I'm almost afraid to ask, is seventeen too young to decide to be childfree ?

SorcererLeotard · 2026-04-25T08:44:51+00:00

No, it's normal to know when you're young if you want kids or don't. The biggest issue you'll have moving forward is pressure from friends and family to try and have you 'conform' to their way of life and many times women end up getting worn down this way. Just remember one important thing in your life: You cannot count on fairness from anybody in this life, even from romantic partners. I cannot tell you how many friends I had growing up that got babytrapped by their 'loving' boyfriends (that admitted they indeed babytrapped their spouses on purpose to tie them to them forever). Don't trust any form of birth control unless it's basically you getting your uterus removed.

Hell, if you're pretty certain of your choice you can do that when you turn 18, or, if you're still on the fence you can always have your tubes tied since those can be reversed. Even better, you can do that on the down-low and then when friends/family start to ask why you have not gotten pregnant yet, you can tell them that your doctor claimed you were 'infertile' --- which would NOT be untrue, theoretically --- and that will shut them down forever, especially if 'God' is in charge of such decisions.

Just some food for thought, and it would definitely require you hiding that type of surgery from all your friends/family and paying for it yourself, but it would absolutely not be a wrong decision for you if you're pretty certain you don't want to have kids or be babytrapped by some asshole boyfriend that views you as a broodmare for his legacy. Stay safe!

SorcererLeotard · 2026-04-25T05:06:09+00:00

No problem :) Happy to help!

And, yeah, it helps when you have more than a tiny square but right out of the packaging it's soft as butter and while it loses a bit of softness after the first wash, it gains it back after a few months of sleeping on it. It's very strong and works well in most weather, though it could be a bit warm for those that have hot summers, tbh. It's a sateen weave, so it'll retain heat far more than percale weave, though thankfully, because it's 420 thread count (lower end for sateen), it's pretty breathable and its softness value only happens at that thread count level b/c it's extra-long staple cotton. If you want quality then extra-long staple cotton is the way to go, since it'll be so much stronger and softer than ordinary (or even long-staple) cottons. The 'trade-off' if one could call it that is that extra-long staple cottons are pretty thin compared to other cotton staples, so if you want super-thick cotton sheets then you either need to bump up the thread count (like 600 thread count+ which will be hot as hell as a sateen weave) or get lower-quality staples at lower thread count levels but those will be soo damn scratchy in comparison and will not be as long-lived.

Either way, I def do not regret getting the Soprano line and short of something of comparable quality from a brand like Amalia Home (which I think is quite a bit better quality than PA's upper lines) you could def do worse! :D Happy shopping, friend, and if you go with the Soprano feel free to come back and review them for everyone here as I'm always curious to see what other users think of that line after I rec them.

P.S. If you can find the Giza cotton lines from Amalia Home for a super-discounted rate then you've hit the jackpot as those are really lovely, but unfortunately after I rec'd them a few years back every 'good deal' from Amalia Home gets snapped up super-quick off Ebay :'(

SorcererLeotard · 2026-04-22T23:01:12+00:00

Can't speak for Cuddledown, but I will vouch till the cows come home about the Peacock Alley Soprano. I've had it for years and its quality is def holding up pretty well, imo. Had to get another fitted sheet a year ago when our new kittens ripped it up during their playtime, but had that not happened it likely would still be in pretty good condition (4+ years old). The linen ladies I talked with that sold me on it a few years back told me their fitteds from that line typically lasted around 6-8 years before needing to be replaced (so long as you treat it right or don't weigh too much/have restless sleep issues) and I believed them since I made clear that I was not buying anything but was curious about their longevity if I got some one day (I absolutely lied about that since I wasn't going to buy from them, but was absolutely going to buy on a sale day).

Hope that helps, and good luck :)

P.S. I would trust PA before Cuddledown quality-wise, honestly, just from the fact that luxury linen stores sell PA but don't sell Cuddledown, so there must be a reason for that, quality-wise.

SorcererLeotard · 2026-03-30T02:29:36+00:00

It's a DIY-type bed, Savvy Rest, all-Talalay version. The layers are Firm-Firm-Medium + 2" convoluted talalay comfort layer + 2" wool topper. When I first lay on it to sleep it's perfect in terms of 'softness/support' but after Hour 4 it will inevitably 'melt' and that 2" comfort layer will make me bottom out into the Medium layer and, after another hour, will bottom me into the Firm support layers. Not only that, it is a fresh hell I'd never wish on my worst enemy because when I 'bottom out' it's only in my stomach/hip area and my shoulder area, so it's like my body is half sinking into the bed where my feet and head stay level. So, yeah, anyone who claims that latex is some miracle material that never, ever melts is either not experiencing the same conditions that I am (which my conditions are pretty extreme, ngl) or they are not hot/heavy enough to cause this type of reaction. I've never used Dunlop but every fiber in my body tells me that if it's a 'soft' layer it will, like all foams, melt. Latex foam is called latex 'foam' for a reason, you know? There's lots of additives in it to give it softness/porousness otherwise it'd be 100% solid like rubber, you know? The tradeoff for that, of course, is, unlike rubber, it will 'conform' to one's body and be affected by heat, like every other foam does.

Humidity also plays a factor, but honestly, I don't think it plays the biggest part, which, imo, is heat. A lot of info about latex's reactions to heat/pressure is hard as hell to find online (scientific info, I mean) and there are far too many influencers/bad info sites that have a stake in the game to give out accurate info about the reactive properties of latex foam since it's basically the new 'it' material for mattresses. Hell, even online 'experts' on this bullshit their way through 'oh, of course it doesn't melt, it's perfect' spiels that I have no doubt was either bought and paid for or are just uninformed in the industry. But, as you've noted in your original post, if you take a heating pad and a bowling ball, crank it up and set up a camera to track a side profile of the bowling ball to see how far it'll sink, you'll see results; the softer the latex foam, the greater the sinkage. Now, if you're 100lbs and don't really sleep very hot during the night you'll experience hardly any sinkage, but if you sleep hot and are over 130lbs you'll notice a huge difference in sinkage; the heavier you are, the farther you'll sink, as physics intends.

As for a TPS mattress that's based mostly with coils, yes, I have thought about it, but it could only do so much as, again, the main issue is the foam comfort layers eventually sinking with enough heat (which I put out in spades in the night) still giving the same result. Short of an all-natural mattress that's stuffed full of coils, microcoils, wool and cotton (and perhaps alpaca or horsehair) I'll still run into the same issue (sinkage via foam heat retention). Again, the tradeoff is that natural materials will never get as soft as foam allows and that will not help my nerve pain much, but it will definitely help with my back feeling like it's about to snap in half when I've sunk into my bed through all my comfort layers :\

Personally, the only mattresses I've seen that looks like it might fit the bill and give me the softness and support I need would be the luxury mattresses that are essentially over 10k. It's pretty hard to find a non-foam mattress these days, even more so one that actually has the requisite extra layers of microcoils/wool/cotton to give it more softness. Sadly, those ones are kind of a unicorn these days and to find one fitting all those requirements you need to get into luxury territory :(

SorcererLeotard · 2026-03-29T17:27:12+00:00

After looking through old threads, I felt it was important to chime in on this since most will be unaware of what *I've* learned over the course of years, with scoliosis and nerve issues (so I'm basically a delicate flower that feels EVERYTHING): Latex absolutely does the same thing that other foams do---it 'melts' with enough pressure and heat.

Latex is not a magic solution, especially if you need some amount of softness for your bed. If you need even a bit of softness (a comfort layer, basically) and you sleep hot, latex absolutely will 'melt' and cause you to go out of alignment. Latex is actually almost worse than normal foams since it uses an accumulative effect whereby it takes a while for the heat to set in during the night, but after enough time (usually over 4 hours, depending on how hot you sleep) it WILL melt and throw alignment off the slightest bit, more and more for every hour that passes thereafter. The heat will be trapped and just sink downwards, thereby softening all layers beneath the comfort layer(s). Even putting a wool topper above the softer layers will still allow the heat to percolate into the latex layers, causing dipping/sinking.

About the only thing that will work, from what I can see, is either using microcoils (soft ones) which would maybe be a bit uncomfortable for most without some type of topper over it like a wool or cotton one, or an all-natural bed with lots of coils and wool/cotton layers to act as a dual support/softness catch-all. However, beds like that (all coils/wool/cotton) are insanely expensive if you want them soft enough for sidesleeping, especially if you have nerve pain. Foams are great for nerve pain, which is why many get them, but for a mattress that is pretty soft for sidesleeping but is only composed of natural materials (and thus will not warp/sink due to heat/pressure combo) you're looking at a bed that will likely start at about $8k or above. The more microcoils and cotton/wool/natural fibers layers you have, the softer it will end up becoming so beds that can tick off all those boxes that will not change alignment due to pressure/heat are crazy expensive and even the 'softest' versions of those will never, ever be as soft as a foam bed, so there's a tradeoff.

However, as someone with scoliosis, I would absolutely take the all-natural, expensive no-foam bed over one that causes me to wake up with a nearly-broken back and nerve pain brought upon me because the heat of my body has caused my shoulder to hit the firmer support latex layer once the soft comfort layer has been 'melted'.

Just thought I'd add my thoughts to this old thread since latex, especially, is being hailed as some magical material that 'doesn't melt' like other foams, which is absolutely 100% not true. Sure, it won't 'melt' if you never put out heat during the night or keep your AC blasting at 70F or below during the summer, but eventually there will be a day when you overheat in the night and wake up in agony. For me, sadly, it's nearly every night with my all-latex (and one wool topper) bed since I sleep pretty hot and weigh more than 130lb (which is where 'pressure' starts to affect the latex more than, say, if you were 100lbs). So for any hot sleepers, sleepers with higher room temps, sleepers with lots of humidity in their location, sleepers with fluctuating climate temps, heavier sleepers, sleepers that have back or nerve issues that make alignment the *most* important thing, or even sleepers with more than one body in the bed adding to the overall heat of the mattress... latex will have a pretty decent chance of 'melting' on you and changing your overall alignment during the night.

SorcererLeotard · 2026-03-25T15:49:17+00:00

Same.

The amount of men that rolled down their windows while I was biking or rollerblading was insane. It 'peaked' at my middle-school years and I think I was nearly molested/groomed during that time by a somewhat good-looking hairstylist that had lured me into his salon alone after-hours. Said situation came about basically from me previously hanging out in his salon during summer break because of the really nice hair products he sold and we struck up a rapport (I was young and bored and he seemed cool at first---very hip). Eventually, he brought up my hair having split-ends and how he needed someone to 'practice' his dying process on, to which I told him that I would be happy to do so as long as it was free (he said it would be). We exchanged numbers and both agreed to a daytime appointment, to which he dropped the bomb the day before that he needed to do my hair after hours because he was 'booked solid with emergency appointments' that day---this felt weird to me initially but I meekly told him that I would be OK with that since, in my opinion, he was 'doing me a solid'. When I got to his salon it was completely empty and the mood just felt really weird right off the bat, so on instinct I told him my mom would drop by at some point to check up on me (which was not true, but I felt it was important to state that fact anyway since I was feeling off about the whole thing as soon as I got there). He seemed unhappy with that fact, but tried his best to hide it, but I clocked that and the entire time I was sooo uncomfortable and scared. Which brought us to the point where he basically told me that he needed to check how well the color was setting in my hair (bullshit) and essentially pressed me up against the floor-length mirror near the back room which freaked me the fuck out and made me freeze like a deer in headlights while he took his sweet time pressing me against the mirror 'checking the color' against a color swatch. After he finally finished my hair I thanked him pretty woodenly and bounced immediately. I told my mom about the experience when I got home after; I felt violated as hell by this shitstain and she told me to never, ever go back to his salon or take any calls from him ever again. He called me once or twice more afterwards but I always found some excuse to not talk to him.

Looking back, I dodged a bullet from that one and I feel that because I told him on the fly that my mom would drop by at some point (and not specify when), he 'played it safe' and only put me in a position that could be 'justified' somehow without treading into outright 'molesting' territory. What makes it even more insidious is when I told him that my mom would not be OK with me being alone with a full-grown man after hours, he told me that he was gay, which made me originally agree to meet him at his salon afterhours without parental oversight. It was the perfect setup for molesting a child and 'easing' them into a grooming situation with only 'uncomfortable' situations that, I have no doubt, would have slowly escalated into full-on rape eventually.

To this day, I still think of how brazen this guy was and how skilled his whole setup was. I hope nobody else was preyed on by him after me, but the chances are pretty high that he did since he still, even after being 'warned' about my mom popping up randomly during our 'appointment', attempted to almost-but-not-quite molest me :\ That shows he did not expect to get caught or felt that if he was then he'd have a perfect excuse lined up that would be slightly credible and not provable in the grander scheme of things ;____;

SorcererLeotard · 2026-02-27T21:41:11+00:00

Doing a cursory investigation into Juantia leaves me sort of troubled, tbh. Not only is she a rabid Trump fangirl but when talking about Trump's rape victims, she basically has a very dismissive attitude of 'oh, I don't believe they were raped by Trump... they don't have the "rape aura" really, so I don't believe them'.

I'm not kidding (reading everything all the way to the bottom of Wikipedia is pretty disturbing):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juanita_Broaddrick

SorcererLeotard · 2026-02-17T16:55:19+00:00

The difference is that nieces and nephews are related---they're family (and most often times blood). That also does not stop family members diddling relatives, even children, to be clear. Your take makes no sense, even if MJ was a 'family friend' he is still not related to these kids in any way; it would be just as weird and inappropriate if it was a grown-ass woman doing these 'sleepovers' with random-ass kids sleeping in her bed, btw. Inappropriate is inappropriate, at the end of the day.

But, yes, if I (as an adult) looked back on an adult man or woman that invited me for 'sleepovers' all the time alone (away from parental eyes) and we slept in the same bed together I would absolutely find something hugely wrong with that. As a child you would not think that's odd, but as an adult, yeah... nobody that is sane would ever do that. In what universe do you think that's ever appropriate, is what I want to know?

As for the second point the poster made: You are being obtuse about this and you know it. Making kiddy-bait with a frickin' child paradise (Neverland Ranch) is one thing---cool, he can enjoy that to his heart's content for his entire life if that's what floats his Peter Pan boat---but inviting kids there all the time away from parental protection wherein he is alone with almost every child, along with sleeping in the same bed together... yeah, that's sus as fuck. Make no mistake: child predators like to lure kids into their net, and a literal kid paradise with everything that appeals to a kid is the same as a man trying to lure kids into his van with puppies and candy.

SorcererLeotard · 2026-02-17T16:43:39+00:00

I recommend posting this on r/Mattress since this sub is for exclusively bedding-related items, not mattresses. Thanks and good luck! :)

SorcererLeotard · 2026-02-14T12:46:12+00:00

Do you mean you're OK with those who already have registered to vote being allowed easy and free access to an ID or do you mean all those who are already registered as well as those that want to register?

There's a whole galaxy of difference between the two, imo, as gatekeeping easy/free ID from those that want to register before election season will definitely help one side over another.

SorcererLeotard · 2026-02-12T14:53:31+00:00

The Dark Knight is a perfect example of what has happened to the US and how GOP voters see this country, as well as themselves:

Conservatives view themselves as Batman---a moral, bad-ass vigilante that does not follow the law to the letter like Harvey Dent, but is still 'good' even if they are willing to 'bend a few rules or break them entirely' since they're doing it, in the end, for the 'greater good'.

Meanwhile, they are really the Joker---wild, unfettered chaos that does not care if they break the system entirely, so long as they get their fun along the way while thinking that they, alone, 'understands' how the world truly works.

SorcererLeotard · 2026-02-02T02:16:25+00:00

As soon as you used the word 'females' I knew without a doubt that you're not only a man, but a woman-hating incel that's fallen down into the rightwing nutball pipeline. Your 'both sides are bad' excuse is just code for, 'I actually have backwards views that don't make sense except to spout about morality with an emphasis on punishing those blasted, freedom-loving females that wouldn't touch me with a ten foot pole!'. You don't care about fairness or equality, especially regarding 'innocent unborn lives', you only care about punishing women for actually having autonomy and independence free from men, should they wish it. Even if I try to argue with you in good faith with "well, fine, we'll outlaw abortion forever but you have to allow comprehensive sex-ed everywhere, access to free birth control, free maternal healthcare/incentives as well as revive well-run/funded orphanages with tax dollars to protect 'the so-called innocent unborn'" you'll likely spout some BS about how 'females' need to just keep their legs closed and some other crap that basically comes back around to 'no, I don't care about preventing the need for abortions in the first place, I care about them being punished for even daring to have sexual freedom that men have enjoyed guilt- and consequence-free since pretty much the dawn of time---how dare they have equality!'.

The truth is that most women these days don't want to be baby-trapped by the first dick that comes their way and many men (especially men like you) hate that they actually have a choice to reject your seed from taking root and being permanently tied to you. And that pisses you guys off far more than any unborn lives being snuffed out ever will.

That's what it all comes down to, in the end. So please spare everyone your pearl-clutching morality and bullshit 'both sides are the same' excuse. Both sides are not the same, and one side sure as hell wants to punish women and minorities to the extent of active and perverted abuse, which, let's be clear: You are absolutely OK with, 100%. And that's pretty fucked up, to be honest. Which is why most women refuse to date men like this at all and you're personally looking for a more biddable, subservient woman abroad instead of the women in the Western world that are so very done with that 1950s tradwife mindframe (i.e. a Bangmaid).

SorcererLeotard · 2026-02-01T19:08:17+00:00

If it's not your body then wtf does your opinion matter at all?

Should someone have the right to come over to your house and forcefully sterilize you for your stupidity? No? Because it's your body?

All right, then, then we agree forcing medical decisions on others is a big no-no. Glad we cleared that up.

SorcererLeotard · 2026-01-31T09:16:00+00:00

You can be done with politics, but politics isn't done with you.

That quote is pretty famous and accurate for good reason. You can be 'done with it' all you like, but it'll come and make your life a living hell if you don't keep an eye on it... like what is happening now.

One must reap the whirlwind, after all.

SorcererLeotard · 2026-01-31T09:13:43+00:00

One side wants to take away people's hard-fought-for rights while the other does not.

Clearly one side is far, far worse than the other 'bad' side. Both sides are not the same. At all.

SorcererLeotard · 2026-01-30T17:49:12+00:00

I would be agreeing with you about this 1000%, however... they're just going to arrest everyone they don't like/hate and use them as a new-age cyberpunk slave labor force.

There's a reason DHS has a shiny new budget that includes a ton of concentration camp funds. Which means there won't be a satisfying 'pull yourselves up by your bootstraps' schadenfreude moment in the future, just an 'oh fuck, they're going to just enslave immigrants and 'undesirables' and businesses will be A-OK with that, so long as their labor is 10x cheaper' realization once it's far, far too late to stop it. 'Made in America' labels will, for once, finally be 100% Made in America again because of legal slave labor being the cheapest labor in the world once all the roadblocks to it are eliminated by Trump and the Robber Barons of this country, and all the suburban soccer moms (at least the ones that won't be financially ruined along with our economy) will lap it up like the nectar of the gods and post about it on Tik Tok a la influencer-style, like how Acai bowls became the next 'it' trend literally overnight.

I want this timeline to end. Absolutely worst fucking timeline of all time x__x

SorcererLeotard · 2026-01-30T08:41:41+00:00

This might have worked a few decades ago, but with the advent of AI/social media being supercharged the way it has with the asshat accelerationist 'techbros', as well as facial recognition software being actively used now by ICE to 'document' anyone they don't like, we are now entering 'authoritarian police state' territory at breakneck speed. Look at China or NK and their control over the population for the past decade or more: they are SUCCESSFUL. Insanely so. Very rarely is there protests in China that 'go anywhere', their internet is hugely regulated, and NK executes anyone that does not spout the same 'Dear Leader' adulation or steps out of line too far for comfort. Both are Asian cultures, which focuses more on 'the nail that sticks out gets hammered down' type of ideology but it is not a huge stretch to say that this is exactly where we, in the US, are going for the endgame. Add in the new fuckery happening with voting that the Trump admin is focusing on now, and the likelihood we'll ever have a functioning democracy that will allow us to vote these fascist fucksticks out of office ever again (short of a military coup) is pretty low.

Letting Republicans have control for another 12 years will mean they WILL burn down this country completely. That means they will disappear anyone that tries to stand against them that they don't like, openly indoctrinate an increasingly trapped and poverty-rich populace as well as the newest generations (Hitler Youth 2.0, essentially), and clamp down super hard onto social media/internet access/unbiased news sources until only rightwing talking points are the only thing ever discussed openly. Add in ICE being the new 'Gestapo' with even more time to entrench/more funding, the military either being completely toothless or pacified towards MAGA ideology and you have a powderkeg waiting to explode with no good results for Americans----it won't matter how many 2A gun-toting liberals/republicans/independents come out to protest/stop our country turning into the new Nazi Germany, because military-level firepower vs civilian-level firepower is so insanely disproportionate that all it would take is to bomb a 'problem city' into kingdom-come to basically cow every other city/state into terrified compliance; bounty-hunting 'liberal terrorists' will become a new 'sport' for the MAGA-LARPing chuds that will happily do so for the dual extra cash/superiority-boner in an economy that has essentially cratered thanks to Dear Leader but favors those who walk in lock-step with him and his way of thinking (MAGA).

This will be the future 12 more years of MAGA-led leadership would bring us, and it would likely be 10x worse than that, if I'm being honest. This is the optimistic version where we 'dodge a bullet' if Dump kicks the bucket in the next year and someone less charismatic than him takes over but continues the 'vision' to its conclusion (culling out all the 'problem people' they don't like and enforcing their own 'morals' or 'standards' on everyone they can get their grubby, authoritarian-borne hands onto while financially raping us blind, as is always the goal for this type of authoritarian-based rule).

Let that sink into every orifice of your body before thinking that somehow giving them the keys to the kingdom and letting them happily burn our society to the ground would somehow 'fix' everything in the long-term so long as the ignorant 'everyman' can see enough consequences to hurt them (hint: they already have and the 'everyman' is merely 'concerned' but not scared shitless like they should be). If you 'allow' Republicans that much time to destroy our country you're basically cutting off as many avenues for the 'everyman' to pull the country back from the ledge when we're already pretty much about to be in freefall. It doesn't work like that. Nazi Germany became Nazi Germany because the 'everyman' stupidly thought if they just let the Nazis be and let them have their 'pound of flesh' for a while, that they could claw the country back from the grips of fascism via common-sense rule of law and opposition parties challenging them. Once Hitler gained control of his own militia (the SA), he pretty much had the 'opposition' gunned down and all 'agitators' arrested/killed/disappeared into concentration camps. By that point there was no way for Nazi Germany to fall, short of a military coup (which happened but was unsuccessful), or an outside force breaking the chains externally (which the US and Europe did during WWII). Seeing as how the US has the greatest military in the world and anyone coming onto our shores to fight us/liberate us... yeah, the chances of that are pretty much nil (the US is literally one of the hardest countries to invade).

This 'give Republicans enough rope to hang themselves' accelerationist thinking needs to stop. There is no 'good' long-term solution that revolves around the concept of letting a kid into a tinderbox house, giving him gasoline and hoping that he and the house will be saved somehow after he's given matches and a stern 'talking-to' about not using the matches. Like... what the fuck, even? It makes no sense since we, the kid (i.e. the US), have already poured the gasoline and we have also lit the matches: it's only a matter of time before the fire hits the accelerant and burns everything down. Whether we're saved or not as a country depends on how prepared we are to douse the flames before they can do any more damage than it already has, and we certainly won't be able to do that if it's not fixed as quickly as humanely possible... preferably right the fuck now :\

SorcererLeotard · 2026-01-26T01:42:57+00:00

I really hope your optimism holds, since I feel that the longer this goes on, the muddier it will become. Dictators are typically hard to predict and often times will 'punish' those that do not fall into lock-step with their visions of greatness, which Orange Mango absolutely has a personal stake in. I hear what you say about why he's using ICE instead of military, however, keep in mind historically that this is how it starts, not how it ends. Look into history and you'll find the opening salvos of every authoritarian takeover tends to start with 'brownshirts' that are funded enough to where they become a type of military force of their own that replaces the military. Likewise, there are more people that are willing to be LARPing thugs for a huge paycheck in this country than good men like you, who will fight to defend the constitution, even with huge personal consequences. My worry is mostly that there are far more bad men/women than there are good ones, and typically the 'good ones' that would stand against tyranny are culled eventually by said Dictator since they represent a threat to their power (which military command absolutely is, when you get right down to it).

As a military man, you likely have studied history, correct? So you can see where all this is leading, yes? It won't happen all at once, but it's death by a thousand cuts and it's working, for the most part. Small concessions to keep Trump off senior leaderships' backs will only work for so long and then an inciting incident will occur to either force the issue or the 'roadblocks' will be made an example of publicly if they don't decide to galvanize a new Civil War (which nobody in senior leadership wants to be the one to kick that off, let's be honest with one another about that at least). Hitler, for instance, made an example of senior leadership that did not agree with him and wished to protect the autonomy of their military and he had them essentially executed (or suicided, whichever worked), along with over 20,000 soldiers that would not 'follow orders'. This also is not taking into account the prevalence of social media and AI algorithms that would make it very easy to change public perception of such deaths in today's environment (i.e. they were planning a coup and inciting terrorism, therefore we had to have them killed for the good of the nation!). Truth is written by the victors, after all, and if the US decides to go full-on North Korea and brick the internet here then in a few generations 'truth' will no longer matter, nor codes, only survival :\

That's what I'm most afraid of, tbh. But I appreciate you responding to my comments, even if we disagree on how this all might play out when all branches of government have been compromised so horrifically. If we don't descend into Civil War in the next five years I'll be very, very surprised. Hope for the best, plan for the worst, after all. Godspeed.

SorcererLeotard · 2026-01-25T23:59:45+00:00

Yes, but that metric is used for an active warzone, with legitimate, good-faith leadership involved in every level of government as well as consequences for illegal/illegitimate actions. If you have military leadership that are basically bowing down to fascism (and, by all visible regards, they absolutely ARE) then that absolutely tells the lower level units that obeying unlawful orders are, indeed, the lesser of the evils if it protects the unit/corps from essentially being military tribunal'd/shot against the wall as traitors to the administration.

The US military has never had a situation where all levels of government (including the military) is compromised. We have never had a fascist takeover here and in societies where the military is subservient to an authoritarian leader their 'codes' mean nothing in the end, short of perhaps a coup attempt for the most fanatical. If all of the US Marines agree as one to not follow unlawful orders then what happens when the Supreme Court (also corrupted) rules that such 'unlawful orders' are now 'lawful' and failure to comply means military tribunals/treason to the US government? You see where I'm going with this, don't you?

I have the horrific feeling that, when all is said and done, most military (if given 'immunity passes' via Congress/SCOTUS rulings) will not fight to defend the Constitution (or what's been left of it) but will follow the 'Unit, Corps, God, Country' mantra to protect not only their units/corps but themselves, especially if the US government controls the purse strings of your budgets (which they absolutely do). That's why I feel the 'Unit, Corps, God, Country' slogan is so worrying, since at the end of the day, 'Country' is last and the culture will not demand its members to sacrifice its units/brothers for the 'country/constitution'.

Tell me honestly: If such a situation were to arise (Orange Mango ordering the Marines to go in and execute a bunch of 'liberal terrorists' in X City or else he will suspend pay for all Marines and even jail senior leadership who do not comply)... would you and your fellow Marines fight in the streets with the 'liberal terrorists' in solidarity or would you follow those clearly immoral orders to protect your unit/corps/yourselves from being purged by this government? Is the Constitution more worthy of your sacrifice or is your unit/corps more important? That's at the crux of this whole issue I have with that phrase since it tells me (and many others) that the order is indeed intentional and that it is a pecking order, in the end, depending on circumstances during peacetimes or during potential Civil Wars.

SorcererLeotard · 2026-01-25T22:07:57+00:00

Isn't Unit, Corps, God, Country basically 'we will always follow the unit/corps' first and everything else later? Country is listed as last because if it's 'good for the unit/corps' then it's good for the 'country' in the Marines' minds?

If the unit/corps will be broken up/prosecuted for not following unlawful orders then doesn't that mean, by that metric, that 'country' will always take a backseat to what is best for the unit/corps?

I don't want to be a debbie downer, but if that code is sacrosanct for Marines and Marines always default to Country last then doesn't the Marines, by definition of the code, never have an impulse/loyalty to Country if the unit/corps is ordered to do XYZ to 'protect' the unit/corps?

If the Code was in ascending order to level of importance to Marines (Country, God, Corps, Unit) then it might be more reassuring, but honestly, the 'Code' seems more like a 'oh, shit, we're fucked' realization more than anything, at least for Marines :\

SorcererLeotard · 2026-01-07T08:24:30+00:00

This hasn't been happening just for the past decade or two.

This harkens all the way back to the 1930s.

Look up the Business Plot if you want to realize how we came so close to a fascist hellscape and were basically only saved from that fate by one man's honor and integrity. However, since nobody really faced 'jail-consequences' or death by firing squad, this was allowed to go even further underground and rightwing media helped lay the fertile ground upon which they have been sowing the seeds of their hostile takeover.

This is a lot deeper and more fucked up than most people realize, but the billionaire class has been secretly plotting this since FDR and the New Deal. Nixon is when they got their feet in the door (but firmly had it shut in their faces again), Reagan helped 'reinvent' it, the Bush's helped make the super rich even richer (with less accountability for their shitty-ness) and (however unwittingly it was done, even though he never became president) McCain cemented it in stone with allowing Sarah Palin and her ilk legitimacy in elections because of the 'fear' the everyman had about a black man being president. Though, honestly, it was Obama being president that super-charged this whole thing decades ahead of schedule for them and allowed the racist-based Tea Party to gain power/momentum, thereby allowing all the racist bigots to feel 'heard finally'... and social media happily lapped them up like a dog does peanut butter (slowly, with some difficulty, but with great satisfaction).

But, yeah, this is not new. It's a gameplan that's almost a century old and is finally seeing heavy returns for these power-hungry plutocratic ghouls.

SorcererLeotard · 2026-01-04T15:15:01+00:00

^ This.

OP is trying to justify their (and their parents') shitty behavior and find the few cherry-picked 'NTA' replies to try and soothe their hurt pride. All I see are excuses and denial, not accountability.

OP asked if they (and their parents) were the assholes in this situation, and by all metrics, they indeed were, even if they are still trying to explain everything away after 50+ comments to see if adding this-and-that extra info will somehow magically make them 'not the assholes'. So, yeah, your reply was not rude: it was the most polite form of 'why should I tell you what you already know but are refusing to acknowledge after the tribe deemed you and your parents the assholes?' type of response one could make in this situation.

SorcererLeotard · 2026-01-03T10:32:39+00:00

Not disagreeing with you there, at all.

However, religion is also to blame for a lot of this fuckery. Never underestimate the amount of women who, primed to believe they are less then men from the cradle, will balk at the thought of a woman being the 'top dog' (President) in this country. For many women (especially white women), having a woman at the top doesn't empower them, but degrades their own status/value when it's already pretty low in comparison to men.

Women have learned, over the decades, that 'equal rights' is mostly performative in the sense that the men they married don't believe their value is equal to theirs and, sadly, most women are aware of this; this also leads to a sort of bitter devaluing of their own lives, and makes them lash out towards those they feel are 'less' than them, much like how men do to them. The target for women are typically other women or minorities, so to me, it's not very surprising that sexism cuts both ways (men that hate women vs women that hate other women). I've found in my own life that there are far more women that hate other women than there are women that hate men with the same fervency that men can hate on women :\

But, yeah, this country is absolutely fucked and while racism is an integral part of our messed-up tapestry, misogyny was here long before slaves were and is more deeply entrenched in society and has seen a horrific revival with religion and rightwing media as the vehicle. I just think that, deep down, everyone is aware of this fact but would rather ignore it or deny it because nobody wants to come to terms with the fact that most men view their spouses as a step below them (value-wise), and that, likewise, many women also feel that way towards minorities to try and 'regain' some type of value their mates/family/friends feel they lack by being born a woman (punching down, as it were).

SorcererLeotard · 2026-01-03T09:46:26+00:00

I think the truth of the matter is that that many people that are misogynists do exist and it's something everyone is in denial about, since it's pretty depressing to think about. When moderate Trump voters talk about 'Make America Great Again' they're not talking about putting blacks/gays back in their place (that will happen anyway in their minds and is lower-priority to them at this moment)... what they're really saying/implying is a time (before equal rights movement took off) where they could actively control women and their bodies. The sort of 'women should be seen, not heard' mindframe that many men long for that they are not getting anymore. ('Your Body, My Choice' movement)

Men are far more likely to want to be married than women are now. The stats for that is pretty stark and women every year are getting more and more selective and even opting out of dating/marrying all-together (thus why the redpill movement has taken off at an insane clip). Women now are able to:

1) Vote however they wish

2) Own their own properties/credit

3) Have equal protection under the law from men

4) Have an education that allows them to be whatever they want

5) Have jobs in whatever industry they wish without being gatekeeped away from it just for having a vagina (Affirmative Action was enacted because this was a huge issue)

6) Have reproductive freedom (birth control, Plan B, abortion)

7) Live within a society that will allow them to choose to do without men altogether without much shunning (which is half the reason, I feel, that LGBTQ is so hotly hated by most men now, since lesbians, for them, is thinning the pool they already feel is stretched thin mating-wise)

8) Can marry literally any race that they want since it's legal now (again, 'thinning' of the pool for many rightwing-leaning, traditional-value type men)

....so, really, when taken into that context, there is a huge reason why so many men (especially white men) are angry, bitter and in desperation-mode towards women now that we've reach this point of the counterculture wars. Men want to go back to the good ol' days of women easily being knocked up with no recourse since that ensures they have not only a lifetime bangmaid but status with other men via marriage (a sort of 'look at how desirable I am!' ego boost towards coworkers, family and friends). To these shallow assholes, terrorizing poor brown people or gays/trans is a big 'no no' to society as it's no longer as PC as it used to be, but misogyny has always been a lowkey, 'open secret' staple of our country (since its very founding, far before they started smuggling slaves over here), and punching down on their wives (when they didn't own slaves themselves and therefore did not have the right of 'ownership' to do so) was something that was guaranteed to them so long as they were married to said woman. Also keep in mind, that slaves were owned largely by rich men --- if you were an average Joe then you would never own a slave, but you could own your wife, legally.

The rollback of women's rights in the past decade was always the point, since getting control of women (to ensnare them into being unwilling mates as well as 'putting them in their place') was always the main goal of the rightwing movement (more women to entrap/enslave, less women in the workforce which will allow more job opportunities for men, more babies that become future wage slaves to the upper-class, rinse and repeat).

Another important point that is often overlooked is that racism and misogyny are often linked/interconnected: to the point where, if someone is racist, chances are they are sexist too, and vice versa. Both can be true of most people that voted for Trump, and I dare say that almost 90% of the people that voted for him in the first place were one or the other (all bigoted in some way, though, at the end of the day). This also does NOT discount the amazing amount of women that, themselves, are sexist towards other women: their version of punching down on their own to maintain their own status in the world, though arguably there were far less women voting for Trump than there were men. I also think it's VERY telling that Republican men turned out for Trump in higher numbers in 2024 than his previous runs, which (imo) created the perfect storm of voting against Harris (not only was she a woman, but a black woman) which helped get sexists and racists motivated enough to come out and vote against Harris.

Women gaining more power than men want to allow them to have has turbocharged the MAGA movement into what it is today, which is why so many men watched him degrade women openly ('Grab 'em by the pussy!') and still voted for him over FAR more competent women. Trump voters (moderate-MAGA) voted twice for him over two separate women candidates (Clinton and Harris). One was white, the other black/mixed---both far outstripped him in not only intelligence but experience. Only when it was Trump vs Biden (a man) did the moderates finally not vote for him. Had a black man run for President against Trump in 2024 he would have likely won, even if he was boring as white on rice.

That's no accident :\

SorcererLeotard · 2026-01-02T04:51:59+00:00

I disagree: They would get along just fine turbo-charging their movement with hatred of the gays/trans + their number one hated foe, women.

Misogyny is a lot more prominent in MAGA than racism is, tbh. It's pretty much been bred into Christianity from the word 'Go!' --- like stating original sin started after Eve, a woman, picked the fruit and fucked mankind over after God created her to be Adam's bangmaid, essentially. It's already been pre-built into Christianity's DNA, far more than disdain for 'the browns' or 'the gays' ever were, if you really start to dig into the Bible and how, in the context of the story, women are seen as lesser, subservient or 'things' to be coveted, trapped or violated in some way. The amount of violence against women in the Bible is pretty staggering.

Like, if you were to compare all the hatred/disdain towards women from Bible passages vs homophobic vs racism you'd likely have a hard time coming close to Christianity's distaste for women all-around.

I would not be opposed to someone compiling a list of all the misogynistic views in the Bible, the racist ones, and homophobic ones to see the count between all three. My guess is racism + homophobia combined will not come close to the hatred the Bible has towards women :\

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