It’s just a lot like Kim Jong Un or Putin, where he seriously pictures himself looking like Vin diesel. And so do his followers. All those maga flags and political comics actually give him a six pack and make him 6’5. It’s gross and kind of scary.

3% on Netflix is really good. Definitely do the english subtitles instead of the dubbing though, it sounds ridiculous.

they needed documentation from the hospital to prove a legit medical emergency.

Do they think people are out there taking life fights in helicopters like they’re taxis? So fucking ridiculous, I’m so sorry you even had to worry about something like that.

People who work for medical insurance companies need their heads examined. You must need a certain amount of psychopathy to get a paycheck from this kind of cruelty and then be able to sleep at night.

And you’ve written some painfully edited highly professional email to your professor or boss and the response you get back from them is a single sentence, not even a signature.

So glad they made it such a point to teach us to write professional emails in my freshman year of college.

More like 80s babies, since we were actually old enough to remember those first two things

Of course the name of his show is “war room,” jfc. All conservatives do is fantasize about violence.

I absolutely agree. But I do think it’s interesting how there’s almost never any discussion of drug use and alcoholism among housed people, as though that’s not a social problem in itself. And imagine how much more severe the consequences are of people going to work fucked up, driving their cars, selling drugs in their dorms and getting kicked out of college, raising a family while trashed on xanax, and so on.

But when this happens, it’s an even more individualized matter than it is with homeless people. When we look at homeless folks, we individualize the blame and socialize the consequences (it’s the homeless person’s fault they’re homeless, but that’s fucking up our city etc). Somehow, we never consider the social repercussions of housed people with addictions, especially if they have an addiction to alcohol. Alcoholism can get pretty far in an “average” person’s life before anyone really steps in and sees it as a serious problem. Same with prescribed drugs, because they have some psychiatrists signature on them. Millions of people drink when they get home from work. But if we see a homebum with a 40, we first make a snap diagnosis, then widen our judgement to everyone whose ever been evicted or had to sleep in their car.

All I’m saying is that half the problem is ingrained social stigma, when they’re really not much different from the rest of us.

Thank you for this, it’s very interesting to hear more details about how this was handled over there. In the US we tend to either have a very idealistic view (liberals) or very negative view (conservative) of Euro and Nordic countries’ social policies. No country is perfect, but I guess if the outcome has worked well then we can’t fault it even if the reason was to maintain their image by hiding poverty.

Regardless, it is an important study to disspell stigmas that have existed since the beginning of private property.

But it is still important when it comes to housing. This argument of homeless people being untrustworthy with money has undoubtedly already worked it’s way into that debate. If people won’t trust them with money, why would they trust them with an apartment? Canada and the US don’t see them as “worthy” or responsible enough to be given anything, not even food. Look at what an insane process it is just to apply for food stamps in the US, and that applies to low income folks as well as homeless people. Everyone is considered a criminal until they can prove otherwise, and they’re rarely given that chance

Not that I think academic research will make much of an impact. Research from the social sciences consistently debunks all kinds of common, harmful beliefs, and yet is still often ignored by policy makers and average people. It’s depressing as fuck that there are academic researchers spending years on studies like this, convincing people to fund them, getting paid dick by their universities, and still a bunch of assholes who have never set foot on a college campus get to just cut it down by saying “oh, well, that’s what I heard.” And then move on with their lives while homeless people continue to suffer for no reason. This is an example of the far reaching impacts of devaluing education I guess.

It’s hard to believe anyone missed this:

As Pole’s computers crawled through the data, he was able to identify about 25 products that, when analyzed together, allowed him to assign each shopper a “pregnancy prediction” score. More important, he could also estimate her due date to within a small window, so Target could send coupons timed to very specific stages of her pregnancy.

This article is from 2012

I wouldn’t underestimate it. I also wouldn’t buy into the “I have nothing to hide” narrative. It’s not about hiding or not hiding. The fallout from the Dobbs decision is a great example of why, if you aren’t concerned with privacy now, then you will be in the future. All of a sudden, the right of 51% of the population to make decisions about their own bodies was suddenly gone, and handed over to state governments. The day before that decision, people needing abortions and the doctors who provide them had “nothing to hide.” The day after? They’re suddenly criminals. Their social media can be monitored. Their online and in-person purchases. Where they travel and why. Their medical records. And maybe worst of all, their fellow Americans are offered prize money if they turn someone in so that they can be charged in criminal court.

Or what about Florida’s “risk prediction” software that supposedly can predict which “at-risk” (aka non-white) kids will become criminals? Maybe I’m wrong for finding that unsettling. This is from 2015

https://theweek.com/articles/495147/floridas-minority-report-crime-prediction-software

What about social credit scores? Which we already have, we just don’t get to see them (LexisNexis “risk solution” software). But sooner rather than later, every word and action will be recorded and held against us in every aspect of our lives, rather than just when applying for jobs and mortgages. And anti-discrimination laws don’t do shit. They always find a work around. Although with the current supreme court I’m sure all forms of discrimination will be perfectly legal soon enough.

Btw private browsing doesn’t prevent tracking. It just doesn’t store anything in the broswer history.

This does not come across the way you think it does.

Because the people who hate him aren’t republicans.

I think their question is more about how we would implement that. Marx believed that proletariat uprising would be the “how,” and that it is an inevitability of end stage capitalism. But the nature of capitalism keeps people from attempting that. This is a system that we are forced to participate in if we want to survive. We need food and shelter and we don’t want to get arrested and/or murdered by cops for revolting. With that in mind, we have to get to a point where we collectively have nothing left to lose.

I get what you’re saying, but I still think it’s a seriously outsized response to someone asking to categorize memes better lmao.

Or some of us might have multiple sociology degrees and/or are in academia. But I’m sure if they wrote comments about Marx (or Weber or Gramsci or Veblen etc) you’d just assume they got it from wikipedia anyway. Though I’m not sure why that’s a bad thing. It’s not like it makes a difference whether someone read primary texts online or overpaid at the college bookstore. It’s the same information. The fact that anyone has a desire to learn, better themselves, and then try to use that knowledge is admirable and a service to society at large. More people should try it.

https://www.nationalpriorities.org/budget-basics/federal-budget-101/spending/

By far, the biggest category of discretionary spending is spending on the Pentagon and military. In most years, this accounts for more than half of the discretionary budget. In 2020, because some discretionary spending passed through supplemental appropriations went to pandemic programs, the share of the discretionary budget that went to the military was smaller – even though the amount that went to the military was just as high as in previous years.

Most “welfare” falls under discretionary. Medicare, medicaid, and social security (also “welfare”) fall under mandatory spending. Social security and medicare make up the largest categories. This organization explains how “welfare” spending increased in recent years due to pandemic spending on things like stimulus checks and increased unemployment.

The bottom line thoughis that people pay into it for years so that it’s available when it’s their turn to need it. If they never do, then great. It can help someone else, god forbid.

So where are all of the conservative “if Biden actually wanted to cancel student loan debt he would just do it” people now

Not voting democrat is a direct vote for fascism. Just because it’s not ideal and not fair doesn’t make it any less true.

It’s just more divisive bullshit purposely turned into bad memes to catch people’s attention. As usual, it puts people in groups and then encourages disagreement between them. It keeps people from looking up. It’s so stupid.

Besides, Boxxxy is just an e-girl. Where are the differences

just increased the national debt by about 45 billion a year.

But helping student loan borrowers would have cost too much. For fuck’s sake.