I want the Palm Pre form factor back. Sooo satisfying to slide that thing open or snapping it closed.

Keyboard was ok but not as good as the BB, IMO.

SoundBlaster?

I want to agree with this sooo badly. But I have some empathy for crazy gun guy. And in some dispicable sense, the gun guy is acting completely rationally, if being severely short sighted.

Hypothetical: You drop litter on the ground. On purpose because you’re a thoughtless asshat. Someone calls you on it. Shouting ensues. They slap a magnet on your car. You rip it off and throw it on the ground because you have already demonstrated your unwillingness to give a shit about leaving things to rot in mother nature. They, in response, give your car a nice new scratch with a key and the damage is now permanent.

What’s your next move? Walk away? Call the police? Try to get their license plate and submit to your insurance company? Shame them on Tik Tok?

You’ve lost because your opponent was willing to escalate to vandalism, a crime for which you suffer and that no one is likely to take seriously enough to bring justice.

Society has broken down in this little ecosystem of two. Anyone can injure you, threaten your livelihood. Take away your security. What’s stopping them?

Until you unholster that 1.5lb mechanism of steel, lead, and brass. Now, you’re back in control. You are secure. Things are certain again. No one will be scratching your car, breaking your window, stealing food out of the mouths of your children.

There’s a certain rationality behind it, is all I’m saying.

Of course, we as rational thinkers can see the folly inherent in this escalation. Every petty spat becomes a life or death scenario. If we assume the rule of law still punished outright murder, then you are right back to your original quandary of whether to walk away or be the ultimate kind of “right”.

This is where mores in a society become critical. Maybe we’ve lost our sense of right and wrong behind a veil of rule-of-law. Maybe we’ve become too virtual to truly have a society based on mutual values. Maybe I’m just high and should go stare out a window.

TL;DR: Don’t litter.

Yeah, I’m on the side of the 13-yo.

DAE died a violent death on reddit years ago. I was there. I remember the backlash.

Let’s not revive it here. This place is special.

I was expecting crazy stuff in this thread. But this… This is art.

Can your employer compel you to provide a DNA sample?

Sus. If there was a security camera they would have checked that first.

Keep your head down anon, it is a bluff.

Also, stop putting shit in drinking water you sick fuck.

There it is.

Nothing these people say means anything until you follow the money.

This is the part the media and the economists get wrong. This was never about trade or the economy. Trump understands neither. What he does understand is power. Control. It is how he has always “negotiated”. Find some pressure points you control, press on it (even if it makes no sense or, worse, actually causes suffering) and then wait for someone to offer something and declare victory.

No grand plan, no scheme, no 3d chess, no deep thought. Just flex and collect.

DVI-L chef’s kiss

And a copy of “The Art of the Deal” alongside an illustrated translation of “Mein Kempf”.

Awww. You got me in the mood for a cuddle.

See also: Tea time prior to the Trump’s inauguration. The cognitive dissonance between preemptively pardoning your loved ones and having tea with the potential perpetrator is goddamn insane.

Though as I’m typing this I see that maybe Biden was sucking up to his new overlord? Maybe both actions were aimed at keeping his family safe in any upcoming purge.

I find myself being obsessed with the thought of day-to-day life under a fascist regime. Like stupid everyday shit. Did people still go out to eat to celebrate birthdays. Did they save money for their kids’ future. Did they buy new cars or sell their houses. Did they wait in line at the DMV. Are new TV shows produced and watched. Do they file taxes. Do firefighters still drive their engines in parades. Do people still take vacations or put in swimming pools. And if so, how in the fuck did they do any of that knowing what was happening. Your elderly neighbors knew. I guess we survived as a democracy just long enough for most of those who knew to be gone.

Not as a united nation, no. I think this is the start of the dissolution of the US as a single entity. The divisions will become clear soon.

I believe there will be at least one camp and at least some people rounded up. Sort of how some pieces of the wall were erected so they could take photos and claim they’ve done something. I also think, like the walls, there will be for-profit companies that will eagerly build infrastructure that (hopefully) never gets used.

On more thought… I would consider upgrading your description of the historical parallels from spooky to fucking terrifying.

Amazing write-up. Thanks for the insight. I appreciate your contrast of the power/money dynamic in “Trump fascism” versus the ethnically driven dynamic in Hitler’s Nazism.

I’m having a moment of self reflection at my gut response of, “I hope FourPackets is right and all the human suffering and death is only due to defacto conditions and government passivity and not active genocide.” Both are awful but I guess this is the path we’re on.

First, I hope you’re right. Still a shitty world but less so than what I’m imagining. The whole “we understand power so we are smart and everyone else is not as smart” is spot on.

But, I think it starts with no intention of gassing the Jews. But after a few generals have been replaced with lackeys, and those “deportation camps” in Texas start to be more trouble than they’re worth, and how convenient it was when that one bunch of them happened to die, a new final solution starts to look more probable. And of course the perpetrators of the new genocide are not the bad guys. They’re making the hard choices. They’re the smart ones and of course it made sense to do it since digging a mass grave was cheaper than feeding 10,000 recently ex-Americans in a camp far away. That’s just good economics, people! You have to think like a billionaire!

That might have gotten away from me, but I do believe there’s a slippery slope and our new President and his orange skinned bff are waxing up the toboggan.

I love this platform. Reasonable conversations with reasonable people. You’ve given me hope, internet stranger. Keep being awesome.