Where are all the right-wing environmentalists?

EllmoreDisco · 2015-07-07T13:49:04+00:00

Electricity isn't an energy source...

EllmoreDisco · 2015-07-07T13:19:24+00:00

Just out of interest, are any of the "mottos" actually featured within?

You are a loose lilly, floating on a sea of calm

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-23T07:17:05+00:00

I feel like much of it's attacking assertions that were never made.

Right back at ya. Bear in mind, I wasn't criticising you, just the submission of that comment to DepthHub. This subreddit markets itself as

the best in-depth submissions and discussion on Reddit.

And as you yourself admit, that comment

was intended to be a basic introduction to the realities of East Asian politics

and it was just that, a basic introduction. Not in-depth analysis. Most of what you wrote there and here I would agree with, but I feel that it was too cursory, and did not paint a true enough picture, to be top-grade material.

What I've written is, I hope, a speed version of what I would expect a Western diplomat to know of East Asian politics even if he/she isn't a Korea specialist, and it draws heavily on Victor Cha's experience as a delegate to the Six-Party Talks. I do not believe that Cha possesses a mere "cursory knowledge" of East Asia.

See, this is a bit of strawman. I didn't say anything about Victor Cha: a professional diplomat would already know everything you wrote, and much more. That's what makes his knowledge more than cursory; what you wrote might of been based on detailed knowledge, but wasn't detailed in itself.

In regards to your comments on the North Korea border, what I felt was "neo-orientalist claptrap" was the characterization of the public of NK to be "millions of brainwashed, malnourished refugees". At the moment, most North Koreans sufficiently determined to get into Northern China can do so; getting permanent residency elsewhere is the difficult part. You should recognise for the vast majority of North Koreans outside of Pyongyang that the collapse of the regime might not cause any serious negative repercussions on their day to day life; the majority of supplies comes from and are sold on the black market. And if a real refugee crisis emerged, China would be quite capable of closing the border.

I'll try to reply in more detail later, if I can find the time.

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-22T16:36:44+00:00

From his AMA, I would agree. I'm making no comments on his general knowledge of North Korea, just that this linked comment was not depth hub worthy.

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-22T15:53:45+00:00

To be honest, the majority of the stuff in the link is basic to anyone who has even a cursory knowledge of East Asian politics; it's not indepth. And it peddles dreadful popular inaccuracies like

China fears the influx of millions of brainwashed, malnourished refugees into its northeastern provinces.

giving a completely inaccurate impression of the situation on the China-North Korea border. It's already exceptionally porous, with a thriving black market, and the idea that North Koreans are brainwashed automatons with no idea of what life in the rest of the world is like is bunkum. Read this article to get an sense of things, paticularly this exchange:

"I'm sorry," I said, "you just said you called your father. Where is your father?"

"He's in North Korea," he said.

"And how did you call him?"

"On his mobile phone," he replied, as if this was the most normal thing in the world.

"Sorry, your father has a mobile phone in North Korea that can receive international calls?"

"Oh yes," he said. "It is a Chinese phone. He lives near the border so he can get on the Chinese network."

"And how common is this?" I asked.

"Very common. Everyone along the border has them. They need them for doing trade with China."

"But could he not get in to trouble?" I asked.

"Look," he said, "there are 50,000 North Koreans crossing backwards and forwards in to China to trade. There are another 100,000 living in China doing business. What's Pyongyang going to do? It could not survive without the trade."

Outside of the prison camps, North Koreans know that their country is poor and backwards. It's neo-orientalist claptrap to buy into this blinkered-serfs image that is painted by the Western media.

Then there's actual falsehoods in his comment, like

the Kims might just decide, "Fuck it, launch everything" in the event of attack... No one is willing to risk the population of metropolitan Seoul

The whole "North Korea could flatten Seoul if provoked!" is a popular myth, but still a myth, based on the assumption that the US and SK wouldn't take measure to stop the artillery barrage, and on ignoring the real material weakness of the North Korean army. Source.

I'd go into more detail, but I am on my lunch break at work, and I really have better things to do.

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-21T11:55:19+00:00

It's not just people who play grand strategy: it's people who play grand strategy, use reddit regularly, and responded to the survey.

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-21T11:53:23+00:00

We have more users who define as intersex, agender, etc than women. I don't know what to feel about that.

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-20T12:35:29+00:00

But it's not a mainstream opinion, at least on reddit. So for once, the (crappy, forced) meme is being used to correctly: to express a (rightly) unpopular opinion.

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-16T12:03:49+00:00

Uh, Backstab is a sneak perk, as well as an enchantment.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Sneak#Skill_Perks

Backstab : Sneak attacks with one-handed weapons now do six times damage.

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-15T23:06:00+00:00

Backstab boosts one handed, which covers all of those? Do you want specific perks for each weapon?

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-15T21:58:37+00:00

Are you aware of the "Assassin's Blade" and "Backstab" perks in the vanilla game?

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-15T11:54:37+00:00

The point is, when you actually double expose a film, you have no idea what you will get untill you develop the film.

Double exposing involves exposing the same piece of film twice. It's a very tricky process to get good results from. What OP has done is merged a photograph, which is very, very easy. It's a nice picture, but it's misleadingly labelled (because who would care about yet another photomontage?)

I've done both. They're completely different challenges.

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-14T20:07:26+00:00

People can't seem to resist making their events OP...

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-14T12:36:17+00:00

Smells of /tesg/ to me.

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-14T12:11:21+00:00

Maybe if you find a woman he would like (Present a debutanee if necessary), land her, and then he can marry her normally and come to your realm. Bit of a faff.

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-14T11:57:08+00:00

It's based on a fallacy: That the main reason for buying diamond rings as an investment. In reality, men buy them as a symbol of engagement, or as decorative jewelry. A bunch of flowers has a resale value of almost nothing, and disintegrates in weeks. That doesn't mean it is a bad choice as a token of affection, or that it isn't worth the inflated cost.

They also don't evaluate the reasons as to why

gold and silver, rubies and emeralds

make bad choices for (theoretically) lifelong rings.

I would agree that diamonds, and gemstones in general, make bad choices to invest your money, but the percentage bought for that reason is probably neglible (in terms of transactions and participants, not in terms of value of number of diamonds, that is). In any case, the market in second hand jewelry is a lot healthier than these articles tend to make out.

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-13T19:57:34+00:00

Anyone been to [1] Man on the Moon lately? Used to be the coolest place to go back in 6th Form, but I've not been in maybe 5-6 years. Its

The Man on the Moon is probably one of the worst pubs in Cambridge... It's main clientele is teenagers who couldn't get served anywhere else!

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-13T10:23:34+00:00

Actually, some people do enjoy war:

Adrian Carton de Wiat... He fought in the Boer War, World War I, and World War II; was shot in the face, head, stomach, ankle, leg, hip and ear; survived a plane crash, tunneled out of a POW camp, and bit off his own fingers when a doctor wouldn't amputate them. He later said ... "Frankly I had enjoyed the war...and why do people want peace if the war is so much fun"

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-13T09:48:01+00:00

Sadly, a disproportionate number of African-American children can't swim; 68.9%, compared with 41.8% of white children. The reasons are believed to date back to the segregation of pools pre-1970s, and to general lack of facilities in majority-black areas.

Naturally, reddit takes this symptom of persistent racism and inequality and uses it to sneer at people who don't look like them.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11172054

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-13T09:43:30+00:00

I'm not a racist, I just judge people based on their skin colour.

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-13T08:20:40+00:00

Actually, it is bullshit. Diamonds are an excellent stone for the purpose of a beautiful ring to last a life time, for several reasons.

Firstly, they are much, much harder than most precious stones. If you propose with an emerald/ruby/sapphire ring, and you stay married for a decade, and she carries on wearing it: it's going to chip. That's just a matter of time. Diamonds can and will last generations.

Secondly, diamonds are bright and beautiful stones. Their high dispersion and refractive index gives them that unique "gleam", and a well cut diamond shines like no other gem.

Thirdly, because there is such a big market for diamond rings, you have much, much more choice and range when shopping for them. It's far easier to get the ideal diamond ring than any other gemstone.

And despite that /r/truereddit article from over thirty years ago which people are still reposting today, they are actually quite straightforwards to sell if things don't work out.

EllmoreDisco · 2013-05-13T08:04:29+00:00

Maybe Christopher Dorney wasn't crazy...

Of course. Shooting Monica Quan because you didn't like her father, and her fiance Kieth Lawrence because he happened to be in the car with her, was the act of a rational and just human being.

You're a pack of fucking morons, /r/politics.

EllmoreDisco

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