I don’t buy the Epstein files distraction, because it’s pretty clear the US public don’t give a shit. What would the Epstein files even prove?

You could release an authentic video of Trump fucking an 8 year old and then throwing the lifeless body down a laundry chute and most Yanks would just shrug and say “whaddaguy”. Hell, if the kid was an immigrant’s, his ratings would probably go up.

There is nothing in the Epstein files that could possibly touch Trump. It’s all already priced in and you elected him anyway.

You mean like the books on this list? https://www.cfpublic.org/education/2024-11-11/florida-list-banned-books-schools

No, not really. But thank you for providing an excellent example; it turns out your free speech absolutism is no protection from the “slippery slope” whatsoever.

It’s not censorship that’s the slippery slope to oppression. It’s electing demagogues that’s the slippery slope to oppression, and it turns out your religious worship of the ability to be offensive to minorities not only didn’t protect you, it hastened you on your journey.

I’d rather live in a country that banned Mein Kampf but doesn’t threaten to shut down media that fails to praise the Dear Leader, than one that searches people’s phones at the border for evidence of thought crimes while defending Elon Musk’s right to spread Nazi propaganda to the hilt, tbh.

I’m sorry, but that’s just trite. Why does censorship, within bounds defined by a democratic decision making process, eventually get abused for oppression when so can every other right which we accept governments can control? What is UNIQUE about censorship?

ALL society is a tradeoff of rights. When you put someone in jail, you deprive them of fundamental human rights more or less by definition. Jails absolutely DO get abused for oppression. Yet we accept that for a civilised society.

Grade-school appeals to Orwell are not a good enough explanation for why freedom of speech is a unique shibboleth in US society. Particularly if “because otherwise it will be abused for oppression” in particular does not stand when your much-vaunted freedom of speech is being abused for oppression; Citizens United is exactly the kind of decision that uses free-speech absolutism to oppress.

I have a suspicion that the kind of surge protector rating it’s reasonable to fit to the main electrical input for a building is unlikely to actually trigger on the small surges that the surge protector in a UPS will, and you will still get earth-leakage trips on the RCDs with UPSs downstream of them.

Having one radial (for the computer rack) NOT protected by an RCD seems like a cheaper and more reliable solution, but I confess it’s not bubbled to the top of my to-do list yet to get a sparky involved for advice.

You understand that the RCD is (mandatorily) in the electrical distribution panel where it hands off to the utility supply right?

Although it’s an absolute pain in the arse in certain scenarios. Surge protectors essentially present as a leak to earth any time they do their job, so my mandatory RCCBs on every circuit turn minor mains fluctuations into permanent outages.

I really need to see if I can legally run one circuit that isn’t RCD protected for my homelab…

Government censorship is not permissible in a free society, period.

Why?

I mean that as a genuine, serious question. Why?

I understand that Americans are raised with this as some kind of article of faith, but have you ever actually sat down and come up with a rational justification for that point of view?

There are many societies that are on all objective levels more free than tbe US, which are not absolutist on free-speech, so why do you believe that?

I moved everything I had in GC & AWS off onto Scaleway when the whole Greenland bullshit started, and I have to say - no regrets.

(At work I cancelled our migration to GC and we stuck with Ionos, for much the same reasons; having now road-tested Scaleway for a while there’s a good chance of introducing them as a second supplier.)

A few tens of thousands of dollars a month isn’t going to make much difference to them, but every little helps.

I turned kitty’s bed - that she slept in as a kitten, but then spent about 5 years refusing to acknowledge - back into a bed by putting an electric heating mat under it. Hey presto, it’s back in favour!

This is not correct; they haven’t been convicted of anything yet.

They’re out on the equivalent of bail awaiting trial. That they are not wearing ankle tags or the like and are allowed to travel was thanks to pressure from the US Government, though.

Cretin.

plonk, as we used to say in the good old days.

No, they’re not.

Next idiotic question?

Ukraine is not a European country then?

I tell you who is crying a fucking river - fucking yanks like you who think putting a bumper sticker on their car is “protest”. I’ve spent time in Ukraine, I’ve had Ryssian soldiers - supported by YOUR president - try to lynch me as a NATO spy. I know what it’s like to wake up to a rocket hitting the building next door to the one you are sleeping in, and I know what is like to drive gingerly around the wreckage of a car that’s been hit by a drone and will never forget how car parts and body parts seem to almost meld together in the wreckage.

So with literally ALL due respect - go fuck yourself.

Yeah, blame the victims, go ahead.

Sort. Your. Own. Shithole. Country. Out.

I feel like you should sort your own fucking house out before worrying about anyone else’s.

The days of Yanks getting a free pass to lecture everyone else are long gone.

No idea why the downvotes here.

I mean, someone up there just unironically called someone else a “class traitor”.

This is not a crowd that’s hanging straight on its hinges.

A brigade of yanks with “you just can’t understand how many solar systems fit in Texas, though” is incoming…

Thank you! I see it has a Linux version, so I will genuinely check that out - as soon as I get home. (As I write I’m waiting to board the first of 13 hours or so of flights - that’s why I happened to be checking out gaming reviews yesterday ;-). I’m hoping the 7th Guest remake will keep me sane…)

Genuinely, thank you both for the suggestions. I’m just wary of falling down the YouTube rabbithole - I refuse to even log-in to the damned site - so if I start watching one of them it’s going to have to be one I can remember the name of to search ;-).

(I thought Facebook was a bad idea from the get-go and never signed up, quit Instagram when FB bought them, quit Twitter when that asshole bought them… Lemmy and (sorry to say) Reddit are literally my only social media, and I question both of them fairly regularly. I do not claim to be normal ;-).)

The only reason I make an exception for Yahtzee is that having had a Steam account since Half-Life 2, Steam nevertheless remains comically bad at recommending games I’d be remotely interested in. Yahtzee’s reviews I often don’t agree with, but they do at least give me a hint of things I should check out.

Literally the only reason I ever use YouTube other than KPop^* videos is very occasionally, if I’m bored, to watch Yahtzee’s reviews. Last night I tuned in and a game I’ve not heard of before, Mixtape, got mentioned.

I thought “sounds curious, maybe I’ll search for some full reviews of that to see what it’s like”…

Ho. Lee. Hell.

There seems to be an entire genre on YouTube of absolutely godawful human beings just being fucking horrible in the guise of “game reviews”. I mean, just really unpleasant people who within about 30 seconds you know would be domestic abusers if they ever met a girl. Is this the edge of the manosphere? It’s absolutely revolting, whatever it is.

On the bright side, my “never, ever use YouTube for anything other than music videos” commitment is redoubled. I am so glad I’m old enough that this shit wasn’t ubiquitous when I was impressionable.