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PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   2256 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for September 13, 2024

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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It looks like they finally disabled old.reddit, which was the only thing keeping it usable (sidebar features, the comments feed, etc.)

(It started working again after ~6hrs. Maybe a test run to check how much user engagement would fall off, maybe just a fuck up)

It still works.

Still working here?

Working here again now after a few hours of "whoopsie you broke reddit uwu" error messages

I'm already a pretty infrequent visitor, but will certainly reduce that to near zero if/when they pull the plug -- I imagine they are aware of the number of such users, but may not care.

This Louis CK SNL monologue came up on my feed. In it he jokes about how a lot of things have changed since the 1970s since he was growing up - except the Middle East, which hasn't changed one iota. He says that he experiences a certain amount of "compassion fatigue" about the conflict in Palestine for this reason.

This monologue was from 9 years ago and is exactly as relevant as when it came out, which only proves his point.

(And this is probably the least edgy part of the monologue.)

The Great Realignment in US politics marches on: https://x.com/IrishPatri0t/status/1834317557329023315

On one hand, the Cheney/Bush-Kamala rapprochement continues. But on the other hand, Trump and Biden seem to be moving closer and closer together? Real - Biden taking a Trump hat with him up onto Air Force One, putting on a Trump Hat in a meeting in Pennsylvania to applause. Fake - the AI stuff.

More seriously: https://x.com/RogerJStoneJr/status/1834560572131602788

https://x.com/captivedreamer7/status/1834091502395388385

However, Biden does have an opportunity to make the most significant endorsement of his political career...

Wait, so he actually wore a Trump hat???

He exchanged hats with a veteran at a 9/11 memorial event. The White House says he did it as a gesture of unity. I wouldn’t read too much into it.

Oh okay that makes more sense

Currently playing Diablo 4 and this cutscene genuinely stunned me in the sense of how it unintentionally conveys perspective of religious reactionaries so well(maybe I wrong here of course, can't read creators' minds). There is plenty of modern mainstream woke stuff in the game. racially diverse cast with good roles for minority characters, angel that was mostly good in lore previously was made into a selfish coward, et cetera. But here we have demonic figure offering freedom from religious obligations and societal constraints, freedom that leads to the brutal killing of a priest who was the one man who resisted the temptation, freedom to be beautiful in sin. That could have been short story told in a tweet by an anon with 5k followers, instead it's a main plot point in AAA game. And normies don't see it, because idk, priest was mean. I am not in any way religious or conservative, but it's interesting to see their views being represented even most likely without them being involved in production.

Currently playing Diablo 4 and this cutscene genuinely stunned me in the sense of how it unintentionally conveys perspective of religious reactionaries so well

I'm not sure how far you've gotten, but it's entirely intentional.

Please explain.

The demonic figure in the trailer is not good. This trailer, and the rest of the game, portrays her and her followers as evil and wrong. The perspective the OP gets from the trailer is the perspective the game intends to convey.

That being said, the church, like the trailer, is also quite harsh. In Diablo, pretty much everybody sucks.

I am not saying that they didn't intend for her to be evil, with the notes of gray but still clearly a villian. I am more poiting out radical political reading on this which is I think clearly wasn't intended. Most likely they just wanted to make a cool scene and make Lilith more sympathetic by putting word about freedom in her mouth and making the opposition be bigoted church which worships another asshole.

I think you are letting your preconceptions about modern media get to you. The reading is entirely intended. Making the church seem bigoted is the fakeout. Lilith seducing the congregation with words of freedom leading to horrors is the intended portrayal.

Did they bring back Zoltun Kul from D3? I loved that character so much.

Smuggest mofo in the underworld, right about absolutely everything, yet ignored and eventually killed by the good guys because they were too dumb to see it.

Then is resurrected by his own foresight to continue his smugmogging.

Absolute vibemaster.

There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Faible, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

Just because something isn’t conventional doesn’t make it woke, and just because it is conventional doesn’t mean it’s reactionary.

told by an anon with 5k followers

What sort of surreal standard of notoriety is this?

I think you misunderstood my point. I am talking about AAA game with fairly standard(and quite good) modern narrative complete with mainstream liberal norms, which in the process of making story more complex and gray most likely unintentionally opens itself to the radical interpretation. Similar thing often happens with villains that do something "to save the planet" or "destroy oppressive society", which are points that far-leftist generally agree with. I am not saying that it is intended or correct reading. And I don't get what you mean by "my philosophy".

What sort of surreal standard of notoriety is this?

5k followers is not much especially on twitter, I have that many on one of the platforms with almost no effort invested and I think most of the people here either can do the same or already done it.

And I don't get what you mean by "my philosophy".

It's a quote from Hamlet.

Ah. I still think it's a bit silly to flag everything that Subverts Expectations as woke, or even liberal.

The "philosophy" bit is just the end of a quote.

Having a beer this evening, and I realize that my knowledge of beer trends is very old. In the 2010s, there was the big shift to IPAs that I remember, as well as lots of people complaining about only being able to get IPAs at bars. Then in the 2020s, there seemed to be this tilt towards sours and goses. That's the last I heard, honestly.

Does anyone know where the beer trends are going? What's cool now?

Does anyone know where the beer trends are going? What's cool now?

As a resident of Czech Republic, the idea of 'trends in beer' seems bizarre. Beer is a daily drink. Asking for a 'trend' in beer is like asking for trends with Coca-Cola. Sure people do try but generally the big established brands produce pretty good lager which is what almost everyone drinks.

It seems in America it's something else, not a basic commodity.

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Do you really not have trends in what styles are popular? The Czechs never had an IPA revolution? Nobody ever got into sours? Every brewery simply sells the exact same product they've been making for 300 years?

And Coca-Cola definitely goes through different trends. The diet soda trend of the 80s, the wide proliferation of flavors in the 90s, the "health drink" trend and diversification into soda-substitutes in the 2000s, the "inject diet coke directly into my veins" performative addiction of the current era. Not to mention the occasional burst of nostalgia and brief increase in popularity of the old glass bottles every few years.

I'm sure there are Czech hipsters and I do know craft beers exist and are drunk (as the chart shows), but it's not really my thing. I've been offered some craft beer and such, wasn't generally bad.

Wasn't generally better than what you can buy in store, just different. I'm not going to 4x my beer costs to get something 'different' now am I?

Due to parentage and upbringing (public school) I'm inacapable of understanding what 'cool' means. Or at least what normies mean by that.
E.g. very early on when at 15 I was out drinking with my high school class (more like a state run & funded prep) and the girls were smoking unfiltered cigarettes & instead of being normal and thinking "they're being so cool" I thought "they think this makes them adults" and having a bit of a laugh internally.

I live in an advanced (1st wave or close to it) and travel frequently to a 2nd wave city. I get to watch things develop and spread in real-time, and I also started brewing and drinking while underage.

I'd say Cjet has it most on the nose. Non-alcoholic beer and lower-carb is now 1st wave. Right behind that is hazy IPAs which I can't fucking stand, and behind that is sours which I'm extremely picky about. I have started thanking breweries and bartenders that still have a West Coast IPA on rotation.

I have to say that Sierra Nevada is still, even as such a huge brewery, still keeping the faith in terms of quality and consistency. Oskar Blues still makes the stuff I like as well, their double IPA is sublime and competes nicely with Good People's snake handler.

I understand the backlash against traditional IPAs and them "Blowing out your palate" but I personally enjoyed only drinking 2-3 beers per night and having an awesome buzz.

There is at least a tiny trend towards healthier beers. Non alcoholic and low carb, without too many sacrifices for flavor. Athletic brewing company is the local option small time brewing option for me, but all the major beer makers seem to have been chasing non-alcoholic and even lower carb versions of their old offerings.

Its probably not necessarily as "cool" as past trends, but I think there is money in it. It requires more science than artistry, and the effort being carried out by the big beer makers suggests that they are at least trying to tap into an underserved segment.

And I remember (and so does my liver) the preceding trend to IPAs in craft beers, at least in my local market during my college years in the mid-2000s: strong, sweet, meal-like belgian or trappist beers.

I do not miss them. Whatever is next, I hope it's not a return to that.

These are some of the few beers I think are truly disgusting. Sickly sweet, heavy and extremely alcoholic.

I can only comment about the Pittsburgh beer scene, but for the purposes of this post I'm going to assume that it's similar to elsewhere, though the brewpub craze started a little earlier here than it did elsewhere. In 2005 there were only 4 breweries in Pittsburgh. One was Iron City, which is the local mass-market beer that competes with Miller, etc. One was Penn, which is larger than most micros and is terrible. There was Church Brew Works, which had the novelty of being in a church and also made terrible beer, and East End, which was relatively new but only slightly less terrible than the other 2 micros. In the 2010s a lot more micros started popping up, and most of them, like Hitchhiker and Voodoo, were heavy on the IPAs. The reason for this is that good beer is expensive to make and IPAs are the most forgiving; if something goes wrong there's less likelihood of having to deep six the whole batch. Now there are something like 78 breweries in the Pittsburgh area and while most are terrible, there are actually a few decent ones. Towards the latter part of the 2010s and into the 2020s, somebody realized that a lot of beer drinkers simply don't like IPAs and if they could make a decent lager or kolsch then somebody would drink it. Also, if your area is at a point of brewpub saturation then you can't get business by simply being the only game in town. As a result of this, most places, both here and elsewhere, seem to have diversified their offerings to a point that I wouldn't say there's any particular trend right now.

Sours and goses have certainly gained market share (I first had one at Allegheny City Brewing in 2016), but, much like IPAs, they're polarizing. I think part of the IPA trend has to do with the fact that most mass-market beers are under-hopped and people felt superior saying they liked something that was totally in the opposite direction, even if it was so bitter it blew out your taste buds to the point that you couldn't taste anything else. I would also note that there seemed to be a trend in wheat beers starting around 2006. Anyway, one trend I've noticed in recent years is the Hazy IPA (also called a New England IPA, though I was in Vermont last year and didn't see it on any menus). It gets its name because it's unfiltered and looks cloudier than most beers. It's similar to an IPA but has a lower alcohol content and is much less bitter, and has fruity, usually citrusy, undertones. But that's just one example. Any brewpub that's small enough that the to-go options are limited will usually have something that's a sort of house specialty and a few other things that are worth trying. It's usually a good idea to go when they aren't that busy; the bartenders in these places love beer and are very helpful about pointing you in the direction of something you'll like.

I think part of the IPA trend has to do with the fact that most mass-market beers are under-hopped and people felt superior saying they liked something that was totally in the opposite direction, even if it was so bitter it blew out your taste buds to the point that you couldn't taste anything else.

Silly story time. I once went to a Thai restaurant and got an IPA (might have been a double or imperial IPA even; I don't remember), because there was one available and I did like them. Then, I ordered my meal way spicier than I probably should have, for reasons (probably not good ones). In any event, this was the moment when I actually learned just how significant pairing food/beverage could possibly be. I had heard of people doing pairings before, but I never really grokked it, if anything, it was always a really subtle effect. But this time, hooooo buddy, this time. Pre-meal, this IPA was an IPA, extremely bold and bitter. Meal arrives, I shove whatever quantity of extremely spicy in my mouth, and at some point finally decide to rinse some down with a little beverage. I kid you not, that IPA tasted sweet after all that capsaicin. It was wild.

Towards the latter part of the 2010s and into the 2020s, somebody realized that a lot of beer drinkers simply don't like IPAs and if they could make a decent lager or kolsch then somebody would drink it.

Took them long enough. I've always hated IPA's, largely because they give terrible hangovers. Probably because they're loaded up with preservatives to play it safe with the batch like you said.

There's a reason lagers are so popular.

Hopefully this is not gauche to do but:

@self_made_human, how are you liking the U.K.? Haven't seen a legit update.

I'm greatly touched that someone remembers what I'm up to haha, thank you!

Ever since I got here, I've been mulling a proper effort post about the place, but haven't really had the time or energy. But since you asked, I'm certainly happy to summarize:

This time, it was far smaller a culture shock than when I was in England 2 years back. I know how things work, and the sight of double decker buses doesn't quite give the same "you're in foreign territory" vibes as they once did. Thankfully, I understand Scottish accents quite well, so no issues there either.

It's been terribly hectic, everything from dragging a large suitcase up Edinburgh (you'd swear you had to go uphill both ways), figuring out work, the millions of little things necessary when shifting countries, it's absolutely drained me.

I currently (and temporarily) live in the middle of nowhere, to be close to the hospital that's my first posting. I'll be moving to a respectable city in a few months, but this was what I opted for because I wanted to live closer to work till I acclimatised or bought a car.

Said work has been a chore. Psychiatry in the UK is rather different from my expectations, worsened by my initial placement being in Old Age psychiatry, with the majority of cases being dementia patients of some description. Wouldn't have been psych work back home, I tell you. It's boring, and not to my taste, I feel like a glorified geriatrician fussing more about last night's falls and who's had constipation (and can I shirk another PR, having made it 3 years into my career only ever having done one) instead of real psychiatric work. I can only hope my stint in adult and adolescent psychiatry is more interesting.

They've also had me running up and down the country, you don't have the luxury of working out of a single hospital during a residency like the rest of the planet. I swear I've done enough miles in a month and a half to circumnavigate Scotland.

The isolation is getting to me. It's been difficult surviving on my own. First time I've been away from home for this long, I tell you. I was nominally away living away from it for 4 years in med school, but in reality home was just a weekend bus ride away. Now I really haven't got anyone but distant relatives in the span of a continent.

I live out of the way, it's hard to make friends when everyone commutes in from the larger cities, though I have the saving grace of my landlord and landlady being lovely people. Another thing I hope changes with a move.

NHS bureaucracy is a headache, the sheer hassle I had to undergo in order to send a picture of a patient's rash to dermatology.. Can't just click a picture on my phone and send it over as is the norm back home, nope, breach of patient privacy. I had to dig out a digital camera approved for "clinical photography" lurking on the wards that predates microUSB and is likely as geriatric as the patients. Predictably, it didn't work (the old batteries blew up and had to be scraped out by me using a pencil, and I couldn't get photos off it if I tried as it needed drivers off a CD advertising Windows 98 compatibility, not we had an SD card or a way to read off one). I ended up googling the closest pictures I could find online and sending those off with fervent apologies. So much busy work and utter wastes of everyone's time, but it's how things are done here. I find it farcical that so many important investigations are indefinitely postponed because the patient declined when I asked if I could take their bloods or do an ECG, when they're involuntarily committed because they lack capacity in the first place. Leaving aside that doctors being responsible for taking bloods and performing ECGs would be farcical in most countries, not just India.

It's also bloody cold, unseasonably so for September, I can barely get out of bed in the morning, everyone agrees it's only really heater time in October.

I've been modestly depressed, for the reasons above. Occasionally I get to see the aspects of psychiatry that actually excite me, but they're few and far between at the moment. I can only pray it'll get better. Either way, it's going to be a long 3 years, and assuming I want to go in the UK, yet another 3. I'm being run ragged, and I can't quite muster up the energy to engage here like I used to. I'm sure I'll write a proper post eventually, but thanks for keeping tabs on this poor soul!

and can I shirk another PR, having made it 3 years into my career only ever having done one

What's "PR" in this context?

A per rectal examination, when the doctor sticks a finger up a bum, most commonly to check if a prostate is enlarged or if the bowels are full of compacted poop. Not much fun to do, and potentially messy.

Lol, that makes more sense than shirking Puerto Ricans, which was the only idea I came up with.

Psychiatry in the UK is rather different from my expectations, worsened by my initial placement being in Old Age psychiatry,

Two things to think about Geri.

  1. It blows, but because of advancing age all specialties are becoming Geri by default. It's good to know.

  2. Good Geri docs know a lot of Pharm you can use elsewhere. Great way to get a handle on second and third line agitation management early and obscure drug interactions (and make you look good on other rotations).

Keep swimming.

Geriatric psychiatry sounds like a truly miserable way to spend your time. I'm no doctor, but it seems like there's little improvement you can provide for most people like that.

Curious to know if you've met any other Indians about the place? And what are you missing the most from home? I recall when I did my year in Asia, my parents sent me a box full of American candy; little knowing that I could buy basically the same things at the corner store. But the sentiment was nice. (They also sent me a lot of underarm deodorant at my explicit request, and that was a lifesaver.)

I appreciate the update. We do miss you. Hang in there and try and make the most of it. If nothing else, as you continue to suffer various indignities, bear in mind that these will be great sources of stories you can tell in the future. "I'm telling you, it was 2024, and I had to try and use a bloody digital camera. What's that? You don't even remember what that is?"

I'm no doctor, but it seems like there's little improvement you can provide for most people like that.

You're right, in the majority of cases they're really far gone, especially the ones who are in-patients, and care is mostly palliative.

Curious to know if you've met any other Indians about the place? And what are you missing the most from home? I recall when I did my year in Asia, my parents sent me a box full of American candy; little knowing that I could buy basically the same things at the corner store. But the sentiment was nice. (They also sent me a lot of underarm deodorant at my explicit request, and that was a lifesaver.)

I do know another Indian doctor in the same program, but he's at a different hospital. There are far fewer of us than further south in England, but I'm not particularly fussed either way, I'm not particularly clannish! It's more that I don't have too many peers where I work, albeit the ones there are nice enough.

The things I miss from home, well, my parents can't send them to me short of flying over to visit themselves, and that's not happening this year. I'll go visit them instead which is nice!

My older dog is doing poorly, and I miss them both, so a trip home to be bowled over and licked senseless would do wonders haha.

I appreciate the update. We do miss you. Hang in there and try and make the most of it. If nothing else, as you continue to suffer various indignities, bear in mind that these will be great sources of stories you can tell in the future. "I'm telling you, it was 2024, and I had to try and use a bloody digital camera. What's that? You don't even remember what that is?"

Thank you. I mean it sincerely.

You're very spot on about the NHS having endless potential for shitshows that can, in retrospect, be very funny. Especially in psych where the patients can do the darnedest things haha. If you want to read a very good book about, check out This is going to hurt by Adam Kay, though the poor bastard made the mistake of taking up gynecology and I was never fooled into that!

Moving to a small town can be tough if you don't know anyone, even if you're a native. I know plenty of people that did their residencies and law clerk service out in the sticks in Sweden and they sounded about as miserable as you.

Keep your chin up, It'll get better once you get to a city!

Also, get season appropriate clothing if you haven't already. I've seen so many Indian tech workers over here that are underdressed come winter and I know how miserable it can be, even if it's just walking to and from the bus. Just go to a goodwill if you don't want to buy something new.

Thank you, I'm certainly looking forward to the big city, albeit everyone here has been so lovely that I'll miss them when I'm gone. I never expected to make close friends up here, I just opted for the closest place I could find to somewhere that's rather out of the way, if I'd decided to commute from said big city, I'd be looking at an hour and a half of travel time every morning and evening, whereas it's as simple as a 10 minute bus now.

I did let my mother coax me into packing heavily for the winter, so I won't outright freeze, but as much as I abhorr the horrendous heat at home, I'm a creature of different climes, and it'll be a while till I adjust.

I know plenty of people that did their residencies and law clerk service out in the sticks in Sweden and they sounded about as miserable as you.

I'd bet, while I don't think I'll suffer too much from SAD (a serendipitous acronym, if not one intentionally named) due to my shunning of the sun, it's going to be an adjustment to waking up in the dark and stumbling home when it's dark at 4. I can only imagine it's even worse in Sweden!

it's going to be an adjustment to waking up in the dark and stumbling home when it's dark at 4. I can only imagine it's even worse in Sweden!

Seeing as Stockholm is north of Kirkwall, I'd say so. But then again we're used to walking to school/work in the dark and walking home in the dark as well.

I have some family living up north though and they note that most of the people who move there move away again and it's never due to the cold. People just don't understand how oppressive it can be that the sun barely comes up above the horizon for months at a time (or at all). People think they know but they don't.

Sorry to hear it has been difficult! Glad to get an update from you though bud. Happy to hop on a call if you ever want to chat, you know where to find me.

Thanks my g, you've got enough going on that I didn't want to burden you with my issues! Do drop me a message about when works for you, it's been a while since we've had a chat.

I find Matt Walsh vapid and not very bright in general but sometimes I have to laugh at his antics. He produced this new mockumentary called "Am I Racist?" and tricked Robin DiAngelo into sitting down for an interview with him (while wearing the flimsiest disguise).

Robin DiAngelo figured it out eventually, weeks later, and offered a statement in defense: https://www.robindiangelo.com/about-that-film/

From her damage control statement above:

Matt asked what I thought about reparations for Black Americans. I said that I agreed with reparations but that it was not my area of expertise. He then pulled up a chair and invited a Black crew-member who went by “Ben” to sit with us, took out his wallet and handed Ben some cash. He said that if I believed in reparations, I should also give Ben cash. While some Black people have asked white people to engage in reparations by giving directly to individuals, reparations are generally understood as a systemic approach to past and current injustice. The way Matt set this up felt intended to put Ben and I on the spot. Because Matt was pushing this on us, I expressed my discomfort and checked in with Ben, to be sure he was okay with receiving cash in this way. Ben reassured me that he was, so I went to my wallet and handed him my cash and the interview ended.

My reaction to this is: what the fuck? Did she really feel pressured into handing a random black person money because they were talking about reparations? LOL

While we're on the topic of mockumentaries, Tyler Cowen mentioned in a recent podcast that Trump has a surprisingly good bullshit detector and that when Ali G tried to punk him, Trump figured out in like one minute that this was a con and bounced. Contrast to Noam Chomsky just going on and on. Ali G punks a lot of people, but not Trump? Completely unexpected!

Robin DiAngelo seems in a class of her own here. Self-punking, perhaps? Talk about being high on your own farts.

Some time ago, I read both Ibram X. Kendi's "How to be an antiracist" and Robin DiAngelo's "White Fragility". While Kendi's book was not exactly high literature, it had a number of interesting aspects (for instance, Kendi came down quite clearly on the side that it is possible to be racist against whites and, indeed, that he himself had committed this sin and needed to repent of it to be a proper antiracist) and seemed at least to be heartfelt in the sense that Kendi really believes what he says. DiAngelo's book, on the other hand, came of as at least 95 % just grift; nothing original in it, a constant undertone of purpose being selling DiAngelo's own antiracism training sessions, in which she of course seems to have succeeded quite well at least quite some time after 2020.

I read them both during the big racial politics dust-up of 2020 and 2021, and my feeling was basically:

White Fragility is pretty much nonsense. There's very little in it that constitutes any form of argument. Most of it is accounts of DiAngelo's training sessions interleved with radical assertions. I have very little to say about it. What's most striking about it to me is how non-constructive it is. It contains zero actual proposals for how to combat racism, or fight for equality, or improve society - there is no praxis or theory of action. There isn't even any discernible interest in those questions. There's a single passage where she describes responding to someone who asked her "what to do about racism and white fragility?", and her answer is to suggest that the problem is that the questioner doesn't already know, and to exhort the questioner to "take the initiative and find out on your own". DiAngelo passes the buck! White Fragility is not a book interested in solutions. It is a book interested in deepening one's sense that there is a problem, but that's all.

How to be an Anti-Racist, on the other hand, is a book with exactly one idea. That idea is roughly: all races are equal, any inequities or differences in outcome between racial groups are therefore the products of racist policies, and as such any inequities or differences in outcome between racial groups must be remediated by anti-racist policies. There's a bit more to this than I would quibble (in particular his definition of race, "a power construct of collected or merged difference that lives socially", is far too broad; by Kendi's definition, genders are races, civic nationalities are races, being a member of a golf club is a race!), but that's the core idea. Different outcomes between racial groups is definitionally racist. Anti-racism is equalising outcomes between racial groups. Then the rest of HtbaAR is extraordinarily padded - a combination of Kendi describing his own (not very interesting) life story, and then Kendi repeating his definition over and over in increasingly tedious ways (biological racism, behavioural racism, colourism, class racism, space racism, gended racism, queer racism, etc.). His definition of racism is "a marriage of racist policies and racist ideas that produces and normalises racial inequities", and then he just replays it over and over.

(I don't think his definition is circular, for what it's worth. The above definitions of 'race' and 'racist' make that clear. A 'race' is "a power construct of collected or merged difference that lives socially", a 'racist policy' is "any measure that produces or sustains inequity between racial groups", and a 'racist idea' is "any idea that suggests one racial group is inferior or superior to another in any way". 'Racism' is adequately defined in these terms. The problematic definition is that of 'race' itself, which as noted I think is way too broad. In practice Kendi states that there are six races in the US - Latinx, Asian, African/Black, European/White, Indigenous, and Middle Eastern - and never considers that his definition might apply to more than these groups, or that you could slice the pie in many other ways.)

The frustrating thing about HtbaAR for me was the way that this idea is only ever asserted, never really discussed or argued for. Kendi never, for instance, says, "Some people might be doubtful of this definition, but here's why I think this definition best captures what we mean by racism and is the best basis for further work to produce justice in society." There are any number of obvious questions we might ask about his definition (have overachieving groups done some kind of injustice? if so, how? if racist policies are those that increase inequities between groups and anti-racist policies decrease inequities, doesn't that mean that it might often be impossible to judge whether a policy is racist or anti-racist before implementing it? if intent is irrelevant, does it mean that a benevolently-intended policy might be racist, and a malevolently-intended policy might be anti-racist?), but he never attempts to answer any such question, even the most obvious.

Ultimately I think my take is that DiAngelo is an opportunistic grifter, and Kendi is a well-meaning but unfortunately not very clever academic. If I were a professor and Kendi were one of my undergraduates, I'd commend his passion but tell him he has a lot more work to do to precisify his thinking.

My reaction to this is: what the fuck? Did she really feel pressured into handing a random black person money because they were talking about reparations? LOL

It seems highly relevent that she was paid $15,000 for this interview. I too would likely pay a few hundred bucks to stay in the good graces of such generous benefactors.

$15,000 for a couple of hours of answering questions on camera is crazy. Is this amount normal for academics?

diAngelo's speaking fees are famously high even by the standards of academics working in this milieu. She was paid the same amount for speaking at a library in Tulsa, refused a $10k speaking fee and makes $700k a year from speaking fees alone. Nice work if you can get it.

Yeah it's not out of line with what famous academics charge to speak for an hour.

For the very top household names it probably is (biblical scholar Bart Ehrman charges about this much for an appearance), Walsh and Co picked a number that was too good to pass up, but not so outrageous as to arouse suspicion.

I can't get over the scene in his mockumentary where the folks at some kind of woke circle realize who he is and kick him out because they "fear for their physical safety."

I find myself wondering: do they really believe this? Do they literally think Matt Walsh is going to rise from his folding chair and physically assault them? I have to think they know they are full of shit and this is just rhetoric to justify kicking someone out whose real crime is being an ass. I do not like Walsh or his tactics, he's a troll, but ffs just say "You're an asshole and we don't feel like being mocked on camera, so gtfo," don't make up some bullshit about fearing for your physical safety.

Do they literally think Matt Walsh is going to rise from his folding chair and physically assault them?

They're not afraid of Matt; they're afraid of his fans, many of whom have no qualms with disrupting their lives with online and offline antics.

That's... okay, I can actually buy that. Having Matt Walsh make fun of you in his movie probably does set you up for harassment by his troll legion.

I am not sure how many of them were actually making that calculation, and how many were just reacting emotionally to a bad man who isn't on their side suddenly appearing in their midst.

If a leftist troll got unmasked at a church or a MAGA event or something, do you think people would be frightened and saying they feel threatened?

I think there may well be a thought process along the lines of "This person is known to unapologetically violate some societal taboos of the highest order. How do I know he won't violate the taboo against suddenly punching his interlocutor in the face? You claim there is a big difference and he for sure won't violate that one, but is it my duty to understand the details of the principles of people with insane evil morality?". There is such a thing as being afraid of something you can't predict - imagine being trapped with a bear (and the claim that this bear is strictly vegetarian at this time of the year) or a member of one of those uncontacted tribes that sometimes shoot outsiders on sight (but sometimes are happy to trade in shells and trinkets).

There is such a thing as being afraid of something you can't predict - imagine being trapped with a bear or a member of one of those uncontacted tribes that sometimes shoot outsiders on sight

Why should I imagine them, and not a member of the society I live in, but one that has a very different worldview? Do you think I have no taboos? The one against surrogacy alone is on the same level as these people have against "racism". It's the fact that you this is considered an apt analogy, while arguing in their defense that gives a massive WTF quality.

I don't mean to argue that the attitude I impute to those people is healthy for themselves or society at large - just that it does not have to be dishonest, nor even made from stuff that is unusual for humans. The less colourful example of a similar sentiment from your ingroup is plain xenophobia (in the traditional, literal sense), like how a British gentleman in the 1850s may have felt queasy about living in a street full of Orientals. This is not to defend being so estranged from internal political opposition that it becomes an unfathomable other to you, but that jug of milk has already been spilt.

What's so surprising about them using words of power to summon The Manager? It's how they solve every interpersonal conflict and take over neutral institutions. It would be an enormous surprise if they didn't reflexively use the same universally successful tactic here.

What's even the point of asking this question? If you're in 1930s Russia, is there any benefit in asking "wow, do you really believe this railyard manager was part of the vast fascist-capitalist-trotskyist conspiracy to wreck the glorious five year plan?"
Just by asking the question you're buying into their frame and positioning the argument right where they want it: fighting over how racist you are for daring to question the lived experiences of trans black womxn.

A 2014 tumblrinaction post doesn't help anything, or it would have stopped this a decade ago. It's been 84 10 years, it's time to let the haughty fake surprise posts go, before you end up saying "these kids are in for a shock when they meet the real world"

Yes, I do think it's useful to question whether people really believe what they are saying.

Your post is very random and appears kneejerk and written without much reflection or content beyond seething at your enemy tribe.

Just by asking the question you're buying into their frame and positioning the argument right where they want it: fighting over how racist you are for daring to question the lived experiences of trans black womxn.

This makes no sense and looks like outrage generated by ChatGPT.

I believe the progressive people in question were doing the same thing.

In other words, they lied and used the privilege of being taken seriously to cover it up.

And to make my point more plainly: yes, I know why they do it. At the same time, maybe I am just too literalist, but I am genuinely curious who is a true believer. Some people did believe in the Red Scare, and heretics, and witches. So when I see a woke person saying, very earnestly, "You are making me feel physically unsafe," I get that it's a tactic, and she probably does "feel" unsafe, but at the same time I don't buy into the whole NPC/zombie meme, so I want to know (and would ask if I were there): "No, seriously, can you explain? Do you think he's literally going to pull a knife on you?"

(It's a good thing I am not a public figure who can be cancelled.)

I suspect that at least some of them are so heavily immersed in the "words are violence" memeplex that they literally no longer see the distinction between someone politely but firmly disagreeing with them, someone teasing them in a good-natured fashion, someone making fun of them in a mean-spirited way (without laying a hand on them) and someone physically assaulting them.

Or they're so fully immersed in safetyism that they're unable to express any objection to a particular person's presence in a particular space without couching it in the language of safety and harm reduction.

The steelman is that stochastic terrorism something something -- you only need one or two complete nutjobs in an audience of (supposedly) three million followers and however many indirect listeners to go on a bizarre stalking incident or drive through someone's front door (or just send a lot of junk e-mails or phone calls, which they counts as physical safety). That's still not a very strong steelman, given how rare it is, but they do act like they believe it.

That said, having seen similar stuff in other environments, I'd expect that the average person is either in the 'it's what I use to win in other contexts' or 'but the politics he advocates would hurt me' or even 'his political aisle used violence somewhere so he must be ejected'.

I find myself wondering: do they really believe this? Do they literally think Matt Walsh is going to rise from his folding chair and physically assault them? I have to think they know they are full of shit and this is just rhetoric to justify kicking someone out whose real crime is being an ass.

I would wager that they do genuinely believe that Walsh presents a danger to them in the moment that can be lessened by him being kicked out. However, that's about the extent of their thinking; there's no actual consideration for logic or physics or logistics of the situation. Rather, the logic is that someone presenting danger is a good reason to kick them out, and therefore if you want to kick someone out, claiming that they're dangerous is a good tactic. But if you claim that someone is a danger despite not believing that they're a danger, then that makes you a liar, which is bad, and you aren't bad. So you come to genuinely believing that this person presents a danger to you.

Do they literally think Matt Walsh is going to rise from his folding chair and physically assault them?

Only as much as it takes for the men they hope will come protect them to take their claims of unsafety seriously. They won’t defend themselves even if he was a threat- that’s beneath them; the most they will do is point their phone cameras (guns by proxy).

Trump figured out in like one minute that this was a con and bounced

Such a gentleman, I recognise that "just politely smile and nod" thing from whenever a crazy homeless person tries to engage me in conversation on public transport.

Floor plans redux!

I really like the "nine window" houses in NE USA:

Does anyone have a floor plan of one of them? I am curious about the staircase placement.

The "colonial" category on AdvancedHousePlans.com has floor plans for several similar designs—e. g., this one.

Man, that portico nailed onto the side looks awful. But I may be biased since I don't like the American colonial style generally.

ta!

Looks like the staircase is right in the foyer. How do they not spread the dirt all around the house?

yuo see Ivan, when you wearink the shoes in house, you will never worry of the spreading of dirt, because the house is already a sty.

But seriously, upstate NY is not dry Arizona, you can't just stomp your feet on the porch to get the bulk of the dirt out. Your boots are snowy or muddy, your coat and hat are wet, you need a place to store them out of the way of people walking between the dining room, the living room and the bedrooms upstairs. Did people who owned these houses not walk anywhere? Did they have their horse carriage parked right in front of their front door for every trip?

These houses were frequently built with a small vestibule just inside the front door, between it and the foyer. This vestibule would have either hat and coat hooks and a chest for shoes or a small closet for those items (or sometimes both). Also, these houses were typically built with wood floors throughout, which makes cleaning easier. And back in the day, most of the owners would have had maids to do the cleaning, so they were probably less concerned about making a mess than they would have been otherwise.

People of the Motte, what does your social life look like these days? What would you like for there to be more or less of? What is working well? What would you change?

Here are the social things I did in the last week. Of note, I am engaged, and so my fiancée (F) gets of my social points.

  • On Saturday, F and I went to Saturday church service, and then we went to a church festival elsewhere of a different church. (I tried to win at the "throw a beanbag at the bowling pins" game, but only hit the target 1 of 3 times. Poor showing.) We bought some stuff at the rummage sale, and listened to the local cover band play '90s hits.
    • Review: I would have liked to talk more to the people at church; instead, we left after the service ended. I want to increase those bonds. I think later this month I will attend my church's book club, currently reading Trials of the Earth: The True Story of a Pioneer Woman. Going to the festival with F was a lovely time that I would repeat without reservation.
  • On Sunday, F and I went to a charity gala sponsored by my employer. We made small talk with a few people, listened to guest speakers, and watched an auction.
    • Review: This was somewhat tedious, but I was honored that my employer picked me as one of just a few representatives to the gala. I would do this again, but I would not really look forward to it.
  • On Monday, my friend S came over to my house. We drank some bourbon and he beat the piss out of me at chess. S is a computer science student at the local university; I met him at the church I attended before I moved out of that neighborhood. S is a 2000+ rated player on Chess.com. He was happy to explain his moves, and my moves, and the implications of each while we played; and I learned a lot.
    • Review: This was a lot of fun and I would like to do it more often. However, overall I'd rather rest on Monday nights than do social things.
  • Wednesday is me and F's scheduled weekly date night. We opted for a quiet night in. On this occasion we read the pre-marriage book we're going through together, made some pumpkin cookies, played with my cat, and watched Gunsmoke.
    • Review: An enjoyable preview of married life, which generally reflects my preferences in every way.
  • The one other usual activity, is that I typically play tennis once a week with J, a man in his 50s who I met at a Meetup.com meetup. J has a moderate mental disability of some kind, and as a result has a mental level that I would say is about 12 years old; and it is very hard to understand him when he speaks. Nevertheless he's actually a pretty good tennis player, and he also likes to rant about the current political situation in a way that I find quite entertaining. Anyway, I bailed this week because I'm trying to get over a bunch of minor injuries.

Additionally, I have perpetual text or e-mail conversations going with: three friends from high school, two former coworkers, and my mom.

My assessment of my own social life: I do wish I had some more groups of friends based on similar interests, but this has never worked out for me before. I could start going to the local chess club or something; but every time I've gone to some sort of interest-based group in the last ten years or so, it's been dominated by strange people with poor social skills, who presumably are only able to socialize with this captive audience. I would like to become engaged with local political entities, and I might go to a dinner hosted by the local political party club in two weeks, just to see what it's like. And sometimes I think about joining a fraternal organization, and letting that be a place where I go to watch baseball games and drink beer socially in the summer; perhaps I will do that.

In general, I am plagued by the idea that I can't find high-quality, interesting, enjoyable people to hang out with - I have the ones I already have, but I can't seem to add to their number. It seemed so easy in college (as everyone says), but maybe my standards were just lower. In adult life, I seem to meet them basically at random, scattered about all different places and activities

My social life feels a bit full, but also I haven't seen enough of some of my long time friends recently.

I have friends from: neighborhood dads, underwater hockey, college, libertarians, and friends of friends. Its easy to see the neighborhood dads and underwater hockey people on a regular basis. Some of my favorite people are ones I didn't meet directly, but met through friends of friends, and I've missed three of the last invites from one of them and I feel bad and need to fix that somehow.

Some of the funnest people to hang out with are often the people I have very little in common with, except an easy going personality and good social skills. My wife is in that category, where we basically like none of the same things, but talk easily with each other and make each other laugh.

More of my social time is being eaten up with kid activities, and meeting parents of my daughter's friends. Generally its not so bad, people in my area that have managed to settle down with a partner and have kids tend to at least have a basic level of social skills.

I do wish I could get more people to play video games with me. I will maybe start putting out feelers on TheMotte closer to when the new Factorio expansion comes out. But if anyone is available to play Starship Troopers I'd like that as well.

I'm currently refreshing on Factorio in preparation for the expansion, let's coop?

I'll play coop when the expansion drops. Don't want to get burned out on the game before then.

Deal, see you then.

Motte Factorio Space Age Coop Campaign?

You in too? I'll save these comments

I'll probably be in the wrong time zone and busy with dad duties and whatnot, but if the stars align - sure!

Is the factorio expansion looking promising? Stuff like the quality modules seemed like a visit from the ☼Good Idea Fairy☼

It looks extremely promising. I've already thoroughly enjoyed the space exploration mod that was created by the guy leading the design for the new expansion (the factorio company hired him). Their Friday blog series has managed to track down and kill some of the slightly unfun parts of the game, or just optimize it to perfection. There are game mechanics in factorio that felt fine because basically no other game really has them. Things like creating circuits that set programmable behavior (other game have circuits stuff, but rarely to this extent). They streamlined it all.

Quality modules are option as far as I know. But I also plan to heavily use them. Right now factorio kinda lacks an endgame resource sink to get awesome stuff (you can sort of get it with research, but it doesn't quite feel right). I can't wait to pour massive amounts of resources into a legendary suit filled with legendary modules shooting legendary guns.

I'm excited about creating another multi planet factory system.

Did they integrate better AI into it ? Rampant seems pretty computationally simple but it works very nicely and depending on the setting and your bad habits can eat all the resources.

Never cared about pollution in normal Factorio, why would you? In Rampant I'm greener than the Germans.

Check out this enemy spoilers for the new expansion: https://factorio.com/blog/post/fff-429

Pretty cool. They're really getting everything out of the engine.

Oh yeah, looks like you'll have to wait for nukes to start just not caring about pollution anymore with that thing around.

that thing doesn't care about pollution. it uses a new system of territory, and only goes hostile if you build in its area. Pretty sure the lava planet doesn't have pollution at all, since the air is already a toxic stew.

I don't know if they changed the original biters. I know they changed some of the turret behaviors.and each planet is going to have its own unique challenges and enemies.

I do wish I could get more people to play video games with me.

What games do you like?

I like some PVE games. Survival, factory building, killing bugs, etc.

Deep Rock Galactic might be up your alley. It's a 4 player class-based PvE game (horde shooter?) where you play as a dwarf and you kill bugs and mine minerals on The Most Dangerous Planet In The Galaxy.

It's mission based. Missions have a primary objective that must be completed, no timer. They take roughly 20-40 minutes on average, but difficulty level and teammates and the specific mission push it lower or higher.

Man all this sounds dry as hell. The game is fun. Shooting bugs, working with your team, navigating the caves. The caves are procedurally generated, which works well due to each class' traversal tool. The driller can drill through anything at walking speed, the gunner can place ziplines, the engineer can place platforms, and all of these synergize and help the team. A mineral deposit high on a sheer wall is no issue, even with randoms, because of the pinging system.

It might have the best pinging system in any game. You hold a button to pull up your laser pointer. It has a little screen that tells you what you're looking at (mineral type, generic Common Rock, name of the bug chasing you, etc.). Press another button and you ping what you're looking at. Other dwarves can see both the ping (through walls) and the laser pointer. It's brilliant, and I think it's a big piece of why the game works so well even when you play with randoms.

As mentioned upthread, my social life is basically nonexistent at the moment. Downsides of living out of the way, with my colleagues mostly commuting in from the big city. No real opportunities to meet people outside of work unless I decide to haunt the local pubs.[1] I presume it'll get better once I move, be it from having opportunities to hang out after work, or simply by proximity to people who share my interests.

Luckily my girlfriend is doing her PhD at St. Andrew's, and I'm being gently coaxed into her social circle, but that's barely begun. They seem like nice enough people!

[1]The Scots have their priorities straight, the place doesn't have a GP or anywhere to buy clothing, but it's got 4 bars. And apparently had 27 servicing a mere 7000 people before COVID culled 'em**)

** The bars, that is, evidently it didn't cull the elderly enough if my patient pool is any testament. It gets awkward when one of the better bars is next to a care home that houses many of them, I could swear that I can spot a few of them who absolutely aren't supposed to be drinking in the clientele.

Nice rundown. I’m not in the US so the church-based focus of this is quite alien to me. A lot of people here go to Church but it’s down from probably 90%+ in the 1980s/90s to 30% now. (Guessing on these numbers but the fall off has been huge in a generation or so…) And the only people who use Church as social outlet are people aged 80 and up. Sad but that’s just the way it is, and probably a natural result of abuse scandals and coverups.

Could you explain what you mean by “ fraternal organization”? [Yes I can ask Google but just wondering what exactly they look like for you…]

For me (40s, married almost 20 years, two teenage kids) social life is quiet. I still live close to where I grew up but drifted away from all school friends (drift took place all the way through 20s, by the time we were all 35 we had nothing in common anymore). And I haven’t replaced those friends.

I’m involved in management teams of my old football club so it’s good to still be a part of a group of 20-30 year-olds trying to get the most out of themselves and each other. (It’s amateur but serious.)

Otherwise I run but not part of a club and prefer to do it alone. Also a member of a tennis club but it’s a strange social set, plenty of older richer people who have it made and are just enjoying life and I don’t have much in common with them, while the people my age and younger are sort of poor, a bit “drinky”, whiny and unambitious.

I’m after people my age with drive, energy and ambition - next stop might be a golf club. I love lots about the game but my game is crap and I haven’t yet got over the ego hump of getting lessons and putting in the hours to improve.

My wife and kids spend a lot of time together. I work from home, wife works near home, so we’re together 7 nights a week for an hour or two at least, but we haven’t done much socially. (Wife and son are mildly autistic and hate crowds so happier sitting silently with books, art or games at home.)

I’m much more extrovert but haven’t had much of a chance to explore that part of me last number of years. I like things like horse racing and poker but don’t have any friends to go/play with, went alone a few times and actually enjoyed it but still hard to get over the feeling of being a loner (I see other loners kicking their heels and looking smelly and friendless and would hate hate hate to be like them.)

I also write some poetry but have zero time for the poetry/spoken word scene. Full of self important dicks who think capitalism is to blame for their shitty lives and want to take it out on the world with snarky writing that has poor scansion and no rhythm.

Thanks for the question. It made me think about something I’d really like to improve.

Thanks for your response. I enjoyed reading it and commiserating. We're a bit apart in age but there is a great deal of common experience here.

For me personally - the church thing was certainly an intentional decision on my part to start using the "church subculture" as a primary social outlet. In my 20s, my socializing involved much more of "people in bars," "people at concerts," etc. It is true, though, that being in America means that it is at least somewhat viable to go this route as a younger person; but I would note it's still very much a minority position, even here. Where I live, you can safely assume that most under-30s you meet will be secular leftists who would not consider going to church.

"Fraternal organizations" are a somewhat unique thing. They are organizations that meet usually for charitable endeavors; and they have club houses in each neighborhood where they exist, where you can go and hang out. Generally speaking, they will have a bar and maybe a kitchen, and if you're a member, you can go there and drink very cheaply if you want to. Some of them are: the Fraternal Order of Eagles; the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks; and of course the Freemasons. It was a very common thing in America for men to join these up until maybe the 1970s or so, but they declined with the advent of television; Robert Putnam writes about this a lot in Bowling Alone. If you're a reader - the novels of Sinclair Lewis from the 1910s and 1920s have lots of characters who are members of these orders.

Anyway, like seemingly every voluntary social activity outside the home, these orders are mostly the reserve of provincials and the aging now; but I went as a guest to the local Eagles lodge a few times last summer, and it was really nice. If these exist near you (or whoever is reading this), they are absolutely a viable option to be your "third place," but many people don't even know they're there.

drift took place all the way through 20s, by the time we were all 35 we had nothing in common anymore

I am 35 now, and I'm experiencing this. I think it is more me that has changed, than them, but I suppose it is inevitable that one or the other will change. I continue to fight it, because I like still having an existing connection with the people with whom I formed pleasant memories; but the memories and the connection are fading together.

I love lots about [golf] but my game is crap and I haven’t yet got over the ego hump of getting lessons and putting in the hours to improve.

You and I have this in common as well. It does suck a bit, to try late in life to take up something which will require hundreds of hours to get good at; with golf I'm trying to decide if I've given up on it. I hit a lot of great wedge shots somehow, but everything else is just frustration, and that's simply because I haven't practiced and learned enough. As I mention elsewhere, I've taken up chess, and at least I can practice that substantially at home. But yes - I've kept up with tennis because I already invested the hundreds and thousands of hours to get good at it: I did this in my teens and 20s. Now it forms one of the limited number of "things I am genuinely good at," which is a number I may be unable to increase now.

I also write some poetry but have zero time for the poetry/spoken word scene.

I was a very keen fiction writer up until I was about 30 or so. Now, yeah, I no longer like the kinds of people that I could potentially share and discuss it with; and feeling like I have no possible audience is quite demotivational. Perhaps I'm best off roping in my friends and family to suffer through that.

Sometimes on weekends I go for long walks. We live near a big park with a giant pond, and Americans I've known who have walked this park say it's one of the finest parks they've seen, rivaling Central Park in NYC. I've never been to NYC (which is weird) but I have my doubts. The park is good though. It serves me well. I used to take walks with the boys when they were little; in the summer I'd take them for soft cream and french fries at the little hut that sells these for two months out of the year. In the fall I remember I once made them ham and cheese sandwiches and thermoses of corn soup and they wore big jackets and swished kicking through the bunches of leaves. We played baseball using pine cones for balls and broken limbs for bats. That memory will die with me, I expect, as they were too young to now remember it. They don't now take walks with me. Parents of young children, take note: Every season is different, and the joys you have now you should savor, for they will someday be gone, replaced. I won't belabor the point.

The park has cranes, turtles, great orange and red and dun-colored carp, big rat-like nutria, many many various-sized and -colored cats who make their home in the thickets and bamboo, and, once, I saw a fox. My wife does not believe this story ("What would it eat?") but I know what I saw. All kinds of pigeons and crows. You can see ducks floating out on the pond (more of a small lake). Once my youngest boy took his birthday present fishing rod out and practiced casting from the big rocks at the pond edge.

In certain times of the year there are fireflies, and you go and all the lights are off and you walk in pitch black by the creek that trickles down up the hill into the pond and the fireflies--hotaru in Japanese--bloom suddenly in that amazing bioluminescence and float up and back into the dark of the trees. Again, something we took the kids to a few times, years ago. My wife took my hand, as she sometimes--rarely, but sometimes--does, revealing what often seems a lost romantic streak. Women are magical. They do piss me off, yes.

I go for long walks sometimes but now alone--people have more important things do do--but I don't mind going solo, and probably prefer it sometimes. I do not listen to music or podcasts or audiobooks. You can see retired Japanese on bicycles with a bank of phones set up across the handlebars to play Pokemon Go. I do not know how it works. The local Filipino dudes fishing off the bridge, expressly against the signs which say "No fishing off the bridge," but I guess they can't read Japanese. (橋上での釣り中止).

People run in the park, and walk, and kids ride their bicycles through. In season, people spread out their light blue tarps and do cherry-blossom-viewing parties in the area with the cherry and plum trees. I walk all through the park and sometimes out the other end, where there is a trail along a narrow river, and across and down a hill through rice fields and into a cemetery. There are stone altar koro with candles or incense sticks. The other day I unwrapped one from the plastic bag in the little box and opened the drawer there where there were matches and lighters. I lit a stick and prayed for the dead, then added a prayer for the living for good measure. It is a Buddhist ritual, and my ex-girlfriend, a Catholic, used to say she felt Buddhism and Catholicism had a lot in common. I didn't know what she meant then and I still don't, but I suppose in very superficial ways the trappings are the same.

I could sprawl this out into a winding yarn even longer than it is. This makes my life sound very sedate and somewhat boring, and probably compared to many of yours my days are probably pretty dry. I write this in a way as a counterpart to this post and this other post, both of which made considerable impressions on me. I typically don't imagine I live in some idyllic wonderland--certainly if I wrote about my wife's hometown, which is like the Shire, only Japanese, I could make it seem as if I do. But I don't fear assault, and I am not routinely plagued by crime or filth or discomfort beyond a couple of guys fishing off the bridge.

As I write this my son is complaining about the fish eggs in the maki my wife brought home. She is insisting it's not ikura but he is having none of it. He is eating without his shirt on, something my own mother never let us do. They're all speaking Japanese, and I'm on beer #2. I just made a slip and when my wife said "You can't see your father's clavicle" I said "You used to could." This has caused a realization that I am actually not a standard English speaker. You can take the boy out of Alabama.

I'll try to improve my posting style to have more structure. I expect someday I'll miss these times, too, by which I mean this family table but also this, just posting on the Motte.

I like the nature here, and walks by myself. There are a huge number of foxes in central London. You see them pretty often, but you hear them howling every night. There are parks and greenery and trees everywhere, more so than any comparable European or American city that I have visited, squirrels so docile or unwittingly domesticated that you could pet them, friendly giant pelicans that waddle around the park and take pictures with tourists, and a very large number of swans. There is also the opportunity to regularly watch nature’s less savory interactions, especially between pigeons and seagulls, since we have great numbers of both. I once watched a seagull rip a pigeon out of the sky and dismember it, and sometimes you do find a brutalized pigeon corpse laying in the middle of the street or on the sidewalk; what at first glance could be the work of a car reveals itself pretty quickly to be that of a seagull.

Like you, I feel lucky to live in a place with little obvious squalor and crime, although certainly more of both than in Japan. There is a long-standing minor epidemic of phone snatching by men on mopeds (with no or removable plates, wearing balaclavas, thus presumably challenging London’s vaunted system of mass surveillance), but there are signs everywhere not to take your phone out on the street, and I find an Apple Watch is good enough to check texts and change music. These thieves do not seem to snatch the ten thousand dollar handbags I see even frail and elderly women around here carrying, interestingly, perhaps because their fencing pipeline is less developed or more easily penetrated by the police. We have some homeless, but they’re largely friendly-enough native military vets with a drinking problem or, Kurdish or Roma migrants who come as families, and who unroll their sleeping bags at night under the awnings of the department stores. They’re friendly enough, and the terrifying and dangerous schizophrenic tweakers one sees in American cities are completely absent. At least where I live, you can walk around at any time of day and night and deal with minimal real risk of interpersonal violence.

This makes my life sound very sedate and somewhat boring,

Trite though it may be, I’d say more of a Miyazaki impression. Magical slice of life.

I always enjoy your prose.

Second this. I think that a quiet, peaceful life is highly underrated. I also enjoy reading about everyday life in another country, as I'll almost certainly never experience it. I might visit Japan, but it's quite unlikely that I would ever live there for an extended period of time and settle into everyday life (nor in any other country, for that matter). So it is a delight to read about even if it seems boring to @George_E_Hale .

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Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


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