English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

A traveling salesman knocked on a farmhouse door and was invited in. He was shocked to find a pig in the kitchen as the family were sitting down to dinner. Even more shocking was the fact that the pig had a trotter (front leg) missing, though it was replaced by a wooden prosthesis.
"There's gotta be a story behind that pig," the salesman said.
"Oh, yes, indeed there is," said the farmer. "Once when little Jimmy here was two he fell into the creek. Horace—that's our pig's name—rushed in and pulled him out, then ran to the house and grunted and squealed until we went to see what was all the c…

alphabet

"Why buy the cow when you can mail-order one for cheap?"

tchrist

2:33 AM

@Mitch @Araucaria-Him Your friend is unhappy. But I can't see what he still wants to know.

the autistic rigidity (closure of this Q) is UNIVERSAL at Stack exchange. — S K 46 mins ago

Could you please explain exactly what question remains unanswered? The one in your title clearly has been answered (yes, both strong and weak forms have always existed in Modern English), and anything else is just a survey question ("Do Americans feels....?"), which we don't do. — tchrist ♦ 5 mins ago

Xanne

2:55 AM

:65564745

alphabet

@tchrist Flagged that comment, since it contains no actual substantive point about why the closure was wrong, and instead is just insulting and offensive.

(Not that tchrist can see my messages.)

Mitch

@alphabet yeah, that sounded mean.

alphabet

3:19 AM

@Mitch In Britain they pronounce it as "min."

alphabet

3:44 AM

Word of the day: productionize. According to Wiktionary: "To put into production; to manufacture; to turn a prototype into a mass production item."

An odd case of a verb (produce) becoming a noun (production) becoming a verb again (productionize).

Wikipedia has an article on productionization--meaning this has turned back into a noun again, with the suffix -tion occurring twice.

I assume productionizationize will come along eventually.

Robusto

4:03 AM

We’re All Reading Wrong

> To access the full benefits of literature, you have to share it out loud.

> Compared with reading silently, the hippocampus is more active while reading aloud, which might help explain why the latter is such an effective memory tool. In a small 2012 study, students who studied a word list remembered 90 percent of the words they’d read aloud immediately afterward, compared with 71 percent of those they’d read silently. (One week later, participants remembered 59 percent of the spoken words and 48 percent of the words read silently.)

Dannyu NDos

^ Try reading out math expressions - good luck!

Robusto

@DannyuNDos If you can't say it, you can't think it.

4

CowperKettle

5:36 AM

I Glued My Balls to My Butthole Again

►

CowperKettle

5:58 AM

twitter.com/jacob_pfau/status/1783951795238441449

Dannyu NDos

10:22 AM

Korean idiom of the day: Either all heads or all tails ― means the situation is very extreme.

Araucaria - Him

10:35 AM

@tchrist @Mitch WELL, it seems to me that Herrison's answer on the linked to question is lacking somewhat because it doesn't ever actually point out that - at least as far as the UK situation goes - been is a strong form, and bin (strong or) weak one, which is pretty basic.

Perhaps it would be better to reverse the direction of the dupe or merge the questions. I think there are still useful additional answers people might give, or useful additional bits. Costillo's contribution isn't bad. And it could usefully be pointed out that /bi:n/ is the suppletive past participle of go when a person has returned from wherever they went to, and when used in that way is very often, if not usually, stressed. I'm sure there's other bits and bobs to be said too.

But I suppose we're unlikely to find out unless the question gets reopened!

Araucaria - Him

12:55 PM

@Robusto I can second that as a language teacher. Students nearly always remember words they've "drilled", but only a small proportion of words they've just had explained or looked up etc.

Robusto

@Araucaria-Him Yes. But here's the thing. When I was in college I played Prospero in a school production of The Tempest. To this day I remember the other characters' lines better than I do my own. I mean, I memorized all those lines (a prodigious task) and certainly spoke them out loud, but why do I remember everyone else's lines and little of my own?

Araucaria - Him

@Robusto Good question. Is it the panic inducing fear of getting lost and missing your cue? Or maybe those other lines had more meaning as they built the context. Or maybe your brain associates your lines with trauma inducing stress and has now blocked them out when they're no longer needed? If only we could find out ... Think what we could do with that info!

Robusto

1:14 PM

@Araucaria-Him There definitely was stress in the dressing room, but once I got into my lines on stage it went away. Kind of like playing music, which always comes back like an old friend once you're actually performing. I mainly interacted with Ariel and Miranda, and theirs are the lines I remember best.

Robusto

2:12 PM

Wordle 1,043 4/6

⬛⬛⬛🟨⬛
🟨⬛⬛⬛⬛
🟨⬛🟨⬛⬛
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

So why implacable but not placable? (NYT Spelling Bee refuses the latter.)

Xander Henderson

#WhenTaken #60 (27.04.2024)

I scored 829/1000 🎉

1️⃣ 📍 355 km - 🗓️ 4 yrs - ⚡ 185 / 200
2️⃣ 📍 334 km - 🗓️ 0 yrs - ⚡ 189 / 200
3️⃣ 📍 1184 km - 🗓️ 1 yrs - ⚡ 165 / 200
4️⃣ 📍 152 km - 🗓️ 5 yrs - ⚡ 189 / 200
5️⃣ 📍 9667 km - 🗓️ 0 yrs - ⚡ 101 / 200

https://whentaken.com

The last one wrecked me. :(

In retrospect, there is a clue, but... sheesh.

Robusto

#WhenTaken #60 (27.04.2024)

I scored 839/1000 🎉

1️⃣ 📍 335 km - 🗓️ 4 yrs - ⚡ 185 / 200
2️⃣ 📍 1605 km - 🗓️ 5 yrs - ⚡ 153 / 200
3️⃣ 📍 5 km - 🗓️ 0 yrs - ⚡ 200 / 200
4️⃣ 📍 3 km - 🗓️ 0 yrs - ⚡ 200 / 200
5️⃣ 📍 9665 km - 🗓️ 0 yrs - ⚡ 101 / 200

https://whentaken.com

@XanderHenderson Got lucky in the middle. I overvalued a clue in #1. And yeah, that last one did have a clue that I totally ignored.

#2 had a red herring clue as well.

Actually, I remembered #3 from articles I saw.

But still lucky.

M.A.R.

2:37 PM

@Robusto reading aloud is just uneconomical. Yes, I prefer to remember 70 percent of a 500-page long textbook for an exam than 80 percent of 1/10th of it.

Robusto

@M.A.R. I think the point is that if you discuss the salient details of the textbook you will fare better with memorization.

M.A.R.

@CowperKettle you're just rubling it in my face

Xander Henderson

@Robusto inorite?

M.A.R.

@Robusto maybe the instructors should cut the crap and tell us the important stuff to learn and leave out the minutiae

Robusto

@M.A.R. I wouldn't want to hang from a rope until they do that.

But in a certain sense, it's all minutiae, innit?

M.A.R.

2:49 PM

Well, when I look back, the important stuff (in a community pharmacy, hospital pharmacy, pharma industry, and regulatory positions) has been disappointingly sporadic. There's a lot of unnecessary crap. There's just too much room for optimization.

So I'm using the phrase generously; it's even worse if you don't want to stay in academia, or find hospitals or drug manufacturers to work for

Robusto

@M.A.R. That's really the issue. In my science classes, taking notes, they doled out the minutiae as if it were all a bunch of holy relics. And I'd find myself trying to take down everything. Especially courses like cell biology. So I couldn't see the forest for the trees.

M.A.R.

@Robusto right? Of the couple dozen profs I've had in couple dozen courses, only a handful managed to communicate what really mattered and what was the bonus stuff.

They were all people who had truly gained an understanding of the topic themselves, rather than trying to just parrot some phrases from some textbook or worse, reading monotonously 200 slides in a .ppt (not pptx!) file

Robusto

To show you how long ago that was, they didn't even know the purpose of Golgi bodies.

Robusto

3:09 PM

Daily Octordle #824
🕛6️⃣
5️⃣🕚
4️⃣🔟
7️⃣8️⃣
Score: 63

M.A.R.

@Robusto whoa, and the world was all in black and white still

Robusto

@M.A.R. Oh yeah. My high school's graduation pictures were definitely B&W.

Daily Sequence Octordle #824
5️⃣7️⃣
8️⃣9️⃣
🔟🕛
🕐⓮
Score: 78

alphabet

4:30 PM

Word of the day: mischievous. Dictionaries still insist that the more common (or even the only) pronunciation is /-vəs/, but (from a cursory examination on YouGlish) the /-viəs/ pronunciation is clearly more common even in very formal contexts, and even the spelling with "-vious" is fairly widespread.

2

Cambridge, OxfordLD, and Dictionary.com all only list the less common pronunciation.

Merriam-Webster calls the pronunciation used by most native speakers "nonstandard."

tchrist

4:54 PM

I've just noticed that they've been working hard on updating the "abstract diaphonemes’" descriptions on the IPA-for-English page at Wikipedia. It's more "correct" now but the notes, exceptions, contingencies, caveats, and provisos are now so manifold that it may not be penetrable to non-specialists anymore.

alphabet

5:05 PM

I like their IPA chart for English dialects but I have some doubts about its reliability; I'm sure somewhere there's a book by an expert with a similar table that's higher quality.

Cerberus

5:18 PM

@alphabet A common mistake does not cease to be a mistake.

Until it does.

But that is rare and can be resisted, it is not some natural phaenomenon.

jlliagre

#WhenTaken #60 (27.04.2024)

I scored 652/1000 🎉

1️⃣ 📍 363 km - 🗓️ 9 yrs - ⚡ 175 / 200
2️⃣ 📍 1563 km - 🗓️ 20 yrs - ⚡ 114 / 200
3️⃣ 📍 17707 km - 🗓️ 4 yrs - ⚡ 96 / 200
4️⃣ 📍 164 km - 🗓️ 10 yrs - ⚡ 178 / 200
5️⃣ 📍 10771 km - 🗓️ 8 yrs - ⚡ 89 / 200

https://whentaken.com

Wordle 1,043 5/6

⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛
⬛⬛🟩🟩⬛
🟨⬛⬛⬛⬛
⬛⬛🟩🟩🟨
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Daily Octordle #824
🕚7️⃣
6️⃣🔟
5️⃣9️⃣
8️⃣4️⃣
Score: 60

Cerberus

5:37 PM

#WhenTaken #60 (27.04.2024)

I scored 663/1000 🎉

1️⃣ 📍 365 km - 🗓️ 13 yrs - ⚡ 164 / 200
2️⃣ 📍 6913 km - 🗓️ 3 yrs - ⚡ 109 / 200
3️⃣ 📍 1129 km - 🗓️ 16 yrs - ⚡ 134 / 200
4️⃣ 📍 835 km - 🗓️ 19 yrs - ⚡ 133 / 200
5️⃣ 📍 1 km - 🗓️ 28 yrs - ⚡ 123 / 200

https://whentaken.com

Well, I got one place right.

user 70432

@tchrist they say that by doing so you've created an ivory tower 🗼

jlliagre

@Cerberus I knew you'll be the one to find it. When I saw the correct answer, I was upset to have confused the language of one sign with another one.

tchrist

@user70432 At least they're starting to distinguish strong vowels from weak vowels on that page. And just in time: we have another question from an L2 speaker who misunderstands reduced vowels again, thinking there is a single "correct" answer in "formal" English to how much reduction occurs.

Cerberus

@jlliagre Well I didn't know the correct language either, but I looked at the background! What was that big thing? Without it, I would have guessed a very different place (and language).

tchrist

0

Q: Correct Choice of First Vowel in Words Such as "Regret" and "Return"

Is it acceptable in formal American English to pronounce the first vowel in "regret", "realize", and "return" as an open-mid front unrounded vowel as opposed to a close front unrounded vowel? Also, how were these words pronounced in Middle English?

alphabet

5:45 PM

@Cerberus Which pronunciation is the mistaken one? The /-vəs/ one matches the more common spelling, but there are plenty of English words where correct spelling and correct pronunciation diverge.

Cerberus

But not this word.

alphabet

Yes, it applies to this word for a majority of speakers of standard dialects.

Cerberus

Again that fallacy...

jlliagre

@Cerberus Koffiekamer didn't ring a bell to you?

Cerberus

@jlliagre Well, it could be one of two languages.

I didn't know the word as such.

alphabet

5:48 PM

What's the reason for calling this pronunciation a mistake?

By the same logic, should we pronounce "rendezvous" with a /-vəs/?

Xander Henderson

ron-des-VOOS

jlliagre

@Cerberus Ah, so I wasn't that wrong. I identified it as the other language but couldn't guess a place looking like a British one but where that other language would also be used.

Xander Henderson

Alternatively, ron-DAYS-voos.

jlliagre

@XanderHenderson Or, pour frimer: /ʁɑ̃.de.vu/

tchrist

@XanderHenderson What's the S on the end?

Like in vamoose? :)

Xander Henderson

5:53 PM

@jlliagre not if'n yet speakin' proper American!

tchrist

Or like in ooze?

Pretty sure it's silent.

Xander Henderson

@tchrist it is voiced.

tchrist

Unless plural.

jlliagre

@XanderHenderson I wrote pour frimer.

tchrist

@XanderHenderson Ah, the plural. Yes, it is then.

Xander Henderson

5:54 PM

Like in ooze.

user 70432

Makes popcorn 🍿🍿🍿

tchrist

I have the same problem with Camus on a camel. One moose, two mooze.

user 70432

mices?

Xander Henderson

@tchrist the great French author, KAY-mooze?

tchrist

@XanderHenderson Who she?

user 70432

5:56 PM

::runs::

Xander Henderson

@tchrist He. He wrote the Stranger.

tchrist

Camooze buckle.

Xander Henderson

Fred KAY-mooze.

tchrist

Ça n’amuse pas la bouche.

Cerberus

@alphabet Both tradition and rules, and the rules are far more complex than that.

@jlliagre Did you think about the big thing in the background?

alphabet

6:02 PM

@Cerberus Yes, and one of the rules is that mischievous is typically pronounced /-viəs/. This pronunciation is quite well-established.

Unless you pronounce harass as /ˈher.əs/, you should probably concede that accepted pronunciations can change.

Xander Henderson

@alphabet her-ASS

alphabet

(Well, in Britain some people still say it that way, but in the US it's clearly died out.)

user 70432

language is like gymnastics

English language, usage, and gymnastics

^possible room name change

Cerberus

@alphabet That is not a rule, it is an incident.

@alphabet "Just because I sometimes change my preferred pronunciation because others change their, that means any change initiated by others must be followed by me."

alphabet

6:19 PM

Let's switch to a less controversial topic, like Palestine.

Cerberus

Lovely.

user 70432

or the Ukraine

or Monika

or ...

M.A.R.

Reinstate Ukraine!

alphabet

Or how we now have two people in this chat--yourself and Araucaria--with the same profile picture, which will confuse me indefinitely.

M.A.R.

@user70432 he's right, that's confusing

alphabet

6:24 PM

"Reinstate Monica" was clearly a Russian-backed disinformation campaign.

But "Monica" was secretly funded by the Iranian government.

Since Russia and Iran started cooperating, both sides started pushing their propaganda less, which is why we don't talk about it so much anymore.

M.A.R.

Besides hasn't that ship already sailed? She's clearly moved on and will never come back

alphabet

Makes perfect sense!

(Before you accuse me of inventing a ridiculous conspiracy theory: that was a joke.)

M.A.R.

@alphabet hey for you maybe. I'm being bombarded here

user 70432

Please label it as such.

M.A.R.

The recent drama in the family sitcom that is Iranian media is about a girl without hijab who hugged a goalkeeper after that football team scored a goal.

alphabet

6:27 PM

@M.A.R. Yeah, I think SE more-or-less offered to consider reinstating her but she refused.

@user70432 Label it as a joke, you mean? I think I already did.

M.A.R.

@alphabet SE never bargained in good faith since they didn't unceremoniously fire her in good faith. And she's not stupid.

alphabet

@M.A.R. Well, they didn't fire her; she was never an employee, just an unpaid volunteer.

M.A.R.

Even the person who worked for SE at the time who caused the whole mess in the first place is no longer working at SE.

user 70432

Her attempt at creating a stack exchange like community on discord has pretty much flopped.

alphabet

@M.A.R. First they stop wearing hijabs, then they start hugging. Where will it end?!?!

M.A.R.

6:31 PM

So @user's avatar is more like "War on poverty--Not the people"

alphabet

Yeah, I am--not to insult anyone here--uncertain as to why people still have those profile pictures. What more is SE supposed to do now?

tchrist

0

A: Correct Choice of First Vowel in Words Such as "Regret" and "Return"

Short answer: it doesn’t matter, and there can be no single right answer that excludes others. The OED says this about the re- prefix’s pronunciation: Stress is usually determined by a subsequent element and vowels may be reduced accordingly. So what really matters here is vowel reduction. Fir...

These take much too much work. They're all the same, too.

M.A.R.

@alphabet I still call that firing. Because there was the smoke and the burning lungs

@alphabet no doubt I will find two brothels by the end of the week in my neighborhood

alphabet

@M.A.R. Right next to a parade of gay furries.

user 70432

@tchrist +1

alphabet

6:34 PM

If you're wearing a fursuit, do you have to wear a hijab under it? Or does the fursuit itself count?

M.A.R.

@alphabet they're not worried much about that since people have been much more resistant to acceptance of . . . the whole gender spectrum and stuff.

user 70432

Especially beginning with the short answer.

M.A.R.

But uf you get them talking, the popular belief is "they wanna turn our kids gay so our population dwindles and we no longer have soldiers"

user 70432

tldr

tchrist

bombero

Noun: bombero m (plural bomberos)

firefighter
bombéro (Basahan spelling ᜊᜓᜋ᜔ᜊᜒᜍᜓ)
fireman; firefighter
bombero
a firefighter

(3 more not shown…)

alphabet

6:38 PM

@M.A.R. I'm surprised people in Iran have gotten to the point of hand-wringing about that. Don't they still have the death penalty for homosexuality?

M.A.R.

@tchrist my face does indeed look like ᜊᜓᜋ᜔ᜊᜒ after a fresh batch of propaganda about Hamas

tchrist

@M.A.R. ¡Jamás!

iconoclasm

Noun: iconoclasm (countable and uncountable, plural iconoclasms)

The belief in, participation in, or sanction of destroying religious icons and other symbols or monuments, usually with religious or political motives. [1797]
Synonyms: iconomachy, idoloclasm
Antonyms: iconodulism, iconoduly, iconoplasm
Hypernym: desecration
(figurative) A challenge to a widely held belief, tradition or cherished institution. [1858]

(2 more not shown…)

user 70432

(⁠╯⁠°⁠□⁠°⁠）⁠╯⁠︵⁠ ⁠┻⁠━⁠┻

tchrist

Please stop clasming our holy cows in this chat.

user 70432

Sorry.

alphabet

6:42 PM

@M.A.R. I'd love to imagine an American president sitting around plotting that.

M.A.R.

@alphabet officially, the same barbaric rules have been in place since Khomeini. Unofficially, people have calmed down considerably since the war. Younger people do not snitch on anything.

@tchrist my motives weren't political so it gets only half the points.

tchrist

@M.A.R. You I was not addressing.

Plus I think you're a bovivore anyway.

alphabet

@M.A.R. Since which war?

I'm not sure what war "the war" refers to in other countries.

M.A.R.

Well you never know. One moment you're chatting, not a care in the world, the next you're clasming a cow

@alphabet Iran-Iraq war

tchrist

Deliberately poking people's kine in the eye is apt to get you kicked by Bossie. Just sayin'.

That's how the Great Chicago Fire happened. Let's not go there.

user 70432

6:45 PM

ᕙ⁠(⁠⇀⁠‸⁠↼⁠‶⁠)⁠ᕗ

M.A.R.

People that were young then are adequately indoctrinated and the main supporters of the regime today. People who came after have repeatedly acted against religious zealotry.

alphabet

@M.A.R. Ah, that one. Good, one of the wars that was only kind of America's fault.

tchrist

Saul was a Zealot until the road to Damascus.

alphabet

One does assume that Iran is not exactly an accepting environment, though.

tchrist

Then he got Pauled.

M.A.R.

6:46 PM

Though without much guidance, you don't really make much cultural progress.

@tchrist Better Paul Saul!

tchrist

And not paulatinamente either, but with a stroke like unto lightning.

user 70432

Apaulling

tchrist

He probably had a stroke.

user 70432

Please no stroking in the chat room

Cerberus

@M.A.R. So people over 55/60 are considerably more conservative than those younger, there is a kind of sharp divide?

M.A.R.

6:48 PM

@alphabet yeah, since no one has really championed any sort of cultural reform. My generation mostly picks up stuff as we stare googly-eyed at the Western way of living, as portrayed in social media

No wonder we don't make much progress

alphabet

If I set my Grindr location to Tehran, it says "no profiles available." How sad.

M.A.R.

@Cerberus getting ever sharper as everyone today has a favorite Telegram channel of their own to polarize them.

Cerberus

@alphabet Probably blocked by Grinder for safety?

@M.A.R. Oh, fun.

At least things will develop in the right direction in the future, probably.

M.A.R.

It's the only way I've found out about our recent drama. Otherwise I'm too busy chasing my tail to care.

alphabet

@Cerberus It's owned by an American company; I wouldn't be surprised if sanctions made it illegal for them to even offer it in Iran.

Cerberus

6:50 PM

I don't know about that.

Some from Iran contacted me via it hehe.

Probably using a VPN?

I don't know whether he masked his location.

user 70432

:O

alphabet

@Cerberus One assumes. Were they in Iran at the time? What were they contacting you for?

user 70432

→⁠_⁠→

←⁠_⁠←

Cerberus

@alphabet Not they, just one man.

Yes, in Iran.

alphabet

@M.A.R. I fail to see how anyone could look at, say, contemporary America and think of it as an excellent model for society.

Cerberus

6:54 PM

He is moving to my country later this year, I believe.

Just looking around here.

alphabet

@Cerberus Sorry, I meant "he."

Cerberus

He also has pictures and videos on his Insta, in which none of the girls wear head scarves.

M.A.R.

@Cerberus I've mentioned it before: There's a bit of that quintessentially Russian sentiment among Iranians of "feeling oppressed", myself included. So I can't hold much faith in people pushing the system in the right direction. Instead it's gonna be a bubble that will accrue pressure and violently pop, allowing the next populist to grab power.

Still it doesn't hurt to hope I guess

alphabet

@M.A.R. Meanwhile, here we have a Houthi influencer problem.

Robusto

@tchrist Now I wonder if bomb and pomp come from the same root. I bet they do.

Cerberus

6:57 PM

@M.A.R. But don't you think society will change once the old conservatives are, well, dead?

alphabet

@Cerberus I wonder what kind of impression he got exactly.

Cerberus

How do you mean?

alphabet

@Cerberus I.e. what he took away from looking at Grindr in the country he's moving to.

M.A.R.

@alphabet the neighbor's grass maintains its shine from afar, and problems you don't have to face are always trivialized

alphabet

@M.A.R. Is that the Farsi equivalent of "the grass is always greener"?

Cerberus

7:00 PM

@alphabet I don't know, he probably already knew quite a lot?

I don't remember exactly.

alphabet

@Cerberus He must have had some reason for being on Grindr in a place where he didn't yet live. Presumably trying to scope things out.

M.A.R.

@alphabet no I was just feeling poetic. The Farsi equivalent is "the neighbor's chicken is a swan".

alphabet

@M.A.R. Do people eat swans?

Robusto

@Cerberus There will be a new crop of conservatives to supplant them, don't worry.

@alphabet I didn't know you were a people. I thought you were a raccoon.

M.A.R.

@alphabet it's probably because they're rare and prettier

alphabet

7:02 PM

@M.A.R. Come to America, where you too can be "randomly selected" by the TSA.

Cerberus

@alphabet Yeah, maybe making acquaintances, seeing what people are like to talk to?

M.A.R.

@Cerberus it doesn't take many people to replace ones in positions of power. They will certainly be so irreligious that they would no longer bother with the pretenses.

Cerberus

@Robusto Did you read what comment by MAR I responded to?

M.A.R.

Other than that, it's hard to picture reform from the inside, thought that's what I'm hoping for

Cerberus

@M.A.R. Hmm not sure I follow.

But imagine if the generation of Khamenei and Raisi are all gone from politics.

Robusto

7:04 PM

@Cerberus Yes. I still stick by my statement.

alphabet

@Cerberus I don't recall having many long conversations much there.

Cerberus

@alphabet Oh, why not?

I often do.

Could be hours, days, weeks, years.

M.A.R.

@Cerberus if a very small minority supports the current theocracy, then they will be the successors, and nothing much would change in terms of policy. It's just that they will not even bother appearing religious.

alphabet

@Cerberus I think most people here use it to find hookups. Some of them seem incapable of writing in complete sentences.

M.A.R.

America will remain the Great Satan, Russia and China will remain allies, various militia around the Middle East will still enjoy support from the IRGC.

alphabet

7:07 PM

@M.A.R. Indeed. It's quite rare for an undemocratic regime to be ousted by (say) protesters who go on to establish a functioning democracy.

Cerberus

@M.A.R. Why would they not bother appearing religious?

And don't you think eventually other people would take over?

@alphabet Some are incapable.

But anything is possible there.

How do you define 'hook-up'? Why would it not involve talking?

M.A.R.

And that's the bubble: Peeple believe that if we stop being jerks to Israel, and switch Satans, then the economy, everyone's main concern, will not go to shit more than it already has.

Robusto

The trouble with democracy is that is dynamically unstable, as we're seeing today in the US. (And as we say in the 1860s as well.)

M.A.R.

@Cerberus they're less religious, just hypocrites, not true believers. And the same will go for their supporters. They will still use verses from Quran to justify poking American bases in neighboring countries, but they won't attend all the Jummah prayers

Cerberus

Ah OK.

Well, I still have hope that things will improve as society changes.

M.A.R.

7:12 PM

@Cerberus I can imagine a totally secular dictator like Putin running the place in the future, but I can't imagine a shift in policy to be friends to America and Western Europe and less friendly towards Russia and China

Cerberus

@M.A.R. Well, I would be mostly concerned with a more secular society.

It would be nice if that could happen.

alphabet

@M.A.R. Presumably nobody in the political establishment wants to suddenly be forced to admit that they spent decades fighting the West for nothing.

(That same sort of inertia is also, I think, a force in American foreign policy.)

@Cerberus North Korea's pretty secular, but I don't think that'd be a better future for Iran.

M.A.R.

And people seem to want those most of all. Nothing about being allies to China appeals to the significant majority of Iranians. China's public image has been a mass-producer of cheaply made goods, and nothing else. Nobody knows nothing about Chinese tech, or military, or the welfare of the average citizen.

OTOH, America is the big bully, ever more impressive as it shrugs Iran's weak attempts at changing the game, with the highest quality goods, be it drugs or cars, with a frighteningly strong military, and most importantly, with a lax attitude towards food, drugs, sex, you name it.

Sure the hippies might babble on about human rights and human lefts, but that's what it's really about. It's constantly on Instagram

So we're in love with the American way of life as portrayed on Instagram, Tiktok, and YouTube

Robusto

@M.A.R. The lax attitude is just a ruse. Our own "mullahs" are seeking to be as restrictive as your own.

alphabet

@M.A.R. You mean people admire and want the drugs and the cars and the sex, but don't care about the human rights? Or that people resent America out of envy?

jlliagre

7:24 PM

@Cerberus The mountain?

alphabet

@M.A.R. Wait, what part of it? Other than just "having more money."

Cerberus

@alphabet Ceteris paribus, it is certainly better.

M.A.R.

@alphabet people don't know what those rights are. They're just using buzzwords to make their wishes and wants sound important. They've only recently figured some of them out as women were beaten and jailed for not wearing scarfs.

Cerberus

@jlliagre Yes!

alphabet

@Cerberus In terms of general living standards, I imagine North Korea is much worse.

Cerberus

7:28 PM

Again, ceteris paribus.

M.A.R.

@alphabet it has a huge overlap with what Americans themselves find appealing in what's portrayed: The shiny, carefree way of life, and being 'applauded' by n people for pursuing it

Robusto

Mar 27, 2022 at 0:29, by Robusto supports Ukraine

@tchrist North Korea should change its name to "Hell On Earth." Because it comes as close as I can imagine to that description.

M.A.R.

Except it's the Americans who know how to have such a life. We instead deal here with taxes and rising prices and horribly made cars.

alphabet

@M.A.R. I don't think most Americans see the American way of life as particularly shiny or carefree. I suppose it is by comparison with Iran.

M.A.R.

@alphabet life as portrayed on social media is different from life as we live it, I mean.

alphabet

7:31 PM

@M.A.R. I'm just not sure what social media content portrays life that way. I guess maybe celebrities' Instagram pages.

M.A.R.

Asians in general just add the extra connotation that it's only the Westerners that are showing off their cars or jewelry or boyfriend.

alphabet

I mean, I spend most of my time on YouTube consuming true crime content, which doesn't really make society look good.

M.A.R.

I don't think I'm interested in true crime in some other country

Robusto

@M.A.R. "Asians" is a gargantuan category. Compare dour Cambodia, say, with Japan and its gaudy consumerist culture.

M.A.R.

@Robusto well, half of China, most of the middle East and India are most of Asia anyway, so it's a good approximation.

alphabet

7:34 PM

@M.A.R. Huh. I get the sense that in the US--probably more than in some other countries--there's a sort of stigma against excessive public displays of wealth. Celebrities can get away with it.

Cerberus

@M.A.R. Yeah people in China would never, ever do such a thing.

Robusto

@alphabet And then there is Jeff Bezos's $500-million-dollar yacht. Which, of course, goes under the radar because who actually knows where it is? And the Hawaiian island that Larry Ellison owns, and on and on.

M.A.R.

You know what I mean. It's Jason Statham driving the Audi, not Amit or Mohamed.

Cerberus

@alphabet Umm America is known for excessive public displays of wealth.

alphabet

@Robusto There's a reason they don't publicize those things; they'd be hated, not admired, for it.

Cerberus

7:37 PM

Perhaps less so than countries which are even newer money, though.

Like East Asia, Arabia.

alphabet

This is why people mock Trump's obsession with having everything made out of gold.

Cerberus

But certainly more so than Europe.

Robusto

@alphabet Look at the gold toilets oil money has bought for the Saudi royalty.

alphabet

Here there's a stereotype of rich foreign exchange students--mostly from China--who go around driving luxury cars and carrying designer handbags; they tend to be seen as tacky and obnoxious for it.

M.A.R.

@alphabet as there should be, but I'm not sure the US is less than elsewhere in that regard. You guys have the biggest hoarders of wealth after all.

jlliagre

7:38 PM

@Cerberus Okay but for me, it's an a posteriori clue. I was too confused to even think about that place. I'm still a little surprised about all of those left hand drive american cars.

Cerberus

@jlliagre Hah!

M.A.R.

@Robusto that's a cheap ego thing. Yeah golden toilets would remind me of fat rich royalty, but that's never what I would crave anyway.

Cerberus

I think Americans drive on the right?

But I hadn't even looked at the direction...

Robusto

@M.A.R. The Shah had gold telephones, IIRC.

alphabet

@Cerberus I do think that America's cultural exports tend to include a fair amount of conspicuous displays of wealth, more than is considered acceptable in America itself.

Cerberus

7:40 PM

@M.A.R. Old money does not have golden lavatories, or at least not nowadays...

alphabet

Particularly if you aren't seen as having obtained that wealth through "hard work."

Cerberus

@alphabet Sure. But still, even then Americans at home are far more about money.

alphabet

So even "old money" types have to pretend that they got their money by being incredibly industrious.

Robusto

In any case, gold appliances are the crudest, least sophisticated display of wealth imaginable. It's what you do if you have money and no taste or imagination.

alphabet

@Cerberus How so?

@Robusto The really rich people pretend to be poor in public.

M.A.R.

7:42 PM

@Cerberus my point is people not living in areas where Transporter 2 is shot think that looking good while driving an Audi is a thing only for people from such areas

Robusto

@alphabet That may be an exaggeration. They may do so in absolute public, but not among their peers.

alphabet

@Robusto Yeah, I mean when not around other rich people.

Robusto

What do you think all those limousines in Manhattan are for? They're a way to insulate the rich from hoi polloi.

M.A.R.

For the longest time I had the feeling limousines had something to do with lemons

tchrist

> < (i) Anglo-Norman and Middle French pompe (French pompe) splendid display (c1165 in Old French), vanities of the world (c1350; chiefly in plural), a solemn procession (a1502), and its etymon (ii) classical Latin pompa ceremonial procession, ostentation, display < ancient Greek πομπή a sending away, solemn procession, parade, display < πέμπειν to send, of unknown origin.

M.A.R.

7:45 PM

The Farsi import is "limoo", which doesn't help

tchrist

> < French bombe, < Spanish bomba (see first quot.), probably < bombo ‘a bumming or humming noise’ < Latin bombus. The word is thus ultimately identical with boom. Compare the earliest English instance bome, directly < Spanish; also 17th cent. bombo from Spanish or Italian Variously pronounced: see the rhymes: in the British army /bʌm/ Listen to pronunciation was formerly usual.

So, no.

Robusto

@tchrist Awww, shucks.

alphabet

I mean, if a friend of mine got a luxury car because their family's money meant they could afford one, I think we'd all relentlessly mock them for it.

I do think it depends on the region. In California I think they put up with that sort of stuff more.

Robusto

@alphabet I could drive a luxury car, but I don't. I just don't get any joy from ostentation.

tchrist

Please don't commit an etymological crime by bombing the Pompidou Center.

Robusto

7:47 PM

@tchrist Noted.

alphabet

@Robusto Well, yeah, and doing so would be tacky as hell.

Robusto

@tchrist Can I still set my sites on the CNIT?

tchrist

Cnidarians need not apply.

Cerberus

@alphabet They talk about it a lot. They consider it more important. They tell each other how much money they make. They love buying things. Etc.

@M.A.R. I got the general point (though not this message haha).

alphabet

@Cerberus That may be something you only see in the media. In my experience, it's generally considered quite offensive to ask someone how much money they make or even to offer that information unsolicited.

Cerberus

7:51 PM

@alphabet I know there is of course variation. But on average the difference is pretty clear.

Watch some videos by Americans who have moved to Europe, for example.

It is the whole society.

Even De Tocqueville already noticed this in the 19th century.

alphabet

@Cerberus I dunno. Maybe it depends on where you're from in the US or something. I think there's kind of a taboo against talking too much about your financial situation, especially if you're rich.

Cerberus

@alphabet Again, that does not contradict what I said.

It is about more v. less, not black versus white.

Robusto

Yes, Americans are by and large materialistic, and large swaths of the society do measure their worth by houses and cars and the like. But that is not all Americans.

Cerberus

Of course.

Just as there are plenty of materialistic Europeans.

Though American influence plays some part in that, we have always had our own nouveau riche too.

And espère-riche...

alphabet

@Robusto Maybe it's just that I reflexively dislike those people so much that I end up in social circles with relatively few of them.

Cerberus

8:00 PM

That would seem quite likely.

I am the same.

alphabet

People who play those sorts of status games mostly succeed in making themselves look incredibly dumb. Especially when they try to make shows of erudition.

Robusto

@alphabet You are fortunate to live in the state that has the smartest people in the country. They do pride themselves on their homes and, privately, their wealth, but they're less likely to do so with crude ostentation. They're just more sophisticated about it is all.

alphabet

@Robusto Yeah, I do think that that sort of "crude ostentation" is somewhat rarer here than in other parts of the country.

And it's always worse in certain ultra-wealthy suburbs.

jlliagre

8:18 PM

@Cerberus They do. I mean American branded cars built for wealthy people living in some part of the left handed Commonwealth.

Cerberus

OK.

Robusto

@jlliagre You mean Ireland?

jlliagre

@Robusto I don't think there was that much American cars in post-war Ireland. They were too wide for the narrow roads there.

Breton verb of the day: gregachiñ. To speak unintelligibly. Lit. to speak Greek.

Daily Sequence Octordle #824
4️⃣6️⃣
8️⃣9️⃣
🔟🕛
🕐⓮
Score: 76

Robusto

8:49 PM

@jlliagre So what other left-side-of-the-road-driving countries are there in the Commonwealth now since Brexit?

jlliagre

9:29 PM

@Robusto Brexit had no effect on the Commonwealth. Many of the current Commonwealth countries still drive on the left side of the road, a notable exception being Canada.

Commonwealth

Cerberus

9:46 PM

Yeah.

I didn't know Papua New Guinea was in the Commonwealth.

Robusto

11:54 PM

@jlliagre Yeah, I was talking about Europe vs. Britain, but I guess I spaced that one.

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