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Joined 11 months ago
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Cake day: August 20th, 2023

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  • I agree with you that a large part of the problem is that destruction is easier than creation, but it wouldn’t be hard to get a lot of progressive things in if there were the political will for it. Appoint tons of progressive judges and start putting through huge increases in wealth taxes, climate and social programs, workers/union rights, scale back police power, etc etc.

    But even if there were hundreds of leftist judges waiting in the wings, the dems are too corporatist to support stuff like that, so the best they can offer is some social programs that won’t upset the status quo too much.






  • I signed up for a gothic class my frosh year that was described as American gothic-- vampires, werewolves, all that good stuff. I dunno if the prof didn’t write the course description or if it got changed later but it was English gothic, which apart from the origins of the genre (Walpole, which ended up being hilarious because tons of modern tropes originated there, like the maiden in the castle using the subterranean staircase to flee from the mad king when a gust of wind blows her candle out) and some of the more satirical stuff (Austin), it was incredibly boring to read.

    There was one called The Mysteries of Udolpho that’s this meme times 10, where during a wagon trip there are literal 30 page descriptions of tress. I get if we’d been warned that this sort of thing was largely historical and we could pretty much skip the sweeping depictions of scenery that only existed because most people in the 19th century didn’t get to travel much so it was exciting to read about exotic landscapes, but the assignment merely amounted to “Here’s a 650 page novel, go read it for next week.”

    At least we got to do Frankenstein and I think there was one Poe story thrown in as well (despite being American).












  • guess which country has one of the toughest immigration policies on earth?

    Lots of them? Like the US, or Canada perhaps? Japan is ridiculously easy to move to if you have a college degree. As long as you can maintain some sort of job they’ll just keep approving your visa. And if you get married to a local it’s way easier than say a US citizen trying to get a green card for your spouse from the states.

    And by outsiders you meant tourists outside of tourist areas? I guess there would be people who’d be uncomfortable about interacting with foreigners they can’t communicate with, but if I try to imagine a similar scenario in the states it seems just as likely to have the same outcome. Someone in a hick town walking into a diner and speaking broken English isn’t much more likely to be welcomed with open arms, so I guess we should say Americans hate any and all outsiders?

    Even when I was traveling when my Japanese was shit I didn’t experience any of what you’re talking about. There’s still definitely issues with black racism, but again, that’s pretty true in the US as well, no?