I am live.
Sorry I didn’t really feel like doing the leg work but here you go.
I swear to God I have this vinyl somewhere in my house but I haven’t seen it in years and haven’t listened to it in years.
But it is quite quite good if you are able to find a digitized copy of it somewhere or the original which is extremely hard to find nowadays.
In terms of sea shanties, and I’ll be the first to say for a 40 year old my taste in music is… Eclectic to say the last, but there is a recording out of the 60s that is the quintessential collection of sea shanties and it is absolutely amazing.
I’m glad you liked Shameless and enjoyed it; it’s absolutely fantastic that you did. There’s no issue with that.
But I thought it was, objectively, a very mediocre show. It relied almost exclusively on unnecessary shock value to drive the narrative and keep people watching.
It was so pointlessly raunchy and disgusting.
If you have to rely on gratuitous sex and violence to keep your audience engaged, you’re not making a good show.
Nip/Tuck is another great example of this.
I would say you believe this for two main reasons. One, those are some of the shows that you watched and are familiar with, and you’ve seen spectacularly little of what is actually on that list.
And two, your own subjective experience is dictating what you feel is better versus what is worse, which is ultimately a completely useless way to estimate how good something actually is.
Furthermore, lists like this are intentionally inflammatory. They’ll put several genuinely good entries way too low on the list specifically so people will argue about it and drive engagement.
I mean, Westworld didn’t even make the cut but Scandal did.
I’m like why aren’t the sopranos in here and I’m like o ya that show came out in the 90s! Then I’m like fuck i’m old.
Also Gilmore Girls deserves to be way, way higher on that list!
I fucking hate holodecks.
They are dangerous, psychologically destructive machines that have no place on earth. We have no idea what prolonged exposure to simulated environments does to the human brain. People are spending hours inside fake worlds instead of interacting with reality. Children are probably going to grow up thinking consequences aren’t real because their parents let them spend twelve hours a day fighting robots in a simulated medieval castle.
And don’t even get me started on the fact that the computer can generate literally anything you ask for.
That is not progress. That is an existential threat to society.
So, naturally, I have volunteered to personally test every single holodeck in the world.
Every last one.
I will spend as much time as necessary inside these horrible, dangerous machines so that nobody else has to endure the terrible psychological consequences of using them.
You are welcome.
I like Kyle.
O! Let’s see if I can stir up some shit!
AI is awesome! I use it all the time.
Socialism is bullshit and sucks really bad!
There are only two genders.
Reddit is a great place with really great communities. Spez is a nice dude!
United States immigration is doing a great job of deporting criminals!
Trump 2028.
😀
Thought of another one: ice is just doing their job!
First, I have to say: that was an exceptionally well-written response. Concise, thoughtful, nuanced, and actually engaging with the substance of what I was saying. That is a refreshing departure from what I usually encounter on this platform, where discussions like this tend to devolve into people rudely dismissing the argument, accusing someone of being a simp, or throwing around “straw man” as though identifying a logical fallacy somehow constitutes a rebuttal. I genuinely appreciate the effort you put into your response.
And honestly, I generally agree with you.
The crux of my argument was intentionally simplified because the audience I am usually engaging with isn’t particularly familiar with the distinctions between the various schools of socialist thought. A significant portion of the people I encounter who describe themselves as socialists are actually advocating for social democracy without realizing that there is an important distinction between the two. That’s ultimately where most of my engagement on this subject comes from.
I’m not trying to argue that socialism begins with Lenin and ends with Stalin or Mao. Obviously, there are numerous socialist traditions that predate, coexist with, and directly oppose Leninism. Your point about material conditions is particularly well taken. Political and economic systems don’t develop in a vacuum, and attempting to judge every form of socialism through the lens of 1917 Russia is just as reductive as pretending Leninism represents socialism as a whole.
Where I think our distinction is primarily one of emphasis is that I’m interested in making sure people understand what they’re actually advocating for. If someone tells me they support universal healthcare, strong labor protections, substantial redistribution, public investment, and a robust social safety net, I’m perfectly happy to explain that they may actually be describing social democracy rather than socialism. If they then tell me they genuinely support social ownership of the means of production, that’s a different conversation.
Ultimately, my goal isn’t to convince everyone that socialism is inherently evil or that capitalism is inherently good. It’s to inform people about what these systems actually mean and the differences between them, so they’re not inadvertently advocating for something they haven’t actually considered.
And this is where I think the historical record matters. Social democracy has been implemented extensively and has produced some remarkably successful societies. Democratic socialism, at least in the sense of substantially restructuring ownership of the economy while retaining democratic institutions, has not been implemented on anything approaching the same scale. Whatever one’s theoretical opinion of democratic socialism, we simply don’t have the same empirical evidence demonstrating that it works.
So when someone says, “I support socialism,” I think it’s entirely reasonable to ask what they mean by that.
And honestly, I hope more discussions about this subject could look like this one. We can disagree about definitions, historical traditions, and economic models without immediately turning the conversation into a confrontation. I’d much rather have someone make a nuanced argument like yours and force me to refine my own position than have someone simply dismiss it because they don’t like the conclusion.
That kind of discussion is actually useful.
Democratic socialism is fundamentally and ideologically different from traditional socialism. It combines a democratic system of government with a socialist economic model to create a system where capitalism can’t run amok the way it does now.
She is not simply a socialist. She is a democratic socialist. One of the worst things about the English language is the word “social” and all of its various iterations, many of which have vastly different meanings. I wish they could have come up with different nomenclature, because it would save us from having these ridiculous discussions all the time.
Moreover, there are numerous wildly successful countries that practice social democracy, whereas there are essentially no countries that meaningfully practice democratic socialism.
Therefore, social democracy in practice is successful, while democratic socialism is a great idea that has yet to be implemented on any meaningful scale.
This is why the distinction matters. AOC isn’t a traditional socialist. She doesn’t espouse Leninist or Stalinist ideology.
It is so tiresome having to constantly make this distinction so people don’t immediately go down the “socialist” rabbit hole.
And this isn’t directed towards you. It’s just frustrating.
Democratic socialist not a socialist.
It is just something else that people are expressing their attraction to AOC as a negative.
I just don’t understand the mindrot anymore.
I mean it kind of sucks that he didn’t play them one through five they are objectively really good games. Especially vice City. So many great memories playing that game.
Anyone playing space Marine 2? On one hand fucking space Marine. On the other hand… Fucking space Marine.
Hotline Miami 🐔
While I totally agree with this the irony is china turned out to be the slightly less evil capitalist than America. And only because of their one party system.
As an American China doesn’t have to steal our tech. They’ve already surpassed America in every measurable metric except for Gdp and consumption which isn’t really a win at all.
Maybe so but I don’t trust sites like that. Many of them are scams.