At least it’s not slacking off anymore.

The insistence on electoral districts.

You get that across the English-speaking world, though. The really weird thing is that even people who see the problem want to keep the districts and argue for non-solutions like ranked-choice voting.

Centuries ago, it made sense. Communities chose one of their own to argue for their interests in front of the king. Which communities had the privilege? Obviously that’s up to the king to decide. Before modern communication tech, it also made sense that communities would be defined by geography.

Little of that makes sense anymore. When their candidate loses, people don’t feel like the 2nd best guy is representing them. They feel disenfranchised.

It used to be, in the US, that minorities - specifically African Americans - were denied representation. Today, census data is used to draw districts dominated by minority ethnic groups so that they can send one of their own to congress. This might not be a good thing, because candidates elsewhere do not have to appeal to these minorities or take their interests into account. Minorities that are not geographically concentrated - eg LGBTQ - cannot gain representation that way.

The process is entirely top-down and undemocratic. Of course, it is gamed.

Aside from that, the mere fact that representation is geography based influences which issues dominate. The more likely you are to move before the next election, the less your interests matter. That goes for both parties. But you can also see a pronounced urban/rural divide in party preference. Rural vs urban determines interests and opinions in very basic ways. Say, guns: High-population density makes them a dangerous threat and not much else. In the country, they are a tool for hunting.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dU8VPQsTqFU

Thank you. Since we decided a few weeks ago to adopt the leaf as legal tender, we have, of course, all become immensely rich.

But we have also run into a small inflation problem on account of the high level of leaf availability, which means that, I gather, the current going rate has something like three deciduous forests buying on ship’s peanut.

So in order to obviate this problem and effectively revalue the leaf, we are about to embark on a massive defoliation campaign, and…er, burn down all the forests. I think you’ll all agree that’s a sensible move under the circumstances.

Many were increasingly of the opinion that they’d all made a big mistake coming down from the trees in the first place, and some said that even the trees had been a bad move, and that no-one should ever have left the oceans.

Well, maybe it wouldn’t if it was gluten-free. Have you thought of that? No, you didn’t, you only think of yourself.

Oh. Someone did notice. How? You use your own font?

Masking was an issue during the Flue Pandemic 1918-1920. The date suggested by @[email protected] is more plausible.

Huh. What a weird coincidence. Out of all the many communities in Canada, it just happens to be the indigenous ones that have to make do without clean water because of military spending. What are the odds?

via https://duckduckgo.com/?q=DuckDuckGo+AI+Chat&ia=chat&duckai=1 with GPT-4o mini

Americans may be seeing serious savings in that picture.

I am seeing serious evolutionary pressure on liver genetics.

Meh. As a german, it just doesn’t make me tingle quite like sending tanks to the east.

Believing that animals are just like us s hardly and outlandish belief, on the facts. We’re evolutionarily closely related. We have basically the same skeleton. Skull, spine, rib cage, hips, 4 extremities. Arms and legs go: 1 big bone, 2 smaller bones, and lotsa little bones. It looks to be the same with the brain.

We expect vegans not to blow up slaughterhouses or such. Fair enough. But expecting them to shut up about their beliefs is a bit much, no? Expecting them not to tell people how they feel, not to kiss in public, or hold a pride para… Sorry, wrong prosecuted minority.

I’ve heard these takes about vegans for literal decades now, and not once has an actual vegan popped up to tell me that I’m a murderer.

Ok, so that’s why you’re not making any sense. You have no idea what’s going on.

Look, it’s very simple. Vegans are a small, harmless minority. So some people bully them. Of course, it’s their own fault. They wouldn’t mind them if they weren’t “out and proud”. It’s always the same story. There’s almost no variation.

I thought you were saying that it’s ok to bully them because they believe the wrong thing. That’s what @redisdead is saying. He compares them to “right wing cunts” when they speak their beliefs. Fascis get bashis. Just like vegans, I guess.

Watch the company you keep.

Vegans believe that animals have the same rights to live as humans. A nazi believes that the “others” do not have the same right to live as “his people”.

I don’t think you’ll be able to convince me that these are morally or ethically equivalent positions. But I see the point. They both believe the wrong thing. The out-group sucks. Yes, I know how humans tick.

Ok, I understand. You don’t like them because of their beliefs.

At first, I was confused. Isn’t the fact that you believe something the only justification for saying something? I mean, otherwise you’d be lying. But you’re saying you disagree with the belief in the first place, right?

Well, it’s what they believe. What exactly is the problem there? I have never been called a murderer. There just aren’t that many vegans around. I don’t know in what kind of circles this would be a common occurrence.

They are a small, harmless minority. Isn’t that enough? Maybe it’s made worse by the fact that they are perceived as non-violent and effeminate, because of their strong opposition to suffering, even when the victims are helpless, like animals. There is no personal risk in bullying them. It’s like the hate for environmental activists, trans-women, or liberals in general. I wouldn’t know that vegans aggressively proselytize their life-style if people didn’t aggressively tell me so; something that they share with “the gays”. Of course, people wouldn’t mind if they didn’t shove it in their faces all the time. Where have I heard that before?

Bitcoin.

It may be illegal to operate a bitcoin miner in Europe. That’s entirely possible. I don’t think the courts would go so far as to outlaw crypto in Europe via that route. But who knows.

the technology is similar in the relevant aspects

No. You can just turn off federation. You can make contracts with the instances you federate with. With crypto, you have to send the whole blockchain around, or else you don’t have crypto.

As for Meta, the problem is that the data they’re sharing is not public.

No. Look up what companies and people are fined for.

Any information that a user willingly makes public can be processed in any way

No! NO!!!

You may not process any personal data without a legal basis. It does not matter if public or not.

Certain sensitive personal data may not be processed at all, even with a legal basis. Except in certain circumstances listed in Article 9.