There’s a lot you can do, actually. You can put people in jail, for one. Possession in non-designated areas, such as a construction site or a personal residence, could lead to confiscation and a misdemeanor. It can just be socially impolite to have one around people—you know, like your car keys are after you’ve been drinking.

The chasm of understanding is that you don’t want to do anything—literally anything—about abuse in your society.

And for what? So that chatgpt can give you advice on what to order next from your burrito taxi? So that you don’t have to go through the pain of writing a long email to your boss that he’s going to summarize with the same AI service anyway?

I don’t think being able to generate funny looking pictures is worth letting Palantir, another pet project of the vampire Peter Thiel, create a nightmare social-credit system actually worthy of 1984 to deter union advocacy, palastinian-genocide protest, being remotely anti-Trump—anything found disagreeable to the state—from ever realistically happening again. In all countries, mind you.

We can’t do anything about that?

…

You know what else we can’t do anything about? Global Warming. When the water wars finally kill us, I suppose I’ll come greet you in hell.

God, it really doesn’t take much to bring out the spite and resentment from people, does it?

And yes, I’m talking about you, Captain.

I don’t know if you know this, but there are a limited number of kidneys to transplant. I honestly don’t know what else to say.

Yes. I know you were.
So, is it that you do think a board of real human people is better, then?

I was talking about the game, sorry. 😅
I’ve only seen a bit of season 1 the show.

Yeah, that’s a bummer.

I haven’t seen much of the show, but this does remind me of a moment in… episode 2, I think? Where they make a joke about the fungus not having airborne spores. And I was like, “have them or don’t, but don’t make fun of me, what the hell?” I liked the airborne spores, haha.

Well, I think vengeance is probably a difficult thing for people to sympathize with in general. Seemingly everyone, even us, give up on it long before Ellie does. Personally, I did believe that she wanted to keep going even if I didn’t.

The difficult thing with Abby is that she’s built up like a monster, so when you switch perspectives, it almost feels like a cheap trick at first. Her being butch and woke or whatever didn’t help, but it is a tough transition, to be sure. The thing I liked about it, though, when they finally face off: I didn’t know who I wanted to win. I liked Ellie a lot more, but I also thought she was a worse person. To me, the game made the case for why Abby should live, and I kind of agreed.

the second game was very much not linear levels like the game was for the first one?

It does ping pong between different flashback perspectives and whatnot. I… probably wouldn’t call it linear.

This might be more up for debate, but I did really like Ellie’s character development in Part 2; it echoed some things I thought about Joel in Part 1.

This article is saying that Part 1 sold 6 million in one year, and Part 2 sold 10 million in 2 years. Bit odd that it’s using such bizarre numbers, but I don’t see how this isn’t a success.

If you’re talking all time, Part 1 came out 5 years sooner and it’s the first in a sequence—it’s always going to have those advantages.

No, no, the second game wasn’t received well because right wingers didn’t like the lesbians or the butch lady, and so it was heavily review bombed.

You can argue some people had legitimate criticisms, as they will, this is always how the confusion circus goes, but you cannot separate this game’s release from the anti-sjw hate campaign that was built around it.

The Last of Us Part II has some fan-tastic story beats that I will defend to death.

Okay? So does it meaningfully help to restrict hammer use or doesn’t it? I’m the one asking the question, you’re just kind of handwaving it away, as if restricting hammers would be “ridiculous.”

but women raping men is irrelevant to the topic of men raping women?

Uh. Yes.

You are looking for reasons to be upset. Knock it off.

If you must hear me say it: women should stop raping men. There you go. Mission accomplished.

I don’t mind condescending to AI salesmen.

If boss Kolanaki can’t replace you with AI, then why is AI passing your classes for you?

I get you want to burn the system, and yay, I love burning things, but it’s kind of irrelevant to the point being made.

It’s just funny that the simple one would win. It’s like a whitebelt getting a technical win against a judo master—it’s just funny that it happened.

Both of these frog images are the work of people, though, which is something AI can’t give you, so…

What is the objective criteria?

and now here you are agreeing that it’s a bad comparison because you think I made it.

No, I think it’s a good comparison. You just don’t understand why I’m making it.

Again, deliberately obtuse.

If a boss thinks it can do the job itself, let it do the job itself.

How does this disagree with Kolanaki, exactly? You’re repeating them.

suggesting that any and all criticism towards any woman on the internet simply must be based on her gender

I haven’t said that. In fact, I specifically said “I wasn’t critiquing their points.”

I have to think you’re being deliberately obtuse. This is actually why I’m being condescending: I don’t think you’re an ally. You are, in your own way, doing the rhetorical ducking and weaving that I’m pointing out.

For example, did I say that gamergate participants were career politicians? Do you think I think they had the ability to pass laws?

then I’m fundamentally asking the same question as you. Why are these people spending so much of their energy defending her?

Uh. Sexism is bad, I think. I believe I’ve been told that.

If you disagree that sexism is happening, then okay. This still answers your question. What more is there for me to do here? Would you like me to give this answer a 4th time?

Lower level math classes still ban the calculator.

Math classes are to understand numbers, not to get the right answer. That’s why you have to show your work.

Does your intimate knowledge of the civil rights era include how people use issues in euphemism to lie about what actually motivates them? You know, the whole reason I even brought up that example.

I’ve never seen this before

That doesn’t even remotely appear to be what is happening here

Okay, realize for a moment that the fig leaf strategy is specifically meant to capture people like you. I know it doesn’t seem that way; that’s the point of them hiding their intent. I’m not critiquing their points, I’m asking why they’re spending so much energy on this. I’ve seen lots of comics I don’t like. I scroll past them.

Here’s a question: Gamergate. Was Anita Sarkeesian really that bad a journalist? Or did people hyper-fixate on her shortcomings for months longer than necessary as a way of damaging the reputations of her and feminism broadly?

You and I both know now, today, that gamergate was bullshit. But did people—maybe you’re very special, but I don’t mean you, I mean people—know back then that “ethics in games journalism” is not really what those people were upset about? Because I don’t know if you remember, but gamergate was pretty popular for a while.

this doesn’t really answer for me why the defensiveness is so over the top

I think they’re attacking a woman they don’t like. That’s in the subtext of my other comment.