Agreed. I’m friends with a few journalists and even the ones who had a steady job at major outlets were working it like a hustle. There really isn’t a good way to do it that doesn’t involve some level of either corporate or wide-public investment and both of those have an easy chance to get corrupted.

I mean, yes, but they’re minimal. They don’t charge enough for a subscription to fully cover their revenues. Plus serving ads has always been something news outlets have done for revenue.

But hey, if they can just fuck off, I guess we can maintain either ads all over the page or let Sinclair/Newscorp run everything.

The issue isn’t data transmission and hosting, it’s paying someone a living wage to do this work professionally, along with their editors, graphic artists, analysts, and everyone else along the way that writes the news. It’s a bit absurd that people complain about ads and low quality reporting/analysis while simultaneously demanding all journalists work for free. Hell, if you get a library card you’ll probably be able to legitimately access the article right now for free in a way that still pays the journalist.

Probably a rosé then.

It’s very common for teens to be impulsive and reckless because they’re basically biologically programmed to be so. It’s not something they can control, really, it’s something they’re experiencing. If you didn’t go through that, it’s all good, probably safer frankly, but it’s not like people are aberrant for being reckless while maturing.

What the actual fuck are you talking about. The Japanese literally used suicide attacks and were so brainwashed they believed suicide was preferable to enemy capture. The Germans literally committed the multiple genocides. They were rehabilitated over time but it took time and effort. Both committed horrific atrocities, yet through international effort, are largely reformed.

You really need to read up on American history.

Not really, that’s a minor part of the opinion. The more important part is they tell you how much food you’re going to get of what kind and then they give you that food. I don’t think anyone would be able to win a case on “my burger didn’t look like the burger in the ad” because every burger looks a little different. Lots of things that are the same don’t look the same and let’s not suddenly pretend we get McDonalds for the appearance. They’d win false advertising if, say, a quarter pounder was only 2 oz.

I dunno, seems like the judge is explicitly acknowledging it.

There is a legal, regulated, mostly safe method to buy cigarettes. It is inaccessible if you are under a certain age, but only the seller/provider is punished for violating regulations. It’s okay to have restrictions on what children can consume.

While current laws on illegal drugs do not work, arguing against any regulation whatsoever is similarly silly, the laws obviously work. Smoking rates have dramatically declined since those laws and public education campaigns began.

If you’re a power user there’s a minor learning curve to prevent shit from breaking and some mild inconveniences like being unable to use NFC. Location can also just not work at times. Overall, I’m glad I made the switch.

All Eastern religions have their own problems and crimes committed in the name of their beliefs. Christianity might have some of the more global harms, but it’s hardly alone in being harmful.

Building up a new economy is not a crash. A crash is when the current system gets wrecked and it’s possible something better emerges from the ashes. The problem is that an economic crash primarily hurts the poor, even if they don’t own the stocks/property/means of production. They’re the ones whose jobs and homes are lost.

Consider, for example, the Bengal famine. Entirely economic, there was literally enough food but it became prohibitively expensive due to market forces driven by the British. The rich British aristocrats didn’t suffer, Indians did. In Venezuela when the market crashed, rich people got out or are able to weather it. Poor people are either stuck having to attempt to make the best of a terrible situation, or flee and seek aid as migrants.

People thought that was the case with finance until 2008, instead we had people left homeless and jobless for years. Wealthy people have a safety net when the system fails. Poor people do not. If the U.S. crashed, people would die from the fallout. People died in the last recessions and they weren’t mostly the rich.

As someone who grew up with those stories, I’m also curious what are considered space battles since I don’t recall any.

OP said coworker, which I think most people missed. If you’re privileged enough to quit your job over a coworker’s political opinion, more power to you, I guess. I think that’s letting the fascists win, since you’ve literally ceded ground. But I believe OP is looking for constructive solutions to discuss politics with a coworker to preserve the relationship, likely both for their sanity at work and because there’s other things about the person they like.

I think you’re wrong about the car example. The reason people don’t know how their car works now is because so much of it involves proprietary software that you cannot fix it with physical labor. You have to understand and debug the code as well. Additionally, the manufacturers and dealerships have made accessing the parts (both on the car and replacements) so difficult that there isn’t really a universal approach to fixing the modern passenger vehicle anymore. Millenials didn’t stop fixing cars themselves out of laziness, it was because the knowledge needed to do so was greater than the cost of having a professional do it and have the repair guaranteed.

Meanwhile, though I understand that touch screen and app-based OSes are pretty difficult to program for the average consumer, it’s not the only option for computing, just a popular one. This also has nothing to do with whether what you’re downloading is safe.

But that’s not really a good reason to not have regulations. “People are going to steal your shit if they want to badly enough” does not mean theft shouldn’t be a crime.

There’s probably a few other things that can be done but that’s generally correct. Frankly, the solution to gun violence is to remove all guns. Make the situation impossible. That won’t happen and neither will appropriate legal restrictions to ownership with the country the way it is, so training and other preventive measures are the next best thing.

While I like the sentiment, it doesn’t actually address OP’s question. My guess is OP also hates fascists but has trouble discussing their opinions on politics with their fasc-curious friend for whatever reason, whether it’s because they want to preserve the relationship or generally have trouble keeping up in a back and forth (which is totally fine, being quick-witted is not a requirement to hate fascists). What are your tips for approaching the conversation?