This is the correct response. Social media, as a construct, is not evil and dos not do harm to anyone. The commodification and commercialisation of social media by capitalistic companies is what has caused the harm we see today.

All of the harms and evils of social media can be boiled down to a single concept: the algorithm. Because algorithmic recommendation of content wants to encourage people to stay on a platform (for capitalistic reasons), and the most enticing and attention-grabbing content is hate-content, these companies have forced hate-inducing concepts down the throats of people in an endeavour to make more money and destroyed individuals and families/friends in the process.

If we regulate the algorithms, we regulate the harm without disempowering anyone. We can, and we should, regulate algorithms on social media to turn it back into what it was 20-odd years ago - a measure to keep in touch with people you know or care about.

Honestly, while Booking.com acted shittily here, I have absolutely no sympathy for anyone who buys a home and does short-term rentals. Every investment vehicle has risks, and this woman copped the short end of the stick when it came to the risk associated with her investment choice. She chose to purchase a basic human need and try to maximise her profit from it at the expense of the average person trying to buy or rent a house and, if she didn’t want the risk of this happening, she should’ve chosen a less risky investment like bonds or a term deposit.

Landlords are bad; fuckwits who own short-stay rentals are far worse. The market distortion they create hurts so many people in so many ways. Frankly, I hope she takes this as a sign she should just sell the property and move on to something else.

https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/problem-with-a-product-or-service-you-bought/repair-replace-refund-cancel

These are direct quotes from the ACCC website (my bolding added for emphasis):

• When a product has a major problem, consumers can choose between a refund or replacement.

• When a business sells a product with a major problem, or a product that later develops a major problem, it must give the consumer the choice of a: refund, or replacement of the same type of product.

Do you mean shot dead?

Too many enjoy the (temporary) safety that Trump provides them to stand up for others. Too many still are afraid to stand up for the rights of others for fear that their rights might be taken away in response. Too many others are beaten down and exhausted from the system that keeps them oppressed to be able to stand up for what’s right. Too many have either never read or truly understood Martin Niemöller’s “First They Came”.

I’m curious, what’s your definition of communism?

I’d go one step further to say that empathy and compassion aren’t actually alien concepts to them - they know full well what they are. Empathy and compassion are signs of weakness to them. Empathy and compassion are evils to them. Empathy and compassion are anathema to their worldview. Empathy and compassion are for those whom they hunt.

They view themselves as amoral apex predators, able to take what they want under ‘might makes right’. They aren’t all psychopaths - they’re sociopaths who selectively choose towards whom they feel empathy and compassion. They’re cognisant of this and view it as their strength. They’re fucking malevolent.

Learning to read analogue clocks also helps provide some foundational learning for circular geometry - being able to quickly identify relevant segments of a circle and their respective fractions (5 minutes = 1/12 = 30° = π/6 rad etc.) helps build towards being able to compute circular geometric problems more easily in later years.

There are larger, more established correlational studies that show a link between dental health and overall physical health as well. There needs to be much more study done but preliminary evidence would suggest that preventive dental care provides for a cheaper overall health cost for a person over their lifetime.

I feel like it’d be ‘Solstheimer’, but I can’t explain why. Just rolls off the tongue better.

I really, really hope you’re right.

Communism doesn’t mandate a single-party government though. Single-party government is just authoritarianism. That’s why there are, and have been, communist parties in democratic countries.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communism

“Communism (from Latin communis ‘common, universal’) is a political and economic ideology whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange that allocates products in society based on need. A communist society entails the absence of private property and social classes, and ultimately money and the state. Communism is a part of the broader socialist movement.”

By this definition, PRC is decidedly not communist as the common people do not own the means of production; products in society are not solely allocated based on need; private property exists; social classes exist; and money exists.

Whose definition of communism are you relying upon?

Weapon degradation seems to be a serious and genuine complaint that a lot of people have with BotW and TotK but for some reason it never seemed to bother me as it has others. I totally understand the criticism but frankly I always had a full stock of good quality weapons - particularly with the Fuse function in TotK - and never ran low or out of decent weapons on hand.

I think they were implemented to try to force gamers to think about other options to take down enemies rather than brute-forcing every battle which appeals to me, but it seems to have angered a significant proportion of people. From my perspective, it helps to engender the puzzler aspect of Zelda games in a novel way - viewing battles as a puzzle to be solved for maximum efficiency rather than how well you can strike and dodge.

Musk is a piece of shit nazi whose public opinions are actively harming his companies, but let’s not get all puritanical about the use of drugs. Plenty of people use the drugs you’ve listed (and many more) and aren’t hateful fuckwads.

Yeah South Australia has done some amazingly progressive things. They were the first jurisdiction in the world to give women the right to vote AND run for parliament in 1894 and when Australia voted No on creating a federal Indigenous Voice to Parliament, they were the first state to set up their own state-based Voice of elected Aboriginal peoples.

Some other progressive firsts:

They were the first Australian colony to accept legal testimony from Aboriginal peoples in 1844; the first part of the British Empire to cut links between church and state in 1851; the first Australian state to give Aboriginal men the right to vote in 1856; the first part of the British Empire to legalise trade unions in 1876; the first Australian state to decriminalise homosexuality in 1975; and the first Australian state to make age-based discrimination illegal in 1991.

I, too, find it really odd that Turning Point has found a hold there. They’ve typically been quite progressive - even their Liberal governments are usually far more progressive than the Libs around the rest of the country.

His records were among some of the first I ever owned (inherited from my father) and it really hurt to destroy them when we all found out about who he actually is. It really felt like I was destroying a part of my childhood. Had to be done though.

That depends - am I only physically attracted to them? The answer is no, whether or not they’re trans. Am I also attracted to their personality? Then yes, whether or not they’re trans.

It helps that I’m bi.

We were taught a similar trick in physics - point your right-hand thumb in the direction that current (or electrons, same same) is travelling and the curling of your fingers shows the direction of the resultant magnetic field that the current creates.

I had a little chuckle-up myself

Uhhh, no. That’s not how RCV works at all.

Let’s say there are five candidates - A, B , C, D, and E.

Let’s assume candidates A & B are the most popular.

Personally I choose to rank them as C, E, D, B and then A.

Out of all of them, no one gets over 50% of the #1 vote. Whoever gets the lowest #1 vote is knocked out first. Let’s suggest that this is C. All of their #1 votes and therefore my vote is then transferred to E.

Let’s suggest that after this there’s still no one who has over 50% of the vote between the other four candidates. Let’s further assume that candidate E has the lowest resulting vote after the first round of knockout. My vote is then transferred to candidate D.

Out of A, B, and D, let’s assume none of them still have over 50% of the vote after this redistribution. Let’s further assume that D has the lowest vote of the three. My vote is then transferred to B.

Given there are only two candidates left, one will have to have a majority. That candidate wins.

Under RCV, as long as you mark every box with a preference your vote can never ever be wasted. It will always end up with a candidate that wins or one that loses, but it cannot ever be exhausted and therefore meaningless.