Random Rant Thread

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Failed society.

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Matty is right here, but it wouldn't occur to the idiots who grew up being told by their parents and society at large that narcissistic self-indulgence was perfectly fine. For most Americans a war is just about destroying another country who can't fight back, and going philosophical over it in their bedroom later. Nationalism and the destruction that it causes eventually, for everyone, is simply the logical conclusion of that.

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When an election is near, you just do, try, everything. Normal.

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I always thought those American right-wingers saying, "I can't take it anymore, if this persists, I WILL move to Texas!" didn't really mean it, that they were just speaking figuratively.

Nope, it turns out that many of them actually meant it, and more importantly that they were saying that while not having the slightest clue about the realities of Texas.

They are typically the kind of smart-ass right-wingers who wouldn't survive a day in the Jesus freak parts of rural Texas, and Austin is nationally known for its uber-liberalness, so the places on the minds of those urban right-wingers are typically Dallas, San Antonio, Houston etc.

Well, what can I say. I don't know how to break it to them.

I mean, sure, Austin is very liberal, but my neighborhood in DFW is basically a supersized Greenwich Village that would make your right-wing ass wish it were in Austin. They wouldn't have much better luck in San Antonio, and certainly not in Houston. At least not in the kind of slightly ritzy urbanized areas that they would prefer. In fact most of these areas have everything that they hate in a neat package, like wokeness, LGBTQ, atheism, random diversity, avant-garde theater, K-pop fan club, you name it. It's a "Cultural Marxism" Boxset, lol.

People often talk about Real America, and East Coast Bubbles and all that, but it clearly cuts both ways.

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It's astonishing to see adults seriously argue that "popular protest" in Russia might be able to stop the war.

"Popular protest"? In Russia? Just because there have been a few brave people protesting and getting arrested in public? What the hell are they talking about?

And what "popular protest" ever came even remotely close to stopping a war *in the US*?

I really don't know what the fuck is wrong with them.

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Incidentally some of my friends in Urban Texas are like "I'm moving to England! I mean it!" after they listened to/watched BBC shows like The Infinite Monkey Cage, The Thick Of It etc. I mean, so much more literate and intelligent than American shows, right?

Yeah, but Brexit.

These things really cut many different ways.

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A truly gifted writer can tell a lie a helluva lot better than this embarrassing self-bromide.

I'm just so familiar with the typical trajectory of people like this one. I can already see what kind of stuff she will be arguing for in 2025.

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You find the largest diaspora of Ukrainian nationalists not in the US, or in Australia, but in Canada. I wouldn't just dismiss all the old Ukrainian nationalists as Nazis - history is complicated - but most of them did subscribe to the core beliefs of Nazism, whether it was out of necessity or convenience. It's impossible to whitewash that, but they have been trying for decades.

Huh. It had to be that specific chant, eh? You wonder what the Poles and Jews and others in the graveyard would feel.

It's often - or you could even say "usually" - the diaspora that keep the flame of vengeful nationalism, and then bring it back into the homeland later. Canada's current Deputy PM is one such person, whose grandfather was a hardcore Ukrainian nationalist/Nazi sympathizer.

Gojko Susak, of Croatia, was Canadian too, you know. This is just the pattern.

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If I were Ukrainian, say, a majority/centrist one who can speak both Ukrainian and Russian but reject both the Mother Russia narrative and Nazistic blood-and-soil Bandera nationalism, I'd be outraged too. Ukraine has fertile land, the strong manufacturing tradition/base from the Soviet days, good universities with quite a few world-class scholars/scientists, and relatively highly-educated population, definitely higher than some EU countries. Yet that joke of an economy.

Is it the world-class corruption that the country is infamous for? That's certainly one, a big one. But then the question is why is that?

Everything has been revolving around that question ever since the collapse of the USSR. I mean, duh, I know, but sometimes I feel that those pundits don't quite understand where the central issue for most Ukrainians has always been.

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It seems that too many people have a pretty stupid definition of contrarianism.

Of course, if everyone on TV were demanding that we hang Saudis from lamp posts now, I would tone down my anti-Saudi fury in public.

And that's absolutely not contrarianism; That's just being sensible.

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War always drags on. I don't mean 100% by "always" but it's really close enough. That's just common sense for sad people like me who follow all wars, but somehow military experts who actually make a living keep saying it will finish next week.

And this one didn't "finish next week" either. I don't know why they keep making the same mistake. I say that while I do appreciate their work, because they do know a whole lot more about tactics and weapons and whatnot than me. I don't know where I would be without them. I check out whatever they are saying on the regular basis, but always, always have to ignore their big-picture predictions. Because they are almost always wrong.

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A bit dated, but very important.

You are an astute observer if you have an eye and ear for this kind of hints.

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Mainland China: Approx. 50% of people 80 and above are fully vaccinated, and mostly with Sinovac.

The number is better than in Hong Kong, but still pretty low. Omicron will definitely try to feast on that enormous population.

There seems to be deep-seated vaccine hesitancy among elderly people in China, and the government/CCP hasn't forced them to get vaccinated. Hasn't even strongly encouraged. That might have to change, but Sinovac is pretty weak against Omicron anyway...

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Ladies and gents, this is a country that has lost one million citizens to one viral disease over two years.

Very normal country.

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When will people understand when it comes to Covid, data analysis without age standardization is utterly useless, especially now?

Probably never. It's very tiresome to have to deal with a horde of idiots who seem to think useless datasets can be some sort of gotcha to prove: the vaccines don't work (are more harmful in fact); Masks don't work (are more harmful in fact); the Covid IFR is overstated; etc.

Just go away, idiots. Go away.