New Testingstan

So I figured I could bring this up here since it's come up in this thread recently

A few days ago latfc reblogged a post by a trans woman about... well I'll just link it here

Then that person got a lot of hate sent her way so the person running latfc posted this. Then he got tons of hate, as you can see if you check out the blog.

Anyway, if you're the kind of "ally" who's coming up a lot here where you tell the people to sit down and shut up and stop being so gosh darned irrational and angry and being such a huge bully to the oppressor classes because you're going to alienate other allies, stop. You are not actually an ally here if all you're doing is continuing to prioritise yourself over those who are oppressed. This goes for every sort of oppression and potential allyship. (also as an aside I do like the suggestion that the term "ally" be changed to "sidekick" because it just works so much better and makes our place clearer)

Ok this is pretty ranty and maybe I should've brought it up on my tumblr but every time I've been talking about stuff like this there one of my friends starts arguing with me and I don't like using tumblr to argue so I'd rather if this kicks up any shit it be over here :L

Anyone have recommendations for a GPS? I'm currently leaning toward the Garmin 40LM but given that it's two years old, I'm not sure if it's worth it or not to choose it over the 42LM. Do the maps matter more?

Garmin's pretty good. I'd just use Google Maps if you have a smart phone, though, since its free and provides all the relevant services plus transit maps.

RyanThunder wrote:Garmin's pretty good. I'd just use Google Maps if you have a smart phone, though, since its free and provides all the relevant services plus transit maps.

When I had a smart phone, I always had problems with Google Maps. The signal would be lost. It'd take me the longer way. I'd be sent to the wrong place. I also want to listen to music on my stereo while looking at a map on a screen. Garmin allows me to do that. You don't want someone talking to you for 11 hours.

IB I've read through like twenty pages on that blog, thanks for sharing that

IB I can't read your tumblr because when I zoom in your sidebar expands to fill the entire screen

I can't find the 'previous page' button. I'm not sure if it's not appearing because of my browser (IE8) or if I'm just being stupid.

Negative Knub wrote:

RyanThunder wrote:Garmin's pretty good. I'd just use Google Maps if you have a smart phone, though, since its free and provides all the relevant services plus transit maps.

When I had a smart phone, I always had problems with Google Maps. The signal would be lost. It'd take me the longer way. I'd be sent to the wrong place. I also want to listen to music on my stereo while looking at a map on a screen. Garmin allows me to do that. You don't want someone talking to you for 11 hours.

I dunno if Android does this, but my iPhone (yes yes, I'm getting something else asap) lets me play music while I use Google Maps for directions.

I personally haven't had those problems you mentioned so my experience of it is more positive.

RyanThunder wrote:I dunno if Android does this, but my iPhone (yes yes, I'm getting something else asap) lets me play music while I use Google Maps for directions.

I personally haven't had those problems you mentioned so my experience of it is more positive.

I mean that I want a screen big enough to allow me to look at a map while I listen to CDs in my stereo. Smart phones are too small for me and I like the way the maps on Garmin GPSes look.

Infinity Biscuit wrote:So I figured I could bring this up here since it's come up in this thread recently

A few days ago latfc reblogged a post by a trans woman about... well I'll just link it here

Then that person got a lot of hate sent her way so the person running latfc posted this. Then he got tons of hate, as you can see if you check out the blog.

I think that kind of caution is perfectly reasonable. What people should find offensive is that people have to live that way.

One thing I would note, however, is that I wonder if the EMT was concerned about offending people or concerned about reactionary shitlords making it a huge hassle to do her job if she did the right thing. In general I think there's an intersection with classism to be considered here - like the idea that minorities should be their "authentic selves" or refuse to conform to the system or they're sell-outs is problematic, so is the idea that non-minorities should always do the "right thing" regardless of consequences to them. Asking people to take a principled stand may ask a lot more of people with precarious lives than people with socioeconomic stability and privilidge.

One example that sticks out in my mind - this is something that came up on SB. Some rich guy who was upset about Chick Fil A's anti-gay marriage stand went down and harangued the cashier for daring to work for such an evil company. And it struck me how horribly classist that was - here was a guy feeling morally superior to somebody and judging them for not making what quite possibly were huge sacrifices he'd never had to make for his own principles.

This is totally a tangent but if you wanted an argument this is the best one I could think up.

also as an aside I do like the suggestion that the term "ally" be changed to "sidekick" because it just works so much better and makes our place clearer

"Ally" can embrace people who don't necessarily have all the same interests or goals as you but are willing to work with you, like Roosevelt and Stalin were pretty different but they were allies when it came to Hitler. "Sidekick" implies being principally concerned with your agenda (instead of your agenda agreeing with some part of their own), and willing to put themselves in a subordinate place; it embraces a more restricted set of people willing to work with you than "ally".

I suppose it's a question of whether you want a "big tent" strategy of trying to get as many people on your side as possible or a "small tent" strategy that values commitment more.

Losonti Tokash wrote:

The Spartan wrote:

Darksi4190 wrote:when was the last time Clancy put out a decent novel?

'Bout twenty years.

Edit: though his non-fiction stuff, I thought, was pretty good. So were some of the video games published under his name.

Coincidentally, I'm pretty sure that's the last time he actually wrote a novel.

Is it? I figured he actually wrote them through about 2003 for the Jack Ryan Universe*. But it was still around that same time that he started releasing different novel series "with" other authors.

*It's just he couldn't keep the story moving and the quality the same as he slowly, but continually Mary-Sue'd Jack Ryan until he was The Greatest President Ever(TM).

nah i believe there's pretty good evidence that ghostwriters took over starting with red storm rising

So basically

Tom Clancy hard turned from an author into a franchise ?

Losonti Tokash wrote:nah i believe there's pretty good evidence that ghostwriters took over starting with red storm rising

Really? I knew he co-wrote (whatever that entailed) Red Storm Rising, but I had thought he had written the books in the Jack Ryan series. Or at least most of them...

My understanding is that Jack Ryan series were mostly written by Tom himself, but all the spinoffs like elite ghost recon opfor patrol were ghost written

Losonti Tokash wrote:IB I can't read your tumblr because when I zoom in your sidebar expands to fill the entire screen

Fuck are you on mobile? I may have to break down and optimise the layout for mobile at some point even though I love the layout

Kryten wrote:I can't find the 'previous page' button. I'm not sure if it's not appearing because of my browser (IE8) or if I'm just being stupid.

It's on the left below the TAGS button and above the robit lady

Darksi4190 wrote:when was the last time Clancy put out a decent novel?

The Cardinal of the Kremlin, maybe?

thejester wrote:

>:3 wrote:Today marks the end of the first quarter of SDN's 12th year of operation. Time to update the posts per day count for the three quarters since the last time I did this.

That's a pretty brutal decline. I wonder if it'll revive with the release of the new movie.

I don't know. Mike hasn't put out any analysis of Star Wars or Star Trek in years, so not much to attract new people outside of the forums who might hop in. What's there on SDN otherwise?

Bakustra wrote:Wonder why SB took off so suddenly.

Various aspects of its Creative Writing forums (including the "decide what happens next" thing), AFAIK.

Negative Knub wrote:Anyone have recommendations for a GPS? I'm currently leaning toward the Garmin 40LM but given that it's two years old, I'm not sure if it's worth it or not to choose it over the 42LM. Do the maps matter more?

Buy newer devices.

Infinity Biscuit wrote:

Losonti Tokash wrote:IB I can't read your tumblr because when I zoom in your sidebar expands to fill the entire screen

Fuck are you on mobile? I may have to break down and optimise the layout for mobile at some point even though I love the layout

yeah basically 90% of my internet use is on either my phone or tablet

but no worries i don't really go on tumblr much at the moment and i think the app isn't garbage anymore so i should try it on there

nah my best friend kept bugging me to go to mobile optimisation and I was just being stubborn since I want everyone to see my fab layout but I GUESS I could be considerate :L

I can vaguely remember reading through a Tom Clancy novel that was interesting and entertaining, but maybe I was a little young for it and lost interest in reading it - I think it involved a top secret Soviet laser weapon facility close to the Afghanistan border.

Novelists don't make old bones.

That would be Cardinal of the Kremlin.

Jung wrote:I suppose it's a question of whether you want a "big tent" strategy of trying to get as many people on your side as possible or a "small tent" strategy that values commitment more.

Mainly it's this

petition to rename allies sidekicks

• -sidekicks help u win ur fights but are never the heros
  -sidekick sounds more sporty
  -sidekicks are expected to screw up occasionally
  -u can fire ur sidekick

Mainly the first (and also the last) one. The narrative that it's the allies who are the real heavy lifters is pretty widespread and corrosive, and actually pretty well-pushed by those who wish to maintain the status quo (look at the farcical mythology of the civil rights movement for a great example)

phongn wrote:

Darksi4190 wrote:when was the last time Clancy put out a decent novel?

The Cardinal of the Kremlin, maybe?

Cardinal of the Kremlin is actually a ripper - best balance I think between Clancy's own technothriller methodology and that of the traditional Cold War spy novel.

thejester wrote:

>:3 wrote:Today marks the end of the first quarter of SDN's 12th year of operation. Time to update the posts per day count for the three quarters since the last time I did this.

That's a pretty brutal decline. I wonder if it'll revive with the release of the new movie.

I don't know. Mike hasn't put out any analysis of Star Wars or Star Trek in years, so not much to attract new people outside of the forums who might hop in. What's there on SDN otherwise?

Yeah that's true. It's interesting when I joined (in 2005 IIRC) having been a pretty regular poster at SB SDN's appeal was very much built not on the SW/ST angle but the alleged superiority of debate and political debate in particular. I think that appeal has faded for a number of reasons, not least that while SB remains more overtly spammy (and I barely post there anymore as well) a hard core of interesting, articulate and progressive posters have emerged that help drive debate. Those kind of posters don't exist on SDN anymore.

Infinity Biscuit wrote:(also as an aside I do like the suggestion that the term "ally" be changed to "sidekick" because it just works so much better and makes our place clearer)

I ain't your sidekick

Respecting you isn't a job, it's just a function of being a human being.

thejester wrote:

phongn wrote:The Cardinal of the Kremlin, maybe?

Cardinal of the Kremlin is actually a ripper - best balance I think between Clancy's own technothriller methodology and that of the traditional Cold War spy novel.

It's probably my favorite of his novels; I think Sum of All Fears is decent if a little out there, and I never got around to reading Without Remorse. Clancy's politics then started overtaking everything and I just got rather tired of it all. I can't recall what I thought of Clear and Present Danger. It's pretty clear his editors just stopped doing serious editing once he became really popular.

Yeah that's true. It's interesting when I joined (in 2005 IIRC) having been a pretty regular poster at SB SDN's appeal was very much built not on the SW/ST angle but the alleged superiority of debate and political debate in particular. I think that appeal has faded for a number of reasons, not least that while SB remains more overtly spammy (and I barely post there anymore as well) a hard core of interesting, articulate and progressive posters have emerged that help drive debate. Those kind of posters don't exist on SDN anymore.

Yeah, there's very little interesting on SDN for me; I just sort of pop by occasionally and look for anything in G&C that might interest me. I tired of SB some years back when the fools had the high ground and the moderators/administrators were overwhelmed, though I heard that changed.