People have a right to be stupid, though.

A lot of culture, is irrational and or superstitious. Tibetan culture has a lot of that, Chinese culture as well and American culture is also no exception.

You may find that disagreeable and not worth preserving, and I’m even inclined to agree with that on many occasions. But who is to decide which parts of ones own culture can be done away with, if not the people practicing that culture?

Can I decide which parts of your culture don’t agree with MY values and take that away from you?

Bathory cover memes?

I’m intrigued.

I disagree with that prediction.

The planet will be fine with it. Life will adapt to it. Even humans will survive it, as a species.

But our modern inustrialized civilizations will collapse.

The paradoxical thing is, that those greedy, wealthy elites who are mostly responsible don’t care, because they think they’re the ones to survive, when in reality, their wealth and power relies the most on the status quo of the rules of society.

It’s not ‘just’ about plants and algae dying, it’s about the tipping point for the climate. Oceans are a huge carbon sink, considering all the carbonates that Coral Reefs, Clam Shells and stuff like that are made of. The more acidic it becomes, the more those carbonates will react to become carbon dioxide, that will end up in the atmosphere, thus still enhancing the greenhouse effect.

Bit of a vicious cycle there.

I am happy to criticise the US system at any point, but the notion that it’s a democracy only on paper is a misrepresentation of reality.

They managed to vote Trump out of office, and back in. Something that wouldn’t have been possible if it were not a democracy.

Now the system of course has loads of difficulties and is suffering from extreme economic inequality, that leads to an immense influence of rich people over the undereducated masses, but they still have to spend their money for massive propaganda campaigns to win votes for their side, so the fundamental processes are still democratic.

We’re gonna see if that remains the case by the end of Trump’s second term, though.

Yet it doesn’t occur to them to have DOGE check wether that money is spent responsibly. Wonder why.

Violent Revolution by Kreator starts playing in my head.

Thanks for putting the work in, to coin such a well-rounded response on a topic that is usually easily derailed.
You seriously exceeded my expectations.

I cannot read through that whole review right now, but it was an interesting read already for as far as I got, taking into account a lot of nuance to the topic, that one doesn’t usually find in public debates. (Or at least, I wouldn’t expect to find on a taboo topic like this. It’s not like that’s something I regularly discuss, just something I had thoughts about when reading comments under a random meme.

I guess I have nothing to add. You clearly understood my meaning very well and as the paper states, there’s probably more research needed. I’d hypothesize, that engaging with such material can lead to both outcomes, just as it can for depictions of other illegal activities. The case might be warped however, because people who are exclusively attracted to children, have no way of acting out on that with a real person, whithout it being illegal and immoral, while people who are (also) attracted to adults have a plethora of possibilities. (And can live out some of their sexuality at least, even if they have trouble finding a partner that consensually takes part in their most extreme kinks)

So yeah, complex issue. Thanks for your valuable contribution.

Do you have any real-world or professional experience with people suffering from pedophilia?

I don’t, but I doubt that stance as being unfairly projecting some idea of how things have to work on those people.

I for one can jerk off to the weirdest porn fantasy things, from the usual thinly-veiled step-siblings trope to rape play, weird power dynamics or tentacle porn (depictions of children not among them, I feel I have to mention that explicitly here), but I don’t have any desire to experience any of that in real life, because I absolutely know it would be wrong.

I don’t see why that should neccessarily be different for them.

Thanks for the info. Didn’t know that and I just assumed from reality that this couldn’t be a case. My fault for mixing up politics with reality. 😅

Alright, I stand corrected. TIL.

Seems like this requirement is kind of a paper tiger, since there’s no deadline and several of the existing Euro coutries don’t even meet the economic criteria.

Though I do understand that it would be a hindrance for the Brits to agree to these terms, even though they’re largely hypoethetical, and given the whole Brexit history, the EU won’t be likely to exempt them from this regultion. I wonder what kind of deal Denmark has made there to be the only exception.

Switching to the Euro was never a requirement for EU membership, though.

Brits didn’t have it before, and there are other EU countries that stick to their national currency.

If there are no clues pointing to another motive, it’s the most likely explanation, thus they are investigating it as such. It’s not a confirmed femicide yet, though.

Also, I’d guess the ideological base that kept monarchies around as a system (at least in Europe) has been shattered fundamentally.
The idea, that the ruling class is put there by god’s grace isn’t something that can work as the foundation of power structures in our post-modern world.
There’s a reason why the remaining monarchies in Europe are really democracies, that simply keep a bunch of monarchs around for representational purposes.

It should also be noted, that a significant part of that motivation is to avoid consequences they’d face for acting out their right-wing extremist, racist views.
Fines, debt and taxes are only the tip of the iceberg.

Two and a half months, they weren’t joking about slow German bureaucracy 😱

Bureaucracy has nothing to do with it.

No no, if you just use Stuhl it works perfectly in German. This word has exactly the double meaning that is necessary for the pun, it’s not even a stretch. I’d have more trouble finding an appropriate verb for the translation.

A Schemel is really a very small seat, no taller than knee-height. It’s something you sit on to milk a cow for example.

And a Hocker is a kind of chair with usually neither arm nor foot-rest of any height. I’d say it’s pretty much a perfect match for the English stool. You could call a Schemel a kind of Hocker, but a Hocker can also be as tall as a normal chair or even taller at counter height, in which case we’d call it a Barhocker.

Oh! You’re bringing up an example from the Australian state of Victoria!

I was just wondering for a minute why homes built during Queen Victoria’s reign were a special challenge for the electricity grid.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victorian_house

Yeah, she was weird anyways. Our session mostly consisted of arguments about our conflicting world views.

Unfortunately it was my first therapy and it took me way too long to call it quits and find a different therapist. But I did, eventually.

I made my therapist lose her shits, because I sat in her chair once.
The arrangement was a small table and two identical chairs on either side, with no indication who has to sit where, other than how we’d usually do it and no clear instructions.
She couldn’t handle it and couldn’t let it go weeks after that session.
Am I winning?