Hey, folks. I’m taking care of some non-blog business (nothing bad), so posts will likely be a bit light for a few days, and moderation will be a bit slow. But please keep sending tips!
In the meantime, here’s a cat. I posted this one before but, come on, this is an excellent cat who deserves some more publicity.
@Sinkable John
My insomnia is always temporary, so sleep aids only working as a temporary measure isn’t as much of a problem for me. Sorry to hear it’s not the same for you. I take it France doesn’t even have legal Marijuana prescriptions? I would say you should move here where it’s legal but we’re so messed up I don’t even want to live here.
@kupo
Blatant self-quoting incoming, because I’m ashamed to admit this a second time on the same thread :
France has no legal marijuana whatsoever. Not medical, not even substitute drugs based on it (although arguably those wouldn’t help in my case). Most of my friends have already had to pay the ridiculous fines, had to go through the ridiculous “civility classes” teaching them they’re funding terrorism each time they roll a joint. Only reason I’ve escaped it so far is that I got lucky, even though I still have a good number of really bad memories involving the police.
Just to put everything in context, the ruling party is called the “socialist party” and is about as close to socialism as I am to the religious right. Our national pride is that of the land of Enlightenment, Human Rights, etc. Really we’re probably just as messed up as you say you are, we’re just very good at hiding it.
OT for this thread, but semi-OT for the site in general:
http://ontd-political.livejournal.com/11560582.html
Basic premise of this article is that since Americans have long since abandoned informative/newsworthy TV shows (aka shows that make you think about the issues of the day) for the likes of reality TV (aka mindless entertainment) and since Trump is far more entertaining like reality TV than Clinton will ever be, Trump gets to be president. And all those people telling pollsters they’re voting for Clinton are lying because they’re too embarrassed to admit they like trashy Trump TV in front of strangers.
So do any of the more more politically savy folks around here think this theory holds water, or not?
On one hand, it’s true that Trump has found the canyon-sized keyhole into american politics : it is reality TV. From a foreign perspective, it was always obvious : the mere production value of your presidential campaigns is absolutely outlandish to us. It’s Hollywood meets politics. By the way we love making fun of you for that. And then we go on with our equally ridiculous elections, but hey, at least we’re ridiculous in different ways ! 🙂
On the other hand, I don’t believe people are “lying” in polls. That seems pretty far-fetched to me. And I don’t think they’d vote for Trump because of his dubious entertainment value, regardless of his actual politics. And the bit about America being “TV culture” and nothing else is really caricatural. You can’t exactly make political predictions based on caricature.
No, I think there’s another explanation to Trump managing to go as far as he did, and it’s both simpler and more complicated : society is churning nihilism by the truckload.
@Sinkable John
Imaginary Petal = Gothenburg, Sweden
kupo = WA, USA
🙂
@Redsilkphoenix
No. I’m not very politically savvy, but that theory leaks worse than John Boehner.
@Redsilkphoenix
There’s this idea called the Bradley Effect, which states that people lie on polls in order to avoid other people in their peer group disapproving of their choices. Then they get into the voting booth and do the opposite
Problem is, the Bradley Effect is suspect at best, and, regardless, Trump seems to have the opposite problem. During the primary, his polling numbers were regularly higher than his results ended up being. Reason? I don’t know. Nobody does. Anyone who tells you they do ain’t worth listening to. Maybe after the election, but it’s way too early to assume things about the psychology of the electorate
Also (forgive me, I’m in a ranty mood), shut up, Eve or whoever wrote this drivel. TV has always had mindless entertainment. Just cos you’re too bougie for Real Housewives of Atlanta doesn’t make you smarter than everyone else (note: RHOA is the one with a lot of black women. Just sayin). Maybe point the doom and gloom at yourself. You’re the one makin stupid ass assumptions about people. Ever stop to think, you’re brand of unearned arrogance is the reason for Trump? Didn’t think so. And name dropping some French muffuga, like we’re supposed to be impressed. Jackass
Tell em, Nene
@ sinkable john
There’s a phenomenon that’s been identified over here called the “shy tory” effect. Essentially people are reluctant to admit to pollsters that they support an unpopular cause.
It only amounts to about a 5-10% error, but it was enough for the polls to get the last general election result and the EU referendum wrong.
It seems to be a new thing so the pollsters are still working on a way of correcting for it.
Don’t know if there’s anything similar in the US, the Trump supporters seem pretty vocal about their choice.
ETA: ninja’d by Axe
Aren’t polls anonymous though ? Just like voting itself. That would defeat the point of lying. Unless people are watching you. Like closely.
I get that people can be shy about controversial views. Pro tip to them : if you’re ashamed of your political inclination, then you might just want to, y’know, like, um, well, rethink it.
Second pro tip : if you’re genuinely concerned you’re gonna be persecuted because you support Trump, then do not rethink your positions, and do not, god forbid, become a feminist or anti-racist. You’d never handle the actual backlash.
ETA : @Imaginary Petal
Thanks for the reminder 🙂
I’m an avid ASMR video watcher (or rather, listener) – I don’t experience the “tingles” particularly often (it takes very particular triggers) but I find them to be really relaxing and great background noise. They will put me to right to sleep if I’m in bed, regardless of whether or not they’re giving me “tingles.”
@Sinkable John
I would specifically recommend guided meditation type ASMR videos to help with sleep, though different things work for different people. Just today I had a friend telling me about how hair-brushing videos were recently helping her deal with her insomnia.
Also somewhat related, “hypnosis” audio tracks (can also be found on youtube) are probably the most effective thing I’ve found at putting me to sleep. They do a great job of A) relaxing your body physically, and B) providing a low-stimulus task for your brain to focus on. I don’t have any experience with insomnia so I can’t speak for what is effective in that situation, but damn does it work for me. I will usually be out like a light in the first 10 minutes of an hour-long video.
edit: just realized I replied to the bottom of page 2 before reading page 3. So, sorry if I kinda jumped the convo a bit!
@ sinkable john
Yup, but one thing that has been noted is that you get different results from totally computerised polling (where people are just left at a terminal) than face to face or telephone polling. But it may be there are other variables at play.
@Petal
Good memory! (I always picture you as Fingie because of your avatar, which makes it even more impressive.)
Thank you so much everybody for your thoughts re my OCD student. I have a clearer idea of how to proceed now, and I feel a bit less stressed about it.
@ Sinkable John – reading about your ordeals made me cry (although I am a tad fragile atm anyway). Medicinal cannabis recently became legal in Aust. so you can come live here any time. The cats will love it 😀
@ Imaginary Petal – I saw your photo of Fingie the other day and squeeeeeed all over the place. He has a look of utter relief combined with quiet resentment!
@Sinkable John – this was a while ago, but thanks for the answer and I wish you the best with your music plans! And I hope the insomnia becomes more bearable. Even temporarily it’s awful.
@Mish – my experience is more about having ADHD and tutoring students with it, but one thing that might help is finding a de-stressing activity that the student can do in a classroom setting. For me it was drawing – I still remember my 5th grade teacher giving me a notepad and allowing me some time to draw. She was great at being flexible while setting boundaries (“here’s when you can draw and when you can’t”) and it showed me she cared. Anyway, you sound like a caring teacher and I’m sure that comes across in the classroom!
Clinton’s well ahead in almost all the polls. It doesn’t seem like stalwart Trump supporters would feel the need to lie, or for that matter care about approval from people they’re likely to despise anyway.
There’s the Trump-as-protest-vote, Bernie-or-bust crowds, but…typically that sort of vote tends to fall away the closer it is to an election.
@Mish
I’m sorry 🙁
Yesterday was one of the bad days, I was pretty upset about it. ’tis better now.
I’m actually considering moving somewhere with legal weed but I’m scared I might be stuck here for dumb sentimental reasons. I hoping that might change this year.
@epitome of incomprehensibility
I reckon it’s probably even more awful when it’s temporary. I mean, I’ve had my whole life to learn to live with it, enough to understand the inner dyanmics and predict whether I’m gonna be able to sleep or not. Plus I already know to avoid jobs that won’t work well with it. Also I’m a 4am writer anyway, so I pretty much need it by now :p
On the other hand, when it hits in the middle of your life just like that and you’ve never been prepared for it… I can’t imagine how hard that would be.
@Bryce
That’s what happened here in 2002. That’s how ol’ One-Eye came pretty close to being president. America is a different context but I think something similar is happening there.
Some seem to think that derailing the train is the best solution. That electing Trump will spark a revolution or something.
Hey all,
Has anyone heard the “Witches of Eastwick” musical? There’s this song in the second act that’s like a PUA anthem:
I mean,
As everyone knows,
When women are near,
A guy has to say
What a gal wants to hear
It invokes religion at the end, as if it knew Roosh’s career trajectory years before it happened:
Don’t believe me? Read your Bible, it’s there in the original plan
In the first act, this character is trying to get into the pants of the female leads, and says quite a few straw-feminist things, like “oh, men are all terrible and started all the wars” but once he’s suckered them in, he reveals his true thoughts in this song. And he’s the villain!
EDIT: Hmm, looks like I haven’t quite figured out how to embed video yet.
@ Sinkable John – please don’t apologise! I didn’t mean it in an accusatory fashion. I was just thinking of you all locked up and alone and over-medicated and it was horrible 🙁
Glad you’re feeling a bit better.
I was overly sad anyway; it’s been a bit of a rough week with too much hard stuff happening. But it’s Friday night (here, anyway) and I have the place to myself (and the cats), and some wine 😀
@ epitome of incomprehensibility – thank you for your lovely comment. It’s a tricky balance caring for grown-up students (well, they’re technically grown-ups!!) because obviously one doesn’t want to smother them or patronise them. But this particular course caters to people from disadvantaged backgrounds with minimal education, so they sometimes need a different kind of help than my regular uni students. I’ll talk to this person next week and ask him if there’s anything we can change that might help.
@Mish
There might be a law somewhere that states that I’m not allowed to admit this in public for the sake of our national stereotype industry, but I can’t stomach wine anymore. It just makes me quite literally sick, even the good stuff. I blame my teenage years spent getting drunk on awful boxed wine.
Although even when it doesn’t make me sick, it gives me the sads.
Some French I am.
On the other hand I found out about an awesome brewery near where I live that makes some of the best feel-good-beer I ever tasted.
@Sinkable John, Alan Robertshaw, others
The biggest and simplest factor in the interior acoustics of a sub is soundproof mounts everywhere. There just isn’t a lot of metal to metal contact over the space of a couple compartments.
@ joeb
Ah, thanks for that. It was weird how sound just seemed to be swallowed up in there. Like you had to almost shout just to talk to someone a few yards away.
I trust the disco facilities on the LA class were up to scratch; should be, they cost enough.
@epitome of incomprehensibility: you’re québécois.e?
Yesterday I had four toast with peanut butter then went to bed at 20h when it got dark and fell asleep on the spot; I think my cats feared I was dead. Not sure if it was social anxiety or overworking or the change of seasons (I’m weirded out with this sensation of not being hot).
Free-associating, I’m led to wonder if Sinkable John just needs to eat peanut butter. Good luck finding it in France though.
My ex and I are still connected on facebook. And although I have a policy of not engaging with him at all on FB over politics – because, y’know – I don’t know what will set him off, it’s been very hard not to call him on his bullshit.
In a recent FB post he and a friend traded praise for Donald Trump and how presidential he seemed in Mexico and how Donald’s comments about Mexicans weren’t really that racist because he said some Mexicans, and of course some Mexicans are criminals, aren’t they? And anyway, the NYT is owned* by a Lebanese-Mexican who has it in for Trump.
What really burns my chaps about this is that this public explanation of how Donald Trump isn’t really racist (or sexist) is some sort of open appeasement of how Donald isn’t really racist, but in fact is just a sensible guy with sensible policies. But in private, I know that my ex is a rampant racist and sexist and he likes Donald Trump precisely BECAUSE he has these views. It scares the shit out of me that he’s poisoning my son with these views. I’m regularly getting questions from my son about Donald Trump, so I know that my ex is lecturing him with his vile views on the world just as he once lectured me endlessly.
But this is what I’m seeing on my FB from other people as well, this post-hoc rationalisation of what Donald Trump said, picking apart his words and being all he didn’t say all the Mexicans and Donald Trump loves a taco salad, after all… This worries me about the polling, etc – and a disposition of justifying all his stupid shit (spur of the moment Mexico visit, racist shit, sexist shit, incomprehensible garbage shit…what he really meant was…)
And that’s how Donald Trump could win.
___
*Carlos Slim, a Mexican billionaire of Lebanese descent does own around 17% of the NYT as far as I can tell…. however, I wondered how my ex knew this… Google search: Breitbart and a primary season love-in article between Steve Bannon and Trump which masqueraded as news.
@rugbyyogi
That Donald Trump: So reasonable! So well spoken!
But now that Donald’s surrogate has said that if Hillary wins, there will be a taco truck on every corner — well, that’s it. I’m definitely voting Clinton.
A vote for her is a vote for incredible, accessible deliciousness everywhere in the USA. I’m not passing up this opportunity!
Re lying on polls, the anonymity of the poll doesn’t necessarily help if the respondent doesn’t trust the pollster*. Given the amount of paranoia about the federal government and NWO amongst even the more mainstream conservatives, that could create a significant error, but how significant is anyone’s guess – probably not enough to overturn the polls. Unless the anomalies of the current election invalidate some basic assumption of the statisticians, Clinton is set to win. It just feels like Trump ought to be doing better because he keeps grabbing all the headlines. Hopefully his bluster will run out come election day.
* As an aside, the US military developed a neat scheme to get around this in order to get statistics on drug use by the respond putting tokens signifying a yes or no into a bag which already contained sone randomly chosen tokens. It was impossible to tell from the contents of any bag what the response was, but the total number of tokens collected revealed the total number who admitted drug use.
@rugby
Sorry for prying, but is it working? Son’s asking questions, so is that good? I hope, for both of your sakes, it’s a good thing
Does he seem convinced by his father’s shittery and just using you to confirm (depending on how bad it’s gotten, Son might take your disapproval as proof. ‘If the [slur] says it’s wrong, it must be right’ kinda thing)? Or does it more seem like he’s looking to you for answers (like he’s doubting Ex’s words and trusts you to be the ‘voice of reason’)
Regardless, and whether or not you know (or care to humor my nonsense with a response), stay strong. I wish only the best for both you and Son. And all of Ex’s furniture can turn into legos for all I care ?