’t counted them or otherwise gathered any evidence to support that conclusion. To believe something is to say you feel it is more likely true than false, and you can’t say that about the given proposition.

Importantly, this does not mean you do believe the number of jellybeans is odd. The fact that one of those two things must be true does not mean you have to pick one to believe and one to disbelieve. It is perfectly rational to reserve belief either way until you have evidence one way or the other. You do not believe it’s even, nor do you believe it’s odd.

So, if we define “atheist” as “someone who does not believe in any gods”, I think you meet the definition of atheist. Just like the person in the above example does not believe the jellybeans are even & also does not believe they are odd, you don’t need to believe “there are no gods anywhere” to not believe “there is at least one god”.

Abstaining does less than nothing for the actual victims of the genocide in question. You think the dems are going to change their stance on Palestine because a bunch of leftists are withholding their votes? Most of their corporate donors are most likely either pro-Israel or don’t care. They’re going to decide it’s a safer play for them to pivot right to try and scoop up lukewarm centrist dipshits, guaranteed. Things get worse for women, immigrants, LGBT people, and the working class in general but hey! At least your hands are clean!

The way to effect electoral change that may actually have a snowballs chance in hell of helping Palestinians is to support anti-genocide reps in primaries and local elections. Get your city to pass ordinances boycotting Israeli products, accepting Palestinian refugees, and supporting international aid organizations. Even if your good local reps can’t make any of that happen, you’re getting more anti-genocide policy makers in the system who may run for higher offices next cycle.

Leftist organizing has always been from the ground up. If you want an anti-genocide president (which I fucking do too!), then work on creating the infrastructure to produce one instead of stomping your feet and insisting the Overton Window move your way ex nihilo.

Didn’t know worms could vote!

I feel you in a big way, but to be totally fair: corporations becoming states has probably trended towards the better from a zoomed-out perspective, and political leaders lying all the time has probably only become more visible than ever.

The entities that were doing all the colonialism for the past several hundred years have been private companies, and they did huge amounts of slavery and genocide. Blackwater is bad, but the East India Company was worse. This is not to say that things are good now, only that they aren’t like worse than they’ve ever been.

And I think the present day has a greater expectation of political leaders being accountable to the people they govern than most of history. Back in the days of monarchs and oligarchs, there was no mass media to tell everyone they were lying and no likely consequences for the liars even if there were.

Again, I empathize a huge amount with what you’ve said & I am also disappointed that the world we’ve created isn’t better than it is. I just personally think that the above two are trending in a more optimistic direction, even if they’re still objectively pretty bad.

Maybe not the best decision in the world.

HOWEVER:

1. Many DSA folks (at least in my local branch) are not happy with many of national’s decisions lately.

2. Fuck you if you’re looking down your nose at the DSA while the extent of your political involvement is only just voting every once in a while.

This was a tactical misstep, sure. But my local DSA is still out there showing up for protests and strikes and unions. They’re getting bills passed in through the city council and getting open socialists elected. If the DSA is the only leftist group near you and you let this blunder stop you from doing any real activism, you’re guilty of the exact same purity testing bullshit.

1. Rape does not always involve physically overpowering someone. Someone may coerce someone else into sex with blackmail, lies, threats, or abuse of a position of power.

2. Erections are controlled by a person’s autonomic nervous system. A man can get hard even when he is not turned on or consenting to what is happening.

3. Not all rape involves a penis. A woman who sticks an object into a man without his consent is committing rape. Rape is about power and control over another person, and the rapist need not be directly stimulated for rape to occur.

They are mortal. They do what they do because they do not fear consequences.

This has been two statements of fact, with no implied conclusions or sub-text.

They’re a part of the rapidly expanding world of so-called less lethal weapons, named such as they are because they are ostensibly less likely to send you to the ancestors when used against you. These weapons come in many different varieties, ranging from “smaller” 9 mm rounds designed to be fired at a person’s legs or torso, to the much bigger, pop-can-sized 40 mm rounds that are designed to be “skip fired” by ricocheting off pavement or other hard surfaces towards their target (police historically do not do this, and simply fire at the target).

I do not for one second buy that they were “designed” to be bounced off the ground. It’s an idiotic concept from the get-go: it’s hard enough to aim a conventional firearm. Expecting any kind of accuracy from a ricochet fired by an untrained and easily frightened moron is a fever dream. Fucking no one expected rubber bullets to be bounced into people’s legs; it was always an excuse for pigs to shoot into crowds. The casualties are a feature, not a bug.

It’s Lemmy. We’ve got to have at least one “America Bad” comment per thread, no matter how irrelevant.

You cheat the perspective. You use CGI. You use electronic sim guns.

John Wick, one of the most gun-heavy actions films in recent memory, never had one actor point a live firearm at another, because that’s stupid and dangerous.

https://www.slashfilm.com/1227707/john-wick-4-director-chad-stahleski-gets-candid-about-live-firearms-on-film-sets/

That’s standard procedure on a film set. Thousands of blanks a year are fired while pointing at people. That’s literally the point of blanks.

Judging by the downvotes, this seems to be a common thought here. Let me cite some applicable industry standards: https://www.actorsequity.org/resources/Producers/safe-and-sanitary/safety-tips-for-use-of-firearms/

Treat all guns as if they are loaded and deadly.

Never point a firearm at anyone including yourself. Always cheat the shot by aiming to the right or left of the target character. If asked to point and shoot directly at a living target, consult with the property master or armorer for the prescribed safety procedures.

https://www.csatf.org/01_safety_bltn_firearms/

It is important that everyone treat all firearms, whether they are real, rubber, or replica firearms as if they are working, loaded firearms.

Anyone handling the firearm will refrain from pointing a firearm at any person, including themselves. If it is necessary to aim a firearm at another person on camera, the Property Master will be consulted to determine available options. Remember: a firearm, including one loaded with blanks, can inflict severe damage to anything/anyone at which/to whom the firearm is pointed.

And I want to re-iterate, Baldwin did not shoot another actor who his character shoots in the film. He was not supposed to have his finger on the trigger for this shot, nor was he even supposed to fully draw his weapon. This was not the first time he pointed a gun at a camera person and fired off-script; the footage played in the trial showed him shooting directly at the camera after the director yelled “cut”.

And again: even if it were industry standard to shoot blanks directly at another person: that’s a stupid and reckless standard, and any reasonable person should refuse. I really feel like most of the defense of Baldwin is borne out of well-meaning ignorance.

I feel like I’m taking crazy pills.

1. It was a gun. An actual, functioning firearm. He knew it was a gun & told the police as much afterwards. There is never any good reason to point a gun at someone you are not currently trying to kill. Even if you ignore the common sense and assume there are somehow different rules for movie sets & using blanks, the other armorer they brought in testified that no one should ever be in the line of fire. He absolutely roasted Reed for not telling Baldwin to not point the gun at people in the footage they played for him.

2. The scene did not call for him to draw his gun, let alone shoot it. He wasn’t pointing it at another actor and playing a scene where he shoots someone, he was pointing it at someone behind the camera for no good goddamn reason. We saw from the BTS footage played in court that this was not the first time he pointed a gun at the camera and shot it outside the actual filming of the movie.

3. Baldwin neglected to do the training for the seated cross draw, the same maneuver he was doing when he killed someone. No doubt Reed was negligent, but even she tried to get him to do that.

I simply do not understand why people are letting Baldwin off the hook. He pointed a loaded gun at someone and pulled the trigger. People fucking die when that happens.

I mean, he did. He pointed a gun at someone and shot them. Not saying that Reed is innocent; the fact that live rounds ever made it into the gun seems to be her fault. But Baldwin absolutely should not have pointed a gun at someone in the first place.

It’s kinda exhausting seeing progressive language constantly used to rag on men. I want men to be anti-racist / feminist / LGBT allies / etc. I get that there are a lot of problems with many streams of masculinity and people who have been hurt by those have a right to complain, but goddamn. I would not expect lots of women to be attracted to a movement that constantly complains about women.

I mean, good on her for being anti-war and wanting to release political prisoners I guess? I have no clue what she was expecting though. Trying to run against a dictator in a sham election seems like maybe not the best way to effect political change, not to mention dangerous.

Java. It’s familiar, it’s the one I use most at my job, and I’m not in love with any other language enough to choose something less pragmatic.

“One of the problems of the two party system is what Margaret Thatcher used to call ‘Tina’ – there is no alternative,” he said, referring to a phrase the former British prime minister used to defend her government’s stringent economic policies in the early 1980s.

“The Democratic party has this crypto-fascist element when it comes to mass incarceration, when it comes to dropping bombs … when it comes to surveillance, when it comes to violation of individual liberties vis-a-vis the national security state.”

I mean, he has a point. However, I don’t know that acknowledging the flaws in a two-party system, then running in such a way that’ll likely invoke those very same flaws is a winning strategy.

It seems to me like someone in his shoes would be more effective running for congress / rallying people around reworking our current first-past-the-post voting system & electoral college.