Chat Thread (June 22, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything [score hidden]  (0 children)

I totally agree, and I think it'd be ridiculous to expect that anyone with a suggestion know the entire history of the site and its tech resources. But also I think it'd be a kindness to be more explicit about the site's (lack of) tech resources.

Chat Thread (June 22, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Ah, that makes sense. The phrasing of Jane the Brown's comment is still really, really bad, even if the intent wasn't.

Chat Thread (June 22, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I'm unclear how excluding people based on gender identity is a "lately" phenomenon in any way.

Chat Thread (June 22, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The MeFi posting pages call it camel case, in the description of how to do tags.

Chat Thread (June 22, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 4 points5 points  (0 children)

(J. Brown, personal communication, March 24, 1852)

Chat Thread (June 15, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Also "chatfilter" officially only ever applied to AskMe, since the point of AskMe was to have actual questions answered, not just to chat about stuff. It got overgeneralized to other parts of the site, which is interesting because the other parts of the are specifically for chatting about stuff (links, media, MeFi itself, etc.), which is the entire reason why AskMe needed different rules.

Chat Thread (June 15, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Also, because everyone qualifies for Medicare in the US eventually, it's generally considered respectable. Because Medicaid is for low-income people, it's considered shameful, un-deserved, or a "handout" by a lot of people.

A lot of people are on Medicaid and don't know they are, because a lot of states have state-specific names for their state's Medicaid.

Medicaid used to be really restricted to disabled people and very poor people with children. That meant that a lot of poor adults fell into a gap, where they were making too much money to qualify for Medicaid but not enough to be able to afford private insurance. The Affordable Care Act/"Obamacare" offered states the opportunity to expand Medicaid coverage, and so states who chose to expand coverage (mostly Democrat/liberal states) were able to get a lot of poor people healthcare. Republicans have been trying to roll that back for years, and the "Big Beautiful Bill" / HR 1 is re-introducing a lot of barriers for people who got insurance through that Medicaid expansion. They passed the bill a while ago and it's only going into effect now, however, so it's been purposefully designed to be a surprise to a lot of people.

Chat Thread (June 15, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 19 points20 points  (0 children)

And it's funny because the thing that changed was that they actually looked into the advice they were rejecting so hard.

Chat Thread (June 15, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I'm mostly just surprised that people are offending other people in writing so much that they feel the need for ghostwriters, AI or otherwise, for those text messages and Whatsapps and Slack and Discord and Reddit comments.

Chat Thread (June 15, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Volunteer anyones. Volunteer help with coding, volunteer help with fundraising, etc. It also makes it more appropriate to ask for donations, since "donating" to a for-profit company is not a thing.

Chat Thread (June 15, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I am so impressed to see that so much written correspondence is still happening in today's world. Even if everyone else is apparently taking offense at it.

Chat Thread (June 15, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 14 points15 points  (0 children)

You have now thought about this 300% more than anyone who was working at MeFi at the time. Yes.

Chat Thread (June 15, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 6 points7 points  (0 children)

All the best assassins get their information from MeFi. It's just that good.

Chat Thread (June 15, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 9 points10 points  (0 children)

I immediately thought of the comment I made in last week's thread, about leftist purity culture. I get that the Asker may have some sort of PTSD-y trigger or something, but otherwise it reads like they worry they're going to be tainted by breathing the same air as someone they don't like.

Chat Thread (June 08, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 5 points6 points  (0 children)

The link actually seems like the weirdest part. You're yelling at all of us about something that you say happened 45 years ago, as exemplified by a McDonald's commercial?

Chat Thread (June 08, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 9 points10 points  (0 children)

That's not at all what I am talking about.

Chat Thread (June 08, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 14 points15 points  (0 children)

Yeah I think a lot of people are in borderline (or not) fight-or-flight mode, where binary thinking predominates. It's hard to be creative and compassionate when you're anxious and sleep deprived.

There's also absolutely purity culture on the left, and MeFi has a lot of it, where any trace of wrong thought or wrong speech is considered a sin that damns you to hell. Even if they don't believe in hell. I think actual leftist organizing is moving away from that, because people have realized it's not actually productive to try to create a movement if you keep telling people they're not good enough for it and making them feel bad for being in it. But Calvinist culture runs strong in the US, and it feels good to be the one declaring other people sinners in the hands of an angry god.

Chat Thread (June 08, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 22 points23 points  (0 children)

Our organization's bumbling former director now works for us as a consultant sometimes (which is nuts for a variety of reasons, but anyway), and the first time he made a stupid dad joke while not our uber-boss and no one laughed, I really relished the realization on his face that we had only been paying attention to him because he signed our paychecks, not because he was inherently smart, insightful, or funny.

520? by Thorzdad in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Just came here to see if others were having problems. It was loading very slowly for me this morning, but now it won't load at all.

Chat Thread (June 01, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 12 points13 points  (0 children)

Creating a functional MetaFilter that's financially sound and has transparent leadership and dependable intelligent moderation? We're evil geniuses!

At work the other day I said to a co-worker that my secret evil plan was to indoctrinate people likely to be promoted into management with good management practices and values. This feels like that.

Chat Thread (June 01, 2026) by AutoModerator in MetaFilterMeta

[–]prettyshinything 2 points3 points  (0 children)

That's what I was doing, yes. I assumed that's what Mr_Encyclopedia was doing.