January 17, 2025
Going Out of Town
I have to go out of town this weekend.
Tonight's stream is cancelled.
We MIGHT make it up tomorrow evening.
I any event, Streams should return to normal by Sunday night.
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Unpleasant Distinctions Between Vile and Illegal
So as I write this, Neil Gaiman is being accused of....
I shall not elaborate upon the specifics of said unpleasantness because I do not hate you.
I could have lived a long, happy, and fulfilling life never knowing any of the details of what is alleged to have gone on between Sir Neil and various of his female fans. That path is now closed to me forever. I do not wish to inflict that fate upon you, gentle reader.
It's appalling. I have always liked the fellow's work, and while I can separate the work from the artist that's a heavy lift in this case. He also struck me as a fairly good dude. On the one hand, the idea that a darling of the left is behaving badly towards women is no surprise. On the other hand, what Sir Neil has allegedly done (and not denied) is WAY beyond the pale of what we would expect from even the mouthiest male feminist. And on the gripping hand, there is the little issue of consent.
There are things that are so objectively "ICK!" So completely wrong, that are red flags along the path to the moral event horizon.
Now. I am a conservative. So I am reported to be neurologically more inclined to disgust than a leftist or a libertarian. However, I do not think that most of my Left/Lib acquaintances would not be squicked out by the allegations. The allegations are THAT vile.
However....
Wait. HOW can there be a However...or a but?
What is alleged is unspeakably AWFUL and so beyond the pale that anyone, who has the faintest grasp of hygiene, propriety, and basic human decency is going to say..."Nope!"
And yet, as much as it nauseates me to say this, there is, a "But..."
"So that's how Brickmuppet died, the villagers all burned him"
Kat Rosenfield is an author that I am not familiar with, but she has looked at this sordid affair sufficiently closely that....that I'm giving her the side-eye.
However, she's looked at the statements from both sides of this little slice of Weimar and notes something.
There's a moment in the Gaiman exposé where the main accuser, Scarlett Pavlovich, sends him a text message asking him how he's doing. Gaiman says he's struggling: he's heard from people close to him that Pavlovich plans to accuse him of rape. "I thought that we were a good thing and a very consensual thing indeed," he writes.
"It was consensual (and wonderful)!” she replies.
Except: she doesn't mean it. We know this because Lila Shapiro, the author of the piece, breaks in to tell us as much:
Pavlovich remembers her palms sweating, hot coils in her stomach. She was terrified of upsetting Gaiman. "I was disconnected from everybody else at that point in my life,” she tells me. She rushed to reassure him.
This is a major issue with our society right now for several reasons, but I'll focus on two.
Sir Neil's behavior and appetites are apparently grotesque. I get nauseous just typing about this and will not revisit this...EVER.
HOWever, it seems that Sir Neil believed that the ...trysts... were consensual. AND at least one of the victims seems to be in agreement on this point in as far as Gaiman's point of view. She actually says in the quoted text that she lied to him, allegedly because she was, what, afraid? disgusted?
Why was there not a "HARD NO!" ?
As a dude who has just thrown in the towel on the minefield of dating post Me-To, this affects me not at all. But IF this is true, and the women never said "No!" How is this an assault on anything but the concept of decency?
How can ANY man date now?
This is a question that's been pending for years as the bar for what's considered rape and sexual harassment has been lowered steadily for 30 years, but it is especially germane here, where the woman actually says she consented, kept up a brave face and then ....
Yes. This behavior by Sir Neil that is alleged is loathsome, and so foetid that it would curl Caligula's nose hairs, but there is a LOT of stuff that is very disgusting, especially to folks like me. Do we really want "yes" to mean nothing.
Now if this (or any sexual impropriety) had happened to a child, then this would not be an issue, because a child cannot give consent, no matter how often they say yes. In THAT sort of situation, I would be perfectly fine with Sir Neil (or anyone) being skinned alive rolled in salt , bathed in iodine and injected with stimulants to prevent him from passing out before his death rattle if that was the case*.
However, This appears to be an adult woman. And that has FURTHER implications, which Kat Rosenfield touches on here...
The thing is, if women can’t be trusted to assert their desires or boundaries because they'll invariably lie about what they want in order to please other people, it's not just sex they can't reasonably consent to. It's medical treatments. Car loans. Nuclear non-proliferation agreements. Our entire social contract operates on the premise that adults are strong enough to choose their choices, no matter the ambient pressure from horny men or sleazy used car salesmen or power-hungry ayatollahs. If half the world's adult population are actually just smol beans — hapless, helpless, fickle, fragile, and much too tender to perform even the most basic self-advocacy — everything starts to fall apart, including the entire feminist project. You can't have genuine equality for women while also letting them duck through the trap door of but I didn't mean it, like children, when their choices have unhappy outcomes. [quote/]
This infantilization of women is likely to have some pretty vile consequences for the fairer sex going forward if nothing is done about it.
There are a vast number of men I met in college, who, unlike me have NEVER had a positive interaction with a woman. That may sound silly and irrelevant but look at the most strident misandrist feminists. They did not spring forth fully formed from the head of Zeus or anything, most of them had real trauma that made them the people they are now, and what they are is generally a bitter enemy to all men. They are human beings who react to trauma as people do...as are men
What we have is a growing cadre of men who see women as deceitful tormenters, an education system that stresses that any form of oppression justifies ANY response, and, increasingly, a legal system that says women can't be expected to have any agency.
This is not a good combination.
I'm an American Conservative. I'm old fashioned. I believe that grown women actually are fully formed adults with agency and an ability to make decisions, and because of their slightly different neurology they look at things from a slightly different perspective and so having them around provides valuable crosschecking to problem solving and enriches our world in myriad ways beyond mere procreation.
We'll see if my somewhat romantic and archaic views can be reconciled with current year attitudes toward women's decision making ability.
Also: Sir Neil seems to be vile.
*I know, I know 8th amendment, but we can still dream when it comes to pedos.
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January 15, 2025
Who could have EVER seen this coming?
I'm sick of current events. Let's look at a historical video from a simpler, happier time, before all this crazy stuff happe.....oh pooh.
Lessons (that were already being ignored) begin at 19:00
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January 10, 2025
Snowplocalypse Incoming
We're getting a few inches of snow with the complication that we're also expecting a quarter inch of ice. Work is on a Christmas-like schedule so I'm going to stream later and go straight to work.
We'll be doing Genshin Impact tonight from 9pm EST/ 01:00am UTC, until the power goes out or I have to leave for work. https://www.twitch.tv/brickmuppet
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So what's going on in Cana....
Oh.
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January 05, 2025
FIRE!
Join us tonight at 8pm EST/ Midnight UTC as we continue to explore the Outer Ring in Zenless Zone Zero! THERE'S FIRE! THERE'S PIGS WITH SPIKY BASEBALL BATS (Who are ON FIRE)! THERE'S EVEN MORE FIRE! MOTORCYCLE RACES...IN FIRE! & FIGHTING OF MONSTERS...IN THE FIRE! https://www.twitch.tv/brickmuppet
...and a girl wearing a pickelhaube for some reason..
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Perfunctory Posting
Small bit of Banality below fold.
more...
As both compensation and as reader trauma reduction here is a celebration of current year.
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December 30, 2024
James Earl Carter 1924-2024
President Carter has died after a century of service to the U.S. and the world.
Naval officer, nuclear engineer, statesman, farmer, diplomat, and president are not career paths that often overlap but they did with James Earl Carter.
People of my generation tend to judge Carter harshly due to his diffident presidency and uninspiring public presence. His term in national office coincided with a number of national setbacks typical of the 1970s, an evil, violent decade that saw the country suffer many misfortunes (including the birth of yours truly) and he most certainly did not reassure or inspire the public.
To be honest Carter faced a steep learning curve as a president who was dealt dreadful hands on myriad foreign and domestic fronts as was typical in that benighted decade. Due to his well intentioned but unrealistic philosophy, many of his policies probably exacerbated the already serious economic woes of the country. However, he was a fairly effective diplomat in some areas, and his appointment of Paul Volker to the federal reserve allowed some needed, if incomplete, reforms, put forth by his successor to bring the country out of its tailspin.
Carter's real contribution to the country and the world revolved around his post presidential career, where he served as a sort of ambassador at large working tirelessly to bring an end to destructive conflicts around the world. He also founded numerous charities, such as Habitat for Humanity, for which later generations rightly hold him in high regard.
His greatest achievement appears to be the elimination of the malevolent scourge that is the Guinea Worm. There were 3.5 MILLION cases worldwide of this awful, agonizing, debilitating parasite in 1986. As it is a malady associated with extreme poverty and has no pharmaceutical treatment it was singularly uninteresting to the powers that be and the professional charity class. Carter set up a organization to deal with the issue. As it was not treatable with pharmaceuticals he went after the monster's life cycle in a manner befitting an engineer, providing improved sanitation to millions of the world's forgotten and ignored. As mentioned above, 3.5 million new cases were recorded in 1986. Last year there were 14.
He lived a century, and his time here was not wasted.
In his final years Carter suffered the loss of his beloved wife and had been in serious physical decline. We can gain some solace from the cessation of his pain, even as we mourn his passing. A sad event which makes the world a less bright and hopeful place.
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December 25, 2024
Merry Christmas!
I hope everyone out there is having a wonderful holiday!
Please take care!
Weeby Christmas Art by Csyday.
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December 24, 2024
IT'S OVER!
The last of the presents is on the big brown trucks. They have left the building to deliver happiness to all the little children....at least the children whose parents don't celebrate Festivus. The month of pain is at an end. Sleep, is, once again, an attainable goal. In celebration, here is a picture of....OH WHAT THE HELL JAPAN?!??!!!1!
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Picture by Rai
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December 23, 2024
Stream Cancelled
I was so exhausted when I got off today I salted my coffee and sweetened my grits.
I'm not much better now.
The ZZZ stream will be moved to tomorrow night.
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December 17, 2024
Cardboard Tsunami
Banality lies below the fold.
more...
As compensation here is a stark-raving-cuckoo-for-cocoa-puffs chunni archer cosplaying as a normal person at Christmas.
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Answering Marc Andreesen's Question
Marc Andressen has been making the rounds with interviews lately, the two best and most informative can be found below. The Bari Weiss interview is, as is her wont, extremely comprehensive, and while not actively hostile she asks ALL the questions in a meticulous probing manner, very much like one would expect a highly professional reporter to conduct an interview (if one believed in such unicorns). Rogan does a good interview too, but in a more conversational manner.
Both interviews are long and informative, but necessarily cover much of the same ground, though the interviewers are astonished and offer follow up questions to different statements by Andreessen. Still, you can probably get by watching either one.
2hours 5minutes
2hours 40minutes
Both interviews cover the confusion, astonishment and horror that Marc Andreesen felt when the left, which had been so supportive of tech in the 90's and oughts, quite suddenly, in Obama's second term became pathologically anti-tech.
This is not hard to figure out looking at it from the outside and with a historical lens, but must be confusing in the extreme if one is on the inside.
The modern left runs on something that is best described as 'elemental smug'. In most of the rank and file it's not actually the toxic sanctimony of their leadership, it just an aura of a smug, self-assured confidence that the lefties are better, brighter and more creative than the filthy troglodytic plebs who dare contradict them or who don't get with their program with great verve and gusto.
Being on the cutting edge of tech, or imagining being so, fed this smug engine. Other areas of expertise, like banking and industry were strangled and controlled....here, Andreesen explains to Rogan what they did to the banking industry in Obama's first term.
Watch at least until Joe 's eyes roll back in his head and he says "OH MY GOD!"
This sort of thing happened in MOST industries. It's one of the reason that defense procurement is so incestuous. In the early '90s most of the defense contractors were concentrated in to a few huge conglomerates. The theory behind this was that it made them easier to regulate, It also allowed strict gatekeeping and the ability to play them against each other. I should note that this specific economic system, a modern, sort of mutant variant of mercantilism, has a name, and that name begins with "F".
For about 20 years, supporting tech made left leaning policy makers feel smug and superior, after all, progressives were theoretically for "progress" and nothing exemplified progress more than new technology. If new technology displaced the less educated that was surely tragic, and was an opportunity to shed some insincere tears signal one's moral virtue, but ultimately advances in tech that one had financed were an affirmation of one's superiority.
Then, in the early 2010s, tech stopped feeding the smug. First by empowering contradictory voices on the internet, then threatening the jobs of the gentry class as opposed to the peons. At this point, tech needed to be reigned in...as Mr. Andreesen explains to Miss Wise here.
(Watch at least until Bari says "WOW!")
Andreesen seems genuinely confused by this, all of his friends in the DNC used to be so pro tech, but I think that the answer is simply that the Dems did what they have always been trying to do since 1912 (with some noble attempts at change in '60 and '76) which is a technocratic paradise for pencil pushers (and hell for everyone else).
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Pack vs. Herd
An extremely thoughtful, knowledgeable, and readable essay on the two broad types of group dynamics that humans engage in can be found over on Unfolding the World.
I implore you to read the whole thing.
I have little to add except to say that it is considerably more fair-minded in its look at this issue than most analysis we get these days. Teams and groups both have their places and uses, but most who opine on the topic in current year are convinced that one or the other is evil, and the other is a universal panacea. Such rantings are not helpful. The linked article is.
Taoist Miscegenating Tadpoles by Unknown Artist
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December 09, 2024
That South Korean Thing
The pithiest take on the abortive Marshall Law declaration in South Korea I had seen was actually by Pixy, who described the situation as the Korean president having "stripped a gear somehow".
Pixy's take is not far off. However, Nick Frietas and crew have a discussion of the matter that is the very antithesis of pithy, but is quite informative.
1hr 55min.
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December 08, 2024
Interview with Dr. Jay Bhattacharya
This is from 2 months ago and is an excellent post-mortem on the COVID19 fiasco as well as an overview of the issues facing the health care establishment. Dr. Bhattacharya suffered personally and professionally for his policy recommendations during the COVID pandemic (recommendations which have proved largely correct)
2hrs 8 minutes
This is a broad ranging discussion and is both literate and understandable to the layman. Both Bhattacharya and "Dad" make a strenuous effort to avoid jargon and make these policy conundrums understandable to the general public. Dr. Bhattacharya has worked in healthcare for many years all over the world and did a stint of work in Indian slums. As a result of his experience he is most decidedly NOT a vaccine skeptic. He does have a fairly nuanced view of the current skeptics given the very understandable skepticism of policy experts as a whole by a wide swath of the public.
This is just a very good discussion and deserves to be watched.
Interestingly Dr. Bhattacharya has recently been tapped to head the N.I.H. It remains to be seen if he gets approval.
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December 07, 2024
We Have Nothing to Learn From History
For we live for the future, not the past.
The past was full of stupid people who believed silly things and weren't as smart as us because they did not know the depth and breadth of their ignorance which we, in our profound wisdom, understand.
Indeed there is talk that that something happened on this very date in the past.
People used to make a big deal about it, which is silly because it's in the past and can't affect me because it happened and therefore it's over.
I think i had to read a book on it.
OH YEAH! I REMEMBER!
"That one about the NAZIs"
In any event, we have nothing to learn from the past.
Today we're so much smarter than those people were. We've got electricity.
Our Navy is concentrated mainly in 3 locations where they are safe, our Air Force's main strike capability is in 5 or 6 bases, and most of those are missile bases that we'll never need because we're smart.
So there is really no point in commemorating whatever it was that happened back in the before times, because it doesn't have any relevance whatsoever.
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December 01, 2024
Schedule Change!
Streaming schedule on the Twitch Channel is in a state of flux at the moment because of my IRL job schedule that is going to be a tad insane for the rest of this month. Tentatively, I'm going to experiment with later streams and then going DIRECTLY to work.
The first attempt at this will be tonight,
Join us at 10:00pm EST / 03:00am UTC for about two hours. as we explore the world of Teyvat in Genshin Impact. We're currently caught up on the main story quest and are exploring this wild and wacky world in a rather more in depth manner than we have been previously (when we were monomaniacally pursuing the plot). We're also trying to level up our newest gacha recruit, a cute nerd girl who is just.....uh....sweet.
Sucrose art is official Yo-Hoyo art
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Back...Sorta
As compensation for the self indulgent banality below the fold, here is a tomboy archer contemplating some pyrotechnic mischief.
more...
Genshin Impact's Amber drawn by Sayla Mars. Support them on FANBOX! (Links NSFW)
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Stanford Torus Overview
Issac Arthur takes a Deep Dive into the Stanford Torus, the winner of a NASA study from the 1970s on space habitats. The math on this design was worked out 40 years ago. It was viable then (given the then fantastic conceit of cheap access to space) Breakthroughs in space transportation like Musk's starship might well make it viable. The advances in most areas of tech over the last 40 year can only make it more refined.
I am much more on board with this sort of space settlement than I am with terraforming. (Though I'm not opposed to the latter in principle). There are really only two viable terraforming candidates in the Solar System. (Mars & Venus...the latter of which would require a truly VAST infrastructure, and, likely, starlifting technology. ) Whereas we can build rotating habitats with earthlike gravity in numbers that boggle the mind.
Quadrillions of people such a program would produce will produce a much larger number of Einsteins, Martin Luther Kings, Ada Lovelaces, Aristotles, Jeffersons, Margurite Harrisons & Issac Newtons, with a corresponding benefit to all civilization from their mental bounty.
Anyway, this is a VERY comprehensive overview of the concept.
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