This comment made me sad, because it’s a reminder of just how bad a shithole most of the United States is: You need a car to go 300 miles at a whim because transit is bad or non-existent, and driving sucks. I know people who refuse to do that distance in one day. You need a car to go longer distances to bars, stores, restaurants, because racism zoning makes everything far away and a pain and a half to access.

You need a secluded, personal space to eat lunch or take a quick nap because the U.S. hates homeless people so much that there’s nowhere to do either of those things in public, and you’ll get abused by the police if you try. A car is a less-than-ideal spot to do either of those things comfortably; a picnic table or a park shelter would be better.

The best protection from threats is crowds, the “eyes on the street” principle. In fact, a lot of assaults happen in parking lots because there’s nobody around to intervene. But Americans are scared shitless of each other for no reason, and our society is collapsing because of it.

Oh, also, a car isn’t even a good place to eat or nap if you’re poor. The cops will hassle you to no end if you look like you don’t belong. (Hence, the prevalence of setting up a van for stealth camping.) It’s not a source of empowerment, if you’re poor. I would never have dreamed of jumping in my car and driving 300 miles on a whim when I worked retail. If the car broke down, or got damaged, I would’ve been supremely fucked, unable to pay to repair it, and without access to any alternative transportation.

But, frankly, I think that’s the point: Car dependency is supposed to hurt poor people, by physically excluding them, and providing a social marker of affluence so the not-quite-so-poor can feel good about themselves. (Why else bro dozers?)

Generally speaking, the opposite of virtue is vice.

Lawsuit? The dude literally asked for five bullets.

As out-of-touch as George H.W. Bush looked marveling at the checkout scanner at a supermarket, that’s nothing compared to the people who think American voters by and of large sat down and thoughtfully compared the policy positions of all the candidates, gamed out the implications, and voted accordingly.

How can you say this after the news about the people who didn’t know Biden dropped out until election day? That had never heard of Project 2025? That didn’t know what tariffs are?

I learned recently from a Lemmy comment that it’s easier to launch something out of the solar system than into the sun. I guess it makes sense, because escape velocity from Earth is only about 16km/s, while the Earth is moving around 30km/s relative to the sun, and you’d have to slow a thing down closer to 0km/s to deorbit it.

I think sometimes it’s worth it to make the extra effort, though, in order to send the right message.

If it’s me on the bike, know that I’m pitying you. -6°C is nothing. I drove a lot of miles as a delivery driver, and saw a lot of faces behind windshields in that time. Very few happy faces. Driving makes people miserable.

I keep seeing this sentiment over and over and over: “I don’t understand how so many people are duped.” It’s bizarre, and seems to defy our common sense. So, maybe it’s time to consider other explanations, and there are some which are backed by scientific research. I’ve been flogging this article since it was published, because it’s the only one that I’ve seen so be far that talks about it:

What Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin and Viktor Orbán Understand About Your Brain

One key element here is that the mind hack needs an ‘in,’ like fear, to get started, which explains why it affects some kinds of people so much more than others.

Egypt’s Sisi rejects transfer of Gazans, discusses aid with Biden

This is a completely false account of what happened, and is emblematic of why I’m completely done with the Democratic Party.

Trying to change leadership away from evil policy is “literally nothing.” Yup, this is why I’m totally done with the Democratic Party.

That’s funny, I seem to recall an Uncommitted movement…

“Good” isn’t a natural phenomenon that just needs a little space to establish a foothold. It takes deliberate action, effort, and sacrifice. And society doesn’t magically reach a stable state. That’s ridiculous.

Each election may have a bad and a worse outcome, but it’s relative. Voting for the less-bad is a strategy that works even when both parties push toward evil. It works even when the choices are a party that supports genocide quietly and one that supports genocide loudly. If the “practical left” is just voting for the less-bad, while shitting on and shunning the people trying to do the hard work because the magical Fairy of Good hasn’t yet shown up to establish that foothold with a wave of the wand, then I question how practical and how left that faction actually is.

Okay, yeah, I get it now. I think we agree. That’s what I was saying originally, it’s that they skipped Step 1, the part about deciding on the substance behind the slogans.

I’m not sure what you’re talking about. Harris’s message was along the lines of (from a Lemmy comment, TBF), “address disparate health care outcomes that predominantly impact Black men.” Nobody even knows what that means, much less has the ability to remember it. Or, she had some talking point about a several-thousand-dollar tax credit. (I don’t recall how much or for whom.) That is, they talked like policy wonks, not in terms like “dignity” and “providing for your family” that reach people emotionally.

Their opponents said highly memorable-but-evil things like, “Haitian immigrants are eating the pets.” I mean, like that, but good. Or, when you think of Obama, there’s one word that immediately comes to mind. Like that.

ETA: I just remembered one of Harris’s other leitmotifs for the campaign: “We’re not going back.” Just awful messaging. Democrats constantly, constantly, go for the negative formulation, which is terrible messaging. For one, saying you’re not your opponent lets your opponent control the terms of the debate. Also, our memories and subconscious minds are bad with negatives. Like the famous pink elephant example, if I were to say, “I’m not a professional dogcatcher,” a week from now, you might have the vague recollection of u/SwingingTheLamp and dogcatchers, or maybe just dogs. If I were smart, I’d say, “u/SwingingTheLamp is such a sexy guy” instead.

This particular example doesn’t suffer from that problem, but on the other hand, it doesn’t say anything of importance. So we’re not going back, great, we already knew that, but where are we going? It doesn’t say anything emotionally-impactful about the future and Harris’s role in it. By contrast, “make America great again” is much better slogan, because it makes a promise about the future. And a vague one, so you can seamlessly fill in whatever you think “great” looks like, and you can actually envision a perfectly-tailored picture of the future. Harris == discontent about the past; MAGA guy == good-feels about the future.

I’ve been thinking about sharing my rule for making Lemmy a better place by having more discussions, and keeping even the arguments respectful:

Never tell another person what they are/think/believe/want.

The rule of thumb is just like in intimate relationships: Use “I” statements instead of “you” statements. Don’t tell people “you obviously think…” or “you support…” or “you are…” Yes, that applies even to racists, transphobes, tankies, everybody. At best, it will never change the other person’s opinion, because everybody is the hero of their own story. At worst, other people judge you to be the asshole. If somebody is truly vile (like Neo-Nazis), disengage. It’s up to the community moderator or instance admin to remove them.

When did that happen? Their messaging is pretty widely regarded as terrible.

1. Figure out what they stand for, stated in two sentences. (From that old chestnut that says that you don’t understand a thing if you can’t explain it in two sentences, or less.)

2. Learn from the experts (PR people, psychologists, neuroscientists, screenwriters, etc.) how to state it in ways that resonate with people.

3. Then, do it. Convince all of us that they care, and are trying. Build coalitions around the message, and strengthen civil society.

The greatest damage from this administration’s lawlessness does not come from tearing down government agencies, it’s the corrosive effect of hopelessness in the minds and hearts of the citizens as we look around and feel like we’re alone, and that nobody else actually cares about our laws, traditions, and principles.

In my experience learning Windows 10 for my job, the results of searching for how to do something are: ‘click-this’ tutorials that don’t work because Microsoft changed something in the next edition, editing the registry, or PowerShell commands. The registry editing sometimes doesn’t work because Microsoft changed something. The PowerShell method is the way to go, because Microsoft has embraced the command line.

Enough farmland? I suggest reading up on the Ogallala Aquifer. Also, where the best climate zones for agriculture will be 50 years from now.

Incidentally, that dynamic describes the first administration incredibly well. All those firings constantly because the firee was a threat to the big guy’s ego by demonstrating too much agency…

It’s easy to forget under the firehose of bullshit, but when you think about it, the continuing presence of President Leon tells us something profound about this administration, and who’s really in charge.