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    1. Movie of the Week #36 - The Mummy

      Warning: this post may contain spoilers

      Starting the month with blockbusters with The Mummy from 1999 which made $417.4 million at the box office.

      IMDb
      Letterboxd
      Wikipedia

      Is this a proper blockbuster with all that entails? Have you seen the other movies in the franchise?


      The rest of the schedule is:

      • 8th: Mission Impossible: Fallout
      • 15th: Snatch
      • 22nd: Barbie
      • 29th: Edge of Tomorrow
      11 votes
    2. Lemonade stands

      One of my kids and his friend really want to do a lemonade stand (or something to that effect) this summer. I'm not really liking the idea of selling actual lemonade but I was thinking maybe they...

      One of my kids and his friend really want to do a lemonade stand (or something to that effect) this summer. I'm not really liking the idea of selling actual lemonade but I was thinking maybe they could stuff some freezies in a cooler and walk over to a local dog park. A big part of me wants my kids to actually execute an idea rather than dream about it and not actually do it. I want them to learn about money to some degree and maybe learn some lessons about making money... potato quality clip from my favourite show

      Did you ever do a lemonade stand (or similar) as a kid?

      What are some other things they could sell that would actually work?

      Would ice be enough to keep freezies cold or should I buy some dry ice?

      Is this all a dumb idea?

      26 votes
    3. It's impressive how much Western and Christian supremacist undertones Supernatural has

      Warning: this post may contain spoilers

      I watched Supernatural until season 7 or so when I was younger. I didn't really examine its subtext at the time, and just thought it lost steam after the original plot ended. I've recently started rewatching the show from the beginning, and, wow, like just wow. It's amazing how much Christian and Western supremacist subtext it contains.

      Before I get into the details, I should mention that I've only rewatched the first five seasons yet. So I don't know if this still holds true after that. With that out of the way, here are the major reasons (obviously, spoilers).

      Pagans are always depicted as bloodthirsty maniacs. Every single time.

      Holy aspects of Christianity -such as exorcism rituals, churches, holy water- are the only "real" effective way of fighting demons. The other ways are made up in the show (demon killing guns and blades).

      The cosmology is a thing on its own. Christian God has created the universe, yet Earth is at its metaphorical centre. Knowing a few things from the seasons after too, I can say that it's the only place of importance in the entire universe. Following the traditional Christian logic, humans are also the most important beings on Earth.

      A special mention goes to the episode "Hammer of the Gods" (S05E19), as a striking example of what I talk about. In the episode, the major "pagan" gods alive gather to talk about the looming apocalypse. This includes Kali, Baldur, Mercury, Baron Samedi, Zao Shen, Odin, Ganesh. It's really telling that they threw in Ganesh and Kali together with old gods. Oh, and of course they all eat people.

      The said apocalypse is to be caused by Lucifer coming back and fighting it out with Michael. Apparently it will be so bad that it will kill around half the human population.

      The gods gather, conspire, with leads Dean and Sam there being held hostage as bargaining chips. They say they have to conspire, because if not prevented, this Christian apocalypse will kill them too. So this led to them teaming up. You can already see that Christianity is depicted as the big bad boy in the entire world.

      During the talks, Kali says this to Loki, who she discovered was actually arcangel Gabriel.

      "Westerners, I swear. The sheer arrogance. You think you're the only ones on earth? You pillage and you butcher in your God's name. But you're not the only religion, and he's not the only God. And now you think you can just rip the planet apart? You're wrong. There are billions of us. An we were here first. If anyone gets to end this world, it's me. I'm sorry. [KALI stabs GABRIEL with his own blade. GABRIEL screams, and in a flash of light, dies.]"

      Don't worry he doesn't actually get killed by Kali.

      Almost just after this scene, Dean gets up and says the following. Emphasis mine.

      "All right you primitive screwheads, listen up. I'm outta options. Now on any other given day, I'd be doing my damndest to, uh, kill you. You filthy murdering chimps. But, uh, hey, desperate times. So even though I'd love nothing better than to slit your throats, you dicks, I'm gonna help you. I'm going to help you ice the devil. And then we can all get back to ganking each other, like normal. You want Lucifer, well, dude's not in the Yellow Pages. But me and Sam, we can get him here."

      I swear, at this moment, I could almost see a 19th century colonizer white supremacist manifest to say this. I should remind that he says this to a group of gods that includes two major gods from Hinduism: a major religion that still exists. It would have been bad even without that, but this fact makes it much worse.

      After this, Lucifer shows up, and kills every god with ease. He's not even the Christian god, and he's not even at his full power, yet he kills multiple major gods from other religions as if they were less than nothing. Oh, and he says that to them too.

      "You know, I never understood you pagans, always fighting, always happy to sell out your own kind. No wonder you forfeited this planet to us. You are worse than humans. You're worse than demons. And yet you claim to be gods. [LUCIFER twists his fingers and MERCURY dies as his neck snaps] And they call me prideful."

      He then kills Gabriel for real too. Because, as is tradition, gods from other religions are too incompetent to do anything to Christianity.

      This episode is probably the epitome of what I mean, but it's just a culmination of what's been there from the start. The trashing of what is deemed as "pagan" (often read: not "Western"), and the supremacy of Christianity has always been there. I still like the show for its other aspects, but its subtext is really Christian and western supremacist.

      27 votes
    4. Midweek Movie Free Talk

      Warning: this post may contain spoilers

      Have you watched any movies recently you want to discuss? Any films you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.

      Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.

      8 votes
    5. TV Tuesdays Free Talk

      Warning: this post may contain spoilers

      Have you watched any TV shows recently you want to discuss? Any shows you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.

      Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.

      10 votes
    6. Norwegian and or European salary expectations?

      Short version: is there a levels.fyi or equivalent for employees in the European Economic Area (EEA)? How do I figure out what an equivalent employee in Norway makes vs one in the US? Long...

      Short version: is there a levels.fyi or equivalent for employees in the European Economic Area (EEA)? How do I figure out what an equivalent employee in Norway makes vs one in the US?

      Long version: I just found out my partner got the offer for a job that'll force relocation to Norway from the US for a new role. My current role, schedule, and responsibilities will likely work just fine in Norway and I expect that I can keep my job if I pitch it correctly to the executive team. I need to figure out what:

      • I should be making
      • What potential hires from Norway or the EEA would need to make

      I work as the Head of AI running a team of 4 technical (ML Engineers) and non-technical (Data Capture technicians) people in a Series A startup. I am the Engineering Manager, the Team Lead, the Tech Lead, an IC, and periodically do pre-sales and technical customer support/onboarding. My team is all new, basically, having been hired in the last 90 days or less, and I am excited to delegate after finishing their onboarding! Currently, I have 1% equity and make $200,000. My role is remote and requires 20-30% travel. Where I live now is actually more expensive for flying across the US than from Oslo and about the same time factoring layovers, so travel costs will decrease. Due to how meeting schedules work out, no meetings will have to be moved to accommodate me at all. Is advocating for maintaining the same salary correct or should it decrease given the higher worker protections and benefits required by Norwegian employment law? Separately, what would hiring Norwegian employees look like from a comp perspective? I'd really like to keep this job and make a strong case for why it won't be a huge net-negative for the company.

      10 votes
    7. Save Point: A game deal roundup for the week of June 30

      Add awesome game deals to this topic as they come up over the course of the week! Alternately, ask about a given game deal if you want the community’s opinions: e.g. “What games from this bundle...

      Add awesome game deals to this topic as they come up over the course of the week!

      Alternately, ask about a given game deal if you want the community’s opinions: e.g. “What games from this bundle are most worth my attention?”

      Rules:

      • No grey market sales
      • No affiliate links

      If posting a sale, it is strongly encouraged that you share why you think the available game/games are worthwhile.


      All previous Save Point topics

      If you don’t want to see threads in this series, add save point to your personal tag filters.

      5 votes
    8. Happy Matariki!

      Matariki is New Zealand's celebration of the new year. You can celebrate it along with me by watching this traditional Matariki video. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/GiEC5Wm5mnM

      31 votes
    9. W11 Bluetooth won't pair but can see devices. BT works w/ Linux

      tldr; W11 bluetooth doesn't work with multiple cards. It will see devices but will not pair. Same hw pairs under Linux. hey folks. I posted this to /r/techsupport on reddit and for some reason...

      tldr; W11 bluetooth doesn't work with multiple cards. It will see devices but will not pair. Same hw pairs under Linux.


      hey folks. I posted this to /r/techsupport on reddit and for some reason they say they don't support Windows 11 Enterprise... and it took them a day to tell me instead of using automod. I thought this was both funny and the dumbest thing. Anyway, here's a fun little issue I'm trying to sort out.

      Windows 11 Enterprise 22h2 (22621.3810)

      About two weeks ago (after a year of having this system) my bluetooth decided not to pair with anything. It will see devices and try to pair, but it never goes through.

      I have tried:

      • a different wireless card / bt combo (PCIE)
      • removing the wireless / bt combo and using a bt dongle
      • removing all drivers (show hidden devices etc), rebooting clean, reinstalling
      • changing the USB connection to the mobo for the PCIE card
      • live boot of latest Ubuntu LTS -- successfully paired DS4 controller and Sony Headphones

      The event logs for Bluetooth Policy are all positive (e.g. A connection to a remote device 0xA4538553B7FD was successfully established) -- but nothing is paired.

      This happened on a day when I added two HDDs to the box and ran updates etc. I also tried everything above without the drives installed without any luck.

      Any ideas?

      notes:

      • I just finished with a W11 windows-to-go install off a super slow USB and I wasn't able to pair headphones or the DS4, but I did pair some sony TW earbuds. I'm sensing a fresh install in my future.
      12 votes