English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

Cerberus

04:00

I agree that adulthood is better.

tchrist

@CowperKettle And no kids to speak of.

Laurel

@Cerberus It's all "the climate is fucked" and "hey look at these idiots who either have been elected or probably will be". Oh and foreign wars I can't do anything about but complain on the internet about

alphabet

I mostly remember being sad, lonely, and/or afraid.

Cerberus

@Laurel Well, you can skip the items that seem too negative to you?

alphabet

Have I mentioned that I have mental problems?

Cerberus

04:01

But don't you want to understand the world around you?

tchrist

Most families had at least five kids when I was growing up. And twice that a couple generations back. You can't run a farm without a lot of kids.

Cerberus

When I grew up, most had two children.

Like now.

alphabet

Childbirth rates are declining pretty fast, of course.

Laurel

@Cerberus Yeah, things are much better, probably because the adult trying to control my life is just me and I get to mostly choose what people I'm around. Maybe people have grown up since high school too

Cerberus

Yay!

Yeah, other children can be nasty.

tchrist

04:02

@Cerberus She kind of has a point. There are times I have to look away. The constant onslaught of War / Disaster / Disease / Trump can be overwhelming.

Mitch

@Cerberus that seems to be the trend in the US nowadays. A large family is three kids (and the third one is 'unplanned')

Laurel

@alphabet I feel like we've lead similar lives…

Cerberus

@tchrist Sure, I skip some articles too.

@Mitch Yeah.

alphabet

@Laurel In part, I think I'm just better able to tolerate it as an adult.

Cerberus

All civilised countries.

alphabet

04:04

@Laurel Indeed.

tchrist

> 50 years ago the average woman had five children, since then the number has halved
In the past people had many more children than today. The number fluctuated over time and there were some differences between countries, but for much of our history, the average woman had at least five children, and often more. Two centuries ago this was true for the US, the UK, Russia, India, China and many other countries for which we have data.

Mitch

Not that Nigeria is uncivilized but it is having all the babies for the rest of us

tchrist

@Mitch Stop using surrogates!

Laurel

@Cerberus What, like everything related to the news? I already have that going, where I'm on a site that's mostly memes with some real news and I skim the real news

Mitch

Plus the Palestinians and Haredim

alphabet

04:05

There is part of me that's concerned about the decline in birthrates. Immigration won't help much if the immigrants become part of the same culture whose birthrate is declining.

tchrist

@Laurel That sounds like a trick.

Cerberus

@Laurel Not everything, only things that seem too negative.

Mitch

@Laurel it's hard to find real news that isn't ... colored by memes

alphabet

> Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has secured a third term as leader of the Middle East’s most populous nation, officials said, after the counting of votes in the election held between December 10 and 12 was finalised.
>
> Sisi won 89.6 percent of the vote, the National Elections Authority said on Monday.

Imagine having a president that popular!

Laurel

@alphabet What, like the loneliness? You're not still actively being tormented by your peers at this age, right?

tchrist

04:07

ourworldindata.org/fertility-rate

Mitch

I keep seeing on NYT or Washington post (can't remember which) always in Sunday a mention of some 'outrageous' joke last night in Saturday Night Live

@alphabet @M.A.R.?

Laurel

@Cerberus I don't know what you mean by news that isn't "too negative"

alphabet

@Laurel Mostly the mental health problems and the general issues interacting with people.

tchrist

@Mitch And you can't remember because they were both too colored by "memes"?

Mitch

No I can't remember because I forgot

Laurel

04:09

@alphabet Ah yeah well that does get better with age, usually. At least if it's the mental issues I'm assuming you're talking about (lol, I'm a menace)

alphabet

@Laurel For me they got much, much worse last year. But now I've recovered. Mostly.

tchrist

Weekend Update ft. Ego Nwodim and Christmas Joke Swap 2023 - SNL

►

Mitch

People chill out as they get older. Maybe they still think things but they're just to tired to say them out loud

alphabet

But I'm scared things will get worse again.

Ah well, one step at a time.

Laurel

@alphabet I think it's just that you get better coping strategies with time. But other things in life (or even random stuff like the chemicals in your not being auspicious all of a sudden) can definitely make mental issues worse

tchrist

04:12

@Mitch LAWN INVADERS!

Cerberus

@Laurel For example, I skip most of the news about Gaza. Most of it it is not important to know for me (few new things are reported), and it is terrible.

But I want to know about the new constitution in Chile that was rejected in a referendum.

And about what the Pope said about blessing same-sex couples.

tchrist

@Mitch I bet it was the Amen Milk joke.

alphabet

@Laurel Last year I came down with an exciting case of "mysterious cyclic mood disorder that didn't quite fit normal diagnostic criteria and wasn't helped by antidepressants."

Not something I'd experienced before.

Mitch

I saw SNL but I can't remember the Amen Milk joke

alphabet

Fun! Always a new adventure!

tchrist

04:13

@Cerberus That's going to piss a lot of people off. But what are they going to do, schism?

Laurel

@alphabet If you'd prefer to talk about it somewhere more private you could always add me on discord

tchrist

@Mitch The stuff about milk coming from mammals.

Mitch

@tchrist oh. Easy low row humor

Cerberus

@tchrist Well, it was worded carefully. A priest may bless a same-sex couple, but not as such. And it mustn't resemble a marriage sacrament in any way.

alphabet

@Mitch Were they pro- or anti-milk? If the latter, I must boycott.

Mitch

04:14

Sometimes weekend update has some zingers that are good

Laurel

@alphabet Omw to google this mood disorder to see if I have it lol

Mitch

And then I forget them

Cerberus

It was like, "a priest may bless anyone; and anyone is a sinner; therefore, it was already allowed to give general blessings of well-being to two people who approach a priest, be they homosexual or not".

alphabet

@Laurel It made my doctors quite perplexed. Eventually I started taking lamotrigine--usually used for bipolar disorder--which essentially cured it.

Mitch

@alphabet it was probably about some farmer saying that milk only comes from mammals and things like oat milk are just woke amok

alphabet

04:16

@Cerberus It's going to piss everybody off.

tchrist

@Mitch blah blah saying that amen milk isn't milk and whipped out a tit

Laurel

@Cerberus I guess I'd have to say, good for homoromantic couples, I guess

Cerberus

@alphabet Meh who cares. It is a small step towards the Church's accepting homosexuality.

tchrist

I think he lactates when the congregation says Amen. Something like that.

Mitch

Great!

Cerberus

04:17

@Laurel Yeah, a tiny bit.

alphabet

@Cerberus How many LGBT people--or people in general--are going to convert to Catholicism because of this? If the Catholic Church wants even to maintain its existing membership levels, it will need new converts.

Mitch

Ty his pope seems less uptight than previous ones

Laurel

Whenever I hear something mildly positive about the pope, I also usually hear people complain about all the ways that the Catholic Church hasn't improved

tchrist

@alphabet Just let priests marry and problem solved. Well, not to each other.

Mitch

@alphabet nobody converts. It's just if they're raised in the tradition maybe they'll stay if they're more accepting

Cerberus

04:19

@alphabet I think the problem is rather the converse: how many straight people in the West and Latin America will continue not to hate the Church if it remains anti-gay? The Church can't maintain this intolerance forever until it becomes a total outcast in the West, since people in the West are becoming less and less tolerant of traditional homophobia.

alphabet

@tchrist I should become a priest; they seem to have much more exciting sex lives than me.

tchrist

@Mitch Than the previous inquisitor pope? Yes.

alphabet

@Mitch So membership will decline, just somewhat more slowly.

Mitch

@Laurel I mean they still believe in faeries and leprechauns

Cerberus

@alphabet More, or more exciting?

Laurel

04:20

Back in the days when I was still going to church (idr when I stopped, maybe 2015?) they were still openly hating on gays. They didn't hate on trans people because none of that was really in the public eye yet

alphabet

@Cerberus Secularization will destroy it either way.

Mitch

@tchrist conflict of interest? HR problems?

Cerberus

@alphabet Perhaps. But fare more slowly if it becomes liberal.

alphabet

@Cerberus They seem to get up to some freaky stuff. Granted, it's mostly with minors.

Cerberus

I doubt that.

tchrist

04:21

@Mitch Irish priests, you mean?

Cerberus

Some Popes were succeeded by their sons, weren't they?

Mitch

@tchrist Benedict whatever-his-number was just doing what he was good at.

tchrist

@Mitch You get more kids if you let priests marry. And they can give better marital advice.

alphabet

@Cerberus I think it'll die at about the same rate either way, to be honest. Not that I really have much evidence for that.

Cerberus

@alphabet I don't think so. It could become like the monarchy.

tchrist

04:22

@Mitch Ratzinger, the Hitler youth guy; Congregatio pro Doctrina Fidei.

Laurel

@alphabet This is the other news I often see in the meme news

alphabet

@tchrist Problem is they're all gay.

Mitch

@tchrist priest should do tiktoks and memes and shit

tchrist

@alphabet Anglican priests marry and have kids.

Mitch

Yay!

Henry VIII had children's best interests in mind

alphabet

04:24

@tchrist And, as we all know, Anglicanism is absolutely booming because of it.

tchrist

@alphabet Schismed.

Why in the world would anybody ever willingly hang out anywhere "memes" polluted everything? Those are like that hypersonic animal repellant to the rest of us, but apparently only we can hear it.

Mitch

This is making me think of the scene in Meaning of Life where the fussy English husband complains to his wife that the Irish (big Catholic families) have a kid everytime they have sex and the fussy English wife says same for us and they have two kids

Haha because oh you get it

alphabet

@Mitch There absolutely are various priests and other religious figures who use TikTok for outreach.

tchrist

It's like somewhere that allowed animation gifs. Just close down that forever.

Mitch

Yay! I'm predicting the future that has already happened

tchrist

04:28

<BLINK> tags

alphabet

@tchrist To the youths, they're catnip.

tchrist

@alphabet Makes me vomit.

Firecrackers going off under your chair.

Mitch

The first time I ever heard of tiktoks was only a couple years ago at a religious shrine with a sign outside that said 'please no tiktoking'

tchrist

@alphabet You know you can turn off images on a site by site basis? Makes the web a better place.

alphabet

A quick Google Search finds this guy: tiktok.com/@father.simon?lang=en

Laurel

04:29

@tchrist What do you do on the internet in your free time then? Read Facebook wall of text rants????

tchrist

@Laurel Um, I don't do any of that. I don't have any social media accounts. I'll sometimes watch PBS videos, but mostly I read news or play music.

alphabet

@Mitch All these kids doing the "Jesus Challenge" and crucifying themselves.

@tchrist ... you do realize that, by using SE chat, your SE account has become a social media account?

tchrist

@alphabet Yes, but I can suspend people who post too many memes here.

alphabet

I'm not really on "normal" social media. I do like obsessively consuming true crime content.

I've learned a lot from true crime. I consider myself an expert in how to dispose of a human body.

tchrist

Is IRC social media? This is just IRC.

Cerberus

04:32

@alphabet Call your family and eat it?

alphabet

@tchrist merriam-webster.com/dictionary/social%20media

> forms of electronic communication (such as websites for social networking and microblogging) through which users create online communities to share information, ideas, personal messages, and other content (such as videos)

To me, at least, it would seem that SE chat counts.

tchrist

@Laurel I don't engage with anywhere that has all that ranting and social pot stirring. Bad for my peace of mind.

alphabet

Certainly I don't think it's different in nature from, say, those massive group chats that the teens have.

@Cerberus Did you know? Burning a human body is quite difficult and requires temperatures much higher than those of a typical wood fire; most people who try it fail miserably.

tchrist

So I don't have "a media stream" feeding me bullshit designed to rile me up to try to provoke more engagement and topple the government.

alphabet

@tchrist rants, stirs pot

tchrist

04:35

@alphabet You figure that out after the first few cremations you facilitate at.

Laurel

@tchrist Didn't you just say you were on news sites tho? Is there one that's not stirring some pot?

@tchrist News sites???

tchrist

@Laurel New York Times, Washington Post, The Guardian.

Cerberus

@alphabet Yes, I would expect that to be very difficult.

tchrist

Not Facebook or Instawhatever or Tiny Tots or I dunno.

Cerberus

Whence crematoria.

Nobody used Facebook here any more expect old people.

Laurel

04:38

What is everyone reading in the news that's not depressing tho? I still haven't got a straight answer

tchrist

Nor Twitter nor anything. That's just 111% garbage, every possible one of them.

Laurel

I try not even to open Twitter considering how downhill it's gone, tho I often see screenshots reposted elsewhere

tchrist

@Laurel Science News. Phys.org. Things like that.

alphabet

I mean, one of today's stories is "U.S. Urges Israel to Protect Gaza Civilians and Pushes Hostage Talks."

That seems...kinda cheerful. I mean it isn't bad.

Granted, the top NYT story is "Abbott Signs Law Allowing Texas to Arrest Migrants, Setting Up Federal Showdown."

tchrist

phys.org

@Laurel Read stuff like that.

Laurel

04:40

@alphabet I just saw a screenshot of that from CBS

Cerberus

For example, on my newspaper's front page:
- Vulcano erupts in Iceland.
- Dutch navy to partake in mission to protect shipping in the Red Seas.
- Strikes at newspapers cancelled because of breakthrough in negotiations.
- Why are there no clinics for long-Covid patients?
- Cabinet plan not to carry out prison sentences in some cases undermines the position of judges.

alphabet

(Insert rant about Biden's bizarrely incoherent border policies making the whole situation worse.)

Cerberus

This is actyally just in the first screen of the front page.

alphabet

@Cerberus The volcano part seems sad.

Cerberus

Well, news doesn't have to be happy. One wants to know what is happing around the world.

Laurel

04:42

@tchrist I'll concede that pure science news isn't depressing

Cerberus

Many important things are bad.

How can you vote if you have no idea what reliable sources like newspapers have to say about the world, about your own country?—if you only consume Tiktok memes instead, possibly paid for by Russian troll armies?

Laurel

I'm already getting enough sad stuff in between memes and it's unbearable tho

tchrist

@alphabet Well at least that'll save them from making it as far as Florida, where De Santis would probably shoot them on sight.

alphabet

I mean, it's important to read the news so you can decide how to vote or whether to protest or whatever. But learning about the Icelandic volcano eruption doesn't, in all fairness to the people of Iceland, benefit me much.

Cerberus

Those are just examples.

Laurel

04:44

I honestly find it very hard to manage with political stuff, I get so angry to the point of wanting to go commit a crime or something (but I don't).

Cerberus

@alphabet I skip lots of stuff in my newspaper, either because it's too depressing or because it's clickbait or unimportant.

Laurel

With US politics, it's like a choice between 1) people who wouldn't care if I (or people like me) died and are passing laws to make it more likely and 2) the other guy

alphabet

@Cerberus Here, your choices in most elections are the crazy maniacs and the lizard people. Mostly you just choose the lizard people.

Laurel

Like I'm upset rn thinking about politics

Cerberus

@Laurel Then skip those topics.

Laurel

04:49

That's not going to help me vote tho

Cerberus

It will if you read about the things that are about actual substance and not outrage and scandals.

Then again, I suppose you have little choice in your voting.

Only two options.

@Laurel But, really, voting is only a symbol of what it stands for: you want to know what is happening in the world, in order to have opinions and take decisions on so many things in your life.

tchrist

Trump Quotes Hitler | Our Full-Time Taylor Swift Reporter | Can Rudy Pay? | Senate Sex Tape

►

Cerberus

Yeah, that is a clickbait headline I would skip.

alphabet

I'm planning on voting for the guy with early-stage dementia currently raising funds for ethnic cleansing

Though I suppose that that applies to both of them

Laurel

@tchrist I heard about all this on the meme news, except for whatever Taylor swift is up to because you apparently do need a full time reporter for that

:64879618

Oop

@Cerberus It's like a fake choice considering that one of the options in the 2024 US election seems like it would end democracy and possibly the entire country

Cerberus

05:06

Right, well, that sounds a bit hysterical.

tchrist

I wish it were.

Laurel

I don't know how I'm going to make it through the season. Even this year was stressful/challenging and there was nothing big happening

Cerberus

Maybe you'd have a different opinion if you read more thoughtful news from a serious source?

You don't need to follow election news.

Skip some subjects you don't want to read about.

But make sure you read a reliable newspaper, for the rest of the topics.

tchrist

@Laurel Season as in the next eleven months?

Laurel

I meant election season, yeah

Maybe I should instead plan to be stressed about the post-election season

tchrist

05:11

They might still allow local elections.

alphabet

I think there's about a 10% chance Trump tries to turn the country into a tin-pot dictatorship. Unlikely, but hopefully we don't have to risk it.

Laurel

Luckily, my state seems to have OK protections for most stuff, but I still get unbearably sad hearing about what's happening elsewhere in the country where they don't have any protections

Cerberus

The world was never a happy place.

Some things get better, others worse.

Never forget how awful most things used to be. Our lives would have been pretty miserable a hundred years ago.

Yeah, newspapers are also guilty of that, emphasising the bad things.

tchrist

That's why we're so troubled by hearing the language of those times coming out of one side's mouthpiece today.

Laurel

I guess it's worse where I'm reading it because what shows up on the page is controlled by user voting, which only exacerbates the whole bias towards extremely depressing things

And memes

Cerberus

05:18

I'm pretty sure a century ago was far worse than that.

tchrist

It was. Because it happened.

Cerberus

@Laurel Ah, yes, exactly. And clickbait, right?

tchrist

But the language of fascism is the same.

Cerberus

A decent newspaper will be more thoughtful, more balanced, less panicky, less exaggerating.

tchrist

Yeah, you can't get torn apart by those audience driven things.

Or algorithm driven things.

Laurel

05:24

@Cerberus Well, it's all images so it's a bit different

Cerberus

@Laurel Even more superficial, even more attention-baity?

Laurel

I just stumbled on a repost of the BBC article about the volcano tho

Like in this case it's just screenshots of what the BBC posted so I wouldn't really describe it as clickbait.

Cerberus

In this case.

Even so, headline are BY FAR the worst part of newspapers.

They are the clickbait of yore.

Laurel

In other cases, maybe I would consider it clickbait? But I think the algorithm is mostly people voting with their emotions (and/or memes)

Cerberus

The article itself will have the nuance, the facts, what really happened.

Laurel

05:41

Yeah, idk. Looking up the full story in the real news behind one of the tweet images I saw didn't make me feel any better. In fact, the detail made me feel worse

Cerberus

Skip that particular topic, then.

Your feed is only giving you the worst, most controversial news topics, probably.

Laurel