Saying an entire generation across the whole of planet Earth is “basically braindead” is a bold claim… and factually incorrect. I’m not here to argue this point - your assumption is flawed.

That looks pretty good - might investigate if I can use it without WiFi, i.e. just using mobile data.

I’m a bit weird as I’ve never had any IT training but have been using all types of computers for about 40-ish years. Back in the day I had a psion 5mx running epoc OS. To transfer a Word (Not to be confused with MS’s Word) file I had to convert it to .txt or .rtf and then save it to a compact flash 8mb memory card. Remove that card from the psion, plug in the CF card reader to my iBook (dual boot OS 9.1.2 and Mac OS X) and import the text. For some reason these files were always read only so then you open a new Jotter file and copy and paste the text over. Absolute ballache. Easy file transfer is a holy grail of digital living.

I use the cable to charge my phone. Am I the only person still doing this?

I just plug a cable from my iPhone to my Linux mint laptop and view/transfer what photos I want through my file browser… seems real easy.

Unless melanin levels play a part in the story (Huck Finn, Mockingbird etc) then there’s no reason to even think about it. Describe to me how the following character looks: they go by the name Jordan and work in a Japanese restaurant in Cape Town. Everybody will picture someone different…

For the record the word Libertarian has a different meaning in the US to that used in the rest of the world.

That’s incredibly grim and it disturbs me - whilst I do (kind of) see where you’re coming from. I’m not gonna try and give you counselling or advice. I’m neither qualified nor know anything much about you to do that. I sincerely hope that in a decade or so a happier you looks back on the immediate future (as it is now) and just takes a deep breath and puts it down to another blip in humanity’s long and winding road. That would be nice.

Another classic example of a technically correct answer missing nuance and context.

That’s incredible - thanks. The idea of the ultimate endgame of capitalistic monopolies looking suspiciously like communism always confused me as it seemed they were just doing the communist legwork before the state intervenes. I’ll probably have a go at section 2, Engels / DiaMat, fairly soon.

Thanks. I’m passingly familiar with Lenin and the New Economic Policy but I’d like to better understand the key differences to Marx’s Communist theory that it had/s. Also, without wanting to be controversial, a good piece about China. Is it Marxist / Communist or not - or is it more complicated than that?

Any particular theory you have in mind, if you don’t mind me asking?

I don’t know… revel in the fact that you are living (so far) through an event that could be epoch defining? Not everybody gets a front seat to history. That’s, uh, about all I’ve got for now. Sorry.

If over half of your active voters want to kill people as part of a national policy then you’re probably fucked beyond repair as a people and a nation. My condolences.

I’d love Karl’s view on Putin/Russia right now… You’re right trying to find a meaning for that nonsense phrase. I remember doing a web search when I first read it - maybe it meant something. Beyond the reference sites it was all US right wing publications using the term. If only one section of one society is using a phrase that should tell you something about the phrase.

Regardless of your views on the Orange Grifter / Gift from God (delete as applicable) this question is fundamentally flawed. “How do we build bridges, find common ground and begin to win over our fellow US citizens who have, in my opinion, made a poor and misinformed political choice that could have terrible consequences for them, our country and the world at large?” might be a more appropriate opener. I understand you’re upset, scared, desolate etc but your language comes off as belligerent and aggressive. Perhaps soften your tone and be more receptive to others’ concerns. For the record, I’ve got no flies on this turd as I’m not from the US, nor do I live there. Good luck.

I’m pretty sure if Marx had met hipsters then the fucker would’ve been clean shaven pretty quickly.

CM is the personification of a supposed organised movement aiming to eradicate the traditional Bible-based societal norms of modern Western European culture. Many people implicitly, and some explicitly, implicate “the Jews” as being behind it. Whilst modern (western) society is undoubtedly undergoing seismic reshaping in its very fabric the idea that people in the shadows are behind it is all a bit fairy tale to me. It discounts the possibility that it is society, collectively, evolving on a social level; organically. The Renaissance partly happened because of the invention of printing. Could not a second Renaissance be happening in the age of the internet - hence the binary positions adopted by so many people? Two incompatible positions striving for control. Interestingly this is where Marx could come in and give us a dialectical breakdown of the two opposing western factions. Maybe.

I’m more than happy to ponder the “sociopolitical concept” of an ongoing culture war that may (or may not) be taking place in western civilisation. The term “Cultural Marxism” is, in and of itself, at best, a conspiracy theory dressed in its Sunday best. I’m sorry the food analogy was lost on you. I was trying to say that those two words turned me off everything else you were saying. The sky man crowd are generally the largest contingent against the “culturally Marxist” shift in society so I thought I’d give them a shout out, for their troubles.

I hear what you’re saying, but… I’m no blocker.

Imagine I was hungry and you kindly served up a platter of exotic and mysterious food but right in the middle of it there was a festering lump of rotten meat… suddenly I wouldn’t be so hungry. That’s how I feel whenever I encounter that term. There’s no great bogeyman controlling things - it’s just that humanity is slowly moving away from its obsession with invisible sky men telling everyone how to live.