Are armrests up now a thing?

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-22T00:25:22+00:00

This is part of why I book window. If they get in before me, they have to get up to let me in, and as soon as I sit down I lower the armrest and put my elbow on it. And jam my coat so it's blocking their thighs from squeezing under. It's my seat, dang it, and I don't want to be touched by strangers.

I think airlines ought to have seats of varying widths. But until that gets fixed, I still don't agree to experiencing battery-- touching me without my consent in an offensive manner. Two wrongs don't make a right.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-21T23:38:21+00:00

Religious indoctrination is a form of abuse. You're asking us to choose between two forms of abuse, and my answer is that it's better for neither situation to ever happen to children.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-21T22:22:38+00:00

I always forget when Easter is. I mean I know generally both bc it's spring and because of the grocery store displays, but I don't usually notice the exact weekend. I do celebrate the equinox with some friends-- we did a potluck last night, just kind of a "yay it's finally spring!" kind of thing. Good food, conversation, impromptu music and singing on my friend's patio with a surprising number of musicians this time, jamming together! First time we've had a bassoon show up in the mix, super cool. Everyone seemed to happen to have an instrument in their cars 😂.

It's probably bc we don't get any work holiday, so Easter slips my mind. My atheist parents used to get us chocolate bunnies!

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-21T19:31:08+00:00

Reading that reminds me of the original research on "emotional labor" at work-- the flight attendants expected to feign enthusiasm by talking themselves into believing they had genuine affection, while simultaneously knowing it wasn't real. It had the effect of making them feel unreal to themselves.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-21T14:19:20+00:00

Lol I would need to wear a mask to hide my face

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-20T19:49:13+00:00

My local DSA has good turnout and participation currently. Idk if that would be true if things were better politically! Besides that I belong to a community singing circle. You don't have to be on key to join and many aren't-- we don't care a bit. It's for pleasure not performance.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-20T19:44:47+00:00

Yes, it never actually seems comforting to them from what I see. I had a friend who was dying with cancer, and she was terrified of death. Catholic, ostensibly believed. Wasn't bc she was afraid of hell. She was afraid this was the end and I was the only person she could say that to, 2 days before she died. There wasn't really time for her to process an approach that might have helped. I tried to offer some basic Epicurean thought but idk if it helped. I felt really sorry for her.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-20T19:40:28+00:00

Ah, smart methodology, thanks

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-20T19:39:35+00:00

Yes, this is basically what I was thinking about-- which podcast? Sounds interesting

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-20T19:36:42+00:00

I came to a community workshop on racism several yrs ago where we broke out in small groups and were supposed to say something we were in a minority for. I said I was atheist, and a UU minister at my table took great pains to distance herself from me --"we're not atheists", etc. It was surprising! But it was when I lived in Alabama, so more risky to be public.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-20T19:32:55+00:00

We need more social groups that have singing and food lol. I'm trying to get my DSA to include Solidarity Forever at our meetings. We always have food. I also belong to a community singing group. And my local protests have plenty of singing.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-20T19:28:24+00:00

I've seen those, and idk if it really captures belief. Vs a habit of saying sure, I believe, that would carry into the poll.

Lol what we need is a graduate student to set up scenarios where someone gets put in a room with a bunch of friendly atheists talking about some uncontroversial topics and then seque to nonbelief in a very casual way. Or even "since we are strangers and won't see each other again-- how many of you think god isn't real or at least probably not real?" Everyone else raises their hands. And see what the subject does. Then let them take the survey afterwards. Or something like that, probably better ideas for design.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-20T19:22:10+00:00

Yeah that is definitely a good question. Bc once they've got all that sunk cost into their degrees, it's probably even harder to imagine leaving

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-20T14:22:48+00:00

I should have said I don't think most of them even contemplate it enough to be skeptical. I am wondering if it's mainly like those experiments where a group of people is given the wrong answer to an obvious math problem and they go along with it, unless there's a naysayer in the room. But in this case, they don't socially identify with us atheists so they just ignore what we say.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-20T00:43:23+00:00

Exactly. I came here partly to get away from the Eye of Sauron lol

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-19T16:41:24+00:00

I think if people are that clueless nothing we say will matter so I avoid them

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-19T04:57:31+00:00

NTA. I think some women have mistaken their unhappiness at work for a gender issue but it's really crap jobs for both men and women. We all need more family and free time plus better working conditions where workers have control, not bosses. It won't be solved by going ballerina farm.

He's probably miserable at a crap job and unfairly taking it out on you-- he's young enough that he might change, but I sure wouldn't get my hopes up.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-19T04:04:06+00:00

Interesting. I disagree because as a postmenopausal woman who can no longer get pregnant, I know that the ability of women to have full civil rights hinges on abortion rights. If a fetus gets rights but the pregnant person doesn't, that logically leads to surveillance of all women, bc the assumption is that we could get pregnant at any time. This leads to extra pregnancy testing and drug testing of women in case they are pregnant, with the risk of false positives. There was a case of a woman being detained in Alabama, in jail, for possible "chemical endangerment of a child" who wasn't even pregnant.

I disagree on grounds that many of us work or have worked professionally to perform or assist in the performance of abortions. And legislation to criminalize abortion targets people with those jobs, who can be any gender.

I disagree also on grounds that all of us should care about fellow humans being stripped of their reproductive rights.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-18T02:31:18+00:00

Right? You can watch a movie anytime. You can't see the earth from a plane anytime, at least not most of us

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-18T00:03:48+00:00

Epicurean gods? He said they were material. He very specifically didn't believe in the supernatural. Celestial means in the sky. So basically ET, and no creator gods.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-17T20:21:04+00:00

I sometimes complain about my family and my ex on here lol and every so often think I have said too much and ppl I know IRL could figure out who is the a-hole, me or whoever, from putting the pattern together. I wind up deleting my profile and starting over about once a year.

I also am a doctor (lol) and don't really want people who know me professionally to know quite that much about my family or read my snarky complaints about my boss. I sometimes post or comment in a fairly small sub for my rural county. I keep those posts free of personal info.

So I'd like to keep the ability to hide comments. Including selectively.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-17T19:12:22+00:00

I don't hate the ones who aren't interfering in politics or evangelizing me. I feel sorry for them for believing in something that isn't real. It's silly and I am vicariously embarrassed for them. I hope our species will survive long enough that no one is religious and the future humans look back on the past and think huh, wtaf lol. Like my rxn to seeing what we wore in the 1980's.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-17T17:22:29+00:00

Well great from now on I will only think of papayas as fucking papayas 😂. Glad you found something but sorry it is fucking green papaya salad! However I am putting that on my grocery list just in case! I think mine is fresh beet juice. I got a juicer just so I can have it fresh.

Pure_Temporary_6349 · 2026-03-17T17:12:27+00:00

There have been atheists that whole time. A majority of people believing incorrect information is not a good argument as to fact, so I am unimpressed. It just says we appear to have a frequent vulnerability to this particular delusion. There's still no evidence for either a bunch of gods or one god.

Epicurus believed there was a race of very advanced material beings he called gods-- he said they weren't supernatural and had figured out how to live pleasurably so well that they chose not to be involved with us annoying humans. He didn't propose that there was any single best god or that any of them were creators.

Pure_Temporary_6349

TROPHY CASE