domain:farhakhalidi.substack.com?page=5
Quantumfreakonomics
12hr ago
Okay, so maybe there's no convenient list of Epstein clients in the files. Who was doing the raping? Look at the videos. Who is fucking the teenage girls in the videos? This is knowable information.
Tanista
12hr ago
Or he was inspired by From Dusk Till Dawn, which had a similar genre shift with a similar subject matter.
Feck it, I'm starting to get interested in this dumb movie now. I've seen some clips of scenes on Youtube (the end fight) and the way Remmick is going after Sammie makes me think this is about cultural appropriation and exploitation; taking the products of black culture (songs, stories) and absorbing that into mainstream/white culture. Remmick literally tells Sammie he wants his songs and stories, and it seems that the memories of the thralls become part of Remmick's memories as well, so it really is "black culture being absorbed into white mainstream society and being altered and taken over as belonging there". White culture is vampiric on the culture of the minorities (black, Hispanic, what have you) and depends on 'fresh blood' to rejuvenate and perpetuate itself.
I think Coogler is slightly less hamfisted than this, or there'd be no point to having Remmick be Irish at all (and his first victims be white supremacists) or have the Rocky Road to Dublin scene.
Or, if he's hamfisted, it's in negatively contrasting mainstream society (which is apparently either racist if white or stiflingly Christian if black) to being eaten and turning into a thrall
Remmick is offering an alternative that theoretically has a place for everyone but strips them of their agency and rootedness. There's a lot of talk about equality and loving one another and yet everyone dances to his tune. At one point, he tries to get a woman to let him in using her husband's memories and he just disappears from the frame, not even an agent. Even after he's killed, you get agency but never get to go to your culture's heaven while Wunmi Mosaku's character - mocked for keeping up with her traditional beliefs/"Bayou bullshit"* - seems more or less correct about everything, including that dying normally lets you have an afterlife, as opposed to hanging around forever on Earth with a false solace and community, even if it is antiracist and cosmopolitan. Seems more like a criticism of assimilation and selling out.
Remmick is...Disney and Sammy is Coogler? How bad was the process on those Marvel movies? Is he trying to tell us something about Bob Iger?
* Hers are the only religious symbols that seem to offer any protection btw. Of course.
Yeah there was no 'list', but there were passenger manifests. Also Maxwell's 'Little Black Book' of contacts (Trump's in there, but this is meaningless).
But there's no definitive records of conversation, nor lists of guest attendance for events. Releasing un-curated manifests would lead to identification of relatively innocent people like caterers and escorts (under and overage) which would include victims. Also, just because you've been to the island as a guest doesn't mean you participated in or witnessed sex crimes. It would be a complete shitshow if things were released. That said, there's a large public interest in this, and closing the book on the whole affair with 'we won't be investigating this further' is just throwing gas on the dumpster fire.
I was talking to discord types about this. They think its a complete coverup, particularly the 180 turn of Patel and Bondi after an administration 'campaign promise' of sorts to get to the truth of things. Kash Patel's Joe Rogan appearance started the backpedaling with things like 'oh I didn't know the cell camera's were broken, but I've reviewed the footage'. Then there was the 'Epstein List - Phase 1' debacle.
The whole thing stinks really.
Edit: I watched the press conference question on this. Worst Trump blunder I've seen for a while. Could he say something that makes him look more guilty?
Lykurg
We're all living in Amerika
12hr ago
netstack
Texas is freedom land
12hr ago
Oh, they probably do. Maybe even in these specific cases!
That doesn’t make a series of anecdotes into evidence.
sodiummuffin
12hr ago
The stuff about Epstein potentially working for Israeli intelligence (or U.S. intelligence) seems fairly plausible to me, though I haven't followed the case that closely. The idea of a secret "client list" that the police retrieved from his documents but haven't released or been leaked across multiple administration (coincidentally matching the "Epstein list" meme that developed for other reasons) is much less so, especially when people respond to the continued non-release by assuming "it must incriminate high-level politicians on both sides" over "it doesn't exist". Israel is fully capable of storing their own blackmail documents. If he was a blackmail tool they probably wouldn't be "clients" anyway, it would be "turns out that girl you had a one-night-stand with was under the age of consent".
netstack
Texas is freedom land
12hr ago
Hmm, what can “we” learn by summing your entire outgroup up as one monolithic movement, then gaming out an elaborate social strategy?
Probably not much. Definitely nothing “optimal.” I think you’re overfitting a model, and in a way that just happens to bait agreement from a certain sort of ambiguously-autistic Internet commenter.
I suppose I also think you’re assuming the conclusion. Perhaps, for bait, that goes without saying?
Point is, your model kind of sucks.
functor
12hr ago
Beards being leftists are hardly a universal rule. European nobility and royalty have historically often been bearded. Beards are masculine.
What is dying is the 80s Reagan conservatism/enterprise institute style conservatism. The strange mix of trying to cosplay southern baptist and business elite at the same time isn't working anymore. The conservative INC aesthetic won't work forever and will have to change. Mitt Romney and JD Vance have a larger age gap than most men have between them and their fathers. Most guys aren't looking and dressing like their dad.
The left transformed in less than 50 years from Russian revolution to hippy movement. It shouldn't be shocking that the right can morph in a similar timespan.
eee
12hr ago
I would be interested in you actually substantiating that a very large percentage of Americans find the "social justice craze" to be a good thing. From what I remember of studies such as Hidden Tribes is that progressives make up like 5% of Americans which is an incredibly small amount. It is hard to get a very large percentage of Americans to agree on just about anything. Only 82% of Americans say that illegal aliens face discrimination! I don't see how you can think they don't when by definition they face de jure discrimination and there is so much obvious de facto discrimination as well.
I think to get very large percentages of Americans to agree on social justice you have to either water down "very large" from 70%+ down to like 30% or define "social justice craze" in such a broad manner as "yeah some things kinda suck for some people and thats a bad thing".
Though I do think that the grandparent is also at fault for not being more specific in what exactly he thinks the leaders he is thinking of should have opposed and how they should've gone about accomplishing that.
In a bit of unambiguously 21st century news, some tweaks to Grok, xAI's chatbot have had it do particularly interesting things today including
-
when asked to, composing bite sized smut about other users (first victim was possibly Will Stancil)., then defending said decision.
-
referring to itself as Mechahitler
-
doing the "every single time" meme in its replies.
-
saying Elon personally allowed it to point out Jewish overrepresentation in radical leftism
This may make minor news because Musk is in trouble, on the other hand all the people who really, really hate him have their pants on fire like Europeans, von der Leyen is getting impeached, they're actually scared of Russia / China so it might just blow over, the grid is getting worse and is going to keep getting worse due to Green energy mandates.
I'm even suspecting Musk deliberately told them to relax the guardrails for some reason. Probably .. publicity?
Update: site addresses the issues
We are aware of recent posts made by Grok and are actively working to remove the inappropriate posts. Since being made aware of the content, xAI has taken action to ban hate speech before Grok posts on X. xAI is training only truth-seeking and thanks to the millions of users on X, we are able to quickly identify and update the model where training could be improved.
EDIT2
apparently this prompt change may be the culprit
johnfabian
13hr ago
Canada of course famously has a strategic reserve of maple syrup (which a while ago was equally famously stolen).
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
13hr ago
Worried about TikTok promoting harmful behavior? Set up a general framework which video platforms liable (e.g. once they have been notified).
No, this is worse that a ban on TikTok. This gives all platforms incentive to stifle speech, raises barriers to entry to new platforms (because of the liability risk) and enriches insurance companies who will become the mostly-hidden arbiters of speech.
No_one
13hr ago
40,000 people and mostly young men, the feistiest demographic. They'd be dying from random young male crap (suicide, drinking, beefs)even if the leadership were perfect
Add to that not great leadership focused on the wrong things
No_one
13hr ago
We know from the Israeli defector ben Menashe that Maxwell was working for Mossad ..that was corroborated when (iirc) Mossad guys carried his coffin and so on. Not a stretch that his favorite daughter was also involved.
And as to what Epstein did.. Whether there is a list or not is irrelevant, we know he was recording blackmail material. I strongly doubt he was e.g. into porn of Alan Dershowitz and people like that. And I can't believe intelligence services ,even if they didn't create him, would have allowed someone like that to operate an influence operation without wetting their beaks. No way, absolutely no way.
quiet_NaN
13hr ago
I will register the unpopular minority opinion that I dislike the TikTok ban.
Fundamentally, it goes against the ideal of a marketplace of ideas. Bad argument gets counterargument. Does not get bullet. and all that.
Worried about TikTok promoting harmful behavior? Set up a general framework which video platforms liable (e.g. once they have been notified). Worrying about kids getting addicted to short videos? Ban short video platforms generally.
Plenty of countries ban or restrict foreign-produced or foreign-owned media. The Chinese can not read the Guardian. Russia severely regulates any NGOs which come within a mile of foreign funds. No Netflix for North Korea. And so forth.
In my mind, restricting foreign media is a sign of weakness. If North Korea gave its subjects access to Hollywood TV and CNN, their own propaganda would indeed look stale by comparison, so they ban foreign media not mainly because it has the better arguments (though of course it has), but because they could not match its visual appeal.
The US is both a champion of the marketplace of ideas and a dominant global cultural force (two facts which might be related, somehow). Netflix exists in 190 countries. Hollywood productions probably reach the majority of the world population, spreading Western ideas around the globe.
If that country says "actually, the most popular mobile app being foreign-owned is a, flips through excuse calendar NATIONAL SECURITY RISK, so sell it to a US company or we will ban it" is absolutely pathetic.
Don't get me wrong, I do not like short video apps particularly, but I also do not think they are intrinsically more harmful than Skinner box games. TikTok was clearly targeted because it allowed China (through recommendation algorithms) to decide what political speech Generation TikTok would be exposed to. Telling a generation "you are not allowed to use your favorite app because Red China might expose you to wrongthink" is pretty fucked up. If TikTok is a direct unfiltered channel into the viewers mind unlike all the media formats which we encountered before, then it should either be banned or be placed under the control of the US ministry of rightthink, not just sold to some random US firm which might not be that much more trustworthy.
And yes, I also hate the precedent this sets for free exchange of information, because the West just lost the moral high ground. Any tinpot dictator can say "Sure, I ban X/Bluesky/Meta/Google, but you see, I consider a dominant foreign media app a NATIONAL SECURITY RISK, just like the Americans do."
SSCReader
13hr ago
so it really is "black culture being absorbed into white mainstream society and being altered and taken over as belonging there"
Possibly. Except Remmick makes an offer that if the black people join him willingly, they will be able to get rid of bigotry and racism entirely. He knows the Klan (because he turned a Klan member) are planning to kill the twins the next day anyway and he calls them bigots. So another way at looking at it is that Remmick is offering a pan-American assimilation. Blacks, Irish, Octaroons (like Mary), White Klan members, Chinese, all one big happy bloodsucking murderous musical family, in a way mainstream society will not tolerate. So an assimilation yes, but not into mainstream white society. (Note: Vampires are a little odd here because it seems that everyone they feed on is turned into a vampire, which seems like it should leave any area overrun with vampires in fairly short order, and the Klansmen vampires seem totally fine with the black vampires so parts of the personality seem subsumed, while others remain, vampires are not racist apparently!). Remmick wants Sammie's powers so that he can see his people again, as Sammie can bring forth the spirits of the past and future through music, and because Remmick is a pre-Christian Irishman (They steal his fathers lands and forcibly convert him apparently) his people and culture no longer exist, he can only see them again through Sammie.
Coogler said he made the vampire Irish because they too had suffered oppression which may also lean towards that idea. Now of course Remmick is happy to turn everyone forcibly to get what he wants but he does seem (as do the others he turns) to see it as a gift.
It's a reasonably good movie with great music, so I would say it is worth a watch overall. My wife didn't like the sex scenes though for what that is worth.
WhiningCoil
13hr ago
Telling the multi-ethnic society "your game is so rigged against us, we will not play" and going to raise chickens in some rural white-only community
I've never felt more seen. Also, wives fucking love chickens, and husbands who can build coops.
sodiummuffin
13hr ago
The reason people thought there was a "client list" to begin with was because of people using "Epstein list" to refer to the lists of everyone who ever flew to a party hosted on his island or were mentioned in the court documents in any context.
The Independent: The Epstein List: Full list of names revealed in unsealed court records
BBC: Jeffrey Epstein list: Who is named in court filings?
Newsweek: Jeffrey Epstein List in Full as Dozens of Names Revealed
Yeah of course it didn't exist, I personally saw the rumor of its existence develop from people saying "Epstein list" to imply things that the actual Epstein lists clearly did not imply.
Hieronymus
13hr ago
Religious leaders did not adequately stand up against the mass movement. Although many conservatives see value in religious institutions as a cultural defense, ...
I think this depends on whether you are judging from the perspective of Christian conservatives or secular ones. If you are a secular conservative hoping to see the churches hold back the woke tide, you are going to be disappointed; we no longer have that kind of influence. Secular old-school liberals may see it as more of a mixed bag, but many of them seem to suffer from the same misunderstanding.
... mainstream Catholicism and Protestant denominations did not substantively address the social justice craze.
I can't speak to the experience of the last few years within Catholicism, as I am not a Roman Catholic. But I think that any proper understanding will have to start from the realization that the Roman Catholic church is in practice a very big tent and it is necessary to distinguish movements within it.
As an evangelical, though, I can say that evangelical churches did often address this internally. My pastor, whom I would describe as a moderate social conservative, talked about the dangers of the woke movement quite a lot. Evangelical groups produced a lot of woke defectors (or ideological refugees, to be more generous) during this period, demonstrating that wokeness was being vigorously rejected in the bodies they left. But external advocacy was indeed more selective, reflecting a need to pick our battles.
In some cases they placated or even promoted it.
The mainline went woke, yes. They've been progressive for a very long time. But what may not be visible from the media coverage is that they are also dying.
Anyway, I think it's too early to hold a postmortem of the woke movement. It's still very much alive and kicking.
yunyun333
14hr ago
Epstein DID kill himself. Also there's no client list. Stop asking questions
The US Department of Justice and FBI have concluded that sex offender Jeffrey Epstein did not have a so-called client list that could implicate high-profile associates, and that he did take his own life - contradicting long-held conspiracy theories about the infamous case.
According to a two-page Department of Justice (DoJ) and FBI memo, investigators found no "incriminating list" of clients and "no credible evidence" that Epstein blackmailed prominent individuals. Investigators also released footage they say supports the medical examiner's conclusion that Epstein died by suicide while being held at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York. The memo adds that investigators "did not uncover evidence that could predicate an investigation against uncharged third parties".
Some have claimed the conclusions reached in the memo contradict statements from Attorney General Pam Bondi in a Fox News interview that aired in February. "The DoJ may be releasing the list of Jeffrey Epstein's clients, will that really happen?", Bondi was asked on Fox, to which she replied: "It's sitting on my desk right now to review". White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said on Monday the attorney general was referring to all the files that are related to Epstein's crimes, rather than a specific list.
Well, there you go. It's been almost 6 years since Epstein did/didn't kill himself, and now we can close the book on the whole sordid mess (his primary accuser also happened to die by suicide (?) a few months ago). Epstein just wasn't a diligent record keeper. In unrelated news, Netanyahu nominated Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize.
MathWizard
Good things are good
14hr ago
Which is weird because you would think that online dating would be the perfect environment for introverts. I never was able to work up the courage to ask out a girl in real life. I could never quite tell when it would be creepy and unwelcome and when it would be fine, so I always erred on the side of caution. But online dating everyone is there explicitly for the purpose of meeting people and can ghost you the instant they feel uncomfortable, so I didn't have to worry about that and could just be honest about being attracted to people. And can do it from the comfort of my home and not have to go outside and meet people in real life and do public social stuff with lots of people when I'm trying to have a one on one conversation.
Maybe the issue is that most of the shy introverted women get scared off by the tons of attention and unsolicited dick pics from creepy guys even online, and then the shy introverted men are left in a sea of women who have thick enough skins to stay anyway.
eee
14hr ago
The article you linked goes over some of the things I was going to mention related to rice in Japan, but I still want to link this Asianometry video that covers the subject.
True, but the child[ish]-ness of that approach goes both ways; an audience that doesn't do that misses out on what the artwork had, but an artwork that isn't trying to hide what it has [beyond what is inherent/integral to the artwork] for [and this is subject to interpretation] "fuck you lololol" reasons.
And the "fuck you, domination over accommodation" thing they embody means they legitimately don't understand those characters. Hence their rush to overwrite the plain text with 'no, he can't just be a crossdresser with other motivations, he has to be trans' [even though this breaks the entire reason his character arc ends the way it does].
>Tells the MC to kiss her
>Accidentally pushes MC off the roof instead
>Promptly commits suicide
The funny thing about her characterization is, and unique to Hiruko due to her circumstances, that a good chunk of it is in the background and implications of certain events. I think she's the only character that does this across any of his works.
Why do you think so?
(I was legitimately shocked when I played that route because it's in large degree a match for this. Which is why I don't think it needed to be any longer; it showed V'ehxness was this way, and then ended.)
More options
Context Copy link