NaraVara's recent activity
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Comment on Donald Trump won’t rule out deploying US troops to support rebuilding Gaza, sees ‘long-term’ US ownership in ~society
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Comment on Donald Trump won’t rule out deploying US troops to support rebuilding Gaza, sees ‘long-term’ US ownership in ~society
NaraVara r/conservative is where MAGA chuckleheads complain about lack of free speech on Reddit while restricting their entire sub to flaired conservative users only. They’re a pretty good demonstration of...r/conservative is where MAGA chuckleheads complain about lack of free speech on Reddit while restricting their entire sub to flaired conservative users only. They’re a pretty good demonstration of the extent to which support for the Republican party today is motivated more by insularity and cope than any sort of principled conservatism.
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Comment on Donald Trump won’t rule out deploying US troops to support rebuilding Gaza, sees ‘long-term’ US ownership in ~society
NaraVara This, like tariffs and mass deportations, seems to be another one of those things that’s a long term fixation for him. Jared Kushner was talking the same way during Trump’s first term. This...This, like tariffs and mass deportations, seems to be another one of those things that’s a long term fixation for him. Jared Kushner was talking the same way during Trump’s first term.
This administration is a 4-way deal between movement conservatives, billionaire tech oligarchs, America’s enemies abroad, and Donald Trump. The first three entertain every demented Fox News grandpa thought that goes through Trump’s head and let him play at being the big man. In exchange the oligarchs are allowed to dissolve the administrative state and loot the treasury. The movement conservatives are allowed to try and reintroduce segregation and ensconce Christian nationalism as the operative principle of American government. Finally, the anti-American faction is permitted to destroy American soft power (USAID) and intelligence capabilities so they can combat the spread of liberal democratic values and American influence.
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Comment on Team behind Twitterrific launches a multi-feed app called Tapestry in ~tech
NaraVara I tried it out this morning. The interface is really clean, I’m a fan. My only complaint is that I think I’d like it to be a little easier to flip between custom feeds. So far I haven’t been able...I tried it out this morning. The interface is really clean, I’m a fan. My only complaint is that I think I’d like it to be a little easier to flip between custom feeds.
So far I haven’t been able to figure out how to port in my RSS feed from Inoreader, but as an RSS reader I think this is way better on mobile than NetNewsWire. It does present a problem for me though because I don’t think it’ll be able to sync my reading between iOS and my Mac as I do with NNW.
Missing an AppleNews+ feed as well, but I guess that’s more Apple’s fault for not exposing it.
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Comment on US President Donald Trump suggests Palestinians leave Gaza and ‘we just clean out’ territory in ~society
NaraVara For sure, but it's hard to say up front how big or small the community would need to be. And you also would need to have a large enough community that it's an actual community and not just a...For sure, but it's hard to say up front how big or small the community would need to be. And you also would need to have a large enough community that it's an actual community and not just a culture that gets erased via dilution.
Tibetans have more or less accepted that they're diasporic nation/culture now, but they have strongholds in the USA and India where there are enough of them to maintain shared traditions and cultural institutions. Palestinians would need something like that if "Palestinian" is to mean anything. Otherwise in a generation or two they just become Egyptians, Jordanians, Kuwaitis, etc.
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Comment on US President Donald Trump suggests Palestinians leave Gaza and ‘we just clean out’ territory in ~society
NaraVara Actual uncommitted voters yeah, but they were a small and unheeded minority among the Palestine protesters. I'm actually not mad at them, they did the best they could with the unimaginably shitty...Actual uncommitted voters yeah, but they were a small and unheeded minority among the Palestine protesters. I'm actually not mad at them, they did the best they could with the unimaginably shitty situation and I have an immense amount of respect for that. It's the larger mass of mostly uninterested virtue signalers online whose main focus is using whatever the fashionable cause is this week as the excuse to trash the Democrats that earn my contempt. I could practically see them salivating over the Gaza issue because marginalized groups only have utility for them as martyrs for them to posture about.
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Comment on Toyota reduces price of new hydrogen car in California to just over $15,000 — with $15,000 of free fuel in ~transport
NaraVara I think the engineering challenge of moving compressed gas around safely is more likely to be tackled than the political challenge of building reliable electrical infrastructure in remote and...I think the engineering challenge of moving compressed gas around safely is more likely to be tackled than the political challenge of building reliable electrical infrastructure in remote and marginalized communities.
Yeah there might be fires and industrial accidents, but it’s nothing they’re not used to with the humanitarian costs of oil refining and transport.
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Comment on Toyota reduces price of new hydrogen car in California to just over $15,000 — with $15,000 of free fuel in ~transport
NaraVara (edited )Link ParentI think the main reason is just that Toyota sells in insane volumes and they literally just can’t source raw materials in sufficient quantities to do a fully BEV Camry or Corolla profitably. I...I think the main reason is just that Toyota sells in insane volumes and they literally just can’t source raw materials in sufficient quantities to do a fully BEV Camry or Corolla profitably.
I think hydrogen is probably also better suited for specific edge cases, and in much of the global south where the electrical infrastructure isn’t there and probably will not be in the foreseeable future. But also vehicles used for long haul travel, work trucks that have to go to remote areas and operate for extended stretches while carrying a bunch of stuff, vehicles that frequently operate in frigid cold, etc.
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Comment on US President Donald Trump suggests Palestinians leave Gaza and ‘we just clean out’ territory in ~society
NaraVara (edited )Link ParentThere’s a backstory to why it’s hard to resettle Gazans. When Jordan took in a large population of Palestinian refugees the PLO tried to launch a coup against the Jordanian government because they...There’s a backstory to why it’s hard to resettle Gazans. When Jordan took in a large population of Palestinian refugees the PLO tried to launch a coup against the Jordanian government because they were not sufficiently militant about reconquering Israel. There’s a view in the Arab world that this population has simply been too radicalized to bring in large numbers without empowering Jihadi factions in their own politics.
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Comment on US President Donald Trump suggests Palestinians leave Gaza and ‘we just clean out’ territory in ~society
NaraVara When the overall margin was 1%, and even less in the swing states that mattered, every individual thing made a difference. The main focus of discussion should be what Trump is doing, but it’s hard...When the overall margin was 1%, and even less in the swing states that mattered, every individual thing made a difference. The main focus of discussion should be what Trump is doing, but it’s hard not to be frustrated when the actual time to do something to stop it has already passed, and the people who claimed to care most couldn’t bring themselves to do it.
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Comment on US President Donald Trump suggests Palestinians leave Gaza and ‘we just clean out’ territory in ~society
NaraVara (edited )Link ParentIt was clear from the start that those people’s concern for Gaza started and stopped with its convenience as a cudgel to beat Democrats. They view politics as a game where Democrats winning...- Exemplary
It was clear from the start that those people’s concern for Gaza started and stopped with its convenience as a cudgel to beat Democrats.
They view politics as a game where Democrats winning elections delays the glorious revolution and so we must elect Republicans until the Democratic Party withers away and they will replace it with a proper leftist party. It’s deluded, nihilistic, and destructive and we’re past the point where we should let ourselves continued to be fooled into viewing such people as allies. They’re handmaidens to fascists. They view a slide into fascism as a necessary first step to realizing their political goals. Every community they claim to care about is something they’re willing to martyr for their ideology. Every cause they claim is non-negotiable is actually a sacrifice they’re willing to make in service to the millenarian doomsday cult.
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Comment on It's time to abandon the cargo cult metaphor in ~science
NaraVara (edited )Link ParentHonestly it’s not even the argument to think harder about the implications of what’s being said, which is fine. It’s just that people want to believe these changes are driven by thoughtful...Honestly it’s not even the argument to think harder about the implications of what’s being said, which is fine. It’s just that people want to believe these changes are driven by thoughtful considerations instead of hurried, reactive takes. It’s evident that specific set of guidance on terminology that went viral was being driven by purely vibes-based etymology with no background research done whatsoever. At best people were operating off erroneous, but oft repeated, folk etymologies (e.g. rule of thumb) but more often it was literally just word association on the part of listeners with no curiosity about whether the offensive interpretation they were running with was accurate (e.g. gold master).
Now that we’ve had some time to soak in this world of vibes over data and operating on reflexive takes that are never critically examined I think we have all started all see where it’s leading us. If that guidance was just a Tumblr post it would have been one thing, but it was (IIRC) published by Stanford’s CS department and then distributed out across the industry as if it was authoritative. That was just toxic to any effort to take these considerations seriously.
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Comment on There is no safe word: How the best-selling fantasy author Neil Gaiman hid the darkest parts of himself for decades in ~books
NaraVara The usual convention with trigger warnings is to use the collapsing hidden text with the trigger in the summary. <details> <summary>Click to view the hidden text</summary> Here's all the hidden...The usual convention with trigger warnings is to use the collapsing hidden text with the trigger in the summary.
<details> <summary>Click to view the hidden text</summary> Here's all the hidden text. It can have **markdown** in it too. </details>
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Comment on There is no safe word: How the best-selling fantasy author Neil Gaiman hid the darkest parts of himself for decades in ~books
NaraVara I’m not entirely sure Palmer’s role in this is as remote as “enabling” to be honest. Comments like “I wish it was like the good old days when we could both fuck you” suggest she might have been a...I’m not entirely sure Palmer’s role in this is as remote as “enabling” to be honest. Comments like “I wish it was like the good old days when we could both fuck you” suggest she might have been a participant in the past.
At the end of the article it mentions that Gaiman’s defense alleges this is a smear campaign by Palmer as part of their divorce proceedings, and while I don’t doubt Gaiman’s guilt and culpability I suspect that might be influencing not getting the same sorts of lurid details about her own actions except what we piece together from clues laying around.
It’s very hard to imagine someone married to him wouldn’t know. And the fact that the straw that broke her back was the “was he wearing headphones” thing makes me think the SA wasn’t an issue for her. My initial read on the accusations was that this is a guy who got away with too much borderline stuff as he came up and it broke his ability to gauge appropriateness and boundaries. But this all makes it seem like he’s given in to much worse demons than that, especially the very flagrant and unambiguous violation of consent over the UTI thing and the fact that his kid had noticed enough to try and act out the master/slave dynamic with his nanny. If he was hiding that from Palmer I can’t imagine he’d be this reckless in front of their kid. Kids talk! A LOT!
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Comment on The tsunami of burnout few see in ~health.mental
NaraVara Yeah I call this the “Dr. Bronner writing style” after the soap bottle. It’s mostly just a rant full of suppositions you’re supposed to accept as true. If you’re lucky you get some data points...Yeah I call this the “Dr. Bronner writing style” after the soap bottle. It’s mostly just a rant full of suppositions you’re supposed to accept as true. If you’re lucky you get some data points cherry picked to support them and some vague hand waving in the direction of some “they” out there that’s trying to decisive you, but it’s all kind of unstructured and seems to just be an assembly of various normal frustrations and grievances that are being blamed on “them.”
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Comment on US Republicans introduce constitutional amendment to impose term limits in ~society
NaraVara If we’re going to be this cynical about democracy, as a concept, then I don’t think merely term limiting legislators is going to be the fix.While this is a great sentiment, you have to remember that most people, at least in the US, don't follow politics, so they either don't vote (which shame on them), or they pick the person that is already there 1. because of name recognition like you said, o 2. because they don't know any better.
If we’re going to be this cynical about democracy, as a concept, then I don’t think merely term limiting legislators is going to be the fix.
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Comment on US Republicans introduce constitutional amendment to impose term limits in ~society
NaraVara Honestly I view gerontocracy as an indicator that incumbent advantages are simply too strong and it probably has to do with the influence of money in politics (incumbents are better at fundraising...Honestly I view gerontocracy as an indicator that incumbent advantages are simply too strong and it probably has to do with the influence of money in politics (incumbents are better at fundraising and name recognition). If a constituency thinks their legislator is too old they should vote them out. If they continue winning then their constituents are signaling that they want them there. If this is obviously bad for them or we think that does not accurately reflect their will we should address how their will isn’t being reflected instead of trying to whack a mole at whatever output we don’t like has resulted.
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Comment on US Republicans introduce constitutional amendment to impose term limits in ~society
NaraVara It’s a pretty consensus finding among comparativists. The most common examples are from Mexico because their term limits were extreme and almost universal. But there are comparisons between US...It’s a pretty consensus finding among comparativists. The most common examples are from Mexico because their term limits were extreme and almost universal. But there are comparisons between US states as well. The effects and the mechanisms don’t really matter much whether it’s the federal level or not. The fact is that legislation is a skill that requires, experience, knowledge, and contacts all of which require tenure. If you don’t allow legislators to accrue tenure then power will flow to those who do, which are unaccountable deep state figures and lobbyists.
And as just a conceptual idea it falls on its face. If the goal is to have outcomes that are more democratic and accountable to the people, you need to hold legislators accountable to the people rather than allocating duties by fixed formulas.
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Comment on US Republicans introduce constitutional amendment to impose term limits in ~society
NaraVara This has been studied extensively by political scientists and the verdict is pretty clear that term limits on the legislature leads to more corruption, worse legislation, and greater influence by...I'd want to get into the weeds more but lifelong politicians tend to be problematic for numerous reasons.
This has been studied extensively by political scientists and the verdict is pretty clear that term limits on the legislature leads to more corruption, worse legislation, and greater influence by lobbyists.
If you don’t want your politicians to serve too long your mechanism is to vote them out. Presumably, if their constituents keep voting for them then they must not mind them having tenure.
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Comment on Dungeons & Dragons shows that modish guff doesn’t serve diversity and inclusion in ~games.tabletop
NaraVara Now he’s mumbling, and he’s screaming, and he don’t know, what he’s singing. YEAH!Now he’s mumbling, and he’s screaming, and he don’t know, what he’s singing.
YEAH!
At least someone is getting what they voted for