Meanwhile, “~x” is drooling on itself over in the corner.

Isn’t it wonderful when your VPN client refuses to connect repeatedly until you realize you need to reboot your PC or restart the VPN service… and then go change your underwear.

I appreciate the suggestion, but that looks like a Java library. Interpreted languages make me feel dirty. Java makes me feel even dirtier. If it’s not C, C++, or ASM, is it really worth using?

I’m okay with the “human-readability,” but I’ve never been happy with the “machine-readibility” of XML. Usually I just want to pull a few values from an API return, yet every XML library assumes I want the entire file in a data structure that I can iterate through. It’s a waste of resources and a pain in the ass.

Even though it’s not the “right” way, most of the time I just use regex to grab whatever exists between an opening and closing tag. If I’m saving/loading data from my own software, I just use a serialization library.

I think you might be misunderstanding what I’m trying to say. I’m not discounting the value of human culture. I enjoy various types of art, and I am grateful for the people who produce it.

What doesn’t interest me in the slightest is urban “culture.” By that I mean going to restaurants, attending parties, seeing live music, walking to the corner pub, etc. I haven’t done any of these things in years, and I’m happy. If I discover a musician I like, I’m going to spend some money and buy their record, but I don’t need to be surrounded by a crowd of people listening to them live.

You mention the term “anti-social behavior,” but that doesn’t describe everyone who’d rather live in a rural area than a city. Some of us just like our peace and quiet. As far as subsidizing roads and shipping to rural areas, you like to eat, right? Where do you think the food came from? You live in a house or an apartment, right? Where did the wood, concrete, and raw materials come from? A huge amount of agriculture and production comes from rural areas, and it’s always going to be necessary to have roads and infrastructure to support this. The fact that I live in the same area that supplied your food doesn’t mean that your tax dollars are paying for roads solely so that I can drive on them.

I understand that people like you enjoy the busy life of a city and that you can legitimately take advantage of what a city offers. I’m not like that. Large gatherings of people don’t make me happy; they just make me want to leave. My original argument was that a lot of people live in cities because they have to for work. Some of them, like you, live in cities because it makes them happy. For the people that live in urban areas because they have to, I was speculating that many of them might move to more rural areas given the option. I’m not trying to shit on your lifestyle (although I do have strong negative opinions about bicycles on roadways), and I would hope that you extend the same courtesy. Life is short, and in a perfect world, everyone could live in a place that they enjoy.

If you feel that way, then you probably should live in a city. Some people prefer city life; there’s nothing wrong with that, but it’s not for everyone. I have no desire to be around other people, and the “cultural” aspect of urban living holds no interest to me. I get enough human interaction through work. At home, I want to be un-bothered by other people and go about my business in solitude.

I’m interested to see if this rural/urban divide is going to shift in the future. With the ballooning cost of real estate and the rise of remote work, a lot of urban liberals are moving to more rural areas.

There’s certainly a group of people that enjoy city life, but a lot of people (myself included) just want some peace and quiet and only lived in or near cities to be close to work.

I’m less than half his age, and if I could, I’d do the same thing. I’m also not running for president and fighting against rhetoric that says I’m old, inept, and mentally not all there.

Good for him, but maybe it wasn’t the best idea to make this public?

C++ is just as “safe” as Rust if you use modern language features (std::unique_ptr, for instance). I would argue that anyone who says Rust provides better memory safety than C++ most likely is not familiar with modern C++ and still sees the language as “C with classes.”

If you really want to win a war, you send Lorca (the mirror universe one).

I know you said you don’t like dating apps, but I would write them off completely. My partner and I met online (we’re both within a few years of your age), and one thing we both agree on is that dating apps are great for vetting a potential partner ahead of time. It’s frustrating to meet someone only to find out that they have/want kids (we don’t), don’t share any common interests, have opposing religious/political views, etc. By the time we actually met in person, we both already knew that we would at least get along as friends. It does seem that women tend to get a lot more “garbage” matches on online dating than men do, though; it probably also depends largely on where you live.

Fuck religion. All of them.

From Israeli taxpayers?

Maybe I’m misunderstanding, but if Israel purchased the equipment, how are taxpayer dollars being used for this?

Mask mandates never should have been lifted in the first place. We already have to wear pants, a shirt, and some kind of footwear in public; practically, this doesn’t really have a good reason other than cultural norms. Adding a mask to this is such a simple request, it blows my mind that people are so strongly against it; it’s one of the few requirements for personal attire that actually has a good reason behind it, and it’s incredibly easy to just put on a mask if you’re going to be face-to-face with another person.

Human beings have developed the science and technology to grow crops to feed the population on a massive scale. In fact, growing plants takes a much lower energy input per output calorie than farming animals for meat. Meat production requires the production of plants first in order to feed the meat animals; it’s extremely inefficient compared to producing plants for direct human consumption. Not only does a vegetarian diet reduce animal suffering, it’s also a more efficient use of natural resources.

Predatory animals do not have this option. The owl that eats a mouse isn’t doing it because he would rather eat a mouse than a soybean. He’s doing it because eating a mouse is the only way he’ll survive. Owls do not have farms, genetically modified crops, fertilizers, statistical analysis of crop yield, or any else of our agricultural advancements.

The fact of the matter is that human have no need to eat meat. We eat meat because we want to, not because it’s necessary for our survival. If you choose to have a steak for dinner, you’re making a decision that your desire for a specific flavor of food is more important than the suffering of a cow that provided the meat.

We are still evolving culturally, but we have moved past a lot of horrible things that we did throughout history. We can afford animals with the same right to life and happiness that we afford each other. The fact that so many people refuse to make even the smallest effort toward that goal is disgusting. “Eat something else” is such as simple request, yet the smallest inconvenience is just too much to handle. What does that say about our species?

Words like “murder” and “rape” only apply to non-human animals because for much of history, taking those actions on animals were necessary evils for us to survive. Our species has learned to evolve over time, and we no longer take many of the horrible actions that were commonplace centuries ago. We need to evolve as a culture away from eating meat, and our language needs to evolve with us.

I strongly disagree. On one side, people get to eat, yet conscious, feeling creatures are killed so that humans can eat their “preferred” source of food. On the other side, people still get to eat, animal suffering is greatly diminished, only some people may not enjoy their dinner quite as much.

I refuse to accept that the atrocities that are committed against what we call “meat animals” are worth it to satisfy someone’s culinary preferences. You can get all the nutrition you need from plant-based sources.

You’re right. It’s just the double standard makes me angry. We have millions of cows and chickens tortured and slaughtered every year, and the vast majority of people don’t care. Yet dogs are seen as companion animals and not a source of food. Pigs are by far as intelligent as dogs and cats, yet everyone loves bacon.

While I’m completely in favor of this, it doesn’t address the more significant problems. Factory farming and the consumption of beef and chicken cause far more animal suffering worldwide than eating dogs. Legislation needs to exist to prohibit the production and consumption of ALL meat products. What’s the point of banning dog meat when cows, chickens, goats, sheep, etc are all raised for meat? Banning dog is a good first step, but it’s insignificant. I see no difference in eating dogs va eating the normal “meat animals.”

Before anyone asks, no, I’m not vegan, but I’m in favor of coexisting with animals and using what they leave for us (like free range eggs), not murdering them for food.