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Whorehoarder , in TIL In the Hot Coffee lawsuit against McDonalds,punitive damages were given due to McDonalds intentionally overheating coffee to save money on refills

Must be one of the more successful smear campaigns in recent history. I’m not even from the us and we heard about that shit and used it as an example of greed and frivolous lawsuits. It was only like 5 years back I learned the truth. Believed that shit for 25 years…

Edit: oops should’ve responded to the media part of thread

Angry_Maple ,
@Angry_Maple@sh.itjust.works avatar

Poor lady. Her labia was physically fused together from the heat, but she was still called dramatic. I can’t imagine everything that she had to go through.

maniajack OP ,

And she originally only asked for McDonald’s to cover her medical expenses ($20k) which they refused.

Dkarma ,

deleted_by_moderator

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  • SoBoredAtWork , (edited )

    Do you really think she just sat there and willingly watched her vagina boil?

    Also, she was wearing jeans, so you’re just making shit up.

    And have you seen pictures? They’re horrendous. I’ll assume you have already, since you’re an expert on this incident, but in case you haven’t, here you go (very NSFW)…

    www.google.com/search?q=stella+liebeck+burns&…

    Dkarma ,

    Thanks for proving my point. There is no way quick contact with coffee even at 200 degrees can do this.

    This is caused by letting it sit. She could have taken her pants off and prevented burns this bad.

    SoBoredAtWork ,

    Lol. You’re a moron.

    Dkarma ,

    Lolok pin dick

    AnonTwo ,

    Old lady in a car gets coffee on her lap.

    No she fucking couldn't. And even if she could you are grossly underestimating the damage of 16oz of 200 degrees coffee.

    All you're doing is showing how much of a sociopath you are.

    theangryseal ,

    The woman was 79 years old. Getting the pants on before her labia was fused together by intentionally overheated coffee was probably a fucking chore.

    jabeez ,

    Holy shit, this is one of the dumbest fucking things I've ever read.

    JackbyDev ,

    Listen, do this as a test, pour water a cup of water on your pants. See if your legs get wet. Better yet, heat it up or chill it (not enough to hurt yourself) and see how cold or warm your legs feel.

    Dkarma ,

    False equivalent test. Yes ur legs will get wet. No u won’t get burns like u see in the pics. That’s my point. This would have been a minor scalding if she wouldnt have just sat there and had taken her pants off.

    havokdj ,

    Dude, she was 79 years old and wearing jeans. You think she could just jump out of them in like 2 seconds? She’s in a fucking car in a drive through, you can’t even get out the drivers side door in those circumstanced.

    JackbyDev ,

    You’d only get a light scalding because I’m telling you to not get near boiling water. I’m telling you to do this to see if your legs get wet and if you can still feel the temperature even if they somehow don’t.

    moosetwin , in TIL about Roko's Basilisk, a thought experiment considered by some to be an "information hazard" - a concept or idea that can cause you harm by you simply knowing/understanding it
    @moosetwin@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

    roko’s basilisk is a type of infohazard known as ‘really dumb if you think about it’

    also I have lost the game (which is a type of infohazard known as ‘really funny’)

    AnarchistArtificer ,

    Oh damn, I just lost the game too, and now I’m thinking about the game as if it were a virus - like, I reckon we really managed to flatten the curve for a few years there, but it continues to circulate so we haven’t been able to eradicate it

    PlexSheep ,

    I lost too. I agree, it’s been going around at least in the threadiverse. I’ve seen it at least 3 times in a couple months.

    shnizmuffin ,
    @shnizmuffin@lemmy.inbutts.lol avatar

    Fuck, I lost!

    decivex ,

    Thanks! I just won the game!

    moosetwin ,
    @moosetwin@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar
    grrgyle ,

    Oh nice I like this new edition.

    PlexSheep ,

    Winning wasn’t in the set of rules I received, can you explain?

    decivex ,

    Make your own rules.

    CarnivorousCouch , in TIL Alice Walton (Walmart heir) killed a pedestrian in a driving accident and was never charged. She has also been arrested for DUI twice but never charged.

    I knew about this but it’s never made sense to me. If I was a billionaire I’d never drive myself anywhere, particularly not if I was going to be intoxicated.

    ElectricTickles ,

    Having billions generally means not having to explain yourself

    Ghyste ,

    Intelligence hasn’t been a requirement for being wealthy for some time. We’re dealing with a growing number of mega rich morons now.

    Greg ,
    @Greg@lemmy.ca avatar

    To be fair, a lot of the mega rich morons, Musk, Zuckerberg, etc are narrow geniuses (with a lot of luck). They’re just not self aware enough to know what they don’t know and they think they’re renaissance men. If the news media was continuously telling me that I was a genius, I might start to believe it too ¯_(ツ)_/¯

    ChickenLadyLovesLife ,

    I think I’m a genius solely because of me telling myself this continuously. I can’t imagine how off the rails I’d be if any other people joined in.

    MelonTheMan ,
    @MelonTheMan@lemmy.world avatar

    You’re a genius!

    ElectricTickles ,

    Who are being reported on far more often … thanks to social media

    The Delaware Du Pont heir being a case in point

    nikt ,

    Having to rely on people to do things for you, even if you’re super rich, can be annoying. People that work for you take time off, get sick, so now you need other people to manage the other people to ensure that someone is always available, then you start to dislike some of those people, but managing who is around you all the time also takes effort, etc. etc. You can’t pay your way out of everything. Plus sometimes you just want to do things for yourself, and sometimes you just want to be alone.

    Myrbolg ,

    Yes and no. At billionaire level I expect they have other people taking care of who is available, and with that a mint of money you can easily keep a backup available as well.

    HeavenAndHell ,
    @HeavenAndHell@lemmy.world avatar

    Exactly. But we all know it’s because they’re cheap AF.

    lvxferre , (edited ) in TIL most cultures and peoples all over the world have historically had trouble recognizing the color blue

    No, the ancients did not “fail to see the colour blue”. Nor the Himba, mentioned in the text. Both simply don’t assign the shades that you’d call “blue” in English to their own special colour word. Each language splits the colour space in different ways.

    I’ll illustrate this with an example in the opposite direction - English using a single primary word for colour, while another language (Russian) uses two:

    https://i.ibb.co/PwGsv95/colours-russian.png

    In Russian, those three are considered separated colours; they aren’t a hue of each other, goluboj is not sinij or vice versa, just like neither is zeljonyj. In English however you’d lump the first two together as “blue”, and the third one as “green”.

    Does that mean that your typical English speaker fails to see one of the first two shades? No. And if necessary they might even use expressions to specify one or another shade, like “sky blue” vs. “dark blue”. They still lump them together as “blue” though, unlike Russian speakers, and they might not pay too much attention to those silly details.

    That’s basically what Himba speakers do, except towards all three of them. Here’s how the language splits colours:

    https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/10/Himba_color_Names.svg/800px-Himba_color_Names.svg.png

    You could approximate it in English as:

    • vapa - white, light [anything]
    • zoozu - black, dark but not reddish, purple
    • serandu - more saturated reds and reddish oranges
    • dumbu - more saturated yellows, yellowish oranges, and extra saturated greens
    • burou - your run-of-the-mill green and blue

    Now, check the colours that I posted with Russian terms. Just like English doesn’t care about the difference between two of them, Himba doesn’t care about the third one either.

    There’s also an interesting case with Japanese, that recently split 青/ao and 緑/midori as their own colours. Not too much time ago, Japanese did the same as Himba, and referred to the colour of grass and the sky by 青/ao; however people started referring to the yellower hues of that range by 緑/midori (lit. “verdure”), until it became its own basic word.

    That’s actually problematic for traffic legislation, because it requires the colour of traffic lights to be 青/ao, and people nowadays don’t associate it with green. Resulting into…

    https://harrojapan.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/traffic-light.jpg

    …cyan lights. They’re blue enough to fit the letter of the legislation, but green enough to be recognised as green lights!


    Now, regarding specific excerpts from the text:

    Gladstone noticed Homer described the sea color as “wine-dark,” not “deep blue,” sparking his inquiry.

    Gladstone (and sadly, many people handling ancient texts) likely had the same poetic sensibility as a potato.

    The relevant expression here is ⟨οἶνοψ πόντος⟩ oînops póntos; it’s roughly translatable as “wine-faced sea”, or “sea that looks like wine”. Here’s an example of that in Odyssey, Liber VII, 250-ish:

    
    <span style="color:#323232;">[245] ἔνθα μὲν Ἄτλαντος θυγάτηρ, δολόεσσα Καλυψὼ 
    </span><span style="color:#323232;">ναίει ἐυπλόκαμος, δεινὴ θεός: οὐδέ τις αὐτῇ
    </span><span style="color:#323232;">μίσγεται οὔτε θεῶν οὔτε θνητῶν ἀνθρώπων.
    </span><span style="color:#323232;">ἀλλ᾽ ἐμὲ τὸν δύστηνον ἐφέστιον ἤγαγε δαίμων
    </span><span style="color:#323232;">οἶον, ἐπεί μοι νῆα θοὴν ἀργῆτι κεραυνῷ
    </span><span style="color:#323232;">[250] Ζεὺς ἔλσας ἐκέασσε μέσῳ ἐνὶ **οἴνοπι πόντῳ**
    </span>
    

    Murray translated that as “wine-dark”:

    [245] Therein dwells the fair-tressed daughter of Atlas, guileful Calypso, a dread goddess, and with her no one either of gods or mortals hath aught to do; but me in my wretchedness did fate bring to her hearth alone, for Zeus had smitten my swift ship with his bright thunderbolt, [250] and had shattered it in the midst of the wine-dark sea.

    Why would be Homer referring to the colour of the sea? It’s contextually irrelevant here. However, once you replace that “wine-dark” from the translation with “inebriating”, suddenly the expression makes sense, Homer is comparing the sea with booze! He’s saying that it’s dangerous to enjoy that sea, that you should be extra careful with it. (You could also say that the sea is itself drunk - violent and erratic).

    The ancient Egyptians were the first to adopt a word to describe the color blue.

    I’m really unsure if this is the exception that proves the rule (since the Egyptians synthesised a blue dye from copper silicate) or simply incorrect.

    At least accordingly to Wiktionary, the word ḫsbḏ* refers to lapis lazuli (the mineral) and its usage for colour is non-basic (a hue). The actual primary word for what English calls “blue” is shared with what English calls “green”, and it would be wꜣḏ*.

    *in hieroglyphs: https://mander.xyz/pictrs/image/e8ce25d7-5b40-4438-a1e7-7ca793e2e43f.png

    owlboy ,
    @owlboy@lemmy.world avatar

    Thanks!

    hakase ,

    Excellent post in general, but it should be noted that the meaning of “wine-dark sea” is still very much disputed.

    lvxferre ,

    Frankly, I think that the only reason why this is considered “disputed” is because a lot of pedants that gravitate towards classical texts are like Gladstone. They don’t see what the author says, on a discursive level; they see individual words, and that screws with their ability to understand metaphors, thus poetry, thus the epics.

    For reference. I don’t speak Greek, but I do speak Latin. If I were to drink a sip of booze every bloody time that a muppet translated Plautus (a comedian) with unfunny shite, or Caesar (a general) with flowery and convoluted words, my liver would be probably floating the same seas as Odysseus’ ship. (It’s likely the same with Sanskrit given the egregiousness of “I am become Death”.)

    sircac ,
    @sircac@lemmy.world avatar

    Thank you very much!

    dogsnest ,
    @dogsnest@lemmy.world avatar

    This guy colours.

    NeptuneOrbit ,

    Whatever the fuck podcast popularized the idea that blue just didn’t exist? Yeah stupid.

    I do believe there is some relationship between one’s main language and how it affects thought patterns, but I mean cmon, even if I don’t know every word for shades of green (avocado VS chartreuse) doesn’t mean I’m not capable of distinguishing them. I may not have an exacting language tool set for distinguishing them. But I could.

    DragonTypeWyvern ,

    Speaking of the relationship between language and thought patterns, chartreuse is clearly a red color.

    Xenxs , in TIL just 20% of European homes have air conditioning compared to 88% in US

    Because for most of Europe, it wasn’t needed to have AC up until more recent years. You would have maybe what? 5-10 days a year that were actually really warm. People wouldn’t install an AC for that.

    These numbers will drastically change the coming decades.

    Aux ,

    That’s not true. While Northern Europe doesn’t really need aircon, Southern Europe is pretty bloody hot since the days of Christ. The difference is that European houses are built with insulation in mind, US houses are built from sticks and shit.

    madejackson ,

    You’re also wrong. Mainly, It has to do with the thermal capacity/mass of the building and not with differences in insulation values.

    There are pros and cons for all building types.

    Aux ,

    I’m not wrong, sorry.

    shottymcb ,
    Aux ,

    Wut? God, the worse from Reddit are already here…

    Huschke ,

    Not saying that is the case, but 20% of Europeans with A/C could also mean that 100% of the people in the very south have it and noone else.

    SCB ,

    Southern Italy peaks at 32C and low humidity. That is absolutely nowhere close to the heat we get in much of the US.

    US houses are most definitely built with insulation in mind. That point is somehow more laughable than you not knowing your own temps.

    Literally every part of your claim is incorrect.

    WhiteHawk ,

    Southern Italy peaked at over 50° C this year, and do you really think a country completely surrounded by an ocean has low humidity?

    SCB ,

    Yes, comparatively.

    Also I assure you no one is making building code choices based on one year.

    happyhippo ,

    Dude, I’m in Tuscany which is nowhere near the peaks of southern Italy.

    This is what awaits me

    https://feddit.it/pictrs/image/521e0d5c-c322-46fd-8c8d-629d3e7cdaeb.webp

    SCB ,

    This matches my expectations pretty well

    jimbolauski , (edited )

    The insulation requirements in the US are higher than many European areas with similar climates. Germany for instance would fall in region 4 and 5 of the US climate wise. R-30 is required for walls, R60 for ceilings, and R20 for floors for homes in the US. Germany recommends 6cm of wall insulation ~R8, 14cm for ceiling ~R19, and 6cm for the floor R8.___

    barsoap ,

    You know if you muppets used sane units you’d be right. But you’re using colonial measurements.

    Here’s conversion table. US R30 is equivalent to proper units R5.3, R60 is R10.5.

    …and we don’t really have recommendations as such. KfW55 is nowadays mandatory for new construction, KfW70 and up gets you cheap loans. KfW70 means less than 45 kWh/m² per year for heating and they don’t really care how you achieve that. We didn’t really get around yet factoring cooling into stuff.

    jimbolauski ,

    I was using freedom units for both. The R values were determined based on insulation thickness. Because you Europeans use energy consumption for your requirements it’s impossible to compare with US requirements. I did find this table giving recommendations for insulation.

    www.new-learn.info/packages/clear/…/slide4.gif

    barsoap ,

    Your numbers still don’t make any sense or are a century out of date or something.

    The KfW also hands out loans to add insulation to existing buildings, U0.14 roof, 0.2 walls, 0.25 floor, so lowest R22.7 in Rankine land. The other numbers are for window, listed buildings, etc. All of that is minimum what’s actually recommended is well ask your architect and budget. There’s only so much that’s sensible to do when it comes to old construction as at some point hunting for air gaps and heat bridges is more bother than tearing the thing down and building new, and the KfW did set the standards sufficiently low so that currently uninsulated buildings at least get something and you can’t just tack on half a metre of insulation to an existing structure either. Mostly it’s the roof that’s missing insulation, walls tend to be defensible as they are and it probably makes more sense to upgrade the heating system.

    jimbolauski ,

    You can back out R values based on insulation thickness, that table may be old… It didn’t have a date on it.

    The values you provided equate to freedom R values of R40.5, R28, and R22.5 for the roof, walls, and floor. Those are inline or behind the US minimum requirements R60, R30, R20.

    Xenxs ,

    I said most of Europe, not all of Europe.

    I’m well aware that AC is common to have in the south but then you’re talking about like 4 countries. Once you move north of those, it’s not all that common to have an AC in the house.

    Aux ,

    Wut? No one is using AC.

    OceanSoap ,

    Your houses would be built with the same materials if you had the earthquakes and tornadoes to deal with.

    Aux ,

    No.

    SocialMediaRefugee ,

    US houses are insulated depending on their climate zone.

    DessertStorms ,
    @DessertStorms@kbin.social avatar

    These numbers will drastically change the coming decades

    which will only make things worse, since AC just moves all the heat from indoors, out, and uses energy to work of course.
    What we really need is builders to start taking the extra heat in to account and designing accordingly (there are loads of different ways to physically control the temperature of a space instead of mechanically).
    Shame that'll never actually happen..

    wieli99 ,

    Can you elaborate on that? European housing is built with a lot of focus on insulation and heat control, what are you referring to?

    bouh ,

    Buildings with all glass façades are an insulation nightmare. Cities need more water, plants and trees. Houses need can be built to favour shadow and fressness. You can even go anciant design that were naturally cooled and winded, like roman or African houses.

    I don’t know about other European countries, but France housing is a disaster the last 40 years. It’s only been a decade at best that insulation is a consideration, but the quality is quite bad.

    dublet ,

    European housing is built with a lot of focus on insulation and heat control

    It’s more about also keeping heat out, as well as heat in. Which have overlap but are not necessarily the same thing. See this conversation for some more details.

    MajorHavoc ,

    The big change that needs to happen soon is passive heat blocking for personal residences.

    Most HOAs don’t allow a big extra wooden structure over the roof to block the sun; but they’re going to need to start to keep home prices up.

    But HOAs are designed to make rule changes almost impossible. So I predict we’re going to see a lot of expensive neighborhoods become cheap ones in the next 15 years, due to their HOA not fkexing to support necessary heat control structures.

    pedalmore ,

    This is a hairbrained idea. Nobody is seriously considering building massive wooden structures over entire home just for shade. Just focus on cool roofs, solar panels, trees, and usual weatherization.

    MajorHavoc ,

    If the temperature stops going up every year, you’re absolutely right.

    Big if, right now

    barsoap ,

    Overall it’s still going to be a net saving as people switch from electric/gas heat to heat pumps and AC is just those but running in reverse.

    And, of course, insulation. The reason we got away without AC is due to generally very large thermal mass of the exterior, you shutter everything in the morning to keep the heat out and when the temperatures drop again you open everything and let the air cool everything down. Thing is: In those recent waves there were plenty of nights where the temperature didn’t really drop.

    ParsnipWitch ,

    Especially since some people are pushing for lower regulations on how to build houses in some countries in Europe. Yes, there is a housing crisis going on. But when we start to build weaker buildings because of that, we just make other problems worse.

    negativeyoda ,

    Yes but not necessarily in the way you think

    theguardian.com/…/gulf-stream-could-collapse-as-e…

    Microw , in TIL the Apollo 11 astronauts had to go through immigration in Hawaii when they splashed down because they had left U.S. borders.

    Cape Kennedy-Moon-Honolulu.

    “You know you could have take a more direct route to Honolulu, right?”

    FlyingSquid OP ,
    @FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

    “We took the scenic route.”

    Everythingispenguins ,

    See this is what life was like before Google maps. You never knew which route was the fastest

    CosmicTurtle ,

    Back then, everything was done through a travel agent and they often got kickbacks if you took certain routes. No doubt some agents got a bonus for routing them so circuitously.

    mdurell ,

    Up voting for word usage.

    Igloojoe ,

    Right before gmaps, you had mapquest. You had to print out your route on paper. Read while driving, and if there was any deviance in the route like construstion, fuck you.

    greybeard ,

    Highway signage was critical. If you were traveling, you could tell which states sucked by them not having any signs pointing you back to the highway.

    Viking_Hippie ,

    you could tell which states sucked by them not having any signs pointing you back to the highway.

    “Oh no you don’t! We’re not showing you how to get out of here! You’re part of OUR tax base now!”

    lambalicious ,

    implying with Google Maps you’d know

    eestileib , in TIL the FBI struggled to hire hackers because of a rule that required applicants to have not smoked marijuana for the past 3 years

    A lot of computer people are also fucking weirdo outcasts who have zero interest in helping the FBI put the boot on people’s necks.

    emax_gomax ,

    I dunno, Microsoft still seems to have no problem finding people to implement spyware and tracking on their base OS not to mention DRM. I think the only real barrier for governmental job offerrings is no one except the really passionate would bother going through the clearance conditions. Which is fair I suppose.

    Sir_Simon_Spamalot ,

    Yeah, not being allowed to smoke pot on one’s free time despite being in legal state would be a huge deterence.

    sturmblast ,

    sounds like you’re the one that needs to go outside

    circuitfarmer ,
    @circuitfarmer@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

    Yeah. I would expect finding talent to get harder and harder as governments and corporations double triple quadruple down on unethical practices. Governments are the most obvious ones, but big corps like Microsoft or major ISPs aren’t far behind, especially since the telemetry / data collection ultimately benefits law enforcement.

    But of course, it will always be blamed on something else, like weed.

    RandomPancake , in TIL if you live in Pennsylvania and make minimum wage you'd have to work 105 hours a week to afford a "modest" one bedroom rental.

    I agree with the sentiment. There’s a large gap between minimum wage and housing. I don’t think anybody expects to afford an ultra luxurious three-story corner penthouse loft from working full time at Taco Bell, but I do think it’s reasonable to expect to be able to afford a simple, safe, one-bedroom in good repair.

    I own so I’m completely out of touch with rent prices. I know what they were when I was renting 10+ years ago but things are a lot different now. I went on apartments.com to see if I could prove this study wrong.

    TL/DR: I could, but … not really.

    My criteria was: (1) under $1002 / month, (2) in a safe area, (3) with free parking, (4) within a 10-minute drive of at least two supermarkets, and (5) within a 20-minute drive of most of our metro area. I found multiple apartment complexes that met all those criteria, along with multiple independent rentals. All of the complexes were within the $900 - $1000 range. So … yes, technically I just proved the survey wrong. But that $100 savings doesn’t really exist.

    First, you need a car to get from there to here. That’s non negotiable. Our mass transit here sucks and you’re either going to be two hours early or 15 minutes late, and that’s assuming you have a regular, consistent schedule to work with. So let’s assume you buy a sensible 10-year-old Civic / Corolla / whatever with 90k miles in immaculate condition. I found a few options nearby for $12k, and let’s assume you talk the dealer down another $2k, you have a $2500 downpayment, and there’s no tax because we’re in magical la-la land. Let’s also assume you got zero percent interest because it’s 2003 again for some reason. A 60-month loan would be $125, or an additional 4 hours a week.

    Next, let’s talk groceries. Let’s say you are exceptionally frugal and can prepare nutritious, filling meals for yourself with only a $200 / month grocery spend. That’s an extra 7 hours of work per week.

    Next, gotta put gas in that car. Your friend, who happens to a magical elf, magically conjures up gasoline just for you for the low, low price of $2 / gallon. Wow! Combined with your extremely thrifty vehicle (and your commute, which also just happens to be entirely on interstate at 40 MPG), you only go through 10 gallons of fuel a week. At $80 / month, that’s an extra 3 hours of work per week.

    Don’t forget car insurance! Your driving record is spotless, your FICO score makes TransUnion weep like that statute of liberty from The Onion’s political cartoons, and your driving is angelic. Your full-coverage premium (because you don’t want to get hit with surprise bills) is only $75 per month. You pay in full to avoid fees, so that’s another two hours of work each week.

    Did I mention car maintenance? You do all your own oil changes, filter changes, tire rotation, everything, because you’re a frugal bastard. I don’t even know what oil costs because I’m fortunate enough to be able to pay people to do that for me, so just for the sake of making things easy, let’s say one banana ten dollars per week. Heck, let’s just round that down an hour of work per week.

    Oh and let’s make utilities super simple. That apartment includes water, sewer, trash, cable, and internet. You only have to pay electric and gas. And because it’s exceptionally well insulated and you’re very frugal with your electricity, your combined electric and gas bill is only $75 / month, averaged year round. That’s only two hours of work per week.

    You use an MVNO to save a fortune, and your phone is only $20 / month. That’s a half hour of work per week.

    And I know it’s exorbitant, but you have the audacity to want to go out once in a while. You splurge by getting the dollar menu at McDonald’s (which doesn’t exist anymore BTW) so you budget an extra $30 / month on “fun money”. That’s an extra hour a week.

    So with those extremely unrealistic and lowball numbers, you’re looking at an additional 20-ish hours of work each week. To afford that barebones and frankly impossible lifestyle, you’re looking at working 125 hours a week. That’s 18 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, with no downtime ever. And again, I’m using impossibly low numbers here and making a lot of assumptions that will never happen.

    That’s before taxes. That assumes you never get sick. You never splurge on luxuries like “plates” or “clothing”. Your car lasts forever. You’re never a victim of crime. Your rent never increases. Inflation never happens. And you never take time to go on interviews for a better paying job.

    So yeah, I technically proved the study wrong, but not in any remotely good way.

    QualifiedKitten ,

    It's late, so I could be making dumb mistakes here, but I think the numbers are at least loosely factoring in those sort of expenses. It's not 100 hours/week just to cover rent, it's 100 hours/week to actually maybe afford that rent.

    $7.25/hour x 40 hours/week x 4 weeks/month = $1160/month gross income
    Assuming a maximum of 1/3 of gross income goes to housing, that's $383/month available for rent. The site calculates $377/month as "affordable rent" for the minimum wage worker, so for the sake of the argument, I think my calculations are close enough.
    So, that means for every hour worked, about $2.39 is going towards rent ($7.25x0.33).
    $2.39/hour x 106 hours/week x 4 weeks/month = $1013, which is just over their "1-Bedroom Fair Market Rent" rate of $1002/month.

    Sconrad122 ,

    Pretty sure they are using 56/12=4.667 weeks per month and 0.3 ratio instead of a third, that makes the numbers line up for me

    QualifiedKitten ,

    Yeah, my numbers were definitely very round, but if we are trying to get more exact, aren't there only 52 weeks per year, so 4.33 weeks per month?

    Sconrad122 ,

    Typo, 52 is what I meant. Good catch!

    themeatbridge ,

    You did not prove the study wrong. The study looked at average rents across the state. Finding a cheap apartment in Lewisburg is not the same as finding something in Lower Merion.

    RandomPancake ,

    Did you actually read my reply?

    themeatbridge ,

    Yes, you started and ended by saying you have technically proven the study wrong. In the middle, you pulled some sample numbers from various sources and agreed with the general premise that the cost of living is too damn high. But then you went back to claiming to have technically disproven the study. Which you didn’t, not in any sense.

    RandomPancake ,

    I did, in fact disprove the study. I found an apartment for under the claimed amount. I then went on to explain exactly why that doesn’t matter.

    Context is king.

    themeatbridge ,

    Right, that doesn’t disprove the study, though.

    RandomPancake ,

    deleted_by_author

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  • themeatbridge ,

    On average. You demonstrated it is possible somewhere in Pennsylvania. That’s not even close to the same thing.

    Manifish_Destiny , in TIL the FBI struggled to hire hackers because of a rule that required applicants to have not smoked marijuana for the past 3 years

    Also no one wants to be associated with feds.

    FlyingSquid ,
    @FlyingSquid@lemmy.world avatar

    I’m betting that’s the real reason.

    d4rknusw1ld ,
    @d4rknusw1ld@artemis.camp avatar

    I mean it’s a good paying job to have lol.

    Mdotaut801 ,

    Not worth it. Not at the expense of others. If the government wasn’t actually helpful, then MAYBE.

    nikolai ,

    While I think you’re right, this is your opinion, not everybody elses

    Ado ,

    Lemmy is hilarious with this silly and clearly extreme takes. Upvotes for no one wants to be associated with the feds, downvotes for ehh maybe not everyone agrees with that. The fbi has thousands of fucking employees, and even more applicants who don’t get chosen. The overall “feds”, the federal government, has millions — clearly people want to work for them.

    GBU_28 ,

    I think a lot of it is either folks on the edges of society (their opinions) or very young idealistic folks.

    If I’ve generalized someone into one of those 2 buckets wrongly, well, it’s cause half of Lemmy acts like it.

    Mind, it’s not that it’s wrong to have a non-mainstream opinion, or to be young, only that it generates a particular flavor of discourse lol

    ZodiacSF1969 ,

    Yeh it’s not wrong to have different opinions but goddamn is kinda boring to have the same views, arguments, discussions, etc. As much as they like to think otherwise, most people on here are in the definite minority irl.

    GortexGary ,

    yes, there are literally millions of bootlickers. Overwhelmingly, they aren’t on Lemmy.

    Wonder why? /s

    havokdj ,

    They’re here, they’re just lurking

    nonfuinoncuro ,

    The US Federal Government is the single largest employer in the country if not the world. That’s true whether you’re talking about just the DOD, just the civilians, or both.

    elephantium ,
    @elephantium@lemmy.world avatar

    people want to work for them.

    I wonder what the breakdown is between:

    • I want to work there because it’s the most meaningful work available to me
    • …because I need health insurance that’s not a sick joke
    • …because even though the work sucks and the pay is low, it actually has a pension

    IMO “want to work for them” conceals a LOT of people who’d rather do something else but feel like they’re wearing golden handcuffs of some sort.

    Shadow ,
    @Shadow@lemmy.ca avatar

    Not compared to the tech industry

    phoneymouse ,

    Tech industry pays way more

    ComradeKhoumrag ,
    @ComradeKhoumrag@infosec.pub avatar

    Gov pays like shit but at least you get free time

    Anticorp ,

    So are most other programming jobs, but those other jobs will have way better working environments, perks, benefits, coworkers, managers, and schedules.

    AngryAnusHornets ,

    deleted_by_author

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  • KevonLooney ,

    People are trying to downvote you but it’s true. If you work in cybersecurity for the FBI you’ll have way better work/life balance, plus people will respect you. You won’t be on call 24/7 because the government has more than 2 people working in your department.

    Plus you can get that extra pay in the private sector any time you want. Do you know how impressive “FBI Cybersecurity Analyst” looks on a resume?

    Anticorp ,

    About as impressive as Oracle or Unity Cyber Security Analyst looks.

    KevonLooney ,

    Not to people who don’t work in tech. I.E. those who manage the IT department.

    adam_y , in TIL the dev of Iron Lung, an acclaimed indie horror game, faced significant backlash over increasing the price from $6 to $8
    @adam_y@lemmy.world avatar

    No mate, I’m doing you a favour playing your game. You should pay me. It would be great exposure. I’ve got literally some followers.

    And yeah, I’ll bang on about minimum wage being too low and I’ll post about AAA Devs ripping off their workers, but a lone developer asking $10 for something that probably took them months, too much. Too much.

    What a sell out.

    (/S just in case)

    adam_y ,
    @adam_y@lemmy.world avatar

    And what’s worse, half of those complaining bought Elon’s blue tick!

    Drewelite ,

    Gamers: Where’s my game? Why do you subject your developers to crunch? Why is it so expensive? Why don’t you pay your developers more?

    nitefox ,

    Just print more money no

    Buddahriffic ,

    Why haven’t you released the game yet, this is outrageous! Why have you released this unfinished and untested mess, this is outrageous!

    Landsharkgun ,

    $8

    Dark_Lords_Servant , in TIL that Jim Carrey was paid $7 million for ''Dumb and Dumber'', while his co-star Jeff Daniels made just $50,000

    Actors get paid based on their popularity, or said differently, you get paid shit if you are not known by millions. You can be the worst actor and get paid millions, while the best actor of the century gets paid minimum wage because noone knows about him.

    Bonehead , (edited )

    It's a little more complicated than that. Carrey was negotiating for Dumb and Dumber when Ace Ventura hit the box office. By the time the negotiations ended, there wasn't much money left for other actors. But that one movie was really all that he was known for at the time. So it was still a huge risk for a potential flash in the pan.

    Daniels wanted to expand his career into comedy, but the producers didn't want him since he wasn't known for comedy. He had done a lot of movies by that point though and was well known, just not for comedy. So they threw him a lowball number to get rid of him. He wasn't suppose to take it.

    It was all just really wild timing on Carrey's part and priorities not focused on money on Daniels' part.

    masterspace ,

    And I hope Daniels made bank off the sequel

    Son_of_dad ,

    Dumb and Dumber is my favorite comedy of all time, but I’ve avoided that sequel like the plague. It looks like it has the budget of an SNL sketch

    NathanielThomas ,

    You’re not missing much. I mean, it’s a 20 year gap in their careers. There’s a gag earlier in the film where Daniels visits Carrey in a nursing home because he’s fallen into a coma for 20 years and then Carrey finally “wakes up” and says it was all a gag. It’s almost like a nod to the Andy Kaufman conspiracy theory that he was faking his death as part of an elaborate real life bit.

    MyNameIsIgglePiggle ,

    According to chatgpt because I had a hard time googling it - $50M he got for the sequel . Meanwhile chatgpt recon6s Jim Carey got $15M

    Ithi ,

    I think a lot of basic obscure facts like this are likely to be inaccurate from ChatGPT if its difficult to find it from a basic search engine.

    Who knows what random source it is viewing as the “truth” and spitting back out to people.

    GregorGizeh ,

    Chatgpt is in no way shape or form a reliable source of information. The Information provided may be out of date, out of context, or even wildly wrong and you have no way to verify this unless you do the research yourself.

    All our current parodies of actual AI are able to do is be very convincing that what they say is true. They don’t know if it’s true, nor are they able to figure that out. They don’t care either. They are just chatbots with bells and whistles.

    Do not use them as sources of information, if anything have them give you an answer that you can then use as a starting point to verify their truthfulness.

    snooggums ,
    @snooggums@kbin.social avatar

    According to chatgpt

    According to my hairdresser, chatgpt is not a reliable source of information.

    XEAL ,

    As much as I am a ChatGPT fan, you cannot trust it when it comes down to factual data unless you’re using a custom model with a specific knowledgebase.

    Empricorn ,

    This is so hard to read, I’m assuming you’re 6 years-old. Or an AI, the end result is the same…

    Dark_Lords_Servant ,

    Oh, interesting. Thank you for the info! I was going with a general knowledge that the more well known actors get paid more because of their popularity. Seema this one was a different case.

    Son_of_dad ,

    If nobody knows about him he’s not that good

    Absolute_Axoltl ,

    Popularity ≠ Ability

    Source: Adam Sandler

    HellAwaits ,

    Dumb logic. That’s like saying the Kardashians are extremely talented people.

    Earthwormjim91 ,

    They are extremely talented at publicity and marketing.

    Which is all a movie studio really cares about because that sells tickets.

    Texas_Hangover ,

    Nobody knew about Patrick Stewart before TNG, and he was quite accomplished.

    danc4498 ,

    I don’t know about you either.

    NathanielThomas ,

    I wonder how many people know about Sir Alec Guinness’ career outside of “Star Wars”

    Dark_Lords_Servant ,

    An actor’s popularity is dependent on if they have a major role in popular movies, a large social media presence, or things like that. Many people don’t exactly care about quality in movies, or the actors ability to act.

    There are some great actors we probably never heard of, because they are cast in minor roles, or in movies barely anyone knows about.

    MossyFeathers , (edited ) in TIL Children as young as eight can and have been put on the sex offender registry, which lasts the rest of their lives.

    So, some context as to why this happens: the US does not give a fuck about how old someone is if they’re involved in the production of csam, nor does it care if it was voluntary. This means that, in the eye of the law, a teenager sending nudes to their boyfriend is just as much of a pedophile as the man shooting child porn; and their boyfriend is just as much of a pedophile for viewing and possessing them. I’m guessing that OP likely posted this after reading an article like this: apnews.com/…/child-images-police-columbus-cf37793…

    It doesn’t stop there though. I have been told to never, ever try to submit evidence to the FBI of someone being a child predator. The reason for that is because the FBI does not give a fuck. They will prosecute you as a predator, even if you’re just trying to do the right thing. Combine that with the fact that an accusation of being a predator is life-ending, even if you’re found innocent, and it encourages people to destroy evidence and stay quiet.

    Finally, if there’s any csam on your PC, whether or not you’re aware of it, regardless of whether you received it voluntarily (like temp browser files from accidently viewing a hijacked website with cp on the page), you are automatically a pedophile in the eyes of US law. This is especially destructive when it comes to a video, where each frame is counted as an individual piece of csam. This means you can potentially be taken to court for hundreds or thousands of pieces of child pornography because someone embedded a clip of cp in a movie.

    Fuck pedophiles, but the law needs an overhaul. In addition to the number of people who got put on the registry as kids, there are probably a lot of people who’ve gotten fucked because they were legitimately trying to do the right thing.

    Edit: I could be wrong about this, the law may have changed or I may have been misinformed. It’s been a long time since I was told this, but it’s in line with the article I linked and the one OP linked, so it’s unfortunately far too believable to disregard. If there are any legal experts who can counter this, please speak up.

    Edit 2: someone has replied telling me that I’m at least partially wrong, which I’m happy to hear. Still, stay safe. It seems like using csam to fuck with people, especially those in marginalized communities, is becoming more popular. Report it, clear your cache and/or temp files directory (whichever is associated with the program you had the misfortune of viewing it through), and move on. Or, to put it another way, treat it as if you accidently picked up an unshielded bar of plutonium by the side of the road. Put it down, leave the area, report it to authorities, thoroughly clean yourself off (then maybe go to the hospital).

    glimpseintotheshit ,

    What the FUCK

    fubo ,

    Um, yeah, most of this is made up.

    If you encounter CSAM on the web, just report it to report.cybertip.org and clear your cache. You don’t have to fill out all the detail fields; just give 'em the URL that linked to it.

    But mostly, don’t go looking. Don’t try to be a brave vigilante willing to subject yourself to awfulness in order to protect children. That’s not how it works. If you go looking, folks will assume you’re participating.

    MossyFeathers ,

    I was mainly talking about submitting evidence, like a discord screenshot of someone posting cp. I might still be wrong there though.

    Edit: like, the issues Lemmy has had with people spamming csam is an example of how someone might come across it unintentionally. Someone might feel compelled to actually submit a screenshot or the video itself as evidence to the FBI, which I’ve been told is a very bad idea.

    fubo ,

    NCMEC is the legally designated place to report it. Don’t go to any more trouble than you need to. There are folks whose job it actually is to track this stuff down, take it down, and prosecute the people creating it. Let them do their job.

    DogMuffins ,

    Yeah it’s just absurd. The offender registry is full of victims. Sure it is. /s

    A_Random_Idiot ,

    There is some grain of truth in his otherwise mad babbling.

    Ohio treats sexting between underage teenagers as manufacturing child pornography www.tribtoday.com/…/teen-sexting-is-child-porn/

    and there was the cunt bitch of a cop recently that threatened a guys 11 year old girl with arrest cause he called the police to report a guy grooming her. www.cnn.com/2023/09/20/us/…/index.html

    I cant find it, cause the previous story about the girl is most the searches, but I also seem to recall a story about a kid from…michigan? i think? being labeled a child porn producer because of nudes between him and his girlfriend or something, I dont know, its been a few years.

    And lets not forget that you can end up on the sex offender registry for harmless things such as public urination (which tends to only happen in places that make it very difficult to access bathrooms…surely not by purpose /s) and prank streaking… and theres also been some cases of people being like…a year and a half a part in age, together from the early gate, but the second one dings 18, some disgruntled family member reports them and they end up arrested, tried, and on the sex offender registry for acts against a minor.

    mightyfoolish ,

    To be honest, it is manufacturing it. Who knows who has access to anything on Internet connected devices. Also, if all were places were as strict as Ohio on this matter, AI generated porn made with classmates would have been seen more serious before it spread.

    DogMuffins ,

    These problems are pretty common the world over. In Australia the risks of teenagers setting each other are taught in schools.

    Yes there are instances where a minor might be unjustly added to the register, but there are many more cases where minors are legitimate predators and adding them to the register is in the public interest.

    Instigate ,

    Australian here; can confirm that in High School over ten years ago we had a cop come and explain to our class (among many other things) that taking nude photos of yourself, your friends or your partner is still considered production of child abuse material, at least in NSW. I’ve literally never heard of a child being charged though, and I work in Child Protection where we regularly get reports about exactly this issue.

    SocialMediaRefugee ,

    The funny thing is at 18 you go from being extremely protected to, literally overnight, being able to legally post a video of you having anal. It is like the magic fuck fairy shows up.

    Daft_ish ,

    Does this magic fuck fairy have a website? Asking for a friend.

    ParsnipWitch ,

    It also shows that people didn’t learn anything from it. It’s still not really about consent or about smart and healthy decisions. It’s about whether or not it’s legal and then the thinking stops.

    Just because someone turns 18 doesn’t mean all considerations can stop now.

    DocBlaze ,

    clear your cache

    yep, I’m sure that’ll do it. yay for anonymity on the internet!

    fubo ,

    Clear your cache because you know how to, and you really don’t want a copy of that stuff; not because you’re trying to make yourself look better.

    pinkdrunkenelephants ,

    Mens rea is a legal requirement, isn’t it? Like don’t they have to prove intent?

    Cryophilia ,

    lol

    tony ,

    There are things called strict liability offences, for which intent is not required to prove guilt.

    Possession of CSAM is one of those, although I’m not sure about the US (most other countries it is).

    Pons_Aelius , (edited ) in TIL researchers at a base in Antarctica started to develop a new accent

    It is not that surprising.

    A: Humans mimic others speech (unconsciously) in order to fit in. EG: person from country A moves to country B. Both countries speak English. A few years later A moves home. People in country A now hear a country B accent when this person talks.

    B: An isolated population's pronunciation will naturally drift away form that of the seed population. (this is how Latin morphed into French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and Romanian after the fall of the Roman empire)

    In this example you have a population likely to come from several countries with different English pronunciation. While in isolation everyone unconsciously alters their accents to more of a local norm.

    PetDinosaurs ,

    Exactly. I can’t on earth see why this would be surprising.

    Even my middle school had some unique weird speech shit that someone made up and it caught on.

    And this was basically before the Internet. The only thing everyone in my generation knew was that Marilyn Manson had his ribs removed so he could suck his own duck.

    Pons_Aelius , (edited )

    The only thing everyone in my generation knew was that Marilyn Manson had his ribs removed so he could suck his own duck.

    In my generation it was David Bowie and Cher that had had their lower ribs removed.

    Dave for the auto-fellatio

    Cher, to have a tiny waist.

    Apparently it was Marilyn Monroe before Cher.

    There are no new stories or jokes. Just ones that have had the references updated.

    some_guy ,

    Same thing with conspiracy theories. They’re all blood libel eventually.

    teft ,
    @teft@startrek.website avatar

    Aliens are blood libel?

    Aesthesiaphilia ,

    I was so busy imagining Cher trying to lick her own pussy that I almost didn't see the tiny waist part

    PetDinosaurs ,
    PipedLinkBot ,

    Here is an alternative Piped link(s): piped.video/nZXRV4MezEw

    Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.

    I’m open-source, check me out at GitHub.

    TheGreenGolem ,
    snooggums ,
    @snooggums@kbin.social avatar

    We also knew that Richard Gere stuck hamster up his ass.

    ShadedCosmos ,
    @ShadedCosmos@lemmy.world avatar

    It doesn’t need to be surprising. It’s cool.

    567PrimeMover ,
    @567PrimeMover@kbin.social avatar

    Exactly. I don't see it surprising, but cool as hell. Its neat to see how our language can evolve, and also a reminder that it's evolving all the time.

    Hyperreality , (edited )

    person from country A moves to country B. Both countries speak English. A few years later A moves home. People in country A now hear a country B accent when this person talks.

    See also: Third Culture Kid and articles about how language influences personality.

    When you're from country A, but move to country B, you don't feel at home in country B. But when you return to country A, you also don't feel entirely home in country A. You have a slightly different accent, have had different experiences, likely developed different cultural mannerisms, habits, etc. etc. .... You're perpetually stuck between cultures, hence Third Culture Kid(TCK). Especially true of children who move at a young age. So much so that, if they read a book about TCKs, they soon realise that what they thought were unique personality quirks, strengths or character flaws. are anything but unique among fellow TCKs. Also true for adults but to a lesser degree. Also true for people who moved larger distances within a country, changed schools a lot, etc.

    A bit like returning from a holiday and finding things have subtly changed, if you stay away long enough you'll likely never feel entirely at home again. The country you knew no longer exists, you're no longer the same, you notice it's not the same, and people notice you're not the same.

    Of course, in some ways nostalgia is similar. Nostalgia is homesickness for a place that existed in the past. Like waking up one morning and discovering someone rearranged all the cutlery, it can make you feel perpetually discombobulated.

    Unfortunately/fortunately, there's no way to stop time, and Make the World Like it was Again. Not that populists and advertisers won't try to sell you on that lie.

    Swedneck ,
    @Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de avatar

    I wonder if this causes TCKs to gravitate toward cultural melting pots like new york/london

    SubArcticTundra ,
    @SubArcticTundra@lemmy.ml avatar

    If it happened there though I’m surprised it doesn’t happen more often, eg on submarines…

    Pons_Aelius ,

    My guesses:

    Submarines and other such military things are nation state based. While there is accent variation within nations it would be less than on a multi-national science project.

    or it could be it has never been tested and there is language drift in long term and isolated military deployments.

    Swedneck ,
    @Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de avatar

    I’m pretty sure there’s a stereotypical (slight) difference in how military people talk, though granted it’s probably to a large part because they’re forced to talk in a specific way a lot of the time.

    glibg10b , (edited )

    Humans mimic others speech (unconsciously) in order to fit in

    No, it’s because the brain uses the speech from others as additional learning feedback when speaking, as explained in the publication. This is why young children, who have zero interest in fitting in, still develop their accents from their social environment — even if that environment changes drastically

    InTheNameOfScheddi ,

    Couldn’t that be called subconsciously wanting to fit in?

    rockerface ,

    There are evolutionary benefits to fitting in for social animals, so of course children would subconsciously do that

    XaeroDegreaz ,

    A: Humans mimic others speech (unconsciously) in order to fit in. EG: person from country A moves to country B. Both countries speak English. A few years later A moves home. People in country A now hear a country B accent when this person talks.

    Yep. As an American who’s lived in Korea for about 10 years, I catch myself doing this all the time when speaking English to Koreans who understand some English. I also find myself doing the same thing to other Americans, and even my family.

    I’ve also been told that I speak Korean with a female accent. I’m pretty sure it’s because the majority of my Korean language exposure is from my wife of 18 years, and her friends. I’ve only really started making male friends of my own in the past three years or so.

    Strange how all of that works.

    Terevos ,
    @Terevos@lemm.ee avatar

    Female accent? Do many languages have male and female accents?

    Swedneck ,
    @Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de avatar

    Closest thing i can think of is valley girl and surfbro accents in the US, though i guess most affluent people in the past had fairly distinct speech between men and women, because sexism!

    The valley girl/surfbro divide is also fundamentally sexism but not outright “this is how women/men should be speaking”, it’s just a natural result of people hanging in groups of their own gender.

    Terevos ,
    @Terevos@lemm.ee avatar

    Oh yeah. Excellent example.

    I don’t know if it’s sexist or anything. People can talk with whatever accents they want to.

    XaeroDegreaz ,

    I’m not sure about other languages in general, but in Korean females tend to use different intonations, pronounce vowels a little differently, and use different verb endings as a means of sounding more cute.

    If you’re not familiar with Korean, then perhaps you’ve heard Japanese males speak before. They’re more harsh, sometimes gutteral, whereas females are more gentle when they speak.

    I think I picked up the gentleness speech patterns, and I often catch people off guard. Firstly there’s a foreigner speaking Korean, but he also sounds like a hot chick 😂

    Terevos ,
    @Terevos@lemm.ee avatar

    That’s hilarious

    expatriado , in TIL yawning is observed in almost all vertebrate animals and is "contagious" across species. There is no consensus on why yawning occurs.

    it exists to make evident it’s time to end the meeting

    grue , in TIL about the phrase 'carbon footprint'

    It’s spread to being used by more entities than just BP, but the blame-shifting purpose remains the same.

    Climate change can only be solved by regulating fossil fuel production at its source (e.g. taxing it enough to fully compensate for its negative externalities), not by trying to guilt-trip individuals.

    cogman ,

    Yup.

    The same trick is played with recycling. Blame the end consumer for a supply chain completely out of their control.

    The biggest polluters are corporations and we stop their pollution by regulation. These mega corps would have you believe that it’s really your fault PFAS are everywhere because you shouldn’t have bought those Teflon coated products. Nevermind the fact that Teflon is everywhere a nonstick surface is needed.

    DessertStorms ,
    @DessertStorms@kbin.social avatar

    The fact that teflon is still everywhere should be proof enough that regulations are worthless in the face of capitalism (a feature of course, not a bug)

    cogman ,

    Not really, PFAS have been almost completely unregulated. It is just in the last 2 years that we are starting to see PFAS regulations globally. Up until that point, we allowed companies to literally just dump them down the rain or in a lake.

    If regulations were so worthless, you should be asking yourself why every single industry fights new ones. Why the supreme court in the US has taken a position to kill Chevron Deference which weakens federal agencies ability to regulate.

    The failure isn’t regulations, the failure is a government system that severely neuters the ability of a government to regulate. The failure is a bunch of science denying corporate captured politicians that don’t care how they destroy the planet.

    DessertStorms ,
    @DessertStorms@kbin.social avatar

    No, the failure is capitalism and those corporations not wanting to be regulated owning the governments making the regulations.

    Which is precisely why any regulation under capitalism is toothless bunk, since it is designed by and for the corporations, to make sure they can keep making money despite it.

    Once in a while having a regulation actually come in in time for it to have any impact is like a broken clock being right twice a day, not proof that regulation under capitalism do anything (you claim that teflon now being regulated means regulations work, but can you seriously not see that it taking that long to get bare minimum regulation after decades of pollution and poisoning of consumers is proof that regulations are merely a lip service paid by government to the public to pretend like they're acting in our favour?).

    The point isn't - don't regulate industry, it's - at the point where industry has control of government, regulation is meaningless and always in their service, otherwise they wouldn't concede (a little like greenwashing - the oil companies commit to producing x amount of green energy, but what they don't tell you is that that x amount is a tiny fraction of their entire production capability, which they'll continue to use oil for. We're never going to get them to stop using oil, because they just don't have to, no legislation will ever be allowed to pass that will stop them. Which is why eating the rich and blowing up their pipelines is the answer, but I digress).

    cogman ,

    Eh, don’t really disagree with what you are saying. The problem is money and industry influence in politics and it’s something that needs to be eliminated. I don’t quiet take your point that regulations don’t matter. Assuming money and industry influence are removed from politics we’d see laws and regulations more line with the public interest over corporate interest.

    Even if we fully ditched capitalism, you’d still need/want regulations setting the bounds on how government can/should operate.

    cygon ,

    Yep. The personal responsibility gambit (or should I say fallacy?).

    It was such a clever idea, starting with Coca Cola’s “Litterbug” campaign (where they campaigned against bottle deposits under the guise of wanting “personal responsibility” over “regulations.”)

    It’s “up to the consumer” to make the right choices. It just so happens that the meat from decently treated animals is five times more expensive and that you have to drive 100 miles to buy it. Or that being environmentally conscious has been made into a tiring exercise in futility where you constantly have to inconvenience yourself.

    As an added bonus, individuals trying to convince other individuals to inconvenience themselves in the same way can be painted as obnoxious, holier-than-thou and insufferable. A real double win for unscrupulous big business.

    admiralteal ,

    Plenty of other ways from a carbon tax -- not least of which because the carbon tax has itself proven to be a convenient industry distraction that sucks air out of the room.

    Especially since it's not clear removal tech will ever be able to ramp up sufficiently to cover continued burning.

    A carbon tax is an albatross. It's not even worth seriously discussing. It's ten steps beyond politically infeasible -- probably even more infeasible than actual prohibition. It's innately regressive even if you try to do weird structural things like progressively returning the money (because the return is just going to be economically inefficient and complex tax codes ALWAYS benefit the poor and vulnerable the least).

    And most importantly, the fossil fuels have to stay in the ground. We have already pumped out too much and we must move towards pumping no more.

    The fossil industry would in many ways LOVE for a carbon tax solution because that would be the exception to prove the rule that continued extraction will be allowed forever. That their business model, which has plenty of cash already, can drill baby drill.

    And in the meantime, we continue along the path of e.g. the IRA and invest heavily in alternatives, renewables, and infrastructure development. Fossil fuels are already a significantly more expensive energy source than solar and wind and that gap will only keep growing wider, ESPECIALLY if we delete fossil subsidies. And those learning curves are how we will kill fossils worldwide. Why should a developing nation with flexible climate ethics be importing Russian coal when they could be building renewable energy production that does not require importing a suspect commodity that will be even cheaper for them?

    pedalmore ,

    Then why does CCL actively promote carbon fee and dividend as its most beneficial policy? Your logic doesn’t even make sense - you’re saying the fossil lobby would love to be taxed further? Nonsense. If that were true, we’d have a carbon fee enacted decades ago. It’s not innately regressive, and your reasoning doesn’t even make sense because your entire premise rests on complexity = bad, not any actual logic. This isn’t to say it’s politically feasible, but you haven’t offered a politically feasible method for just stopping drilling altogether. All a carbon fee does is offer a revenue neutral way to slowly and surely shift everyone’s behavior by pricing in externalities. It’s very much viable and equitable, and if you think it’s somehow harder than banning fuel and banning capitalism you’re simply not being serious. We have a market mechanism to prevent bad behavior - taxes and fees. Let’s use them. Feel free to ban extraction too, but that’s not where I’ll be focusing my personal lobbying efforts.

    citizensclimatelobby.org/basics-carbon-fee-divide…

    admiralteal ,

    Why does CCL, an organization that was founded by a bunch of neoliberal/Reaganomics businessmen specifically to advocate for setting up a carbon tax, advocate for a carbon tax. Hmm, let me think about that for a few minutes and get back to you...

    There's so many voices in the climate movement saying the same things I do -- that chasing carbon taxes and similar politically radioactive policies is terrific waste of time and that we should instead focus on building incentives and public works towards research, infrastructure, and energy investment. But chase that white whale, have fun.

    pedalmore ,

    You can’t just call any market based solution “Reaganomics”, but ok. It’s logically inconsistent to say that carbon taxes are favored by industry and neoliberals, when those very people aren’t actually pushing for carbon taxes. Since neoliberals and industry have a stranglehold on policy and they haven’t done it, I must conclude you’re wrong. Why don’t you cite some of the voices "in the climate movement " that are against carbon taxes? I’m not seeing them. What I see is trust the science, and the desire to build political momentum that will results in the science based solutions coming into effect. Things like ending fossil fuels subsidies, requiring utilities switch to renewables, increasing vehicle emissions standards, incentives for electrification, and yes, carbon taxes.

    I’m really curious what your actual solution is here. How are you going to get everyone to leave the oil and gas in the ground? A white whale is something you can’t actually find - seems like destroying capitalism or whatever your vague idea is fits that description much better than pricing in externalities via a tax, something that can very simply be layered in to our market structures with our current institutions (and something that is actually happening in dozens of countries, but is somehow impossible according to you).

    admiralteal , (edited )

    George Shultz, one of the founders of CCL, was literally one of the guys who helped Regan craft his economic policy vision, and I'm sure many of those he brought on with him were part of that field too. I don't just call anything Reaganomics, but I DO call this shit that way.

    If you seriously want to hear different voices, I recommend you start with David Roberts at Volts: https://www.volts.wtf/

    He interviews everyone, has clear opinions, and backs up his positions with practical politics.

    (edit: maybe start with this one?: https://www.volts.wtf/p/do-dividends-make-carbon-taxes-more )

    I already told you my actual solution. You didn't listen.

    we continue along the path of e.g. the IRA and invest heavily in alternatives, renewables, and infrastructure development. Fossil fuels are already a significantly more expensive energy source than solar and wind and that gap will only keep growing wider, ESPECIALLY if we delete fossil subsidies. And those learning curves are how we will kill fossils worldwide. Why should a developing nation with flexible climate ethics be importing Russian coal when they could be building renewable energy production that does not require importing a suspect commodity that will be even cheaper for them?

    pedalmore ,

    What an odd revisionist characterization. Schultz was active in many administrations, including Regan’s. You’re both elevating his relevance to the movement (one which your own link at the Volt describes as left leaning grassroots campaigners) and mischaracterizing the entire approach. Reaganomics is synonymous with tax cuts, deregulation, and “trickle down”. A carbon fee and dividend is not a tax cut, it’s not deregulation, and it’s the opposite of trickle down. Schultz was also a key part of Montreal protocol, literally the most effective international policy of all time. Is the Montreal protocol “Reaganomics” as well?

    citizensclimatelobby.org/…/george-p-shultz/

    There are many, many more people involved in CCL than you’re attempting to characterize here, including a wide mix of academics. That’s because they promote good policy.

    As to the Volt article you linked, while interesting, all it says is that support tends to be static for the first few years in two countries. It should surprise anyone that conservatives in Alberta are still against a carbon tax a few years later. This isn’t even the right success metric - what matters is effectiveness over time. Public perception needs to be high enough to avoid a repeal, and not higher. You still haven’t addressed your original claim that the fossil fuels lobby is behind a carbon tax, which they so obviously are not.

    Your “solutions” are a fine a slow way to transform one sector of the economy - electricity generation. That’s not enough, and it’s not fast enough. I’m not saying don’t do those things too - I love the IRA and I love federal efficiency standards and gas bans and all that good stuff, but no reason to argue against some rocket fuel to accelerate carbon reductions (and touch the rest of the economy).

    Pretty sure if e.g. the US manages to pass a carbon fee, Greta herself wouldn’t say that fossil lobby won, she’d probably say great, now also do XYZ and raise the carbon price higher while you’re at it. That’s a much more mainstream attitude.

    admiralteal ,

    Pretty sure if e.g. the US manages to pass a carbon fee

    But it won't. Politically radioactive. And in the meantime, you could've been advocating for policies that actually have traction. That build constituencies instead of tearing them down.

    But whatever. You've got Faith in this policy and there's no point arguing with it.

    pedalmore ,

    I can walk and chew gum at the same time. I advocate for every policy that will reduce carbon emissions, and I will celebrate both a denied permit and a carbon tax instead of demonizing one of them. Maybe if otherwise likeminded folks like yourself didn’t spend so much time dumping on carbon taxes in favor of your “ideal” policy, we’d have slightly higher support.

    metaStatic ,

    you could tax at over 100% and it couldn't compensate.

    certain people need to be lined up against a wall and I'm sure there are people in their circles that are underpaid enough to make it happen

    crispy_kilt ,

    No problem, we can tax it at 20’000 % or whatever is the correct amount.

    It will then turn out to be completely uneconomical to use fossil fuels at their true price, as it should’ve been.

    Same goes for wasting freshwater and waterways/groundwater pollution. The tax needs to reflect the damage.

    Market mechanisms will still work, we just need to prevent companies from externalising the cost of the damage they are causing.

    admiralteal ,

    It will then turn out to be completely uneconomical to use fossil fuels at their true price, as it should’ve been.

    Renewables are ALREADY out-competing fossils joule for joule and learning curves are only making that delta bigger over time. The US has seen a spate of utilities buying up coal power plants just to shut them down because it is so uneconomical to operate them, yet still we have politicians vowing to support coal just because they like it / to own the libs.

    The issue is that there are people who want to use fossil fuels. Many nations' entire economies depend on it. So they'll keep doing it. They'll sell and use the fuels in places that don't tax them, if they have to. They'll literally build demand. They'll push to get every molecule out of the ground and sold, even as returns diminish.

    Not to even get into the conservative lunatics who want to keep using them on principle, even knowing they are an economically bad deal.

    Even if you could get a carbon tax passed in the US (which is a giant, giant, giant "fat chance"), it'll have more leakage than the tattered Depends worn by all of our politicians.

    Meanwhile, like with any tariff, the people hurt most by this carbon tax won't be the producers. Saudi Arabia is not going to agree to pay our taxes. Instead, it'll be the end consumers. Regressively, with the poorest and most vulnerable consumers who cannot afford to immediately electrify hurt the worst.

    The philosophy of the IRA is the way to win this fight. Invest, incentivize, and do it progressively. Building a constituency all the way.

    DessertStorms ,
    @DessertStorms@kbin.social avatar

    Climate change can only be solved by regulating fossil fuel production at its source abolishing capitalism.

    GoodEye8 ,

    I don’t think it’s reasonable to be this extremist, there are other ways to solve climate change. But since we’re already trying to fix it getting rid of capitalism would be the best way because we wouldn’t be fixing just the climate issue, we’d also be fixing a whole slew of other issues that are just next in line after the climate issue.

    Trainguyrom ,

    Climate change can only be solved by regulating fossil fuel production at its source

    I like this. Balance the cost equation of recycled plastic vs new plastic vs glass/metal (since glass and metal are basically infinitely reusable and recyclable) for single use and minimal use items so they’re more expensive and it tips the scales making many things far more financially-responsible to both produce and consume in a climate conscious manner

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