KarthNemesis

I legit knew a repub irl that baldly admitted to thinking like this.

(Old family friend, used to be the adults' way of saying they were accepting of other political beliefs. "You can make friends/marriages across the aisle work, if you're just patient and tolerant" kind of self-aggrandizement. Cue the guy bullying his liberal wife into voting repub for years and eventually ditching her on a whim after controlling her entire life... at this point even my "tolerant" family was fed up with him and had been sticking around only to keep the wife company, and her poor kids.)

One minor example (of many) of what appeared to be hypocrisy on the surface:
Railing against the welfare system, nonstop unprompted for years, and then when he lost his job he sat on it for as long as possible before he was forced to find a job. It wasn't that he was struggling to find a job, he didn't even attempt to try until the deadline was pending. He was proud of "abusing the system."

I wouldn't even criticize him for it if he hadn't spent years talking about how people who ever used welfare were lazy and selfish. But he was the laziest and most selfish person I have ever spent any meaningful amount of time with. He's a big reason I don't tolerate entertaining republicans.

If that man had a rule he could bend or break, even if it hurt others, maybe especially if it hurt others, he would and feel no regret or remorse. He thought it was mostly amusing to torment people. His kids especially. And his dog.

He's not the only republican I've met that thinks like him. Just the most careless. Said too many quiet parts out loud.

It's not hypocrisy to him. You're absolutely right, it's just them telling on themselves as to what to expect from them if they have the space to. Any leniency in the systems exist to be abused, and too often many of them are too happy to.

I do commiserate with the feeling that communicating anything takes a lot of energy and deliberateness to get across what one would actually like to, without compromising values. It's part of why I wouldn't mind finding some autistic friends, it's been exhausting to have had this expected of me by default for so long.

I think surety in ones' own sense of self takes time and introspection like you are doing now. I used to struggle more with being afraid of not "really" being autistic, bipolar etc, but time has showed me that I was right and trusting myself when it comes to myself is the smart thing to do. It's possible you could get a sense of closure in that regard, in time, as well.

But even if you don't, taking it tongue-in-cheek and keeping introspective means you're growing, and that's always a good thing ^^

I heard some advice a while back that was along the lines of, "stop apologizing and start thanking," and I feel like it's positively impacted how I phrase things.

Instead of asking forgiveness and moving the conversation into them feeling they have to defend their values on the spot, showing gratitude for their understanding actually makes people feel more valued. "Thank you for your patience" is an entirely different vibe than "sorry I didn't get back to you" and puts much less burden on them. It shows you care about their time without making the focus about your failings and whether or not they agree they are failings.

It's subtle, but I find it's made a huge difference for me.

I also agree with others, in my experience apologies should be reserved for regret and actual feelings of penitence. It's actually a very strong value of mine nowadays, and it certainly makes me much healthier.

Just some thoughts about what I've learned about this particular situation, it's up to you how valid you think they are.

keep on truckin' yourself. ^^

It's not a verbatim quote. It's sardonic, derived from the introduction.

I do not like being called "particularly vulnerable to the impact of traumatic events," ha. Even if they are utilizing that phrasing primarily for kids and young adults, and hedge it in tentativeness, it genuinely is not a dissimilar wordage to people who had been abusive to me during those periods of my life.

I wasn't particularly vulnerable to the impact, I was in a crap situation trapped with people who deeply did not understand me, that had complete power over me. That would be bad for anyone.

It's not a critique of the article as a whole. More of a pet peeve on how many people frame approaching autism, even without any malignant intention. I don't hold any ill will against the researchers, I'm just tired.

==

I agree with the conclusion of your shared article that people have a tendency to frame perceptiveness as "too sensitive," twisting a genuine strength into a bad thing to undermine your own critical thinking.

I also want to state somehow that I appreciate the pure good faith way you approached my original comment ha, keep doing what you're doing.

And I said "probably." I didn't misrepresent them.

If it is the first go-to speculation, it is fairly representative of the default of what they assume could be valid, and it's annoying. That the automatic primary speculation is that minorities are "just sensitive" should be challenged. Tentative couching of that prognosis does not excuse them from review.

I realize you did not state this as your position, and I do not expect you to defend it as your own, but I'd very much prefer to stave off any implication.

"People who are discriminated against have more stress and PTSD. This probably is because they are more sensitive."

Sigh.

I exclusively use "could you repeat that?" Cuz otherwise... yeah.

Rarely, even with being careful, they do still try to expound instead of repeating, which is annoying when I'm trying to accommodate them with specific directions. But it is at least done less.

for someone totally new?
i guess it depends on what you mean by "addicting," so i'll try to put in "potential hours" as a reference. regardless i think all of these are quite fun and consuming for me for a while.

The Binding of Isaac Rebirth.
its difficulty sort of "scales" with how well you do in your runs: if you never beat mom, the next boss, the next boss etc, it'll stay "easier" for as long as that takes. (and if it gets too hard when you start beating stuff, you can always wipe your save and start over, or start a new save, hah!)
the control scheme is extremely simple and it's fine to not be completely perfect at it if you're just going for basic runs and okay with relying more on "lucking" into victory. you really don't have to take on mega-satan or whatever.
up to you if the horror-to-horror-adjacent visuals appeal or not. you do also have to be okay with the idea of dying, it's a roguelike.
you can play this for literally thousands of hours.

Slime Rancher 1.
just a fun time shlorping up slimes. very low stakes and silly and cute. meant to be pretty accessible. if you're brand new i could see it taking up some time, and it's a good way to learn "video game logic." i've spent 80 hours in SR1, playtimes can be a bit varied.

Plants vs Zombies (the original GOTY edition, and definitely not the ad-ridden mobile port)
old 2000's popcap games in general were onboarding for many a gamer back in the day. i've spent 60 hours of it on steam, no idea how much back in the 2000's. playtimes overall can be a bit all over the map on this one.

Garden Paws,
if you like cutesy and the idea of gathering stuff for villagers, with farming / animal raising mechanics. it's slightly jank but it's very endearing. no fail condition. (it's somewhat similar to stardew valley with some differences!) this can be played almost infinitely, if you really like the loop, decorating, or have a few people to play with. playtimes tend to be 40-200 hours roughly.

Wobbledogs,
if you like the idea of raising cute pets with a genome and don't mind the very subtle horror/bizarre aspects (they can die, eat each other's bodies, and they pupate like caterpillars lol.) pretty sandbox game, and you can turn death off if you want. (or "clone" dogs you want to keep with the export/import tool in the menu.) this is a newer one for me so i've only put in 35 hours, but i fully intend to go back and try for some Huge Dogs TM. average seems about 20 hours but you can spend a lot if you like raising weirdo pets.

their "hello fellow kids" energy works better for their goofy insignificant patch notes than it does for combating bad PR.

i was very on the fence about keeping it installed on a potato windows laptop i don't use for much else. this article absolutely convinced me fully not to. they could not have written a worse case for themselves if they had tried.

they have stated they even intend to try getting anticheat on macs as soon as possible. even if it is not possible, (which seems likely to me, considering the ecosystem?) their argument for axing linux could easily be used to just ditch macs. "we don't know how to secure it, and there were only 800 players [on a random, cherry picked day.]"

having a section in which they claim there are zero false positives is delusional. that's not how technology works. there will literally always be bugs, glitches, edge cases.

they claim they can currently read stuff in user mode, so it'll be essentially analogous in invasiveness, and it's straight bullshit.

this is several degrees of trust beyond "can read stuff in user mode when running"
this is "can read anything in user mode, in admin mode, on all other users on your computer, can restrict your bios and hardware, and has full potential to have permanent root access to any user or system you install in the future"

either they do not understand what they are implementing, which is a really bad sign for trusting them with it,
or they know exactly what they are doing and lying about it, which is another really bad sign for trusting them with it.

i'm gonna be honest, if they had taken the hardline "we know it's more invasive, but we need this" and kept it straight, i might have kept playing. it's the only multiplayer competitive game i have anymore.

but the ad hominem attacks in here, the calls to the "angry twitter mobs," the disingenuous and extremely loose way they play with the truth, ~~(it's not running all the time! well, it is, but we don't really think it should count)~~ that in just a few paragraphs has burned any goodwill i had towards them. they are weaponizing their own playerbase to cannibalize themselves and attack their friends for having legitimate concerns about degrees of personal invasion and that's unconscionable. that disgusts me more than the crappy implementation and the cavalier attitude ever could.

props to them, i guess, for making the only choice to be to quit a game i played happily for about a decade.

I started at 25mg 2 weeks, went to 50mg 2 weeks, now 100mg. It's faster than most people, for sure, but should be titrated enough to avoid SJS. I would not recommend starting at 100mg lmao. thanks ^^

i've been looking into lamotrigine for about 4 years, the same amount of time i've known i was almost certainly bipolar. i like knowing fully what i'm getting into. i chose this to start with this one specifically with great intention.

the intense joint pain was unexpected, it's a very rare symptom. the heat flashes, the headaches, tinnitus, the intense weirdness, moreso expected (though still interesting, it's given me various very curious intense feelings on an apparent roulette wheel.) i know enough to give it time at least, a month minimum to settle. i have hopes, people with symptoms presenting similar to mine had pretty positive results.

i don't feel "bad," exactly. just very strange. though i appreciate your well wishes.