Fuck, now I’m crying too. I’ve lost friends and family to this mental illness. There is much to mourn. The values that you and I share are not the values of the Americans who wield national power right now, nor their cult. Many of us are fighting for our values over here. And your unconditional message of friendship means so much. Thank you. I feel the same way. Fuck the imaginary lines on the map. I pledge allegiance to YOU, and to any other individual, wherever they are, who believes in basic human decency: honesty, respect, compassion, non-aggression… against the psychopaths who don’t.

Rhythmic? No, not really. More exciting if the musician could somehow anticipate this fundamentally unpredictable event? Absolutely.

It’s a reference.

In Aristotelian geography, the coastline is infinitely divisible.

Of course, you can think of consciousness as analogous to excitation of a field, and, like the electromagnetic field or gravitational field, there is no center, and everything is interconnected. And yet, like every particle is ultimately a wave in disguise, we can still meaningfully talk about individual particles, because some waves do behave that way sometimes.

An individual consciousness is particle-like. As a shorthand for “this relatively independent packet of consciousness which has measurable distinctiveness from other packets and does not freely share perceptions or memories with them,” it’s often more practical just to say “I” instead.

Quantum cryptographically signed memory certificates from my designated reality broker or it didn’t happen.

This is the only absolute truth, for each of us. I may be a brain in a vat being fed false stimuli. I may be in a grand computer simulation. I may be a resident of Plato’s Cave. Everything I believe or guess about the world around me may be an illusion. But I do know that I think, and therefore, in some sense, I am.

But you have to understand, to 74 million people, the Fox News Cinematic Universe is reality. There’s regular bullshit, and then there’s bullshit so widely believed that you actually have to study the bullshit, just to be able to predict what its subscribers will do next. Like religion.

He’s always got le mot juste.

In my experience (which, to be fair, seems to be different from many people’s), it couldn’t be any worse than the real thing. 12 different licensed and trained medical providers each responded to my complaints about the ongoing traumas in my life with some variation of “Sure, but focus on the positives!” I’d have been better off saving the money and venting to a chatbot, if venting did anything for me.

Please don’t tell me to see a 13th. I’m completely done with the idea.

This reminds me of last year’s Christmas present from my husband - a homebrew powerpoint Only Connect game based on our favorite media. Instead of “twisted flax” or “two reeds” my categories were things like “lightsaber” or “Starfleet insignia.” Love the format (and that sweet man).

Counterpoint: he’s controversial because of what he says and does, not because of lies people tell about him.

Everyone.

I tried to explain this near the time of the event, back when I was on reddit. For this I received mass downvoting, and a universal consensus that misgendering is perfectly appropriate as long as the target has done something evil. Even from trans people. “We don’t claim her!”

It would be one thing if these same people also misgendered any given cis person who did wrong. But they don’t, and that double standard is transphobia. “Of course I would never misgender Hitler. He was AMAB. He earned it. You’re not AMAB? Then your right to be a man is contingent on your behavior. I’ll decide if you’ve been good enough to deserve it.”

We’ve got a long way to go culturally before people recognize that there is literally one and only one valid criterion for entitlement to a certain gender identity: claiming it.

For airborne contagions. Next question.

What is the opposite of a cat, then?

If your answer is, “it doesn’t have one,” then I nominate dog.

I’ve got the daily low-dose version, and it’s changed my life. True to expectation from a dissociative drug, it causes me not to feel so much personal identification with the unwanted thoughts that keep bubbling up in my head. It may not work for everyone, but it works for me.

I’m so dreadfully sorry. I cannot help myself. Please forgive me.

It’s “zero kelvins” not “zero degrees Kelvin.”

The question was, “How do you deal with depression about climate change?” Maybe voting in local elections does that for you (singular), but it may not work for you (general).

Already doing that. No change in material conditions, still depressed. Next idea?