refenestrator

vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

Cheers!

vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

> the idea that the professionals to whom we give vast sums to be excellent at lying, cheating, stealing, killing, and betrayal - spies, in other words - should be given a sort of "Mister Magoo" benefit of the doubt when lots of people die -- that's, for me these days, the more extraordinary claim.

That's where we differ. They're Mr. Magoo with money in my opinion. How many brilliant exploits have they ever had? Even their wins are, like, "we sponsored some death squads who killed the opposition and eventually the anti-communist guy won due to having overwhelming resources".

The CIA is called 'the company' in DC and it's apparently a super-corporate environment. I've worked in corporate. It's stupid. A big part of the stupid is the local ideology, which is a multiplier effect on the general 'none of us is as dumb as all of us' effect, and I could probably go a long ways with you critiquing the CIA's default and unspoken ideology. But I still think 'organizational stupid' is such an absolute..

refenestrator

vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

I'm with you on being outraged, but organizational dysfunction is the norm and not reigning it in is one way of "dropping the ball".

There wasn't, like, one single person who had all this information and he was personally stopped by the head of the CIA from telling the executive branch. It was a SNAFU of competing interests and stupid bureaucracy.

The fact that these people were promoted afterwards, however.. yeah, my blood boils.

refenestrator

vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

Having a family is the bedrock of society. If only the top 10% of earners had one, we'd find ourselves in some trouble.

refenestrator

vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

General knowledge, but I checked your link in your previous comment, and that article put 55M of the 60M on disease in the (early, pre-british) timeframe they're discussing.

Sources of death, wider timeframe:

  *  Disease
  *  Columbus on one tiny island
  *  Spaniards in general who are not Columbus (who was italian but sponsored by Spain)
  *  British/Americans

Disease sounds like #1 from what I can tell. Spaniards might edge out Americans, or maybe we're worse, I don't know. We left fewer survivors but they were in a larger area. Columbus for a few years on one island is clearly last place.

refenestrator

vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

You're mostly talking about disease in that case, which was "nobody's fault", with a side-helping of 7 years war.

On American currency, Washington, Jefferson and Jackson (!) are most relevant although they're obviously not the only authority figures that were all about taking land.

The first ~12 presidents or so are each responsible for more atrocities against natives than Columbus could ever have done on the one crappy island he occupied for a few years. You don't go from 13 coastal colonies to "sea to shining sea" without breaking a few eggs.

refenestrator

vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

> I have no idea what your currency is and who is on it.

My currency is American and every single one of them has more native bodies on them than Columbus. President's day has zero people protesting against it.

Like I said, history is written by the winners.

refenestrator

vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

Compare Colombus Day to President's Day in terms of body count. Which one gets pushback? Who's on our currency?

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vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

Everyone involved in the late-70s intra-Party disputes in China not only knew how to write, but was a skilled propagandist and had learned from one of the best to ever do it.

Winning is what mattered in that case. There's gotta be a Mao quote for that, barrels of guns or something.

refenestrator

vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

History is written by the victors in all cases. If Hua and Deng didn't win against the Gang of Four, you'd have a different history of the cultural revolution. Fortunately, they won.

America's won too much, even when we're wrong or stupid, and our historical frame has suffered.

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vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

I think you're right and you're not succumbing to any effects. The nuts are the loudest and wiser people stay quiet, which gets worse when it causes the young and impressionable to think that the nuts have buy-in.

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vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

Latin would be ungendered, but it's been said for years by all sorts of people so it doesn't serve the cultural signalling purposes to show that you're enlightened. Gotta use that x to demonstrate your tribal allegiance.

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vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

I've seen you make a lot of good comments but this comment feeds the problem you're describing.

Either I have to agree with obviously stupid stuff from "my side" or I'm with the nazis? That only empowers the stupid at the end of the day.

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vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

This isn't a tech thing, it's an english language thing.

Are women in finance degraded by this extremely common linguistic quirk? Women in medicine?

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vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

I've referred to entirely-female groups of people as "you guys". It seemed like a better bet than "hey ladies", and I'm not southern enough to pull off "y'all".

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vor 5 Jahrendiscuss

But it's all white people getting offended at it, and specifically it's white people who never give a shit about Chinese in any of their other culture wars.

Discriminated against in college admissions? Erased in discussions of diversity in tech? Who cares. Call me back when we can use you to get mad at a children's book.