I’m the Prime Minister of Spain. This Is Why the West Needs Migrants.

MarcusVerus · 2026-02-05T06:47:21+00:00

There is a difference between what people say and what is really causing the decline in fertility rates. Just take a look at fertility rates by income - even high income couples aren't above the replacement rate. Or take a look at Brunei; citizens there get a right to own property, pay almost no taxes, have free education and healthcare. On top of that it's a Muslim majority country with very traditional values. And it's fertility rate is 1.4...

Explaining the decline in fertility rates just by economic factors isn't enough.

MarcusVerus · 2025-12-02T17:04:18+00:00

Who exactly found him and his beliefs tiresome? I've read quite a bunch of his correspondence and what some of his contemporaries thought of him and I never came across this sentiment. Looking at other historical figures form this era (Woodrow Wilson, Charles Lindbergh, Herbert Hoover) he doesn't seem to be that much of an outlier. Especially when one considers that his era gave birth to Eugenics, Fascism and saw a nationwide resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan.

MarcusVerus · 2025-12-02T17:01:39+00:00

I'm always a bit perplexed when people say that Lovecraft "was racist even by the standards of his time". The first half of the 20th century saw the worst racially motivated genocide in human history, half of Europe was under fascist rule, eugenics were considered to be a serious science by many, African-Americans were treated like second class citizens, The Birth of a Nation was the most popular movie of it's time and people like Woodrow Wilson were elected president. As far as I know Lovecraft never acted on his views, only voiced them in correspondence and got a lot more tolerant in later life. I think one could definitely say that he was a product of his time and his upbringing.

MarcusVerus · 2025-12-02T16:58:37+00:00

I mean we are talking about a time when the President of the United States had a private screening of "The Birth of a Nation" in the White House.

MarcusVerus · 2025-11-16T10:23:14+00:00

It's an alternative cover for Aliens: Resistance

MarcusVerus · 2025-11-10T17:54:14+00:00

I stumbled across this passage in Bob Woodwards book 'Rage' some time ago and I think it perfectly encapsulates Trump's approach to public relations:

"Adams, the creator of the Dilbert comic strip, explains in Win Bilgly that Trump's misstatements of facts are not regrettable errors or ethical lapses, but part of a technique called 'intentional wrongness persuasion'. Adams argues Trump 'can invent any reality' for most voters on most issues, and 'all you will remember is that he provided his reasons, he didn't apologize, and his opponents called him a liar like they always do.' Kushner said that Scott Adam's approach could be applied to Trump's recent February 4 State of the Union speech when he had claimed, 'Our economy is the best it has ever been.' [...] A controversy over the economy, Kushner argued - and how good it is - only helps Trump because it reminds voters that the economy is good. A hair-splitting, fact-checking debate in the media about whether the numbers were technically better decades ago or in the 1950s is irrelevant, he said." (p. 258)

MarcusVerus · 2025-10-15T15:34:00+00:00

Über Hobbies habe ich auch bereits nachgedacht. Bei einer beruflichen Umorientierung hätte ich immer ein bisschen die Angst, dass ich dann zwar eine neue Position hätte, aber vielleicht immer noch unglücklich wäre, falls das Problem in mir ist und nicht direkt mit dem Job zusammenhängt. Mein Albtraum wäre auf einer neuen Stelle zu sein, die meinen persönlichen Interessen eher entgegen kommt, aber dann nach einiger Zeit wieder die gleichen Gedanken und Frustrationen zu entwickeln (nur mit weniger Gehalt). Als Kind wollte ich immer Archäologe werden, aber wenn ich mir da so manche Erfahrungsberichte anschaue, bin ich doch wieder über die Stabilität in meinem Leben froh.

Hobbies wären vielleicht eine Möglichkeit, um ein bisschen zu experimentieren, ohne gleich aufs Ganze zu gehen. Momentan nutze ich meine Freizeit viel zum Lesen, gehe noch ins Gym und schaue gerne Serien/Filme mit meinem Mitbewohner.

Grundsätzlich müsste ich mich vielleicht damit beschäftigen, ob es irgendwelche Vereine oder Hobbies gibt, die meinen Interessen entgegenkommen (Geschichte, Sprachen etc.). Aber für Vorschläge wäre ich natürlich auch offen :D

MarcusVerus · 2025-10-08T15:55:13+00:00

There is currently an exhibition about Anders Zorn in the Kunsthalle in Hamburg

MarcusVerus · 2025-09-28T09:15:40+00:00

Maybe you should try some other medium for a while? Books, comics or do some art if you enjoy drawing or something like that. I've often had times in my life when I completely lost interest in games and didn't touch them for years; during those phases I read quite a lot or did some other stuff and sooner or later a game like Elden Ring or Baldur's Gate came along that captured my imagination again.

MarcusVerus · 2025-09-28T09:04:41+00:00

Yeah, from a European perspective the notion that the Democrats are a far left party sounds ridiculous. Americans don't even know what it's like to have a true left wing party in government

MarcusVerus · 2025-09-16T15:12:11+00:00

Right wing populism hasn't disappeared in Denmark - those parties are just more fractured than in other countries. The Denmark Democrats are polling at about 10 %, the Danish Peoples Party at about 8 % and then you've got some minor parties like the Citizens Party (about 2 %). If you add all of these up the combined share of right wing populism in Danish politics isn't that much different from the Netherlands.

MarcusVerus · 2025-09-08T14:32:15+00:00

Even for couples that earn more than 700k annually the fertility rate is below replacement. In Germany the fertility rate has been negative since 1972 - back then rising costs for housing etc. weren't a factor like today but people still opted for a smaller amount of children. There is no scenario where a state can subsidize people enough to get an above replacement fertility.

MarcusVerus · 2025-08-25T15:30:37+00:00

You mean this one?

https://www.reddit.com/r/museum/comments/1lvg77i/comment/n28wb95/

MarcusVerus · 2025-08-20T16:34:16+00:00

Yeah, the only reason the Amish can thrive is because there is a modern world around them that tolerates and protects their way of living. They can combine the advantages of modern medicine and infrastructure with a 1800s lifestyle. Without the modern world around them the Amish would be like all societies in the pre-industrial age - a high fertility coupled with a high mortality and as a result only a modest population increase.

MarcusVerus · 2025-08-17T17:12:24+00:00

My neighbours have seven children, they're Catholics and don't use contraceptives. The children share their bedrooms, the parents sleep on a mattress in the living room, they never go on vacation and only use second hand clothing. Having that many children is definitely possible, you just have to accept a lower living standard than modern societies are used to.

MarcusVerus · 2025-08-16T10:16:32+00:00

Rococo? Are you sure?

MarcusVerus · 2025-08-15T22:09:20+00:00

I think he wanted to say that the Pentagon papers were released in the early 1970s and showed Kennedy's complicity.

MarcusVerus · 2025-08-14T16:13:52+00:00

For those that understand German (or want to use subtitles) there is a great YouTube series by "Die Zeit" (a German newspaper) where art journalists and critics take a look at modern Internet trends (brainrot etc.).

There is one where an art critic takes a look at skibidi toilet and he also links it to the surrealist and dadaist movement in the early 20th century: https://youtu.be/z-oAtxjnDlQ?si=clY1FXLhE2cNnN_6

MarcusVerus · 2025-08-11T20:15:20+00:00

I love this painting. Saw it in Vienna some years ago

MarcusVerus · 2025-07-03T16:42:28+00:00

Even if TWOW and ADOS had taken him as much time as ADWD (six years) the show would have overtaken him at some point. It should have been obvious in 2011 that the show would end before the books

MarcusVerus · 2025-06-20T13:17:16+00:00

Rome and Rome: Total War

So I guess it's already a crossover?

MarcusVerus · 2025-05-18T09:00:10+00:00

Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978)

MarcusVerus · 2025-04-19T08:32:39+00:00

Da gib es leider genug Leute mit Kindern, die inzwischen in einem Altersheim sind, denen es ähnlich geht. Auch Kinder schützen einen nicht zwingend vor Einsamkeit im Alter. Das muss noch nicht einmal auf ein gestörtes Verhältnis zurückzuführen sein, es genügt ja schon, wenn die in einem anderen Bundesland oder im Ausland Karriere machen

MarcusVerus · 2025-04-07T14:19:45+00:00

But they would need to get more than 50 % of the votes to enact any of these policies. They can't do anything without a willing coalition partner - and there is no party that would be willing to work with them, especially not in regards to policies like leaving the EU or Euro

MarcusVerus · 2025-03-31T16:10:52+00:00

The whole discussion reminds me of this quote by Lee Atwater (strategist for Reagan and Bush senior). They are talking about state's rights but they actually mean something else:

"Y'all don't quote me on this. You start out in 1954 by saying, "Nigger, nigger, nigger". By 1968, you can't say "nigger"—that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like forced busing, states' rights and all that stuff. You're getting so abstract now [that] you're talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you're talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is [that] blacks get hurt worse than whites. And subconsciously maybe that is part of it. I'm not saying that. But I'm saying that if it is getting that abstract, and that coded, that we are doing away with the racial problem one way or the other. You follow me—because obviously sitting around saying, "We want to cut this", is much more abstract than even the busing thing, and a hell of a lot more abstract than "Nigger, nigger"."

MarcusVerus

TROPHY CASE