“Political supporting for me, Shut up and dribble for thee!”
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Heard about this. Nah bruh. Everybody needs to shut up and dribble.
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This probably should also be in the Trump effects on culture thread.
True. Pulisic did something after a goal, saw other sports people doing it, thought it was fun, so why not.
Pulisic, in 1930’s: “Yeah, I saw some other people raising their arm straight ahead and at a 45 degree angle, walking all goose-steppy, thought it was a fun thing to do, so why not?”
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It’s an inherently political statement, and if you’re going to make one, at least have the courage to stand by it and explain it.
When Colin Kaepernick took a knee during the national anthem to protest police brutality, he didn’t shy away from questions. When USWNT legend Megan Rapinoe did the same, she was also able to answer for it. She wrote an entire piece about it
If Pulisic wants to use his platform as the face of the USMNT to do that dance, he should be brave enough to give an honest explanation.
Pulisic might as well say “Facism is fun”.
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Whatever one thinks of ao_fan’s behavior here and on the outpost, she is posting a lot of good anti-Trump and anti-MAGA stuff on Facebook. (not sure whether I’ve reposted any of it here, much is more suited to viewing than cut-and-pasting.)
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I want a Putz Talk mug.
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One of my SILs suggested I read this article. Thoughtful but a bit depressing.
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I feel like I grew up at the beginning of the very end, although I suppose that is pretty conceited. I grew up in the age of civil rights and watching people strive to get to the moon. My parents would wake me up in the middle of the night to watch coverage of all the space missions. While I didn’t think of it as reason or enlightenment, per se, I think that’s what was really in my head when I had a strong feeling that we were at the point that science could and would solve all the world’s problems. I mean, geez, we put a man on the moon. If we could do that, what couldn’t we do? I’ve talked to quite a few people my age who went into science and engineering, like me, for exactly that reason. But I’ve not talked to anyone who grew up after me that can describe anything at all similar to that.
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Can’t think of anyone better than Trump (or MTG) as the antithesis of an Enlightenment person.
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I find it surprising that science/tech nerds are not similarly excited by AI these days.
I understand why people are critical or afraid. But it’s weird that people are bored and dismissive of what feels like a new age of discovery.
Maybe the uniting force for humankind will be a battle against artificial intelligence controlling us: a war against thinking machines as chronicled in Dune.
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58 posts were split to a new topic: Artificial Intelligence Discussion
Eh, his cronies will have destroyed democracy by the end of 2025. Trump might die – heck, they might want him to – but this shit legacy will remain.
Agreed.
Once you burn institutions down, its almost impossible to build them back up. Specially in countries like the US that are still extremely politically polarised.
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Interesting. In the comments, someone mentioned John Ralston Saul’s book “Voltaire’s Bastards”. It’s a book from the 1990s but from reading the reviews, would seem to give a lot of reasons for why the establishment is now doing so poorly. Have you read it?
From that column:
Our social media feeds are a firehose of addictive and largely useless images and videos, curated by online algorithms designed not to inform but to keep us engaged.
Well, “antisocial” but accurate.
I wonder how long a news website using an algorithm that shows people what they need to know would last? I mean, even my Google News feed is pretty shitty (yes, probably caused by my clicking on stuff I want to see, sadly).
And from a “click this” link there:
Synder elsewhere notes there is probably no technology more conducive to fascism than social media. It offers finely engineered propaganda tailored to the individual. It steals and narrows attention. It cements dread and anxiety as the foundation of one’s intellectual home. It reduces life to formulas and platitudes. Most importantly, it destroys imagination. In the alternative reality of fascism, no one can imagine walking in another man’s shoes, let alone think about a child walking barefoot through the rubble of Gaza.
In such a world, power doesn’t need street thugs to induce fear when a digital gadget can divide people between us and them with a handy algorithm. At the same time, the internet can serve as a holding pen where average citizens might spend a third of their day with “influencers” that lie and charm.
We know now that a constant flood of decontextualized information confuses and disorients people so thoroughly that they will stop thinking altogether and surrender to the comfort of falsehoods. That is precisely the aim of any authoritarian leader — to rule a society hollowed of any widely shared, coherent meaning that might compete with their own supreme leader mythology.
Have you talked to a 20- or 30-something worker with a median wage of $60k who would like to buy a house? On the internet, they seem to think that the “basics” are getting out of reach.