The answer is always sexual intercourse.

I’m not in disagreement with your general thesis. However I stand by my statement that your occupy the epicenter of the capitalist monster.

We have a saying that what happens politically in the US will happen here in 15 years time. That’s not totally true. You guys have borne witness to stuff we have never seen. Mass lynching, repeated political assassinations, gun violence, extreme gerrymandering, and the like. This isn’t a critique ( you do you) it’s a simple observation. But neither is it a prediction of what will necessarily happen here. You have fairly unique circumstances. One is the belief in American exceptionalism. Only Americans share that belief.

Europe tends to be pragmatic in the modern era. We will wait out this insanity and reroute circuits around the damage. As I said in my first response. I would look inwards for a solution right now, if I were you. We are actively doing the same, which will become apparent to Wall Street in about half a decade from now.

I do understand that the capitalist system is broke. We see it too in our own countries, but you are certainly downplaying the US role in this catastrophe. You really need to stop telling us to put out that cigarette when America is the primary culprit in spraying gasoline over everyone.

In our countries we can reasonably dump a bad leader, and we do on the regular. But you guys?? Plus, even our evil pricks understand that the elections are fair so they have at least play a level of persuasion. That is the tricky bit - on a level playing ground it is quite difficult to go the full fascist. Ask Italy and France who are always just about to elect someone like Trump, but never quite manage to.

I do appreciate the “we’re all in this together guys”, vibe, but you and us are still leagues apart. It’s for this reason nobody is buying that argument. I needn’t tell you that Europe and most of Asia are crab walking away. If you think that makes me happy think again. You are making all this a gift to China who looks serious, reasonable and sensible by comparison.

First of all, I am not referring to you personally. Nor Americans like you. Unfortunately, by having the system you guys have, it makes no fundamental difference. The States are doing untold damage, and if you get lumped into the mix against your will, it is still being done in your name regardless.

The rest of the world are not plugging our ears - we are being held hostage. I just filled up my car today and paid an eye-watering amount. I didn’t vote for that, neither did several hundred million of us.

I’m sorry, but while I am intensely interested in how you guys are going to put this right, I’m less interested in American views on international issues.

By the way, not saying that we don’t have our own problems, we certainly do, but we are dealing with them behind the scenes quietly, such as dropping as much US software and hardware as possible. Trump has been a boon for national infrastructure development.

Oh, take Australia, for example. They have supported US foreign policy for over 80 years. They have supported every US war since WW2. That stopped dead this year. The public announcements from the government have been neutral, but the actions speak for themselves.

Anyway, I’m at pains for wishing you guys the best, especially the good people such as yourself. I hope that you can figure it out somehow.

Look, what the guy said might have been crude, but he’s not wrong. It doesn’t matter to the rest of the world whether one American, or another, is resisting US fascism. It makes no fundamental difference to the globe.

You really need to step outside of your perspective.

The ICC was set up to hold war criminals accountable. The US fought against it since the beginning and is still fighting against it now. Trump wasn’t president when it was set up. The US just wants to go rogue in international affairs. That’s where we come in. The international bit.

To the rest of the world, we just want the US to just shut the fudge up and leave us alone. We don’t need American advice, and don’t want it. It’s like a neighbour offering advice about our fire regulations when their own house is burning to the actual ground. Pull out of NATO, hit us with tariffs, start stupid and unnecessary wars and all the other dangerous crap. Just leave us out of it. Like the guy said, your country took yourselves out of the global community. Fine. Keep your advice about how to fix Europe to yourself until you learn how to provide healthcare and basic services to your own citizens. It wasn’t for nothing that your ridiculous tipping culture was a shock to Europeans during the world cup. In Europe service staff are paid a living wage. To them, tipping is the cream, not the cake.

I apologise for the slightly hostile tone, and don’t mean it towards you personally. I also know that 50% of Americans don’t want this, but the other 50% come across as pretty toxic.

The minute you declare that you are only interested in American values and that you are not accountable to the world then you lose the right for the rest of us to pay you any regard. Your system produced Trump twice. Twice! We know that you can pull that trick at any election, and the chaos returns. Europe and other countries are now building guardrails. We have to, but it’s not what we want. It’s too exhausting.

Not sure if you got my suggestion.

You won’t be commuting, you will be dodging killer drones with Burger King logos.

The billionaires are now richer than many nation states.

I guess the next development is that they will start to go to war against each other over commercial advantage.

Guess who will be in the front line as part of the Great Amazon-SpaceX War?

Not Jeff Bezos or Elon Musk.

But can you get books to read on it? I suspect that these gadgets will get locked out of the market by the thugs.

I just watched a doco on the Nuremberg trials today in Netflix - by way of coincidence. These guys were the GOATs at instilling a sense of justice and fairness. That was their prime and only job. Guess what, they also celebrated the bad guys deaths. Especially the really bad guy, but also the henchmen like Goring (who topped himself).

I’ll not keep on arguing because we are both sick of the topic. I just don’t understand the sacred seperation between permitting calling someone an arsehole when they are breathing, but the moment they stop breathing you can’t say ‘fantastic’. Great news.

But as you say, them be the rules, I guess?

I get the rules. What I don’t get is that most moderators think that their job is entirely one of enforcement. It’s not, it is moderating where necessary, which also means taking no action if none is required.

Which is pretty much what you seem to be doing, to be fair. That’s a good thing. It’s a human’s role to determine whether a line has been crossed or if they might just be dancing along the middle.

In the days of AI I’m not sure a photo counts. How about a live interview?

Then ban toxic posts. Don’t shoot everyone just because they don’t blow kisses at a monster.

I do agree that censorship and freedom of speech are related to how a government deals with the matter, so you are right.

However, free speech principles have, thankfully, escaped the confines of government control. People generally like to express an opinion and hear others - particularly on private platforms that are supposedly set up for that express purpose. Sure, set of terms of service putting arbitrary guard rails on ethical grounds (one’s own) and see what that gets you in the long run.

Most of us already know the extremities of free speech. Saying ‘great’ when a douchebag stops being a douchebag is hardly ban worthy.

Or maybe it is, and if so, welcome to your weather channel.

One of the great many problems with the"celebrating death" rule (whatever that means) is that much commentary is generated just talking about why it it pointless. The moderators must have already removed the most violent opinions because most of the ones remaining are along the lines of “good, I’m glad”. Pretty tame stuff, but apparently not permitted all the same.

If it is a rule, at least you have the good sense to realise that “celebration” is a pretty broad term and should be handled judicially.

You need to justify why celebrating someone’s death should not be allowed.

I’m not advocating for anyone dying, that’s a different bowl of nuts. Virtue signalling one’s own ethical purity might get you off, but it only annoys everyone else.

No adds yet. Neither did Reddit once upon a time.

Yes, if we wanted to spend time on Fox News we already know how to do it.

So you are telling me that there are many ways of sticking rags in my mouth because a community needs to be protected from other voices. Gotcha!

Then what’s the point?

Thanks Mate