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Worthy of Better, Stronger Together for Reproductive Rights bundle live on itch.io
6 Jul 2022 at 4:38 pm UTC Likes: 4
Of course, as I said before, one could argue about this. People could, for instance, argue with abortion providers or with women who need abortions. But the TherinS of the world instead want to jail them. They figure that while Conservatives can make up their minds about this, women needing abortions cannot, they should be ruled by Conservatives. Because that's freedom.
6 Jul 2022 at 4:38 pm UTC Likes: 4
Quoting: TherinSWell, here.This could be a serious argument. But it is misleading. Yes, pieces of the brain do exist at this point. But they are not functioning. They do gradually start to from this point, but function begins in the brain stem, which is not a site of consciousness; early fetal movement is caused by brain stem activity. Front brain stuff doesn't start to be active until quite late.
Quoted from: https://www.healthline.com/health/when-does-a-fetus-develop-a-brain#anatomy [External Link]
Around week 5, your baby’s brain, spinal cord, and heart begin to develop. Your baby’s brain is part of the central nervous system, which also houses the spinal cord. There are three key components of a baby’s brain to consider. These include:
Cerebrum: Thinking, remembering, and feeling occurs in this part of the brain.
Cerebellum: This part of the brain is responsible for motor control, which allows the baby to move their arms and legs, among other things.
Brain stem: Keeping the body alive is the primary role of the brain stem. This includes breathing, heartbeat, and blood pressure.
/end quote
It looks like the argument about the point at which a baby is considered alive is after the 5 week mark, which is about 1 week after pregnancy symptoms develop (I think. I'll never have children so I don't pay attention to that).
Of course, as I said before, one could argue about this. People could, for instance, argue with abortion providers or with women who need abortions. But the TherinS of the world instead want to jail them. They figure that while Conservatives can make up their minds about this, women needing abortions cannot, they should be ruled by Conservatives. Because that's freedom.
Worthy of Better, Stronger Together for Reproductive Rights bundle live on itch.io
6 Jul 2022 at 4:25 pm UTC Likes: 6
Higher child poverty levels too. Conservatives are notorious for "We totally care all about you as long as you're not born yet so you represent an excuse to control your mother's life. Once you're born, you're on your own sucker! But we'll make sure you have plenty of chances to get shot at school." That isn't caring about life.
If Conservatives wanted to conserve life, they would push for strong sex education and birth control. They want to punish people for sinning, so they can maintain social control. The common thread in Conservative thinking: Define a rigid "way people are supposed to be" and maintain a sense of order by punishing people who deviate from it, say by being non-Christian, or gay, or black, or a woman who has a reason to use contraception. And then they call this rigid social control "freedom", which I suppose it is if you're white and male and straight and not poor and Christian and boring.
6 Jul 2022 at 4:25 pm UTC Likes: 6
Quoting: TherinSWell, that would sound much more plausible if those same Conservatives didn't consistently oppose both birth control, sex education, and social programs that would help those children after they were born. There is a strong tendency for heavily conservative states to see higher abortion levels. Just more dangerous and probably later term because of the delays their policies lead to one way or another. Now with actual bans it will be the same only more so--abortions will be more dangerous, and some women will get put in jail for them--in a very caring way, no doubt--but they will still happen; in places where Conservatives are emboldened to double down on the stupid policies around sex education and contraception, they may happen even more. And in typical Conservative fashion, the wealthy will have ways to get it done discreetly and will never get charged; it's the poor women that will take it in the neck.Quoting: GuestConservatives don't care about children (not just in the USA but everywhere), they just want control of womens bodies. It's also a ridiculous thing to consider the unborn thing a baby and totally disregard a pregnant womans needs or feelings over it. It's not a casual thing women do between lunch and dinner. Where it's legalised there are no abortion factories either, the women have to talk to their doctors and at least one psychologist.That's about a B.S. argument if I ever heard one. Conservatives want to CONSERVE LIFE. The whole point is to PROTECT children, born and unborn.
Higher child poverty levels too. Conservatives are notorious for "We totally care all about you as long as you're not born yet so you represent an excuse to control your mother's life. Once you're born, you're on your own sucker! But we'll make sure you have plenty of chances to get shot at school." That isn't caring about life.
If Conservatives wanted to conserve life, they would push for strong sex education and birth control. They want to punish people for sinning, so they can maintain social control. The common thread in Conservative thinking: Define a rigid "way people are supposed to be" and maintain a sense of order by punishing people who deviate from it, say by being non-Christian, or gay, or black, or a woman who has a reason to use contraception. And then they call this rigid social control "freedom", which I suppose it is if you're white and male and straight and not poor and Christian and boring.
Worthy of Better, Stronger Together for Reproductive Rights bundle live on itch.io
6 Jul 2022 at 12:36 am UTC Likes: 4
The question is where "personhood" begins, or at a minimum, when some entity capable of independent experience or sensation begins. There are at least two ways to look at that--scientific and religious. I don't like looking at it the religious way because it's foolish superstition, the US Constitution doesn't like looking at it the religious way because "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion". That leaves the scientific way. Looking at it the scientific way, it's not a person or capable of registering experiences until it has, at least, both a brain and some kind of thought-like activity in that brain. That happens relatively late. There could be a lot of fruitful discussion about the science of just when there might be grounds to worry about the ethics of abortion . . . if the religious people would shut up. But they won't, so that discussion can't really take place.
And the only people arguing for abortion bans are doing it on religious grounds (which, themselves, are mainly excuses for forms of social engineering); again, if they think it useful they may reach for pseudo-scientific arguments like "when does life begin", but that's not what they mean. They mean "When is there a soul?" To which my answer is "Never, there's no such thing", but to which the pre-20th-century Catholic doctrine's answer was "at the quickening"--which is to say, when you can feel it move. Christians never had a soul-based early abortion ban doctrine until modern times, when some of found the need to invent it as a weapon against feminism.
6 Jul 2022 at 12:36 am UTC Likes: 4
Quoting: TherinSGetting to the base of it is the belief of when life begins. Is it at conception? Is it only when that baby becomes self-sufficient? I could argue that I have some relatives who have still not reached that point after 30 years.Of course the question isn't where "life" begins. There are millions and millions of live things in and on everyone's body. Bacteria, many of them beneficial, microscopic little bugs living in our skin, on and on. Indeed, there are some things which are independently mobile and have human DNA (certain white blood cells and glial cells, for instance). Nobody says we shouldn't be allowed to do them in if we want.
The question is where "personhood" begins, or at a minimum, when some entity capable of independent experience or sensation begins. There are at least two ways to look at that--scientific and religious. I don't like looking at it the religious way because it's foolish superstition, the US Constitution doesn't like looking at it the religious way because "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion". That leaves the scientific way. Looking at it the scientific way, it's not a person or capable of registering experiences until it has, at least, both a brain and some kind of thought-like activity in that brain. That happens relatively late. There could be a lot of fruitful discussion about the science of just when there might be grounds to worry about the ethics of abortion . . . if the religious people would shut up. But they won't, so that discussion can't really take place.
And the only people arguing for abortion bans are doing it on religious grounds (which, themselves, are mainly excuses for forms of social engineering); again, if they think it useful they may reach for pseudo-scientific arguments like "when does life begin", but that's not what they mean. They mean "When is there a soul?" To which my answer is "Never, there's no such thing", but to which the pre-20th-century Catholic doctrine's answer was "at the quickening"--which is to say, when you can feel it move. Christians never had a soul-based early abortion ban doctrine until modern times, when some of found the need to invent it as a weapon against feminism.
Quirky murder mystery adventure Lord Winklebottom Investigates releases July 28th
5 Jul 2022 at 4:49 pm UTC
5 Jul 2022 at 4:49 pm UTC
Actually sort of interested in the soundtrack.
13 years ago we appeared online, Happy Birthday to GamingOnLinux
5 Jul 2022 at 4:47 pm UTC
5 Jul 2022 at 4:47 pm UTC
Oh! Well, happy birthday!
Worthy of Better, Stronger Together for Reproductive Rights bundle live on itch.io
5 Jul 2022 at 4:41 pm UTC Likes: 5
Well, this gets long, so
Now, it is certainly true that the US Constitution defines the relationship between federal powers and state powers in a way that is intended to restrict federal powers. This is largely because in the US, the states were pre-existing entities whose governments wanted to continue doing their own things, committing their own injustices, rather than suffer the possible injustices of this new entity they were creating. They needed to make a federal government, but they didn't really want to make a federal government. So they tried to make one that basically wouldn't work, or at least, which would work for warfare and little else. They didn't succeed, partly because the politicians in the central government were, just like the state ones, powerhungry, partly because if a country's going to exist it needs to function, so workarounds to constitutional roadblocks had to be found. Note that one reason for doing this that they did not have was the notion that small states were somehow more democratic than large ones. Frankly, a big part of the motivation was the slave states wanted to make sure nobody interfered with slavery.
They also built the federal government to be fairly undemocratic (e.g. consider the Senate), and that part was fairly successful, so one might think that giving the individual states more power would lead to an increase in democracy. One would think wrong. The individual states are also very good at being undemocratic. Their politics are gerrymandered to hell and gone, just as deeply drenched in money as the federal politics, and of course the ways the political landscape is sewn up by the two major parties to the exclusion of all others are rooted in state institutions, which are carefully designed to make it very difficult for other parties to get on ballots or in general make any headway. The United States can only be called democratic if you squint real hard with a bunch of drinks under your belt, and that's true at both the federal and state level. And the results are similarly horrible; I'm constantly reading about some disgraceful, vicious abuse by some US state-level government, often something the state's citizens bitterly resent. There is then nothing sacred about decision-making going to state rather than federal governments (or vice versa); most countries don't even worry about that very much, it became an issue due to the specifics of political horse-trading in circumstances specific to the United States.
But the abortion dispute has, in any case, nothing to do with states' rights or democracy. In general, the right wing culture warriors have wielded whatever weapons come to hand while claiming them to be principles; when past judges have made major decisions, they say the idea of "activist judges" is terrible; they keep saying this right up until the moment they get their own activist judges in position. They back intimidation and even assassination by protesters when it comes to abortion clinics, but take principled stands against any protest around anti-abortion judges. They back states' rights when it's convenient, but use sweeping federal powers when they can get their hands on them. Even this very court, whose Roe vs Wade decision is supposedly all about states' rights, just struck down a state's right to regulate firearms. States' rights are a convenient tool to get their guns, gays and God stuff, not an actual principle they believe in in any serious way. Same goes for the constitution itself, whose stuff about religion they routinely ignore.
And in terms of democracy, polls are clear that the majority of voters in the US favour abortion rights, including majorities in most of the states which are banning abortion rights. Legislatures doing it were elected on other issues or other parts of the sort of right wing cultural zeitgeist that have broader agreement, or they won without majority support from the population because of that gerrymandering. But they sure as hell didn't gain power on promises of banning abortion, nor did they take a vote on the question. So, this decision is to allow state legislatures to better run roughshod over the wishes of their citizens. And that's democracy and freedom?
Finally, in all of this you completely ignored my fundamental point, and the real fundamental issue. You talk of what freedom looks like. I think freedom looks like actual people being free, as in for instance having the right to do things that they want and have strong reason to do. This ruling takes that away from a lot of people. It makes them less free. That is the bottom line, that is where the rubber meets the road--if you oppose actual people being free, you are not supporting freedom. Even if your point is that in theory, sometime in the future, somebody else might get some freedom as an indirect result of the decision to restrict these people's freedom, it is utterly dishonest to ignore the freedom of the actual people you are actually taking it away from.
And hey, there are times when I don't support freedom. So for instance, seatbelt laws--I'm all in favour of circumscribing people's right to ride in motor vehicles without seatbelts. There are other values and rights which need to be balanced with freedom. That's why the "Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society." But when I back restricting freedom, I don't pretend I'm doing it in the name of freedom.
5 Jul 2022 at 4:41 pm UTC Likes: 5
Quoting: TherinS(responding to purple).The thing is, I'm not an American so I don't have to worship the American Constitution. The Canadian one, for instance, is far better, and the Venezuelan one immeasurably better. The US Constitution needs some major updates. As a possibly-relevant example, the US Constitution does not contain equal rights for women. But it clearly should.
You've always seemed like a voice of reason so I'll be kind to you in my response. It seems like many people are not aware of how the Colonies (er, US Constitution) determines what rights the citizenry has. The Constitution is a document detailing the LIMITS of the federal government. Everything not specifically enumerated in the Constitution (and its amendments) is the right of the individual States to decide. The overturned decision is not and was never defined in the founding documents or subsequent articles, and until 1973 was left to individual states (the voting citizens) to decide for themselves how they wish to address the subject matter and that right has now been restored.
How other way than to return the power to the people could Democracy be defined?
If complaints of "Freedom" and "our Democracy is being destroyed" are what you are referring to, then perhaps a good long think about what freedom looks like is necessary.
Well, this gets long, so
Spoiler, click me
Now, it is certainly true that the US Constitution defines the relationship between federal powers and state powers in a way that is intended to restrict federal powers. This is largely because in the US, the states were pre-existing entities whose governments wanted to continue doing their own things, committing their own injustices, rather than suffer the possible injustices of this new entity they were creating. They needed to make a federal government, but they didn't really want to make a federal government. So they tried to make one that basically wouldn't work, or at least, which would work for warfare and little else. They didn't succeed, partly because the politicians in the central government were, just like the state ones, powerhungry, partly because if a country's going to exist it needs to function, so workarounds to constitutional roadblocks had to be found. Note that one reason for doing this that they did not have was the notion that small states were somehow more democratic than large ones. Frankly, a big part of the motivation was the slave states wanted to make sure nobody interfered with slavery.
They also built the federal government to be fairly undemocratic (e.g. consider the Senate), and that part was fairly successful, so one might think that giving the individual states more power would lead to an increase in democracy. One would think wrong. The individual states are also very good at being undemocratic. Their politics are gerrymandered to hell and gone, just as deeply drenched in money as the federal politics, and of course the ways the political landscape is sewn up by the two major parties to the exclusion of all others are rooted in state institutions, which are carefully designed to make it very difficult for other parties to get on ballots or in general make any headway. The United States can only be called democratic if you squint real hard with a bunch of drinks under your belt, and that's true at both the federal and state level. And the results are similarly horrible; I'm constantly reading about some disgraceful, vicious abuse by some US state-level government, often something the state's citizens bitterly resent. There is then nothing sacred about decision-making going to state rather than federal governments (or vice versa); most countries don't even worry about that very much, it became an issue due to the specifics of political horse-trading in circumstances specific to the United States.
But the abortion dispute has, in any case, nothing to do with states' rights or democracy. In general, the right wing culture warriors have wielded whatever weapons come to hand while claiming them to be principles; when past judges have made major decisions, they say the idea of "activist judges" is terrible; they keep saying this right up until the moment they get their own activist judges in position. They back intimidation and even assassination by protesters when it comes to abortion clinics, but take principled stands against any protest around anti-abortion judges. They back states' rights when it's convenient, but use sweeping federal powers when they can get their hands on them. Even this very court, whose Roe vs Wade decision is supposedly all about states' rights, just struck down a state's right to regulate firearms. States' rights are a convenient tool to get their guns, gays and God stuff, not an actual principle they believe in in any serious way. Same goes for the constitution itself, whose stuff about religion they routinely ignore.
And in terms of democracy, polls are clear that the majority of voters in the US favour abortion rights, including majorities in most of the states which are banning abortion rights. Legislatures doing it were elected on other issues or other parts of the sort of right wing cultural zeitgeist that have broader agreement, or they won without majority support from the population because of that gerrymandering. But they sure as hell didn't gain power on promises of banning abortion, nor did they take a vote on the question. So, this decision is to allow state legislatures to better run roughshod over the wishes of their citizens. And that's democracy and freedom?
Finally, in all of this you completely ignored my fundamental point, and the real fundamental issue. You talk of what freedom looks like. I think freedom looks like actual people being free, as in for instance having the right to do things that they want and have strong reason to do. This ruling takes that away from a lot of people. It makes them less free. That is the bottom line, that is where the rubber meets the road--if you oppose actual people being free, you are not supporting freedom. Even if your point is that in theory, sometime in the future, somebody else might get some freedom as an indirect result of the decision to restrict these people's freedom, it is utterly dishonest to ignore the freedom of the actual people you are actually taking it away from.
And hey, there are times when I don't support freedom. So for instance, seatbelt laws--I'm all in favour of circumscribing people's right to ride in motor vehicles without seatbelts. There are other values and rights which need to be balanced with freedom. That's why the "Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society." But when I back restricting freedom, I don't pretend I'm doing it in the name of freedom.
Worthy of Better, Stronger Together for Reproductive Rights bundle live on itch.io
4 Jul 2022 at 11:44 pm UTC Likes: 15
4 Jul 2022 at 11:44 pm UTC Likes: 15
Quoting: TherinSWith the decision, Democracy in the USA is shown to be stepping in the correct direction! Removing the choice from the people is something governments, at a national level, have done for thousands (?) of years. Now the choice of forging our own future on this matter has been rightfully returned to individual states where the citizens get to decide for themselves how they wish to be governed. This bundle SHOULD be raising money promoting the freedom to choose our own paths, instead of going to organizations/efforts that wish to strip away the rights of the people to Democratically vote for their own rulers who represent THEM.That's a lot of clever dancing to get around the basic fact that the decision strips actual choice and rights away from a lot of actual people. I'll admit I have been wondering how a bunch of people who normally are all about yelling "Freeeedoooommm!" manage to square this with taking people's freedom away. So the idea is it's OK to take real people's rights away as long as in the process you give rights to a . . . legal entity. Because that's whose rights are really important, and it's much better for this slightly smaller legal entity to have them than that somewhat larger one. Got it.
If a bundle comes along that supports the rights of citizens to make their voices heard in the democratically way our founders intended, then it will be a bundle worth supporting.
Denuvo announced Denuvo SecureDLC to protect DLC
4 Jul 2022 at 11:31 pm UTC Likes: 1
Anyway, aren't the DLC DeNuvo are talking about more like all the stuff people get for aesthetics or pay-to-win in free-to-play games? Seemed to me it was more like that, making sure you can't copy what you get from microtransactions. No doubt it would work for real DLC too, but I feel like that isn't really the focus.
4 Jul 2022 at 11:31 pm UTC Likes: 1
Quoting: scaineWhile the Paradox business model is certainly based on selling a bunch of DLC, as far as I'm aware they don't even have DRM on the base games, let alone the DLC, so I don't see how you can say their business model is based entirely on DRM. At least, I'm pretty sure I've played Stellaris off-line.Quoting: mr-victoryBecause the Paradox business model is based entirely on DRM. If they implement this, and you resent Denuvo enough to avoid buying anything encumbered with it, then this will affect a LOT of DLC.Quoting: finaldestI am looking at you, ParadoxDoes Paradox implement non-Steam DRM? Why are you looking at Paradox?
For example - Surviving Mars is £28, but its DLC is another £80. City Skylines is £23, but its DLC comes to a cool £160. Crusader Kings is free... but (brace yourself) has £220 of DLC available.
I actually don't mind the model - I like that they support their older games with constant expansions (unlike Ubisoft [External Link]), and at the end of the day, you buy what appeals to you. But that's a lot of DLC to apply DRM to.
Anyway, aren't the DLC DeNuvo are talking about more like all the stuff people get for aesthetics or pay-to-win in free-to-play games? Seemed to me it was more like that, making sure you can't copy what you get from microtransactions. No doubt it would work for real DLC too, but I feel like that isn't really the focus.
Denuvo announced Denuvo SecureDLC to protect DLC
4 Jul 2022 at 11:27 pm UTC Likes: 3
4 Jul 2022 at 11:27 pm UTC Likes: 3
Quoting: scaineI wonder if at this point it's actually one of those insurance/legal things. Like, shareholders can sue you or otherwise give you a hard time if you didn't do everything possible to prevent loss of profits via piracy, DRM is theoretically a thing possible you could do to etc. etc., so your legal dept. says if you don't do the DRM (and incidentally employ more lawyers to oversee it) you might be open to troubles. As the guy said in Robocop, "Who cares if it works?"Quoting: AppelsinThat’s a common misconceptionThat's exactly what I meant by "fear of piracy". I think you're pointing out the difference between early release piracy and long-term piracy? I think?
But it's all piracy and there have been quite a few studies (or at least polls) like the one covered here [External Link], that show that the people who pirate games wouldn't (or can't) actually buy the game anyway, so it's all bullshit. Indeed that particular study suggests that piracy increases sales - an outcome unique to the gaming industry.
All DRM does is piss off paying customers and spread misery amongst the people who can't or won't buy the game anyway.
Denuvo announced Denuvo SecureDLC to protect DLC
4 Jul 2022 at 7:29 pm UTC Likes: 5
4 Jul 2022 at 7:29 pm UTC Likes: 5
Quoting: grigiGacha games should be illegal, frankly. They're a form of gambling except without even the chance of a jackpot.Quoting: Purple Library GuyThey say their customers are "ecstatic with the results". Either they're exaggerating a tiny wee bit, or we have adult game developers jumping around with glee and going "OH! Oh yeah! So goood!!!" over some scheme to encumber the hats they sell with DRM.Sadly many games designed for mobiles adopt predatory strategies, and they really don't care if the game makes you happy.
It's better if it drives your anxiety up and you spend money on some fake relief over and over again.
I'm sure those devs would be ecstatic about DRM.
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