Random Rant Thread

[miscmisc]

Really getting the hang of it.

Wordle 228 2/6

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[miscmisc]

A former Kyoto resident here. Of course it *is* sure it wants them back, lol. If you ask them, "do you like the peace and quiet now?" then they would say, "in a way, yes, but..." And you just cut them off right there, didn't you.

Kyoto will be in a world of shit if the foreign tourists are gone. Of course it *needs* them fucking back. Silly headline and article.

Covid robbed Kyoto of foreign tourists – now it is not sure it wants them back
City that had 8 million overseas visitors in 2019 – including free-spending parties of Chinese people – is getting used to the peace and quiet

www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/02/covid-robbed-kyoto-of-foreign-tourists

[miscmisc]

See?

It's not only nearly as big a deal for kids, but also not for parents either. Social media is not real life.

[miscmisc]

For the n-th time, doctors and nurses are unfortunately one of the biggest sources of socially harmful information in general, arguably the biggest. Total cranks and tinfoil hats everywhere, forming these square-sounding, benign-sounding orgs left and right, promoting shit like "all gay men carry disease".

[miscmisc]

See, I was right on Covid in Texas. I told you it was actually one of the worst performing states despite the fatality rate lower than the states average in the official data, considering the population significantly younger than the rest of the country and arguably large-scale undercounting.

There's always someone on the internet who is smart enough to do actual work to prove your thesis. I'm grateful.

And it's, you know, nearly Eastern-European-level bad, as it turned out.

[gols]

Feb 1, 2022 16:49:23 GMT 1 miscmisc said:

I guess that's the crux of the matter - the media. As far as I can see, the British mainstream media, a large part of it, has been the main force that has bailed him out of all the "scandals" and "incidents", over and over again. I guess they think their own vapidness can be justified by keeping a hedonistic character like him in Downing Street.

And if you had asked me to guess whether Johnson had a secret party or two despite the restrictions, I would've answered YES. That's precisely what you should and would expect from him, and I assumed that all Britons understood that kind of typical Eton fuckery was part of the package deal called Boris Johnson.

It seems that it was a lot more than "a party or two" after all. But I thought, if it turned out that the leak on a secret party was all it took to destroy him, that would be super anti-climatic, like seeing Palpatine slain by someone like Lando Calrissian in the final episode of Star Wars. He survived all the Jedi attacks, and then pathetically folds like that against fucking Lando? Really?

I also thought that it seemed like the most efficient and least damaging way for Tories to ditch the man that they clearly disliked, but then that petit conspiracy theory of mine also quickly crumbled as the Tories didn't seem to know what they were doing either.

It does seem to me that Johnson has been shitting all over the place and generally screwing up big time over this. But I still can't believe this is it for him. Fool me once etc., you know.

So, in a nutshell, I still don't understand UK politics at all, lol.

I can't say I really understand my fellow Briton's attraction to Johnson, but I think there are a lot of people who would've previously just laughed it off as "Boris being Boris" that are now more like "My mum died of Covid and I wasn't even allowed to say goodbye, and this guy's having a party". It's finally hit home what he is. 

As for the Tories, as you say most of them clearly disliked him and only put him in power to win the election. I guess he has created quite a few loyalists since then - maybe they see him as the only way their less-than-mediocre selves could get a promotion (see the current cabinet...).

[miscmisc]

The normalization of abnormality is a process that is extremely hard to reverse. It would take actual *effort/hard work* to unseat the abnormality, and of course a decent opposition force too. It doesn't just happen on its own, but all I have seen so far indicates that there isn't the will. I thought there was among the Tories and media elites, but now I don't know about that. I'd still bet on his dodging this one too, for what it's worth (which is close to nil, mind you).

[miscmisc]

I'm still waiting for the apologies from many, many people, about this man.

[miscmisc]

It's funny that this Danish thread has been universally praised for its "rationality".

First of all, I'm not against Denmark's decision. I think it makes sense (to me, what it's worth, remember), and I'd *probably* accept it as a Danish citizen/resident. I can't say for sure since I'm not, though.

But if you read the tweets carefully, you'll notice that it isn't about science. It is about something else, something a lot blurrier and more abstract. You could call it an ideology, though I wouldn't use that word.

It's not an answer given by The Computer whose main purpose is minimize the illness and deaths of Covid. By that criteria, this strategy is of course utter nonsense because more people will die of Covid this way than otherwise. "Not too bad, though" is the excuse that he gives, basically.

So those tweets are the excuse for their giving up. I'm not dissing that by saying that. Sometimes it's better to give up before you end up digging in too deep.

But this isn't about "rationality", let alone science. Let alone any kind of intellectual bravery. Don't make me laugh. You feel that way because you are just projecting.

It's a pure act of giving up with a load of excuses attached to it, including very social-science-y "data", and I'd probably support the decision while understanding all of that not least because a clear majority of Danes seem on board. I would *probably* take a ride with them.

[miscmisc]

He fixed the charts with better data (the median age of deaths, rather than that of the population).

Texas still among the worst 5. Florida a lot worse than with the previous calculation.

Mississippi is literally Eastern-European-level bad.

And I'm sure I saw Doug Ducey (Arizona) all but brag about his record on Covid a few months ago. Incredible people.

[miscmisc]

So, yeah, it's the Olympics, *again*, and I must stress that in the Winter Olympics the King of Sports is not hockey, not downhill, not figure skating, not 500m speed skating, no, no, no, none of those. It's curling. You're missing something huge in life if you don't/can't enjoy watching curling.

[miscmisc]

What's going on here? I'm getting too good at this, just as the New York Times - of which I'm not an official subscriber any more - bought it.

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[miscmisc]

Fluke streak ends, and back to my true dumb self. Luck runs out eventually, always.

Wordle 231 6/6

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[miscmisc]

It does seem that the immunity that you can get through Omicron infection is substantially weaker than through the infection with the previous variants and Wuhan/Italian originals. Hell, it seems that it can even forget the very Omicron in three fucking months.

Nice to have met you, and see you again, soon. 

We get a lot of bitch moves from this strain in exchange for some virulence. It is milder all right, but still can totally kill a lot of old/immunocompromised people anyway.

I really don't think this one is overall better (for us) than Delta, which was at least pretty powerless against the standard vaccines based on the original. Too many bitch moves here and there from Omicron OTOH, and they add up in the end.

[miscmisc]

One thing that has been rarely mentioned re: the Joe Rogan issue is the fact that if you talk for 2, 3, 4 hours straight, you are bound to say more than a few truly dumb things. I know I would. Hell, I *did*, routinely.

Most things in the world actually need to be heavily edited. Uncut stuff gives you the thrills, the sense of "real" and perhaps some sort of "honesty" too, but in an overwhelming majority of cases it doesn't add anything positive, and all that's left there is some shallow gratification, or/and indeed room for misinformation.

The problem is that there are truly dumb people watching shows like Rogan's, and they watch those shows *precisely* for those inevitable ultra-dumb moments, where Joe Rogan (or whoever else), the guest, or both fall down to *their* level of dumb. And the dum-dum tribe feel as if that validated their dumb opinions and sentiments.

In far too many cases, what "telling it like it is" actually means is broadcasting dumb shit that should've been edited out.

That really is one secret of that show format. It attracts lots of dumb people (who think they are smart, of course), and needless to say there are a huge horde of them out there.