John Swinney pauses new funding for arms firms supplying Israel
John Swinney pauses new funding for arms firms supplying Israel
The first minister said the government could not ignore evidence that Israel was committing genocide.Glenn Campbell (BBC News)
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That price includes a whole bunch of stuff besides the actual tank. To quote the Czech Ministry of Defence (machine-translated):
The purchase price of 44 tanks includes self-propelled and anti-mine protection systems, as well as integrated logistics support including spare parts, support management, documentation and training.
So basically it's 44 tanks plus a massive service and supply contract to keep the tanks running properly
Hot mic catches Xi and Putin discussing organ transplants and immortality
Hot mic catches Xi and Putin discussing organ transplants and immortality
The Chinese and Russian leaders have been in power for 13 and 25 years respectively, with neither expressing any intention of stepping down.Emily Atkinson (BBC News)
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should get a brain transplant asap
Maybe Trump already did
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My guess is that billionaires will go for self-cloning until immortality exists
It's for this reason one of my dream is to take a shit on Mao's grave.
This poeple needs to be remembered in the right way.
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"In the past, it used to be rare for someone to be older than 70 and these days they say that at 70 one's still a child," Xi's translator could be heard saying in Russian. An inaudible passage from Putin follows.
It's the BBC printing a translation of a rumor of a partial conversation from two world leaders their parent government hates. Might be worth taking this with a grain of salt.
Nothing western press loves more than doing Ralph Wiggim tier headlines any time a National Enemy gets near a podium.
I agree, but they got the translation wrong. This is interesting because this is not uncommon due to the dialectical differences between Russian and Mandarin.
When you listen to the actual audio clip, you will understand that it is said "one becomes child again". It's a sly dig at aging brains that doesn't translate well when done literally. The nineteen eighty nine authoritarian response and slaughter of thousands of innocent civilians in response to the tiananmen square protests and xi being a winnie the pooh knob head is hilarious you authcino bootlicker if you don't understand the cultural idiom component.
Immortality has been the dream of autocrats for millennia. As soon as we see centralized oppressive regimes, we see leaders obsessed with immortality and their afterlife.
Death is the final equality and we'll always see the most bloated parasitic elites trying to skirt their responsibility to die like it was their fair share of the tax burden.
It's wild that after so many thousands of years of rulers chasing the mystical arts and obscure kookery to gain immortality, we're actually living in the age where we have an understanding of biology and physical processes on a deep enough level that we can actually conceive of real immortality as a possibility.
Which proves to me that these oligarchs and dictators are complete idiots. Because if they had several brain cells to rub together, they would be converting all that stolen wealth into science and research on moonshot scales to unlock biological immortality or anti-aging tech close to it. Sure they would still horde the tech as long as possible, but the point is they are like everyone else... incapable of investing in their own future over maintaining social status in the here and now.
elites trying to skirt their responsibility to die like it was their fair share of the tax burden.
Nicely phrased! A++ would read again.
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Fifa says 2026 World Cup tickets will start at $60 but dynamic pricing looms
Fifa says 2026 World Cup tickets will start at $60 but dynamic pricing looms
The World Cup organizer has set a price floor of $60 per match, though that will likely change as variable pricing takes hold early.Alexander Abnos (The Guardian)
States fast-track wind, solar permits and contracts to beat Trump’s deadline
States fast-track wind, solar permits and contracts to beat Trump’s deadline
Federal tax credits have brought project costs down 30 to 50 percent, advocates say.Alex Brown, Stateline (Grist)
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Jamaicans head to polls for election as ruling party faces corruption concerns
Jamaicans head to polls for election as ruling party faces corruption concerns
Polls point to ‘very close election’ between the Jamaica Labour party and the opposition People’s National partyNatricia Duncan (The Guardian)
Sudanese rape victims speak from Chad’s refugee camps
cross-posted from: ibbit.at/post/43978
From Al Jazeera – Breaking News, World News and Video from Al Jazeera via this RSS feed
Sudanese rape victims speak from Chad’s refugee camps
Hundreds of thousands of women and girls have fled Sudan’s war, only to be faced with violence again in Chad.Caitlin Kelly (Al Jazeera)
In a war in Mexico between cartel factions, influencers become targets
In a war in Mexico between cartel factions, influencers become targets
Targeting of influencers reflects their alleged role in money laundering – and their place in cartel propagandaThomas Graham (The Guardian)
Jeremy Corbyn: Labour Is Paving the Way for Fascism
The Labour Party could have made the case for a humane immigration system that treats refugees with dignity. Instead it has fanned the flames of racism and emboldened the far right.
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History repeats itself.
We'll get another entry for "Social democracy the left wing of fascism" in another decade or two.
I wish Corbyn and the like-minded success in preventing fascism and further neoliberal regression.
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jewishvoiceforlabour.org.uk/ar…
How very sad it is that Corbyn was ousted as leader for making the case for Palestinian rights too early. Now look at what the current ruling Labour party is doing.
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This is a very weird framing of what I understand was a refusal to join a meeting in Jan 2018, which was organised by SNP and had no government presence. He never went in the room at all, so the "flounced out in a huff" appears to be complete fiction.
I personally don't think that one meeting, containing small parties that were not in power, had any meaningful effect on the proposed deal with the EU, which was still being discussed up until 2020.
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I don't think letting asylum seekers work would make a blind bit of difference. The right just don't want them here at all. They want them to stop coming, not let them continue coming but then working. The right will just complain that they're taking people's jobs.
I'd be curious what approach Corbyn's policy would be on this.
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I don't think letting asylum seekers work would make a blind bit of difference.
It would because if they can work and become productive members of society, the real issues fueling rightwing bigotry would be lessened. Of course the already bigoted will want them gone, but the right relies on issues like crime and the budget to spread.
The right will just complain that they're taking people's jobs.
True, which is why a comprehensive leftwing program is necessary to facilitate job creation and provide safety nets for those who fall through the cracks.
As long as they keep seeing x number of immigrants arriving each day, they'll keep voting far right. They just want them to stop, I think they've been clear on that. They want a party who says what they want to hear (I doubt Reform would be able to do anything about it).
I think the reason why asylum seekers aren't allowed to work is because the stay is supposed to be strictly temporary. They're supposed to return home when things are safe. Letting them work would probably make it less likely they're going to return home if they start settling. I can't see that being a popular policy as they'll see it making the UK more inviting (either way it's the wrong move as they'll just complain they're on benefits).
Fuck the right wing.
That's what the policy should be. Throw their Nazi asses in jail.
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Putin and Xi brainstorm living to 150 with modern organ transplants
Putin and Xi brainstorm living to 150 with modern organ transplants
Russia’s leader caught on hot mic musing about “immortality” with Chinese ruler.Elena Giordano (POLITICO)
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nbcnews.com/news/world/china-f…
theconversation.com/killing-pr…
China forcefully harvests organs from detainees, tribunal concludes
China's harvesting of detainees' organs serves a booming transplant trade that is worth some $1 billion a year, according to an international tribunal.Saphora Smith (NBC News)
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Yup. The elderly generally do not do well with:
1. Major surgery
2. Immunosuppression
And they're asking for repeated episodes of 1 and possibly 75 years of 2. I'd be all for letting them slowly kill themselves this way if it weren't for the fact that every organ they use is an organ that could've been given to someone who actually needs it.
Your phrasing of "allowing" implies that these guys are in power through some sort of legitimate electoral process. They're both dictators, who claimed power through force and intimidation. There's no "let" about it, nor any "say" in the situation from people at large.
Just because dictators demand to be called by western elected official terminology in translations to english media, doesn't make them same animal. It's propaganda meant to normalize their rule.
Right, by that reasoning the people of Gaza are willingly allowing themselves to be genocided. They should just rise up and declare a democracy in the region.
Oh, wait, the real world doesn't work like that.
To me it seems naive to think that the disparity between the people of Gaza, and the people of Israel, is not dissimilar to the wealth inequality of the poor, and the rich. People seem to gloss over how modern western democracies generally got going -- through violent revolutions with lots of dead rich people. And those movements were often seeded by essentially the middle class military, who the rich had paid to outfit with the intent that they'd carry out the upper class's orders. People like Cromwell didn't exactly wake up one day, and just happen to trip across a bunch of Cannons to point at the British royalty. Until there'd been that blunder from the nobility giving the military too much autonomy, coupled with the advent of Canons, the ability for regular peasants to rise up against the nobility and their goon squads was pretty fuckin limited. For such a revolutionary figure to emerge from a poor, downtrodden and financially bereft area such as Gaza, would just be highly improbable.
Like China hired gangs of thugs with bats to beat the shit out of Democratic advocates during the crack down in Hong Kong, and has taken out bounties on people living abroad who advocate too vocally for human rights in the region. You can't realistically look at what went on there, in my view, and say that the people didn't try really hard to maintain their civil liberties -- but were beaten down quite explicitly by force and the sheer scale of resources available to the CCP. Yes, if there was some mass uprising all across the country they could spontaneously change their systems of governance -- but that's practically unheard of in real world countries of note in modern times. Taking a more realistic view of the situation doesn't make it any better, in that things will most likely continue to suck for most people, but it at least sets more reasonable expectations.
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leaders of two of the world's most technologically prominent countries muse on the prospects of transhumanism in front of a crowd of dozensrabid disapproval from liberals who claim that Putin and Xi got caught on a hot mic wanting to live forever so they can rule eternally or something, idk
Seriously, the reading comprehension is abysmal in this thread. Can someone show me where Putin or Xi said they personally wished to live to 150?
two of the world’s most technologically prominent countriesRussia
LMFAO. lemmy.ml users just can't stop glazing autocracies, can they?
Not even remotely related to the part I quoted and laughed at, but I'll humour you.
It's called deduction, you just need to use that gray matter of yours. Two, rather old, psychopaths muse about extending one's lifetime. Could it be that they themselves have a vested interest in this? No, that must be a conspiracy theory by filthy liberals.
Not even remotely related to the part I quoted and laughed at, but I'll humour you
So how does a claim regarding Russia's technological capabilities relate to my original comment? The only person being humoured here is you.
The way the healthy skepticism just leaves the liberal mind once a state department hit pieces comes out is laughable. You have been effortlessly oriented. Yall just eat this shit up. "Deduction"... lmao.
Again, maybe one day show me where Putin or Xi expressed interest in extending their lifespan. You won't.
So how does a claim regarding Russia's technological capabilities relate to my original comment?
Your original comment literally calls Russia one of the world's "most technologically prominent" country, stop trying to gaslight me.
leaders of two of the world’s most technologically prominent countriesPutin and Xi
Dog.....
My original claim was that in none of these articles is there any evidence of Putin or Xi expressing interesting in extending their lifespan.
It's a claim you still have yet to disprove, btw.
Claiming that Russia is not technologically advanced is a nonsequiter. Refusing to engage with a nonsequiter is not underhanded. And you're not humouring anyone by backing down from your attempt to turn this conversation into one about Russia's technological capabilities. You're just backpedaling.
Again, please show me where Putin or Xi expressed interest in extending their lives.
Old farts should sit in care homes, not ruling nations. Term limits and the same age cutoff as the regular blue collar worker and then go paint bad pictures on your ranch like W Bush.
I didn't think I'd ever get a very opinion of the latter, but here we go.
It's just that there should be a term limit for everyone. 5 to 10 years top then you're out.
"Earlier, people rarely lived to 70, but these days at 70 you are still a child," Xi told Putin according to the translator in Russian.
Hard to argue with that. Both of these cunts seem to lack any emotional intelligence whatsoever.
Why does no journalist ever ask why government officials want Israel to be our ally. Just because they were for x number of years has no bearing on whether or not they should have been or should still be our ally. Russia was our ally, guess what, they’re not anymore. We don’t have to ally ourselves with murderous countries.
The whole interview centers on Israel must be our ally so we must do stuff for them. They shouldn’t fucking be our ally!!! They’ve been committing atrocities for generations at this point!
Isreal is an ally because it's a FOB for the US to use against the middle east.
That, and modern Evangelical Christianity hinges on the Jews controlling the holy land as a precursor to the apocalypse. And Evangelical Christians vote Republican.
He got super close to asking that, and Lew’s answer was completely infuriating, as was every response he gave. But you’re right, I wish they would ask it outright.
Q: In the essay, you write a lot about the shared values of America and Israel. But today you have talked about pushing them to deliver aid, and you’ve talked about the fact that once Trump came into office and that push wasn’t there, the humanitarian situation got worse. Why was there a need to push so hard? Why do they need to be pushed to not ethnically cleanse Gaza? Why do they need to be pushed to have their military act in an honorable way? If they are our shared ally and our great friend, why aren’t they doing these things on their own?A: The environment in October and November of 2023 was how do you sustain an enemy that just slaughtered twelve hundred of your citizens? You had to create a way for the aid to get in without it having the effect of making your enemy succeed. It is pretty unusual.
Wow, what pieces of shit. I had often wondered if it was just pride and sunk cost fallacy, but they’re pieces of shit
Maybe I’m naive but I bought into it at first. Israel did suffer a horrible terrorist attack, their citizens were kidnapped, and terrorists were hiding among Palestinians, so a military response could be expected. But there’s got to be a point where they recognize the harm to innocent civilians, where enough is enough and they’ve long past it for most people. Yet still trying to justify it?
[JS] GPUGate Malware: Malicious GitHub Desktop Implants Use Hardware-Specific Decryption, Abuse Google Ads to Target Western Europe
::: spoiler Key Takeaways
- Trusted‑source Illusion: Even when a link seems to point to a reputable platform such as GitHub, the underlying URL can be manipulated to resolve to a counterfeit site.
- Ad‑driven Redirection: Paid search and display ads can be weaponized by bad actors to distribute malicious payloads at scale, misleading users who rely on search engines for discovery.
- Privilege Escalation: Once the malicious payload is executed by the user, it gains administrative rights, enabling further lateral movement and persistence.
- Malware Uniqueness:
- The initial installer is a 128 MB MSI file that mimics the legitimate GitHub Desktop installer but contains over 100 dummy executables to inflate size and evade sandbox limits.
- The installer employs a GPU‑gated decryption routine: an OpenCL™ kernel derives the AES key only on machines with a real GPU, whose device name is at least ten characters long, causing the payload to remain encrypted in headless analysis environments. (A headless environment is where the front-end or user interface of an application (the “head”) has been decoupled from the back-end services, allowing each to be developed and operated separately.)
- The GPU-based decryption mechanism suggests the attackers are targeting systems with specific hardware configurations, potentially focusing on users involved in development, gaming, or cryptocurrency mining activities.
- Campaign Goals: We believe the goal of this campaign was to gain initial access to organizations for the purposes of malicious activity such as credential theft, infostealing and ransomware deployment, by misleading IT workers (who often have higher level of network access) into downloading malware while attempting to install GitHub Desktop.
- Geography and Industries Targeted: The campaign we observed targeted users in Western Europe, in the Information Technology industry.
- Attribution: The threat actors behind this campaign have native Russian language proficiency, as demonstrated by PowerShell script comments written in Russian.
:::a threat actor leveraged GitHub’s repository structure together with paid placements on Google Ads to funnel users toward a malicious download hosted on a lookalike domain. By embedding a commit‑specific link in the advertisement, the attackers made the download appear to originate from an official source, effectively sidestepping typical user scrutiny
The delivered malware is unique: the bloated 128 MB Microsoft Software Installer (MSI) evades most existing security sandboxes, while a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU)-gated decryption routine keeps the payload encrypted on systems without a real GPU. We have called this new attack technique “GPUGate”.
GPUGate Malware: Malicious GitHub Desktop Implants Use Hardware-Specific Decryption, Abuse Google Ads to Target Western Europe - Arctic Wolf
Arctic Wolf has uncovered a sophisticated delivery chain: a threat actor abused GitHub’s repository structure and Google Ads to redirect users to a malicious download, while a GPU-gated decryption routine keeps the payload encrypted on systems withou…Arctic Wolf Threat Research (Arctic Wolf Networks)
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Xi and Putin overheard talking about organ transplants and immortality
In short:
A live-stream broadcast of China's military parade has captured Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin discussing biotechnology's potential to extend life.
An interpreter translating Mr Putin can be heard saying in Mandarin that human organ transplants could let "us live younger and younger, and perhaps even achieve immortality".
Mr Xi responded that it may be possible for people to live to 150 years this century.
ABC News
ABC News provides the latest news and headlines in Australia and around the world.Iris Zhao (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
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Uncovering Evil: Illegal Organ Harvesting in China and the 2025 “Stop Forced Organ Harvesting Act” - McCain Institute
This blog is part of a summer blog series written by the McCain Institute’s Summer Junior Fellows. Jillian Proshan is a junior fellow for the Human Rights & Freedom program. Let’s begin with a math problem.Staci McDermott (McCain Institute)
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This ^
Having a PhD does not automatically mean you know what you’re talking about outside your field lol.
smart people are wrong sometimes
issac newton thought he could synthesize a philosophers stone
Intelligence isn't required of these people and I doubt anyone in that room could explain telomere shortening and aging at a molecular level.
You cant do a brain transplant from a clone and be the same person even. Just megalomaniacs who care nothing for anyone but themselves.
We need to forcefully redistribute all excess wealth and power.
These delusional sycophants are going to be the death of our species.
Apart from the fact that your brain ages too and it's 100% irreplaceable, the main issue with turning yourself into the human Ship of Theseus is that you're going to be on immunosuppressant drugs forever.
I guess if you were a monster you could raise clones of yourself to adulthood and then murder them for their body parts. This doesn't solve the problem of some parts not being reasonably replaceable, but it could protect you from some organ failures.
There are current studies about growing entire organs in a lab environment using 3D printed scaffolding and stem cells harvested from the patient, so the final product is 100% compatible and eliminates the need for immunosuppressants.
Still a few decades out for human testing imo but they'd be the first in line.
If we figure that out, artificial blood (which is already making good progress) and finally a way to regenerate brain cells without causing massive brain tumors we can extend life considerably, probably closer to 200 years on extreme cases.
Or, at least, making it to 110 while still having a good quality of life, basically making 100 the new 60.
Lol, lmfao
They can't even give us a relatively nontoxic living environment and adaptive and responsive nutrition plans
Not to mention there has NEVER been a patient who has had MULTIPLE 3D printed organ transplants, let alone continuous transplants PRN (the suture sites are going to be dissolving scar tissue). And that 3D printed organs are extremely complicated especially depending on which one is being built, with their own cellular memory including circadian rhythm and local homeostasis.
Not to mention that merely transplanting an organ does not mean the patient will have adequate neurochemicals or enzymes or receptors to carry out the processes needed to support these organs, regardless of supplementation
Like certain conditions, at end of life, oppose each other especially in treatment. Eg congestive heart failure, pulmonary edema, and kidney failure all interfere and interact with each other. Assuming you could successfully perform a lung, heart, and kidney transplant in a geriatric patient, whose to say their veings, connective tissue, ureters, etc won't prolapse or blow out from all the pressure and new stressers?
This shit isn't as easy as they want to claim (maybe they want to taunt Trump with immortality), but if they want to be the guinea pigs for it, let them ig - that's the most ethical thing they could do with this, is experiment on themselves and take the consequences.
Well, you suggested to let them do it. I'm suggesting that they will not hesitate to commit massive human rights violating, nonconsensual nazi experiments, so no we shouldn't allow them.
The fact that it absolutely won't work is secondary.
I'm not granting permission, I'm saying if we follow their logic and methods to its natural conclusions, they will die, eg giving a proof.
They cannot use other human organs, this is already a roadblock for them. If they could, they already would be doing so (see blood transfusions). I was talking about 3D printed organs, not organs from others.
You brought up organs from others. I then explained it is even MORE of an issue to attempt to transplant (hence why we developed other means). Your refusal to understand that does not mean you are correct that they will do this. You're in fact wrong.
However, perhaps they want to eat these organs instead of transplant them, I'm not saying they won't go after human bodies for various reasons, and obviously all genocide should be stopped.
But they aren't going to do multiple organ transplants from other human to human donors in our lifetimes, if ever. If you understood transplants, you'd understand why that just isn't a thing and won't be a thing.
It's as stupid as head transplants and Neuralink.
I think if ALL, literally ALL of your other organs were functioning great, then it is unlikely your brain will deterioriate by itself randomly. Your body is constantly repairing itself, that's why we are able to live so long.
But like, are they REALLY going to transplant things like the thymus? Can they even do that? Adrenal glands, parathyroid glands, thyroid, kidneys, livers, pancreas - idk man, I do not see these people getting all these organs replaced. That is an INSANE bodily experiment that has never truly been tested, let alone with lab grown organs (as Xi or Putin suggested), let alone in elderly and delicate subjects. We can't even pull off natural looking facelifts in most subjects.
Adding in organs with different ages and donors also means they also may have increased loads on their remaining old aged organs too. Everything works together and donor organs can have a different circadian rhythm, let alone different genes which means different reactions to stimuli. Not to mention currently the most likely situation for organ transplant would be gene editing animal organs - again, experimental and never done on multiple organs.
hms.harvard.edu/news/first-gen…
Like managing multiple organ rejections in a 90yr old seeking immortality sounds like a joke of a case for any health care provider.
But please, someone convince both those men to get multiple organs transplanted ASAP
In a First, Genetically Edited Pig Kidney Is Transplanted Into Human
Procedure marks milestone in quest to provide more organs to patients in needhms.harvard.edu
Apart from the fact that your brain ages too and it’s 100% irreplaceable
Braincells are irreplaceable (barring some experimental stem cell work) but the networks between those brain cells keep growing and intertwining. It's the network between the cells that defines your mental aptitude. Plenty of stories about people with severe brain damage who still continue to function comparatively normally after a period of recovery and rehabilitation. The human brain is remarkably plastic.
I guess if you were a monster you could raise clones of yourself to adulthood and then murder them for their body parts.
Even that isn't strictly practical. The failure rate on cloning is enormous. What's legit more monstrous than killing someone for organs is producing all of the failed clones necessary to land on a copy that's viable.
Dolly the Sheep was a "successful" clone, and even it didn't live a particularly long or happy life, being euthanized at half the normal age of a domesticated sheep of her breed due to arthritis and lung disease.
No doubt someone is out there doing human cloning illegally. But I would not bank on it as a viable alternative to simply getting bumped up the organ donor list the old fashioned way.
I don’t see why they can’t live 150 years with that.
The reason is typically measured in caliber.
Israel harvested organs in ’90s without consent
Israel admits that in the 1990s, its forensic pathologists harvested organs from dead bodies, including Palestinians, without permission of their families.NBC News
Real liberty can exist only where exploitation has been abolished, where there is no oppression of some by others, where there is no unemployment and poverty, where a man is not haunted by the fear of being tomorrow deprived of work, of home and of bread. Only in such a society is real, and not paper, personal and every other liberty possible.
Real liberty can exist only where exploitation has been abolished, where there is no oppression of some by others, where there is no unemployment and poverty, where a man is not haunted by the fear of being tomorrow deprived of work, of home and of bread. Only in such a society is real, and not paper, personal and every other liberty possible.
Literally no where is like this
In Eastern Europe, Russia, China, Mongolia, North Korea, and Cuba, revolutionary communism created a life for the mass of people that was far better than the wretched existence they had endured under feudal lords, military bosses, foreign colonizers, and Western capitalists. The end result was a dramatic improvement in living conditions for hundreds of millions of people on a scale never before or since witnessed in history.
~ Michael Parenti, Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism
people in China, Russia, north Korea etc still suffer
The sharpest spike in human misery in both Russia and N Korea followed after the Yeltsin coup of the Soviet Parliament in 1993.
This precipitated a wave of de-industrialization, mass displacement, and famine spanning the USSR. It paved the road to multiple civil wars, invasions, and genocides, not the least of which we're seeing the modern day.
Westerners will tell you that these countries were liberated with the collapse of the USSR. They'll also insist the residents of these countries are subhuman and deserve to die.
Yeltsin Shelled Russian Parliament 25 Years Ago, U.S. Praised “Superb Handling”
Washington, D.C., October 4, 2018 – Twenty-five years ago last night in Moscow, Russian President Boris Yeltsin ordered tanks and airborne troops to shell and storm the “White House,” the Russian Parliament (Supreme Soviet) building, to suppress the …nsarchive.gwu.edu
Westerners will tell you that these countries were liberated with the collapse of the USSR. They'll also insist the residents of these countries are subhuman and deserve to die.
Maybe some, but certainly not most, but to say that there was no one ruling over them before yeltsin is silly, fucking Stalin was a monster, krushchev wasn't great. Mao was a horrible dictator.
to say that there was no one ruling over them before yeltsin is silly
The Soviets self-governed for the length of the Cold War. A radical departure from Nazi occupation of the 30s/40s or the debt peonage of the interwar period.
fucking Stalin was a monster. Mao was a horrible dictator
Confederates said the same thing about William T. Sherman and Abraham Lincoln.
The Soviets self-governed for the length of the Cold War
Except for the leaders of the party? How do you define self governing?
Confederates said the same thing about William T. Sherman and Abraham Lincoln.
Sure there were some monsters in the Union army, but they were fighting slavers, so I don't really care for their opinion. Nor should you
Except for the leaders of the party?
You mean the survivors of the Holocaust and resistance movement heroes that liberated their nations from brutal occupation?
Sure there were some monsters in the Union army
Okay buddy. Glad to know where you stand
You mean the survivors of the Holocaust and resistance movement heroes that liberated their nations from brutal occupation
Your original premise was that there was freedom without being ruled over, I was saying that was bullshit.
Okay buddy. Glad to know where you stand
Anti slavery? Yeah happy to be anti slavery haha. I'm glad to know where you stand
I was going to say there was no actual evidence, but huh, I actually fell for some of the tankie lies after enough time. China's deputy health minister Huang Jiefu repeatedly publicly acknowledged that most organ transplants came from death row inmates, and separately China was exporting organs to south korea on a massive scale prior to 2007.
(though it's notable that this has not been connected to the Uyghur situation specifically)
(Also noting that it's Israel claimed to end the practice in 2000, while China claimed to end the practice in 2015)
sources pre-emptively posted: the guardian, (old) beijing times, zhenhua.163.com, der spiegel
China Prepares for Olympics: Drop in Executions Leads to Organ Shortage
With the Olympics in Beijing just 500 days away, China has begun cleaning up organ trafficking practices. Not only have exports been banned, but with fewer prisoner executions, a major source of organs has dried up.DER SPIEGEL
And if you solve enpugh to get to 150, you should live a lot longer.
Really depends on how you solve it. Announcing "we can keep you in a vegetative state for an extra 50 years" isn't a strong sign that the technology is there yet. Besides, there's a lot more to living than just heartbeat and baseline brain activity.
I honestly believe people could live to 150 within the next century
It's a fun and easy thing to believe. Significantly harder to accomplish.
I don’t expect those advances to be soon enough to help either of these guys
They've already benefited substantively from the last 70 years of health technology. And I wouldn't be surprised of Xi, in particular, is enjoying some knock-on effects of being the head of state in a nation that's on the cutting edge of medical research.
But there's a huge difference between "living to 100" and "being a functional adult at age 100". Xi's already pushing the line in his 70s and should have been queuing up a successor two terms ago. Putin's in it even worse, having trotted out Medeved and watched him flop in front of Parliament back in... what? 2008? Now he's got the tiger by the tail as he coasts into his own golden years.
The fact that the US is floundering amidst its own techno-fascist gerentocracy should be a giant alarm bell for every other national government. You can't just stack the fate of your country on whether Chucks Grassley and Schumer can maintain a pulse indefinitely. But I guess when its your turn in the big chair, its easy to think you'll live forever.
Life expectancy at 25 hasn’t changed dramatically in the last 2000 years
Heavily dependent on where and when you lived. In Tibet, for instance, life expectancy topped out at around 35 years in 1950 and is now cresting 75 in 2025. In the Palestinian Territories, the last ten years have seen life expectancy actually grew from 67 years to 76 years between 1992 and 2022. Then, in 2023, it fell off a cliff for some reason.
A nasty famine, a brutal war, or a global pandemic can clip the lives of senior citizens short very quickly.
But otherwise, sure. Solving the problems of agriculture and sanitation modernization have been comparatively easy relative to addressing telomere erosion or alzhemier's treatments. Simply not killing people is a lot easier than keeping them alive indefinitely.
Although, one might also argue that the problems of aging haven't been felt so acutely prior to the 1950s, because comparatively fewer people were living into their senior years. Now that we have a bumper crop of senior citizens, we've been given a strong economic incentive to pursue technologies at an industrial scale. It's not just The Qin Emperor downing cups of mercury, thinking his exceptional wealth and privilege will grant him an extract century of youthfulness.
The life expectancy at 25 in Roman times was about 70 years old.
Maybe for a Senator or other member of the patrician class.
But even in the last century, we've seen more movement than what you're describing.
in the early 20th century (around 1900-1902), a 25-year-old could expect to live approximately 39 to 40 more years, reaching around age 64-65. By 2017, a 25-year-old could expect to live about 55 more years, reaching roughly age 80.
So, closer to 20%
of our advances have added about 10% to a person’s life span after they got past childhood diseases, the recklessness of youth, and serving in the military in the case of Romans.
The vast majority of these advanced have occurred in the last 70 years. The intervening 2500 has been relatively flat.
And I’m not entirely sure of the relevance of a genocide in Israel to Xi’s prospects.
Mostly just a comparison of wealth and technology.
Decennial Life Tables for the White Population of the United States, 1790–1900 - PMC
This article constructs new life tables for the white population of the United States in each decade between 1790 and 1900. Drawing from several recent studies, it suggests best estimates of life expectancy at age 20 for each decade.pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
A lot of people see the idea of age limits (or term limits) as a backdoor way of getting "their guy" off the ballot. Because so much of the modern political scene is just charismatic demagoguery, anything that threatens the position of your personal political Messiah is an attack on your ideological faith.
Better to elect some decrypt mummy leaking shit out of his adult diaper than risk some rival sect of the party taking office.
Pretty sure that's part of the plot of Time Enough to Love
Also, hope you enjoy your diets of microplastics and really fucked up climate
There's a fictional movie about it.
Honestly kind of idyllic. The premise of living in a childish Utopia until you've "won the lottery" seems far more generous on its face than the slaughterhouse conditions most domesticated animals endure.
Okay, just because you think can live that long physically doesn't mean you'll be there mentally. You can do all these transplants to keep your body going, but I don't think we've figured out how to replace the brain without killing someone since I doubt healthy living and organ transplants are gonna keep the brain healthy enough to be mentally fit to do much of anything.
Also, I personally wouldn't want people like them to be living that long.
I think this is Xi and Putin deliberately fucking with Trump.
Think about it: he's circling the drain, they know it, and he's desperate for anything to save him.
interestingengineering.com/sci…
World-first: Paralyzed patients walk with China's brain-spinal chip
Paralyzed patients in China regained mobility within 24 hours of groundbreaking brain-spinal implant surgery.Sujita Sinha (Interesting Engineering)
Xi Jinping says world faces ‘peace or war’, as Putin and Kim join him for military parade
Xi Jinping said the world was facing a choice between peace or war as he held China’s largest-ever military parade, joined by Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un in a show of defiance to the west.Putin and Kim, the authoritarian leaders of Russia and North Korea, were among dozens of world leaders who attended the parade, a massive display of military hardware and personnel, orchestrated to mark the 80th anniversary of the end of the second world war, which China calls the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression.
“Today, humanity is again faced with the choice of peace or war, dialogue or confrontation, win-win or zero-sum,” Xi told the crowd of more than 50,000 spectators, adding that the Chinese people “firmly stand on the right side of history”.
Xi Jinping says world faces ‘peace or war’, as Putin and Kim join him for military parade
Trump criticises victory day event as China caps off week of diplomatic grandstanding seen as rebuke to the westHelen Davidson (The Guardian)
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NoneOfUrBusiness e hornface like this.
When an authoritarian offers "peace" they mean "everyone lets me do what I want"...
That's not peace, it's waging war on their own citizens and usually a couple neighboring countries.
Nothing is more peace than:
- a military parade showing of weapons capable of ending the world
- having a guy who has started and still cotinues the biggest war of 21st century
- having another guy who runs the most brutal and isolated country in the world who's also contributing to the said war
It's just blatantly giving
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength
Don't know why you were downvoted
FYI : all comments have been downvoted. Twice to be exact. Thats not a coincidence.
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They are whiny babies who don't even trust each other. They want their way with everything and not getting it is a crime to them.
There is true evil in this universe.
Those that do not value the life of other intelligent beings as though they were themselves are in this category.
Thailand ruling party moves to dissolve parliament
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NoneOfUrBusiness e essell like this.
Thai politicians doing Thai politics.
I'm certain it would be entertaining if I only know what the hell was going on. I've been a long time observer but I just don't get it.
Donald taking notes
Or he would, if he could read or write
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Pedro Sánchez: Europe’s response to war in Gaza has been a failure
Pedro Sánchez: Europe’s response to war in Gaza has been a failure
Spanish prime minister says double standards over Gaza and Ukraine threaten to undermine the west’s global standingSam Jones (The Guardian)
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This is just hand wringing.
Until you actually recognise this as genocide and then implement your responsibilities under international law then you are still complicit.
Foreign policy is not part of the EU and is the sovereign responsibility of each country so you do not have to be in sync or follow others in this.
Argentina couple under house arrest amid search for painting stolen by Nazis
Argentina couple under house arrest amid search for painting stolen by Nazis
Daughter of former Nazi official and her husband to be questioned after raid on home failed to find masterpieceGuardian staff reporter (The Guardian)
US kills 11 people in strike against alleged drug boat from Venezuela
US kills 11 people in strike against alleged drug boat from Venezuela
President Trump confirmed the operation, accusing the ship of carrying drugs and of having ties to the Tren de Aragua criminal organizationMacarena Vidal Liy (Ediciones EL PAÍS S.L.)
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What will Venezuela now do? It feel much like Middle East
Terrorist v drug
Israeli drones drop grenades near UN peacekeepers in Lebanon in what UNIFIL calls a serious attack
The peacekeeping force known as UNIFIL described the Tuesday morning incident as “one of the most serious attacks on UNIFIL personnel and assets” since the cessation of hostilities in November that ended the 14-month Israel-Hezbollah war.
UNIFIL said Israeli drones dropped four grenades close to the peacekeepers, who were working to clear roadblocks that hindered access to a U.N. position along the border line. One grenade hit within 20 meters (yards) and three others within approximately 100 meters of U.N. personnel and vehicles, it said, adding the drones were observed returning toward Israel. No one was hurt in the attack.
UNIFIL said the Israeli military had been informed in advance of the peacekeeping force’s road clearance work in the area, southeast of the village of Marwahin less than a kilometer (mile) from the border line.
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Death penalty for Indian man who burnt alive wife over skin colour
Udaipur: Death penalty for Indian man who burnt alive wife over skin colour
The judge said the murder fell in the category of "rarest of the rare" and was "a crime against humanity".Geeta Pandey (BBC News)
I live life by recognising three things we all share in common...
- We had no say in being born
- We had no say in what vessel we'd get to live in
- We had no say in the conditions we'd be born into
Anyone that can't acknowledge this has long since been able to acknowledge themselves. They are so lost that they will never find happiness.
I' don't condone torture, but in this case, my protest would probably accidentally arrive too late.
Tolerance towards intolerance feeds intolerance.
Paradox of tolerance:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_…
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Dunno - that seems like it could be made to last a lot longer than incineration, unless you saved him from the fire but made him live with the burns. Of course your suggestion has its own possibilities like pouring salt or alcohol into the fresh open wounds.
Anyway, that's enough for me. Can't believe I even just said that stuff because I'm not normally an eye-for-an-eye person - this crime just disgusted me that much.
Goodnight.
only the stupid among us would think they are superior because their skin makes less vitamin D so they have to take supplements if they want to live north or they can only be outside for 10 minutes each day if they want to live south…or get a sunburn and get called redneck for that.
Is this referring to white skin or darker skin? i get your message im just confused by the example.
On the night she died, Kishandas had brought a plastic bottle with a brown liquid - he said it was a medicine to make her skin fairer.According to the statements, he applied the liquid to her body and when she complained that it smelled like acid, he set her on fire with an incense stick. When her body started burning, he poured the rest of the liquid on her and ran away.
Kishandas's parents and sister took her to hospital where she later died.
Right? I am pale as snow and man I envy people who can just throw on shorts and walk outside without concern because I am an absolute reflective hazard. I could blind someone!
Grass is always greener, I guess...
Two reasons:
- Internalised oppression. Because of European colonisation, white skin has been equated to beauty and higher status in former colonies.
- However, even before European colonisation, fairer skin has always been seen as a status symbol. Fairer skin means someone wealthy enough not to work outside being exposed to the sun.
It is not one or the other explanation by the way, these two coalesced. But in some countries that were never colonised by Europeans, the answer for obsession with lighter skin is number 2.
Edit: I should also mention, Europeans used to be obsessed with light skin for the precise reason as number 2. European nobility powdered themselves white. The obsession with getting tanned only came much more recently, because getting tanned implies one can afford holidays and thus a sign of status symbol, at least in Europe.
Trump accuses Xi of conspiring against US with Putin and Kim
Trump accuses Xi of conspiring against US with Putin and Kim
Donald Trump's comments came as China held a massive military parade attended by the Russian and North Korean leaders.Emily Atkinson (BBC News)
Child Rapist attempts yet another distraction.
I'm not an unreasonable person. In lieu of the Epstein Files, I'm willing to accept your obituary.
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Or maybe he is just pretending, because how could anyone no matter how stupid have expected otherwise from the policies of Trump? You'd have to be a MAGA republican to be that stupid!
Oh wait...
How surprising, countries working together against a country that is clearly trying to undermine them!
Even fucking Europe and Canada are working closer together with China now, because Trump forced them to.
Trump is a traitor and a Russian asset, he is just pretending to be upset by the results of the policies he was instructed to by Russia!
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Chat are the allied countries of Russia and China conspiring?
Dude's about to find out how he got elected.
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blech. literally every expert said we shouldn't do this and the rightoids did it anyway because they're obsessed with culture.
edit:
some of my favourite nonsense includes
- a documentary from the 70s about the mods subculture
- the criminal code
- a waterfall
- a speech about the welfare state
- the post of national ombudsman of justice
- a house where a painter used to live
- a jet fighter
this is insane. and when interviewed by aftonbladet, the cultural policy spokesperson for the sweden democrats said, quote
Det är en bekräftelse för den öppna nationalism som jag och sverigedemokraterna står för
lit. "this is an affirmation of the open nationalism that me and my party stand for"
the fucking what
SD party has nazi roots, so you can have a better perspective.
And now they're the second parti in Sweden 😱
Man, I hope you won't believe anybody in the world cares about any single letter or sound you emit, cause it would be pretty sad for your life.
If you think my post it's out of focus, just go ahead, it's called being an adult.
"It must be 50+ years old so no ABBA!"
In 1974, ABBA won the Eurovision Song Contest for Sweden with their song "Waterloo".
crickets
Indonesia embassy official’s shooting in Lima probably a ‘contract killing’, says Peru government
Indonesia embassy official’s shooting in Lima probably a ‘contract killing’, says Peru government
Interior minister says ‘they were waiting for’ official who was shot at point-blank range outside his home in killing that has shocked PeruDan Collyns (The Guardian)
Indonesia, Peru strike trade agreement as leaders meet
They agreed to boost cooperation in fields including defense, narcotics, food security, energy, fisheries and mining, without providing details.The Jakarta Post
Belgium To Recognize Palestine, Impose Sanctions On Israel
Belgium will join France in recognizing a Palestinian state at the upcoming UN General Assembly session in New York this month, the country’s foreign minister announced on 2 September.
Belgium to recognize Palestinian state at UN General Assembly
Belgium's foreign minister said Tuesday the country would recognize a Palestinian State in response to the human cost of Israel's offensives in Gaza.Le Monde with AFP (Le Monde)
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If they fall i'd say that is good.
Zionism is a political, legal, moral, economical and social liability. If they won't stop supporting it, because that is the legal and moral thing to do, then they need to suffer consequences that make them stop supporting Zionism.
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Belgian here. Their wording is confusing and I’ve been trying to figure out how much of it is meaningful.
They tacked on a precondition to them recognizing Palestine: Hamas must give up power. I don’t see that condition being met faster than Israel can flatten what remains of Gaza and force its population out – which in turn only creates more suffering and anger for the militant recruit pipeline.
The sanctions mostly concern boycotts on products produced in occupied regions. Fuck that – boycott all trade with Israel.
Our rightwing prime minister is on record saying that the whole debate was annoyingly motivated by ‘morality’ and that he’s glad the government (an uneasy coalition) can move on to more important matters. Downright shameful.
Come protest this Sunday in Brussels. Last one was attended by 100k demonstrators. Was a fun afternoon. More info at 11.be
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Whitout doubting what you say, from this last tweet it looks like the narrative (at least in this instance) has shifted? In the sense that this text seems pretty clear to me.
No matter what, I hope the protest goes incredibly well!!
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Wikipedia is resilient because it is boring
How Wikipedia survives while the rest of the internet breaks
How the world’s largest encyclopedia became the factual foundation of the web, but now it’s under attack from the right wing, tech billionaires, and AI.Josh Dzieza (The Verge)
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reshared this
Technology reshared this.
:::
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Great article, would highly recommend anyone with the time give it a full read through.
Wikipedia is incredibly valuable, and insanely well edited and put together, and we're all lucky to have something like it available for free.
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They have what?
Here we go! Dang, they even got pins!
Wikimedia project lapel pins
These lapel pins represent each of the 17 Wikimedia projects with the additional W pin, from Wikipedia to Wikispecies. Do you have a specific project you love? Want them all? Individual pins: $3.00 18-pack: $45.Wikipedia Store
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Citation Needed sticker
Transparent [citation needed] sticker. Useful for decoration, or perhaps for adorning your local questionable advertising or political campaign messaging.Molly White
store.wikimedia.org/products/i…
Internet-in-a-Box
While our store is sold out, you can order directly from our partners at Wiki Project Med Foundation via this link Please note: Shipping to the USA is currently paused, with plans to resume again soon.Wikipedia Store
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Thanks for encouraging to read the whole thing. That is a loooong article! But a great informative read. Took me a couple of sittings to read it all properly, well worth it!
I had no idea about so many of the challenges they’ve gone through & seemingly managed to fight back so many attempts to control & mask the content on more volatile subjects. Always had a lot of respect for the editors, but even more so now.
I do donate a small amount to them once or twice a year. I think I will try to increase my donations going forward knowing it might help with some of their legal fights.
Knowledge really is power, & we all deserve access to true knowledge, more now than ever it seems.
Better front-end:
Wikiless
A free open source alternative Wikipedia front-end focused on privacy.
1. No JavaScript or ads.
2. All requests go through the backend, client never talks to Wikipedia.
3. Prevents Wikipedia getting your IP address.
4. Self-hostable. Anyone can setup a private or public instance.^[[1] https://github.com/RealFascinated/wikiless]
GitHub - RealFascinated/wikiless: A free open source alternative Wikipedia front-end focused on privacy.
A free open source alternative Wikipedia front-end focused on privacy. - RealFascinated/wikilessGitHub
1: You can easily disable JavaScript and still browse Wikipedia without any issue. This also removes all banners, which I assume is what I mean by "ads", which on Wikipedia only appear from time to time and advertise WMF events and donations.
2 and 3: Your IP address is deleted after 3 months, and there's nothing people can do to you just for reading Wikipedia either. Just visiting Wikipedia's servers carries no risk. The exception is if you edit courts could get your personal information when the WMF loses a case, but you can't edit using an open proxy like Wikiless either (because if they allowed you to edit, it would be also be easy for banned editors to edit).
I hate to say it, but I don't think Wikipedia is as neutral or as open as it claims to be. Some of the article comments talk about there definitely being some bias against anonymous editors, even if they're correct.
I'm not sure if it was in that article or in another comment section, but someone said after Elon Musk did the Nazi salute at Trump's event, an anonymous user mentioned it and there was a big controversy. And a registered user took it down and berated them for it, and another registered user came along an added the salute info back in and it was fine. Or something like that.
I definitely still think Wikipedia is a net good. But it seems to me any time you have a centralised source of information, a small group of people will fight to control the narrative so they can spin it any which way they want. For example, on Reddit, my favorite band's unofficial subreddit is run by a guy who bans any fan cams of the events — unless they're his. So obviously he does fan cams so he can make ad money on YouTube, but he uses Reddit to block those of others to direct the traffic to his. I think Fandom (the shitty wiki site with all the ads) run a lot of gaming communities, again, to drive ad revenue. Lot of that shit going on. I mean, if they tried that on Lemmy, someone could just open a community on another instance and the users could then decide who they want to support.
Is Wikipedia susceptible to that kind of influence? Of course it is. And I worry about it being taken over by the wrong people. I don't think that has happened yet, but I've seen it happen on other sites.
To be clear, we should definitely support Wikipedia against the alt right, but we should also be cautious that they, and other bad actors, don't destroy its credibility from within. Yes, the alt right has their own Wikipedia (Conservapedia or something like that) but that's not good enough, they want ours to be theirs, too.
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Wikipedia has mountains of useful information, but it is limited and censored when it comes to "controversial" and dissident information, due to it being the status quo and the establishment.
It is known the three-letter agencies have a lot of power controlling and censoring information in media and social media; this includes Wikipedia.
We should always question and be highly critical of these types of organizations and groups, similar to anything politicians and the military spew out.
Thanks for your informative comment; it seems many don't know or care to question status quo sources and establishment organizations.
Whistleblowers and independent journalists have spoken about this for many years.
Kinda, sorta, not really.
So on Reddit, the people who run the iPhone subs have iPhone 17, iPhone 18, iPhone 19, and so on registered and they're squatting on them until they become useful. Or Fallout 3, Fallout 4, Fallout 5, Fallout 6... Now what some people have done is add a word. Like you have the "Cyberpunk" sub and "Low Sodium Cyberpunk." That works. Or like you have Atheism, and you have RealAtheism. So you can put a word on it, or something like that. But you'll never be able to be the "original" because a small group of people control those.
Now with Lemmy, those same people will just make those communities on the biggest Lemmy instance, but they won't do it on all of them. I use Divisions by Zero, which leans a little further left than some of the others, it's more of a fringe instance I guess? They're probably not gonna target that. So if someone made a community and tried to divert views to their videos for profit like I said in my example, I could make a community with the exact same name on this instance. The other community probably wouldn't let me advertise it there. I could do it once and get banned and maybe get a couple people to join both, at least, but I could promote it on neutral ground, and people could decide who they want to support. Because of federation, even if you aren't on db0, you can still subscribe to a community hosted on it. Like this community is on lemmy.world and I'm subscribed to it and freely commenting on it (at least until/if lemmy.world decides to defederate the instance I'm on — they have that right and ability. But I could make an account on their instance or one that is federated with them. And that's kosher as far as I know, as long as I myself am following the rules of the instances I post on.
Aatube likes this.
I’m not sure if it was in that article or in another comment section, but someone saida small group of people will fight to control the narrative so they can spin it any which way they want.
Your source for your broad categorization and claims seems incredibly weak. "Someone said, somewhere, I'm not sure where I read it, though."
Wikipedia tracks anonymous contributions, too. You could check the Article and Article Discussion pages histories before making these claims, and before concluding from one comment that Wikipedia has the same systematic issues like Reddit or other closed-group moderated platforms.
As far as I see it, Wikipedia has a different depth and transparency on guidelines, requirements, open discussion, and actions. It has a lot of additional safeguards compared to something like Reddit. Admins are elected, not "first-come".
What I find much more plausible than "they didn't want to accept an anonymous contribution" is that the anonymous contributor may not have adequately sourced their claims and contributions. Even if they did, I find it much more likely that it may have been removed, then a discussion was done in the page discussion, and then it was added back.
Of course, instead of theorizing what happened in that case I could have checked Wikipedia too. But I also want to make a point about my general and systematic expectation of how Wikipedia works, which other platforms do not have.
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Good science is boring, good politics is boring, good espionage is boring, good journalism is boring, good history is boring, good banking is boring, good business is boring. Entertainment serves us this pop view of the world...
But wikipedia is more valuable than all the LLM slop machines combined.
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I would love some of those less exciting times.
May you live in exciting times
Is the worst curse
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Aatube likes this.
This is so true. These systems that provide the foundation to our daily existence should be all boing, because they should be always working well and never surprise us.
Then everybody would get the chance and energy to pursue excitement in their life’s meaningful parts: having interesting conversations with friends, passionate relationships with their partner, or finding excitement anywhere from horror movies to skydiving.
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I’m not Russian at all and I want to separate because all I get from the federal union is taxation without representation. I’m tired of subsidizing failed religious extremists. It’s abundantly clear that there is no rule of law at the federal level, and I would sooner die than bend the knee to a king.
Edit: and our homegrown Russian asset Jill Stein has never once mentioned balkanization. I just don’t believe your accusation, it doesn’t seem to be based in reality.
As a Russian, honestly these are all sorts of shit with no practical difference for us.
Except for Alaska, some people think it shouldn't have been sold. And 0.7 mln total population is (far) less than Crimea.
That aside, a confederacy (I guess some other word would be better) of the old US and some more autonomous things, like, for example, California, would possibly be a stabilizer.
There's been a number of news coverages of this. It's not like it's the biggest operation or anything but they have been trying to plant that seed intentionally.
sacbee.com/news/local/article2…
archive.thinkprogress.org/russ…
latimes.com/world/europe/la-fg…
Moscow welcomes the (would-be) sovereign nations of California and Texas
Russia hosts a 'Dialogue of Nations,' inviting separatists from Ukraine, Italy, Lebanon, Northern Ireland--and California and Texas.Mansur Mirovalev (Los Angeles Times)
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May I ask what your native language is? It’s plainly obvious that it’s not English of American dialect.
(I don’t mean this question in an adversarial way, I’m trying to understand the point you’re trying to make.)
i'm the OP lol
i get reply notifs and i happened to just finish replying to someone else
and at least on mbin there's a bell icon and i think that can customize notifications for anyone?
edit: anyone meaning yourself the one logged in of course
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Lol. I just have a writing style that I use. It can be considered eclectic with a mix of various influences. The pluralized word is a buffy "whedonesque" influence.
But the point is that Russia has been running alternative warfare efforts and cyber stuff for a long time. They stoke various movements and invent ideas and spread them with bots and shills. Basically anything that strengthens Russian imperialism and weakens or fractures NATO.
“One of the things I really love about Wikipedia is it forces you to have measured, emotionless conversations with people you disagree with in the name of trying to construct the accurate narrative,”
Yeah, I think what makes Wikipedia resilient is that you can’t just go there and say something subjective. You need to find the correct way to state the actual fact, even when it can have different interpretations. Cause that way, no group can contest it.
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It's not internal bullshits, it's whether there's enough neutral-schoursches-to-schoursche-its. That's all Notability's about.
It has a really bad name though, that guideline. I was a part of the editors who wanted to change it to "suitability" but there's the resiliency.
Oh no, I once had an article I contributed removed for exactly that, notability. Not sourcing or lack thereof. That was also the last time I ever contributed, obviously.
It didn't help that a couple years later somebody else decided it was notable after all and created the article.
Notability is sourcing: Articles generally require significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the topic. They even made a catchy name for it: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedi… (well they borrowed it but you catch my drift). Even if every single claim is Verifiable, it will be deleted if there aren't enough secondary (independent of the topic) sources because it's dangerous and likely non-neutral to only hear the subject's view of themselves. Confusing Notability with something else is a pretty common pitfall for new article creators, so there's things like "Articles for creation" where you can submit article drafts for review and have conversations with the reviewer on what exactly is wrong with your article, as well as many other guides and forums like Help:Your first article, WP:Teahouse, and WP:Help desk.
It didn't help that a couple years later somebody else decided it was notable after all and created the article.
The essay en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedi… is often cited to say "This might get the needed sourcing in a few years, but right no we can't tell, so it's better to create the article again when it has what's needed to align with our content guidelines rather than rush to make a misleading one right now." So either that's exactly what your situation was, or . I'd love to take a look at the article you're talking about.
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Ooh, creating that article's a lifetime achievement!
Looking at the deletion discussion, I see why you would think everyone only looked at the fame, but none of the article's citations such as "Leeroy/Mortal Kombat Techno Remix" could've shown that it was actually a meme beyond someone's personal character. One editor mentioned hardly finding any Leeroy Jenkins results from Google back then, let alone reliable sources. I have to admit there were definitely some !votes that didn't look for sourcing, though It doesn't help that the article did look like something some random guy created for their OC:
Comically offsetting his ham-handed actions, which led directly to the disgraceful slaughter of his entire group, Leeroy is shown with exhibiting machismo [...]
Anyways, just five months later a year-old editor with just over 200 edits made a draft with plenty of good sourcing and took it to WP:DeletionReview, and everyone agreed it was notable enoug.
Apps such as kiwix.org/ uses the data dumps regularly made available by the Wikimedia Foundation at dumps.wikimedia.org/.
The entire Wikipedia might be large, especially with images, but e.g English Wikipedia without images is a couple of 10s of GB.
Explore Offline Wikipedia and Educational Content with Kiwix- Kiwix
Your gateway to offline Wikipedia and a vast array of educational content. Access knowledge anytime, anywhere without an internet connection.Kiwix
As of 7 September 2025, there are 7,052,247 articles in the English Wikipedia containing over 4.9 billion words (giving a mean of about 706 words per article). The total number of pages is 63,983,130. Articles make up 11.02 percent of all pages on Wikipedia. As of 16 October 2024, the size of the current version including all articles compressed is about 24.05 GB without media. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedi…The following graphic illustrates how large the English Wikipedia might be if the articles (without images and other multimedia content) were to be printed and bound in book form with a format similar to Encyclopædia Britannica. Each volume is assumed to be 25 cm (9.8 in) tall, 5 cm (2.0 in) thick, and containing 1,600,000 words or 8,000,000 characters. The size of this illustration is based upon the live article count manually adjusted by the average word count on an irregular basis on a user subpage of the graphic's creator Tompw. The growth rate is approximately one full volume every three days if the increase in average article size isn't accounted for over time. The print volumes as shown in the illustration would take up just over 9.34 m3 (330 cu ft) in total volume.
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downloading it is fine but i think the contents of wikipedia are so thoroughly archived that i doubt it is in danger of becoming "lost media".
my fear isn't that the information would be destroyed, but that the ongoing project of keeping the knowledge up to date would stop, or be split across some underground efforts with varying quality standards.
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::: spoiler spoiler
Um, just in case, maybe spoiler that? It's not like that first case was difficult to figure out, but still.
:::
Edit: Fucking oops.
Boring is subjective.
For me, Wikipedia is a joyful wealth of knowledge & collective factual editing in one of the most responsible executions expected of such a format.
If we're being subjective; knowledge is hella fun, yo.
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Yes, US funded groups are involved in Indonesia unrest
cross-posted from: lemmy.ml/post/35603443
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Vatican puts Pope Francis' ecological preaching into practice with vocational farm center
CASTEL GANDOLFO, Italy (AP) — The Vatican is inaugurating an ambitious educational center inspired by Pope Francis’ ecological legacy, a 55-acre utopian experiment in sustainable farming, vocational training and environmental schooling for kids and CEOs alike on the grounds of the papal estate on Lake Albano.
Pope Leo XIV, who has strongly reaffirmed Francis’ focus on the need to care for God’s creation, will formally open the center Friday, returning to the grounds where he spent his first papal summer. He’ll tour the lush gardens, vineyards and farm of Castel Gandolfo and celebrate a liturgy for the staff who have been working since 2022 to turn Francis’ ecological preaching into practice.
Officials on Tuesday gave a sneak peek tour of the project’s heart: A huge greenhouse in the same curved, embracing shape as the colonnade of St. Peter’s Square that faces a 10-room educational facility and dining hall. Once it’s up and running, visiting groups can come for an afternoon school trip to learn about organic farming, or a weekslong course on regenerative agriculture.
The project was inspired by Francis’ 2015 encyclical “Laudato Si” (Praised Be), which cast care for the planet as an urgent and existential moral concern that was inherently tied to questions of human dignity and justice, especially for the poor.
In the 10 years since, a grassroots movement has taken root in the church to implement its holistic message via workshops, conferences and now most tangibly, the educational center named for the encyclical, Borgo Laudato Si.
The center aims to accomplish many of the goals of the environmental cause. Solar panels will provide all the power the facility needs, plastics will be banned and recycling and composting systems will be used to reach zero-waste. Officials say water will be conserved and maximized via “smart irrigation” systems that use Artificial Intelligence to determine plants needs, along with rainwater harvesting and the installation of wastewater treatment and reuse systems.
https://apnews.com/article/vatican-environment-pope-francis-2496c463d6a6f13b5b18d172e7d7ccd2
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Hmm... makes me think the best thing the Catholic Church could do is tell their followers to plant one tree each Sunday, every Sunday, as part of their worship. Heck, put out a papal missive to make it officially a required part of Catholic religious devotion for each member over the age of, say, 12, to remain in 'good grace' if that's what it takes (like regular confession).
We'd hit that 7 billion-tree goal or whatever it was very quickly!
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(Not really, that's just the percentage of Earth's land area this project spans. Given that they use AI, it's hard to tell if they are really helping.)
Google Avoids Harshest Penalties in Landmark Search Monopoly Ruling
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China's Xi says the world faces 'peace or war' as Trump claims Beijing conspiring against U.S.
China's Xi says the world faces 'peace or war' as Trump claims Beijing conspiring against U.S.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korea's Kim Jong Un are among the leaders from more than 20 countries attending the "Victory Day" military parade in Beijing.Evelyn Cheng (CNBC)
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Xi, Putin, and Kim gather at Beijing landmark for a grand military parade
They're telling the world that democracy will always devolve into fascism and Nazism.
I'm honestly not sure they're wrong about that.
Ukraine Pursues a Weapons Buildup More Potent Than Any Security Guarantee
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i don't doubt it, but an extremely short-sighted, risky, not to mention EVIL approach.
the only acceptable outcome for our society is for Russia to lose. anything else and the West is fucking done.
I can’t blame them for wanting it, but let’s not go there.
Reducing the number of countries with nukes was and still is a good idea. Everyone seems to think that MAD was a reasonable strategy because we muddled through without ending civilization. It is not. It is not foregone. It is not likely. It is way too big a risk for all of civilization.
Peace through being a hard target is a strategy that has been proven effective throughout history.
It'd be nice if international law and fickle allies would help, but those have never been that reliable.
Developing countries swap out of dollar debt to cut borrowing costs
Sovereign borrowers are turning to lower interest rates in currencies such as the Chinese renminbi and Swiss francA switch to renminbi borrowing — which comes as the Chinese currency hits its highest level against the dollar this year
Kenya and Sri Lanka are seeking to convert high-profile dollar loans into the currency.
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Brazil: Supreme Court mulls verdict over Bolsonaro coup plot
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Israel Massacres Gaza Children Fetching Water, Starves 13 More Palestinians to Death
Israel Massacres Gaza Children Fetching Water, Starves 13 More Palestinians to Death
"A child in Gaza shouldn't have to die for a sip of water," said one Palestinian American critic. "Families are starving, fleeing under bombs, with nowhere safe to go. Humanity is failing them."brett-wilkins (Common Dreams)
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Justice Barrett, other conservatives talk marriage equality
Justice Barrett, other conservatives talk marriage equality
Is Barrett really disinclined to overturn Obergefell? And what are others on the right saying?Trudy Ring (Advocate.com)
Temu hit with $2 million penalty involving reporting of stolen, counterfeit or unsafe items
Action is the first brought under the Act, which ensures consumers can report suspicious activity to online marketplaces and contact major third party sellers
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mrdown
in reply to mrdown • • •Why just a pause rather than cancelling any arm shipment to Israel committing a genocide?
So Israel will keep getting revenues from trading that will be used for the genocide
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