So basically, a heads up on where propaganda will need to go.

My entire point was that they weren’t doing so …

Good times create weak men who think those good times came out of nothing and want an easy excuse on why they are being deprived of something they thing they are naturally entitled to. This excuse usually ends up being believing those who the good men who created those good times fought against.

This is the time you decide whether the Civil War was just about about keeping the country united to maintain its power or whether it was about ending slavery (which it didn’t, but that’s another point). It’s clear that keeping the country together only helped maintain US power and influence internationally, because the assholes who rebelled to protect slavery have kept their agenda and are clearly in power now. It does not bode well when only the abuser is willing to stand up for themselves and their narcissism while the victim still thinks that if they are nice enough they will get anyone to see the error of their ways. Are democrats just willing to tolerate abuse? Is there nothing they would secede from, even a tyrant?

Right now, some GOP members are playing a charade of fighting the administration on side issues like Ukraine. Make no mistake, they are still complicit with a Trump admin, and midterms will be a charade as well.

What’s wrong is that officers of the law are allowed to lie like that, yet still want to be respected.

The guys that are currently restoring confederate monuments would perform a takeover of the state by the federal government. US states no longer share core values, sometimes very hypocritically so.

Also would mean they would incidentally lose all right to ever call China’s Tiannamen Square massacre out again.

That’s no what it costs, that’s a portion of the survival fee Israel has imposed on Gaza’s Palestinians now.

They should be. Meanwhile, the governor, while criticizing Trump, was still whitewashing him when he said he would be willing to work with him. That’s the thing, fascist dictators will fabricate if they are not able to force a situation, and sometimes that’s to handle the situation before it ever gets a chance to materialize. Look at Erdogan and the failed 2016 military coup that basically disarmed any further attempts against him. Trump wants to prevent and punish rebellion because he knows that where he is going to bring the United States is going to instill a lot of it.

States do need to secede, the US is no longer operating within the constitution, it is their only out, and Trump is going to do everything to prevent it. The problem is, a lot of states should be coordinating together on this and falling back to Articles of Confederation between them to retain their autonomy and prevent the subverted military agencies from invading them. It really requires a mindset to resist forcefully if necessary while people are still getting brainwashed through their social network bubbles and the militarized occupation forces are already present. The constitution is no longer in effect, all branches of government are now irrevocably corrupt, and Trump is crowning himself not as a modern king but as the type of king the thirteen colonies rebelled against.

“But we belong to the special exclusive club of supporters who are protected from those actions, actions that mean we will be better off even if the majority of everyone else will be worse off!” To them, they can have their lack-of-empathy cake and eat it, too.

That’s why Trump distanced himself from and actively pissed off international allies while siding with dictators. This is why Trump has sunk the economy to promote only that of his insiders. This is the context under which Trump is considering taking over Canada and Greenland while pulling out of NATO. He has been promised a kingdom and he doesn’t care how much worse off the country it is as a result of it because he only cares about being a malignant narcissist, just like the people propping him up.

All forms of condensation must be exterminated!

Anyway, the reason they want to push bullshit laws is that bullshit laws can be used to punished whomever they like precisely because they are not founded in reality.

The law hasn’t mattered so far. It is illegal for him to deploy the National Guard without the governor’s consent, which was not given. Not only was it now given, but Trump went out of his way to denounce the governor while illegally deploying the National Guard.

The US is no longer operating within the constitution, it is operating under the appearance of one, an appearance that falls apart the closer you look at it.

The environment has been shaped by countless extinctions over millennia. The environment does not need white knights, it simply is. Another entirely is what we would like it to be. A whale “tracking the ethical and environmental impacts of its pod’s consumption” would be at a competitive disadvantage to those who don’t. specially given that they are carnivores who don’t have the privilege of omnivore white knighting. Not eating meat is them dying en masse unless one of them is able to survive off of plants somehow, if at all. Bulls will skewer anyone who go near their territory, and they are herbivores, nature does not share your concerns not because of intellectual capacity but because they don’t need to.

We can track the ethical and environmental impacts, but we only do so within our own perspective. It is a trait of any animal to show empathy for that which they do care about, and ignorance and even disdain for that which they do not. People who care about the feelings of animals, feelings they do have, do so because they have the luxury of not becoming fodder. Not only people, but animals in captivity who are fed and need not worry about where their food or if they are food have been shown to express this notion as well.

Life exists to survive. Don’t think your ethical and environmental concerns will afford you likewise considerations from other animals, from humans to whales alike. Just because you feel and because they feel does not mean they will care. You pick your fights, you want to care about whales, you might end up caring too much about everything before ever finding yourself getting kicked to the ground because of a dystopian hellscape that was too out of focus for you coming from your own species. Will you ask if the concerns you chose to erect walls around helped you out then?

Our ecosystems are doomed to change just as we are, but we should not accelerate their change unless we are ready to change ourselves. Unfortunately, the entire ocean is changing now, and if anything major governments driven by profits have made sure we are not ready to change. F-ing whaling is the least of my worries nowadays because so much more has become concerning.

If there were fish artists, do you think they would draw depressing pictures of whales obliterating entire colonies just to feed themselves, or humans doing the same for entire ecosystems?

I’m all for taking better care of our ecosystems, but let’s face it, a lot of animals are assholes whose lives literally depends on preying on other animals. I also don’t like to hear plants scream: https://www.sciencetimes.com/articles/24473/20191218/a-group-of-scientists-suggest-that-plants-feel-pain.htm

It’s also as a consequence of states that no longer share the same values. While I’m sure NY has its fair share of assholes working under ICE, how much do you want to bet most of that ICE staff has been brought from places like Texas? They are literally targeting states like NY and LA with military vehicles.

When will the US realize that people no longer hold the same values across state borders and that the only who will win out are the ones who exploit it? This isn’t because of the people but because of control of the media and culture, like how Sinclair has been buying up local news stations selectively.

This is no longer a test, it is a reality. Too many branches of the federal government are corrupt, with legal exceptions to back them up. If a bridge is no longer just in need of severe maintenance but is in the process of crumbling, do you still call it and use it as a bridge? That’s the actual state of your Union right now. I don’t think seceding is realistically an option right now because it requires opposition that just isn’t there, but I don’t see any other realistic alternative. Look at LA, that’s falling directly into Trump’s hands by giving him emergency powers and control of the national guard, the only difference if a state attempts to secede is that it has more of a chance to use its institutions to resist. The excuse under a dictatorship is always doomed to be manufactured if not forced.

The federal government has irrevocably been compromised, US states need to be able to leave it. Preferably like the UK left the EU, without a civil war. It’s only going to get worse, and reform is no longer possible, as too many branches have been compromised and midterms are likely to be compromised by Agent Kraskov and friends. As much as the Trump-Musk sideshow feud keeps going, it’s not doing much and is not likely to do much to stop Trump.

No time like the present to begin creating a European alternative, given the geopolitics of the times.

No offense, but have you ever read EULAs? Even Windows EULA has a lot of “cut off a finger” provisions. It’s invasive, and people are right to complain. People might cry Linux, but when their job requires them to use Windows and abide by that EULA, most will crumble.

Like it or not, most EULAs are legally binding bullshit that more often than not has to be ignored or bypassed outside of it if necessary. How many people are watching YouTube and ignoring their Terms of Service while using adblockers?

This is nothing new in the world of gaming, and to the scale of affecting over 50% of the score of a game for a provision that is often included in other games they have no problem with is what’s revealing. A lot of MMOs and many multiplayer games do, but people haven’t cried wolf outside of a minority of their community. Pitchford has given his explanation, that it is a matter of the 2K EULA Gearbox has to adopt.

Let’s try this logic on other things. Are all 2K games that have this in their newly updated EULA’s being boycotted? Hint: Civilization is a 2K game.

Some things are just obvious when your head is not stuck inside the ass of a circlejerk bandwagon. It’s just sad that some people aren’t honest with themselves and and are not willing to recognize how easily they are influenced by people who are holding hidden grudges. Too many games are getting shit on because of this, and I say this as someone who is not looking forward to the next Borderlands game until the discounts drop it well below its 80 dollar price tag several years from now while plenty of loud people in this thread will go out to buy it on day one.