erin (she/her)

Genuinely, I cannot tell what your point is. In some alternate universe, are we just rolling the rocks downhill? Don’t you think we’d already be doing that? This seems like a great use case to replace diesel trucks with ones that recharge themselves using potential energy from ore. This absolutely is a galaxy brain moment, in that it’s a very smart idea.

Yes. “Cis” is just a description, like “straight” or “white.” Calling someone “cis” is not an insult, but some conservatives take it as such. The common phrase they echo is “I’m not cis, I’m normal.” They’re trying to denormalize trans people by making an inoffensive and common descriptor an insult. The same people sometimes have a problem with being called straight by queer people because they see themselves not as straight, but normal, and anything different is abnormal. In reality, “gay,” “straight,” “trans,” and “cis” are no more abnormal descriptors than calling someone “black,” “white,” “American,” or “tall.” It’s all just “othering” those they perceive as political opponents.

They’re seismically isolated

Or much much longer. It’s not going anywhere. It can’t escape its cask, and outside human intervention the casks won’t be breached. It’s just locked-up metal that gives off some radiation, fully contained within the cask. It isn’t oozing green goo.

The casks waste is stored in would take bunker buster yields to breach.

All the waste a plant ever produces in its lifetime can be contained with ease on site. Waste certainly isn’t the main issue, though it’s portrayed to be. Cost of deployment and staffing are more prohibitive issues, and both are surmountable. I don’t think it’s a bandaid for all power issues, but it’s a powerful tool that should be used more often, not phased out.

Authoritarian doesn’t mean exercising authority. Banning slavery did exercise authority, of the law, over slave owners, but it was anti-authoritarian. It took power, and authority, condensed wrongly in the hands of a few and, in theory, distributed it to the many, however effective it actually was.

Expressed well or not, you didn’t use any logical fallacies or resort to ad hominem attacks. I could disagree on every point and still enjoy the discussion just for the sake of respectful debate. Hope to run into you again.

I happened to read your last reply before it was deleted, and I have to give you props for disagreeing respectfully. I don’t see nuanced debates online often, and I’d much rather have a respectful discussion where we don’t see eye to eye. Have a good one, you seem dope.

I think the issue is that the “new” usage of “they” is seen as different, or incorrect, when that’s simply not the case. The strict usage of “they” as only a plural pronoun is not “correct.” It’s revisionist. Historically, “they” has been used as both a singular and plural pronoun, and it can be found in conversation and literature going back hundreds of years. At some point, we revised that they should be only plural, and that’s why it feels like things are changing in our current lifetimes. We aren’t changing how the word is used, we’re going back to how it’s been used for centuries.

Language is not a set of rules and strictures. It’s fluid, and the way people use words becomes grammatically correct. If these things could not change, then language couldn’t exist. You can feel uncomfortable that language has changed from what you’ve known, but don’t hold it back, or complain about the next generation. Language will change in their lifetimes too. Overall, it’s a good thing and pushes us to understand each other in the manner appropriate for the times. Right now, an easily recognizable and commonly accepted gender neutral, singular pronoun is more valuable to language than a strict usage or a new word for the use case.

“They left their bag.” “They went that way.” “I’ll find them later.”

All these examples could refer to either singular or plural cases, and maybe that confuses some people, but I think it’s very simple to determine with even the barest bit of context. It’s better than defaulting to “he” for any unspecified gender, as was “correct” for the last few decades, and allows for non-binary people to be referred to without needing oft-criticized neo-pronouns.

TLDR: Times change. We need to get with it.

It’s my name

I don’t like the Democrats one bit. It frustrates me to have to vote for them. BUT, they aren’t the ones demonizing me and removing my healthcare because of an innate part of myself. I’m trans, and Republicans are doing their damnedest to kill us. Democrats aren’t helping, but they aren’t calling to put us on lists and remove all of our healthcare, or make it illegal for us to change our names. Being a casualty of the apathy of those that think it doesn’t matter makes me want to cry, every day. And we aren’t the only ones! There are so many other targets conservatives are hunting and actively trying to hurt (people that can give birth, immigrants, veterans, etc), and no vote is just letting them get away with it. The Democrats are complicit and aren’t doing nearly enough, I’d vote for a leftist even after the primaries if one had any chance of election, but right now I have no choice for my own self preservation than to vote blue.

Please, I beg you, think of those that are vulnerable and hurting if conservatives have power. It’s not a good choice to vote blue, but it’s the least bad one.

You’re thinking of “snaps,” where someone might send a photo just to keep a streak going. There are regular text chats on Snapchat.