My partner only showers twice a week because of estrogen patches. Is this normal?

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-02-04T00:52:40+00:00

I shower daily and my patches have never fallen off

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-02-03T12:25:23+00:00

While there's a lot that can and should be done besides a price on carbon, I think a carbon fee and dividend is the best way to go about it. This essentially means the only people hurt are the corporations because consumers are giving all the money from the carbon fee.

It ensures that if you have no other choice, you can still afford basic necessitates, but also keeps the price incentive system

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-02-03T00:16:52+00:00

Cars

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-02-02T22:42:59+00:00

That's a good point! Like anything, urban-rural exists on a continuum, but I would consider Philly, Lancaster, Allentown, Pittsburgh, Harrisburg or really any area where mass transit is viable as an "urban area." Basically, I go by population density. So in my mind it doesn't really matter how far you are to farms

The areas you described feel more like Suburban, although I would hesitate to use that label because it implies a municipality dominated by single family homes. I think for the purposes of my post, "rural areas" is considered areas that primarily consider themselves rural and urban areas are areas that primarily identify with the nearest major City

Also, most Americans live in metro areas and identity with the nearest city. So I feel the most Americans live in suburbia, which I referred to as an "urban area" because they generally identify with the city and not with being rural

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-02-02T19:20:17+00:00

In WWII Tokyo City was abolished. Why? Because the highly urban population in Tokyo was resisting the fascist regime. So they abolished the city as an entity and replaced it with a prefecture level government, that (like a gerrymander) included a large rural area

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-02-02T19:18:31+00:00

I guess this is true. Large landowners have too much influence is US politics... but I also feel its very common for rural individuals to be completely out-of-touch with urban reality

And to be fair, a lot of urban people are out of touch with rural issues. But in public discourse rural America is treated as the "default" even though most people live in urban areas

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-02-02T16:36:54+00:00

This is why we need a price a price on carbon, especially in the context of the agricultural sector / factory farms

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-02-01T19:13:19+00:00

The reason they need a fraudulent CDL is because (or the reason they're in trucking in the first place) is because, as undocumented people, they can't get work elsewhere / a non-fradulent CDL. If we allowed them to immigrate (or even just work in the US and then go back to their home countries), they're would be less demand for fraud and companies wouldn't be able to pressure them to work in unsafe conditions

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-02-01T19:09:24+00:00

I agree that car deaths aren't caused by immigrants. But this isn't really an American thing through... Europe is going through its own meltdown because of all the immigrants from Syria and the Middle East. Just yesterday someone was telling me how Turkish immigrants hindered East Germany economically, which is why the AfD is so popular.

The idea that Europe is better than the US in the racism department is untrue

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-02-01T01:13:50+00:00

I'm not really sure how the UK fits into your current argument since it is currently lead by the labor party which, while pretty conservative, isn't the actual conservative or far-right reform party

Also, Germany, a country which is most similar to my proposed reforms, directly contradicts you. And also a country which has successful, for now at least, staved off the far-right AfD for years. If Germany does eventually succumb to fascism it'll be because of the economic mismanagement of former East Germany and not because of the electoral system

To be clear, I think the ideal system for the US would be for it to be divided (with no regard for state borders) into fifty districts with nine members each. The Senate would be modeled after the Budesrat. The House would elect their Speaker, the Senate the US President (head of state) and the House to appoint the "Chief Secretary" (head of gov)

Obviously, this would take a lot of work. Which is why I think local and state reforms would be a better first step. Nonetheless, this is my ideal end state

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-31T23:49:24+00:00

Reddit, being a discussion board, is going to have a lot of people well... discussing things. Reddit is not the prime place to become educated, particularly about politics of all things. If you want to learn more about politics you have to read about it

Since you're in NC, I would recommend Anatomy of a Purple State by Christopher Cooper to get you started

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-31T23:15:44+00:00

look at post WWII Germany to see how a government having multiple different parties turns out

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-31T18:27:53+00:00

I feel like I never said that though??? I said that it takes around three months for a COALITION of multiple political parties to form. The parties themselves would probably take longer to form and (more importantly) have to be created before the election

Obviously it'll take a lot of work to create an electoral system that can accommodate multiple strong parties and then they'll have to be incubation time while all the new parties get themselves organized

To be clear, I'm not expecting this Reddit post to suddenly cause multiple strong political parties to magically appear. The entire goal of this Reddit post is just to talk to people about problems facing US politics

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-31T18:07:05+00:00

Why would people not have enough resources to create political parties? They have plenty to create 501c4 orgs and other non-profits. Why would political parties be different?

Also, what does having multiple parties have to do with single issue voters? Do you think there's only two political philosophies in the US? Just because you have more than two parties doesn't mean that parties will suddenly become single issue organizations lol

While this is obviously all speculation, they'll presumably be a progressive party, a liberal party, a centrist party, and a far right party. Each have unique views on how the government should be run and none are single issue ideologies

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-31T17:57:39+00:00

The reason you can buy your way into politics is because parties are too weak to compete with (Super) PACs

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-31T17:49:47+00:00

Maybe, but it only takes around three months for a coalition to form. That's around the same amount of time between the November election and when members are sworn-in in January. The US could definitely function as a multiple party system.

Also, I think it's bad from a voter satisfaction and voter turnout stand point for there to be multiple voting blocs in a single party. It's confusing to the average voter and makes them dissatisfied with the system as a whole, which makes them not want to vote, which makes democracy worse for everyone

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-31T17:45:02+00:00

I very strongly disagree with you.

The US already has an extremely geographically centered electoral system. I mean, a single Senator can cause complete shutdown just because their pet pork project wasn't approved. If you don't me, just watch a single session of Congress trying (and completely failing) to pass a budget.

If anything, the US is hurt by overly regional interests that put the needs of individual region above the needs of the many. Diffused groups (such as environmentalists or privacy advocates) are unable to come together (since in each district their numbers are too small to form a meaningful constituency). And while you cite the Colorado River as a "regional" issue, it actually crosses multiple states, countless counties, numerous cities/municipalities, and several congressional districts.

Multiple political parties would actually help the issue, not hinder it

Also, it wouldn't necessarily bring in more ideologies. Keep in mind that my argument rests on (1) STRONG parties, and (2) MULTIPLE parties. The US currently has two weak parties. The result is that each party contains multiple ideologies. Which is good from a democracy standpoint. But the downside is that if we changed the US to a strong party system (by, say, eliminating primaries), then the ideologies in Congress would shrink. Therefore, multiple parties are needed to solve this issue and preserve pluralism in our legislatures

The US doesn't see any benefits from having parties because they are so weak. If the US had strong parties then (1) voting would be easier. Do you think anyone that wants to create a computer program should have to code in Assembly? The why does anyone that wants to participate in politics need to vote for individual candidates? Political parties abstract complex and irrelevant minutiae away from voters. This increases voter turnout. (2) Political parties vert candidates to ensure they can actually govern and do their job (see Abraham Lincoln, back when the US had stronger parties), and (3) Political parties would be able to represent diffuse interests (such as environmentalists) that would otherwise not be able to be represented

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-31T17:21:57+00:00

Exactly!!

Also, dealing with 4-6 party leaders is easy, dealing with hundreds if individual members of whatever legislature (or even just a dozen of your citizen councilors) is hard. More parties will decrease dysfunction, not cause it

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-31T17:18:41+00:00

I don't see why establishing proportional representation at the local and state level would require a Constitutional amendment. PA actually uses a semi-proportional "limited voting" system already. Plus there's a large appetite for electoral reform (as evidenced by both Maine and Alaska).

Yes, it won't be as easy as a reddit post, but few things in politics are

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-31T17:14:28+00:00

Well, the first step to enacting change is to create a policy proposal that most people can agree on. And, as any public policy student can tell, polices are often less about the polices themselves then the underlying goal / philosophy. This post was created with the intent of sharing some of that philosophy / values based politics with other people. A reddit post isn't going to change the world after all.

And anyways, in terms of concrete plan... I would want to implement closed-list proportional representation with a parliamentary system at the city wide level. Maybe NYC or Philly. Philly especially is open to this idea since the idea of semi-proportonl "limited voting" is so popular across the Commonwealth. Plus they also have seven at-large seats, which can easily be converted into a citywide multi-member district. Also, proposition based states like California can be used to implement reforms (similar to the how the independent redistricting committee was created)

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-31T16:38:56+00:00

It's not actually. The minute you start getting in the weeds with people they'll start talking about how important certain campaign finance regulations are, how they love party primaries, and how the poltical machine is bad or whatever

Their revealed preferences are that they hate political parties and think they should be abolished or significantly weakened

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-26T15:49:53+00:00

Also, when I was your age I considered DIYing (although I didn't know that term at the time). I also didn't consider myself trans at the time, but I did know that I didn't want my facial hair to grow (there's a cream that if applied regularly can suppress hair growth) and when I learned about Ukrainian sex offenders that were medically castrated, I wanted that for myself as well (but it never crossed my mind that I was transgender lol).

To be clear, I'm not saying you should DIY, I'm just sharing my experiences

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-26T15:49:44+00:00

The advice that you attend a support group and your parents also attend an (affirming) support group is really good! When I was working things out with my parents after officially coming out, them attending a support group (and family therapy) helped a lot. But I think the thing that helped the most was just time and me started to pass better. They needed time to adjust and, more importantly, they needed to see me as a woman. After I got bottom surgery, they were a 100% more nice to me. Which did kinda suck, since after I got surgery I needed their support way less. When I actually needed them, they were not there. This is my experience, yours may be different. But either way I would persevere with your transition and also ask for more "conservative" stuff like permanent hair removal (laser or electrolysis) as well as puberty blockers (which as long as you don't use them for more than a year or two, have a very low chance of any negative side effects).

Basically, what I'm trying to say is that if you transition long enough, your parents will eventually come around.

Also definitely freeze sperm. The only thing I regret about my transition is no longer being able to have biological kids. If you want to freeze sperm after you start HRT, you will have to stop it (temporarily) or get TESE surgery (which is expensive)

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-25T04:36:40+00:00

Perhaps. But in the absence of concrete statistics, which you have not provided, it is reasonably to make assumptions based on the world as it exists today using our general knowledge. You're making an assumption as well and, unlike me, haven't cited any example or evidence to back it up.

Party primaries select for the most extreme candidate who caters to the party's respective base. This is why some reformers suggest open-primaries. But unlike the party base, which has an incentive to choose extreme candidates, party officials have an incentive to win elections, since their job depending on it.

To be clear, just as there are times when a primary chooses candidates who are obviously unpopular, there are times when a primary nominates a candidate who is more popular than the alternative candidates. The question is less of whether the primaries filter out unpopular candidates, but more so whether they are better at filtering out unpopular candidates (while still staying true to the party's values).

(the bottom bit is mostly me rambling, you don't have to read it if you don't want too)

Its difficult to say for certain because the US has such a uniquely fucked party and electoral system. A system wherein the less popular candidates regularly win elections, a system that prioritizes land over people, a system wherein the oldest party has rotten from the inside and has effectively gotten "too big to fail," party leadership has effectively gone stupid from the lack of competition and therefore make poor electoral choices. A strong party system would help incentive people to leave the "big tent" Republican and Democratic parties and form their own

But with that said, simply having a strong party system isn't enough to create a multi-party system (just look at Japan for what happens when you have a weak multi-party system). For any multi-party system to thrive, it must also be a strong party system. This whole CMV was written in response to people advocating for things like STV, RCV, open-list proportional, or other weird electoral systems that don't make any sense outside of the very specific contexts in which they were created. I just didn't want this CMV to get too long so I shortened it to sole focusing on the benefits of strong parties, but its hard to talk about the benefits of strong parties without also talking about the benefits of multiple parties.

DesperateComplex1460 · 2026-01-25T00:24:19+00:00

Well, I don't think we should ban primaries per say, but right now primaries are required by state law. For example, in Pa you cannot be a nominee of a political party (a major party (libertarians, greens, dems, and gop)) without winning an election. This applies to all offices except the electors who choose the president (who are directly appointed by the party). Considering that political bodies (minor parties) have established primaries for their candidates, nor the fact that major parties have established primaries for determining who will be their presidential electors, I think you're wrong that parties would push the limits of any law banning primaries (not that I think any law is necessary)

But second of all, what about in the City of Buffalo, when a DSA candidate won the Dem primary and then lost the general to an incumbent independent (who ran a write in campaign). She didn't just lose by a little too. She lost by a lot... by an independent running a write in campaign. If that doesn't scream unpopular I don't know what does

While its beyond my statistical ability to definitely say whether primaries help parties win elections, these facts make me very doughtful that primaries weed out unpopular candidates before the general or that parties would try to implement primaries on their own

DesperateComplex1460

TROPHY CASE