As a guy, the same thing would be important to me. I’d want a girlfriend who valued herself enough to make that choice. Also, what if I screwed up and got her pregnant? I’d want her to get whatever care she chose, and not be treated like a breed sow.
As someone who used to be a teenager, I imagine that remaining 27% being mostly guys that haven’t thought that far ahead, and would have been much higher in my day
Congratulations to the zoomers for proof that you’re compassionate and can think beyond immediate needs and desires
And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light. It is not surprising, then, if his servants also masquerade as servants of righteousness.
Except they don’t even attempt to look like good people. Satan would think he’s been doing it all wrong, he should’ve just said “I’m here to rule over you all and destroy the world, vote for me”.
In my experience, a lot of them don’t need Trump as an excuse not to follow Jesus. I’ve come across plenty of so-called Christians here in the south and lot of them are the most judgmental , racist, and hateful people I’ve ever met.
EDIT: Your downvotes won’t change the continuity errors in the Bible or your teachings.
There are four different Jesuses depending on which Gospel you pick, and if you believe in the Trinity, then you are giving Jesus way too much credit considering he’s the same guy who drowned the entire human race.
For those reasons (among others), it never sits well with me when someone tries to declare that someone is or isn’t a Christian.
Matthew 5:17 ESV Jesus said “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.
The old testament is still quite relevant. There’s also quite a bit more than the golden rule in the new testament.
For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.
Matthew 5:18
The golden rule is the only thing that really matters.
Yeah that thing that was articulated 5 centuries before Jesus supposedly lived and was known in Aramaic at least a century prior by Rabbi Hillel.
This entire comment screams “I have no understanding of what I’m trying to say.” You do realize the Gospels are four different perspectives, right. Get three different people to tell you about anything that was in the news last week and you’ll absolutely hear three different stories.
Except that isn’t what happened. Mark built Jesus out of the letters of Paul and various pagan-jewish works. Matthew copied Mark but really liked the Pentauch. Luke copied Matthew and tried to shore up the apostles. John took all three and some local Messiah stories.
None of these people were eyewitnesses, none of these people even talked to eyewitnesses. A copy of a copy of a copy with no original.
What did Mammon ever do to you? Other than make you pay more taxes than it’s billionaire true believers, lay you off, make you pay Microsoft a subscription…
Congress has wanted nothing to do with conflicts in an official capacity for the last 50-60 years. They want sound bytes in unofficial interviews for grandstanding and to be able to blame everyone else.
This is actually a result of those decades of congress, regardless of party in control, abdicating their constitutional duty. For a recent example, check out post 9/11 and congress.
Both Obama and Biden have been more than willing to sign a repeal or massive overhaul of the AUMF, but both chambers of Congress and members of both parties therein are cowards who would rather cheer or criticize in front of a camera and microphone than perform their Constitutional duties of checking the power of the Commander in Chief.
They have a responsibility to carry out such actions in the presence of Congressional inaction and cowardice.
As long as the AUMF exists and is in effect, it is both legally and effectively the role of the President to act under its grant of authority in accordance with its purpose.
I’m sorry but saying the president can, so they have to, is the most reductive thing I’ve ever seen. It’s the epitome of absolute ideology. Thinking a piece of paper absolves the genocidal actions of anyone……
Targeted killings of senior leaders in the Islamic extremist movement is hardly genocide. We have an actual fucking genocide in progress to reference and you want to sell us on the idea of drone strikes as genocide?
No. How the fuck does a ship taking oil from an Egyptian port to Vietnam, just with an American financial stake have fuck all to do with genocide?
Just because someone claims they’re fighting something does not mean they actually are. Nothing about what the Houthis are doing is actually about Israel except their words.
Shame on me for not adding to the discussion but the caffeine still ain’t hit. I just want to say for some reason that seeing a willingly obtuse clown be challenged to be even more so genuinely made me giggle for some reason. Thank you.
As long as the AUMF exists and is in effect, it is both legally and effectively the role of the President to act under its grant of authority in accordance with its purpose.
Nah, this bullet is an off the wall insane interpretation of the AUMF. They were 100% right to mock you for it. Not to mention that the AUMF is actually about September 11, and specifically textually so, not just in motivation. Did the Houthis plan, execute, or shelter those responsible? It’s been a huge stretch to even use it how it’s been used. It’s not in any way, shape, or form a requirement to go fight other random Islamic groups, whether or not they deserve it.
Given that actual US Navy ships have been getting attacked and this is largely in retaliation of that, I think it stretches the imagination a bit to say that the US started this.
From where did you get this opinion? None of the articles I’ve read about the US attack have mentioned an attack on the US Navy. The closest I could find in a search was missiles that landed 10 nautical miles away from a Navy ship in November. Which, at the scale of the ocean is sorta close, but it’s a stretch to call it an attack in need of immediate retribution. All the direct justifications presented by the US are that this is in response to and designed to deter their attacks on commercial shipping.
The Houthi’s have been launching missiles at our ships and hijacking cargo ships basically since thw October 7th attacks. This is just the first time the US has done more than a warning, which is why you’re hearing about it now.
This doesn’t seem to be in response to the thread. The Axios link doesn’t say anything about an attack on the US Navy. The second link has a mention by Biden of “US ships” (not Navy) as targets, but the linked story only says a British navy ship may have been targeted, but they weren’t sure. I’m well aware they’ve been attacking shipping, that’s not in question and not what I’m responding to.
Our corporate oligarchs already pitch a fit about collective bargaining, universal healthcare, and adjusting minimum wage to match inflation. I can’t imagine they’d react well to a universal basic income except by raping the fading middle class even more.
The universal healthcare one baffles me because it would save businesses money and increase employee retention. But corporations still fight against it.
Having healthcare tied to your employer is both a way for companies to pay less while offering more benefits to entice new workers and also keep workers from fighting too hard for their own rights because now maintaining a job is directly related to health. If we had universal healthcare, companies would have to compete more directly on wage and that would cost them more. Providing healthcare, while negotiating for deals for said healthcare means they can say that they are providing more benefits than they actually pay for.
The health care industry (insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, hospital administration, etc) make up a very sizeable portion of both the economy and the workforce. Gutting that will have very large knock on effects throughout the country
But the other aspect? While this has likely shifted a bit due to the republican jihad on medicine of the past couple years, the US has really good healthcare… for those who can afford it. Because with health care costs so high (even accounting for the bullshit insurance companies and hospitals pull), you can get paid quite a bit if you are a specialist in some form of medicine. For a lot of specialty treatments we are (or at least were) still one of the better places on the planet to “get sick”… if you can afford it. And countries like the UK have issues with preventative care simply because of how overworked health care workers are (on account of people being able to afford it…). You’re a lot less likely to die if you get sick, but it is also “harder” to not get sick, as it were.
Personally? I think our health care system is so fucked that it is hard to do much worse. But hybrid models (I think it is Denmark that is often held up as a great example of this, but also grain of salt because Left Leaning Millennials have a massive chubby for anything “nordic”) where you have a government provided/supplemented baseline “basic human rights” health care system but the ability for employers to offer premium care seem like the way to go.
Which is why I still prioritize UBI over health care reform. Because all of the above will result in a lot more people needing UBI. And while I acknowledge it is portrayed as a dystopia for a LOT of reasons, I still think the Martian model in The Expanse is probably what we as a society need. UBI and housing so that people aren’t dying in the streets if they can’t get enough shifts at Wendy’s. But a strong incentive to still pursue higher education (the cost of which definitely needs adjusting…) or to work less than desirable jobs to be able to afford luxuries and a higher quality of life. Effectively a hybridization of “Capitalism” and “Socialism” as it were.
And if people’s healthcare isn’t tied to their jobs there would be more people willing to start their own business increasing the chance of competition.
Because it also gives employees more freedom. Tying healthcare to employment is insane and extremely expensive, but it also creates a worse power dynamic
It’s because there is no unified aristocracy. All those rich families are cordial but are out only for themselves. They can’t see that having all the menials healthy/housed/fed improves all their wealth.
That would basically cover my student loan payments, so it would be equivalent to loan forgiveness for me. Improve is an understatement, that would actually allow me to save money. Right now my wife and I make slightly above area median income and we’re just treading water financially. This would be a game changer. We could actually consider having a kid.
It’s more than that per month just for childcare, assuming they are anticipating they will continue to work. It’s significantly more than that in food, Healthcare etc per month. If all you need is $750/month to have a child, than you can already have a child.
But the reality is, their lifestyle will eat that $750, and they’ll continue thinking they can’t afford to have a child. And, frankly, they probably can’t. Children are for the poor and the upper-middle class and above. It’s weird, but it’s true.
In California, it’s an issue of fairness to count ballots cast by people who then die before election day, Secretary of State Alex Padilla said. He said it’s just as conceivable that someone who votes early in person also dies before election day, and there is no way to identify and reject that ballot.
Edit: I feel compelled to make it clear that I don’t want anyone to die due to political violence. However, if someone has to die I would prefer it be those who seem hell-bent on undermining the democratic process.
It’s sad that I knew what you meant before reading your edit. Like we all know that this next election will result in violence. We can all only hope that it’s against the right people…
Probably. But for every Trump fascist getting arrested or making a video "patrolling" a ballot box drop-off, for every fascist getting killed, those are huge news stories that will make voters reconsider if it's even safe to vote. It'll have a massive chilling effect on voters who aren't obvious Trump supporters. Which is the point: fear.
Pussies are warm, deep, and can be quite resilient. Trump voters as a whole have a long way to go before I would bestow them with that honorable title.
I think they’re alluding to the fact that domestic abusers are grossly overrepresented among cops? And thereby suggesting that such a law, if feasible to enforce against all such offenders, would amount to disarming cops wholesale.
I live in one of these cities (Denver) and in my city’s case this push is part of a ton of other provisions including a push to set a maximum speed limit citywide of 25 mph.
About 80% of my trips out of the house are walking or on a bike, but it seems clear to me that policies like this don’t improve safety. It’s just lazy policy making. For example, if you set a 25 mph speed limit on a road designed to support 45 mph traffic, most drivers will still drive 45+ mph and you instead get a wild mismatch of driving speeds. This just slows traffic with an arguably negative benefit to safety. Similarly, if you ban turn on red in the city many drivers will still turn on red, but now whether or not a car will turn on red becomes unpredictable.
What our cities need is more dedicated bike and pedestrian infrastructure that is separated altogether from the roads, as well as greatly improved public transit.
In NYC, right on red is illegal and I’d venture a guess that >98% of drivers obey this. Obviously each city will need to handle it differently, but they can’t make it illegal and then call it a day. Enforcement and change infrastructure to match the new rules of the road are necessary. In the case of lowering speed limits, traffic calming measures should be put in place with the reduction in speed limit, so that going 45mph in a 25mph zone is difficult.
Enforcement is the big issue. I’ll be taking pedestrian safety to my city task force next month and addressing a number of systemic issues, the biggest one of which there is zero pedestrian safety enforcement.any states and cities have absolutely great pedestrian safety laws, they are just not enforced at all. The article has some nice data points I can mention.
In Oregon, any interestion, marled or unmarked is a crosswalk and drivers must stop. Of course they don’t and get aggressive or just drive past you when you try to cross in 30+ roads. If we enforced pedestrian safety for existing laws with 10% of the effort we put into enforcement of other crimes the culture could change.
See, the thing is, those roads that were 45mph have more than enough room for both cars and bike/ped infrastructure. The issue is that, generally, the lanes for higher speed roads are wider. Narrow the lanes and people feel they have to go slower to stay in the lines (which is true for a lot of drivers, bless their hearts). It's an unconscious response to narrowing roadways that can be used to actually make people slow down, rather than just telling them not to. And when you narrow the lanes, that leaves more room in the same space for stuff like bike lanes and sidewalks.
Yup and I’d LOVE to see some of those four lane roads get turned into two or three lane roads with protected bike lanes
However, in a city that’s primarily optimized for cars and lacking in other forms of infrastructure, the main impact of traffic calming measures is to make it really hard to get anywhere in an efficient manner. I don’t believe it significantly improves safety, but it will undoubtedly make a lot of people who rely on their cars absolutely miserable.
The root of the problem is that we simply have too many cars on the roads to begin with. However, we can’t reasonably ask people to stop driving until the alternatives are as safe and convenient as a car. The primary focus should be on urban planning that makes walking, biking, or taking light rail an attractive alternative. In the case of walking and cycling, this overwhelmingly means dedicated infrastructure.
The root of the problem is that we simply have too many cars on the roads to begin with. However, we can’t reasonably ask people to stop driving until the alternatives are as safe and convenient as a car.
You’ve got that entirely backwards: driving must become painful in order for people to support funding alternatives.
Edit: downvote me all you like, folks, but it doesn’t change the fact that we’ve been trying to do it the other way for decades and it doesn’t fucking work.
You’re being downvoted, but that’s exactly what many europeans cities have been doing for many years now. When going into the city center by car is the worst option, people choose other ways to go.
Did those cities already have good mass transit set up to facilitate a better option, I legit don’t know? I like this plan but I wonder if it will be successful with how absolute dog shit this country’s mass transit is.
Did those cities already have good mass transit set up to facilitate a better option
Maybe, but that’s a moot point because so did cities in the US. Take some of the biggest poster-child cities for car-dependency, Atlanta and Los Angeles, for instance.
Here’s what Atlanta’s streetcar network looked like in 1924:
I agree for the most part. It’s better to design streets so that drivers feel uncomfortable at higher speeds. Street narrowing, bollards, trees, smaller set backs can all slow cars down.
That said, as a counterpoint, despite similar street design, the speed limit in most of Canada is 50kmh (30 mph) and many urban residential streets are down to 30km (18.6 mph). Some people speed, but driving 45 mph (72 km/h!) down most city streets is pretty rare. Pedestrian and cycling accidents involving cars in Canada are close to half the rate of the US. Which is to say, I don’t think the Denver mayor’s proposal is crazy. It works in Canada, but it will take time for the culture to change.
I think the focus here really needs to be on supporting alternative forms of transport.
We have a city that’s already filled with gridlock almost 24/7, even at 2am in the evening. The city planning is such that it’s hard to go significant distances without a car without spending hours in transit. If the primary lever for change is to institute slower speed limits and traffic calming measures, it simply makes things miserable for everyone involved.
IMO the root of the issue is we have way too many cars and not enough alternative infrastructure to make going without a car especially practical.
Denverites love to walk and bike when it’s convenient and they feel safe. I firmly believe that dedicated infrastructure would dramatically reduce the number of car trips as well as give structural safety measures walkers and cyclists. This would reduce deaths while making the city a more pleasant and healthy place to be. Thats why it should be the primary focus in terms of change.
I agree with everything you said in the second half. Better non-car infrastructure should be the primary focus!
But I don’t see why traffic calming and slower car speeds would make things miserable for “everyone”, like cyclists or pedestrians. I wouldn’t ride my bike nearly as often if cars could go 45 mph on Canadian streets. Making cars uncomfortable is part of encouraging other modes of transportation.
There are many reasons why it is bad for everyone, but I will cite a few specifics.
To start with, in the absence of good alternatives, vast majority of pedestrians and cyclists would also be regular drivers. The only exceptions would be people who are too poor to avoid a car. If the drivers and the walkers are the same people then the people who regularly walk still suffer from slowed traffic because they still take the car for some trips.
Poor mobility for cars also translates to increased cost of living. Most businesses rely upon vehicle transport in some way or another and the increased cost of doing business gets passed onto the consumer.
In addition, the existence of high throughput streets with higher speed limits tends to concentrate traffic into specific predictable areas. When you reduce the throughput of those areas, traffic gets distributed onto more roads. The result is that cyclists and pedestrians are less able to avoid cars with strategic route planning.
I wouldn’t ride my bike nearly as often if cars could go 45 mph on Canadian streets.
To clarify, this isn’t every street in the USA, it’s only major thoroughfares. Most side streets in US cities have a 25-30 mph speed limit. In a world with well designed bike infrastructure we would have dedicated paths separated from traffic so you don’t have to share the road with fast moving cars.
Poor mobility for cars also translates to increased cost of living.
Nope, that’s backwards. Poor mobility for cars comes from higher-density development, which is also efficient development because you don’t have to spend huge amounts of money building parking. Getting rid of the cars is the thing that lowers the costs!
Futhermore, getting rid of the cars is also the thing that enables walking/biking/transit to be viable (because there’s physically less distance to cover, since you don’t have to cross a wasteland of pavement), which also lowers cost of living.
The bottom line is that if you build to accommodate cars, you will never have walkability. It’s geometrically impossible.
When you reduce the throughput of those areas, traffic gets distributed onto more roads. The result is that cyclists and pedestrians are less able to avoid cars with strategic route planning.
Distributing traffic onto more (uniformly-slow) streets means that cyclists and pedestrians have less need to avoid cars with strategic route planning because slow-moving cars aren’t nearly as much of a danger to begin with.
The point is that simply lowering speed limits as the primary lever to improve quality of life isn’t useful. It does nothing to reallocate that space in a beneficial way.
I’m literally arguing in favor of reducing space for cars for more pedestrian, cycling and transit infrastructure
The bottom line is that if you build to accommodate cars, you will never have walkability. It’s geometrically impossible.
Guess what? The city is already built. I agree with you.
The question is how to move forward and slapping lower speed limits on everything isn’t the solution. You need to actually spend money on revamping the infrastructure so there are meaningful alternatives. Try to read more and jump to conclusions less.
I’m literally arguing in favor of reducing space for cars for more pedestrian, cycling and transit infrastructure
You’re literally arguing for going about it ass-backwards in a way doomed to failure, which is a disingenuous, passive-aggressive way of opposing it.
You need to actually spend money on revamping the infrastructure so there are meaningful alternatives.
In order to actually spend money on bike/ped/transit, the politicians have to allocate it for that purpose. That doesn’t happen unless the public is made to hate driving first!
I’m sorry but most of what you say doesn’t make any sense. Why would making it easier and faster to drive encourage cycling and walking?
Let me address your points in turn:
Yes, slowing car traffic makes car travel worse. That’s the point. Cars are massively prioritized right now.
Cars are a cost of living disaster. The US and Canada spend the most on transportation costs in the world. The US actually spends more public tax dollars on transportation because car infrastructure is the least efficient and most expensive to build. Cars themselves are the biggest household expense after housing. Businesses also thrive in car free environments. In Europe, businesses know this and fight to remove car infrastructure. Ever wonder why the most economically vibrant areas are the least car dependent? The US and Canada are brainwashed.
The solution to cars driving on cycling routes is to lower the speed limit even more on those routes. Like I said, in Canada many cycling routes are 18 mph. Most drivers go even slower on cycling prioritized routes. It’s mind boggling to think it would be safer if cars could go faster.
I’ve lived for many years in both countries. The US drives way faster and is much more dangerous, despite similar looking streets. In most other developed countries, traffic accident rates are falling to record lows. The US is a tragic outlier.. Prioritizing “traffic flow” is the heart of the problem.
More infrastructure for cars = even more cars on the road, as simple as that.
You want to fix a gridlocked city with awful traffic? You start taking lanes out and making them exclusive for public transport, and you build big sidewalks and a cycling lane. Now you can get where you want to go in 10 minutes using public transport or bike, or you can sat in traffic for an hour - magically, you’ll see traffic getting better and less cars on the road.
It’s not as if this is some mistery - it has been done in many cities around the world and it works. The alternative is the american way, “just add one more lane”, and you guys live with the results.
I think there’s a lack of understanding on just how differently American and European cities are structured. Unless you’re in the Northeast, cities aren’t densely packed. They’re broad and sprawling. This is especially true of mid sized cities. Housing is typically far from businesses. A 10 minute bike ride would barely get me out of the neighborhood, and I’d still have aways to go before a major road.
On the other hand, I biked around campus in college and took the bus system all the time. I didn’t need a car for my day to day.
Public transit is a real challenge for us. There’s no easy answer. Our cities just aren’t structured for it. And I don’t think there’s a public transit model yet that could totally replace cars for us.
Yeah just like Oklahoma tried to ban driving through a yellow light they had to repeal that shit fast.
Cities cant suddenly change the turn on red when we were all taught we can. And if any city made the entire city 25mph I would avoid it like the plague and most companies that deliver good like truck drivers would either ignore it or boycott your town. Good luck with your supply chain issues.
Disagree. I spent all of my 20s living the no car lifestyle and cycling 100-200 miles a week on city streets. I have had countless negative interactions with cars but not a single one had anything to do with right turns on red.
I just don’t see any meaningful safety improvement from it but significant downsides in terms of traffic flow.
There are countries where right turn on red is prohibited and it makes no problems with traffic flow. Also, change is possible, people are able to get used to new rules.
In my country, besides right on red being illegal (having never been legal), traffic lights themselves are seen as a thing of the past and most of them were replaced with roundabouts decades ago.
I find this really hard to believe. Probably once a day I have to deal with some dipshit not looking for bikes coming down the bike lane before turning right.
Maybe you biked in the car lane, which is fine, but that doesn’t mean those of us in the bike lane don’t have to deal with this constant danger.
I have… Was on a poorly designed bike lane where the straight bike lane & right turn lane merged at the intersections. I stopped at the red light waiting for the light to turn green (as your supposed to do).
A car pulled in behind me and immediately started honking and putting his head out the window to berate me for blocking his right turn on red. I was actually terrified & was one of the interactions that made me reconsider using my bike as transportation.
Sorry that happened to you. I have had similar experiences, I have had people literally hit me with their cars because they’re angry I’m taking the lane, bad things thrown at me from moving vehicles.
However, I don’t see experiences like yours as being caused by the right turn law so much as the constant fact that people on cars sharing roads with bikes are assholes.
I will say, as a cyclist the polite thing to do is to position your bike to let turn-on-red people past you whenever possible. I don’t think it justifies this guys behavior and don’t know what this intersection looks like but it’s worth bringing up.
Weird I had a car in my 20s and still had multiple right turn on red incidents as a pedestrian. Crazy how our narrow perspectives aren’t the full picture.
My first bad interaction as a cyclist was from a right turn on red.
My bike got crushed, and I was told it was my fault since I was on the sidewalk (The alternative would be to share the actual lane with cars in the highway, with no room for the bike. There was no bike lane.). 20yo me was devastated to lose my only means of transportation, I didn’t have the ability to get a new bike, so I had to walk instead, this was annoying/frustrating enough to stick with me…
You see how anecdotes aren’t necessarily ways to determine this? Everyone will have different ones.
I mean, that’s a large part of why it’s illegal to ride a bike on the sidewalk and every major bicycle safety advocacy group says to take to the road. It’s pretty well understood that riding on the sidewalk is incredibly dangerous because it’s very difficult to see a fast moving bike when it’s off the road.
If it wasn’t a turn on red it would have been someone turning right into a driveway eventually.
The alternative would be to share the actual lane with cars in the highway, with no room for the bike. There was no bike lane.
Yes this is exactly what you should be doing as a cyclist if you want to be safe and seen. If there isn’t a bike lane you take the entire lane like a car. I have ridden many thousands of miles like this. Even when there is a bike lane it’s often the safest option if the bike lane is in poor condition.
The reason I advocate so hard for dedicated infrastructure is because I want to see more people biking and many people have a hard time feeling comfortable riding in the street. I get that. But in this case it’s the fault of the cyclist for failing to follow the rules of the road.
To counter your anecdotal evidence, I have nearly been hit several times because cars can turn right on red. I have had the cycle lane or sidewalk blocked because of it. And any time I’m wanting to cross, I’m fearing a car will show up and hit me before I’m out of the way.
What my city is doing is removing car lanes to replace with bike lanes, lowering the speed and also policing it and it worked to turn a 4 lane, 45mph area into a 2+turn lane, 25mph road and improved bike safety. Lowering the speed limit is the cheapest and easiest method. It will probably take a bit to claw that land from the driver's and build something for pedestrians with it.
I live in Seattle. We implemented the 25mph rule and it does seem to actually be helping. This is after a lot of attempts at improving pedestrian safety failed to have any effect. It’s irritating because it seems like it takes forever to drive anywhere in this city, and there are definitely a lot of corners cut in infrastructure that could improve safety—including very simple things like adding more marked crosswalks and stop signs at uncontrolled intersections—so I consider it a mixed bag overall.
Similarly, if you ban turn on red in the city many drivers will still turn on red, but now whether or not a car will turn on red becomes unpredictable.
Put up traffic cameras and ban those ignoring the red light light from driving for a month. You know, just like it’s done in other countries already.
They take your license just for running a red light? In many parts of America that would leave you unable to satisfy basic necessities like getting to work and buying groceries. It’s frankly ridiculous.
Not to mention, running a red isn’t usually a willful thing, but a “shit can I get through this yellow light?” And there’s always that uncomfortable of grey area on if you should slam your breaks or speed up.
Glad to live in a country where people don’t run red lights nearly as commonly. Speeding is still far too common though, here’s hoping we get to implement the Danish model where extremely reckless driving will lead to the car you’re driving being confiscated and sold.
I think all that would accomplish is getting a lot of working class people fired who are living paycheck to paycheck. Other countries have much better public transit.
Overall, we rate the Texas Observer Left Biased based on story selection and political positions that mostly favor the left. We also rate them High for factual reporting due to proper sourcing and a clean fact-check record.
This is a serious over-generalization. Brownsville and the RGV vote reliably Democratic, and abuse of authority situations, involving school districts, criminal justice systems, and the police, et al, absolutely happen all over the country.
Yeah there’s some good people in Texas. That doesn’t change the fact that, for the most part, the entire state is a disgusting shit hole that is one of the biggest embarrassments in America.
That doesn’t change the fact that, for the most part, the entire state is a disgusting shit hole
There are some shitty parts of Texas for sure, but “for the most part?” You don’t know this state dude. Texas reliably votes like 55% Republican and 45% Democratic, and there are tons of awesome people, beautiful scenery, and multicultural urban centers here. The state is gerrymandered to hell though
Sorry, didn’t realize y’all only think in black and white like children. Fuck the most diverse large city in the country, right? And the most Hispanic large city in the country? Fuck those motherfuckers. Shitholes, all of them and every person in them
You seem to be reading things into comments that aren't there. Texas is a shithole because of the government running the State, not the people suffering through it.
I'm failing to see where anyone is blaming them for the shit their republican government is doing.
I’ll make this more extreme as a means of illustrating the point everyone else seems to be trying to get across…
Russia is a nation full of parents who love their children, artists and musicians creating interesting and new art, and rebels developing creative and novel approaches for resisting their fascist government. But, when people say that “Russia sucks”, those aren’t the reasons.
No? I don’t know a single woman fleeing. I’ve had 3 trans friends/coworkers who have fled for sure, and I don’t blame them one bit given the political climate here, even though their local communities are extremely supportive of them. But no, not a single woman. Where are you getting your information? Hmmm?
You personally know 3 people who have had to flee the state. That’s JUST PEOPLE YOU KNOW. And you STILL say the state is a good place for the most part.
Well, I’m a cishet white male and I still didn’t like living in Texas. I had to drive like 3-4 hours to get anywhere and back home, its hot, no winter for the most part(and when there was, any plans I had that involved leaving the house had to be canceled), power grid is shit and has way too many rolling blackouts. Internet service was abysmal, hot trash. The MAX speed I could get was like 10Mbps down. And then there’s the political climate… Yea fuck that I’m never moving back.
Bruh I live here. And I as a woman cannot WAIT to get out. It’s not great, and we shouldn’t pretend like it is. And I’m fortunate enough to be stuck in a pretty blue area. I just gotta finish serving my contract and then I’m running for the blue states ASAP.
Bruh, as someone who spent over ten years in Texas and got out, you are lying to yourself. Everyone i know that still lives there wants to get out but can’t for one reason or another.
You have to go back to Ann Richards and the 90s to find actual bipartisainship in texas man. I miss a lot of the people and the food especially, but fuck that state went bonkers after GWB and only gets more nuts. Fuck they pardoned Ken Paxton.
Democrats are frequently still racist, obedience-loving sacks of shit, they’re just the lesser of two evils in a system where the greater of two evils is a pack of utterly cynical greed-as-a-virtue actual fascists.
Was in the RGV right before Trump was elected - and again during the Beto-Cruz fight - the amount of support for conservatives there is MIND BOGGLING. I kept asking ‘how the fuck are so many latinos in the can for Cruz and Trump?’ I do not understand, especially around Harlingen and the other ‘towns’ down there.
I feel like every person in this thread that cannot fathom how he feared for his life has never had personal experience dealing with someone with severe mental illness, in their family or in public or something. Direct experience, though, of interacting with a large, loud, mentally ill person.
If you think you can just assume a stranger you encounter who shoves a phone in your face is mentally healthy, you’re missing some facts of life.
Can you then not empathize with how this delivery driver was afraid for his life? Not necessarily taking his time and thinking through his options, but reasonably in an actual state of irrational fear?
That’s fine. But it does mean there was no malice, as the jury eventually decided as well. He could have reasonably been afraid for his life, as he had no way to know if this 6’5" individual was sane or very much not.
I mentioned this in another thread but I keep thinking about Trayvon Martin and how upset I was that Zimmerman was released and got his gun back. I feel like our country is increasingly more acceptable of gun violence as a fact of life. How could precedents like this be applied to future cases? I’m not claiming to have all the answers I’m just not convinced that this is the best decision. I could be wrong though. It wouldn’t be the first time.
… I think you’re right, we are becoming a little more accustomed to gun violence, of the large-scale type especially. While I think we’ve always had a lot of gun violence in general, especially if you include gang/organized crime activity, the 24/7 unending stream of news makes exposure to stories of it a lot more consistent and even.
Regarding how the precedent could influence things into the future, I’m not sure.
The issue in that case if memory serves is that nobody actually knew and could testify as to what happened during the confrontation.
The privilege of self defense can be gained and lost in the course of an altercation. If an initial aggressor says “sorry, I’m outta here” and starts walking away, the initial victim’s privilege ends. If you shoot them in the back while they leave, it’s a crime. I didn’t believe a word that Zimmerman fuck said but the burden of proof was on the state. All Zimmerman had to do in the criminal case was say nothing, which is what he did. In the Martin family’s wrongful death suit against the homeowners association, I believe the association’s insurer settled for seven figures or more. Guess they thought Zimmerman wouldn’t make a very credible witness when he’d be required to testify in civil court. They knew why was he was hastling Martin in the first place, knew Zimmerman’s story had gaping holes in it.
The right to remain silent and the reasonable doubt standard rightly freed Zimmerman, in my view.
In the story above, there were numerous witnesses and video. I didn’t follow the trial, though.
So theoretically if someone shot someone else and there weren’t any witnesses or video and the shooter said exactly what happened in this case happened in this hypothetical situation do you think it would be equally justified?
It’s not a great fit because of two factors the food court patron knew there were others around and saw the YouTuber’s posse standing there with cell phone cameras. If I were on the jury, that would make it less reasonable for the patron to claim he was in fear for his life. He had no reason to assume the YouTuber was armed, and with that evidence of so people around and it being so open and public, and again, no weapon, patron was at best about to catch a beating, which I think even is a stretch because there was no verbal threats or display of intent to do violence.
Anyway, to your question, assuming the jury is going to disregard the public location and cameras everywhere, if the patron gave the exact same story, I think it would remain unjustified. The shooter claimed that, given the circumstances, he drew the inference that his life was in danger, a danger of serious bodily injury. That’s the standard.
I think there the facts support only an inference of a threat to bodily injury. The shooter could have safely waited before escalating to shooting. Shooting a YouTuber in the chest was disproportionate to the facts, in my view. The proportion has to be objectively reasonable, such proportion as society is willing to accept. I think, if everyone shot in this sort of situation, nobody would like it, and there would be many, many more deaths by gun violence.
Sure he did. He could have pulled out the gun so the aggressor saw it. Could have said “stop or I’ll fucking kill you.” All while continuing to walk backwards and creating space.
If the person keeps coming after you’ve said that, that’s what you can hang your hat on at trial: you knew your life was in danger because the assailant had no fear of death. You could at least say you feared the guy wanted to take your gun and kill you with it. Evidence was that the guy in the article shot immediately upon drawing and didn’t give any sort of warning. He apparently took a few steps backwards, said stop three times, and then drew and instantly fired.
I think the fact that the police arrested the guy, the prosecutors put the case on, the judge didn’t dismiss the it after close of evidence, and the jury was nearly deadlocked, show, that the charges were reasonable in this case. Certainly the jury is in the best position to decide the facts and apply the law.
The thing that may have saved him is that he fired only one shot and the aggressor lived. You’ll notice he was not charged with attempted murder but rather wounding in the commission of a felony, or something like that.
I wonder if the aggressor will pursue a civil lawsuit for assault. Sort of how OJ was acquitted in criminal court but then found civil liable; the criminal standard is one of reasonable doubt, the civil one of preponderance of evidence. Certainly both parties could be found liable under negligence, if the parties sue each other.
Not a very good idea when you’re already inside grappling range. A handgun becomes useless if a much stronger person seizes the hand that you are using to hold the gun. Additionally, if your first few shots fail to stop him, perhaps he’s on powerful drugs and you have a bad angle, then he can kinda just rip your face off anyway, since he’s already there. Or he could attack with a hidden knife, that’d be unpleasant.
This tells me you have no actual personal firearms training, no one with any training (and sense I suppose) would advocate for threatening an unknown assailant with a point blank gun.
The question becomes, could it reasonably have been perceived as an assailant. And that is a subjective question, a matter of opinion. Answering these questions is the job of juries, and they did so.
Also, I have at no point argued the charges were unreasonable. The charges were reasonable, this was not a clear-cut case. The verdict was also understandable and reasonable, that’s all.
Oh, and if you “fuck around”, you might “find out”. This is an important life lesson in general, that almost everyone learns at some point in their teens to 20s. If they make it that long, without getting shot by a doordash driver for a dumb prank.
You’re changing the hypothetical and added mere possibilities. Anything is possible. That’s why self defense is considered an imperfect legal remedy, and it’s one reason why it is said “the law abhors self help.”
When the qualified privilege to use reasonable force in defense of yourself or others proves insufficient, the perfect remedy is in a civil action for wrongful death.
What matters in evaluating the use of force, the privilege only exists where these hypotheticals are reasonably probable.
What fact would you hang your hat on here, to tell the judge and jury that you probably had absolutely no choice but to try and kill, especially when, as here, you are proved to have been mistakes, and were not in physical danger and the putative aggressor was unarmed?
That an assumption that any putative aggressor actually is unarmed is flawed. That is not determinable in a short span of time, and an inappropriate assumption for a person to make.
You don’t get to kill based on mere possibility. And you would not like living in a world where you could.
The patron had plenty of room to retreat. Plenty of time to give a better warning, such as “stop or I’ll fucking kill you.” If a person keeps coming after that sort of warning, that’s a fact from which the inference a threat to life is more reasonable; a person with no fear of death.
This dude had a phone in his hands. Didn’t take a swing at the guy. Didn’t persist with no apparent fear of death. The patron pulled out the gun and fired instantly after merely saying “stop” three times.
I accept the jury was in the best position to decide the facts and apply the law. The dude was charged, stood trial, and was only partially aquitted. I rest my case.
Possibility is irrelevant. Their instruction is to find beyond a reasonable doubt, not beyond all conceivable doubt. These would be two different things.
No this is exactly where carrying a weapon is bad. The guy had reason to act in self-defense, however potentially lethal force is a harder sell, and boasting away in a crowded place is wrong. If the guy didn’t have the gun, or otherwise defended himself without it, we’d all be cheering and justice would be swift
If the guy didn’t have the gun, or otherwise defended himself without it, we’d all be cheering and justice would be swift
Where’d you buy your crystal ball that shows the outcome of unknown hypotheticals? I’d love to not only see that, but risk my life with it as well, I’m sure you would do the same…
You dont need to have dealt with mental illness to have that feeling… you just have to had trauma in the past. I have been jumped 2 times in the past by gang members, and you bet your fucking ass I get absolutely anxious if some stranger gets up to my face… good times
Gut/nut punch to get them to double over, THEN headbutt. Or even just pull them into you by their shirt. It’s not overly difficult once you know what you’re doing, but don’t celebrate your ignorance of hand to hand combat like it’s actual knowledge.
This shit ain’t Hollywood. You aren’t doubling someone over unless you’ve trained pretty hard. And even then it’s not guaranteed. Your mugging will not be choreographed.
Funny. I’m not saying I’m any kind of in shape these days, just that I once was. But I was in some glasgow pubs earlier this year. Maybe you had a specific one in mind? All the ones I saw were really welcoming to a couple Americans.
did I? or did I just make the logical conclusion feom thwir words, he just said lthat you can’t assume someone is mentally healthy when he approaches you and puts a phone in your face, he said many people don’t understand the trauma of dealing with mentally ill people and feeling threatened thus justifying the actions of the person who shot the youtuber.
I really did not, what else is there to interpret from his words?
as long as you feel threatened and you have past trauma with mentally ill people, you can shoot them in a public place and call it self-defense, it’s just how the US works.
How is that a ridiculous when OP was defending a guy who shot someone by saying “every person in this thread that cannot fathom how he feared for his life has never had personal experience dealing with someone with severe mental illness” and “If you think you can just assume a stranger you encounter who shoves a phone in your face is mentally healthy, you’re missing some facts of life”.
What in the world else do you think that could have meant other than that it’s okay to fear for your life and defend yourself with deadly force because someone is acting mentally ill?
At what point in that small reply do you see him saying that?
The entire comment. The topic is fearing for one’s life and defending oneself with a gun, and this guy basically says that it’s right to fear for your life because someone might be mentally ill. Comment again so you don’t have to scroll up:
I feel like every person in this thread that cannot fathom how he feared for his life has never had personal experience dealing with someone with severe mental illness, in their family or in public or something. Direct experience, though, of interacting with a large, loud, mentally ill person.
If you think you can just assume a stranger you encounter who shoves a phone in your face is mentally healthy, you’re missing some facts of life.
The entire comment. The topic is fearing for one’s life and defending oneself with a gun, and this guy basically says that it’s right to fear for your life because someone might be mentally ill. Comment again so you don’t have to scroll up:
Directly quote the part that makes the claim that at any level the point in which you fear for your life is correlated with the idea that they “might be mentally ill”. That was never said, nor would it matter if it was, because fearing grave injury or death is the determining factor, not any other.
The youtuber is 6 foot 5. Someone that tall is going to be intimidating if they get in your face and will not fuck off when asked regardless of what your prior experiences are. This guy knows he scares people. Thats the point of his channel. I mean the dude calls himself the goon squad. He knows hes being an asshole. He gets into peoples’ faces, scares the shit out of them and films the reaction.
Tell us you didn’t read the article without saying that. Plus even if they had used normal paint, that’s literally nothing compared to what this yacht does on a regular basis.
I think the best part is that an “X” in the top corner of a website is a well known sign to close a page. Like, I need to fight the urge to click it to exit out. Beyond that, how the fuck are you even supposed to search anything about it? X is such an ambiguous name. I don’t know why the fuck Musk spent billions on Twitter just to completely rebrand the IP into something so utterly idiotic. Considering his destruction of the platform and firing of most of the staff that maintained it, I would have thought the one thing of value he still had left was name recognition and major cultural ownership of words like “tweet”. I can hardly believe that a decade ago I thought Musk was a genius and I dreamed of working for SpaceX (a dream that faded as soon as I saw employee reviews thank God). Now it’s clear that the man has no idea how to run a small business let alone something as big as Twitter.
The one thing of value he has left is the user base. And it seems that this will not change, no matter what he does. So unfortunately neither Reddit not Twitter will crumble anytime soon…
I think that’s true for Reddit because Huffman hasn’t done anything dramatic enough to lose the base yet unfortunately. But I think Twitter’s base has been melting away. Hard to say because only Musk has the numbers. But with Threads out there now with millions of users and Mastodon having over a million users, the disillusionment with Twitter is much more clearly shown.
Shocked, SHOCKED I am that the white guy who grew up rich under South African apartheid is a racist who will use racist tactics to defame a black woman he doesn’t like.
Maybe, but I’m not so sure it would be a long campaign. At his core, he is extremely lazy. Trump, for all of his faults, is not lazy. Elon would get very tired of going on the campaign trail because it means work. He couldn’t just sit around and Tweet himself into the Oval Office.
That makes zero sense. Elon Musk is a workaholic. You know, the polar opposite of lazy. He’s a POS but lazy he is not. Rather than campaigning, Trump plays golf. Dude’s as lazy as lazy gets.
Anything to avoid spending time with his kids. But seriously, friends who used to work for him said they’d find him at 7am sleeping under conference room tables.
Just after Elden Ring came out, Musk tweeted out his build. Internet sleuths figured out he would have needed to play about 12 hours a day to have that build, and that it was kind of shit.
I’ve seen enough Superman stories to recognize a Lex Luthor type when I see one. I could absolutely see him, or Bezos, running for President or Governor someday.
Good, because that is fucking bullshit. Imagine if there was a “black panic defense” where someone claimed that they lost control violently because a black person made a pass at them?
Or even better(?) a “white panic defence” for non-whites (hold for crowd’s audible gasp). The fact someone came up with that garbage is yet another example of how absurd it is getting over there.
The comparison is that the cops are using something about the person to be an excuse for violently panicking. Not literally the same thing, but the same kind of fear based on who the person is.
That’s where they got the “xyz panic defense” from!
“The Big Scary Black Man™️ got on the elevator with me! I had to mace him because he said HeLlO”
(Yeah. That was my security guard. He was in uniform, starting his shift and you just maxed him for starting his rounds.)(fortunately it was that cheap pink pepper spray that- for the record- can’t stop any one for shit. It’s just… irritating.)
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