America’s crazy Ex-Girlfriend

Posted on by Sarah A. Hoyt

There is a trope that the right in America is Masculine, and the left is Feminine. This is not precisely true. There’s plenty of women on the right, and they’re the most feminine women where it counts: Married women with children.

But in general, it kind of is true. Or at least the argument of the right tend to appeal to a more “masculine” stereotype mindset, and the ones on the left, to a more “feminized” stereotype mind set. There’s more socializing, more mind games, and an approach to life that’s designed to make everyone “behave” the way they want you to. There’s also a lot of social signaling, and women, being hypergamic, tend to do that more.

Mind you, of course, a more feminized approach refers to the stereotype, and there are men and women on the same side. However on the whole, overtime, this image was true.

Was? Oh, yeah. Starting with the fall of the USSR and then definitely with Trump’s election, and the widespread rejection of the left’s long term projects, it’s more like…. our left is America’s crazy ex girlfriend.

She refuses to let you leave. I mean the way the elections are rigged? Not to mention the way they keep telling us we deeply care about climate change or whatever her obsession is. It’s like she’s telling you that you just can’t break up with her. And when you change the keys, she jimmies the locks to get back in.

She eats our food, tears up our stuff, runs up our phone bill talking trash about us to everyone else. She lets homeless men in to sleep on our furniture, poop on our carpet, kill our pets and set random fires.

Every time we try to get rid of her, she tells us we really love her, and if we say no we don’t, we’re breakup-conspirators and she threatens to get us locked up.

She steals from our wallet too, in ever increasing quantities. And keeps calling our boss and getting us fired.

The question is, how do we serve her an eviction notice?

200 thoughts on “America’s crazy Ex-Girlfriend”

  1. The crazy ex hates it when you ignore her. But really that’s the best. Obviously you have to stop her from grabbing your wallet and reading your texts but apart from that, ignore the bitch

    Liked by 1 person

    1. That’s rather hard when she’s walking around your house putting a wind farm on your roof and cutting off your power.

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    3. You have maybe not heard that saying,
      You can ignore reality,
      But you cant ignore the consequences of ignoring reality,

      Pretty much sooner or late this ones going to need to be dealt with.

      Liked by 1 person

      1. My ex isn’t here to defend herself so limiting my snark.

        Next time, I will just buy a house I can barely afford, furnish it, file the needful permit, and let the fire department burn it down. Would be easier and cheaper.

        (Additional snark deleted)

        Liked by 1 person

          1. Nope. Don’t know him.

            Heard something similar to mine from an Irish comic as I was in the midst of snarkworthy litigation. Something like ” …find a woman I hate and buy her a house…”

            Seed was being advised “should have burned it before the courts ate it”. (Legally indefensible, but really funny given the advisor)

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    1. Of coarse not. Election denial over President Trump’s election has been on for 7 years and counting, and still is not election denial. Hillary won, don’t you know. (jic Sarcasm)

      Liked by 1 person

  3. There is a trope that the right in America is Masculine, and the left is Feminine.

    I haven’t seen this trope but it’s nonsense. Real masculinity and real femininity are complementary. The left isn’t complementary to anything. It’s more of “toddlerity” (shut up autocorrupt, that’s totally a word). It’s the philosophy of a spoiled child, too young to understand consequences. It’s pure Id. It wants what it wants and to hell with reality.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Mind you, that’s how a lot of “modern women”, infected by the left behave but that has nothing to do with actual femininity, any more than the posturing of “machismo” has anything to do with real masculinity.

      Liked by 2 people

      1. It’s like the twisted version of “woman” that the high-profile MtoF transactivists flaunt. There’s a vague semblance of femininity, but not the real thing.

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          1. I don’t have to evacuate, thanks be, but I know people who had to flee.

            The fire runs most of the width of the Texas Panhandle along the Canadian River (Dumas to Oklahoma.). It’s thick enough in the house that my eyes have itched constantly since the wind shifted (from W to N), and my chest is a little tight – my dust allergies trip when there’s enough smoke gunk in the air.

            Liked by 1 person

              1. No, not great. The winds should calm down after midnight. The much colder air will also help reduce fire spread by increasing the relative humidity. [I’m not a fire expert, nor did I sleep at Holiday Inn Express™.]

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    2. I agree, though I’m familiar with the trope.

      It’s more that the failure state of either is similar to the toxic versions of either sex, in as much as it’s accurate at all… but then, genuinely toxic guys do underhanded nonsense, too.

      …

      Oh, oh, I think I got it!

      It’s a matter of which is appropriate.

      The Left is using private-relationship norms in a public-relationship context. Since women tend to be the ones that do upkeep on private relationships, that is recognizable. Like Sarah sometimes talks about, “being a gentleman” in public.

      There are some crazies who try to push using only public-relationship behavior in private, but they’re not given much power. Although the Progs come as close as anybody. >.>

      Liked by 1 person

    3. I would argue that the things leftism pairs well with are obvious. Deleterious to civilizational efforts, but they do seem to always mesh together quite well.

      Those things being corruption and all its cohorts, lies, thievery, violence, abuse, depravity, insanity (the real thing- not the common usage of the term, although that too), utopianism, schemes and con jobs, treason, and in general anti-civilizational efforts common to the bandity types.

      Just as wee seedlings left alone tend to grow into trees and shrubbery so does leftism naturally grow into Socialism, feudalism, and general criminality. The poison isn’t added later. It’s an essential part of the recipe.

      Liked by 1 person

      1. Those things being corruption and all its cohorts, lies, thievery, violence, abuse, depravity, insanity (the real thing- not the common usage of the term, although that too), utopianism, schemes and con jobs, treason, and in general anti-civilizational efforts common to the bandity types.

        I dispute that those things are paired with the left any more than I am “paired with” my spleen. They are part of it, built in as part of the structure.

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  4. Pb Pills if it comes to it, unfortunately. Well some places have bans on Pb so Cu works, some ways better. Keep your pill dispensers close and where you can find them in the dark.

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    2. I came here to say basically the same thing. The fastest way to kick the (female dog) to the curb is simply shoot it. Alas, that brings about other rather distasteful things. I really don’t want it leaking fluids all over my house and inviting even more vicious bugs into the house. Ignoring it may be best in the long run, but I’m getting tired of cleaning up the diarrhea and vomit it keeps trailing all over the carpet.

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        2. The amazing thing is that the situation has lasted so long, with a good portion of the population actively trying to break the systems that keep them alive.

          Our world is too interconnected and complex to function well under totalitarian rule. Pieces start to break, strains aren’t removed, replacement pieces aren’t available, technicians don’t know all the needs of each nut and bolt, let alone understand why they shouldn’t yank out that apparently useless pin.

          So they yank it, the whole mechanism settles by a millimeter, barely visible, putting strain on another pin that is someone else’s responsibility half a world away.

          Everyone involved can honestly say they’re just doing their jobs and it’s not their fault when a belt crumbles under strain it was never designed to handle and the whole system screeches to a halt.

          Doesn’t mean they won’t go hungry.

          Liked by 1 person

          1. “Our world is too interconnected and complex to function well under totalitarian rule. Pieces start to break, strains aren’t removed, replacement pieces aren’t available, technicians don’t know all the needs of each nut and bolt, let alone understand why they shouldn’t yank out that apparently useless pin.”

            I started making that point here and elsewhere a decade ago. Testing systems is what I do. Sooner or later there are no workarounds.

            Liked by 1 person

          2. There is a not-insignificant portion of the population that has no clue how hard it is to live. As evidenced by all the people who think that “medieval peasants had more free time than you do” meme is in any way accurate. (Heck, the person whose information was used for the meme has stated that it’s wildly inaccurate, and that he doesn’t know how he came up with that high number of “days off.”)

            Liked by 1 person

  5. I don’t have an answer to the question, but do know this: What CAN’T go on, WON’T go on. LIke a pending earthquake, the slippage is primed, and the results are devastating.

    Liked by 1 person

  6. Speaking of ex-wives, what if she has custody?

    “What does a neurotic mother have to do to keep her sons from “sliding right”?”

    “https://twitchy.com/brettt/2024/02/26/the-cut-can-we-keep-our-sons-from-turning-conservative-n2393333”

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    1. “There’s no mystery about why young women are becoming more progressive, but it’s harder to understand the factors behind the increasingly conservative young men. “

      That’s comedy gold right there.

      “What can we do to keep our favored targets close so we can beat them some more?”

      In other news, illegal immigration might just eclipse white folks by 2050 or something. It is things like this that lead my mind to forecasting “bloodbath.”

      On the other hand, America has traditionally been the land of miracles. Maybe there will only be a little bit of blood?

      Liked by 2 people

      1. Not sending money overseas, and refusing to pay to or for illegal aliens here would solve a lot of problems.

        If you took away federal funding from any place that gives money or shelter illegal aliens, the states would either swear off federal funding, or scramble to deport everyone so fast that their heads would spin.

        Liked by 2 people

        2. “If you took away federal funding from any place that gives money or shelter illegal aliens”

          You were off to a good start, but you didn’t stop in time. There shouldn’t BE any ‘federal funding’.
          ———————————
          Why do so many idiots believe that our problems will be solved by the same shitheads that caused them?

          Liked by 1 person

          1. This, the Federal government last year took 1/3 of my paycheck in various direct payroll taxes. My state took 5%. This doesn’t even consider consumption taxes (which various municipalities take around 8% for general purchases, and lets not get into fuel taxes).

            Anyway, isn’t it odd that the group with the widest tax base is taking the most taxes, and the states which provide far more road and services to their populations are having to live on far less? The problem is the Feds tax more and then send it back to the cash starved states with string attached. This behavior needs to go. (honestly, my preference would be funding the Federal government exclusively on balanced international (and only international) import and excise taxes. Free trade is great, and so I don’t want a high tax, but a small 3% – 5% tax would mean they would have zero business looking at the citizens personal lives, just what crosses the border.

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      2. The first plague of Egypt.

        19 The Lord said to Moses, “Tell Aaron, ‘Take your staff and stretch out your hand over the waters of Egypt—over the streams and canals, over the ponds and all the reservoirs—and they will turn to blood.’ Blood will be everywhere in Egypt, even in vessels[a] of wood and stone.”

        20 Moses and Aaron did just as the Lord had commanded. He raised his staff in the presence of Pharaoh and his officials and struck the water of the Nile, and all the water was changed into blood. 21 The fish in the Nile died, and the river smelled so bad that the Egyptians could not drink its water. Blood was everywhere in Egypt.

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    1. Yep, sometimes you have to let them walk out into the ocean and not go get them. Not my girlfriend, but …. Ugg …. Boys, don’t get involved with crazy.

      Liked by 2 people

      2. Best advice on women was delivered from a cherished NCO.

        “Don’t stick your dick in crazy.”

        Sadly didn’t remember it until much too late. (Grin)

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        1. I got exactly that advice from my Da and gave exactly that advice to my sons. It’s a father’s basic duty.

          Marriages break up for all sorts of reasons, not necessarily anyone’s fault; but crazy is crazy and crazy is forever.

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          1. There was also the observation “Fun to ride. Don’t be seen on it. Get off early.”

            Ah, my misspent youth…..

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    2. “And when you really tell her to get lost, she declares she’s going to kill herself.”

      To which the correct response for that sort of attempted blackmail is, “OK. So what’s the downside?”

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      1. Yep. I had some chick try to play that one on me way back in high school. She sent her friends to tell me I had to call her because she might kill herself otherwise. I told them if they were worried about her, maybe they should’ve stayed with her.

        Liked by 1 person

        1. Another possibility: Just smile and say, “Her body, her choice”. It fits so well into Duh Narrative… :twisted:

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      2. Hand her a sharpie and say, “Down the inside of your forearm, not across your wrists. Follow the dotted line.”

        …I think I’m still single is because some bullying tactics cause me to respond by hitting back even harder.

        Liked by 2 people

        1. I hear you and I tend to agree, but I’d hesitate to do something that could be interpreted as “assisting in suicide”. As stupid, venal and basically corrupt as many DA’s are today I’m sure one would think “Ooooh! Look! Another conviction for sure! Mr Soros will be so proud!”

          Liked by 2 people

          1. Yep. But don’t try to tell the blackmailers that. Fortunately for me, I’ve been married for almost 60 years and haven’t had to deal with that crap since high school.

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  9. Unfortunately killing her is the only way we are going to get away from this cray cray, before she kills us mind you, just look at history.

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    1. Looking at history is exactly the problem.

      There’s a long history of folks deciding the only way to Fix Things is to kill the other guy off.

      There’s an equally long history of the many ways that goes badly, starting with bad target selection.

      Liked by 2 people

      1. When the result of doing nothing is certain, and playing out in front of us…. I’m pretty sure the Founders didn’t feel like the quasi deities of wisdom we’ve made them into. Just read what they wrote.

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        1. Nobody in this situation is “doing nothing”. Most of politicians are actively working to make things worse, and some of the states are working to make things better.

          Where any of the states are actually doing something in the right direction, it is working.

          But, as they say, the enemy gets a vote too. So for every one working in the right direction there is also someone working to sabotage it.

          Yes, it’s easy to get impatient and want things to be over now. I, personally, am very impatient and would like at least the threat of death to be on the table.
          But the non “kill them all and let God sort them out” options haven’t finished being worked through.

          There are a lot of things one could do, mostly monetary, that would help, that haven’t even been tried yet.

          Liked by 2 people

          1. Yeah, I’ve posted three links TODAY that show flagrant disregard for the Constitution and the laws.

            From every police blotter in the country: “Despite a restraining order from the court…..”

            We chant that “gun control laws don’t work because criminals don’t obey them” and the parallel should be obvious.

            Liked by 1 person

        2. When the result of doing nothing is certain, and playing out in front of us….

          And if you assume your conclusion, the conclusion is always right!

          My trust in your judgement hit the road several years ago with the “execute those who I heard were accused of WrongThink” demand, and your abject failure of specific predictions (wow, I’m still alive. Somehow. In spite of your repeatedly predicting my murder by government agents.) doesn’t help.

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      2. And some times it works out fine. The Romans did a fine job in dealing with the Carthaginians, for example. Eventually.

        Marxism delenda est.

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        1. A fair number of distinguished Romans were also people of Carthaginian ancestry. For example, St. Augustine and his mom, St. Monnica.

          So “deal with” did not equal “kill them all,” even for the Romans.

          Liked by 1 person

        1. Dude, your starting assumption was that it would to horribly bad for the group you want to kill.

          Your solution being “hey it might hurt the other guys as well as us” is really not a great sale.

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    2. not if they’re as small a minority as I think they are. I think this is more the histrionic girlfriend, and will snap out of it at a drop of a hat.
      We walked back from the brink with Reagan. And they had more power then.

      Liked by 1 person

      1. I hope you are right, but I fear decades of additional leftward slide in our education system has indoctrinated far too many of younger than Gen X such that they believe far too much of the drivel. I realize many don’t believe as much as they used to, but it still shapes far too much thought. The default mindset is still too much of “there ought to be a law” and “of course the government should control x” and such.

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        2. Heck I’ve seen switches flip on my nieces. Funny how married, over 30, now with babies, they suddenly went, “Um. Wait a minute!” And, one of them works for Nike, another is a teacher whose husband works for a state government (engineer so he knows “feelings” does not trump physics). Whether or not they’ll break voting ranks or not, TBD.

          Liked by 1 person

          1. Unfortunately we are graduating “engineers” that are expected to believe that LeftValuez trump physical reality. After all, reality is just somebody’s constructed interpretation …

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      2. We pay attention to the bad/crazy because it Demands Attention !11!

        All the great stuff about the USA gets overlooked because decent function isn’t dramatic, thus stealthy.

        We live in a civilization of vast abundance, vast liberty, vast safety, and vast opportunity.

        Compared to most elsewhere, darn tootin it is. Thus the multitudes who come here.

        The folks who want it otherwise will go to extremes to focus on the glitches.

        The engine needs a tuneup, not a chop-saw.

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          1. LGB’s current term ends January 2025. If the voters give him another go, then he is out certain when the next term ends in January 2029.

            We survived worse peckerheads in office. We will survive the doorstop.

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            1. At what cost? That human-shaped sack of excrement and all the other bags of manure around him are doing a lot of damage to this country, and it’s hard to stay hopeful. But hopeful or not, all we can do is keep putting one foot in front of the other and do our best with what we’ve got, so…we’ll see.

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              1. There was more damage done before, just different kind: Clinton, or worse Woodrow Wilson, FDR, etc. BUT we couldn’t see it. Remember it’s a good thing we can see it now.

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  10. I just had a beautiful dream about a Thermidor reaction here in America that started, in all places, New Jersey. It started at a Trump Rally and spread like wildfire across the whole country and thensome and destroyed the woke, while leaving minimal damage and chaos to the average sane citizen. I pray to God this dream comes true.

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    1. I am old enough to remember when the USSR was an unstoppable juggernaut that would invade and destroy the West. And we were all so very surprised by the Velvet Revolution.

      Liked by 3 people

        1. Well, considering how much they cribbed from the Soviet playbook already I can’t say you’re wrong.

          I mean, why do they go to such effort to try to convince people that they and their ideas are ubiquitous when anyone with half a brain cell could tell they aren’t?

          Liked by 2 people

        2. But it took over seventy years to fall down. I don’t want to go through three more generations of this shot in America. I don’t want to raise my daughter in Soviet America.

          Liked by 1 person

          1. There isn’t an America out there to prop up the supposed Soviet America. So the model doesn’t function.

            Without everyone helping them bully the targets, and suppling them, Soviets can’t even retake the folks who finally escaped.

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          2. took over seventy years because we subsidized it, because we were afraid of what it would do otherwise.
            NO ONE CAN subsidize us. They can’t. We’re too big. And we’re the ones who feed the world. CHILL.

            Liked by 1 person

        3. I read “Red Storm Rising”by Tom Clancy in, I think, 1986. It was absolutely terrifying in the context of the times. (A few months after Chernobyl and before Reykjavik.)

          Liked by 1 person

          1. Reykjavik I?
            When the Soviets came expecting Reagan to hand them what they wanted so he told them their was then nothing to discuss, got and left. And it took them a while to realize he had and well truly in a very USAian “FU” to them? That was a GLORIOUS REVELATION for them!

            Liked by 1 person

      2. Argentina was irrevocably lost, never to rise again. Javier Milei has apparently turned them around in weeks.
        So Trump or someone else can do the same here. More to the point despite relentless negativity he did turn the US around in 4 years. Had he not been a germ a phobe or so slow to realize thst no one in government was on his side he would be serving now and the world would be very different.

        Liked by 1 person

  12. The only thing inevitable in Communism is its ultimate collapse. Anyone who has given it even the smallest amount of thought or exposure to history knows this. That is what is driving the left in this country insane, they know their ideology is failing, but they can’t admit it. So they lie or outright ignore the truth and it drives them even crazier. Now the whole country is walking on egg shells waiting for the other shoe to drop. Woe unto you who stupidly drops that shoe. Pass the pop corn I can hear that type of music starting.

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      2. It’s been a lousy day (O Lord, would you send me a healthy knee*?), and this is the second chuckle** I’ve had today.

        ((*)) Fell, bruised the hell out of my left buttock, and rolled to hit my right (carefully repaired) knee. Ouch! After a month, It’s. Not. Getting. Better. (Actually worse.) X-rays came out negative, though it did rule out arthritis. MRI to be scheduled. Whee.

        ((**)) A bit of bitter Schadenfreude. Reports from the Klamath River damn demolition came as an absolute surprise to TPTB, and not at all to those of us who said it was a horrible idea. Combine tribal whining, Warren Bugget (totally unintended, but I’m leaving it in) with his lack of desire to build fish ladders, and Cali/Fed Donk’s desire to screw the flyover farmers (will assistance from some R politicians who should have known better, but obviously didn’t care–GWB gets that dishonor) and it was going to be a done deal. So, we get to pay for the dam removal and enjoy the benefits of less and more expensive power. Thanks, assholes. Word is that the river is currently dead for salmon, and the mud where the reservoirs used to be has claimed several deer.

        Yesterday’s medical appointment and obligatory market trip was interesting, for values of ouch. I’m praying.

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    2. Our friendly local Ox had a relevant post this morning . . . money quote within the post:
      ““If you converted a million dollars into bolivars in 2013 — when Nicolás Maduro first came to power — and left it in an interest-accruing Venezuelan bank for the past decade, your current balance would be about 3 cents.” — The London Times”

      Liked by 1 person

    3. Sure they’re human. They’re just the embodiment of bad humans!

      There is a particular flavor of evil that is uniquely (until aliens- and proof, much proof) human. The dark side of the virtues are the sins we all know. Envy, gluttony, pride, lust, wrath, sloth… Recall how “for the children” became so common. It calls to the good and right love that mankind (nigh all men and women, all cultures) in general has for their progeny.

      They prey upon the better instincts we all have, and seek to corrupt them however they can. And it works. All too often, in folks too naïve, innocent, or foolish to recognize that yes, evil really DOES exist.

      The instinct to take what one can, no matter how, has been with us at least as long as we’ve had thumbs, I suspect. The dark desires of man were with us when we were living in caves, and remain today.

      The rest of the world knows these moral failures and suffers under them as well. Just as humanity can aspire to greatness, it can also resemble a crab bucket of competing villainy.

      Well, all that and the leftys like to consider folk like me and mine subhuman. You know, the way they want to put us in camps, re-eductate, and sometimes slaughter us in job lots.

      Liked by 1 person

  15. In the first Laundry Files novel, Charles Stross showed Bob Howard getting over his crazy ex-girlfriend Mhari. But one of the more recent novels had Mhari as the protagonist and was told largely in her voice. Oh, and in the meantime she became a vampire . . .

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    2. Well, the last time she tried to seduce him (the same novel in which she turned into a vampire), the… thing… that’s currently living in Bob’s head looked at her out of Bob’s eyes, and basically projected the thought, “Lunch!”

      That was a while back, and I don’t know if she’s made any other moves on him. But it does tend to restrain the crazy…

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    3. Stross has stated during and after writing The Rhesus Chart that he viewed Bob’s perspective on Mhari as “his perspective,” despite the fact that other people in the house noticed that she was…not exactly the most stable of roommates. Unreliable narrator and all that, Bob being the classic ’90s clueless nerd with poor socialization skills, etc, etc, etc…

      And when I read her stand-alone book, her denials of how much she “hates” being a vampire ring so very, very hollow…

      (The Mo book, The Annihilation Score was just a massive whine fest, about how Mo has regretted all of her decisions and now that she’s in middle age the regrets are coming fast and hard, and that she all-but-cheated on Bob, who had been tempted multiple times but never gave in as close as she got, etc, etc, etc…

      (The “superhero” patche and him trying to map it onto Lovecraftian horror didn’t work very well, either. Felt far too forced and mean-spirted.)

      There’s a reason why I consider The Delirium Brief to be the logical end of the series, mostly because past that is when the Laundry sold-out to one of the Elder Gods and they’re now the Quislings running England for the Black Pharaoh. They essentially did an “only if they enjoyed it” with their rapist.

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      1. I enjoyed The Nightmare Stacks, with its innovative take on elves (somewhat like Pratchett’s, actually, but Stross gave us a biological rationale, which Pratchett didn’t bother with); the scene at the end where First of Spies and Liars applies for asylum was brilliant. But The Delirium Brief suggests that Stross was lastingly embittered by Brexit, even though he had predicted the force behind Brexit several years before in his discussion of the “beige dictatorship.”
        I agree about The Annihilation Score; Stross really wasn’t the right author to do a parody of superheroes, and what happened between Bob and Mo in that volume was just ugly, to the point where I don’t want to reread it.
        The other thing I’d note about Stross is that his stories set in the United States just don’t convince me, and particularly because of his take on American religion.

        Liked by 1 person

        1. I think that the mixture of BREXIT and Trump broke Stross, who was having several other major issues in his life at the time (if I remember the order right-Dad having very bad dementia and dying, Mom getting sick very quickly and dying every quicker, being unable to figure out how to write the sequel to the Eschaton and Halting State novels, BREXIT, Trump, COVID, etc, etc, etc..) and the Martian Brain Fungus just really, really started to take hold.
          It doesn’t help that he has the current “educated” upper-European opinion on the United States and its politics (i.e. we’re the biggest threat in the world and the sooner we become a proper parliamentary democracy with socialist aspects that doesn’t listen to the wrong kind of people, the better).
          The only reason why I re-read The Annihilation Score is for the few good bits of story that are fun (the mad-scientist-as-an-organization, for example).

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          1. It always amazes me how UK people suffer from the NHS not providing enough, or in the right places, or at the right times. And they talk about it. And then you point out what they just said, and they start French kissing the NHS.

            And they know FOR SURE that America is worse, even though their American friends usually live through X or Y, that kills their friends and families in the UK.

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            1. The “sacrifice yourselves to save our beloved NHS” ad campaigns in the UK during covid made me sick to my stomach. There’s something very wrong with a place that doesn’t see something very wrong with that. (Maybe many of them did; for the sake of my sanity, I wasn’t following it that closely.)

              Liked by 1 person

      2. Ironically, the last book I read was Nightmare Stacks, which was the one right before Delirium Brief (it’s the one with the elf invasion). Nightmare Stacks felt like Stross was switching protagonists, and the lead in Nightmare Stacks would be taking over as the viewpoint character for the series. But it looks like that’s not what happened.

        Reading the plot summary on Amazon for Delirium Brief (paraphrase – “The Laundry decides that it needs to overthrow the new duly elected government that it’s a part of for the government’s own good”) sounds both very disturbing, and eerily familiar…

        I enjoyed the Laundry books when they focused on poking fun at bureaucracy and the like, when the worst enemies were within the department itself. The novels in which Stross aims at other targets were generally ones that I didn’t like. #4 in particular, in which the bad guy is an American televangelist, was probably the most tedious of his books.

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        1. Beautiful justification for what many people said happened in 2020, isn’t it? That the Right Kind Of People realized how bad things were going to be, so they threw the election…
          Definitely when Stross moved out of the stale-beer spy novel genre, the Laundry series started to develop serious structural problems. Especially where in The Nightmare Stacks I could see him trying to do a “mil-SF” parody in how the Elves dealt with things.

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            1. In general, it’s a bad idea to parody things for which you have no affection; you’re unlikely to known them well enough to get the parody right.

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    4. Didn’t know who this Charles Stross guy was, or what the Laundry Files was. Tried to figure out just from context in the comments. Then did some googling. The MANY ads for his books crowing “Hugo Winning Author” were one explanation for my not knowing; that blurb has apparently been a warning ( for me ) of ‘not a good book’ for at least twenty years. At least, not unless I received a recommendation from someone I knew and trusted, ( often including an explanation of how someone wrote an actually GOOD book and still won a Hugo …) and if I had time to read said ‘good book’. Read a short excerpt offered up on the one site; hmmm, OK, not actual garbage, but not especially promising, either. Probably won’t get around to trying more.

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  16. Sometimes in dealing with a crazy or irrational person, the best thing to do is simply ignore them to the greatest extent possible and go about building an alternate life in which they play little or no part.

    One of the things that empowers the shrill and over-expressive among us is the the attention they are given. I cannot control how much attention they are given, but I can control how much attention I give them – be it actual attention or my money, which is an exchange for my attention.

    As a great many in industries are finding out now even as we speak, being ignored and having people walk away has actual consequences – mostly decreased company incomes which in turn become decreased or soon to be non-extant salaries.

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  17. Somebody hold Sarah’s beer. The left just opened up a whole new subbasement of crazy:

    These people control the unions, including the teachers unions, the police unions, the government unions, the medical unions, the media unions – all the unions.  They control a lot of corporate board rooms.  They control a great many elected officials, not a majority. They are in our military.  They take our Starbucks order.  They drive the garbage trucks. They have infiltrated our churches.

    High School students today, whether graduating or not, are the first full generation that has been completely indoctrinated from K-12.  There are exceptions, to be sure, but those are in the minority.

    We saw a lot of attractive young faces articulating a powerful message.  America has a powerful message as well.  But we spend more time and effort fighting each other than advancing America’s founding vision.

    The Deep State is a big problem.  This is a bigger problem because these people staff the Deep State.

    The World Economic Forum is a big problem, this is a bigger problem because these people staff the institutions the WEF are subverting.

    The Chinese Communist Party is a problem, this maybe is not a bigger problem because they are here and the power base of the CCP is on the other side of the Pacific Ocean. – mostly.

    Strength is perfected in weakness, the Good Book says. Good news, we got weakness!

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    1. High School students today, whether graduating or not, are the first full generation that has been completely indoctrinated from K-12. There are exceptions, to be sure, but those are in the minority.

      Oh bull.

      You might be able to argue that today’s kids are ALMOST as under control as the Boomers, but not even close to as much as Gen X, much less my Millennials/Gen-Y.

      Not only are there more routes of information available– I was seriously screwing up my boomer teachers by getting primary sources online faster than anyone could have managed a decade earlier– but home schooling is massively more common, before one corrects for numbers as percent of total population.

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      1. Granted that there are people like yourself who will intelligently push back, but they are relatively few in number. So too home schooled kids. Add to that these people are going around presenting weekend Socialism Schools.

        Here in Alhambra the school district has very effectively hidden the woke agenda that would be anathema to the largely Asian population. But I do know that they are holding social emotional learning (training for radicalization) classes for the parents. Essentially a Socialism school to complement what is undoubtedly being taught in the classroom.

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        1. I wasn’t “intelligently pushing back.”

          I was just the only person dumb enough to let the teacher know I didn’t agree.

          And that has nothing to do with the ludicrous assertion that today’s youth are in a WORSE situation– and for homeschoolers?
          Good heavens. We went from “Almost non-existent” at that time, to “almost everyone knows at LEAST co-worker who was homeschooled, unless they’ve made it very clear they’re actively hostile to such a thing.”
          (It is very funny to have someone get huffy about how they don’t know a single functional adult, and then another coworker points out that several of his supervisors were homeschoolers.)

          But I do know that they are holding social emotional learning (training for radicalization) classes for the parents. Essentially a Socialism school to complement what is undoubtedly being taught in the classroom.

          You’re in the LA area of Southern California, and you think that the school publicly offering “social emotional learning” classes means that the kids are getting it worse than they ever have before?
          Do you have the faintest clue if it is even the nonsense type, or the “how to emotionally self- regulate” type? (Before the question of exactly how freakin’ racist those folks are to think that Asian parents are going to have issues with emotional literacy.)

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            1. “Ignore any sort of history beyond yesterday, much less any sort of reasonable knowledge of what they skinsuited, and watch this video. That’ll persuade you.”

              Good grief.

              You open up with a freaking stupid black-pill bit of nonsense– which you still have not bothered to defend– and then shift through to shock that a school in the LA area is doing something you don’t like, and THEN defend your preferred use of totem phrases with a podcast.

              Perhaps you are so sure the progs are stronger than ever because you’ve so whole-heartedly adopted their rhetorical methods.

              Oh, but do so please go on with lecturing someone who literally has to go through school supplies and is actually familiar with the various movements and hijacking of the same, since she doesn’t abandon her kids to public schools. Since you’re pretending it’s unusual already, small jump, eh?

              It’s not as if it’s blindingly obvious why progs would try to steal “how to not be controlled by your emotions” the same way they try to seal “justice” and anything else that’s a threat to their power.

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  18. One of the Promo books, Carbon Copy, has a great crazy ex-girlfriend!
    (ever so slightly edited for extracted readability)

    “Four flat tires and the carving on the hood?”
    “No, five. She stabbed the spare tire as well…
    “How do you know it was her?”
    “Besides the heart carved into the hood with initials? She texted me and sent me a picture of it.”
    “Oh, one of those… Just how unstable is she?”
    looks out window, “Crazy enough to be pouring a container of gasoline on your squad car.”

    Liked by 2 people

  19. This leads into the whole issue of “why do men turn to porn/video games/anime?”

    Easy. Most women in porn aren’t this kind of crazy. Unless you’re buying stuff that has the psycho tags on PornHub (it’s been a while, I don’t know if they still have it), the rules are clear for the most part. And there aren’t the kinds of emotional pain and suffering that men get hit with by women who know how to wield them. The women are often attractive…mostly (I blame HD video, still have issues shooting in high-def without making the makeup obvious in such sweaty and close-quarters environments). And you don’t have to put up with all of the emotional damage and angst that is usually required to get nookie.

    Video games? For the most part, you can follow the chain of consequences, even in the Bad Endings of VNs and romance simulators. The women, for the most part, are conventionally attractive. They are enthusiastic about being with you, for the most part. The hidden bad-guy and the third act twist are sometimes obvious.

    And sometimes you can blow the psycho-girlfriend up with far too much high explosives.

    Anime? Conventionally-attractive females, even the psychos, for the most part. I won’t say that most of the male protagonists are bland, but I will say that they hit many of the male wish fulfillment niches. Women that can kick ass-and be feminine as well. And even most of the crazy ones have valid reasons for being crazy.

    But having seen too many high-drama/high-psychotic women at close range, realizing how many of them congregate to the liberal/left side does not fill me with joy. Especially since the Left is a realm of emotions more than reason.

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    1. Pretending is easy, and trying to find a mate is hard.

      Much, much safer to blame the entire sex for bad dating options existing at all, and just check out entirely.

      …funny thing, this is basically the intro to the romance novels I’ve been studying. (It sells, I want to learn to write it.)

      Specifically, the ones with painfully liberal FMCs.

      (Haven’t found an even basically conservative FMC yet, means there’s an unfilled niche. And yes, phrasing, especially given the subject.)

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      1. I don’t blame women for bad dating options.

        I blame a very small cultural subset that because of their interior position in our media have created circumstances where women have it beaten over their heads (maybe literally) that if they don’t get a 6/6/6 guy (at least 6′ tall, at least 6″ of cock, and making at least a six-figure salary) they have settled and settling is a worse sin than murder, and only slightly better than betraying your sisters to the Patriarchy by settling. The only viable alternative to the 6/6/6 is the Sensitive Liberal Male, who is almost as rare in the wild and is often a protective coloration by the worst sort of males.

        Anything else, in the current media zeitgeist is settling and you might as well be doing short strokes with Lucifer rather than settle.

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        1. See that way more from guys than from gals.

          Usually when explaining why they can’t manage a hookup, rather than thinking…hey, maybe the nice girls like I want aren’t into hookups.

          The ones where the guy is explaining why his hookup was OK because the gal had unrealistic expectations so they’re not hooking up, anymore, and we should be sorry for him for not getting sex are special.

          If you want to be mad, start with the folks that spent the last several decades beating women up with the expectation that they should be having no-strings sex.

          THAT is the unrealistic expectation.

          Liked by 1 person

          1. Except that the unrealistic expectations that Author in Charge is describing usually preclude even a basic date from happening, regardless of whether or not a hook-up is going to take place. Though having “six inches in the pants” as one of the sticking points suggests that the woman in question is willing to hook up.

            You’re talking about guys that went out, failed to get her into bed, and went looking for excuses that didn’t involve “She’s a prude.” I would expect that kind of woman not to put much emphasis on the size of the man’s genitals.

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            1. Except that the unrealistic expectations that Author in Charge is describing usually preclude even a basic date from happening, regardless of whether or not a hook-up is going to take place.

              Again, the expectation is that dating = sex.

              This is not even unusual; this has been taught, in public schools, since at least the 90s.

              What, have you not noticed the “if she isn’t sleeping with you by date three, you’re being abused and friendzoned, you need to dump her”?

              That one isn’t even just a couple of “influences” on youtube, or other shockjocks, or even it having been seen on hook-up apps.

              This is a cultural norm.

              Though having “six inches in the pants” as one of the sticking points suggests that the woman in question is willing to hook up.

              Go look at the definitions for the rule of six.

              I did, last time you brought it up. Trying to find it in the wild, so to speak.

              You’ll find mostly the six inches in the pants on content generated by guys, and specifically including that it means guys aren’t even able to “blow their load” on her unless they are impressive.

              More common, there’s “Six pack, six digit income, six cylinder engine, six foot tall-” and goes on for quite a bit, I got bored at that point.

              Especially since what kept coming up was either guys complaining about it, or dating coaches saying they didn’t actually HAVE any gals with those expectations, maybe get off of Tumblr and touch grass.

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              1. Your complaint is that only men are reporting it. Why would women advertise it to other women? It’s men that are the intended recipients of it.

                As for the first part…

                You’re changing the subject.

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                1. Your complaint is that only men are reporting it.

                  No, my report is that it is PRIMARILY from guys, with a side serving of a tiny sample from HOOKUPS.

                  Why would women advertise it to other women?

                  Have you… met women?

                  Aside from the prior statements that it was supposed to be showing up in dating apps, HAVE YOU MET WOMEN?!?

                  I’ve sat through what I would describe as an obnoxious amount of drama performance art, but it starts at obnoxious, especially if one doesn’t indulge. The fifteen minute recital of “what God needs to send me in a perfect man,” followed by jazz improv as the group elaborates ever more on their “requirements,” is a pretty dang normal “look at me I am soooo special.” It’s a competitive sport, similar to the “how much my spouse sucks” and “how hard my life is” displays.

                  Women are the primary audience for such romance drama, since they are the competition. There is a sub-section that is attracting the attention of guys, like the “all girls are really lesbians” type preening, but that is a rather small subgroup. (though solidly in the crazy-bait).

                  Which is why the rule of six is a list of stuff that GUYS brag about.

                  It’s a stupid set of standards, but it is a set of standards– and it’s hardly news that guys value what they have to work for. It’s a dumb set of rules because it’s hook-up based, and plays strongly in to mechanical tendencies of guys.

                  The PURPOSE of the noisy standards is for guys to try anyways, so they can win the “oh look how valuable I am” signaler over– which doesn’t work when dating equals sex. It works even LESS in a hook-up app.
                  Described the rule of six to husband, without any context, simply saying that I was discussing some gals that had that as their standards for dating- and his comment was to get off of the swipe left apps. Hadn’t even mentioned it WAS in an app. (Followed by “get out of clubs, and the bar, and anyplace else to meet girls where meeting them means they get in bed.” Then went into a nice discussion of how they’d harassed their office mate into a date with the cute girl two offices over.)

                  You’re changing the subject.

                  He says, in the second post after jumping in to an exchange about how the culture is BROKEN and trying to drag it off into the wilderness, to a statement that is reiterating the major point of the comment he responded to in the first place.

                  Specifically:

                  If you want to be mad, start with the folks that spent the last several decades beating women up with the expectation that they should be having no-strings sex.

                  Like

              2. There’s also the effect of the dating apps, i.e., I gather many people lie about their personal characteristics.

                Shocker I know.

                But, on the apps, reportedly women are swamped with matches, whereas most men are not. Given the demand, of course people filter, by age, location, etc. It’s an artificial setting, which doesn’t translate directly to the real world. In the real world, we don’t have our income or height stamped on our forehead. Women also aren’t facing hundreds of guys at a time.

                I think the apps also give an advantage to people who can write well. Add in the number of bots on the sites, and some of the “women” may not commit to a date because, well, they’re imaginary.

                I do agree with Foxfier that women in general are not looking to hookup.

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                1. But, on the apps, reportedly women are swamped with matches, whereas most men are not

                  :nods:

                  Yep, roughly two to one…and that’s including the “female profiles” that are some dude catfishing, on the more-serious but still hookup apps.

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        1. :wry: Theology alone, I’d go nuts, and don’t get me started on the animals stuff.

          Scifi and fantasy I can handle, that’s at least their own world building. I have to learn how to write it, and I have to sell it to me about writing it.

          Main thing I’m finding is a lot of really lonely women who have picked up on the not at all subtle message of “put out, easy and cheap, or you’ll die alone.”

          Which is…really not surprising.

          Sad, but not surprising.

          So when all of a sudden, yet again, some dumb little niche that dares to have standards, even of they’re stupid standards is a Really Big Deal that’s causing cultural destruction… not, y’know, the mainstream norming of kleenex women… it gets a little too deep for hip waders.

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            1. Was thinking about that famously far end of the crazy/hot matrix but in a fun way actress, that talked about how she liked her men like kleenex– clean, strong, and disposable.

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          2. Given the discussion above about staying away from crazy … One of the best ways to ID crazy is her putting out easy and cheap. Again, my Da told me that and I made sure to tell my boys. It’s a real shame the BS women are being sold about what men want. Some men do, most don’t. The men that do tend to be crazy themselves.

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            1. It’s considered “boring,” but the advice my husband got– and that we followed– is to marry a good friend.

              sings How can we be lovers if we can’t be friends-

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        2. Not my thing at all, but I would like to see someone actually write Amish Vampires of the Apocalypse.

          While I’m making a titles wish list, I wanted the trend of books purporting to be autobiographies of short visits to the afterlife to include ‘7 Minutes in Heaven’.

          Liked by 1 person

    2. Being moderately attractive, in shape, social, and having a stable career will get you dates and hookups in the modern age. Finding a compatible semi-sane partner was the hardest part.

      I could write a book or a movie about the crazy internet and regular dating scene back in the 90’s and ’00s. The plot was almost as crazy and unrealistic as the current political plot. “Normal” folks were more insane than the kinkiest RenFair fanatics or Russian mob daughters. I swear some of these woman had to be aliens due to their behavior and rituals.

      Had about 200 first dates/meetups and a few semi-serious relationships before I found my spouse. About 100 of the first dates didn’t have red flags, they had whole brigades of revolutionary drill teams.

      And the number of men and women that cheat and were open to cheating totally amazed this choir boy. Was tempted, but coming from divorced parents that had a combined total of six marriages, I didn’t go there. Didn’t partake at work either.

      Also turned down the gays guys that hit on me, including David Gerrold, whom normally likes them much, much younger. (He wasn’t the GoH at the con, I think it was Butcher or someone more worth listening to…)

      Let me know if you are writing a anti-romance or comedy and I’ll share a couple dozen of the weirder experiences or just give you titles for writing prompts.

      Liked by 2 people

      1. I have my own writing prompts, from the other direction. From the man who “dreamed” we were going to get married (we weren’t even dating) to the gun runner, and everything in between. There’s a reason I haven’t dated since I was 30.

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  20. The left is a squatter that shows up one day and demands everything you have and will have in the future because it believes it is entitled to it. It is that attitude that has created the squatters problem around the country, especially in places run by Democrats, and the shoplifting epidemic, etc. It is a sense of entitlement that has a religious fervor to it.

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    1. Most criminals see the lax prosecutions and feel what the hell, if the others can get away with it so can I. So they keep on their crime spree until they are finally put in jail. The consequence to this is the rich and well off leaving an area and never going back. California’s problems are only starting as are New York’s and Illinois. Cali, is now running out of other peoples money much quicker than they thought, because of the billions of dollars that left the state when the rich and well off did. Those rich liberals that remain will get their wish to pay more in taxes, because that is where they have told their communist slaves where all the money is. When your rich pampered Liberals leave you are in big trouble, and they are leaving in droves. I can’t wait until they come for Meathead’s money, because liberal retard Meathead is by their definition rich.

      Liked by 1 person

      1. I think it is much worse than “most criminals see”. I think it is “most PEOPLE see”. Someone, not me to be sure :), who would not normally consider shoplifting sees “everyone else” getting away with it and thinks, “why not? I’m a chump if I pay for what everyone else is stealing.”

        Social Security Disability has a similar issue.

        Liked by 1 person

    1. And the funny thing is that the POV of the woman in the song is that her hubby/BF is “probably” doing all these things. There’s no statement that he’s actually guilty of anything. For all we know, he was giving his buddy a lift home from the soup kitchen, or distributing blankets to the homeless.

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      1. Which is why I call that the Pro-Vandalism song. It grates on me no end, as soon as I hear a recognizable bit of it, I am CHANGING THE CHANNEL!!! It is absolutely the female equivalent of the wife beater excuse of ‘She deserved it!!’ Some imaginary slight in YOUR mind means you get to attack/abuse another person with NO proof and NO logical reason, or anything resembling reciprocity. GRRRRrrrrrr….

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    2. My sister had a friend who met a new boyfriend while he was at a bar with his wife. He went home with the friend, divorced his then current wife, married (moved in with? Can’t remember) the friend, and she totally freaked and couldn’t figure out what went wrong when they went out one night and he went home with a new girlfriend.

      Lots of histrionics, how could he do this to me, he’s such a…

      Hey, girl. That’s how you met him, remember? You knew he was a cheating scumbag, and you were ok with that until it was aimed at you.

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      1. Contender for most evocative song title: Your husband is cheating on us

        Or an Onion headline: Local Man re-assures mistress he’s not some 3-timing creep

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  22. I know some of you know what I mean when I say “4 boxes”; but we may be too late for anything but Divine help.

    I’m not giving up; but I’m not smart enough to fix what’s gone sideways.

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    1. Part of the problem is the people deeply invested in the feeling that they are smart enough to sort out whatever with their own cunning or theoretical stuff.

      There are several answers.

      One, not one big problem, but actually a combination of many smaller problems, which can be solved or mitigated separately. Work on what is in front of you, think about what you can see, etc.

      Two, there are probably not enough really bad people to ensure a victory for their side. Otherwise, things would be substantially worse.

      Three, we can always try to be better role models, and work on being better people. Humility, understanding the flaws in our own thinking, work on being lest technocratic, or whatever.

      Four, God can make better plans and can deal with complexity better than we can. How He works is a bit different from merely human planning, but His counsel is useful.

      Liked by 1 person

    2. It might require Divine intervention, I lost a great deal of optimism, watching the Canadian Trucker protests. I heard too many stories of young bureaucrats not understanding that the truckers and farmers had leverage with food, because they were convinced that food came from grocery stores.

      These kids needed more field trips to farms.

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    1. I see they’re still parroting the ‘official lie line’ on Sad Puppies and pretending that the Hugo award’s integrity is only now being called into question. Uh-uh bub, they burned their boats back in 2016. They got no way off their island of shame.

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      1. I have seen one saying that Larry Correia can’t accept that the growing diversity of the audience. Which I suppose why he bought a mountain. . . .

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    3. That was an addendum to another comment that disappeared less than 10 minutes after it posted.

      I’ve never seen WPDE do that before. I suspect the mention of unhappy immature canines might have something to do with it.

      Liked by 1 person

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