LeoGrun

That's not actually possible. What Germany has done-- righly!-- is ban all historic narratives that deny the Holocaust. All history is presented as a narrative, we just have to accept that things are not fair and a narrative that is beneficial to a person or group might also be factually substantial. It's not just about what's taught in schools, they are able to place additional restrictions on the media that the U.S. government cannot because we have the first amendment 'right to be stupid'. Last time the government tried stepping on that right things ended very poorly, so I'm not sure that's the solution we want here. Part of why this happened is criticism of the progressivist narrative that was taught for years. This is what I was taught in school. The idea that history is always marching forward, in the morally correct, more scientifically advanced and correct direction and that the past is bad and wrong. It's taught that slavery is a big problem that the civil war is the 'solution' to, then fails to explain why the civil rights movement of the 60s happen. Then, once the schools integrate at the end of that-- which is not discussed as the difficulty it really was-- all racial issues are now tied up neatly in a bow! For some unexplained reason there's still unresolved racial issues in the 80s and 90s... but how can that be if those were 'solved' already in the 60s? Didn't the government force white people to give black people what they wanted? Well, that's the problem with that narrative. Problems crop up seemingly out of nowhere, unexplained then are tidily solved like the end of a very special episode in a way that fails to explain how things are linked, or how the reconstruction era was a colossal failure. So, for want of a better narrative we had to change it. Some people saw an opportunity to impose a narrative that much more overtly benefited them and that's the problem we have now. That said, most history classes are now even renamed to be 'citizenship' classes and are used to impose propaganda on students. Public schooling has always been to impose middle class values on working class children, so why not some government propaganda, too? Hellen Keller appears as a 'woman in history' as a way of 'diversifying' the narrative. She presented as a pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps inspirational story about overcoming disability. Fighting for women's rights and so on. They just leave out she became a card-carrying member of the communist party and that she believed strongly working class people were more susceptible to become disabled later in life due to industrial accidents. Why? That part had the black highlighter put over it by the house of un-American activities committee I'm sure. Anyway, the problem isn't that history must be told as a narrative, or that that narrative might benefit some people. History does not really exist in factual absolutes most of the time. The only real solution is to attempt to teach competing narratives and perspectives. We shouldn't teach in a way that presents slavery as a correct or good thing. However, teaching slavery in a way that explains why it was useful and to whom it was useful is important (this answer is not actually just 'white people', by the way). Understanding that racism is a social tool used to control people, not just the people who are being transgressed. Rather, the group in power controls each other with racism to create fear and a common enemy. Of course in the real world you're more likely to marry outside your race than your tax bracket, but never mind that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1hzk-uStLo&ab_channel=myjunkshared I like to imagine it's like this.

I'm going to pick Bonehilda, the skeleton scullery maid from The Sims 1 (Makin' Magic expansion). Why? Well, we all have skeletons in our closet and I think we should put them in a uniform and put them to work! I'd just be a little light necromancy. Someone needs to vacuum this carpet and ah, well, there's so many good videos on youtube, you know.

For the most part this. Also not trying to play games when I'm very tired. Wild how you can practice at something to get better at it! 😁

I would imagine aliens come from a culture with fantasy ideas and made up stories like us. I think they would understand that we have interactive stories based on our own folklore and legends that we don't seriously believe anymore-- because I would imagine they have their own cultural stories and ideas. I'd like to imagine aliens visiting Earth in whatever they have for cargo shorts and socks with sandals. Tacky tourist stuff. Speaking slowly and loudly at the poor hotel front desk agent who can't even begin to process their alien language. I'd like to think people are all the same-- even the people who might not strictly be people. (Can a non-human alien have personhood?)

Education is already the thing I get pissed off about. The issue here would be solved by explaining historiography. The idea that there's a particular 'historic narrative' that is told for a reason-- usually to benefit people in power. I can assure you there are no academic historians who would seriously endorse that slavery was a good thing for the slaves. I suppose there's a group of people who benefit from this narrative and ignorance... though the essential question here is what can we actually do about it? So many people "learned" in school that a can of soda has a serving size of half a can. I can not find any evidence this was ever true for the 12 floz (us units) cans that are common now and have not been able to find any cans in the market since I started looking. Yet, teachers still "teach" this in school and people are prepared to carry and defend this information because it came from a source they respect and consider authoritive. I would also like to include the information that arson is illegal and that (thanks to Canada) many government buildings in the U.S. are no longer very flammable.

This happened to me with an old keyboard after I spilled lemonade on it. It was sticky and had some shorts on the board. Had to be replaced. Assuming you've done basic cleaning and have up to date software for it, probably it needs to be replaced (some you can clean the boards, though...)

I haven't tried a PS5 controller. Maybe it's better. My hands cramp up quickly with lower thumb sticks and I don't see that changing. On even larger controllers with sticks at the bottom the sticks fall on the joint of the thumb which is better and less crampy, but very slippery instead. I game mostly on PC these days, but more and more 'cross-platform' games aren't really optimized for mouse and keyboard, so it's becoming more of an issue.

I am a very big-handed person. It just seems odd that there's no other big-handed people who prefer this style-- or not enough that they're easy to get anymore. Where is the Pepsi to the Coke?

So far as culture wars go, well, it was long enough coming. This was on the horizon back in 2015, probably earlier. Hollywood will never be diverse because what we consider diverse keeps changing, can't really be predicted and the industry is based on nepotism to start with. Movies are already divided, they are marketed to a demographic and often that demographic falls along those lines. A Hollywood movie begins by saying something like "let's sell something to middle-aged white women" and if anything else pays for it that's just a bonus. Movies are made now first as a marketable commodity. There's no real reason to ban movies because Hollywood won't put out a big, popular movie that really goes hard against the government, anyway. Books need to be banned because there's too many independent publishers to control them in the same way. Books are almost always about something that isn't just the narrative story which makes them much more dangerous about a superhero movie with the depth of a saucer of milk. There's nothing wrong with liking those movies, but they're not deep. There's nothing wrong with liking ice cream, it's just not healthy. I wouldn't call any society "normal" but you do make a good point that the movies create a shared social experience-- something that societies are built on-- that streaming does not. However, no one is interested in friends anymore. They're all "introverts" and media and companies are their "friends." The rest of us are alone. (Sorry, what episode of black mirror is this?)

And they made that event suck. I don't think streaming is to blame for theaters doing poorly. Theaters took the bank manager's approach to doing poorly and raised prices. In many cases the properties had not been kept up, sometimes in years. They became complacent and then acted too slowly when streaming first hit. They took out seats and benches long before COVID, they shrank their arcades long before COVID. They were charging more for fewer lower quality concession items long before COVID. Basically, they were taking everything away that allowed you to have a sort of night at the movies because loitering teenagers had bad press. Of course, that takes away the things the adults wanted too. They also started opening fewer theaters and showing only the big blockbusters. You would go to the movies, watch your two hour movie then immediately leave the theater. $18+ per ticket for that? Why, when the whole group can rent it for $4 on YouTube-- assuming you don't already have it at no additional on Netflix, Disney+, Hulu, Peacock, Paramount+, Tubi, AmazonPrime Video, Squelch, TeeBeep or Smok (can you guess without googling which I made up?). The only theaters I know that are still doing well are small live venues that show movies to supplement the live productions. They usually show classics or cult movies and pull out the stops to make it feel like an event. tl;dr they made it an expensive, filthy time lacking in choices and treated patrons with a watch your movie then leave attitude then acted surprised when people would rather order a pizza and watch something at home in barbeque-sauce-stained sweatpants.

I have given this too much through, probably. I went over Shark Attack (Freezepop, "Fashion Impression Function" 2001) "I took a spin on the giant wheel / like my life the prizes passed me by" or Circus Latino (The Attraction, Self-Titled Release, 1979) which is this sort of melancholy but hopeful song, which is always the right mood. Does including songs I rejected violate the rule? Officially I would like to submit... In high school my friend felt that this song seemed like me. Later, I would spend six years in hospitality, three of them with a manager who told me I should go into revenue management. He said "Don't take this the wrong way, but you're a little bit of a dick." I assured him that no, he was right I knew I was. Although, you sort of have to be when you have people making up stories to try and get a discount. Separately another friend told me I reminded her a lot of Basil Fawlty-- her father used to watch Fawlty Towers. I don't know if hospitality was the correct or worst career move for me. I guess this song more sums up things from 2004 onward, but I couldn't find a single song that really summed up everything so I guess this is the best fit.

Based on my very scientific background of watching enough of The BBC to give it the definite article of The BBC... On a car bonnet usually means hood (or, if you're my mom you call it the lid-- as far as I can tell this isn't regional, she's just weird). I'd like to 'second' this and say I think it's reasonable to infer that they were on the front of the riding mower in this case. I'm not aware of anyone calling the front part of a riding mower a hood or a bonnet in the U.S. in casual conversation although it's not something that comes up regularly. Calling it the hood as on a car would probably be readily understood by most people in the U.S. though.

I'm still modding sims 1. Why? Er, well, that's not important. Anyway, I'm finally tackling overhauling cooking which is probably the single most complicated sequence of scripts in the game. I just took an amusing development screenshot. The character/sim I've been testing my scripts with (Madame Test) is in the screenshot and it came up at just the right time that it appears she's looking at herself in the UI. Why is there banding in the screenshot? Well, they started development in 1997 and when you only have 256 color BMPs to work with you sort of just deal with some things.

I'm not apologizing for the WiiU! Everyone else should apologize for the way they treated it! j/k The truth is that the games it did have were a lot of fun-- I even liked Animal Crossing: Amiibo Festival, although on a base-level I already enjoy board games. It just never had enough games, never managed to court any particular audience or third party support. I do think the name was a mistake, as was the marketing. However, it also became the whipping boy for gaming media, with many speculating that Nintendo might "have to" become a third party only developer like SEGA after the "flop" that was the WiiU. As if (1) The DS and 3DS did not basically print money for them, (2) they were at all in a similar financial situation and (3) nobody was saying that when the PS Vita happened. Remember the PS Vita? Every surface a touchscreen-- that won't make your handheld difficult to handhold. a few of us went in buy one for a friend as a birthday present at launch, because they were so expensive. It now means to more to her as a present from her friends (an ex) than a gaming console.