• 17 Posts
  • 143 Comments
Joined 2 years ago
Cake day: June 19th, 2023
  • Andy@slrpnk.nettoAsklemmy@lemmy.ml•Does David Hogg creep anyone else out?
    1·
    2 hours ago

    I don’t really know much about him, and I can’t dispute your personal gut feeling. But I’m not familiar with anything that gives me this feeling.

    For what it’s worth, I think in general that if you say, “I just don’t quite trust <name>. I didn’t know why, but they creep me out,” about pretty much anyone in public political life you can probably find a basis for that over a long enough time scale.

  • Andy@slrpnk.nettoMemes@lemmy.ml•Keep MAGA off my GUNS!
    131·
    5 days ago

    This meme doesn’t work because a conservative literally bought me a copy of that book and it’s infantile.

    This book is titled “Basic Economics” because Sowel is a troll, and the economics in his book are largely correct but incomplete to the point of misinforming people. This is an incredibly “conservative” book through-and-through.

  • Andy@slrpnk.nettoTechnology@lemmy.world•Elon Musk, Jack Dorsey Call For Abolition Of All Intellectual Property Laws, Arguing There Are 'Much Greater Models To Pay Creators'English
    74·
    7 days ago

    I find this surprising, because frankly I agree.

    I don’t know much about Dorsey, but in Musk’s case, I think this is another case of him espousing a good idea he’d never actually honor.

    I think that anyone should be able to make movies with Mickey Mouse and no one should need to license code. But I suspect that like with free expression, these are values most proponents only like when it’s benefiting them.

    Also, as for the alternatives to support creatives, I would say start with universal services. Universal housing, universal healthcare, universal education, universal food. We would have so much more art if we recognized that no one should have to “earn” their survival. Once that’s guaranteed – and abolish billionaires and extreme wealth inequality too – I think discussions over how to support creatives would take place from a much more favorable starting point.

  • Andy@slrpnk.nettoAsk Lemmy@lemmy.world•Now that S&P 500 is climbing and a lot are celebrating, does anyone else feel like this is just the tip of the shitberg?
    3·
    8 days ago

    I get the sentiment, but I think it’s possible we might miss the benefits you’re describing less than you think.

    For the average American, the biggest manifestation of what you’re describing was cheap electronics, trucks, and suburban developments. These kinds of benefits are a poor salve for the alienation and atomization that now besets us. We have been trained to try and fill the holes in our lives with crap while losing more and more of the time and security that affords actual contentedness.

    I think a generation raised knowing and trusting their neighbors, able to walk to school and bike to work and possibly go home for lunch, where they can eat some veggies grown in a community garden on an apartment roof might not feel like they’ve lost all that much just because they can’t buy an exercise machine they never use for $99 at a Black Friday sale.

    There’s a reason a lot of “poorer” countries greatly outpace is in satisfaction and quality of life surveys.

  • Andy@slrpnk.nettoAsk Lemmy@lemmy.world•Now that S&P 500 is climbing and a lot are celebrating, does anyone else feel like this is just the tip of the shitberg?
    151·
    9 days ago

    I agree with most of this. However I think there are additional elements that make prediction challenging.

    First, if the US undergoes any kind of revolution in the next five years, the cultural effects you mentioned could by overwritten by more recent events. I realize this sounds improbable, but the transition from the New Deal era to global neolibralism was a revolution. “The Reagan Revolution” was an actual economic and social revolution. And we’re overdue for another.

    Second, both the markets and the real economy were in an unsustainable condition before Trump. The pursuit of endless growth, the disruption of climate breakdown, the end of the US’ monopolar hegemony, and the return of extreme wealth inequality in the US made the status quo impossible to simply maintain. Big changes were coming even without Trump.

    I maintain some optimism. I think anti trust regulation, climate-based financial regulation, and an embrace of market socialism could render the last three months to be the last gasps of the old order instead of another point in what has been a decline decades in the making. But it depends what happens next.

  • Andy@slrpnk.nettoAsk Lemmy@lemmy.world•*Permanently Deleted*
    18·
    12 days ago

    This is what I was going to say.

    Falling apart at 28 isn’t normal, but what is normal at 28 is having your body suddenly stop giving you a hall pass. That’s very relatable.

    Get 8 hours of sleep a night, walk and bike when you can, eat your greens, etc. and you might notice a difference.

  • Andy@slrpnk.nettoAsklemmy@lemmy.ml•What did Cory Booker 25-Hour speech actually achieve in terms of change?
    142·
    19 days ago

    This is essentially what I was going to say (though more poetic).

    I’m of two minds. I admit that i cringe a bit that he would even call this “good trouble”. John Lewis’ “good trouble” was nearly getting beaten to death. How Booker can apply such a label to an act of protest that didn’t even meaningfully delay any noteworthy business is frankly amazing to me.

    But also, he did fucking do something. He specifically articulated that we should all be alarmed, and he declared that he intends to not cooperate with or normalize what is happening. Low bar? Yes. But we all have to start somewhere.

    I actually like Cory Booker. He was my third or fourth pick among the 20-something candidates that ran in 2020.

    I’ll say this: this act is not enough to convince me that elected Democrats are going to do anything meaningful in the next two years. But the absence of it would’ve made me far less likely to expect it. Good for him.