I’m betting that this is exactly what happened. That girl, in all probability, has been treated like meat most of her life. There’s a nontrivial chance that she’s a victim of some kind of abuse.

So having a real connection to someone who doesn’t just treat you like meat, and is only interested in what she can do for/to them, is probably very different than the interactions she normally has.

It’s sad, but likely true.

I’m not American, but tariffs to fix import issues is pretty stupid.

This is the capitalist dream, export all the production of the goods you use daily to third world countries, who will have shit labor practices like the US used to have when slavery was a thing (and bluntly, for quite a while afterwards), so that the boots-on-the-ground laborers that produce everything are either treated like slaves or literally are slaves, then import the raw material to be manufactured into whatever you’re selling in the US, so you can slap a “made in the USA” sticker on your shit to enhance sales and charge more. Meanwhile “made in the USA” doesn’t and shouldn’t imply that there’s no imported goods going into the manufacturing process to make that thing, just that you took raw materials (from wherever) and made this thing in the USA.

Tariffs unduly harm end consumers, pretty much everything we buy and own is, or has components that are, imported shit.

Most microchips, a large amount of the food we eat, most electronics, pretty much everything you’ll find at a dollar general, etc (the list is very very long)… all imported in whole or in part.

Hell, there was a time that it was more economical to have your raw materials, even if they’re mined/harvested/produced in the USA, shipped overseas for assembly by slave labor, then shipped back for sale to the US public, than to have it assembled inside the US. Much of that is still true. The US neither has the manufacturing capacity, nor the desire to build their own shit. The only time that’s not the economical option is for large cost (and scale, either in size or money) items, like housing or vehicles. Assembly generally happens in the country/landmass where the vehicle will be sold and used. Even a company like Toyota, a Japanese brand, will have assembly plants in the USA for cars sold in the USA, because that’s cheaper than importing hundreds of vehicles. For everything else, it’s generally cheaper to assemble it outside of the country and import the final product.

You think process are high now? Wait until the tariff wars really kick off.

No company is going to accept the costs of tariffs and be okay with that eating their profits, they’re passing that cost into consumers, because we’re the saps that are still going to buy it.

When the tariffs come down, and they will eventually, prices will drop, but not to where they were from before the tariffs. Companies will continue to post record profits, justifying not giving raises because tariffs, and wages will remain stagnant. We’ll earn less, while they rob is for more than they already do.

The worst part is that when the tariffs are lifted, we’ll thank them for lowering the prices by buying more of their shit. We’ll be grateful for the opportunity to pay even more into their profit margins.

Congratulations, you’re experiencing late stage capitalism. The system is working as intended. You are poor, you remain poor, barely able to scratch out a living, while your owners profit more and more off of your hard work, and you get to thank them for that opportunity.

I don’t want to live on this planet anymore.

Technically, we don’t need raw sugar for our diet at all. So technically correct?

We also don’t need any sugar substitutes, like HFCS, but you can find that or sugar, in the ingredients list of pretty much all processed foods.

Yay capitalism!

Fact is, HFCS is cheaper. I haven’t checked the entirety of it’s supply chain to figure out why, but it is cheaper.

If sugar was the same cost, they wouldn’t have switched to HFCS in the first place (why mess with your successful product for no gain?). Fact of the matter is that HFCS is saving them money. It might be pennies per bottle, but when you’re moving 10M bottles of soda, those pennies turn into dividends, literally.

You mean, so-called shit hole countries?

As a Canadian, I’m curious if we’re considered a “shit hole country” to these fucks.

Foreign slave plantations.

… Not that slave plantations anywhere makes it better, but the fact that it’s foreign will mean that not only is the labor mainly performed by slaves, but we’re also paying a premium because it’s imported goods. Double jeopardy.

Yay capitalism!

Sounds like you ended up in the Bible belt.

There’s lots. A pretty easy example:

Person 1: I like my truck Person 2: I prefer my EV, trucks consume too much fuel.

P1: trucks have to consume so much fuel because that’s what makes them powerful P2: but most people don’t need that much power, trucks are unnecessary.

P1 (feeling attacked, goes into a defensive mentality): I need a truck and lots of other people do too. (Continued rationalizations of why trucks are necessary) P2 (unmoved in their opinion): I still don’t think they’re necessary for the average person.

P1: (further rationalizations as to the everyday benefits of a truck) P2 (still unmoved in their opinion)

P1 successfully convinced themselves of the benefits of owning a truck.

This is will known to marketing too. Most vehicle advertising is not to get you to buy a (insert vehicle here), but instead, get those with (insert vehicle here) to be so proud of how great their car is, that they convince you to buy (insert vehicle here).

This concept has a name. Cool, thanks, TIL.

This is actually a very interesting psychological phenomenon. I’m no psychologist, but stretching what I learned from “how to win friends and influence people” to the extreme, directly opposing someone’s viewpoint generally forces them to defend it. By defending it, they rationalize the reasons why they adhere to the idea, and thus end up convincing themselves of their belief.

Your opposition literally only serves to force them to rationalize their belief, and deepen their belief in that thing.

It’s fascinating, but stupid. In my experience, the most intelligent people I’ve ever spoken to will always take opposition seriously, even if with a grain of salt. When struck with an opposing viewpoint, they usually inquire about it, asking the speaker to justify their position so they can understand why they came to this conclusion. The mildly intelligent will then use that justification to tear down the person’s belief in that system. The highly intelligent will then ask questions that cause the speaker to question their own beliefs.

But doing nothing more than asking specific and pointed questions about someone’s beliefs, I have seen very intelligent and clever people, get others to convince themselves that they’re wrong in what they believe.

Long story short, your neighbor isn’t wrong, but they’re also not exactly correct. The character of a person, IMO, is not in what they believe in, but how they react to adversity. Whether that adversity is political, intellectual, physical, or emotional; how you deal with difficulty is the content of your character.

If making people of color, LGBTQIA+ people, and women, equal, by granting them the same rights and freedoms as everyone else (including bodily autonomy, and the ability to live, vote, and marry who they wish), causes you to start to lean towards fascism, what do you think that says about your character?

As a white person, I’d like to ask that you don’t lump me in with them in any way, shape, or form.

Thanks!

She’s having a glass of wine, not getting shit faced. What the fuck is this tweet?

I’m not American, and I can’t vote in US elections. Bernie Sanders is one of few US political figures that I respect the opinions of.

I don’t know what Pelosi is smoking, but it has to be some good shit.

If I can quote the late George Carlin: “They call it the American dream because you have to be asleep to believe it.”

I would argue that George was right and the American dream doesn’t exist, and never existed. You cannot destroy that which does not exist…

Trump has a … Nope, nevermind, I don’t care. I don’t want to see that, and I’m not even going to ask.

Fun fact, most LED displays will only display a very specific wavelength of light for each primary color, if you can isolate the specific values of red, green, and blue, that the sphere uses in the LEDs in its displays, and get tint/filters for those wavelength ranges, you can effectively “tint” the windows where the sphere would be nearly impossible to see, while almost everything else would be fairly clear.

Almost all other light is broad spectrum, so even a single color item would reflect a much larger range of wavelengths than what the sphere produces, which may make red/green/blue objects less bright through the window, but they will still be observable, while the sphere is basically just black.

I’m in a place with daylight saving time, and when DST ends, the sun is basically only out when I’m working, so I don’t really ever see it, nor do I get to enjoy any time in the sun.

Once that happens, the happy chemicals get much harder to brain.

Doesn’t this proposal also make anyone who participates in the production of porn into a criminal?

Is the first Lady going to get arrested for her involvement in the creation of porn?

Dunno what’s wrong with your shit, but it looks fine from here.

I did not know this. Thank you.

Related: Alberta, get your shit together.