Duncan has posted "How I became a Trans Rights Activist, then turned “Gender Critical”. Part 2 "

quickbeam · 2020-08-08T03:01:53+00:00

This is really excellent. Has anyone cross-posted it to the other communities on here?

quickbeam · 2020-08-08T02:54:01+00:00

Thanks for being nice to this poster. Even if someone is trolling, it takes about the same amount of time to say something nice as to say something mean. And a troll is usually looking for people to get angry/upset. I usually just ignore people if I think they may be trolling, but saying something nice, well, in case the person isn't trolling, you've just done a good deed for the day. <3

quickbeam · 2020-08-07T19:11:14+00:00

It's not really a lifestyle and sexual choice for me, though. From my early childhood I've had crushes or been in love with more than one person at the same time. I thought I was broken because we live in a society that basically venerates monogamy as the only moral option. When I found out polyamory existed it was a big "aha" moment for me. Again, I don't think it's at the same level as sexual orientation, and there is a big umbrella of non-monogamy which does encompass many people for whom it may be a lifestyle or sexual choice, but there are people who identify as polyamorous where their lovers are their family. They would like to be married to more than one person. A lot of us are women married to feminists.

In terms of discrimination - if you google polyamory and custody you can find a number of articles about custody battles with polyamory. I don't have kids so this thankfully isn't an issue for me. In terms of employment, it's more that polyamorous people keep things hidden on purpose because they assume they'd be subject to firing especially in conservative areas of the country. In Seattle it may be no big deal, but that's not true everywhere. In terms of housing there are often clauses in rentals that prohibit more than 2 non-related adults to cohabitate. So I could live with my partner and my sibling, but I couldn't live with two partners. I could live with my partner and 4 kids but not two partners because I can't be legally related to more than one romantic interest.

In terms of legality, you'd probably need to make law tailored to polyamorous people - but this could be as simple as you add a clause where polyamorous people must write up legal documents assigning ownership/wills/custody as part of having their relationships legally recognized. You could also still limit who counts as dependents on taxes or insurance documents.

It's kind of sad to see a lot of assumptions made about polyamorous people. There are a lot of people out there using the label to do shitty things which aren't really polyamorous. But there are a lot of just really normal, committed, ethical poly people out there too just trying to enjoy their lives and love more than one person romantically or sexually at the same time. We're so boring you probably know some of us already.

quickbeam · 2020-08-07T02:04:29+00:00

There are honestly some polyamorous people for whom being poly is pretty intrinsic. I'm one of them. It's also not on the level of a fetish or primarily sexual for me. I don't try to insert that identity into the alphabet or LGB spaces, but there are people in the poly community with rights concerns. Poly people who have several committed long-term partners with whom they raise children can be fired from jobs, discriminated against by landlords, or have their child custody threatened despite offering a safe home. It doesn't rise to the same level as LGB rights, but it also isn't very sensible or justifiable to fire somebody for the mere fact of having more sexual/romantic partners than the standard. Especially when there's so much cheating within ostensibly monogamous relationships.

quickbeam · 2020-08-07T01:59:55+00:00

I am poly and have never liked this tendency of some people to include polyamory in the alphabet. I do feel intrinsically polyamorous, but it's clearly a different issue with different concerns and non-monogamy encompasses a lot of different groups all on its own.

quickbeam · 2020-08-07T01:45:58+00:00

My god, I thought this was part of that thing where they made those fake research papers up, and now I realize that's why they made the fake research papers up. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/10/new-sokal-hoax/572212/

quickbeam · 2020-08-07T01:40:47+00:00

This is the way I most frequently see heteroflexible used, often in an effort not to overly appropriate bisexuality.

quickbeam · 2020-08-05T21:49:23+00:00

I purposely go to other subs and add wholesome content/rebut some of the bad arguments in order to keep this site going. I don't do Reddit anymore out of principle and I'm not interested in joining an even more niche site.

quickbeam · 2020-08-04T18:32:51+00:00

LOL - nah, dude, we're here because Reddit started censoring women and LGB people. Sorry to bust up your conspiracy racket.

quickbeam · 2020-08-04T18:10:56+00:00

I think we'll be okay, but thanks for the concern. :)

quickbeam · 2020-08-04T18:06:30+00:00

Fits a few of the people I know. I know a Type 6 who is pretty low-key and thought they were a Type 2 for a while but came back from the brink. Not at all bisexual as far as I know, but definitely always wore nail polish and sometimes liked to wear dresses, etc. I know a Type 5 who is pretty much dead accurate but actually is lesbian and also identifies as a femme, changes their pronouns frequently enough that it's hard to keep up, but is always offended if misgendered.

quickbeam · 2020-08-04T17:55:05+00:00

Yup. This is a great point. It's a huge disservice to the many cops who are upholding professional standards and acting according to the Constitution to allow terrible cops to continue working. It stains the whole profession and probably makes it a lot harder for the good cops to do their jobs. Granted, I think these good police should speak up and say as much, but I understand there could be significant institutional pressure on them. The "ACAB" people aren't helping either.

quickbeam · 2020-08-04T17:49:57+00:00

I'm going to keep coming on here and debating because as more people leave reddit we can probably make saidit a more representative forum without this dominance of white supremacist views.

quickbeam · 2020-08-04T17:47:58+00:00

Hope you'll join us in protesting police brutality then! I don't support police killing unarmed civilians.

quickbeam · 2020-08-04T17:47:12+00:00

You'd have to be the biggest dumb-ass in the world to think that holding someone who can't breathe in a chokehold for over 8 minutes while they slowly lose consciousness wouldn't potentially lead to their death. So he's a cruel murderer or the world's biggest dumbass. I'm thinking the former is much more likely but if it's the latter, he has no business being on the force either.

quickbeam · 2020-08-04T17:45:53+00:00

Do you or do you not believe it is wrong for police to kill unarmed citizens? If the answer is "yes, it's wrong" then it's totally understandable that people are sick of it and protested it.

In terms of riots/looting: While I understand the motives for these I am actually opposed to both riots and looting. A lot of the rioters/looters were not politically motivated, however, and where I live a lot of the rioters were bored white kids from the suburbs, and some of them politically conservative. The vast majority of protests have been peaceful, well-organized and it's been the police response in most cases which has escalated it.

And here's another thing - I am more mad at police killing people because they are being paid to help people not kill people. I'm not paying the protesters/rioters/looters and they are often arrested. The police, however, are killing people which is unconstitutional, not what we're paying them to do and cruel. It shouldn't even matter to anyone who cares about the Constitution who is being killed or whether they committed a crime or were on drugs. If you have any belief in democracy or our justice system or other police officers being safe to do their jobs instead of being viewed as enemies, you should also be loudly protesting these police officers.

I'm not going to dignify your other comments by arguing about them, but the thing is I shouldn't have to prove you wrong on any of them for a person who believes in our Constitution to admit this was wrong.

quickbeam · 2020-08-04T04:09:50+00:00

There is no justifiable reason for a police officer to murder an unarmed person. None. They managed to bring in almost every white mass shooter no problem, so they can bring in some random guy who wrote a forged check or they are incompetent at best, cruel and murderous at worst.

quickbeam · 2020-08-04T02:18:13+00:00

Is it considered good policing practice to put people who are already telling you they can't breathe onto the ground and putting them in a chokehold for over 8 minutes past the point when they have appeared to lose consciousness? Is that better, somehow?

quickbeam · 2020-08-04T02:16:17+00:00

In other news, it snowed, so climate change doesn't exist.

quickbeam · 2020-08-03T01:25:03+00:00

Given that the OP is posting in English and seems to be coming from a Western perspective, I decided to respond from a Western perspective and specified that I was doing so in order to clarify my viewpoint. The world is so large and so full of variables that it would be impossible to have a sensible discussion on Islamophobia if we didn't clarify our perspectives/countries and the contexts we are living in because institutional power/cultural norms matter when discussing discrimination and bias. You cite articles from the Middle East or Nigeria, but those are very different contexts. Maybe they are your context, I don't know, as you haven't said where you are from. My suspicion is that you are not from those areas, however. I have actually lived and worked in a non-Western country for years and I wasn't even raised in a religion, so I'm able to kind of look at religions as more or less equally valid/equally weird and I do have an international perspective. But I guess though by labeling me a "U.S. supremacist" who hasn't traveled you feel you can muddle the discussion further.

Really, you come off as someone who has a huge ax to grind with Muslims, and I don't feel like engaging you further as a result. I was wrong about the prevalence of hate crimes but only because Jewish people are the victim of so many more hate crimes than Muslims. Muslims still have the dubious honor of coming in second, however. https://ucr.fbi.gov/hate-crime/2018/topic-pages/victims

As to the bulk of anti-Muslim bias coming from immigrant communities - where's your statistic for that? I doubt that it's the case simply because such groups make up such a small % of total U.S. citizens and I know plenty of white people who love saying Islamophobic crap and believe ridiculous things about Islam.

Anyway, feel free to write another paragraphs long response, but I'm disengaging. You can't have a good faith discussion when you won't acknowledge that context matters and it's impossible to have a realistic conversation about religious/racial bias on a personal level when your context is the entire world and all of history as well.

quickbeam · 2020-08-03T01:01:30+00:00

Avocado toast is delicious and not associated with intestinal parasites. You can make it at home for real cheap too.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T23:28:19+00:00

"Eating ass" is apparently very popular in the younger demographics no matter what combination of genders are involved. No matter what kind of washing is involved that's a pretty good way to pass intestinal parasites.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T20:45:38+00:00

I'm so glad I'm not a teenager today. Jesus Christ. I'm not sexphobic, but when I was a teenager the magazines were giving you kissing advice, not encouraging you to perform sex acts which can lead to higher rates of venereal disease, intestinal parasites and things like fistulas which no one should want. I'm not saying no one should enjoy anal sex, but I think there's already way too much pressure on women to perform this from heavy porn consumption.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T20:02:06+00:00

Go review a book then and post your review here!

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T20:01:46+00:00

Thanks for these reviews. I'm interested in reading "Where The Crawdads Sing" now; I didn't realize it was a genre book. I've read both the anti-racism books, but I got a lot more personally out of How to Be An Anti-Racist and I don't think it suffers from the same weaknesses that DiAngelo's book has.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T19:51:44+00:00

I didn't say Christians have never been discriminated against in the entire historical record or might not be discriminated against in one country or by specific individuals. But it seems kind of irrelevant to bring up things that happened ages ago to inform a discussion about how Christians and Muslims are situated in the West today. I also didn't say that Muslims were "the most oppressed group of people", but speaking as a United States citizen, Muslims and people perceived to be Muslim due to their skin tone/religious garb are often the victims of hate crimes and that discrimination is supported by the current administration in banning people from Muslim countries when no credible threat is present. I do think they are the religious group currently most persecuted in the United States today, followed perhaps by Jewish people who have also been victims of hate group violence. Christians, if they are attacked at all, are attacked for other reasons such as race.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T18:06:34+00:00

Definitely agree that some people use it as a silencing technique and often they don't even really understand much about Islam in the first place or that Muslims can belong to any race or be from many different countries. It also continues to be nuts to me the amount of erasure of feminist concerns in recent years in social justice communities. It's not like we solved sexism.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T17:03:56+00:00

In terms of critiquing Islam for treatment of women, I'd say it's a complex issue. In different countries and different sects women experience life much differently. It would be like lumping all Mormons together - from those living on compounds to those living in Salt Lake City. Very different life experiences affecting women very differently. Maybe the best way to perform this type of advocacy would be to find Muslim women interested in changing their own faith and support their work specifically.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T17:01:49+00:00

I see attacks on Islam as attacks on brown people partly because Islamophobia often stems from racism and often results in racist attacks on people who aren't even Muslim - such as the attack on the Sikh temple in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, or random attacks after 9/11 on people as unrelated to Islam as Buddhist monks. Of course not all Muslims are brown, but a lot of Islamophobes don't even know that. The two often go hand in hand. Also, in my country Christianity is still the dominant religion; we ban Muslims from the country currently, not Christians. So it's kind of absurd to talk about "Christianophobia" when Christians are in power and not discriminated against by powerful institutions.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T16:58:31+00:00

Keep it classy, dude. Thanks for revealing exactly what type of behavior you view as "supreme", showing exactly how empty all your "philosophy" is. Hope someday you'll wake up from your bad dreams; I really do. For your own sake as well as the world's.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T16:32:43+00:00

There is a lot to unpack here. It sounds like you're having a lot of medical problems that I don't have, so that's not something I can understand well. I can't do birth control either, but I'm wondering is it possible for you to not take that? Or is it used to help with one of your health problems? If there's a way to get off the hormonal stuff I would and see if there are herbal or more natural options.

In terms of being short - you would still be short if you were a man, though then you would get social stigma associated with a short man, which I hear really sucks. Possibly you would be stronger, but I have known some very strong women and some men who couldn't put on muscle to save their life.

I don't think of myself as feminine and weak. I don't compare myself to other people as much as possible though. I think that the key to a lot of my happiness was when I stopped comparing myself to other people. I said - I'm just going to be the best me I can be today. I'm going to appreciate what my body can do and what I do like about it. There is quite a lot, it turns out. It sounds from your post like comparison is something you're doing a lot with other women's looks. That's a good thing to put down, and it can be done. I think for me it was partially adopting meditation practice and partially making a constant choice again and again to not play the comparison game.

Are people actually insulting the way you look? Are these co-workers and acquaintances or strangers? Avoid as many of these types of people as you can. Self-hate on the other hand, that is your battle you will need to fight with you. I only try on clothes when I'm feeling good. Sometimes I get down if I gain some weight, so I always bring in some sizes I think are too big so I will be prepared. I also try to shop at stores that carry a wide variety of sizes. Of course that takes time to find which places those are.

"The stupid fucking shit I'm supposed to care about" - Fuck it. You don't have to care about anything in particular. I don't have kids, nor do many of my friends. I never wear make-up or heels and I barely do anything with my hair. Most of my friends do not behave in particularly "gendered" ways. We just talk about politics or pop culture or whatever. These people exist.

Not being taken seriously at work is a big issue and not your fault. If it is possible to change the culture at your work with other co-workers, that might be something to work on. Or if it's possible to change to another employer. I'm sorry that's happening to you, though. I would definitely change doctors ASAP. Sometimes you have to change doctors until you find someone who will listen.

If you woke up tomorrow as a man I bet you'd miss things about being a woman. And I bet you wouldn't enjoy the shit men are "supposed" to care about or dealing with some of the culture men are faced with. Maybe I'm wrong. And maybe it's hard for me to understand how painful your medical problems are. I hope you will get relief from those. I hope you will get relief in general. Much compassion.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T03:29:16+00:00

Like, literally, 10 o'clock on a Saturday and you're not even afraid of Covid, so why don't you go like cough on people at a bar or something? LOL. Gonna go hang with my family. Have a nice life!

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T03:26:39+00:00

I hope you don't get Covid. Even though you are not particularly pleasant on the internet I wouldn't wish a serious case of Covid on anyone.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T03:25:51+00:00

If I bore you, then I hate to think how boring everything else in your life is, given you're here.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T03:25:05+00:00

I love how this used to be an argument about how mailing in ballots was supposed to be the most likely way that elites would commit election fraud, but y'all realized that your theory fell apart under inspection and now it's just you randomly trolling me about my mental illness that I'm not ashamed of and your supposed prowess at making foreign food even though you are scared of foreigners.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T03:23:41+00:00

Oh look at you with your one fascist German word. I speak pretty good German, actually, and I hate to break it to you but Trump doesn't even speak English all that well, let alone a second language.

quickbeam · 2020-08-02T03:01:33+00:00

Honestly I'm most insulted by this at the level of orthography.

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T18:46:36+00:00

LGB Non-fiction - The Mayor of Castro Street is a book I feel like everyone should read. I take so much inspiration from his coalition-building, and I think today's activists of all types could learn from him.

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T15:22:46+00:00

Sounds cool! I'm betting my husband would like that book. Kendi's book is a very good read full of historical information and interesting ideas. I'd recommend it for sure, but it doesn't go down as easy as a novel, say. :)

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T12:40:56+00:00

Remember like 3 years ago when woke people pretended to care about rape victims for a while? I guess that's over.

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T12:39:52+00:00

I care about people with low self-worth. People with low self-worth need the help of loving people who respect their right to have boundaries more than other people need them, not less.

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T04:43:04+00:00

I don't have to agree with the author's definitions or categorizations. There are economic leftists and cultural leftists. Many people are both. But even among people who are both some of those people tend towards authoritarian/anti-debate mindsets and others tend towards strong belief in freedom of speech. I'd say older leftists (over 40) tend largely to be pro-free speech and able to debate, much more than people who might identify as "liberal" and "woke."

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T03:56:58+00:00

Shit I can't help myself. Just one link, as a treat. https://www.cato.org/blog/white-houses-misleading-error-ridden-narrative-immigrants-crime

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T03:51:27+00:00

If I thought that spending an hour sending you research refuting your claims would realistically move the needle with you, I would, by the way. But I don't. And I'm bored of trolling you. Technically I try not to troll people because I'm sure you have some good qualities and there's no sense in spreading sadness and hatred in this already sad world. But I'm going now. I guess you can have the last word and feel that you have "owned the libs." Have fun with that shit.

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T03:49:57+00:00

Not any dunce can make the awesome fucking noodles and dumplings I had for dinner. I'm betting you can't. You can't even troll that well. I've seen better trolling from Biden supporters on Twitter which is really fucking saying something.

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T03:49:08+00:00

I would gladly take in any of the immigrant families currently in ICE detention into my household. They are no more likely to be a rapist or murderer than any other person on the street. As to feeding and clothing them - they earn their own money and illegal/undocumented immigrants pay into social security but they don't get any of that money back nor can they receive most social services. I live in the U.S. cause I was fricking born here. But if I could magically trade in for citizenship in Europe I'd be gone tomorrow. Doesn't work that way though. So I do my best to make this country the country that welcomes immigrants (since everyone who isn't black or indigenous is descended from immigrants). I do my best to live up to the statue of liberty and the spirit of helping my fellow human being.

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T03:40:36+00:00

Yes, yes, this entire worldwide pandemic is just a conspiracy to hurt poor old Donnie. Never mind that every fucking country changed their way of life in order to deal with it. I actually have friends who live and work in other countries, (and used to work abroad myself), so I'm not caught in this ridiculous provincial perspective that some of y'all seem to have.

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T03:37:31+00:00

Not being able to turn on one's computer is not a symptom of anxiety/depression. Not being able to treat people with mental illnesses with common decency is a symptom of being an asshole though. Might want to get that shit looked at.

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T02:08:01+00:00

Nope. And I don't like the odds of going to a public place where there's even a 1/1000 chance of dying. Imagine someone saying to you "you can go to this polling place, but there's a 1/1000 chance you'll die and about a 200/1000 chance you'll be really sick for weeks. No fucking thank you. Let's even say a 20/1000 chance. I'll be real generous to your utter lack of concern for facts. Still not going. Those are not good odds for a thinking person.

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T02:05:55+00:00

Not that they're sharing with these mysterious government officials who are somehow going to illegally mail them ballots which they will then totally fill out because they are so committed to rigging elections between working at the meat packing plant and raising their kids, which they will then somehow mail to the other evil government officials who will then hand them off to still more corrupt government officials for processing. All of these people are involved in the exact same conspiracy, somehow. The fact that this is totally believable to you is amazing.

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T02:02:44+00:00

Honestly, if people hate immigrants a suitable punishment would be having to cook all their own foreign food. You shouldn't even get Taco Bell, really.

quickbeam · 2020-08-01T02:01:54+00:00

I have anxiety and depression yet I am not irrationally afraid of people simply because they come from other countries, nor am I so sad or bitter that I assume my fellow humans are mainly dishonest or out to get each other. If I can keep a positive vision of humanity in my mind with my diagnosed conditions, why can't you?

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T22:09:53+00:00

p.s. It must suck to hate and distrust so many people this much. I have fucking full-blown anxiety and depression and I still realize that most people in this country are good-hearted, well-meaning honest people and even if I don't agree with them on everything or they might vote differently than I do they want the best for each other and their families. What you describe in your rants here is not a realistic version of America. It seems like the product of getting most of one's impressions of other people through the television or the internet rather than talking to lots of different types of people in person. Which is too bad. I hope that someday you will have a more positive view of humanity. Take care.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T22:07:28+00:00

If I felt like spending an entire day on it with the result of you saying that everything I linked to was "fake news" I could refute all 100 of your propagandized arguments. But I'm going to go back to my regularly scheduled life where I will be eating delicious Chinese food prepared by recent immigrants to this country who have made my life much better through their skills and entrepreneurship.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T22:05:01+00:00

Oh shit I didn't see this epic rant. :) LOL. I take it back; don't work the polls. I wouldn't want to subject ordinary Americans to this mindset.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T22:04:10+00:00

You are acting as if mail-in ballots are the thing we ought to be worried about when it comes to mass election fraud when the real vulnerable spot where you could change results without a trace are the machines. I'm not naive or uninformed; I've actually worked the polls which I've mentioned repeatedly. It seems like you just want to remain panicked about this much less likely scenario out of what I can only assume is partisanship. Go work the polls if you care so much - I'll repeat it again. It's not hard to get those jobs - they're actually asking younger people to take them.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T18:19:02+00:00

To the best of my knowledge Bernie Sanders supports freedom of speech pretty unequivocally. I think in campaigning within the party he had to adopt some of the woke speak to get by, but he was criticized heavily by woke types for not swallowing it all wholesale, for things like touting the Rogan semi-endorsement, etc. Bernie's an economic leftist, which is how I orient.

I don't think the left has any kind of monopoly on not being in favor of free speech though. When I was growing up I was basically socially "canceled" for being vocally in support of gay rights. Right wing religious types to this day engage in censorship of books and public art, infringe on religious freedom both by forcing Christianity on people and by trying to get Muslims not to dress as their faith demands, attempt to silence doctors especially when it comes to abortion information, try to erase climate science from government organizations, and the free press is threatened by people across the political spectrum who have economic or political interests in silencing them.

So I think that while the left may hold the most obvious cancel culture cards at the moment in terms of visible culture wars, there are insidious threats to freedom of speech waged by the right as well, that usually affect people like whistle-blowers, journalists, scientists and members of minority religious groups. I'm not okay with any of it.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T18:02:33+00:00

I'm a leftist. A Bernie-crat if you will. I'm either with Bernie or slightly to the left of him on pretty much every issue. And it's not like I followed Bernie to these positions. He just came along and spoke all the stuff I already believed and I fell in love politically as a result. I'm almost a free speech absolutist and a civil libertarian in most ways. I used to believe in 2nd amendment rights, but that has eroded with the uptick in mass shootings and the realization that the government will always have the people outgunned and most of the people stockpiling guns aren't using them to stand up to the government in meaningful ways anyhow. I'm also a big believer in a strong social safety network and massive government programs to solve issues like climate change. I very much believe in getting money out of politics which the "neoliberal"/"corporate" wing of the party seems to have no interest in doing. I engage in more debates than I really ought to given that life is short.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T17:27:59+00:00

Not all leftists are woke authoritarian. A lot of us are just leftists and we will debate people sometimes. But being willing to debate sometimes doesn't mean I always have the patience to take on all comers, since I am not a professional debater and I also enjoy other activities such as eating pizza, making art projects, writing fiction, spending time with humans I love and sometimes even working at a job. I get really sick of internet randos alleging that I won't debate them (or I'm cutting off a conversation) because I don't have a good argument when in fact I just find their argument illogical or boring and I strongly suspect that debating this person will involve an hour or more of sending links to information that they will dismiss as "fake news" or making ethical or logical assertions which they will flat out deny, leaving us both in the same space we were before we started debating, only now with both of us having wasted an hour of our lives that could have been spent eating pizza.

So yeah, there are shitty leftists that won't debate people because they don't have real arguments. But sometimes if a leftist doesn't want to debate you it's because you're not the greatest debater yourself or they're just actually not in the mood to argue on the internet. Be self-aware. You can't improve other people, but you can improve yourself. And any honest person should have an interest in improving themselves by reading philosophy or long form books on politics/history/etc.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T17:19:48+00:00

The ACLU ain't what it used to be. I'm a leftist, but I'm a leftist who believes in freedom of speech and freedom to report or take pictures in public.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T17:18:11+00:00

Also can I just say "two hundred million fake votes" not a big deal - it's like you don't understand the amount of paper that would require, postage, people handling those boxes and not noticing a discrepancy, people processing those votes by hand (which is the case with mail in voting) and somehow not noticing that they don't match the lists, etc. It's just stunning that you think that would be easy to achieve. 1,000 fake votes on paper would be almost impossible to pass through, let alone two hundred million. On a voting machine, piece of fucking cake, which is again why, if there is fraud on a mass scale it will be done digitally.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T17:15:53+00:00

Covid, my friend. This is the obvious answer but your mind won't accept it because you default to distrusting the most obvious answer and also people's motives. Also, again, I used to live in a state where almost everyone has used mail-in voting for years. Somehow Oregonians still elect blue reps in the blue areas and red reps in the red areas.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T17:14:40+00:00

I wouldn't call it an obsession but COVID. I know people who have had it and been hospitalized with it. In-person voting will spread Covid especially in places where lines are long. It will prevent medically vulnerable people (or people who are caregivers of those types of people) from voting. I want the most registered voters to vote as possible.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T17:11:17+00:00

There is no evidence that either of these people aren't women, and honestly I find that borderline offensive to women who are gender non-conforming to assume that if a woman looks somehow butch she isn't a woman.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T17:08:41+00:00

Again, I worked as a poll worker. Your ballot will not be processed if it does not match the registered voters list. Illegal immigrants? Are you kidding? The very fact that they're "illegal" means that no one would have their address to mail anything to in the first fucking place. Let alone that they would want to expose themselves to being deported in order to help people do voter fraud. Do you realize how illogical this all is? If you're so concerned about undocumented immigrants we need to crack down on corporations that hire them, not the immigrants themselves. I don't really have a problem with immigrants of any kind because quite frankly borders are some made-up bullshit and climate change is going to mean that large swaths of the world suddenly become uninhabitable and people will need to cross borders to survive. To me people are people. I've lived abroad and been treated with respect and love by citizens of a country where I didn't speak the language. As long as corporations will hire undocumented workers to do a job they're not willing to pay citizens properly for, people will move here. If you want that to stop, it'd be a lot easier to go after the corporations and toughen laws on wages and labor conditions.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T17:03:15+00:00

Electronic voting is too is the only thing you needed to say here, though, because every damn vote goes through that system and if you are a person at a high level trying to impact the vote (not some two-bit city council candidate trying to steal their own election) that's the method you use in this day and age. You say "removing boxes" like it's a simple thing that doesn't require coordination. And guess what - you can also remove boxes of votes of people who voted in person! Sometimes you can't even tabulate those votes the day of polling because the machines malfunction. It's overwhelmingly Republicans who have been fucking over votes in recent years though by closing polling stations in key areas and leaving low income or majority minority communities without enough polling stations so that working people have to choose between getting back to their job or standing in line for 5+ hours. Or sometimes so they can't actually get transportation to a close enough polling station. But you guys want to focus on these rare as hell cases of people using ridiculously clunky 20th century methods to steal elections that no one in a real position of power would ever resort to.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T16:59:34+00:00

LOL. I'm naive says the person who thinks the electronic voting machines are more reliable. https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-a-data-security-expert-fears-u-s-voting-will-be-hacked-11587747159 https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-vulnerabilities-of-our-voting-machines/ https://thefulcrum.us/voting/hacking-voting-machines

It is so much harder to falsify hundreds of paper documents or disappear thousands of ballots. One person can't do it on their own; they would need help. The more people you involve in any type of conspiracy/crime the easier it is for them to get caught. Whereas with hacking the voting machines one person can do it and it can be done without leaving a trace. We'd all be better off if paper votes were counted by hand by old church ladies and it took weeks to get final results.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T16:55:42+00:00

There's a reason these people got caught - they were all ham-handed schemes that are noticed by the city clerks and poll workers that cross-check documents and check for things like people voting twice. If you want to commit mass election fraud - the type that would affect a national election, you'd hack the voting machines. Paper ballots - and people casting multiple paper ballots or false paper ballots - is the easiest thing to catch and check for.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T16:51:24+00:00

Like, how are you imagining this mail-in ballot being dealt with? Do you think that anything that gets mailed to the board of elections is magically tabulated by elves without checking it against any official lists? The votes aren't even visible on the outside of the ballots! The biggest risk is actually from throwing ballots away, but that would be done by government officials, not individual people, and again, that could more easily be done by hacking voting machines. - If you've never googled how easy it is to hack the voting machines, get on that. I expect better from random internet people - most people who spend this much time on the internet are already aware that voting machines represent the major election fraud threat.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T16:48:28+00:00

For the millionth time, the votes get mailed in to the exact same people who would tabulate the in-person votes and those votes are checked against the voter registration lists by actual humans. So it makes, again, no fucking difference, the method by which a person votes.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T00:16:42+00:00

Again, I worked the polls and it doesn't matter whether someone comes in in person or submits an absentee or vote-by-mail ballot. All that shit gets counted by the same people, all of whom have to check the ballots against the voter registration list. The majority of your security concerns should be aimed squarely at the easily hacked voting machines that are used to tabulate all ballots including the paper ballots in most areas. If you had any remaining concern, well that would lie with people who are verifying the count who are largely state government employees. Regular people aren't out there stuffing ballot boxes and if they were they would be election officials who would have no incentive to use mail-in ballots to do that - it would actually take a lot longer to mail out ballots to random voters than to just manufacture fake ballots or, again, hack the very easy to hack voting machines. This is all a fake problem that you've bought into because "Trupm" said so. In fact he's either just talking out his ass or he wants an excuse to declare the election invalid and rule as a dictator.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T00:12:16+00:00

Again, please go work a poll. I encourage you to do so. You can see how the sausage is made. You can be the watchdog on the front lines of all this voter fraud you think is happening.

quickbeam · 2020-07-31T00:11:31+00:00

LOL. No, sorry. I'm not interested in voter fraud because it almost never happens. I am interested in election fraud, which is a huge concern especially in terms of voting machines. But as there is very little I have the power to do about it, I try not to lose sleep over it.

quickbeam · 2020-07-30T22:17:26+00:00

It's not a phobia when there's a respiratory virus killing people and causing permanent organ damage, my dude. It's called being a rational fucking human being with a sense of self-preservation.

quickbeam · 2020-07-30T22:15:29+00:00

Call me crazy, but I tend to trust doctors/nurses and primary sources like medical research when it comes to diseases, rather than scouring through a bunch of rando internet forums. A former teacher of mine had to be hospitalized for Covid, as did both of one of my friend's parents, so excuse me if I think that it's worthwhile not to gather in crowded spaces or wear a piece of cloth over my face. Also, other countries exist and I see how they've handled the virus. I have friends working abroad all over the world and most of them have been able to resume semi-normal lives because their governments aren't being held captive by anti-science types.

I'm not 100% against conspiracy theories either, but they have to have A) a credible motive B) be something that could actually be kept secret by the amount of people who would need to keep it secret. These Covid conspiracy theories have neither, but especially not B. And even if some of these theories had any truth to them they'd have no relevance to whether we should vote by mail which is no different than voting in person because again, everything gets tabulated by the same people using the same systems and mail-in ballots would 100% be invalidated if those voters weren't on the lists of registered voters that the city clerks and poll workers use to check for voting integrity.

quickbeam · 2020-07-30T22:01:07+00:00

If you're so worried about voter fraud I encourage you to contact your city clerk and become a poll worker. There are paying jobs or you can volunteer. Then you can go behind the scenes and see how the system works in your state. I bet you'll be amazed at what ordinary good-natured people are in charge of ensuring election integrity.

quickbeam · 2020-07-30T21:58:35+00:00

Uh huh, great. So if you think the voting is all going to be rigged anyway, at least we could let people stay home and not get Covid on top of everything else.

quickbeam · 2020-07-30T21:57:54+00:00

Objection. Relevance.

quickbeam · 2020-07-30T21:57:09+00:00

What's your source for any of this? Also, all mail in ballots need to still be checked at the polls against the lists of registered voters. I know this because I worked the damn polls. Everything ends up being run through the same processes no matter whether it's done in person or by mail.

quickbeam · 2020-07-30T17:43:24+00:00

Growing up the only times I heard the word were from guys demeaning each other with it or guys who watched too much porn. My associations with it were primarily based in misogyny. I like "cunt" better, actually, because I came of age around the time some women were taking it back and it sounds somehow stronger.

quickbeam · 2020-07-30T17:36:57+00:00

This shows very little understanding of how votes are counted or where fraud would likely show up. The postal workers don't even open the ballots and why would they disappear a bunch of ballots? It would be very difficult to do with physical ballots (much easier to disappear electronic votes on easily hacked voting machines) and they'd have no idea who any of these people are voting for anyway. The federal government, moreover, is currently controlled by Republicans who would have a much easier time hacking the vote if hacking were to occur since they are in charge of more of the infrastructure and have a Supreme Court majority. Either way, though, it's a lot harder to steal an election than you seem to think. The election has to be very close to make it credibly steal-able. I think the reason Trump wants to delay is he's starting to see that it's not going to be close because of how much he dropped the ball on Covid. If he were a sensible person he would realize that stopping the spread of Covid is literally the only way he could win in November, but he's either too dumb to see that or it's gone so far that we wouldn't be able to stop it without the most draconian measures.

quickbeam · 2020-07-30T17:32:59+00:00

There's nothing wrong with vote-by-mail. I lived in Oregon for a while where everyone can vote by mail (with some in-person for those who prefer it) and it works just fine. Also - some people chose to line up to pay respects to John Lewis, but I'm not planning to go anywhere crowded and inhale other people's germs. It's quite another thing to force people many of whom are medically vulnerable to go out and risk their health or lose their voice in a democracy. BTW - the exact same people are going to tabulate your votes whether they're done in person or by mail. The exact same hand-counters and/or machines. I've been a volunteer poll worker so I've seen the votes get counted firsthand.

quickbeam · 2020-07-30T17:24:30+00:00

Yeah, that casual use of "pussies" really fucking bothered me, tbh. I only felt comfortable using that word in purely sexual situations when I was in my 30's because it's so often used in gross or pejorative situations. To just fling it around like that gives me a sense of that person's maturity level/respect for women.

quickbeam · 2020-07-30T17:18:21+00:00

LOL. This is the Jenga move that will collapse their whole tower.

quickbeam · 2020-07-30T00:38:47+00:00

I love Brienne of Tarth in the Game of Thrones series. The series is not for everyone, but I love that character so much, especially in the books. I also really love Edith Wharton's characters and Jane Austen's characters.

quickbeam · 2020-07-29T18:47:33+00:00

From age 11 I was aware of what "rape" was and that it was a thing that could specifically target me. Plenty of women are aware of it earlier because they are raped as children. From age 11 on I took on that extra fear, and as I grew up I learned self-defense techniques and to always be hyper-aware of my surroundings. When I was dating my husband he suggested I bike home at 2 a.m. one night because he needed to get good sleep. I did bike home because it was early days, but the next day I had it out with him and explained to him that you're not safe at 2 a.m. as a woman just because you're on a bike and can "go fast." Today he's a great feminist man, but even someone who's become a great feminist man was clueless as to what it's like to be a woman and what risks we face before I educated him.

quickbeam · 2020-07-28T23:26:00+00:00

Some books I would pick: Journal of a Solitude by May Sarton, The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood (obvious, but obvious for a reason), Where Are You Going? Where Have You Been? by Joyce Carol Oates (technically a short story but there's a lot there), The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton (because I love classics, and I think it's interesting in terms of how it examines a woman's position at a time when she was meant to "marry well"), The Color Purple by Alice Walker

quickbeam · 2020-07-26T19:48:02+00:00

How does this sort of thing pass for thought?

quickbeam · 2020-07-26T16:31:53+00:00

I got to visit a lake this weekend and go swimming. (There weren't too many people, so social distancing was possible.) Good for the soul. I'm reading "Wow, no thank you" by Samantha Irby. I'm only 4 essays in, but man is it hilarious. As to introducing myself, I'm bi and poly (more in theory than in practice of late) but I'm also married and pass as a normie heterosexual. Sometimes I feel like I shouldn't take up space in this sub but I am committed to staying on-topic if/when I post/comment. And I'm committed to preserving the rights and dignity of LGB people.

quickbeam · 2020-07-26T01:30:43+00:00

Seriously? He's not even one of the series' better actors!

quickbeam · 2020-07-24T00:34:27+00:00

https://tenor.com/view/confused-lady-math-lady-dafuq-gif-9356431

quickbeam · 2020-07-24T00:10:20+00:00

We should all care about police killing unarmed civilians. We are paying police officers' salaries, and as such we should expect them to earn those salaries by not killing innocent people sleeping in their beds or people who maybe committed misdemeanors. Last I checked we weren't paying police officers to be judge, jury and executioner. So if you care about the Constitution you ought to care about the main goal of the Black Lives Matter movement, which is to hold police accountable for police brutality and killings of unarmed civilians. I'm not going to bother to get into the weeds of your other argument, because I'm not in the mood to have a huge headache.

quickbeam · 2020-07-23T18:28:17+00:00

I feel better about it than if he were to pick a white woman or a white man, because no matter who he picks it's probably not going to be a progressive like I'd prefer, so he should at least pick someone who might have some chance in hell of helping him demographically speaking. If he picked say Barbara Lee I'd be delighted, but I never see her as a potential choice.

quickbeam · 2020-07-23T17:54:11+00:00

"Raise the Red Lantern" is one of my top 10 favorite movies ever despite being emotionally difficult to watch in some places.

quickbeam · 2020-07-23T17:53:18+00:00

I knew a lot of lesbians in college who were rocking that Sarah from "Labyrinth" flowy shirt and a vest aesthetic.

quickbeam · 2020-07-23T17:50:59+00:00

I respect the hell out of old-school "homosexual" lesbians. I will do what I can to stand up for you. I'm really sorry you were sent hateful materials. So many online spaces are so full of hate these days, which makes me very determined to not give into it myself and try to spread as much love as I can. You are allowed to set your own boundaries. Your boundaries matter. And they are not up for debate. Take good care and I hope this will be a supportive environment for you!

quickbeam · 2020-07-23T17:44:50+00:00

Thank you, I'll look into it!

quickbeam · 2020-07-23T17:44:38+00:00

Thanks!

quickbeam