“When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people.”

“The brutally honest care more about the brutality than the honesty.”

“Reasonable people can disagree reasonably.”

I can’t live up to those ideals but it would be cruel to myself and others to stop trying to.

Thank you, that makes sense. I wasn’t sure if the sleep deprivation was just making me (more of) an idiot.

Logically, if he treats the sex worker right, with no demanding, no (non negotiated/sane) violence, and his actions don’t extend into monogamous relationships, and his views on future sexual partners are neither transactional nor cruel, it should be fine.

Emotionally would likely be a different story for the partner, or at least for me. Partly due to the stigma attached to sex work, and partly due to feelings of inadequacy or worry about needing to perform unwanted acts, and partly due to a suspicion that that really would affect his views, because people’s thoughts and feelings are messy, sprawling things that don’t fit into the mental cabinets we stuff them into. But if the partner couldn’t get over that, then they’re not for him.

And yes, this applies to women who pay for sex workers, too. Or at least it damn well should.

I can’t be the only one who can’t parse this sentence.

I’m sorry, can you rephrase this? I don’t understand what you’re trying to say.

That’s a good point, and you’re right that I’m conflating them.

What other elements of AI would you imagine would be useful here?

Given that the AI we have is prone to making things up because it “fits” according to the models it trains on, how much faith would you have in a translation done by an AI on writings made by people who lived millennia before said language models were developed?

My cat is deaf, so there have been a number of “Oh! It’s you!” startled “mrrrrAAAAAs” directed at me when I come around a corner.

She’s quite talkative, with lots of greeting (and aforementioned startled) trills and meows that can range from normal level to “causes ear bleeds at close range” level.

Oh I love that idea! It draws from the historical presentation of salt in vessels like boxes or cups and it would look lovely as the centerpiece of a full set.

That’s very pretty: it looks like a swirling potion in the center.

What do you plan to put inside it? It makes me think of incense burners but I don’t think that’d be good for wood…

A shrug and a “pretty good” = acceptable, not worth complaining about.

A slow grin first or it being said loudly = better than good, great.

Although this depends on how emotive the speaker is.

Exactly. Places/communities like Lemmy can and should serve different functions for different people - newsfeed, forum, meme collection/dumping ground - but the fine line between value and addiction gets obliterated by moneyed interests.

The sound you just heard is 45,000 men simultaneously and furiously searching for the long term effects of compost exposure.

“DON’T. THROW. THE BONES.”

Dinotopia: cottagecore, atop a hadrosaur.

I know what you’re asking for. Why?

There’s a fine line between curiosity seeking, digital self-harm, and contributing to that garbage and consequently harming others.

None.

What you’re describing is not community.

Forgiving myself for feeling them.

Realizing that my emotional reaction is 1) human and 2) understandable and 3) a reaction, not an inevitability, can allow me to mentally (and physically, if necessary) step back. A sharp emotion is not yet a sharp word, and my initial reaction to a situation can be both normal and wrong, but I’m not locked in to that initial feeling. I can interpret and interrogate and change my mind.

It’s hardly easy to do that in high stress situations, but as a general rule it doesn’t help to fight high emotion with another high emotion like shame. Awareness of what causes them, knowing yourself and how you react and nurturing the patience to give yourself time and space to process can go a long way to making you feel less volatile.

Well, there’s the obvious will, but since it doesn’t specify how you die: an advanced directive.

An advanced directive is a document wherein you, while living and conscious and with control of your mental faculties, detail end of life care in the event that you are not capable of providing informed consent. You can detail how much and what kind of resuscitative or palliative efforts are made, assign someone you trust to make medical decisions for you, and what to do with your body.

DNRs (do not resuscitate, meaning no CPR done on you if your heart stops) are parts of advance directives and if you are serious about one make sure it gets into your medical chart: EMS personnel MUST provide CPR if it isn’t official.

If your family/friends situation is poor, contentious, and/or you can’t trust them to make the right choices for you medically, this can save you a painful death. Unfortunately, a lot of end of life “care” is the family’s attempt at prolonging the heartbeat of a nearly dead person because they can’t accept loss.

If your situation is good, it can still be a huge load off people’s minds to know that there’s a plan being followed, and it can prevent any rifts from forming. Even though you won’t see it, it’s a kindness to your loved ones to give them some peace of mind during what is often a chaotic and confusing time.

So here’s what we do: we start a TikTok challenge. “Nickname November” or something like that, where you use a different name every day of the month for maximum confusion. Get a couple classes doing it, especially if there are any trans kids in the school, and you can see how far you can stress the system.

For the schools that require physical signatures, that’ll piss people off right quick. For the ones that just use an automated email and call it a day, toss in a twist: have each student loudly announce their new name at the start of every class, AA style. Heck, get the school announcer in on it. “Chess club on Wednesday has been cancelled, and Squidward Jones is now going by Jackie McJackson Johnstone.”

They want a ridiculous law to be followed? Okay, here you go.

Personally I use those to test for the presence of mold. Great success so far!

But yeah, I get what you mean. I’ve had to be the Bad Guy who throws out the 14,000+ cups of tartar sauce and soy sauce that take up as much space as the rest of the takeout that has long since been eaten.