erin (she/her)

America is not a fascist state. Elements of fascism are baked into the system and continue to creep out of the woodwork, but let’s not wear our the significance of fascism by equating the modern United States to Nazi Germany. Hyperbole at best.

And yes, police are a serious problem in the U.S., but Trump wants to give them total leeway and freedom to enact “one day of violence” and just take out political dissidents and undesirables. They are just not the same and acting like they are is delusional at best and intentionally muddying the water at worst.

I doubt it will be as easy in a fascist police state.

The choice cannot be so single issue. Donald Trump is doing everything he can to subvert the election process, and will try to upend it entirely if he can. Harris is a disappointing choice at best, downright revolting at worst, but she respects the election process. Under Harris, I have a chance to continue voting third party in local elections and trying to change the system. Under Trump, not only is my life and the life of many other Americans in danger, but this may very well be the last time I ever get to vote.

The choice cannot be so black and white. The Democrats have always been neo-libs that are okay with bombing third world countries for imperialist reasons. However, in this election, they’re the ones we have the best chance of voting again under and continuing to try to change the system. I will not be so short sighted as to believe the average American is going to do anything but vote Biden or Harris, so making an ideological stand is doing nothing but wasting my opportunity to stop total fascism from removing the ability to make this country better in the future.

Even if I believed Trump and Harris would be identical on the issue of Gaza, when I strongly believe Trump will accelerate the genocide, I still have to vote Harris in order to retain the ability to vote in the future and secure the current (distasteful) state of our democracy so it can be improved in the future.

I missed the original comment and this discussion now makes no sense. Why would you edit the content of your comment when you don’t care about the points or the outrage?

On the contrary, since growing my nails out my nails have been way more clean. There is an awkward period between no nails and long nails where stuff gets caught underneath, but once you grow them out (only two weeks or so), they’re perfectly clean because there’s just more space underneath and nowhere for gunk to get caught as the angle is wider.

(Classic guitar players have long nails)

The Barnsley Fern was constructed specifically to resemble the species of fern that it does. There are versions of it that have been modified to resemble other ferns. The fractal isn’t some secret mathematical code for why ferns look like they do, it’s more like a drawing of a fern. If someone made a fractal to look like another leaf, it would be just that, not an advancement into the secrets of botany.

The short answer: no. The two do not connect beyond the fact that ferns have a design reminiscent of a fractal, which is likely what inspired the fractal’s creation.

How “real” is it? It is a real set of functions, but if I design a set of functions to look like William Dafoe, it doesn’t mean I’ve cracked the matrix code into his genetics.

It doesn’t really sound like you want the government to get out of people’s lives. Fair taxation, defending protected classes, and gun regulation are all very hands-on, and I agree that they’re all important. The real thing right wingers mean when they say “small government” is “no regulation for corporations or states” so they can be as authoritarian as they want locally and the rich don’t need to pay taxes. Banning gay marriage, controlling reproductive rights, and immigration control are not small government tasks, they’re just tasks they want the authority to mandate on a state level since they know they’ll never get the entire country on board.

What I wish more “centrists” would realize is that no one in the country, except anarchists, actually want small government, because they can’t enforce control over the things they don’t like without it. Rules for thee, not for me.

My main point being: Gender is a social construct, and doesn’t fit the complex reality of lived human experience. Let people define their gender in their own terms, for those that desire a label, and otherwise abolish it.

Whether or not the statement is recursive, it is a basis. I see no valid reason to define it more rigorously. I identify as a woman, therefore I am. I identify as bisexual, therefore I am. Those are labels for nebulous social constructs, and don’t need to be rigorous definitions. Any basis beyond “because I say so” would be inherently exclusionary. The entire debate over what defines a woman or a man is a pointless affair which harms transgender people and gender nonconforming cisgender people alike. I believe we should be abolishing gender, not trying to establish a basis for what makes someone woman or man enough. It’s all made up.

In a philosophical sense of the strict definition, you’re correct. I see no good reason to use our language like that though, as it would inevitably hurt trans people. I choose to instead use gender as an identifier assigned by each individual, as it’s our colloquial definition and less harmful to trans people. In my opinion, if someone identifies as a woman, she is a woman, regardless of external perception.

And yes, I also agree that gender would be better abolished and relegated to a vibes-based, self-identified label for people that want it.

External perception should not be a qualifier of gender. Passing shouldn’t be required for a trans person to be a member of their gender, much as a feminine presenting man is still a man and a masculine presenting woman is still a woman, unless they say otherwise. Because it’s all made up anyways, we can allow the definition to be as flexible as gender itself is.

But yes, gender is often performative, but rather than defining that in the terms of the audience, define it in terms of the cast.

They called you a douchebag because your response was snippy and rude. “Click your own link” sounds condescending and arrogant.

That’s not what the definition has changed to. Women can be women without identifying with that traditional role. A woman is someone who identifies as a woman. I am a woman, and I certainly don’t identify with the role of a traditional woman.

That doesn’t say he was flawless, it said they couldn’t find anything to attack him on, which is true. They liked the whole “blowing up brown people with missiles” thing. That comment isn’t unilateral praise of Obama, it’s an explanation of why Republicans couldn’t find dirt they could use on him, because the dirt that was there was on their faces too.

If you think that this:

Replace “machine” with “film crew”, “rerun” with “do another take”, and “tweak the prompt” with “provide notes”. If they’re giving notes to a computer or a person doesn’t really change the nature of their work, only the language they use to provide those notes.

is what a director does? You have no clue what you’re talking about. They’re far more involved in the creative process on every level than you understand.

Your question about who AI helps is a valid one. I agree that that’s what’s important about AI use. I use AI in my work, but not to replace human beings, but as a tool to make easy mock ups or test ideas. I find trying to replace human creativity in a way that replaces jobs or the human spark that makes art, art, abhorrent. AI art cannot exist without humans to train on, so humans cannot be fully replaced, but I hope to never see a day where AI takes the positions of well compensated artists leeching off the work of unpaid or underpaid humans.

I’m not suggesting that the director has full responsibility for the art. They are part of a team, and the creative style of a director heavily influences the finished product. You can tell who directed a movie just by watching it. There are very important creative decisions and directions that point the team of more specialized artists in the right direction.

This is not analogous to AI art. That would be like the director of a movie telling a team of interns to cut together clips of other movies as best they see fit, within a general outline of the script. A person using AI to generate art isn’t part of the creative process in the same way; they tell a machine what to do, and decide whether to rerun or tweak the prompt after seeing the result. This takes some small modicum of creativity, but it isn’t creating art. It’s fine for fun, or to use as a stand in tool, or to mock-up designs, but it will never have the creative direction of a human being, or stand on the same level with true masters, regardless of how well it can copy their style. It can’t understand the art.

Directing is an art form of its own. The cinematography, the pacing, the set design, acting, and so much more is all influenced by the director’s decisions. It would be like saying a conductor or a music producer isn’t an artist. Easy to say if you don’t have an understanding of the art form, but dead wrong. There are a ton of creative choices at all levels made by directors, and there’s a reason we’ve been using them in one way or another since we first started performance art. I’ve worked under and beside directors in the past, and I have only the utmost respect for what a good director can do for the art.

A bad director however… I might agree with you.

That certainly is an opinion

My experience is so different, and so are the market statistics. A “forever mouse” is a dumb idea just looking for a subscription cash grab, but the PC mouse market is expanding year over year as more people get desktop computers, and especially for PC gaming, an expanding market in its own right. The customer base of people who use mice might be shrinking in some Linux communities, but stating that across the board is just incorrect.

Yes. “Cis” is just a description, like “straight” or “white.” Calling someone “cis” is not an insult, but some conservatives take it as such. The common phrase they echo is “I’m not cis, I’m normal.” They’re trying to denormalize trans people by making an inoffensive and common descriptor an insult. The same people sometimes have a problem with being called straight by queer people because they see themselves not as straight, but normal, and anything different is abnormal. In reality, “gay,” “straight,” “trans,” and “cis” are no more abnormal descriptors than calling someone “black,” “white,” “American,” or “tall.” It’s all just “othering” those they perceive as political opponents.