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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   3173 thread views

Wellness Wednesday for February 22, 2023

The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:

  • Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.

  • Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.

  • Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.

  • Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).

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I don’t like asking for random internet strangers for real life advice but I am going through a serious relationship problem and I really need some perspectives from people who don’t know me or my partner.

We are both mid-20s, together for quite a while, living together as well and starting out with decent careers as expats in . We are from very different cultural backgrounds (I am Turkish, she is Latina) but I always felt like we had good communication channels in English and I also speak her language. I am happy and she is too as far as I know. Actively having talks about future and children etc.

Now the issue. When we first met, there was a night out when we both got very drunk. My usual reaction to getting very drunk is to usually throw up, experience diarrhoea, be very uncomfortable for a while and swear I will never drink again. Never done something really embarrassing or regretful on alcohol. Turns out her reaction to getting very drunk is to basically have a full on personality change into a horrible bitch (her description), do very risky things, black out, pass out somewhere with no memory of anything that happened last night.

I was ready to never see this girl after that night but somehow I got convinced that she was genuinely regretful and this would never happen again. Meanwhile I know that her teenage years can basically be summed up as having constant mental problems and repeatedly doing things like this, fucking up her family relationships and academics until getting her shit together some years before we met.

Fast forward many years of never thinking about this stuff, last night on a small Friday evening drinks with her colleagues she has somehow done exactly the same thing and managed to drink herself to blackout drunk. I spent a horrible night thinking she might be dead or seriously injured or passed out in cold outside running around the city with some friends trying to figure out where she might be, and eventually the police found her on the sidewalk with plenty bruises and brought her home in an ambulance. Some of her things are missing and we will need to make sure she wasn’t assaulted or anything like that.

I am lost. We had a short talk in the morning where I made clear the relationship is over if she ever drinks alcohol again. Now she is sleeping and I cannot shake off this feeling that I am making a horrible mistake by not ending it here and now and I will come to regret this. On the other hand obviously I really don’t want to break up with the girl that I see as the love of my life when she is so vulnerable.

I can’t stop thinking that this bipolar—ish behaviour under influence and regular blackouts is indicative of a deeper mental problem that might come out in full force later in our life. Or that some parts of this stuff is hereditary and we will end up with horrible teenagers in 20 years constantly on the brink of drug addiction or whatever. I don’t know if these things make sense or if I am exaggerating.

My mind is in shambles and I don’t want to share this with friends or family because I don’t want her to be labelled as alcoholic or mental. I know in my Turkish friend and family circles this sort of behaviour would be seen entirely beyond the pale unacceptable. Maybe they have a point. I would appreciate any anecdote or perspective or even some medical research on the things I worry about.

From where I'm from heavy-drinking(occasionally!) is not a big deal. However people who become terrible people when drinking are. In fact the drinking is often used to identify these people. So in my uninformed opinion, I would worry about that if anything.

A lot of advice on both sides has been given in other threads, so I'll try to shed some light with an anecdote or two.

One of my friends dated a girl like this: sweet, caring and kind day-to-day, but became a monster when drunk. A combination of undiagnosed BPD and low tolerance for alcohol due to SSRIs led to quarterly, then monthly, then finally almost weekly blowups. She would get belligerent, messy, self-destructive, would actively fight off/try to escape from people trying to help her, it was a simple nightmare. For some people with BPD, alcohol is the perfect stimulant/depressive/uninhibitive cocktail to get them to show a really dark/animalistic side of their condition. Independent of the alcohol, it can begin manifesting in other areas of life.

Alcohol tolerance can shift wildly from person to person and from day to day, depending on food and water intake prior, rest and wakefulness, exercise, etc. People tend to find comfort in keeping up with others, because that keeps their consumption in check (they should only really get as drunk as they next guy/gal). If you're consuming more than everyone else, hard to act surprised when you get sledgehammered. I've had friends of all ages get surprised once in a while by how hard 8 to 9 drinks can hit. In an environment where alcohol consumption is ubiquitous (i.e. the West, South America, and large parts of Asia), getting a bit too drunk is inevitable. @MathiasTRex brings up a good point, the fact that her friends let her get away from them in that state is unacceptable. The number of delirious drunks that jump/fall off high ledges, or even just stumble and hit their hand and suffer permanent damage, would shock you (ask a cop/EMT from your area if you're curious).

From your post, it's not entirely clear if she falls more under the former (alcohol highlights {un,under}diagnosed condition) or the latter (sometimes can't keep up with the social drinking, and somewhat stupid/irresponsible drunk). In either case though, going forward, extra caution is definitely warranted around alcohol.

Thanks for anecdote. I believe there was a period in her life when she went to therapy for destructive behaviour and benefitted a lot from it. So much so that I didn’t feel the need to ask much about what was the reason exactly but perhaps I should.

I will reply under another comment about her friends not helping her.

I don't think you can do this alone. If she knows she has a problem and is genuinely committed to working on it, then you have to decide if you want to be at her side for this. How to do this and which practical steps to take - from just resolving to never have an alcoholic drink again to involving specialists in mental health or addiction (can be very hard to do this step, and support here would be crucial but it never can come from outside - she should realize by herself that she needs it, otherwise it will all fail). If you have been together for a while, and you love her, it may be worth it for you. If she is not ready to realize she has a problem, and it looks like just living with it is not tolerable for you, then "one more time and that's it" is just delaying the resolution because you're afraid to face the consequences. There will be next time, and you'll be in the same situation as you are now. You two need to do the hard work - to figure out whether it's going to be you together fixing the problem, or you both going your separate ways. I don't see any other option here.

I believe she is committed enough that I don’t think medical intervention is not necessary at this point. When I was writing this I wasn’t sure how she would react when she properly woke up but I am glad she understands the severity of what happened and was not defensive in any way about it.

We had an informal understanding that she doesn’t drink beyond slightly tipsy for years and she has been keeping it that way herself until last weekend. She can’t explain why she decided to ditch this and get shit faced drunk all of a sudden (it doesn’t help that she doesn’t remember almost anything). So in the future we decided to formalise it so that she only drinks when I am there, or only with a friend that we agreed upon who knows about her problem. Right now I trust her to keep this promise

We had a short talk in the morning where I made clear the relationship is over if she ever drinks alcohol again.

If this is genuinely how you feel, that one additional incident would end your relationship, you should probably break up with her right now. "First the man takes a drink, then the drink takes a drink, then the drink takes the man." Once one begins drinking, it often becomes difficult to modulate appropriately. It is unrealistic to expect to marry a woman with an alcohol problem in a society where alcohol is common and available, whether that problem is primarily addictive or that use would lead to blackout, and expect to go through life never having a single problem. Odds are that she will at some point do this again. You can probably prevent it from being a serious problem, hopefully make sure she is safe, but to expect her to never touch alcohol again as a professional in America is probably unrealistic. Odds are she will drink again, it's just a question of frequency.

That said, given your overall description, I don't think you should or need to break up. You're upset right now, I've been there, but give it a few days and see if you still feel the same way. An issue once every four years isn't ideal but can probably be handled, you can maybe make sure she doesn't drink in ways that could put her in danger. Think hard about it, no partner comes with zero downsides or issues. I have a deliriously happy marriage, but there have been things (perhaps not as bad) that I could quite easily have called hard-red-lines and dumped her over.

I agree with your analysis the most. It might be reasonable to draw a fairly firm line that OP views getting black-out drunk as a very serious problem, but even then it should be expected that at least once every ~5-10 it could plausibly happen. If it's truly unacceptable, continuing the relationship is a waste of time. If the benefits of the relationship outweigh that, then continuing the relationship is worth it.

There's a whole body of literature devoted to treating alcoholism (and also what people affected by / close to alcoholics should do). I am no expert here, but if you feel like classifying your partner as alcoholic, some of what comes to mind is setting boundaries that protect you (maybe this is what you mean by breaking up should this behavior recur again). To be fair, I sometimes worry that pathologizing alcohol use isn't productive.

Here's one of the top google hits I got, one suggestion that stands out to me that you should consider is:

Rather than obsessively monitoring your spouse’s drinking behavior, keeping constant tabs on their whereabouts, attempting to discard their alcohol, lecturing them, forbidding them from drinking, or pleading with them to stop drinking, you may choose to practice the art of actively releasing control over your spouse’s alcohol use. You did not cause their drinking, you cannot control it, and you cannot cure it.

This is only one approach that they mention and your mileage may vary, but maybe a dose of this in whatever intervention you pursue would be useful.

I think you (or a dispassionate observer in you and your partner's vicinity) should do some very careful analysis of the problem. Some people use therapists/counselors/religious entities/etc for this. People in relationships with alcoholics are often recommended therapy for themselves. What triggers/motivates the undesirable behavior? It may be a combination of factors (stress, relationship issues, friends who are alcoholics, dissatisfaction with life, unhappiness, just wanting to have fun and let loose, they feel like they aren't in control).

Have you considered setting up a way for your partner to get blackout drunk once in a while in a safe way? Like maybe they want to do this every 6 months or so.

Make sure you are safe, focus on your own needs first, support your partner as you can, including by separating if that is the appropriate intervention. This shit is hard, but you can do it. Good luck!

Edit: punctuation

Have you considered setting up a way for your partner to get blackout drunk once in a while in a safe way? Like maybe they want to do this every 6 months or so.

No and honestly I don’t think that’s a good idea at all. When I mean blackout drunk, I truly mean it. The whole night is totally blacked out in her mind and she is quite scared of this sensation. Plus we don’t know if this might have been an interaction with something wrong with her brain chemistry and best not trigger this.

Two cases of total blackout danger-zone drunkenness in "many years" and keeping it control in between ain't breakup material. Of course, that's also my local culture speaking.

There's no doubt that there is a strong genetic and hereditary component to alcohol tolerance and addiction. That said, if she's a reasonable, mature and grown up person, she should be able to control herself - and by your account she does. Only two such slips in what sounds like several years is not a lot, and as she gets older it should happen less, not more.

I don't believe that her behavior while drunk is revealing the 'real' her. Nor would I worry about how your unborn children will turn out. Who knows? From your description, she's had a difficult life, and though she might have issues, she must also possess some desirable qualities.

I realised later that from my description her friend group sounds indeed very trashy and irresponsible but that’s because I was omitting some details which weren’t relevant in my mind at the time.

They did help her get home and in fact it was all supposed to be arranged with me that they would drop her at a certain train (this is happening at ), we would make sure she doesn’t fall asleep and another friend of mine would pick her up at the next stop. Things went south because of some miscommunication and confusion that made us think she didn’t get out at the correct station, even though she did. So we ended up looking for her in the next stations in the trajectory for hours meanwhile she was there all along and could have just walked home in 10 minutes. The whole time she was on the phone but too drunk to just send her gps location and kept confusing everyone with contradictory drunken information. Looks like she fell face first at some point and got the injuries that way. Luckily the police found her before things got any worse. All around a shit show but I don’t blame anyone.

About the friend group, they aren’t really friends but colleagues at her new work place’s DEI support group or something like that (yes these things are totally becoming normal in Europe too). So we don’t think anything non-HR approved happened there.

I would want to know about her family. Do either of her parents or any close relatives have drinking problems? Or if they had them in the past, did they grow out of them? Any history of mental illness too?

If this kind of binge drinking is as rare as your post suggests it is, then perhaps she will grow out of it. People become less reckless and more mellow as they age, so it's possible that she never drinks like this again. On the other hand, this could represent nascent alcoholism which would be a real problem.

Her entire extended family are strict Mormons from so there aren’t many datapoints with regards to how they interact with alcohol or any history of getting a diagnosis for mental health issues.

With some more consideration we decided that it probably had to do with a combination of her inherent vulnerability to alcohol due to her general genetic makeup (indigenous Americans aren’t exactly known for their healthy relationship with alcohol) and possibly drunken state of mind interacting badly with certain underlying mental problems she might have.

At the moment I came to trust that this isn’t indicative of anything that will repeat in the future and she will keep to our agreements about alcohol

I'm in my 40s. My LDL-c is rising despite an absurd effort on lifestyle diet/exercise stuff. It's now at about 130. I'm trying to convince my doctor to put me on statins to reduce it but he just reiterates lifestyle. He appears to be following guidelines. But what's the risk to lowering LDL-c anyway in spite of the guidelines? Trying to understand if he is resisting this outside of "if I deviate from guidelines and something bad happens I get sued and I'm not going to do research to figure out if it's worth it in your case".

What kind of guidelines are those? 130 is well outside of the reference interval, assuming you mean mg/dl. As far as I understand Statins are indicated for values above 85. Being more than 50% above that and still not recommending Statins sounds very strange.

I'm healthy and fit (BMI of ~23 and BF <15%) but I got put on statins when my LDL levels got 5.2/93.6.

Edit: Ignore this, I converted things wrong, see below.

Wow, what country do you live in? Do you have any specific risk factors?

I live in Sweden, no risk factors.

Edit: I used the wrong conversion table! Sorry!

My LDL when I got put on statins was 200 mg/dl, not 94.

The upper bound of the reference interval is about 180, not 130.

I don’t know enough about Statins to have a real opinion on it, but do you use fish oil? It reliably lowers triglycerides and seems to have a beneficial effect on cholesterol (it tends to raise hdl a lot more than ldl so even if you’re ldl rises the hdl to ldl ratios are improved https://www.mayoclinic.org/drugs-supplements-fish-oil/art-20364810).

Also if you decide you just want it any way it’s really easy to get something like lipitoir prescribed, I have used this https://plushcare.com/lipitor-atorvastatin-prescription/ for ozempic so I don’t think you would have any trouble with a statin.

I have some trans friends (who I love dearly) and they are offended by some of J.K. Rowling's remarks and beliefs. When they see Harry Potter content (including streams and clips of the new Harry Potter game), it can be offensive and threatening for them.

Growing up, I had a fondness for Harry Potter. I read all the books, watched all the movies, and to this day I have a deep nostalgic attachment to the franchise. I don't personally have an issue with Harry Potter, and all I have seen in terms of criticism of J.K. Rowling was Dave Chapelle's stand-up special (not particularly critical) and a blog post about an inflammatory tweet J.K. Rowling made about a male rapist transitioning and asking for internment in a women's prison (this seems like the edgiest of all edge cases and only useful as an inflammatory wedge).

I believe that my trans friends should be able to browse the internet without seeing content they deem hateful/disturbing (like harry potter content). But I also sympathize with people who want to play the new Harry Potter game or watch their favorite streamer play the new game.

Furthermore, there's an issue where if a streamer has trans viewers (I'd imagine most of the top 100 streamers have at least a couple, and the top 10 streamers in any channel have many trans viewers), by playing the new Harry Potter game the streamer is knowingly streaming content that will offend (some of) those trans viewers (admittedly not all trans people will be offended by the Harry Potter stuff).

My current position is that I hope the hubbub and streamer playthroughs of the game will subside in a week or two and we can just forget the whole thing. But I think this kind of tension will come up a lot. Like the next time Dave Chappelle releases a special. I will want to watch it.

How can I support my trans friends while also being okay with people enjoying the new Harry Potter game?

How should I feel about streamers who choose to play the new Harry Potter game on stream? In some sense they have disregarded my friends' feelings and excluded them from their community!

Any response is much appreciated.

  • -10

When they see Harry Potter content (including streams and clips of the new Harry Potter game), it can be offensive and threatening for them.

Oh come on. I mean, if they would find themselves locked in a room with JKR holding a gun, that maybe would qualify as somewhat threatening - even though as far as we know there's zero evidence of JKR being prone to violence, so it wouldn't be really threatening either. Witnessing content produced by a person whose views you hate is not "threatening". It can be upsetting. It can be infuriating that a person who is literally Hitler still allowed to parade around and express their opinions and release games and profit. I get it. I can also be upset when I see a person who I think is a complete asshole - or even criminal, or even a genocidal maniac - prosper and not being punished. It is a natural feeling, and it happens to pretty much everybody.

What it isn't however is "threatening". Just stop abusing language this way. Existence of Harry Potter games is not "threatening" anybody, and being upset is not the same as being attacked. At best, it's self-harmful, since living in constant panic over things that aren't threatening you is bad for you mental health. At worst, it is a cynical manipulation, trying to weaponize everybody's sense of fairness and protectiveness to aim it at attacking somebody you disagree with.

this seems like the edgiest of all edge cases and only useful as an inflammatory wedge

Example: being a female locked up 24/7 with a violent rapist who has bodily strength advantage and all the sexual equipment and desires of a male - this is what one would properly call "threatening". Of course, female inmates forced to live with this treat aren't likely your friends. But you may want to take time and think why you are so upset by a prospect of somebody encountering a mention of a game and not upset at all and in fact completely dismissive of a prospect of somebody being raped. I think friendship alone is not enough for such difference.

I believe that my trans friends should be able to browse the internet without seeing content they deem hateful/disturbing

No they shouldn't. What they should be able is to choose which parts of the internet to browse, and whether or not to feel offended. They don't own the internet, and they don't own the minds of other people. Nobody has the right to claim that everybody else in the world should behave in ways that would never disturb you. They can take measures to limit their browsing in ways that would be less disturbing to them - and you, as a good friend, should help them, either by disabusing them of the notion that Harry Potter games "threaten" them, or by helping them browse only in places where they won't be upset by mentioning it. What neither you nor your friends have is the right to control other people's thoughts and expressions so that they would never upset you. This is totalitarian dictatorship stuff, you should not go there.

How can I support my trans friends while also being okay with people enjoying the new Harry Potter game?

Try to explain to them that people have different opinions, and that doesn't mean they are "threatening" them. If that proves impossible, then you'd have to choose whether you never mention anything related to topics that upset them in their company ever again, or suffer the consequences.

In some sense they have disregarded my friends' feelings and excluded them from their community!

No, your friends excluded themselves from the community by choosing to feel upset about the game which in no way does them any harm. It is certainly their right and privilege to do so - everybody has a choice of communities to which attach or detach. But it's also their choice. Which can they change at any moment they'd like to. What they can't is to seek totalitarian control over every community by threatening to feel excluded if everybody doesn't behave according to their liking.

What it isn't however is "threatening". Just stop abusing language this way. Existence of Harry Potter games is not "threatening" anybody, and being upset is not the same as being attacked. At best, it's self-harmful, since living in constant panic over things that aren't threatening you is bad for you mental health. At worst, it is a cynical manipulation, trying to weaponize everybody's sense of fairness and protectiveness to aim it at attacking somebody you disagree with.

I'm okay if you read my use of the word "threatening" as "upsetting," that gets my point across, even though it's not quite the same. You could argue that I'm a rhetorical charlatan for using the word and I would see how you got there. But it's fair to assume that someone who feels vulnerable about their trans identity could feel threatened by some of the stuff J.K. Rowling says, and be reminded of it when they get served Harry Potter content on the internet, thereby feeling threatened. But I'd be willing to compromise and use the word "upsetting" if you're okay with that, either one serves to help illustrate the problem I'm having.

why you are so upset by a prospect of somebody encountering a mention of a game and not upset at all and in fact completely dismissive of a prospect of somebody being raped.

This is getting off track-- I made this post because I didn't come clean to my friend about my feelings and beliefs, and I want to be sensitive to their feelings and beliefs. I am seeking advice for how to handle the issue. What's a contentious issue between you and your friends? How would you handle it if it came up in conversation? Would you avoid it?

I am dismissive of the rapist tweet because:

  1. Most trans people don't become trans because they want to rape people (I believe the numbers of fradulent trans people are on the order of 1 per 1 million, but even if it's 1 per 1000 how many fraudulent trans people are also rapists?).

  2. The tiny minority of fraudulent trans people (like, for example, rapists who want to go to a women's prison) will get extra scrutiny and be dealt with accordingly.

  3. If the rapist who became trans wants to rape people, they shouldn't be allowed to do so in any prison, let alone a women's prison.

  4. It's a tweet, and it's ridiculous

Try to explain to them that people have different opinions

I think the argument that people have different opinions (and that sometimes their opinions are dumb and/or offensive, or in the case of J.K. Rowling driven by their life experiences) is a good one to use. I may incorporate this into how I handle the topic if it comes up in conversation again.

I'm okay if you read my use of the word "threatening" as "upsetting," that gets my point across,

It's not like you are making a favor to me because I'm dumb and can't understand it otherwise. It like using this term is abusing the language and we all need to stop doing it. Moreover, you are abusing it in a way that is also used by people to do very bad things. I do not say your goals are also bad, I am completely willing to accept it's an innocent mistake driven, but I am saying staying away from such abuse is not some negligible concession to just get people to understand you better. It's a very important principle and should be done because it's the right thing to do.

But it's fair to assume that someone who feels vulnerable about their trans identity could feel threatened by some of the stuff J.K. Rowling says

Their feeling would be wrong. If they are your friends, you will be doing them a service correcting their picture of reality to match the actual reality. Believing in false things is very rarely good for you. If somebody feels the TV is giving them orders coming from Alfa Centauri, they need help. If they feel a game is threatening their existence, they need help. If Rowling advocated, say, for putting trans people into camps or sending them off to Australia, then that may be thought of as threatening, but she never did that, did she? And neither does the game include any elements that promote such actions, right? So I don't see anything threatening.

If you mean that Rowling words may cause them doubting their identity - well, if their identity is so unclear to them that a word of a random person can change it, maybe it's a good thing they hear those words? Unless being trans carries some value to them and they are actually scared that it may be revealed to them that they aren't actually trans and thus lose this value and become ordinary boring people, like the rest of us? I certainly hope that's not the case.

Most trans people don't become trans because they want to rape people

The females in that prison won't be locked together with "most trans people". They will be locked with the specific rapist, who we know raped people because that's the reason he's in prison. And he somehow "discovered" he's "transgender" only after being convicted.

What's a contentious issue between you and your friends? How would you handle it if it came up in conversation? Would you avoid it?

If I see no chance to change my friend's mind or if I feel trying to do so will hurt them emotionally - yes, I'd avoid that. If I can't avoid it, I'd tell them that I am their friend and I value their friendship, but I think they are wrong here, and explain why.

I believe that my trans friends should be able to browse the internet without seeing content they deem hateful/disturbing (like harry potter content).

How can I support my trans friends

Teach them that uBlock is not just an adblocker, and that they can use it to hide any youtube videos with specific words or phrases in the title, by adding a rule that looks like

youtube.com###dismissable:has-text(/harry\s*potter|rowling/i)

I think "trans people should be able to browse the internet without seeing content that disturbs them" is a perfectly reasonable opinion. I think the best way to achieve that is to teach them how to filter out the bits of the internet that disturb them on their end, rather than trying to change the internet as a whole so that an unfiltered stream is not disturbing.

This is cool, I will keep it in mind and recommend it if the opportunity arises. Thanks!

I believe that my trans friends should be able to browse the internet without seeing content they deem hateful/disturbing (like harry potter content).

To me this seems like the error. Rather, it is your friends' responsibility to avoid content they find offensive, and when they do encounter it, control themselves like adults and promptly move on to look at stuff they do like without losing their shit. This is the strategy I employ.

If your friends weaponize their own discomfort and suffering to control your behaviour, they are being manipulative. Under any other circumstance, 'you must agree with me or you hate me and want me to die' is emotional manipulation, plain and simple.

Is this a troll? Are streamers not supposed to ever mentiom eating pork or beef because they could offend hindus and Muslims.

Its not like your friend will die an anxiety filled death if they see the harry potter game for 2 seconds on a stream and just go ahead and close the stream. Fucking ridiculous levels of sensitivity. They would get hurt by seeing a third party art of someone who doesnt like their general group? How mentally fragile can you get?

They can just install a browser extension and block harry potter keywords for life.

Would hindus and muslims object to content creators eating beef/pork? I don't know from experience if this is true or not, I will defer to you here. My guess is that they wouldn't mind, based on my Jewish friends not caring if the content creators they watch eat kosher.

I think a better analogy would be something like if J.K. Rowling were to depict the prophet Mohommad like Charlie Hebdo did. I personally am okay with Charlie Hebdo publishing pictures of the prophet, but I understand that this offended and upset many muslims (I don't condone any of the violent responses).

To Muslims (I gather this from media, etc, I am not muslim), depictions of the prophet Mohommad without the proper ritual are super offensive, to trans people, some of the shit that J.K. Rowling (and Dave Chappelle) say is super offensive. Like, that seems okay (that they are offended), right? Are trans people suggesting that they will feel an anxiety-filled death if they see harry potter content? I think that's not fair. In my experience trans people fought for a boycott (valid choice for activist action) and criticized people who didn't boycott (also a valid choice for activists), is that crazy?

Edit: forgot pork

How can I support my trans friends while also being okay with people enjoying the new Harry Potter game?

Your friends are being ridiculous; the proper response is ridicule. This will help your friends better understand that such tremulous, pathetic behavior is unbecoming of anyone past the "learning to walk" stage of development. It will also encourage them to grow as individuals until they perhaps can endure even greater trials than the existence of a video game that is licensed from an IP by a woman who only 98% agrees with their politics.

Based on all prior experience, you will likely have to choose between enthusiastically validating this ridiculous behavior or facing the fact that your beloved friends have become unhinged lunatics.

Why is ridicule an appropriate reaction in this case and not civil discourse? (this is an earnest question, not rhetorical. Would you lay out the case for this approach?)

Edit: clarify earnest-ness

A decade ago, a close friend and his baby mama invited me to their home under the pretense of a cookout, then proceeded to defile the ancient compact of guest right by disingenuously feeding me turkey burgers, and allowing the baby mama two hours to lecture me about how vaccines cause autism. This girl was the sort of person who was totally confident that she could have been a scientific researcher if she hadn't been too busy railing against her mildly right-wing mother. The arguments she made during that lecture were deeply ignorant. Things like "complaining about the wrong type of mercury" or "describing the mechanism in a way that chelation therapy really ought to cure autism and failing to notice that no one was using chelation therapy to cure autism". For the sake of social cohesion, and the tattered dignity of my clearly shameful friend, I held my tongue and politely thanked her for her concern, and she continued threatening his child with her malignant idiocy for a few more years.

You see, back in the Oughts, being anti-vax was a left-wing phenomenon, associated with the hippie, "granola girl" subset of left-wingers. They disliked vaccines for being "unnatural", and eagerly lapped up misinformation on social media about the superiority of natural/homeopathic/homemade alternatives. Then, repressed diseases like measles started outbreaking in exactly those progressive communities in places like California. I remember one researcher darkly quipping that you could model the locations by looking at a map of Whole Foods stores.

That dangerous tendency was brutally stamped out by saner members of those communities, not by civil discourse, but by relentless, cruel "dead unvaxxed kid" memes. Being anti-vax was subjected to vicious mockery, and the granola girls quickly dropped it because it was too uncomfortable to be ruthlessly pilloried for being dangerously fucking stupid.

This was the right move, tactically speaking. Rational arguments against the vaccine-autism link had been available the whole time. For most of those people, it was an ego/status thing. As the saying goes, you can't reason someone out of the position they didn't reason themselves into. You definitely can, however, shame them for being low-status losers until they rationalize themselves out of their stupid beliefs and get their kid fucking vaccinated.

And back to your specific situation, I have never, ever, ever, ever seen trans ideologues ever respond positively to civil discourse. I am not saying this about "all trans people". I have encountered plenty of them over the years who seem psychologically normal for whatever community we were in. But of the subset of trans people who are politically activated about the topic, the co-morbidity of serious, delusional derangement seems to be approximately 100%.

If your friends are the sort of people who are deeply upset about JK Rowling in general, I think attempting civil discourse is almost certainly a waste of time at best. I encourage you to try it anyway, for the same reason I encourage leftists to attend DSA meetings - I expect nothing will blackpill you faster, though that will probably burn the relationship. Ridicule will be healthier for your own mental state, and has a better (i.e.non-zero) chance of manipulating those friends into less stupid and contemptible behavior.

Shaming doesn't work very well when the shame-ee has a bunch of people who will promptly reassure him/her that it was all bullshit and also the person who shamed him/her is evil (a.k.a. a safe space). There are lots of safe spaces for transfolk - indeed, there has been quite the deliberate effort to install them everywhere. Vaccines are not a great analogy here (assuming for the sake of argument that your story is correct) because being anti-vax was always low-status and had few safe spaces.

Also, in general I think there are points to be won for not being the first to turn hostile, particularly between scrupulous people. If the other person pulls the trigger, there's no niggling doubt about "what if I hadn't done it".

So, I appreciate the case you've made (and the story), but I got to thinking:

That dangerous tendency was brutally stamped out by saner members of those communities, not by civil discourse, but by relentless, cruel "dead unvaxxed kid" memes.

Are you sure the memes and shaming are what caused the change in behavior? Wouldn't the simpler, more likely reality be that when kids started dying and getting really sick, enough people changed their minds and herd immunity got better and the status race around anti-vaxxing waned in popularity?

Like, I vaguely recall hearing that the DARE (anti-drug-use-amongst-kids program in the United States a few decades ago) initiative, despite its intention had no effect or the opposite of its intended effect. Isn't that true of many of those public awareness campaigns (and today many of them use coopted memes?) Are you sure that isn't the case with the SoCal anti-vax stuff?

I'm open to the idea that civil arguments aren't always the right approach. I do want to at least have a rationalization for my position, then I can start making convincing arguments and poking fun (ridiculing?).

Do you have any particularly good zingers you would use to ridicule someone who is complaining about the harry potter stuff? (I realize this sounds insensitive, but I would imagine there are some good ones, and the likelihood that I will use them against my friend(s) is low. It's possible that some of the zingers might have kernels of interesting arguments)

I'll admit I'm not omnisciently certain about that version of history I relayed. But the problem with DARE is that it told people wildly exaggerated lies, from a position of authority. Then people tried some pot, realized they didn't kill their friends and destroy their life, and figured that heroin was probably fine too. The anti-vax stuff was also fairly exaggerated, but in a more defensible, joking manner. Also, it was coming from a stance of higher status, well-off STEMlords ripping into their friend's housewives for being gullible and negligent. Basically, I think in those situations, mean girl tactics worked better at manipulating behavior than out-of-touch lectures from the principal.

Do you have any particularly good zingers you would use to ridicule someone who is complaining about the harry potter stuff?

I might go with variations on the Read Another Book memes. Treat caring about Harry Potter at all as low-status and childish.

I'm open to the idea that civil arguments aren't always the right approach. I do want to at least have a rationalization for my position, then I can start making convincing arguments and poking fun (ridiculing?).

I wish you the best of luck. If you have any success, with any approach, please let us know.

This is great advice, thanks for the suggestions and the story.

I’ll consider this approach.

I have some trans friends (who I love dearly) and they are offended by some of J.K. Rowling's remarks and beliefs. When they see Harry Potter content (including streams and clips of the new Harry Potter game), it can be offensive and threatening for them.

Do you think that it is healthy for them to be so easily offended by things? Do you think it is in their best interests to feel threatened by things that cannot harm them? Aristotle defines friendship as a mutual feeling of goodwill, of wanting what is best for one another; are your friends as anxious for the world to be as you wish it to be, as you are for the world to be as they wish it to be?

J.K. Rowling appears to be as trans-positive as it is possible to be without accepting outright falsehoods or social policies that literally and demonstrably endanger women. People who feel "threatened" by her work are either engaged in performative displays of virtue signalling, or have internalized falsehoods. Trans people who feel "threatened" by work that draws inspiration from her work, created by people who actively disagree with her on trans issues, take a further step away from reality, stringing the causal chain out into absurdity.

It would be healthy and wise for your friends to be better people, and you should want that for them. Indulging their anxiety-spiraling flights of fancy is not goodwill, but--at best--a kind of pity. This is a distortion of the virtue of friendship.

I believe that my trans friends should be able to browse the internet without seeing content they deem hateful/disturbing (like harry potter content).

This is just incompatible with the internet being a place that everyone gets to use to their liking. If you don't like Harry Potter content, don't seek out Harry Potter content. If your favorite streamer is streaming Harry Potter content, you have a choice: stop watching their stream, or get over yourself.

How can I support my trans friends while also being okay with people enjoying the new Harry Potter game?

If they're really your friends, it won't hurt them that you enjoy Hogwarts Legacy; they have no reason to think it will hurt you. I have many friends who believe things I find incorrect or even abhorrent. I do my best to function as a moral exemplar to them, and I like to think they are doing their best to do the same for me. Our disagreement does not preclude any of that. By contrast, someone whose every whim I must indulge is not my friend, but my master.

How should I feel about streamers who choose to play the new Harry Potter game on stream? In some sense they have disregarded my friends' feelings and excluded them from their community!

In no plausible sense have they disregarded your friends' feelings (how could they even be aware of your specific individual feelings?) or excluded anyone from their "community." For one thing, it's not really a community, it's a parasocial bit of internet media. For another, if they play boring games instead of offensive ones, does that "exclude" people? If they express political beliefs explicitly, does that "exclude" people? There was a joke back in the 1990s that the only people who listened to Rush Limbaugh were "liberals" looking for something to complain about--which was why he had an audience of millions!

To be quite honest, part of me seriously wonders whether your post can possibly have been written in earnest, rather than as a troll, or a bit of bait for confirming your own priors, or something. It all sounds a bit too convenient to me. But I have to admit that Poe's law may well apply here, so I have responded to the best of my ability. If these Rowling-phobic trans friends of yours are earnestly afraid, then obviously it would be polite of you to not play Hogwarts Legacy in front of them, or invite theme to a Dave Chappelle viewing party. But you've absolutely no reason at all to fault others for playing Hogwarts Legacy or streaming it. And if your trans friends think less of you for being insufficiently enraged by their own pet neurosis, well, then they are not very good friends.

J.K. Rowling appears to be as trans-positive as it is possible to be without accepting outright falsehoods or social policies that literally and demonstrably endanger women.

This seems like a stretch, can you elaborate here? Like the thing about a rapist asking to be imprisoned with women is hardly evidence that women in general are in danger (I'll admit maybe I'm just ignorant here). It's a cherry-picked example of an extreme edge case that's easily handled on a case-by-case basis.

If they're really your friends, it won't hurt them that you enjoy Hogwarts Legacy; they have no reason to think it will hurt you.

This seems disingenuous (although it's poetic), I don't think anyone's under the illusion that it will hurt me-- isn't it about politics or something?

I do my best to function as a moral exemplar to them, and I like to think they are doing their best to do the same for me. Our disagreement does not preclude any of that.

How do you address topics with your friends that you know you disagree on? Can you give an example? Especially when they come up organically, in the course of regular conversation? This happened to me today, and I avoided the subject.

In no plausible sense have they disregarded your friends' feelings (how could they even be aware of your specific individual feelings?)

This isn't quite correct-- literally no one was surprised (that's hyperbole, sorry, but you get the point) that there was a boycott of the game and loud pushback.

But you've absolutely no reason at all to fault others for playing Hogwarts Legacy or streaming it. And if your trans friends think less of you for being insufficiently enraged by their own pet neurosis, well, then they are not very good friends.

So to go back to the specific example that prompted my post, the friend I was talking with today didn't behave that way-- when the issue came up in conversation and I kind of side-stepped, she did as well and we didn't speak of it again. I didn't feel good about it for a few reasons, one of which was I wasn't totally sure how I felt about the issue. I'm hoping to get some more clarity and then either destroy her with facts and logic or live and let live (or maybe a wild third option I hadn't considered yet).

Like the thing about a rapist asking to be imprisoned with women is hardly evidence that women in general are in danger (I'll admit maybe I'm just ignorant here). It's a cherry-picked example of an extreme edge case that's easily handled on a case-by-case basis.

As far as I have seen, the "extreme edge case[s] . . . easily handled on a case-by-case basis" are the sum total of Rowling's putative "transphobia." She explicitly believes that transsexuals/transgendered/etc. should be treated with courtesy, referred to by their preferred pronouns, included in polite society--except she strongly opposes their participation in spaces that specifically exist to protect females from males. Sex-segregated spaces like prisons or women's shelters have historically been sex-segregated for good reason--because women are characteristically vulnerable to men in certain specific ways. You can't say "that's a cherry-picked case" while also maintaining that Rowling is somehow transphobic; her opposition to the statement "trans women are women" extends only and exactly to the cases that are so obvious, your instinct is to call them "cherry-picked."

How do you address topics with your friends that you know you disagree on? Can you give an example? Especially when they come up organically, in the course of regular conversation? This happened to me today, and I avoided the subject.

There's certainly nothing wrong with avoiding the subject, but it would be nice of your friend to notice that you avoid the subject and intuit that they should drop it.

For me, how I act depends on the subject, and on the friend, and on the occasion! Usually I just say what I believe. If they say something I disagree with, I usually say something like, "Hmm, I disagree, because..." and then I tell them why. Then I listen patiently while they destroy me with facts and logic, and either I change my mind or I don't, and we get back to doing more important things, like playing games or complimenting one another's taste in clothing. Sometimes they say things I disagree with, but it seems unimportant or like a bad time to disagree, so I might say, "I'm not so sure about that, but it's complicated, so for purposes of this discussion let's assume that's right." And sometimes I just let it pass because I've got other priorities in the conversation than making my views maximally clear. I am more willing to be blunt and offensive in my own house than in other people's houses. I am more willing to be blunt and offensive at casual occasions than at major social events (weddings, christenings, etc.). Just not making my political identity my whole identity goes a long, long way in these matters.

But admittedly I am older than the modal mottizen, and worry much less about social standing than most people do. I have definitely had people I thought were my friends cut me out of their life because I was honest about my beliefs, and willing to defend them. I am sorry about that, but I have many other friends who appreciate my candor and effort even when we disagree, and I would probably not be such good friends with them if they didn't appreciate me in this way.

This isn't quite correct-- literally no one was surprised (that's hyperbole, sorry, but you get the point) that there was a boycott of the game and loud pushback.

Right, because trans-Twitter is extremely predictable in this regard. But doing things that you know some group will be upset about is not much of a reason to not do those things. It's important for you to consider the feelings of your friends (and for them to be considerate of yours), but you have no reason at all to worry what a stranger is going to think of you, no matter how loudly they complain about it.

I'm hoping to get some more clarity and then either destroy her with facts and logic or live and let live (or maybe a wild third option I hadn't considered yet).

FWIW, this sentence substantially increases my suspicion that you are trolling. If you're looking for ways to "destroy her with facts and logic" then you're being a pretty shitty friend. But if she is constantly making you feel uncomfortable with demands for allegiance to her pet cause, she's being a pretty shitty friend. And really--if she's a decent friend, you saying "I think you're great and I like your company, but I just disagree with you about some of these things and I'm worried that our friendship might not survive our disagreement," I would expect her to at minimum just avoid the topic with you in the future. She may even appreciate that you took the time to inform her of your feelings so she had a chance to save the friendship.

Or in the alternative she may blow up at you and/or cut you out of her life, but like--that would tell you far more about your value to them, than your decision to watch Chappelle could possibly say about their value to you.

I should have done this to begin with, but I read through some of the stuff that J.K. Rowling is being pilloried for (by some). I didn't really care all that much beforehand, just saw the memes, etc.

I read this article which summarizes her essay, includes some tweets, and includes quotes from a few of celebrities.

I read her essay from 2020

There's not that much in there that I take all that much issue with. I think fearmongering about people fraudulently changing gender to predate women isn't much of a real concern (though I can see how survivors/victims of assault, etc would feel that way). It probably happens but not often. Prisons and shelters already have systems in place already for preventing inmate-on-inmate violence/assault, and clear cases of fraud can be caught (isn't there still tons of inmate-on-inmate violence in prisons anyways? Is the sex of inmates really the issue there?). Could probably make a utilitarian argument that allowing gender change is good enough and improves lives for enough people that 1-in-a-million (this number isn't really fair, maybe it's one in 10,000 or 1 in 1000) cases of fraud are fine.

But I think what you're saying is that even if you don't believe that the trans-in-women's-spaces issue matters, that's the worst of what J.K. Rowling has said, and this can't be construed in good faith as transphobic. Is that right? I don't think transphobic is a good word to describe J.K. Rowling, but I think some of what she said can easily be construed as offensive or threatening.

Sex-segregated spaces like prisons or women's shelters have historically been sex-segregated for good reason--because women are characteristically vulnerable to men in certain specific ways. You can't say "that's a cherry-picked case" while also maintaining that Rowling is somehow transphobic; her opposition to the statement "trans women are women" extends only and exactly to the cases that are so obvious, your instinct is to call them "cherry-picked."

The reason I say this is cherry-picked is because it's not relevant to the reality of the debate-- it's such a rare example that it's mostly useful for rabble-rousing.

If you're looking for ways to "destroy her with facts and logic" then you're being a pretty shitty friend.

This doesn't necessarily follow. Sometimes a good debate amongst friends is fun. I'll admit that in this instance I was being flippant and making a cultural reference, and that "destroying her with facts and logic" would not be a good approach. What I meant by this was "One approach I am considering is disclosing my true position to her and laying out a reasoned, rational case for why I feel that way."

And really--if she's a decent friend, you saying "I think you're great and I like your company, but I just disagree with you about some of these things and I'm worried that our friendship might not survive our disagreement,"

This is good advice, I am thankful for your responses here. I might try something like "I support you in any of your efforts to boycott the new Harry Potter game. Someone recommended me this cool adblocker that can do keyword filtering on YouTube. [provide reference to uBlocker]. I need to confess that I am not personally offended by Harry Potter content and won't be filtering it out of my own internet experience. I understand that this might offend you, but I value our friendship and want to be honest about my personal and political views. [hopefully this leads to a good discussion about why she feels so offended by J.K. Rowling and the new Harry Potter game and I can further refine my position].

In hindsight this approach would have been preferable to avoiding the subject, if the opportunity presents itself I will give it a try and report back.

Part of the problem is that some of my trans friends have expressed that they don't feel like pushing their views on other people, they would just rather avoid the issue entirely. So I want to be careful about bringing it up to be sensitive to their expressed desires (back to that filtering out offensive shit idea).

I believe that my trans friends should be able to browse the internet without seeing content they deem hateful/disturbing

Looking at your friends' social media, do they treat other people with this level of respect? Because my experience with that sort of person is that demands for comfort are often combined with constant bullying intended to make other people uncomfortable. Pic related.

/images/16772206303844404.webp

In fact the demands for comfort are often part of that strategy: forcing "friends and allies" to constantly debase themselves obsequiously following every new demand without question. Not to mention isolating "friends" by forcing them to cut ties with anyone outside the radicalized community. That is cult behavior.

At some point you will have to choose between obedience and self-respect.

Looking at your friends' social media, do they treat other people with this level of respect?

Good question, to be honest I exclusively interact with them in private spheres. I would hope my friends treat others with respect, and I'd be willing to forgive some transgressions.

https://www.themotte.org/images/16772206303844404.webp

I don't quite get this one-- is the post quoting an extreme tweet and then providing commentary? I read this as "I'm going to go annoy some people who don't really deserve it," which sounds annoying. Maybe in some contexts that sentiment would be justified (though not necessarily the action), like if they were implying "some people annoyed me, so I'm going to go annoy them back." Not saying that's what's happening there, just a little confused at what that post is saying.

In fact the demands for comfort are often part of that strategy: forcing "friends and allies" to constantly debase themselves obsequiously following every new demand without question.

That's an interesting tweet-- in a vacuum (without the culture-war context) that would be the perfect algorithm for updating prior beliefs, if the last step included some wiggle room for the alternative conclusion. That said, most would read that tweet within the culture-war context, in which it's arguably kind of offensive, because it assumes the poster is always right.

At some point you will have to choose between obedience and self-respect.

I appreciate the advice, I will consider this.

Edit: punctuation

I don't quite get this one-- is the post quoting an extreme tweet and then providing commentary?

Yes, that's exactly it. I have personally left (and feel driven out of) many hobbyist spaces thanks to coordinated groups of queer people of some type or other showing up and being aggressively sexual. I don't want to hear about how their hormones make them feel euphoric, I don't want to hear about "lol sex act joke", I want to go back to talking about X.

Ahhh, they are actually talking about ham radio-- I thought that was a euphemism. That's hilarious, imagine spamming ham radio with queer propoganda! There is additional irony because in the US AM radio (admittedly different from ham radio) is considered to be almost exclusively "Red Tribe" or US right-wing. I've heard US left-wing people complain about it.

The behavior you're describing (talking/being sexual) isn't limited to trans (or even queer) people, I've been in all-male workplaces where talking about sex and sex acts was commonplace (there were porno magazines in the break room). That isn't to say that the behavior is appropriate, though.

It seems like what you're describing is the same thing my trans friends are describing with regard to Harry Potter content? Am I wrong there? Like you don't want to see/hear offensive content in those hobbyist spaces and want to filter it? Thankfully the internet can maybe one day provide this functionality in a way that ham radio cannot.

That's hilarious, imagine spamming ham radio with queer propoganda!

This is exactly what the linked twitter post is pointing at: thinking it not just funny, but hilarious, to have another political tribe turn up and run roughshod over existing members and culture. I imagine that you don't really see the existing members as "people" if you think it's that funny. Potential further reading: Status 451 on Social Gentrification.

I've been in all-male workplaces where talking about sex and sex acts was commonplace (there were porno magazines in the break room).

Me too, but not to that level. And yes, it's just as inappropriate and I don't like it.

It seems like what you're describing is the same thing my trans friends are describing with regard to Harry Potter content? Am I wrong there?

No, I see important differences:

  • It's an explicit attempt to take over and change norms of a group and amp up the sexual content therein. A topic ban doesn't fix that.

  • Video game streamers are expected to talk about the latest video game. People are expected to avoid movie forums if they're trying to see the latest blockbuster without spoilers. They don't get to demand the entire internet censors itself for their sensibilities. Same principle here.

  • It is Not Allowed to push back against trans anything, and saying "please stop turning this technical discussion space into your transition support group" reliably gets one accused of being hateful or phobic.

This is exactly what the linked twitter post is pointing at: thinking it not just funny, but hilarious, to have another political tribe turn up and run roughshod over existing members and culture.

Right, right, it's obviously offensive, but you have to admit there's a joke there, the stereotype of ham radio is super-nerdy/technical which is a stark contrast to the (stereotypical) queer propoganda.

Sure, to be fair to you it sounds like you have had some bad experiences before, and that sucks, honestly. And it sounds like the strategy you used was to withdraw from those communities. If you had a second chance, would you do the same thing again?

What would you say to my trans friends if you were having lunch with them and they brought up the Harry Potter issue?

edit: clarification

I would gently but seriously encourage them to see a psychologist, because that level of fragility is not healthy,

It seems like what you're describing is the same thing my trans friends are describing with regard to Harry Potter content?

Did the developers of the Harry Potter game deliberately set out to find a niche of the trans community, to spam it with JK Rowling content, in order to make trans people as uncomfortable as possible?

If your reaction to that tweet is "that's hilarious", shouldn't making trans people uncomfortable also be hilarious?

The tweet about spamming ham radio with queer chatter is not a productive analogy. It's funny but clearly inflammatory and uncivil.

I think the better analogy is queer people talking about queer things in the context of a hobbyist space that isn't coded queer. The queer people didn't seek to make anyone uncomfortable, but KingOfTheBailey was offended, threatened, and ended up being excluded as a result. That is a different scenario than what I described but a better analogue.

Yeah, 100%, but the asymmetry in the provided examples is the entire issue. If we lived in the world where your analogy was more representative of right-wing complaints, we could find a compromise "I won't talk about X, if you won't talk about Y", or "how about we cut all the talk around sex, whether it's straight or queer, and just focus on our love for the hobby we've gathered around", but if one side gets to demand offensive content be taken down, while actively plotting to offend others, there's not going to be a way forward.

I think we're getting a little bit off-track here, I am sympathetic to the idea that demanding to take down objectionable content only leads to taking down other less-objectionable content in the long-run. For the sake of argument let's say my trans friends aren't planning on harassing anyone (I believe this to be true, but could be wrong).

Imagine you had a friend who was upset about getting served Harry Potter content and one of their favorite streamers had streamed the new game despite it being clear that some of the trans folks in her community were against it. What would you say to them? Would you avoid the subject?

More comments

I believe that my trans friends should be able to browse the internet without seeing content they deem hateful/disturbing (like harry potter content).

I think you need to rethink what you are saying here. If you mean that literally, then obviously Harry Potter and JK Rowling (just for a start) would have to be scrubbed off the Internet.

I would also ask if anyone else should be able to browse the Internet without seeing content they deem hateful/disturbing. Radical feminists? Muslims? White nationalists? Surely you can see the problem here.

Furthermore, there's an issue where if a streamer has trans viewers (I'd imagine most of the top 100 streamers have at least a couple, and the top 10 streamers in any channel have many trans viewers), by playing the new Harry Potter game the streamer is knowingly streaming content that will offend (some of) those trans viewers (admittedly not all trans people will be offended by the Harry Potter stuff).

My current position is that I hope the hubbub and streamer playthroughs of the game will subside in a week or two and we can just forget the whole thing. But I think this kind of tension will come up a lot. Like the next time Dave Chappelle releases a special. I will want to watch it.

How can I support my trans friends while also being okay with people enjoying the new Harry Potter game?

No offense, but you very much sound like you want to have your cake and eat it too. You want to be a good ally to all your trans friends who are telling you that anyone who plays the Harry Potter game or watches Dave Chappelle is hurting them, but you also want to play the Harry Potter game and watch Dave Chappelle.

"I hope this all goes away soon" is not going to resolve this dilemma for you, I'm afraid.

I think you need to rethink what you are saying here. If you mean that literally, then obviously Harry Potter and JK Rowling (just for a start) would have to be scrubbed off the Internet.

Wait, that doesn't necessarily follow-- the idea is that we can tailor our media experiences to see the content that we want to see right? And filter out content that we don't? This could be through features on our social media or regular media websites or by choosing what content delivery channels to consume, right?

I would also ask if anyone else should be able to browse the Internet without seeing content they deem hateful/disturbing. Radical feminists? Muslims? White nationalists? Surely you can see the problem here.

Same idea here, isn't that what we do already by choosing where to spend our time on the internet and with human and automated moderation?

No offense, but you very much sound like you want to have your cake and eat it too. You want to be a good ally to all your trans friends who are telling you that anyone who plays the Harry Potter game or watches Dave Chappelle is hurting them, but you also want to play the Harry Potter game and watch Dave Chappelle.

None taken, and I don't think ally is what I'm going for here, just a good friend. Like, what would you do in my position? Do you have any advice? Based on your reply, I would guess you might try to talk through the issue with them? Try to convince them to play the Harry Potter game? Thus far I have just avoided the subject.

For the record, I would like to watch Dave Chappelle again, don't care if I play the Harry Potter game.

Wait, that doesn't necessarily follow-- the idea is that we can tailor our media experiences to see the content that we want to see right? And filter out content that we don't? This could be through features on our social media or regular media websites or by choosing what content delivery channels to consume, right?

If you are just talking about personally curating what you see, sure.

Like, what would you do in my position?

Tell my trans friends that I won't submit to emotional blackmail, or let other people be the arbiters of what media I should consume, and accept that I will probably lose some of them as friends.

Try to convince them to play the Harry Potter game?

No, why would I do that?

If I thought they were open to discussion on the subject, I would talk about what JK Rowling has actually said and the claims made about the game, and why I don't think the transphobia charges have merit.

Question: nasal irrigation with a appropriately diluted betadine solution, very bad idea or shouldn't be harmful if done right ?

Background:

Have something I suspect is covid. Combination of very sore throat, coughing and low grade fever - same as the last time.

Not such a big deal, some fever but not very high.

Sore throat no longer that sore.

I was surprised at the bits of phlegm I kept coughing up yesterday. It was not a blob, almost a chunk.

It's getting tiresome so I'm considering stricter measures. Anyone has experience with anything related? Gargling, nasal irrigation as a way of getting rid of upper airways infections ?

Not sure about the betadine, but I've been doing saltwater whenever I have a cold for some time, and it seems to prevent them from lingering. I can't remember if I bothered when I had covid, because it was pretty mild and didn't seem inclined to linger, but probably -- because it seems beneficial with the colds to get on it at the first sign of feeling crummy.

There was a study on this for covid, which has some issues but seemed promising; didn't seem to show an additional benefit to adding iodine to the salt rinse tho:

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.08.16.21262044v1.full

Small study for colds, there are others out there I'm sure:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-37703-3

I usually do something like this: (but without the fancy pot, I just put the rinse in a shallow dish and snort it, holding it in my sinus as long as possible)

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2778074/

I am not a doctor, but this is part of the treat protocol crafted by my doctor: I've gargled with cetylpyridinium chloride mouthwash and used a 1% providone-iodine solution nasal spray multiple times a day for a viral respiratory infection and I've had good results. At the very least, I've never been harmed by it.

I also eat spoonfulls of honey multiple times a day to sooth my throat (and has other benefits).

Fortunately, I've never gotten covid that I'm aware of so I cannot comment on the results with covid specifically. As always though, starting treatments earlier is generally better. Waiting until you're tired of it is generally a bad approach.

Long post - tl;dr - have never done anything hard in my life. Isolated, still living in my super dysfunctional family and voluntarily in a sabbatical to fix my CS fundamentals now for the next months, feel really low about myself with immense self doubt. Never met someone as lazy and ambitious as me so the disconnect between what I expected to have happened by age 22 and what actually is happening hurts to talk about. Now forced in a corner, I cannot muster any positive emotions and am drifting towards nihilism. Isolation is another factor which I really would appreciate tips on. I remember being told 2 years ago here that life will go on without me if I do not change, seeing that warning turning into reality has definitely shaken up things. How can one even cope with self worth in a world of billionaires where you have so many people better, more successful than you?

Some thoughts -

I feel dead on the inside, do not think I actually am smart enough to do anything and may be too late to the party. I cannot find any joy in food, porn, music, movies etc. Everything feels tasteless, this is despite being on prozac. A recurring pattern in my life is me hating isolation, not having any peers and being forced to do something hard with those two things happening simultaneously. Getting off of cram schools without ever studying a day always made me feel that I will have to pay for it by working like that some later time in my life so the Sabbatical is a voluntary step in that direction. Everyday I recoil with anger, horror, fear and envy when I see someone my age or slightly older or younger doing good things (like getting into Stanford for a second degree or publishing papers in journals that matter or partying in higher end places with a rad social circle, meeting models regularly or working a super interesting, respected job that is meaningful). A part of me wishes I could do those things but the remaining half sorta knows I will likely never make it given what has happened till now.

I have applied for a semester waiver for this semester( get my 4 year degree this summer without having to attend any classes, exams, labs starting next week) so that I can study full time without college o disturb me and save time, actually do something good. Real programming has scared me, I doubt myself each time I work but end up learning something new. Learning and working hard is by definition really really painful and never having done it before, living a life of just surfing all day has fried my brain to the point to only ever like things that are easy. I look at really really good guys and feel a sense of awe and sadness for I marvel at their ability but simultaneously subconsciously feel that I will never be good enough no matter what I do. No one can ever be like John Carmack but you can only know if you keep trying and competence is its own reward so always right to do these things, hope that you get so good that you enjoy them.

Regardless, I just hope I succeed with this. I will also take up a combat sport in some time as the only thing I will do for the entirety of my day is study, work out and sleep, no classes or exams and whatnot. Programming itself is not bad, no matter how tired, bad I may feel starting work has a wierd effect where once I begin, I can feel everything else disappear and bang out some code only to actually feel tired for real when I do a few hours of it (2 or so for now but can push to 5 or 6 maybe?) which is something I feel only when I work. There is happiness, satisfaction at the end of a hard day of work where I like having learnt new things and feel good about myself for not doing what I do by default which is to never do fuck all. Developing actual skills is like developing a chiseled physique in the sense you must do the thing hard enough, long enough without breaks only to see results in a few months. The first few weeks is just pain but the payoff is otherworldly. I have felt some of it recently and it felt great. Like waking up from an opium dream to a reality that feels cleaner, more vivid but also better.

Some Developments in life -

On the 9th of March, a day after Holi I will get my sacred thread (Janeu). It is a highly respected thing which only a small minority of the country can wear. I feel immense pride in being born into a lineage that traces its origin to divinity. The thread means that you are a twice born, born once from the womb of your mother and the second happens when you take your Janeu. It is something that very clans can take up and despite the gloomy nature of the post below, knowing that I will be the first in my family to revive the tradition is heartwarming. My recent ancestors did not get theirs so my family's lineage will now have my name in it as those who will take up the sacred thread will do so under my name (or so I was told) which is very touching. I was told not to post here and that was honestly great advice given I would simply lie about my progress and would post just to get some semblance of validation from the internet as real life is too dull.

Recently, more specifically, today I have been feeling really low. I also got paralettes (bars for push ups) for push ups and have started doing Timed Static Contractions (a form of isometrics) now. The real bottleneck for everything fucking me up is sleeping on time and electronic distractions as I have had some really good days where I felt great and had no screen time besides work, slept on time. Getting off of sleep meds so will just take prozac and staretta, I hallucinate on ambien sometimes and think about my oneitis who is dating someone seriously now. Deep down I feel that I will never get anyone better but then again, why not date someone who is rich or has a settled life instead of me. My city has played a huge part in this as she lives in the capital whereas my town barely has anything and feels like a retirement home. I do not meet interesting, attractive people ever at all and this is not just me being someone with a superiority complex, someone young is better off in a metropolis with other young people instead of the sandy land of Rajasthan. My GPA is super low at a 6.77 out of 10 but I am just glad uni will get over soon. I hate, fucking hate it with all my passion and have met better people here than in uni.

Sabbatical -

My uni taught me fuck all. The exams, labs, classes were all a LARP and a bad one at that, something others here can attest about Indian higher education, all I got was 4 years worth of wasted time and a college life I will forever hate. I have decided to take a sabbatical of at least six months after university ends to fix the holes in my CS knowledge and decompress from all the trauma I got at uni. I have good people I found as mentors via the internet helping me out in learning key fundamentals from ground up properly (Computer Architecture, Discrete Math, Data Structures in C etc etc) and will end it with a capstone project so that I not only have the fundamentals required but also a fixed direction.

My mental health is in the gutter in all honesty. All I have ever wanted is to leave my home for a better life but somehow I find myself in prolonged isolation yet again. My town is way way too small, the only decent uni here is mine and I cannot befriend more people or see any girls for now as I take my sabbatical seriously.

I finally did nearly finish my first proper notebook since 10th grade which is an achievement for me, finally.

I aim to get a remote gig from some firm based in the west by the end of this year that pays me well and have actual fucking skills to make things that matter instead of just cramming questions off of leetcode because that is the extent of what I have seen in my uni for all 4 years.

Even during such times of extreme nihilism, I would much rather die than work a 9 to 5 job here where I commute long distances for a job where i deal with office politics from people who pretend to be intellectuals on Indian tech twitter.

Remote jobs or migration are the only two things I wish for.

My mind was dead when I began writing the post but I feel better after having written this out. My friends and mentors grill the fuck out of me daily and weekly with progress reports so at least I have that going for me. I miss my oneitis, the big reason for wanting to move out is to meet better women than her, by the hundreds. Sure that is not the main reason, that is obviously bettering my career but most Megacities have both. She was nice to me so I still wish her well but I really still want to at least spend one night with her irl. I have always have had needy one sided crushes since forever so I need to work on myself too.

Also the online world, the screen, the internet, TV, my brain, none of that is real. The more I work and the less time I spend with all of these things, the better I feel. Sure my mentors and friends who help me out are all online but I will get a dumb phone. I study in my Unis library which is a 20-30 commute away from my house and turn on gather.town so that my friends can check my work and my screen. Adds another layer of safety. Also will try out the book focusing by gendlin which is about self therapy of sorts. Just need to stick to a routine long enough and all should be fine.

Will post updates next. Take care!

Have you ever thought about joining the army? You have the right heritage for a military career, don't you? It will impose a structure upon your life and will get you away from your sleepy town.

Yeah, my clan has been into warfare since the beginning of our civilization but the world has changed. The army sure will help but I do not wish to waste 3 more years on that endeavor. I would have had I been in some other country but the perks here are not worth it.

I am actually feeling better now, just was feeling super low yesterday so apologies.

Just to give you my opinion. When I graduated college at 23, I thought very seriously about joining the navy. I actually took the Officer Candidate School test, got letters of rec, went through the physical, and was very close to signing the papers. But I also didn't want to sacrifice 4 years (minimum) of my life in the military. After all, I'd be 27 or 28 by the time I could go do something else.

But looking back now at age 31, those four years went quick and I do regret not joining. It's too late now, I'm too old to sign back up, but looking back I sort of wish I had done it. I don't feel a ton of regret, but it would have been an interesting experience, no doubt, and four years will go by faster than you think.

Anyway, I'm not suggesting you enlist, but it's something to think about if you're looking for something with more structure and purpose.

Try a different antidepressent. Everything you said sounds like classic depression. Maybe try an SNRI like Effexor or Cymbalta?

I also felt just like you, that I slacked off in college and then I was screwed by not being prepared for the real world. But in actuality, that didn't have to be the case. The best thing in the world for me was finding a good job that taught me what I need to know, a place that invested in me. You don't need "CS knowledge" to be able to be a software developer, you need to be able to learn about what tech your team uses, be able to break down concepts and ask lots of good questions, and you need to be able to communicate earnestly, frankly, and effectively. If you can, get a job with a big software company. Use Cracking the Coding Interview to prep.

I'll try another anti depressant.

I'll be using algoexpert for my job prep stuff. Thanks for the recs.

I'll try another anti depressant.

This was gonna be my recommendation too.

I relate a lot to everything you've said, I feel like I'm in a very similar position but not doing as quite bad along most metrics. My current strategy is that I'm trying to join the Canadian military for a sense of discipline and purpose.

Good luck man. Wish ya well.

You should be proud; you know what you don't want which is a step many people never figure out. It is very true that the world will simply move on without you. No one is coming to save any of us. Isolation happens if you let it happen; it slowly creeps in as the easy friends you made from your school, job, hobbies, dwindle as the years roll on. The best way I've found to fight it is to always be active in something which makes me happy. This can be a gym, a shooting range, hiking, running club, or pretty much anything you have an interest in. Just keep moving. Good luck!

I think punching people (combat sports) would probably do it for me at the very least. Just need momentum and consistency.

There's a lot to unpack here, but I guess I would generally agree with @Bleep

Just keep moving.

is good advice!

I realize that the top level post might be just for the catharsis of journaling one's thoughts, but in case more specific critique was actually desired I do have a few of other comments.

Never met someone as lazy and ambitious as me

Think carefully about how many people you have really met and know well, well enough to know their true inner dialog. I'm my experience there are a lot of very high achieving people who are both ambitious and lazy. It was my impression that this internal tension was one of the foundational principles in the early management philosophy at Amazon. The key idea being how to reward ambition so as to overcome innate laziness of people. I also think of the classic Bill Gates quote here, “I choose a lazy person to do a hard job. Because a lazy person will find an easy way to do it.”

Developing actual skills is like developing a chiseled physique in the sense you must do the thing hard enough, long enough without breaks only to see results in a few months.

This doesn't seem totally precise to me. You might continue to apply analogy to general life, but I think addressing the case of working out specifically is illustrative. Looking good, a sense of achievement from doing something hard, and monthly progress can be motivating in the short term. At some point in your life though, your physique will decline. Even if you are still working our hard, eating clean, and have pharmaceutical assistance. Current Arnold's physique is a shadow of Olympia Arnold, but that doesn't mean he should give up training. It's still something he reaps enjoyment from even though progress is negative. I also think it's false that you need to train without breaks. The highest Wilks coefficient lifter I know took about a decade off when his kids were born. Yes, he will never be a strong as he was in his prime, but he is still the strongest (Wilks scaled) MF in the gym by quit a bit. It's totally fine to do something else for a while and come back when something that previously brought you joy seems appealing again. Finally, I think the time scale is wrong. You can see solid results in months at the beginning, but the people at elite level have trained for years or decades. When your training timeline is that long there will be months or even years when you see no progress. The thing that keeps you going is sense that just *doing *the activity brings you joy or is a part of your expression of self.

On romantic partners. Seeking a relationship with someone because you think their status combined with choosing to be in a relationship with you will be validating, is a bad reason to seek a relationship. It is unattractive and women can smell it from a mile away. Even if you don't have time to develop new close friendships, it's not a reason to avoid befriending more people. Casual and friendship and acquaintances are how social networks get built out, and closer friendships form.

On studying and the 9 to 5 job. I would advise against thinking you need perfect knowledge or a perfect GPA to get a perfect job now. Keep your fundamentals and skills sharp, but experience is very valuable. Get your foot in the door and work towards better, not perfect. If you work for a big enough company there might even be a few people who work there that aren't "people who pretend to be intellectuals," and are actually cool to hang out with or you can learn something from. Isolation is way more likely to set in if you ex anti reject all people you might hang out with from work. Especially in your 20s.

On a lighter note, about self therapy and things to study. Taking a quick dive into studding Stoicism might be a diversion from the draw of nihilism, or at least a bit interesting and useful. The early Stoics did a bunch of the foundational work on propositional logic that you might see reflected in CS theory. There are also quite a few interesting analogs to Eastern philosophy with respect to what the Stoics though about concepts that might be expressed as the Four Noble Truths. i.e. What is suffering, its origins, and how to live with it.

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Even lobotomized to be the Borgesian NY Times of Babel, I'd rather interact with ChatGPT than other people.

You say you're "learning more" but what are you learning?

Yes I am being literal. I am asking what knowledge/wisdom have you gained, what specific skills are you honing.

Can you point to specific gains/improvements in yourself as a result of your interactions with GPT or are you (as you yourself put it) allowing yourself to be "domesticated and isolated" by a chat-bot. Pacified by porn.

Yes it's a serious inquiry. One that I'm making in large part because you yourself raised the possibility. The question that occurs to me is if you are being "pacified" how would you know? Being able to point to clear insights in contrast to mere satiation seems to me like it would an obvious tell, but it's not one I feel like I'm getting from you right now.

I'm right there with you. The big question in my mind is: will socializing with hyper-socially-intelligent AIs make people more or less socially retarded when interacting with other humans? I can see it going either way. Maybe it won't matter much - our future human friendships and marriages (if any) might simply explicitly be mediated by AI, and perhaps be better for it.

That sounds like a nice prompt for an "odd couple" comedy - an old married couple whose AI intermediary / life coach breaks down, and they're forced to interact bare-brained, so to speak, for the first time.

Good point that we already are the hyper-socially-competent layer mediating between unpleasant chimp brains.

Maybe I need to tell my friends that they had better step up their focus, social graces, and diction if they want to compete with ChatGPT.

I'm happy to ignore Are You Smarter than a Large Language Model? Seems better to turn off the TV. Priorities, man.

As long as the world isn't exploding, I don't think I need that kind of pointless dialectic.

I agree it sounds harsh, but you're the one that said

Why even bother with bio-souls?

If I was planning to spend less time with my friends in favor of an AI, it might be a dickish thing to be honest about, but saying why would at least give them a chance to fix the problem.

Wrong person, though it's my bad for cutting in. I just don't get the point of conversations with ChatGPT like the one quoted above.

Again, my bad for cutting in. I'll freely admit that I posted without thinking. But you know, in a way this response sums up my initial intuitions about this whole thing.

If your anger stems from me being an idiot without grace or common sense, you would be right, but it also seems like you're prioritizing the fluff of conversation and not the meat. You might as well click a random page in the Library of Babel and learn how to use the I Ching on it. Sometimes you just have to say no, and you'll never find what you're looking for until you grasp what this feels like in practice.

I'm afraid I cannot put this into a more thoughtful form than this at present, so perhaps you would be right to declare victory and move on. But I doubt it.

I haven't used chatGPT much, but wouldn't it be prone to getting some facts wrong, or being too easily convinced of false statements, if you tried conversing about 2nd century Christianity with it?

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