Sounds like someone thinks there is only one choice, buy or don’t.

🏴‍☠️Harhar! 🏴‍☠️

My friends and family are feeling stirs of panic, and it has pushed many of us to start taking a more active role in making our voices heard. Letter campaigns to Congress, joining activist groups and participating in those groups, and a much higher level of alertness towards government action are just a few of the more obvious results and changes I’ve seen.

I fear that it won’t be enough, but with young kids in our household we are trying to do what we can in nonviolent ways. The risk of prison or worse would take a huge toll on the little ones.

Thank goodness, I’m embarrassed that the walking cheeto would melt down like that while holding one of the most prestigious offices in my country, although unfortunately I’m not surprised by it. I’m glad Ukraine has other places it’s leadership can turn too in this time of need. Sadly, I can only hope that the dark spector of mortality does it’s work swiftly in the oval office and this geriatric orange is done for good sooner rather then later.

This is plainly insane.

The Flying Spaghetti Monster has decreed to me that VPN use is totally cool and his worshipers should feel ok using them. 🍝

Not all home internet is unlimited. In many US rural areas, home internet connections have a monthly cap just like mobile networks do. A higher cap costs more, if it’s available at all.

This hits like a cyberpunk dystopia

Any kind of surge pricing by for profit companies providing basic needs should be illegal full stop

Fixed that for you

🏴‍☠️

“B is for Buy-n-Large, your very best friend.”

I agree these where choices, and he should be held accountable for them. I disagree that they make him a bad person, because a person may not have the understanding of what those choices can result in. I agree that he is not a good person, but I agree because he is refusing to take responsibility for his choices.

Edit: And upon reading the remainder of the article, I agree he is not a good person, because he clearly did understand what those choices could result in. Shooting video while driving, let alone at those kind of speeds, and while drunk? I can’t think of any excuse or explanation that could mitigate that.

Watching the movie Idiocracy.

A

“Thoughts and prayers” seems to have crossed the pond. I genuinely hope they are more useful over there, because they are absolutely worthless here and usually indicate that nothing of consequence will be done about the matter.

Disassociation mostly.

Biker Mice from Mars, I loved that show as a kid, gave me a lifelong appreciation for Root Beer

Sounds to me like there is a class of people that shouldn’t continue to hold position. Even Jesus said the rich where detestable. “It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle then for a rich man to enter heaven.” Once ‘rich’ and ‘poor’ aren’t a viable distinction anymore, the problem you describe is resolved. Not that other problems wouldn’t be present, just saying some change is needed.

TURN DOWN FOR WHAT

But her religion specifically says to go forth and multiply! /s

The logic of this is nonexistent. An argument could be made very convincingly that cars are dangerous to allow in the hands of criminals. 2 tons of metal, well known for and capable of ending a life, with the ability to aid criminal enterprises and avoidance of law enforcement. So should car sales now require a criminal background check? All this would do is further disenfranchise convicted felons, regardless of the actual crime committed, and create new difficulties for a group that includes a very high percentage of people already proven to give no shits about the law who will find and exploit ways to continue activities despite any laws attempting to restrict them.

I’ve already said I don’t pay for anything in Lemmy. If by support you mean, do I contribute code, servers or bandwidth to Lemmy as a project? No, because I don’t have those things to contribute in this field. I only know enough code to announce “Hello World”, I don’t own or operate a server farm or service, and I don’t have enough bandwidth to be able to contribute a reasonable amount to a project. However, I think your argument is starting to lose focus. I have not been advocating leaving social media of all kinds, that would be hypocritical since I’m posting this here after all, I have been advocating for avoiding the use of overly monetized platforms. I also noted that I don’t have an objection to paying for a service I find desirable. I pay for a streaming service for my household, and occasionally purchase apps that I find important. However, I think the over use of ads and subscriptions have polluted the market of software and services. Of course open-source projects, like Lemmy, are going to develop slower then a corporate alternative. But we wouldn’t be here if we all wanted the corporate alternative, would we? I can’t speak for your choice, of course, but I for one use Lemmy because I left Reddit. I use Linux because I prefer it over Windows and despise Mac, and I use Raspberry Pi’s because I prefer to self-host my photo back ups rather then use Google.

Twitter has become a shit show, not unlike watching Facebook devolve back in the early 2000s. I prefer not to use it because I have better options in life for my time, not because I think I’m better then those who do use it. My original comment was a sufficient explanation of this philosophy, I think. I’m not calling for such extreme measures as cutting all social media from use, I’m reminding with my own example to be cognizant of one’s time and use of services that are not under one’s own control. That can be Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, Lemmy, Mastodon, Twitch, Youtube, or any of the numerous other platforms that are available today. Don’t avoid the path if it’s really the one you want to walk, but be aware of your choice and know you have one. That’s all I’m saying.