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Re: Random Thread

Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2021 4:29 am
by hwhatting
Nortaneous wrote: Tue Oct 12, 2021 9:04 pm is AfD so thoroughly infiltrated that they decided to stop prosecuting it, or is that just NDP? I can't imagine very many people would want to vote for a fed honeypot
The current status of the AfD is that the Verfassungsschutz (Office for the Protection of the Constitution) decided to start to observe the AfD on the federal level, but that was stopped by a court. AFAIK some parts of the AfD on the state level are already being observed by state offices of the Verfassungsschutz. So it would be still quite a step to an attempt at prohibition.
The case with the failed attempt at prohibition due to over-infiltration was the NPD; they now are back to splinter party status, as the voters who gave them a presence in some state parliaments a decade or so ago have moved on to the AfD.

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2021 7:28 pm
by Nachtswalbe

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2021 7:47 pm
by Nachtswalbe
Queen Isabelle of Italy
Isabelle Hélène Sursock fell in love with Prince Marcantonio VII Colonna [it], who brought her to Italy, where she was able to integrate successfully into Roman high society at a time when it had to deal with Mussolini. After the end of the monarchy in 1946 Isabelle effectively replaced queen Marie José as the substitute queen of Italy, hosting regal receptions where royalty and, among the bourgeoisie, only financiers and bankers were allowed.[54][55] Donna Isabelle, as she then became known, occupied a prime position amongst the élite of Roman society throughout her long life up to the 1980s. She was a lady of great intelligence and power who intensely guarded the artistic collection of the family throughout the darkest periods of both world wars. She shielded persecuted Jews and resisted the fascists wherever possible. She and her husband were immensely loyal to the Holy See, so much so that she was given the rare honor of Vatican citizenship
The Actual Queen

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2021 7:53 pm
by Nachtswalbe
Sir Sadruddin Aga Khan's work for the UNHCR
Prince Sadruddin's determination not to discriminate between European and Third World refugees helped prepare the UNHCR for a change in the landscape of internationally displaced persons. During the 1950s, between 200,000 and 300,000 refugees of European origin required assistance. By the 1970s the European refugee problems were mostly solved, but had been replaced by millions of displaced persons in the Third World. He had widened the UNHCR mandate well beyond its original focus on Eastern Europe, extending the organisation's reach to refugees from Palestine, Vietnam, Angola and Algeria.[10] As the scale and complexity of refugee issues continued to increase, the UNHCR and the international community at large was better positioned to adapt.[6] By the end of 1977 when he chose to step down from the position, he had become the longest-serving UN High Commissioner for Refugees

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2021 10:01 pm
by Nachtswalbe

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2021 10:09 pm
by Pabappa
sometimes you dont have to add anything useful though. i go to chatrooms where nearly everyone is smarter than me, because i like intellectual conversation, and I am nearly impossible to embarrass. i'd rather be wrong and have someone show me up, than be right and have to take the time to explain to someone why they were wrong.

What Im doing doesnt involve money though, so I assume @vgr would not have anything against me. also, i've never claimed to be smart in these communities, so there's not even the possibility of someone taking my word over that of someone who's more knowledgeable.

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Sat Oct 16, 2021 2:48 am
by Nachtswalbe
https://mobile.twitter.com/vgr/status/1 ... 0531431424
His reaction to anti school Discourse
Yeah yeah holy war school is a prison that destroys kids blah blah soap box...

...but don't let criticisms of schooling fool you into thinking everybody would be a genius if it weren't for school ruining their beautiful little minds

It's the same spread of idiots every cohort

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Sat Oct 16, 2021 3:48 am
by Nachtswalbe
https://mobile.twitter.com/Cambechambe1 ... 6610490370
Basically customs operators in any country are generally discriminatory (and paranoid)

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Sat Oct 16, 2021 11:36 am
by Nachtswalbe
kodé wrote: Sat Jun 29, 2019 9:06 pm Heh, Sal, being a parent of a small child in the 2010’s in the USA, and thus knowing a shitton of other parents of small children in this time and place, both the macroeconomic (relatively worth of capital vs. labor) and microeconomic (career and childcare) reasons for our historically low birthrates are true. Basically, having kids at this juncture in history is a terribly decision financially: it’s both a short-term setback in spending money on your kids and a long-term setback in the damage it does to your career. And children are not investments, at least not for three or more decades. In particular, childcare is a huge burden, and until your kids are old enough to be in state-sponsored childcare slash education, you’re at a loss to figure out what to do with them that doesn’t prevent you from earning something.

So like Zompist is saying, if you want high fertility rates—or at least rates higher than our current, abnormally low ones—you’d need to focus on childcare. More broadly, you’d need a society-wide understanding that people in their 20’s and 30’s are going to be dumping a large portion of their time and resources into raising children, and not focusing mainly on their careers. Right now, we’ve got the opposite: the 20’s and 30’s are a crucial age in your career and in getting a solid financial foundation. Alternatively, child-rearing could be a task given mainly to people in their 50’s or above.
Or maybe relatively high population growth in the decades or centuries after a 'regional' nuclear war as contraceptives become absent and gender equality tend to take a back seat to survival

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Sat Oct 16, 2021 2:25 pm
by alynnidalar
That post was from over two years ago--I doubt you're going to get a response!

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Sat Oct 16, 2021 3:24 pm
by alice
alynnidalar wrote: Sat Oct 16, 2021 2:25 pm That post was from over two years ago--I doubt you're going to get a response!
Especially since Sal disappeared from the board in mysterious circumstances long ago.

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Sat Oct 16, 2021 5:17 pm
by Richard W
alice wrote: Sat Oct 16, 2021 3:24 pm Especially since Sal disappeared from the board in mysterious circumstances long ago.
Nothing mysterious - it was the result of a deeply held difference of opinion between Sal and the boardlord over whether a hypothetical example of Sal's was deeply offensive or innocuous.

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Sat Oct 16, 2021 5:50 pm
by Nachtswalbe
Ali the Highest wrote:There will be new cultures and new types of people that aren’t defined by race or geography.

You can see seeds of this in Internet cultures.
Sometimes I wish all humanity would submit to an Esperantist government like the kind portrayed here and snazzy posters of Lumo Txiuhoma de Humanetso Morgawa

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Sun Oct 17, 2021 10:28 pm
by kodé
Nachtswalbe wrote: Sat Oct 16, 2021 11:36 am
kodé wrote: Sat Jun 29, 2019 9:06 pm Heh, Sal, being a parent of a small child in the 2010’s in the USA, and thus knowing a shitton of other parents of small children in this time and place, both the macroeconomic (relatively worth of capital vs. labor) and microeconomic (career and childcare) reasons for our historically low birthrates are true. Basically, having kids at this juncture in history is a terribly decision financially: it’s both a short-term setback in spending money on your kids and a long-term setback in the damage it does to your career. And children are not investments, at least not for three or more decades. In particular, childcare is a huge burden, and until your kids are old enough to be in state-sponsored childcare slash education, you’re at a loss to figure out what to do with them that doesn’t prevent you from earning something.

So like Zompist is saying, if you want high fertility rates—or at least rates higher than our current, abnormally low ones—you’d need to focus on childcare. More broadly, you’d need a society-wide understanding that people in their 20’s and 30’s are going to be dumping a large portion of their time and resources into raising children, and not focusing mainly on their careers. Right now, we’ve got the opposite: the 20’s and 30’s are a crucial age in your career and in getting a solid financial foundation. Alternatively, child-rearing could be a task given mainly to people in their 50’s or above.
Or maybe relatively high population growth in the decades or centuries after a 'regional' nuclear war as contraceptives become absent and gender equality tend to take a back seat to survival
Response, indeed! No necro too necrotic.

FWIW, I prefer plentiful childcare to nuclear holocaust. Or rethinking the nuclear family instead of just going nuclear.

Sorry if I missed a bigger point being made here. I just doubt that contraceptives and gender inequality necessarily enforce low fertility rates, though they often lead to them.

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Sun Oct 17, 2021 10:43 pm
by kodé
Richard W wrote: Sat Oct 16, 2021 5:17 pm
alice wrote: Sat Oct 16, 2021 3:24 pm Especially since Sal disappeared from the board in mysterious circumstances long ago.
Nothing mysterious - it was the result of a deeply held difference of opinion between Sal and the boardlord over whether a hypothetical example of Sal's was deeply offensive or innocuous.
While I did think Sal was in the wrong on that occasion, I’m still really bummed that he’s gone. I always like him. :cry:

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Mon Oct 18, 2021 7:46 am
by hwhatting
kodé wrote: Sun Oct 17, 2021 10:43 pm While I did think Sal was in the wrong on that occasion, I’m still really bummed that he’s gone. I always like him. :cry:
Same here. Even when he was wrong, he added depth to discussions, and I liked his dispatches on British politics.

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Mon Oct 18, 2021 7:54 am
by bradrn
It’s not just Sal. I can think of quite a few other people with deep linguistics knowledge who seem to have vanished. I think some have moved to the CBB or Reddit; not quite sure, but they certainly aren’t here any more, which is a real pity. (It was nice when there were people who could correct me on obscure linguistic topics — I learnt so much from them.)

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Mon Oct 18, 2021 9:15 am
by Man in Space
I particularly miss Whimemsz. He was knowledgable on North American languages and diachronics. Then he blanked a bunch of his posts and left. Unfortunate.

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Mon Oct 18, 2021 9:37 am
by Linguoboy
hwhatting wrote: Mon Oct 18, 2021 7:46 am
kodé wrote: Sun Oct 17, 2021 10:43 pm While I did think Sal was in the wrong on that occasion, I’m still really bummed that he’s gone. I always like him.
Same here. Even when he was wrong, he added depth to discussions, and I liked his dispatches on British politics.
I really appreciated those.

He does have a blog, but he mostly uses it to talk about books, occasionally conlangs, and never politics as far as I can tell.

Re: Random Thread

Posted: Mon Oct 18, 2021 10:35 am
by hwhatting
Linguoboy wrote: Mon Oct 18, 2021 9:37 am He does have a blog, but he mostly uses it to talk about books, occasionally conlangs, and never politics as far as I can tell.
Yep, it's mostly book reviews and I haven't seen anything on politics there.