askchapo

22930 readers
307 users here now

Ask Hexbear is the place to ask and answer ~~thought-provoking~~ questions.

Rules:

  1. Posts must ask a question.

  2. If the question asked is serious, answer seriously.

  3. Questions where you want to learn more about socialism are allowed, but questions in bad faith are not.

  4. Try !feedback@hexbear.net if you're having questions about regarding moderation, site policy, the site itself, development, volunteering or the mod team.

founded 4 years ago
MODERATORS
226
 
 

EDIT: Translation - 'quid' means £1 ... British slang.

Not saying I have the time to host it right now, but there's a lot of 'free' money to be made in referral links to various offers. Most of these offers truly only take about 5 minutes.

Some are a bit more elaborate but still easy - and technically better paying than many of our jobs per hour, I bet. Don't expect it to cover your rent of course, but an extra 30 quid here and there really racks up. I've seen lots of people make an extra 1500 yearly by essentially doing nothing.

Anyway, with these referral links, not only might we all end up a little better off and less stressed, but I think it opens up much more 'mutual-aid' ability - I certainly feel more generous when it's 'free money' that I'm giving away.

Currently, I'm using referral links from total randoms on Reddit, meaning half of the referral money is going to some Reddit bloke, when actually it could be going to one of us, or even towards hexbears maintenance fees. If a hexbear admin had a referral link to all of these offers, they could end up with 200 quid in their account from just one post...

I get there's probably privacy issues with it, but to me it seems like a good idea.

227
 
 
228
 
 

a life with no social media and phone, having more DIY, Punk, hacking style and stuff, how is that possible in current years? my ideas are having so low or no use of social media, using Linux or BSDS, having a custom rom at phone (or dumphone) and using alternative sites like image boards, IRC, old/niche forums, going to punk gigs and raves, learn music instrument, learn about cybersec, download music and movies, piracy in general, dress alt, make a personal webpage, using less javascript and using alternative's to crapitalism.

229
 
 

Are the C and the K interchangeable? Why does the "of" in Republic of Corea get in thr acronym while "Democratic People's Republic of Korea" ditches the "of" in the acronym?

230
17
submitted 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) by Gorb@hexbear.net to c/askchapo@hexbear.net
 
 

If so what mods would make the game nicer for the unity version

Found a nice looking modlist: https://youtu.be/LSM5VjsNP2A

231
 
 

I feel like I don't hear much internal critique about China from the ML side of things - is this more of a 'critical support' posture or are people just generally more optimistic about long-term socialization of their market?

edit: if there are more reading materials that discuss this topic in-depth, I am very interested in recommendations

232
 
 

I was recently in a conversation with my mom where she mentioned how a lot of her friends and relatives in the USA have been sharing on Facebook just absolute nonsense about Norway: videos and posts with exaggerated if not flat-out incorrect facts about the country, and more notably, "AI-generated" pictures of fairy tale-esque natural scenes. Mom said how she pointed out to one of her relatives who shared such a "photo", how it was made up, and that relative got a bit irate about my mom's comment and said, "Who cares if it's AI?! It's a nice picture!" — even though that relative seemed to fully believe it was a real photo right until mom pointed out it wasn't, and left no indication that it was not a real photo.

...So that's a bit concerning, "post-truth" as they say.

Relaying this anecdote to me, mom remarked, "I mean, seriously, what if someone came to Norway hoping to see these crazy flowers and natural phenomena and stuff? The locals would be like, 'What the heck are you talking about? That doesn't exist.' — So how can someone share misinformation like that, and just not care simply because it's a 'nice picture'? It's bizarre." — And I said that someone coming to Norway because of "AI-generated" pictures would be like the modern-day version of Gregor MacGregor's Poyais scheme.

Anyways, after relaying this anecdote to me, mom then remarked something to the effect of that it's as if her friends and relatives in the USA think of Norway as this magical mystical fairy tale country, and will cling to anything that lets them keep that conception, no matter how ridiculous it is, and will get upset if you try to poke holes in their "mythologizing". And I said, "That's called borealism, isn't it?" — and she hadn't heard that term, so I read the Wikipedia article to give her a basic idea of it.

Borealism is a form of exoticism in which stereotypes are imposed on the Earth's northern regions and cultures (particularly the Nordic and Arctic regions).

The term was inspired by the similar concept of Orientalism, first coined by Edward Said. An early form of Borealism can be identified in antiquity, especially Roman writings; but, like Orientalism, Borealism came to flourish in eighteenth-century European Romanticism and Romantics' fantasies about distant regions. Borealism can include the paradoxical ideas that the North is uniquely savage, inhospitable, or barbaric, and that it is uniquely sublime, pure, or enlightened.

A further form of borealism is the explicit invocation of the boreal by white-supremacist far-right politicians.

The Wikipedia article neglects to mention that the concept of borealism was first coined by Kristinn Schram of the University of Iceland in 2011, in articles like "Banking on Borealism: Eating, Smelling, and Performing the North" and "Borealism: folkloristic perspectives on transnational performances and the exoticism of the North"

In any case, not long after I told my mom about borealism, we noticed that NRK was airing Der ingen skulle tru at nokon kunne bu, meaning something like "Where Nobody Would Think Somebody Could Live" — this is a TV show about people who live in inhospitable places around Norway, close to nature and all that. And mom remarked, "Is that a form of self-borealism?", and I said, "Maybe."


But ultimately, just because someone wrote a couple articles about it, and it got a Wikipedia page, doesn't necessarily mean that it is an accurate or useful concept. The term "borealism" is not in any major dictionaries — not even Wiktionary — and the concept of borealism has seen very little discussion or usage in academia compared to orientalism since it was first introduced. This can probably be partially chalked up to orientalism being a much older term that covers the exoticization of a much larger share of Earth's land and population, where the power dynamics, harm, and extremity of such exoticization tend to be much more readily apparent.

From my own perspective I can certainly say that I've seen people exoticize the Nordic and Arctic regions in weird ways, and locals do by all means play into these same exoticizations — and I can further say that I absolutely believe that the presentation of Norway as exotic in this manner is tied to the power dynamics between Norway and other regions.

However it also kinda feels like... can't you say that about every region? Like are we also gonna have an "occidentalism" and an "australism" just to get the "full set", or is there really something special about the concept of the "exotic north" that makes it uniquely deserving of its own term? I suppose I should read Kristinn's articles first to get a better idea of what he meant by the term and why he thinks it's useful.

233
 
 
234
 
 

Share your stories below if you care too.

For me, way more times than I care admit.

Threatened with murder etc

235
 
 

I had seen some movement to hopefully do it again but haven't seen anything on when or if it will happen. Wanting to know if I should just start reading on my own or hold out and wait for the reading group, which would be my preference.

236
 
 

You know it’s coming.

Please post your predictions of specific scenes and plot points below

Here’s mineINT - CAPITAL BUILDING, AOC’S OFFICE

After they plant the nuke, the evil brown terrorist ringleader pulls out a gun and aims it at the Jewish kid who’s helping them free Palestine. “You can’t kill me, I’m your ally!” he pleads. Evil terrorist dude replies “no, he will,” and hands the gun to the Jewish kid’s Muslim best friend. He hesitates for a few seconds, but eventually regains his mojo and aims the gun at the Jewish kid’s head, drops a Hitler quote and kills him. Terrorist dude says something about not trusting Jews as they stuff his corpse into AOC’s closet, next to the nuke. Normally the nuke would’ve been discovered the next day by the janitor, but AOC fired her for being Jewish.

Somber music plays as we cut to Jonathan Greenblatt getting laughed out of the police station by the woke DEI hires as he desperately tries to convince them that evil muslamic international students are going to nuke DC.

237
238
239
 
 

Some of mine are: reading 52 books, going for a walk at least once a week, getting a new piercing, and doing my budgeting every week instead of waiting multiple weeks, etc etc

What's everyone else's? Maybe comrades with similar goals can be accountability buddies blob-no-thoughts

240
 
 

I qualified for financial help with one of those places that advertise on social media (Joyous, if you know it), and I've got enough to buy myself the first month of pills.

Curious as to if anyone has had experience with it. On paper it sounds like it would be great for me, but my ma is scared of it cause apparently there are horror stories going around in the news. Way I figure it, if it doesn't help, at least I get drugs.

241
 
 

Been reading through my usual posts and this thought popped up in my head. Did a bit of searching and now I'm curious what y'all's analysis is on this. And how potentially the CCP will respond to climate related consequences in the coming decades since they are becoming an increasingly massive superpower and their actions will have global impacts for the rest of the world.

242
 
 

My dad's always been an anti-intellectual prick but now he's a smug one having his worst impulses reinforced by assholes on the internet and his workplace.

243
 
 

what year was it? What caused it?

I think he was going to usher in the end in 2012 but fucked it up and it turned back in on himself but libs didn't want to admit what happened so he was wheeled around and puppeteered

244
 
 

cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/6614768

I mean the text is already on the PDF, not embedded on images inside, so no OCR needed. If not, they could be screenshotted for an image-based service

245
 
 

Asking for a friend

246
247
 
 

Like is there some way to get a cheaper mattress without grabbing a shit stained one off the side of the road :agony:

I’m about to get a new place and yeh bro… I just paid 3k as a deposit I don’t have $1500 for a fucken piece of foam

248
 
 

did a fresh install of firefox, need some good addons. I have the basics like ublock, sponsorblock, dark reader but what are your favorites that I probably don't know about?

249
 
 

Especially in imperial countries where the kids have to deliberately go along with many wrong history lessons?

I don't have kids, Matt Christman having one just makes me wonder how he and other Communist parents do it.

250
 
 

You know, the music that's in every fucking insurance advert that wants to market itself as wholesome.

It's usually got the following: Ukelele strumming, jaunty whistling, a bunch of dudes in what sounds like the far off background happily chanting "waaaooooh" or sometimes if the composer is feeling extra evil, the dreaded baby piano. Can someone tell me what this shit is called?

It's the Corporate Memphis of music. I hate hate hate it.

view more: ‹ prev next ›