macerated_baby_presidents

reddit is truly incredible they're telling OP to vote for Genocide Joe in the comments

we don't eat animals not only because it is wrong but also because it is disgusting

I don't eat animals because it's wrong. They tasted great to me on the day I stopped. It's true that my taste has changed as a consequence of not eating animals - after a restaurant miscommunication I discovered that butter tastes weird now - but focusing on that is counterproductive for external messaging. Carnists eat flesh and think it tastes good. You can't convince them that it tastes gross and trying to do that will have you dismissed as a picky eater.

not a bike lane in sight. I now recognize my mistakes and condemn this Stalinist revisionist authoritarian autocratic regime

"people are less likely to read the original stuff, and it becomes clear that part of the original work is simply wrong"

(a) hexbear is running a Capital book club at this very moment (b) Marx was right.

Mighty Weinersmith, from a liberal perspective, deals a killing stroke to DSA's North Star caucus and possibly Pete Buttigieg types. I'm quaking in my boots

They're still pushed for the reasons you mentioned, but I think an experiential or specialty shop gift card - ideally something that the person would consider an indulgence and wouldn't go to on their own - can be a fine gift. The recipient "gets" the experience of shopping without guilt/thriftiness, and they pick something they like within the bounds of the gift. E.g. you could give somebody a certificate to a small Etsy seller and they can pick jewelry that matches their outfits, or to a fancy truffle shop and they will avoid buying flavors they don't particularly like. Coupon for glassblowing or cooking class? Cool gift. But it's got to demonstrate thought, a Target gift card sucks and multi-store gift cards like the picture are just money with extra steps

This isn't as dynamic as jamming, but you could also learn a DAW and record into it. Synth drums are surprisingly fun and you can assemble rhythm + lead + vocals in separate takes. Definitely recommend finding some local people to play with, it's the only thing forcing me to get better

Actually that brings up one thing, how close to the original is good enough? Obviously there's no right answer but it's hard to draw the line because there are so many little techniques that give these songs their character and texture but if I had to learn all of them at once, I'd never play anything.

i'll tell you a surprising amount of punk/rock songs are literally just power chords and some effects, and you can play them "correctly" with little effort. Justin Guitar (free) has a transcribing section where you go listen to a Blink-182 song and discover it's literally three power chords or whatever. Of course it's frustrating to be confined to a different genre, I like a lot of guitar-forward things that I can't play at all. Personally I am satisfied with riffs 99% correct and chords mostly correct - fingering often doesn't matter outside of like shoegaze. E.g. Rush's Fly By Night has a very easy intro riff, seems like an easy target except for the solo.

However I've been having more fun playing with friends at a similar skill level. If we're writing our own music, then I can write an "easy" riff that doesn't move around the neck, simple rhythm parts, etc., and they are how the song is meant to be played rather than mutilating somebody else's song that actually depends on the complicated stuff.

second vote for justin guitar, it's nice

I don't think you should feel bad for giving to people begging. I budget some money for this purpose. But giving money to poor people will not end poverty; ending capitalism will. The bulk of your available time and effort is probably better used fighting for structural solutions. So I don't think there's a moral obligation to like, seek out individual homeless people to give money to or something like that, but you are probably obligated to work towards eviction protections and public housing and stuff.

America is hands down the shittiest place on earth to live

correction it is the stupidest place on earth to live

endless and expensive wilderness therapy programs for troubled teens in Utah

oh jeez.

also please note that My Old School is actually about Bard College, where both Chambers and Steely Dan went to school. That's a "neat, alma mater mentioned" kind of remark not a "music is secretly talking about me" kind of remark. Weiss L

Under a planned economy, how exactly can this work, though? An overseeing body will care about an overarching goal, and therefore things that are not useful to achieve that goal will be pushed back or completely discarded.

Already wrong. Try this: when you see "planned economy", replace it with "democratically planned economy". Right now the economy is planned: business interests use the US government to choose interest rates, sustain the war companies, make huge warehouses of cheese to ensure that the market can't knock out cheese farmers, yadda yadda. Government sets the broad shape of the economy and private enterprise (vaguely mediated by consumer demand) fills in the details.

Instead, socialist states have democratic governments - actually representing the people - that picks these high-level criteria. You have several options for feedback mechanisms to fill in the details. One option is keeping a market. Often feedback is mediated by administrators with twin obligations: to the central/broad priorities and to their constituency. If people are not getting any luxuries, there's a method for them to replace the administrator. If nationals check in and the administrator spent all the labor budget on fumos, they also get fired.

But yes, there is going to be some stuff that's unavailable. Some stuff is also unavailable under capitalism. For instance, an extremely rare disease that has like 2 patients won't get a research lab under capitalism since those two patients can't pay a bajillion dollars each. Consumer goods too. I want a French fry press with removable (i.e. sharpenable) blades in a triangle pattern, as a push-down apple corer type hand tool. Nobody sells these. I could make it in my free time if I got some machine shop time, and try to start a business if I made a prototype and it was good. A socialist state will also require some pathways for innovation that happens outside state research labs; good ideas are not always planned.

TL;DR it's not about what people "need", it's about what they want. Axiomatically, in a worker's state the workers decide; there is no third party who claims to know better than they do.