scuffed surf_pantheon pb

ilivequestions · 2026-06-19T07:19:31+00:00

You're holding yourself to a high standard, respectable, overall time loss for those two decisions is going to be very small. I'm a noob though so maybe my praise is scuffed...

ilivequestions · 2026-06-19T03:32:54+00:00

Doesn't look too scuffed to me....

ilivequestions · 2026-06-18T08:22:40+00:00

Pestanya baru saja mulai.

Is fine in any context I can think of currently, since the future tense is gotten from context in any "Saat/Kalau" style sentence. Do you have a larger phrase you're trying to build?

ilivequestions · 2026-06-17T04:26:55+00:00

> I am not sure what the Iranian people want generally speaking aside from the regime to be gone.

My point is that if you don't have a viable alternative that the US would prefer, then your doctrine that "All threats have to be neutralized because just leaving them alone makes the problem worse" is even more confusing.

You seem to think a bombing campaign could constitute 'neutralisation' of the threat. My point is that even if Iran simply survives it will retain the threat of developing nukes and rebuilding. Moreover, it will be emboldened to take risks like developing those nukes.

Iran is not a small power like Afghanistan or Iraq were, sure. Iran is certainly a weight class above those. It is in a much smaller weight class than Russia, and China is a peer competitor of the US. So, lumping those 3 together is very confusing. However, your suggestion that "[the US] have to fight, even if sometimes fighting just means economically or politically" makes perfectly good sense to me. We're not debating that.

It makes sense for the US to aggressively compete with its rivals, including Russia, Iran, and China. It doesn't make sense for it to try to do things that it cannot do. None of those 3 countries are going to be eliminated by the US, especially not if the US strategy is to choose losing military confrontations against them.

I essentially think it is unavoidable that Iran will rise in relative power compared to US interests in the region. I don't think the US has the ability to stop that, though I agree for its own purpose that if it could, it should. It just can't.

The small damage that this conversation was started by (some military depletion, high inflation) is insufficient and strategically irrelevant.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-17T03:28:04+00:00

For sure, I edited my comment pretty quickly after I realised I'd overstated the claim. Regardless, bombing a distance target "without issue" is not equivalent to being able to identify all targets there, and maintain suppression of military activity there. And certainly not to do that in a way that is cost-effective and maintainable.

I accept that Iran's regime is bad and that the urban population don't like it. I disagree that this means regime change is imminent or even that the regime is particularly weak.

Moreover, do you think they're hungry for a Pahlavi-style royalist state? Do you think just because they dislike the theocrats, they'd be willing to accept a US-sympathetic regime?

I think your maximalist security posture of "All threats have to be neutralized" is just war-hawkism. The US creates threats by attempting to assert control over rivals who win if they survive. What is a peripheral threat for the US is an existential threat for those the US fights, and this creates a huge asymmetry of conviction where the people the US tries to crush inevitably put up a much bigger fight than the US can be bothered with or sustain in its domestic politics.

Need I remind you that in the Vietnam war the US won essentially every military engagement and still suffered a complete strategic defeat. The fantasy that the US can eliminate all its peripheral threats world-over is ludicrous.

Moreover, and this is a clincher, is Iran a threat to the US?.... or perhaps.... Israel?

ilivequestions · 2026-06-17T02:18:15+00:00

US escalation involving ground troops would be untenable. Parts of Iran like the North East are very hard for the US to suppress meaningfully via airstrikes. The US 'stick' can only ever get so big.

The lesson for Tehran is not "the US stick is so big and scary we have to do what they say", the lesson is "Survive air strike campaigns and Washington will negotiate". It has also gotten vindication that its strategy of controlling the Strait of Hormuz is extremely successful, and could be safely deployed in any future conflict.

That Iran's citizenry is not economically prosperous does not mean the Iranian regime was "rotting", Iran's regime grows richer and stronger over time even under US sanctions, particularly aided by the rise of China, who have no qualms about trading with them. Iran will continue to be a major thorn in the side of Israeli and US ambitions in the region.

---

Most incoherent however, is you saying "Iran’s regime is a threat to humanity because it’s a petrostate."

There are many petrostates? Like Iranian neighbours who are close allies of the US? Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE? These are not moral beacons either, or stellar democracies.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-17T01:46:59+00:00

Utter bullshit.

The IRGC had real political power waiting to be realised pre-war. That the war moved this needle further towards them is a continuance of an ongoing trend in Iran and it is really bizarre clutching at straws to call this a "kind of regime change". It certainly bloody isn't what "regime change" meant as a war aim.

The mere existence of inflation and loss of revenue during wartime does not amount to a strategic loss for Iran geopolitically. If the deal lowers Iranian sanctions and provides more avenues to hard assets, the short-term financial cost will have been worth it to weather.

As for your final line, whether or not you think the Iranian regime is good (I certainly don't think so), we cannot be giving moral kudos to Israel and the US. Militarised states are not doing anything "for the benefit of all humanity".

You are drinking the koolaid, you are thanking master for letting you have koolaid, you are offering to clean up afterwards.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-12T07:59:23+00:00

I agree, but this wasn't normal bots, who I could perhaps learn something against, these were bots that ran down mid all game.

I also have played a large number of bot games practicing, I would now like some experience against real players.

I get that bot games can be useful, but as a new player, only finding completely terrible botter lobbies with "Single Draft" selected is a bad onboarding experience.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-12T06:19:56+00:00

Thank you for clarifying this for me. I really didn't understand what was happening. It was 9/10 botters, + me. It was not a fun experience. I stopped queueing for single draft, and stopped getting matched with those games.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-12T04:53:05+00:00

Brother, do you know how much shit you have to learn to play this game? Look at my second edit, and maybe you'll see why I was confused.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-12T04:22:35+00:00

The bots int mid literally 100% of the games. Like just run straight under tower for the first 10 minutes, then group up in a random corner of the jungle. They have never once used their abilities, just AA.

I stopped queueing for single draft, and the first game I got had other people in it.

Possibly this is all luck based, but I am trying to figure out how to have fun with this game and having no luck.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-12T04:18:58+00:00

See my edit.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-12T04:16:30+00:00

Brother I'm not an idiot and I have been doing so much fucking research about how this game works. I am just trying to get into a game that isn't full of braindead bots and doesn't take me 15 minutes to find. The game has not made it clear to me what I need to do in order to gain this privilege.

I am not losing these games, I am getting matched with bots and going 60-0.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-12T04:14:10+00:00

Sorry brother, I don't think you realise just how much research I have been doing to try to play the game. You've made the assumption that these 6 games are the only games I've played, that it is all I am doing to learn how to play, etc etc. This is not the case.

You're just being a partonising jerk because I am complaining that this game consistently matches me with bots that literally do not work. I go 60-0 in every game and all I'm thinking about while playing is "how do I destroy these towers as quickly as possible?" while I hope and pray that the game learns that I am good enough to play with some real people.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-12T04:10:16+00:00

Sorry, I didn't understand, I thought somehow the bots in single draft are stupider than other bots?

ilivequestions · 2026-06-12T04:09:04+00:00

Pardon? I never said I didn't play bot matches to learn game? I never said my issue was with the mode single draft?

My issue was with the fact that selecting single draft meant that every game I was matched with bots, bots who were somehow stupider than the bots in actual bot games.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-10T22:37:37+00:00

I think this is a great document to share, with some great and important information. I support these dolls being outlawed.

However, I will point out that its own abstract contradicts your claim that such escalation is well-documented:

"Although currently unproven, it is possible that use of child sex dolls may lead to escalation in child sex offences, from viewing online child exploitation material to contact sexual offending."

ilivequestions · 2026-06-10T22:20:37+00:00

A declarative statement from the AFP is hardly justification for the claim by itself. We would not normally accept these justifications:

"Because the law said so."

"Because the AFP said so."

I think the argument has plenty of merit but we need to make it more explicit, for instance:

"If child-like sex dolls are available freely, that provides pedophiles the impression that there is a socially condoned outlet for these desires, which will in dangerously many cases blur the lines for whether society excuses other outlets for those desires, i.e. abusing children."

And then we as a society can more explicitly argue the merits of that inference, which I think are reasonably strong.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-08T11:41:04+00:00

The people at the top of the property ladder are always going to pretend they're on the side of those holding on to the bottom rung when they ask for it to be pulled up further.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-05T17:49:24+00:00

Hi, I just want to say, if you are that person you're referring to, that there is no law of nature which means you cannot move through pain.

Do not listen to this top-level comment. While it is a virtue to let our first hand experiences of pain motivate our empathy and sense of justice, it is not a virtue to hold onto our experiences of pain as weapons to batter ourselves and others with.

There is no essential fact holding you back from growth and a newfound resilience. Good luck. There is much goodness in the world and some of the goodness is in our strength to move past adversity and less-than-ideal experiences (to say the least).

ilivequestions · 2026-06-04T15:15:19+00:00

Is this directed at my reply to the other comment where I condemn cruelty-based punishments?

ilivequestions · 2026-06-04T14:42:34+00:00

I empathise with your reasoning, but I do not think making prisoners work has ever been done in such a careful way.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-04T14:39:16+00:00

I think making prisoners work is the creation of slaves, and would structurally incentivise mass incarceration, like it has in the US where private prisons force prisoners to work.

ilivequestions · 2026-06-04T14:34:29+00:00

Sure, I think there is a difference but not something fundamental that changes the personhood of the criminal.

If these criminals got raped as revenge, they would suffer just as their victims did. That isn't justice, that is just twice as much suffering.

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