guf's recent activity
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Comment on Germany’s expansion of border controls is testing European unity in ~news
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Comment on Tildes Minecraft Survival Weekly in ~games
guf LinkI found an ominous goat: https://0x0.st/Xx2C.pngI found an ominous goat: https://0x0.st/Xx2C.png
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Comment on The rise of DIY, pirated medicine: Four Thieves Vinegar Collective has made DIY medicine cheaper and more accessible to the masses in ~health
guf Link ParentYeah, from what I've seen, it is usually made from Chinese-sourced estradiol powder. A lot of the gray market HRT drugs are also just "actual drugs" from Türkiye resold to Europe (like...Yeah, from what I've seen, it is usually made from Chinese-sourced estradiol powder. A lot of the gray market HRT drugs are also just "actual drugs" from Türkiye resold to Europe (like anti-androgens or transdermal estradiol patches).
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Comment on The rise of DIY, pirated medicine: Four Thieves Vinegar Collective has made DIY medicine cheaper and more accessible to the masses in ~health
guf Link ParentYeah, I think I've read stereochemistry is actually an issue for clandestine-chemists producing methamphetamine, and also the Thalidomide (Contergan) scandal illustrates the importance of...Add in the fact that many active drug molecules depend on having the right stereochemistry
Yeah, I think I've read stereochemistry is actually an issue for clandestine-chemists producing methamphetamine, and also the Thalidomide (Contergan) scandal illustrates the importance of stereochemistry etc.
The part of the story that pertains to stereochemistry is that the original drug was made and sold as a mixture of 2 forms shown above. These are mirror images of each other, as you can see; they are not identical. Further research revealed that only the form on the right (the "R" form) was therapeutically active; the one on the left (the "S" form) was not only ineffective, it was the source of the birth defects!
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Comment on The rise of DIY, pirated medicine: Four Thieves Vinegar Collective has made DIY medicine cheaper and more accessible to the masses in ~health
guf Link ParentI understand your points and agree safety is a concern, but safety is also a political consideration/trade-off in the end, and the distribution of access to specific medical interventions is...I understand your points and agree safety is a concern, but safety is also a political consideration/trade-off in the end, and the distribution of access to specific medical interventions is political/cultural in general (a good example is that of abortion medicine given in the article). I think it's a bit comparable to debates on safety vs. freedom w.r.t. other, non-medical technologies.
Implementing informed-consent models of medical care could also reduce waiting times at public mental health services and lead to harm-reduction in some cases. For example, where I live, even my GP could prescribe the hormones which I use to self-medicate (I could pay the medicine privately), but it is understandable he does not do that since he does not want to be held liable, as there's no informed consent model for gender-affirming care here. Which means if I wanted to get a prescription from a reputable source (as taking home-brewed substances and gray market drugs is always riskier), I had to go through the psychiatric system which already is at capacity.
So I think in some cases it would be better to allow (more or less informed) people to take more responsibility for themselves, but I'm probably pretty biased, and I also get it's not an easy topic without its contradictions.
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Comment on The theory that men evolved to hunt and women evolved to gather is wrong in ~science
guf Link ParentReminds me of this article from the National Museum of Denmark which also shows how physiological differences are not set in stone: The article lists no source though, and even today, the skull is...Reminds me of this article from the National Museum of Denmark which also shows how physiological differences are not set in stone:
The faces of men and women in the Viking Age were more alike than they are today. The women’s faces were more masculine than women’s today, with prominent brow ridges. On the other hand, the Viking man’s appearance was more feminine than that of men today, with a less prominent jaw and brow ridges.
These ambiguous facial features mean that it is difficult to decide upon a Viking skeleton’s sex based on the skull alone. Therefore, other traits need to be studied in order to identify the sex of skeletons. Pelvis width can be very useful in this respect.
The article lists no source though, and even today, the skull is the least accurate in determining biological sex (and the pelvis the most accurate) I think, but I still found it interesting.
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Comment on Which magazines do you read? in ~talk
guf Link ParentI used to have a subscription to The New Yorker from 2014 to like 2018 and loved it, but it got too expensive for me. I kept all of the issues I received, so I can still browse through them from...I used to have a subscription to The New Yorker from 2014 to like 2018 and loved it, but it got too expensive for me. I kept all of the issues I received, so I can still browse through them from time to time. I enjoyed the cartoons of Edward Steed, the humor, and the fiction. It was also fun looking forward to the cover art.
Used to subscribe to Current Affairs as well, which I enjoyed, but had to quit after the incident.
I had to google it, I assume you refer to this?
In August 2021, Current Affairs staffers accused Robinson of trying to fire staffers for attempting to organize the magazine as a worker-owned co-op.
Seems pretty hypocritical of a socialist magazine if it's true.
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Comment on r/science user about long-term unemployment in ~health.mental
guf LinkI kind of relate to some of that. Yesterday, I had to go to the doctor, and it was the first time I have left the apartment in like three months. It's easier than I had imagined to disengage and...- Exemplary
I kind of relate to some of that. Yesterday, I had to go to the doctor, and it was the first time I have left the apartment in like three months. It's easier than I had imagined to disengage and withdraw from society, even though I already feel it's hard on my body (and the few people around me, but if I'm being honest I have lost my ability to care to some degree). I don't really see a future, I've gotten really lazy, and lost enthusiasm over the years. But seen in a different light, my situation is kind of freeing, too. Feels like "I've already passed my test in life".
I don't think I relate that much to the "I will never be able to afford a house or nice wedding" parts, I would assume that's probably more of a middle-class (or former middle-class) sentiment. It's never been realistic for me, even though it might be cool to have some kind of house/hut. But I agree being long-term unemployed restricts your choices (freedom) in ways that are detrimental to changing your situation, and housing as a whole definitely is an issue that contributes.
Being unemployed and poor makes people less mobile and flexible, as most long-term unemployed people (unless they are upper-class unemployed) won't find an apartment (even with roommates) in the current housing market here, especially in cities and areas with more job opportunities (since many people want to live in such places). Being long-term unemployed excludes you from the job-market (almost nobody wants to hire people with multi-year gaps in their resume), and even if you find an unpleasant/unpopular job you could get hired for, it will be hard to fill that position since the housing market also excludes you (despite of the populist myth, most landlords really don't like unemployed people as tenants), which makes it almost impossible to move for a job that might be available.
The suggestion of the poster to do some charity work is really good, but the issue of limited mobility (there are way more opportunities for charity work in cities, but long-term unemployed people are excluded from living in or near cities if they don't already live there) still applies. Disability, or degrading skills as a result of long-term unemployment also might make it harder to meaningfully contribute. I remember volunteering when I was young, and even though I was not yet long-term unemployed at that time, my social skills were so bad it was not a good experience and did not make any others (or myself) feel better.
There's also the concept of subsidized jobs in Germany (where an employer is paid by the state to hire an unemployed person), but to me, it seems hard to properly implement such schemes without undermining worker's rights and distorting the labor market in favor of the owning class. Technically, those subsidized jobs are only allowed if they are not able to replace "real" jobs, but practically, that's not easily verifiable. The people working those subsidized jobs also don't have workers' rights (since they are not considered workers by law). From what I've read, the more intensive of those subsidized measures specifically for long-term unemployed people cost about 1820 € per month on average (source in German), which makes me wonder if it wouldn't be better to just give people cash if they'd prefer (but that might have secondary effects by making some people in the social sector who run such programs lose their jobs).
The post talks about social contracts being broken, which to me kind of sounds like implying social contracts ever used to be non-broken, but I'm not optimistic about that because I assume the "brokenness" is kinda inherent. The contributions of individuals of a community started to matter less for survival once people formed larger agricultural societies, and it became possible to accumulate resources to such a degree they could be used to make "natural" social power hierarchies even steeper. I feel social contracts are mostly just divide and rule tactics of those higher up in social hierarchies, and with agricultural and industrial societies, the power differentials have grown. Probably I'm just overly cynical, though.
In 1950ies and 1960ies Germany, there were people, mostly young men with long hair, who tried to reject middle-class life and regular gainful employment. They hung out in public spaces together, being perceived by the majority as lazy and unkempt menaces to society. They were called Gammler as an insult (meaning something like "bum(s)"; the noun Gammler is derived from the verb gammeln (to spoil/rot, but also "to hang around lazily"); the adjective gammelig (rotten/old) has the same proto-Germanic ancestor as the Danish and Norwegian-Bokmål adjective gammel which means "old"), but many of those being called Gammler started to claim that word for themselves. There even were Wochenendgammler (weekend-bums), who identified with that subculture superficially, but only hung out with the others in the evening or on weekends (since they had normal, regular jobs).
There's an interesting 1966 documentary about some of Munich's Gammler (sadly only in German) called Herbst der Gammler, it has some wild interviews with the "regular" Germans demanding the young, "lazy" and unkempt people hanging out in public to be put into camps again.I miss the time when I felt healthy enough to be outside just taking up some public space like the Gammler did. It felt okay being an eyesore and outsider because I still felt willing to try things and felt at least kind of healthy. But I think it's easy to get sick, and being unhealthy makes it way harder to live an independent, different life others don't approve of. And most of the Gammler stopped being that once they got older after all. I think the more I am losing my abilities, the more I feel trapped by "normal" society which I have gotten used to be fed by. I think it's possible to be unemployable but content, but I think being unhealthy makes it way harder (and being unemployed makes it easier to make unwise health decisions). At the same time, health and unhealthiness are concepts which can be used to exclude unwanted people from society, so it's important to be aware of that as well I think, to not give up too soon trying to find contentment.
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Comment on The American/Western right-wing is a threat to queer people worldwide in ~lgbt
guf LinkIt's really good you reported it and the graffiti got removed! Just this August, some unknown people have sprayed anti-trans graffiti (calling for the murder of trans people) on two lgbt spaces in...Just the other day I reported a major hate speech graffiti I saw in my neighbourhood. Luckily it was removed, but I heard from friends similar recent occurances of this hate speech graffiti targeting queer people.
It's really good you reported it and the graffiti got removed! Just this August, some unknown people have sprayed anti-trans graffiti (calling for the murder of trans people) on two lgbt spaces in Munich (I've actually been to one of them a few times). A few weeks earlier, some people (possibly the same due to similar handwriting) also sprayed "Kill all Trans" and "Kill all Gays" on a train station and on a rainbow-colored bench in the same quarter (which is known for being the "gay neighborhood").
But more than a thousand people showed up to protest against lgbt-hate as a reaction, which is pretty great I think.
This is also another reason why USA's elections are everyone's problem. The internal power struggles and ideological battles there are exported to the rest of the world.
I definitely agree that many reactionaries use US-influenced rhetoric and talking points, but I don't think the issues where I'm from (Germany) are issues imported from the US (but I agree different flavors of politics, hate and so on could influence each other globally very easily, and I agree the US has a lot of cultural capital).
Germany has a long (and native) history of hate against lgbt people and against trans people and gender minorities specifically. The Institut für Sexualwissenschaft (Institute for Sexual Science) was founded in 1919 in Berlin, and later raided and forced to close by the Nazis. Magnus Hirschfeld started to get targeted in the 1920s by the burgeoning national socialists, and one of those incidents where he got beaten up took place in Munich, which illustrates the continuity of those issues in Germany quite well. It is definitely not merely an imported issue here, I would say it's mostly some of the old hate but sometimes dressed up in the modern language and cultural context of the anglosphere.
Even some disagreements and debates within the lgbt communities from back then resemble those which are still being had today, just dressed up in different language. For example, some German gays in the early 20th century tried to hold up the ideal of gay men being particularly masculine (with plenty of greco-roman aesthetics, glorification of soldiership, and racism), and they really hated Hirschfeld and his ideas of "intermediate sexual types", "third genders" and so forth, which kind of reminds me of the "LGB+ (minus T)" talking points of today that were mentioned by @flowerdance in their comment. There was a really nice exhibition in Munich about lgbt people in the early 20th century, and they still have some free online material if anyone is interested: https://www.nsdoku.de/en/tobeseen
I've also seen many right wing people arguing trans identity (and other lgbt topics) basically just being American imports, and that's just provably false. So personally, I'm always a bit skeptical when people argue certain sociological or political issues are American imports, but I obviously don't know how it is in non-western countries etc.
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Comment on Have you ever fallen victim to a Siren's Song? in ~talk
guf Link ParentThanks for your anecdote, that's pretty interesting. I'm glad you found medication that works for you! My problem kinda is I got diagnosed with ADHD while I was inpatient at a clinic, but I don't...Thanks for your anecdote, that's pretty interesting. I'm glad you found medication that works for you!
My problem kinda is I got diagnosed with ADHD while I was inpatient at a clinic, but I don't "have" a psychiatrist right now. So I had to go to a psychiatrist I've seen a few years ago and he prescribed it to me after reading the recommendation to try Medikinet the clinic gave me, but I'm not sure whether he has enough time to experiment or to have regular appointments, since he does not take any new patients. But I guess I should try to talk to him sometime and maybe try again with adhd meds or ask about the other options.
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Comment on When victimhood takes a bad-faith turn. Wronged explores how the practice of claiming harm has become the rhetorical province of the powerful. in ~life
guf (edited )LinkIt kinda makes sense to me, but "has become"? I didn't have the easiest time trying to understand the article (if someone might summarize their understanding, that'd be interesting to read), but...Another, Chouliaraki argues, is that victimhood has too often become the rhetorical province of the powerful, sometimes even of the aggressor. We’ve gotten ourselves turned around.
But Chouliaraki’s biggest objection to our increasing emphasis on victimhood is that it creates a strange inversion wherein “claims to victimhood are claims to power.”
It kinda makes sense to me, but "has become"? I didn't have the easiest time trying to understand the article (if someone might summarize their understanding, that'd be interesting to read), but to me it feels like the powerful (and also the less powerful who are afraid of losing their status to those even less powerful than themselves) using victimhood as an aggressive tactic to advance their own agenda or to protect their own standing in the socio-economic hierarchy doesn't seem to be a new phenomenon at all. I would guess the degree of that rhetoric being used probably increases whenever people are afraid of losing their current status of power or feel threatened (for example during economic crises and so on).
I'm thinking of the narratives used by the national conservatives (and later national socialists) in Germany after WWI, for example. Conspiracy theories like the "Dolchstoßlegende" (claming the German Reich lost WWI because social democrats and Jewish bolsheviks betrayed the military), the idea of being a victim of unfair war reparations, of decadent art and Jewish science corrupting the German spirit, and so on. Even older examples would be the anti-Jewish pogroms which happened throughout Europe during the middle ages and later (where Jews were being blamed for plagues etc.).
The article claims contemporary victimhood rhetoric has an emphasis on overly individualistic "personal tales of pain", but that's also not intuitive or obvious to me (or I misunderstood what is meant by it). I would guess those personal tales of pain and the individualistic nature of victimhood rhetoric are way more visible and accessible nowadays due to how the internet is used, but I have a hard time believing those are new or increasingly common phenomena.
An idea to think about might be how victimhood also seems to be important in religions, and how the changing role of religion might have influenced victimhood rhetoric. Religions were probably often effective in upholding social order (you might be a victim now and are suffering, but your suffering is meaningful and you'll have it good in heaven if you behave and accept your lot; you are virtuous by being a victim; you are suffering because god elected you to be damned, and while it's not your fault, you cannot do anything about it).In Wronged, this story is both a warning against “victimhood culture” and an illustration of how claiming victimhood can collapse “systemic vulnerability and personal grievance … into one vocabulary.” Chouliaraki wishes to undo that collapse. Another is to help readers “recognize the suffering of the vulnerable for precisely what it is: a matter not of victimhood but of injustice.”
Central to Chouliaraki’s exploration is the distinction she draws between victimhood and vulnerability. She argues that victimhood is not a condition but a claim—that you’re a victim not when something bad happens to you, but when you say, “I am wronged!” Anyone, of course, can make this declaration, no matter the scale (or even reality) of the wrong they’ve suffered. For this reason, per Chouliaraki, victimhood should be a less important barometer for public decision making than vulnerability, which is a condition.
That makes sense I think and seems like an interesting distinction, but I feel there's still the issue of someone having to judge whether the condition of vulnerability applies (even if it might be measured objectively in some cases), and what should follow from that condition. The difference seems to be that between a subjective self attribution (victimhood) vs. an attribution through others who have the authority and knowledge to determine it as objectively as possible (vulnerability), if I understood that correctly.
But even in cases where vulnerability can be measured somewhat objectively, people in power could still easily argue certain classes of measurable vulnerability (e.g. certain illnesses) are not worthy of support and protection because of their moral views (e.g. a vulnerability might just be a matter of personal responsibility or the result of immoral actions according to them), while other forms of measurable vulnerability might be worthy of such support. Social-darwinists for instance could argue there's no reason for public decision making in favor of people with poor socio-economic status (a somewhat measurable condition/vulnerability, but obviously there will also be arguments about different metrics that might be used) because that condition or class of vulnerability might be just/natural/inevitable to them.
She asks readers to rethink the language of I am wronged and turn instead to questions that are more basic, yet harder to solve: Who is in pain? What tangible protection can we give them? How can we keep others like them safe? She seems to appeal less to the truly influential, whom she may see as a lost cause, than to her many potential readers who occupy a social middle ground: vulnerable in some ways, yet close enough to power that victimhood culture might benefit them. If those of us who are in that place reassess the appeal of victimhood, Wronged suggests, we can decrease others’ ability to use it in bad faith, or to conflate having to do something they dislike (wearing a mask, let’s say) with genuine pain.
That makes a lot of sense (I think). But it still seems easy to argue about what genuine pain constitutes, because in many cases, there is no easy way to just measure it objectively. And beyond that, asking people to consider sharing resources with those below them in certain socio-economic hierarchies is an noble goal, but I feel pretty pessimistic about people being just willing to do that, especially if they feel threatened in their socio-economic standing themselves (whether justified or not) and internalized having to assert themselves in a competition for limited resources.
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Comment on nematode farm — a web game where the opponent AI is an actual simulation of the nervous system of C. elegans in ~games
guf LinkThis was kinda fun to play. I think it would be a nice project to build a similar game (pushing worms or other organism into their pens) but with multiplayer.This was kinda fun to play. I think it would be a nice project to build a similar game (pushing worms or other organism into their pens) but with multiplayer.
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Comment on Have you ever fallen victim to a Siren's Song? in ~talk
guf Link ParentThanks. I'm glad you are able to treat it! Have you ever tried methylphenidate (Ritalin/Concerta/Medikinet) before you started taking Vyvanse? I got a prescription for methylphenidate (also...Life doesn't have to be this hard. Be honest with yourself, accept yourself, and create an environment where success becomes easier than failure. Get away from the people, places, and things that keep hurting you and letting you let yourself down. I'm here if you need to talk.
Thanks.
I personally have pretty bad ADHD and take a small dose of extended release Vyvanse under the supervision of my wife and doctor. Doesn't seem to be a problem for me because I actually get the intended benefit from it in proper doses and it doesn't get me high. Make no mistake though, I know the euphoria that comes when you're abusing it and it's a really amazing feeling (until it's not).
I'm glad you are able to treat it! Have you ever tried methylphenidate (Ritalin/Concerta/Medikinet) before you started taking Vyvanse? I got a prescription for methylphenidate (also extended release), but it made me feel kinda exhausted and I did not bother to renew the prescription. It helped me to fall asleep and wake up early, though.
If you're curious, I would say that stimulants make you feel like a genius version of superman, while opiates make you feel warm and safe. It starts in your chest and radiates to the rest of your body. Opiates will instantly give you all the love you wished you had but never got.
Interesting, thanks. Abusing stimulants felt very different to me, I would say more like the warmth and love you described, and it also made me feel relaxed, gullible, and less anxious (but after a few hours, I tended to get anxious and sad). Obviously also depended on the type of stimulant, and dosage.
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Comment on Where do different ideas of masculinity fit into the US presidential election? in ~life.men
guf LinkI don't really think I feel the same. It just makes me think of conscription and men dying in war, or men not being worthy for just being, but only if they have skills and abilities useful to...“There are very many different ways of being masculine. But I would say that the longest and best established definition of masculinity that I found as I've done this work is really of being of service to others, of being of for more than yourself.”
Reeves explains that historically, what has distinguished a man from a boy is the ability to “generate more of something than you need for your own survival.” It conjures up the idea of the “breadwinner” of a family, though Reeves says it doesn’t necessarily mean that.
“I think the idea of a man who exists only for himself, that's actually the opposite of masculinity. And so there's a certain selflessness to all of the definitions of masculinity that I think is positive, that I think should define what modern manhood is.”
I don't really think I feel the same. It just makes me think of conscription and men dying in war, or men not being worthy for just being, but only if they have skills and abilities useful to others in some sort of competition. I get that he understands his definition "conjures up the idea of the 'breadwinner' of a family" while "it doesn’t necessarily mean that", but that's still the first kinda thing I associate with his definition.
“What she's come to realize is that a world of floundering men is not likely to be a world of flourishing women, and that we do have to rise together. And that actually, if men really start struggling to do their bit on the home front or in the labor market, it's not like that women end up unscathed from that,” he told Morning Edition.
That makes a lot of sense to me. Also reminds me of a book I read on the topic of masculinity and the patriarchy, The will to change: men, masculinity, and love by bell hooks. I recommend it, it's also not too long and felt pretty accessible.
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Comment on Where do different ideas of masculinity fit into the US presidential election? in ~life.men
guf (edited )Link ParentI'm not a trans man, but I still found that kinda relatable. I've also been to some lgbt-events etc. (before I kinda dropped out of being social) and what you've written definitely seems worth...When they looked more female, they were very readily accepted, but as they begin to look more male and adopt more masculine mannerisms, people forget that they are trans and lump them in with cis men — who do not receive nearly as warm a welcome.
Basically, they can't find acceptance as trans men anywhere: their local progressive spaces don't want men, and their local conservative spaces don't want trans people. They can find something that feels akin to acceptance by passing as cis men, but this is of course not the true acceptance they yearn for. This puts a lot of trans men in a very difficult position, socially, and it seems a lot of them kind of just ... drop out of the whole thing
I'm not a trans man, but I still found that kinda relatable. I've also been to some lgbt-events etc. (before I kinda dropped out of being social) and what you've written definitely seems worth paying attention to. Whenever I went to a "quiet" queer event that did not involve drinking or partying, most of the attendees tended to be women or other people who "looked at least somewhat feminine in a socially acceptable way". And most people seemed at least middle-class, and pretty young. Which is totally fine, but I get how the hurdle might be higher for lgbt men (or "masculine looking" people) to attend such events as a result, even if they would be happily accepted there. Same also applies to people who are ethnic minorities, disabled, or socio-economically disadvantaged and so on.
Whenever I wanted to socialize with lgbt men, it was way easier to find them in spaces where alcohol was involved (and in spaces which probably were more sexualised). I'm really thankful those spaces exist, but I remember wishing there would have been more men or masculine looking people comfortable and interested in also showing up in those "quiet spaces" I've mentioned. In some of those "more feminine" quiet spaces, I felt "too masculine" and uneducated/poor, and in the loud "more masculine" gay spaces I sometimes felt too unattractive, or a bit like an intruder because I take estrogen and was afraid people might think it's weird if I still just live as a gay man despite of that. I remember some man asking me if I take hormones and touching my body "to check", and it felt bad, so I could imagine why some trans men might also feel uncomfortable in such spaces.
Thinking about it, most social events I've been to that didn't revolve around some specific skill-based hobby but were mostly focused on socializing unto itself and didn't involve partying, drinking and so on, often seemed to be dominated by women (or at least people being read that way), so I'm not even sure my observations are specific to lgbt and progressive spaces. Probably also really depends on location.
I also think some men (and people being read as such) might be afraid of making other people uncomfortable to a degree that's unhealthy. I think many men probably have to constantly be mindful of not being perceived as a threat, which might make it harder for them to open up and to be vulnerable, especially for men (and masculine looking people) who for instance are ethnic minorities, or have autism, mental illnesses, or low socio-economic status (as they might be perceived as being more threatening).
All the hate against trans-women which frames them as a danger and as sexual predators and perverts, and all the issues non-passing or masculine presenting trans women face, probably don't exactly contribute to men (or people read as men) feeling open to question their own performance of masculinity either. I think it's ironic and sad when men who complain about prejudice against men are themselves transphobic while transphobia is often somewhat based on gender-essentialist prejudice against men itself.
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Comment on Have you ever fallen victim to a Siren's Song? in ~talk
guf Link ParentHave you ever tried bupropion (Wellbutrin)? I never really got addicted to nicotine, but when I took bupropion (got it prescriped for depression) and tried smoking a cigarette, it was instantly...Smoking is the one habit I still haven't kicked
Have you ever tried bupropion (Wellbutrin)? I never really got addicted to nicotine, but when I took bupropion (got it prescriped for depression) and tried smoking a cigarette, it was instantly pretty disgusting and not enjoyable despite me usually being able to enjoy nicotine. It is actually prescribed to support smoking cessation.
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Comment on Have you ever fallen victim to a Siren's Song? in ~talk
guf Link ParentThanks for your comments and your post. It is well written and interesting to me. I'm glad you managed to get better and continue to do so! Have you ever tried hard stimulants? I never did heroin,...Thanks for your comments and your post. It is well written and interesting to me. I'm glad you managed to get better and continue to do so!
Nothing compares to the high highs and low lows of heroin. Nothing.
Have you ever tried hard stimulants? I never did heroin, only some prescription opioids and research chemical opioids, and they never felt great compared to some stimulants. Opioids also gave me constipation, itchiness and nausea, which is unpleasant enough; I couldn't imagine how bad withdrawals must feel if even just trying to take the drug tended to make me feel sick. Maybe prescription opioids (like the one you mentioned taking after your knee injury) can be a gateway to addiction because they will give you some tolerance with fewer side effects at first. Do you think opioids are an acquired taste so to say (maybe a bit like alcohol)?
I wonder if some people are more prone to getting addicted to certain substances (while being less likely to get addicted to other ones) just biologically, and whether that could be tested one day. I think I read something like that about alcohol, but I'm not sure.
Maybe the route of administration also matters, I never injected any opioid. Do you think it made a difference to your addiction how you administered drugs? Stimulants felt way more addictive and "great" when I snorted them, maybe it works analogously with opioids.
Heroin seems hard to get nowadays where I'm from (Germany). From what I've read, many addicted people switched to purely synthetic opioids, but I'm not sure if that's true. I also wonder if it's actually true that opioids like fentanyl feel less "warm/good" than heroin. I recently read about kratom (which apparently has some light opioid-like effects) and considered buying some as it is legal here and apparently helps some people with chronic pain, but I read many people got addicted and got bad withdrawals even from that.
The odds of success are definitely up for debate and it really depends how far gone someone is. Some sources say 90% of heroin users recover, even without treatment, while other sources say 90% will never recover.
This is an interesting point. My boyfriend was committed to a mental hospital a few years ago due to drug use (not heroin), and one of the doctors there told him most people like him never get better, which in hindsight seems like such an irresponsible thing to say because he got better pretty quickly, and never really had the same issues again (even though he could very well have died from an overdose). I assume he recovered because he was young, pretty new to taking drugs, had a support system and changeable life circumstances, while a doctor having to deal with addiction every day probably gets jaded and biased since they often have to deal with the sickest patients over and over again.
If he hadn't had a good support system and his family, it maybe actually could have ended like the doctor predicted, but not because drug abuse is inherently "impossible" to treat like the doctor suggested. I think treating addiction without helping people to also change their life-circumstances will never have the same success rate. I think that also applies to other illnesses. I had to get treatment for an eating disorder this winter, and while I made measurable progress there, I did not manage to change my life-circumstances, so I did not end up recovering long-term.
I think those biases which might develop in people who are treating addiction and other illnesses could be counter-productive and might influence policy in a negative way. I would assume similar biases might apply to cops and public school teachers for instance, but I only have my anecdotes and no data (and I obviously also might be pretty biased myself).
Another point is the people who never got that far into an addiction (or are functional addicts who manage to get better over time) also might not show up in official statistics. I feel like I could very well have gotten addicted to stimulants, but I managed to stop after getting myself into some really bad situations. I think I was also lucky I had no friends or social circle using hard drugs (like you mentioned you had) when I had to stop, and had someone believing in me despite acting shitty. I think it must be hard for alcoholics to stop, as every supermarket here sells it cheaply and there are ads everywhere. Other drugs are easier to avoid.
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Comment on I hate alcohol. Totally hate it. in ~talk
guf LinkAs a young teenager, I had to witness my mother being passed out drunk on the floor and I remember being both very angry, but also afraid she would die in her sleep. I've been a passenger in a car...As a young teenager, I had to witness my mother being passed out drunk on the floor and I remember being both very angry, but also afraid she would die in her sleep. I've been a passenger in a car with some man who was way too drunk to drive (I still regret not having stopped him). I only ever got groped by drunk men. So I empathize and agree alcohol is a dangerous drug.
A related issue that has not been mentioned (I think) are Fetal alcohol spectrum disorders. I am annoyed by the social taboo surrounding this issue. Most people affected by them probably remain undiagnosed (or misdiagnosed). The taboo does not help anyone (apart from the conscience of some parents maybe). I don't hate alcohol (or other drugs) and I don't think "just don't drink alcohol" is a viable solution in most cases, but I think people should take responsibility for the harm they cause. Same with smoking. I remember having to go to school reeking of my mom's cigarette smoke to the point some teachers assumed I was a smoker myself.
There is no safe time for alcohol use during pregnancy. Alcohol can cause problems for the baby throughout pregnancy, including before a person knows they are pregnant.
- There is no known safe amount of alcohol use during pregnancy.
- There is no safe time during pregnancy to drink alcohol.
- All types of alcohol can be harmful, including red or white wine, beer, and liquor.
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Comment on American Red Cross national blood inventory plummets 25% in July - declares emergency blood shortage in ~health
guf LinkSeems to be an ongoing issue in Germany as well (at least according to the German Red Cross): Article from 2024 - "Critical shortage of blood donations" Article from 2022 - "Not enough blood...Seems to be an ongoing issue in Germany as well (at least according to the German Red Cross):
Article from 2024 - "Critical shortage of blood donations"
Article from 2022 - "Not enough blood donations"I never donated blood. I think I'd actually want to try it (it even seems to have some health benefits), but I'm pretty sure from the research I've done I would not be eligible (which is also the result of the local red cross' online test I just did).
"Interesting" historical aside: Men who have sex with men (and trans people "with sexual risk behaviours") were completely excluded from donating blood in Germany until 2017. Since 2017, they were only eligible if they completely abstained from sex for the last 12 months before a donation, and since 2021 they were also eligible if they did not have any new sexual partner in the last 4 months (and lived monogamously).
Only since 2023 have those discriminatory rules been removed, meaning a person's eligibility must now be evaluated according to their individual risk behaviors and not by their sexual orientation (or trans-identity). According to the new rules, all people (no matter their sexuality or identity) who have had anal sex with a new sexual partner in the last 4 months are not eligible to donate anymore (even if they use condoms or are on PrEP), which could still be seen as unnecessarily discriminatory in some cases.
The previous age limit of 60 years for blood donors was also removed in 2023.
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Comment on What are your ten favourite movies of all time? in ~movies
guf LinkNon-fiction Tokyo-Ga (Wim Wenders, 1985) Paris is Burning (Jennie Livingston, 1990) Titicut Follies (Frederick Wiseman, 1967) Nuit et brouillard (Alain Resnais, 1956) [I have only seen the German...Non-fiction
- Tokyo-Ga (Wim Wenders, 1985)
- Paris is Burning (Jennie Livingston, 1990)
- Titicut Follies (Frederick Wiseman, 1967)
- Nuit et brouillard (Alain Resnais, 1956) [I have only seen the German dub "Nacht und Nebel"]
Fiction
- Idioterne (Lars von Trier, 1998)
- Kiki's Delivery Service (Hayao Miyazaki, 1989) [It's the only Studio Ghibli movie I've seen so far]
- All of us Strangers (Andrew Haigh, 2023)
- The Olsen-Banden movies I've seen so far
- Blade Runner (Ridley Scott, 1982) [I have only seen the Final Cut; I also liked Blade Runner 2049; I did not enjoy Alien that much]
- Apocalypse Now (Francis Coppola, 1979) [I've only seen the redux version]
The fiction movies in that top 10 are mostly not set in stone, there are many other candidates (Memento, Fargo, The Big Lebowski, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Dr. Strangelove, The first Pokemon movie, The Way He Looks (2014), Moonrise Kingdom, Stranger Than Paradise, ...)
Just to put that into context, Denmark has had like seven years of "temporary" border controls (I have experienced them myself basically every time I've been traveling from Germany to Denmark by train). Sweden, France, Austria (and, like already mentioned in the AP article, Germany) are among the other countries which had similar "temporary" border controls in place for quite a while now.
(Source in Danish)
In late 2023 to early 2024, I've also been using a regional train line which starts in Austria, and this train line already had regular delays due to German border controls.
It might also be useful to look at statistics like the absolute and relative distributions of first-time asylum applications within the EU (but there might be more suitable statistics):
(Source of the European Commission)
According to this graphic (same source), Poland had fewer first-time asylum applicants in 2022 and 2023 than countries such as Sweden, Romania, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Ireland, and Switzerland, despite having a larger population than all of those. I don't think most of the people who fled Ukraine and who are under temporary protection are counted in that statistic, though, so those numbers might be pretty misleading in a way (maybe someone could find other statistics):
(source)
On a related note, the German government is already trying to use the (perceived) threats and incidents mentioned in the Associated Press article to encroach upon civil rights (the government now proposes legislation which would allow police to run biometric surveillance tech (such as facial recognition) on social media platforms and would expand "no knife zones" where police can check and frisk innocent people (in practice especially those who look foreign) without cause). (Source in German)
If a government of social democrats, green party, and libertarians plans to pass this legislation (on top of the additional border controls mentioned in the AP article) in such a hasty manner, I am really not looking forward to what the right-wing anti-EU extremists and conservative christ-democrats have up their sleeves.