FriendOfDeSoto

I watched the news segment linked in here and I’m neither a doctor, nor a healthcare administrator, nor an Aussie: this does sound rather daft. You could contract the disease while being abroad even if all Aussie ticks were proven to be clean. Which is at least in doubt based on two local cases they interviewed. I’m guessing this is a very small number of people getting royally screwed by the system.

On a semi-serious note, would the Australian healthcare system also refuse to treat a person with Ebola based on the fact that the virus is known to be of African origin?

Thanks for writing that. It’s quite long but I can see your point. I’m relieved that you didn’t just read two headlines and sent him to the digital gallows. Personally, I don’t reach the same conclusion as you. If you’d say in reply my standards were perhaps lower I would not disagree with you. As I wrote before, this is not enough for me. Weir is not a saint. I heard hin trash talk his own follow-up to the Martian in an interview when Hail Mary came out. He knows he’s not Asimov or Dick. Or Shakespeare.

In terms of what science fiction is best at doing, we don’t appear to be that far apart. Allegorical storytelling is great. That’s why I mentioned Picard S2 where there is none of that. They have characters sit in ICE detention or looking at the burning mountains in 2020 and say this is shit (which, of course, it is). Zero allegory, all in our face virtue signaling. Virtues that I find valid but in a sci-fi story told in a very literal (read: shit) way. Politics overrode good story telling. (Then again, it was the pandy, there are extenuating circumstances.)

You don’t have to answer this; I’m just curious. How is your enjoyment of 90s Trek knowing that Rick Berman was involved? I’d argue he’s a far bigger sob than Weir.

He is a huge hypocrite in your opinion. Which I don’t find convincing.

I just read up on the woke comments. What do you find so terrible there? That he writes avoiding an agenda? Or that he criticizes works that plainly have one?

It’s his opinion. I don’t wholly disagree with him. Science fiction often works best when they don’t hang a giant lantern on what the lesson to be learned is. When the politics override good storytelling. Like in Picard S2. ICE is shit and so are climate change denial and the burning mountains around contemporary LA. But to me that came across as preachy, not a great story.

If anything you have to respect the man for not mincing his words at all. That doesn’t mean I agree with him but in this outrage driven world that’s almost a baller move.

I don’t think he has alienated as many people as you suggest. And I haven’t heard enough to be worried. He might be a prick but these two stories are not enough to build a case just yet IMO.

The man has a vested interest to be in the headlines. Media take an interest in him because of the movie. It’s the perfect climate to turn a statement of not much importance into a news headline.

I haven’t listened to the podcast. If anybody has, maybe they can comment on the tone of the conversation. Seeing it just in writing makes him seem a bit petty and adversarial. But the way it happened it could just as well be isolated, throwaway jovial comments where the “fuck them” could be much less pointed and we are left feeling this was a nothing burger.

This is of the same quality journalism as any actor of the fantasy lightsaber universe being asked if they world return to the franchise. Sure, if the script looked promising, said Daisy Ripley. “Ripley to return to Star Wars!” reports niche media site struggling to get eyeballs in front of their ads.

Because this feels like a loaded statement, I’d respond like this: Biology makes mistakes. Biology is fallible. To frame this about biology is not sufficiently complex to address the issue.

1. Talk to experts.
2. The initial statement seems to me is that of a culture warrior, not a curious mind. Therefore it doesn’t matter to me.
3. Compassion doesn’t require logic. But if you want sonething slightly logical: I don’t understand quantum physics either. I’m reliably informed it exists. Me being unable to grasp the uncertainty principle leaves me feeling uneasy and frustrated. Others may feel in a comparable way about gender identity. It’s okay to admit that you don’t get it. I don’t fully understand it either. It’s not okay to be an asshole about it.
4. Apples to rotten pears.

I know that in certain countries like Japan or South Korea: it’s normal to leave the front door unlocked

Can’t speak to the Koreans. I don’t know anybody in Japan who doesn’t lock their door even when they’re home. Granted, I don’t know the entire population. Even in the countryside I suspect more people will lock when they’re not at home. There is a tradition where the area immediately behind the front door where you take your shoes off is considered not that private. They call it genkan. And delivery people may - in rural areas - enter that area without being invited. The fear of one day finding the public broadcaster TV fee collector, the yoghurt mafia, Jehovah’s witnesses, or the Mount Fuji cult recruiters in your genkan, makes most people lock.

I can’t remember. As you can tell from my lengthy historical summary, I’m old enough to use that as an excuse.

I have recorded songs off the radio onto cassette. I have made mix tapes. First off records, later CDs. There was a general trade going on at school among friends. Somebody would get a new album on tape or on CD and when the owner had listened to it enough times it would make the rounds so people could record it for themselves. Musical socialism.

I have made Minidisc mix tapes as well. I went as far as recording concerts from VHS onto Minidisc. Adding track names was harder than T9 texting and took fucking ages.

I ripped and burned CDs, some of them are still stashed away in an attic somewhere.

I don’t remember the infancy torrenting service that we used around the turn of the century. It wasn’t Napster. I also made mix tapes of downloaded songs onto CD. To play more easily because there weren’t any iPods yet but everyone had a stereo.

Now I stream the music I used to steal. Can’t feel great about it because I know the artists get next to nothing for it.

I miss having a good stereo. Now it’s crappy phone speakers or compressed Bluetooth shit.

Humans have no problem holding in their mind simultaneously two fundamentally opposing ideas. Your question stems from the assumption that beliefs and especially religious ones are borne from this sort of unimpeachable internal logic, if A then B. That’s enlightenment wannabe thinking how we should be. And it isn’t like that.

Also, we are herd animals, we want to belong to something. A lot of people want to belong to this or that religious group to fulfill their own needs. Even if they disagree with some of the religious commandments. So they espouse stuff they don’t actually agree with without any or much internal conflict.

I also feel that few people are actually “raised Christians.” They tend to be raised Baptists, Presbyterians, Catholics, Mormons, etc. They have wildly differing views on that carpenter from the Middle East and what it all means.

If you like LD I think you’ll find stuff to like in Academy as well. Tawney was in the writers room. I’m glad to hear you’ll give it another shot.

I wish this petition the best of luck. I would like them to succeed although I fear this effort will be in vain.

Wouldn’t it have made sense to choose an image from the actual show though?

Your loss. What’s your favorite?

There world breathed a sigh of relief after Russia and Qatar thinking thank Pele the next world cup will be held in nice, non-contriversial countries! And then time moved forward.

I didn’t have any plans to visit in the first place. But if you ask people who organize conferences or other events these days they all bemoan a significant drop in demand from abroad. I think Mexico making the headlines recently with the cartel starring a turf war will not have helped either. My prediction is the highest percentage foreign visitors compared to local spectators will be at the games in Canada. I suspect the US venues will struggle to put butts in all the seats like during the Club WC.

I also think it is very likely that I, personally, will never travel to the US ever again. I have no money - undoubtedly the bigger obstacle - but I lost all interest.

Encounter at Farpoint was terrible too. If you got thru that, you can stomach 90210 in space as well.

Savor the Trek that is available for I fear there will be significantly less new stuff in the future.

You’ll never know if you don’t watch it.

“Killer feature” is silicon-valley-invrstor-ROI-speak. The fediverse is designed in opposition to central platforms funded by investors looking to make a profit.

I don’t want to go back to reddit because they abandoned third party clients and made another few decisions that made me mad. Lemmy today is - objectively speaking - worse than reddit was circa 5-7 years ago. The user numbers aren’t the same, the way the fediverse is connected reactions aren’t as snappy and the search function is way worse. If I judged this on “killer features” I might be tempted to go back to reddit. I tolerate the shortcomings because I believe centrally operated platforms have a high tendency to enshitify as soon as they realize they need to make money.

I only use my head + the clues some streaming services provide marking shit as viewed.

I hold them in much higher esteem than people who randomly capitalize words online.

No, they aren’t. No, you shouldn’t care less. No, that doesn’t matter. And unfortunately yes, it is.