Hot Button Topics (religion, politics, sports)

[NejinOniwa]

Yes, the greeks are rather mad

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfA-7XrJWPQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMyqx47vo9Y

[Chocofreak13]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lIELv_nBChg

[Cockleshell]

right let me just post this here since posting it on tumblr probably won't get any response

[Chocofreak13]

was she tazed?


theory of what happened dictates that if she was and she was on the drug, she could have later died in custody and, fearing scandal, they strung her up to make it look like a suicide.

[Bella]

https://www.bostonglobe.com/arts/2015/07/18/counter-protesters-join-kimono-fray-mfa/ZgVWiT3yIZSlQgxCghAOFM/story.html

Not to beat a dead horse, butttttttttt.....

"We actually do not quite understand what their point of protest is," said Jiro Usui, the Deputy Consul General of Japan in Boston. "We tried to listen to those people who are protesting, but we think together with the MFA we should encourage that Japanese culture be appreciated in a positive way."

I'm sure glad those protesters know more about Japanese culture than a Japanese diplomat. Maybe Tumblr DOES offer a better education than college, life experience and being a part of a particular culture! Who knew. /s

[Chocofreak13]

s'what i've been saying ALL ALONG about this. hell, the kimono in question was MADE IN JAPAN. it was tried on IN JAPAN BY JAPANESE PEOPLE. the japanese people LOVED IT. and just because it has connections to a french painting, we're encouraging colonialism?


am i encouraging the government to take away womens' voting rights and redact child labour laws by wearing clothing from the late 1800's? ><;

[Pitkin]

This little thing I wrote isn't necessarily an inflammable topic per se, but since it's quite closely linked to politics and differing opinions, I thought I'd post it here.

Recently, I've seen quite many posts on social media about people 'cleaning up' their contact and friend lists, which means removing and/or blocking all of those contacts whose political opinions are too different from their own. The fieriest topic in Finland, for example, has been the European migrant crisis and the Finns are very much divided between those who hate the idea of receiving any foreigners and those who welcome everyone wanting to enter the country. The tone's got quite violent between the two camps and people, who've never talked politics together before now notice that they're not exactly seeing eye to eye in such issues. Thus, I see friends posting things like "everyone who's against our rabbit overlords, you can unfriend me before I unfriend you."

I'd like to know your opinions on this matter. Do you think it's better indeed to "clean up" one's contacts to not risk high blood pressure every time one signs in on Facebook, or do you think one should keep those contacts around perhaps to pursue at least some kind of dialogue?

Personally, I must admit I've done that sort of "contact cleanup" before, as I'm the type who easily gets angry and loses their nightsleep over even the pettiest of things. However, despite the fact I've done it before and risk doing it in the future, I believe it would be better for us to have those annoying contacts around as well.

Why? Well, I don't know about you guys, but I've quite often heard somebody say, "How the hell did X win the elections? I don't know anybody who agrees with them." This sort of reaction is pretty much a symptom of being in a sort of a social bubble, something one could call a Happy Family. If one actively avoids everybody not totally agreeing with them and only discusses politics / ethical / religious / etc. matters with people they already knew from the start would 100% agree, they can only be surprised slash disgusted when they eventually hear a differing voice. Everybody reasonable agrees with me; therefore, anybody not 100% with me must be an idiot.

At the same time, I totally understand removing those arrogant bastards from one's news feed / contact list. If one shares one's honest opinions with someone, isn't it natural to expect being able to feel safe and comfortable? Disagreement can feel like an attack on one's person, especially if the two sides don't make an effort not to come off as hostile. Local example: this cretin Pitkin who sees it her right to call people assholes when they post a single thing she doesn't like. Mea culpa, sorry about that. Facing a hostile crowd (even a crowd of one) isn't always easy even for those whose job basically means persuading others and finding common ground, and it's naturally even worse when it happens unexpectedly, such as in one's FB news feed or post comments.

While this whole crap I wrote probably doesn't make any sense, it's my way of expressing regret on this issue. I used to have some very interesting contacts back in time but I've lost them due to the afore-mentioned friend list cleansing. Whether I'm conservative or not, I really need to work my listening of the other side of the argument. After all, even if I found 90% of everything they say unreasonable or rubbish, maybe in that 10% there's something that I could take a lesson from. At the very least, in honing my own future arguments.

Sorry about that, carry on!

[Nichi]

For me, it really depends on the person; like, even if we disagree on politics, we can at least find some common ground somewhere else. There are exceptions, though; like if their political beliefs are so tightly engrained that it's impossible to be around them without hearing them complain about [pick: Obama \ "the gays" \ "the thugs" \ etc.], like they have absolutely nothing else going on in their life, so they need to complain about everyone and everything that doesn't fit their narrow-minded worldview.

I suppose the worst are the ones that come off as two-faced; like a former friend of mine, whom I used to work under at Gamestop. You know something's up when he did the whole "rainbow-tinted profile pic to celebrate marriage equality", and while his avatar is still that, making a post that states he feels it's a bunch of "bullshit" to distract people from "the real issues", like [pick: government spying \ horse meat \ the lost episode of JonTron Show \ etc.], while also routinely cracking downright offensive "jokes" about Catelyn (sp?) Jenner (Which does make me fear for the well-being of his son; since he was born with a female body).

Also, there's the issue of Walmart: before he was fired from Gamestop, he was strongly against Walmart, and felt they were the worst company you could ever go to work for...and then he goes to work there, and suddenly he changes his tune to "Walmart is the greatest company ever; everyone needs to come work for this wonderful company", when he wasn't even that supportive of Gamestop when he worked there. It feels like his desire to appeal to everyone makes him feel less trustworthy, as you don't know what his real worldview is; the only consistent is the tinfoil hat conspiracy theories.

I would try to open a conversation with some of these people on their differing worldviews, but as I've established in the past, I have a problem with confrontations; especially with how these people get very defensive and often result to insulting the other person in an effort to prove their superiority. Rather than trying to reach an understanding and be mature about it, it instead becomes about proving one's choice as the One True Choice^TM, like how they need to spend hours on the GameFAQs boards justifying their purchase of a PS4 by talking down to Xbox One owners over any little thing they can use against them (see: "my console solds 2041 more units than yours did #YOLOSWAG").

[Chocofreak13]

i'm too lazy to actually trim people from my FB lists, so after seeing several offensive/unappealing things on their post lists (or even just one if i don't interact with them much), i shove them into the acquaintance folder and am done with it. i've blocked a few people in my life, but that was only under extreme circumstances (someone i considered a mortal enemy, a stalker, my cousin who was going on an abusive rant in PMs to me, an ex-boyfriend whom if i ever see again i may actually kill, etc etc).

i'm in support of people 'cleaning' their friendlists, because occasionally you'll make a friend under seemingly nice circumstances, and then they rear their ugly head later. i friended a girl once at a cosplay event, and had intended to trade some stuff with her for some nice-sounding stuff (a pair of lilac Hakama, for example). i made one off-the-cuff remark about 'spirit animal' (a joke i hadn't made in over a year, to boot), and she flips her goddamn lid, saying that i had no right as a "whitebread" (or something like that, she was white too) to make remarks about her religion or culture or whatever. thankfully, everyone jumped in to my defense, and i came back with the remark that she should shut her goddam mouth about things SHE doesn't know since, as a pagan, i could have a spirit animal, too (i don't, it doesn't mesh well with my interpretation of the religion, but other pagans do). ><;

a lot of friends of mine turn to FB for support or for people that actually agree with them, and sadly these random friends that people pick up may not just have differing opinions, but may start spouting off hate speech or triggering remarks without a second thought. my friend Arty actually friended someone she greatly respected and looked up to (an older (40's - 50's) trans woman), who ended up going off on one of the most explosive, hate-filled rants i've ever heard because she didn't like the terminology someone was using and claimed she was "correct" despite it being hurtful to the person because "i went to Harvey Milk" (an LGBT-focused high school in Manhattan) and "i've been in this community longer than you", despite the attitudes toward things changing. i think she used the word "tranny" a few times. Arty unfriended her, and was extremely upset--someone she idolized had just outright attacked her friends and (much in the way of MRAs), tried her best to play the victim in that situation. ><


i see the 'cleansing' process as one that's necessary for some people. a lot of people go to facebook not for debate, but to vent and rally with like-minded individuals. as long as one is keeping up with the news (independent news, mind you), they won't be shocked about opposing views, but they will save themselves a lot of frustration and emotion by trimming things down. :\

[Nichi]

True that. I've only ever unfriended one person for conflicting worldview, and that was a former friend of my bro-in-law. He was a pretty cool guy, but he went through a rough patch in his life where he was working a shitty job miles away from his family, and his way of taking it out was by going the extreme right-wing (Like, guns are the solution to all problems and anyone that doesn't vote republican is a "fat, lazy slob"). I just quietly unfriended him and never looked back.

TBH, it's part of why I run two FBs; sometimes I want to see what friends are up to, without it getting buried beneath posts from mom's family (Although most of them unfriended me. Nothing of value was lost), people that happened to work with me at Gamestop that I never was on a shift with them, and other things from other people I barely know and don't care about but they're on my friends list because "eh".

[LeaflameSD]

The politics thing doesn't bother me that much, apart from when that one person clogs up my feed with contradictory politics memes.

[Chocofreak13]

@pent: your mother's family unfriended you. that's beautiful and hilarious and i kind of want to know their reasoning. xD

[Nichi]

You're actually the reason xD

I remember my sister made a post on not wanting to shop at Hobby Lobby anymore, over the corporate policy on birth control, and you got into an argument with one of my aunts (Mom's younger sister) in the comments; whom was pro-life and absolutely loved Hobby Lobby because it was run by "good Christians" for standing up against the "murder of innocent babies". At the end of it all, mom's family unfriended me and my sister, and at family gatherings, that aunt barely talks to me. Which is fine; I still remember her using her status as "adult" to talk down to me when I was younger and blow off everything I said, even when I knew what I was talking about*, so her not wanting anything to do with me is a breath of fresh air.

(*Like with the ESRB rating system pre-1998, and its spiritual predecessor, the Sega VRC: GA = K-A = E.
However, she's thought I was a little shit that was lying so I could play Mortal Kombat in front of her poor children, when I just wanted to play some goddamn Vectorman or Sonic 3 & Knuckles, with the only obstacle being her inability to listen to me, like how a lot of people in positions of power over me feel I'm beneath them in every regard, and as Rush put it in one of their songs, they're always the type that are "quick to judge, quick to anger; slow to understand". It's worth noting that, had my older cousin repeated everything I said verbatim, she'd listen to him because she actually respects him as a person and feels he can do no wrong).

[Chocofreak13]

I AM THE GREAT LIBERATOR

DO NOT WORRY YOUNG PENT, I WILL SAVE YOU FROM THAT ASSHOLE OF AMERICA CALLED TEXAS

[Pitkin]

I'm not too happy using reddit as a source, but the original French article on YAGG (an LGBT news portal) is behind a paywall.

For you Steven Universe fans, fear no longer, for the children are safe!

from r/stevenuniverse

French Cartoon Network censors Ruby and Sapphire's relationship when translating Steven Universe