Miles O'Brien

I tried being a moderator on a forum once, and after alerting admins and the FBI about csam less than a week in, I decided I was done being a moderator.

It was a forum for RC stuff, mostly diy rc planes.

Unfortunately, therapy only helps you cope, it doesn’t let you forget.

I’ve had more conversations than I can count with people I would never be able to talk to in person, all using our own native languages.

The original posts are in English, people comment in their native language, and I use a translator, then respond in my own language. Is the translator perfect? No! Neither is theirs.

With the way most translators I’ve used work, it’s easier for the non-native speaker to try translating, since the translator might try and use different words that entirely change the meaning, but likely list possible alternatives. A native e speaker will understand the alternatives while a non-native speaker probably won’t.

That’s my thought process anyway.

Never had anyone who wasn’t pearl-clutching or virtue-signaling complain about it. And I’ve had tons of conversations with people I’d never have talked to otherwise.

Nothing says “we are a free and open community that welcomes others” like moderators banning discussion of poor moderation.

Yes, I do understand what the rule is there for. No that doesn’t make it any less hilariously shitty.

we’re very far from that.

As usual, the only thing keeping humanity back is… Humanity.

Petty differences and ancient squabbles that turn deadly over the years has turned humanity into crabs scuttling around a bucket.

We have the capability to feed, house, and clothe everyone on the planet. We have the capability of electrifying every industry on earth.

The only things keeping us from doing so are “it’s expensive” or “the logistics are too complex”

All of which sounds to me like children whining “it’s too haaaaaard” when told to clean their room.

By no means am I saying you are wrong, we are very far from all that. It’s just our own fault.

Hi, gender is a spectrum and while I fully identify as male and straight*, I had long hair as a child. If my school had tried to cut my hair by force, I would have absolutely thrown hands, and I was not a small child. Apparently I pushed a teacher into a wall as a first grader but I have no memory of doing so.

Hair is not “gender conforming” unless you’re the most vanilla, thinks-flour-is-spicy, “mayonnaise has too much flavor” basic bitch in the universe. If you really think hair has two genders “long and short” then you are just the saddest sack of shit.

Hair is whatever the fuck you want it to be. I decided I didn’t want long hair anymore, so I started getting it cut short. I even had it around 1/4in at one point just because of how easy it was to be done with. Now it’s long because before I got married, my now-wife said she liked when it was longer, so I’m growing it out again until we decide it’s long enough or I get tired of it again. If I wanted to shave most of it right now, I can do that. Nobody controls my hair but me, and nobody has any say in how I keep it, short of safety concerns. (protip: hair ties and a hair net when working with rotary tools, once you’ve seen a video you never want it to happen to you)

Get the fuck out of here with this weak ass bullshit policing children’s hair.

They won’t be happy until everyone is a straight white silent and obedient clone of each other.

*It’s a spectrum, sometimes I want to feel pretty so if you had to stick me in a hole I’d say I’m straight but I’m sure someone could make a convincing argument that I’m at least a little fluid.

Yes, but since the offending country 1: has nuclear weapons and B- keeps saying “whoopsie didn’t mean to pinky promise” everyone just throws up their hands and says “well they claim it was an accident so just bump the sanctions 2% and call it a day” rather than the literal acts of war that they would be in any other context.

It’s like watching what’s happened in the US happen on a global scale.

We all know things are being smashed on purpose with the intention of making life difficult for other people, yet nobody is doing a goddamn thing to stop it.

And just like in the US, I’m sure there are plenty who would absolutely love to row out and try to stop it themselves but a large ship is just gonna steamroll a small one. I would love to row out and start some shit with the ships cutting cables. But by myself, I’m getting crushed without a second thought, and tons of people will watch on and go “well what did they expect all by themselves they should have gone out in force as a group if they wanted to really put a stop to it. Now I gotta go post a Facebook update saying I stand in solidarity with the cable”

I’ll let the readers sort out this metaphor.

Beware that Nvidia cards have driver issues, they’re fixable but if you do have an Nvidia card, I’d just use the built in graphics chip for trying out Linux at first.

Well, shit. Extra work for me. I knew I should have waited for the AMD series to be in stock…

I know just enough about Linux to know I should have been getting into it when I graduated over a decade ago.

I also know just enough to know it can do pretty much everything I need, as long as I’m willing to switch to a Linux alternative with similar capabilities.

However, I am Linux-dumb and deeply set into my windows, to the point where I’m not sure I have the technical savvy to switch.

From my understanding, Linux works very well, as long as you know what you’re doing.

I’m sure I’m overestimating the learning curve but it’s still intimidating.

It’s the balcony bailout party overlooking the occupy Wallstreet tents, just slightly better at hiding the contempt.

Companies sure so have a lot of “glitches” and “technical difficulties” when they’re introducing controversial features that forces it on a group of people, only to be nearly immediately removed with all kinds of excuses… And then the feature is forced for everyone within a few months.

Almost like it’s NOT unintentional, they’re NOT experiencing technical difficulties, and they’re actually just testing the waters before diving in, with neatly 0 intent to pull back unless the consumers put upenoigh of a fuss the company execs get scared.

Go punt kick the first fish back into the ocean as it tries to waddle it’s fat ass out of the water.

I know that’s not how evolution works but I can dream… Life would likely be vastly different given such a long period of time with something like that changing either way.

/j then you don’t love your mother enough to learn coding and make a mom-proof distro.

/uj oh my god I have ptsd from the one time my parents tried to switch to apple products. It lasted less than a week. Please don’t let them decide to switch to Linux and ask me things.

It’s just going to be a bathroom in March of Legos. Or somewhere near where he buried evidence an ex-wife.

He’s not clever enough for the air hole…

At least you all can get your family to use it.

I can’t even get my spouse to use it unless she thinks what we are talking about might be illegal where we are (it usually isn’t)

I’ve tried convincing family to use it, but all that happens is I just never hear from them until I see them in person or they call me.

They don’t even feel the need to back up their Amazon Kindle collection before they get cutoff from it… Thousands of dollars wasted if they ever lose access to the account.

Calling out reposts obsessively is weird to me.There’s more people who have not seen something than who have seen it, at least on the internet. I think most people have seen the moon…

But if I ever have a problem where the vast majority of the posts I see are reposts, I’ll simply block the channel for awhile. It costs me nothing, and takes less effort than typing out a comment complaining in every repost.

It’s the “STOP LIKING WHAT I DON’T LIKE” meme, come to life. And I’d rather let people have their fun. Doesn’t cost me, nor anyone else, a thing.

Weird, I just had a bunch of mls tell me just the other day that a comment I made was strawmanning a hypothetical tankie telling me I’m wrong.

And here we see yet another ml strawmanning.

Super Weird.

All I see is a bunch of people saying this is dystopia nightmare shit, and so far the only person I’ve seen do anything other than call it what it is is the ml comparing this to China.

Surveillance states are bad anywhere, you won’t get many people arguing that city wide government facial recognition is a good thing.

I love when people say they feel dumb because they didn’t know something, because then I get to share xkcd with them, too.

My first though in reading the title was “well when your alternatives are shit like fox or CNN, you might as well just get it from social media.”

There’s about the same amount of integrity from it, and it’s way easier to think “man, this one guy I’m watching might not know what he’s talking about” than it is to think “this whole team of people are wrong” but then you have to take into account the parasocial relationship many viewers have with their content providers. It’s easier to trust “Paul” because he’s wearing the same clothes I am, speaking to me the way I talk, giving me things I like to hear.

Content creators (I stubbornly refuse to call them ‘influencers’) will push brands and sponsors all day every day, but news outlets will fabricate your entire reality at the behest of whatever rich fuck is in charge. News outlets happily run state propaganda, knowing they are lies.

Conclusion: all media sucks. Sensory deprivation chambers are the future of mankind if we are to survive. And I’m only partially joking, I think.

Man, imagine if your neighbor was getting shot at by his neighbor on the other side, and while you’re telling your neighbor “you got this Bro, I believe in you and here are some bullets” you go ahead to the other side and continue buying things from the shitbox taking potshots.

Buying stuff from Russia makes you a piece of shit. Pure and simple. You’re funding genocide.

And please do bring up the US and Israel, as if I won’t agree the US is a piece of shit for funding Israel’s genocide of Palestine and you’re engaging in whataboutisms I see people harping on every time China gets brought up.

Lmao this guy thinks hard work is what makes people rich instead of massive amounts of exploitation in an inherently exploitative economic system…