MetaFilter

the purpose of a david brooks is what it does
posted to MetaFilter by logicpunk at 10:40 AM on September 24, 2023

torn on this because the price of many things, groceries & restaurant meals especially, really has gone up dramatically recently for me at least

like it did not use to cost $9 for a 12-pack of soda! or $5 for a bag of chips! or $40 for two people to get combo meals & horchatas at Filiberto's! when I went completely overboard buying too much cheese & snacks for a party the bill used to be $200 and now it is $300!

like I genuinely... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by taquito sunrise at 2:53 AM on September 24, 2023

So on Wikipedia, deletions perceived as aggressive or hasty are often reverted. When the deleter is seen as a newcomer and the restorer has a long established rep (even as a loose canon inclusionist) , it's really hard to win this kind of edit war. Even when you are right and they are wrong. And an easy compromise "solution" like adding a "citation needed" or "dubious" tag may appease the group, but it won't help you or your friend.

Having... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by SaltySalticid at 7:27 PM on September 23, 2023

TVTropes on Space Romans.
posted to MetaFilter by plep at 12:15 PM on September 23, 2023

The people who push this for black people in particular don't appear to care to observe the outcomes for progeny of two parent homes that were actually disclosed in the article* - often still not great - because it means that you'd have to discuss the impact of racism again. On a micro level they seem to understand the idea that "no, the man she was with was not a good prospect for marriage even if he requested her hand, which was a circumstance that was unlikely to occur", but on a... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Selena777 at 8:19 AM on September 23, 2023

I've read about causality going in the opposite direction-- poor people are less likely to marry because they see that poverty makes it hard to maintain a marriage.
posted to MetaFilter by Nancy Lebovitz at 7:28 AM on September 23, 2023

This is the only marriage policy article I’ve read that points out a simple, obvious issue: “you cannot just conjure stable and rewarding romantic commitments on command.”

This is true but it's also true that conservatives are also super excited at the idea of disobedient women being punished and controlled and humiliated (both in the usual sense and in the sense of being forced into humility) by being shackled to the abusive, controlling monsters they... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Pope Guilty at 7:06 AM on September 23, 2023

I've been in the UAW for 19 years (legal services lawyer, not auto worker), and I am so excited about Shawn Fain and the other new leadership. The UAW was essentially a one-party state for 70 years, run by a group called the Administration Caucus. They were corrupt and weak, truly did not stand for the members. In late 2022/early 2023, the UAW had its first ever direct election of union leadership, and the reform candidates smoked the AC candidates. Fain... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Mavri at 3:50 PM on September 22, 2023

I like to drive and many, many Americans don’t live in big cities on either coast. Many of my friends work in film production and it’s very hard to transport your grip equipment on a bus.

I don’t have the energy to respond to this comment with the extensive disagreement it deserves, so I will just, for the sake of argument, agree with the premise of the comment and say, that’s fine. Can the tens of millions of us that do live in... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by rhymedirective at 5:24 PM on September 22, 2023

it would be pretty neat if there were great public transit options, though. pretty neat.

we should probably get working on that.
posted to MetaFilter by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 4:13 PM on September 22, 2023

How can they be sure they were made with tools by humans?

It’s possible the slots in the logs, bearing what appear to be stone tool marks, found next to stone tools, could have been cut by a series of improbable events. Maybe it was a guy named Ockham with a big razor and a time machine.
posted to MetaFilter by zamboni at 5:07 PM on September 21, 2023

I hope nobody objects to the size of this comment. It's Zelenskiy's speech as posted to Telegram on his official account (and translated by Telegram).Ukraine surrendered its third largest nuclear arsenal. Then the world decided that Russia should become the custodian of such power. But subsequent history proved that it was Russia that most deserved nuclear disarmament back then, in the 1990s. Russia deserves disarmament even now: terrorists do not have the right to possess nuclear weapons.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by krisjohn at 4:53 PM on September 19, 2023

I appreciate the work done by the reporters, but it seems to me that they missed the point of this story, which was probably an unprovable case against the person combined with someone in the system who did not believe the investigation results and did not want her back at the office. If they had grounds to dismiss and/or charge her, they likely would have done it years ago.Instead they left this hanging over her head for seven years.

One of the many reasons unions fight... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by rpfields at 1:59 AM on September 18, 2023

FEED ME SEYMOUR
posted to MetaFilter by eustatic at 4:09 PM on September 17, 2023

LOL I'd never heard of this site before (apparently tho it's A Thing™), but it reads like if Herbert Kornfeld had a much chiller cousin writing about popular culture, which I appreciate greatly.
posted to MetaFilter by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 10:17 PM on September 16, 2023

The whole essay is so full of non-sequiturs and statements without any grounding. I was going to write something about "this is where it goes off the rails", figuring there must be a point where it turns, but there isn't a single point. The whole thing is a pinball bouncing around making chiming noises but you're never sure exactly what points are really being scored.
posted to MetaFilter by hippybear at 3:02 PM on September 16, 2023

This blog post is insane. Apple recently launched a classical music app featuring over 5 million tracks and touted partnerships with many top orchestras and artists.
posted to MetaFilter by snofoam at 1:28 PM on September 16, 2023

anyway, it's so exhausting how we gotta think a lot about elon musk all the time. here's hoping for a future where no one thinks about elon musk at all.

like, some time in the future you won't think about elon musk for a whole month. and that time will come sooner than you think. then you won't think about elon musk for a whole year. for a decade. someday you will think about elon musk for the last time — and that day may well be long before you die! you won't know... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 9:40 AM on September 16, 2023

There is no public infrastructure that does with Twitter or Facebook does for getting information out. The closest we have are text message alert systems or emergency broadcast notifications on radio and TV. Those tend to be used only for absolute emergencies, a notification a year at most. What we need is something for lower tier information alerts, like "this highway is closed" or "there is a fire 30 miles away and it's probably no big deal but you should be aware of it" or... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Nelson at 7:57 AM on September 16, 2023

And then ... whatever. I guess, like Hunter Thompson so eloquently put it, the wave broke somewhere in the vicinity of Las Vegas, 1971 sometime.

I think that it's worth quoting at length because, not only is it the best thing that HST ever wrote, but also it has a clue as to what really happened:

Strange memories on this nervous night in Las Vegas. Five years later? Six? It seems like a lifetime, or at least a Main Era — the... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Halloween Jack at 10:27 AM on September 16, 2023

This article is just full of deliciously dense, contemptuous language. This is my nomination for the best part.They exist in a different context, the one in which the richest and most powerful man in the United States of America is awakening to his own disgusting and anti-human values in real time, post by post, which also happens to be the one that requires Yaccarino to rush up yelling "did someone say sports?!" immediately afterward.
Metafilter: Did Someone Say Sports?!... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Nelson at 4:11 PM on September 15, 2023

relatedly/tangentially: "there's a main character and it's the same person every day" might be a good short description of life under fascism.

yes i'm calling stalin and mao fascists 𝕕𝕖𝕒𝕝 𝕨𝕚𝕥𝕙 𝕚𝕥, 𝕥𝕒𝕟𝕜𝕚𝕖𝕤
posted to MetaFilter by bombastic lowercase pronouncements at 2:07 PM on September 15, 2023

I wish there were a temperature-controlled diverter for when I'm waiting for hot water. Our hot water comes from a well (under our half of the duplex), via a water heater (attached to my landlord's half of the duplex), then back to us. It is like this for Reasons.

It takes about 2.5-4ish gallons of cold to get hot water. Right now the solution is me sitting there with jugs and using that water for the Brita filter, plants, the dog water, and so on. it would be nice if... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by blnkfrnk at 3:49 PM on September 14, 2023

50. The Buggles, “Video Killed The Radio Star” (1979)
49. Beck, “Loser” (1993)
48. Frankie Goes to Hollywood, “Relax” (1983)
47. Yo La Tengo, “Sugarcube” (1997)
46. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, “Don’t Come Around Here No More” (1985)
45. Aphex Twin, “Come To Daddy” (1997)
44. Taylor Swift, “Blank Space” (2014)
43. LL Cool J, “Going Back To Cali” (1988)
42. Twisted Sister, “We’re Not Gonna Take It”... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by glonous keming at 2:37 PM on September 13, 2023

A distinct anti-crime bias.
posted to MetaFilter by sebastienbailard at 5:12 PM on September 11, 2023

I, like many people, have arranged my life so that my run-ins with this problem are incidental and diffuse, but this article makes me think about my parents, currently aging in place in a conservative community and completing a decades- long process of being pushed into ostracizing themselves by insisting all people have dignity. I remember the early incidents in the 90’s, when my father (who won’t admit it but probably voted for Regan) joined the local school board and repeatedly refused to... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by q*ben at 6:55 AM on September 8, 2023

So, if that's to be believed, he had a US citizen maliciously sabotaging a foreign nation's military efforts, did I get that right?

How the hell hasn't the Logan Act been used to charge him yet?
posted to MetaFilter by sotonohito at 11:24 AM on September 8, 2023

I’m pretty sure that’s not how “presumption of innocence” works… The prosecution needs to be able to say “in our opinion, supported by the available evidence, defendant did [crimes]”, or else they’re never going to be able to do their job.
posted to MetaFilter by not just everyday big moggies at 9:50 AM on September 8, 2023

Great article, very thoughtful.

I'm not sure the author has thought through the economics though when it comes to things like this:One extra person working to care for passengers would negate the need for half a dozen punishers kept mostly on standby, but that doesn’t even seem to be an option the airport and airline consider. Once an organisation has committed to having a coercion apparatus on standby, it doesn't really cost much more to keep deploying it. So... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by TheophileEscargot at 12:20 AM on September 7, 2023

They’ll flip to “it’s real and we must defend habitable areas against immigrants” soon enough.
posted to MetaFilter by Artw at 10:21 AM on September 7, 2023

If you're into this sort of thing, Fani Willis responded to Jim Jordan's letter about the Trump indictment. It's sort of a thing of beauty. [DocumentCloud]
posted to MetaFilter by hippybear at 3:06 PM on September 7, 2023

Must we react to everything every asshole says? People say all kinds of shit. When Huckabee actually does anything, we can react then.
posted to MetaFilter by LooseFilter at 9:48 AM on September 7, 2023

Their car control app is barely functional, with one star being the most popular rating on Google Play.

Incompetency is unfortunately one of the great enablers of illegal data collection. While they (an incompetent corp, not Renault specifically) themselves may not excel at exploiting private data to sell to other corporations, they are more likely to lack the culture and resources to do things right. So they'll have all kinds of managers, employees,... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by UN at 10:23 PM on September 6, 2023

It's Latin so it will make you seem erudite and elegant and not possibly an attempted murderer

That's not Latin... Mom! Bart's fakin' it!
posted to Ask MetaFilter by MetaFilter World Peace at 5:16 AM on September 6, 2023

Die
Bart
Die

It's Latin so it will make you seem erudite and elegant and not possibly an attempted murderer
posted to Ask MetaFilter by Jacen at 3:35 AM on September 6, 2023

An image from an Itchy & Scratchy title card (I like Little Barbershop of Horrors)

The pillow factory Sideshow Luke Perry lands in, or the Museum of Sandpaper he hurtles through first

Mr. Burns dancing on a lamppost
posted to Ask MetaFilter by miles per flower at 9:50 PM on September 5, 2023 marked best answer

I really dislike the assumption that "desert" is synonymous with "empty." Deserts are rich ecosystems. The deserts near Black Rock provide the habitats to foxes, antelopes, squirrels, kangaroo rats, lizards, badgers, snacks, shrimp, etc. It's not a blank canvas to paint on.

The event takes place on a playa in a desert- a (usually at this time) dry ancient lakebed that is under water all winter. It's extremely unusual to see any... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by oneirodynia at 8:26 PM on September 4, 2023

I can also add a riff on this, from the article:

What’s missing today isn’t just the thrill of climbing trees or playing flashlight tag. It’s that when an adult is always present — in person or electronically — kids never really get to see what they’re made of.

So, my most common playmate when I was in grade school was the daughter of the family across the street. When we were both about eight or nine, both her Mom and my... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by EmpressCallipygos at 1:29 PM on September 4, 2023

My anti-carcereal leanings for sure have a priority list and they are at the bottom of it.

I always thought those flags were bullshit.

Nah, it’s about who gets to be a cop. Kyle Rittenhouse? Honorary cop. Guy standing in the way of a fascist? Not-a-cop, false cop, not represented by the flag.
posted to MetaFilter by Artw at 11:36 AM on September 4, 2023

RFERL: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said late on September 3 that he has decided to replace wartime Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov with Rustem Umerov, a Ukrainian politician of Crimean Tatar origin, in a surprising shake-up as Kyiv's forces press on with their counteroffensive against the Russian invasion.

Professor Olga Onuch gives a brief bio of Umerov on the Twitter.

Whatever else this might mean, it certainly signals that the... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Kabanos at 3:53 PM on September 3, 2023

I was an enthusiastic progressive until they derailed the Trump indictment thread.
posted to MetaFilter by otsebyatina at 9:01 AM on September 1, 2023

NATO does have considerable leverage in what settlement the Ukrainians accept. There is negligible motivation for Ukraine to accept any settlement unless it brings their unoccupied territory fully under the protection of NATO. So it is possible that Ukraine would reluctantly allow parts of their occupied territory to get signed into some alternative status, if that concession resulted in all of their unoccupied territory becoming safe from farther aggression. NATO has the same kind of leverage... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Jane the Brown at 7:31 AM on September 1, 2023

People whose politics seemed formed in response to that monoculture, or which seemed to critique that monoculture, were willing to become a part of it themselves.

The thing here is - KRS-One performing for Eric Adams? Okay, that’s a pretty straightforward sellout. Performers with inchoately “anti-establishment” politics shaking out as some variety of conspiracy theorist you can no longer respect? Rather predictable, and in fact premonitions have... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by atoxyl at 1:06 PM on August 31, 2023

Sure, it's not the same, but it's a hell of a better reason.
posted to MetaFilter by Flunkie at 12:19 PM on August 31, 2023

Biden is the most consequential president since LBJ for Democrats. The IRA and his other policies are rapidly reshaping a whole slew of industries and segments of American life. If you are not enthusiastic about his continued leadership I urge you to reconsider and take a closer look at what his administration’s has accomplished.
posted to MetaFilter by interogative mood at 10:48 AM on August 31, 2023

> "What'd get me really fired up..."

I mean, same, but we're not the only people who vote, and left-wing populists aren't winning presidential primaries. If big inspirational ideas were the real secret, they would be.

And until they do, I will be *enthusiastically* voting for the at-least-we're-not-actively-evil party.
posted to MetaFilter by kyrademon at 8:27 AM on August 31, 2023

FMD. This is something I had honestly never thought about. Ta. Like, if PV is a big thing, then obviously (here, at least) it’s seasonal. Why can’t aluminium be a bit seasonal?


A big part of the answer is economics and capitalism - if you want aluminium (or whatever else), you need a factory that makes it; somebody has to pay for that factory and they want to make as much money as possible. Asking them to idle for big chunks of the year... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Tomorrowful at 6:01 AM on August 31, 2023

Uh, no. Here's his bona fides:

I don't care about his gatekeeping or his bona fides. The author is saying, quite clearly and at length, that hip hop WAS interesting and vibrant when he was young and when there was no money in any of it. Regardless of the eventual downfall of the artists of those elder days, he believes there used to be something good in this art form until it sold out, and now there is nothing good in it.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by cubeb at 8:12 AM on August 30, 2023

Man in late 40s is dead certain that today's music is just a bunch of worthless sellouts, not like when he was coming up ✅️
posted to MetaFilter by cubeb at 6:28 AM on August 30, 2023

That is the thing--people have been saying that for decades now! Microtransactions are a great idea that people keep implementing badly. Recently I've even seen someone write that the reason they've never taken off is because people don't want them, and that's so stupid. The reason they've never taken off is everyone's versions of them, from Flooz to cryptocurrency, has had something essentially wrong with it.

Well if the internet is... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by JHarris at 10:04 AM on August 30, 2023