It is beautiful.

But, it is missing the puckering of a witch’s sphincter.

Hello friend. I was also in your position not so long ago and really feel for you so much. But have hope. There is light at the end of the tunnel youre in, and you’ve taken the first and hardest step in admitting to yourself that it’s a problem. Seriously well done.

There are two things I would suggest you consider if you feel you have the energy to start to tackle this:

The first is that, I believe current methods of getting “clean” and “sober” are inconsistent in their outcomes for a reason.

Whilst total sobriety works for some people, it is my belief and experience, that going completely cold turkey and abstaining from a social and common drug like weed forever, is the hardest route forward long term. I have observed that for those that choose this path, they will always to some degree, feel the pull towards that drug regardless of the length of time they’ve abstained. It will be a constant battle for the rest of their life. To some degree this is sobriety on a knifes edge.

I saw this in the midst of my addiction and decided this wasn’t what I wanted. I wanted a new relationship with my drug of choice. One where I challenged every unhealthy behaviour I’d developed with it. One where I gained control back piece by piece. One where I rewired my brain so much that I could say yes or no depending on the context and reasoning occurring inside.

And so that’s what I did. I started by weaning myself off by working out how much I smoked and choosing to weigh that amount at the start of every day. I’d then decrease this little by little every day, getting used to the feeling and effects of taking that control and running out at the end of each day. This forced my front brain to take charge amdnstart to plan where I’d have this limited amount.

Over two months I eventually whittled it down to one joint a day. It wasn’t without slip ups, but it was important that I accepted these, and instead of criticising myself, got straight back on the horse.

Once I made the jump to zero, I felt it important to give myself a length of time entirely off of it. To deal with the effects of withdrawal, such as night sweats, nightmares, vivid dreams etc.

Then once that period of time, for me six months, had elapsed, I made a list of all the unhealthy behaviours that I had built up over the years with weed. And reintroduced the weed with those in mind, challenging them each individually. This ranged from being able to say no to it when being social, to stopping at a certain point of the evening (one and done etc), to preplanning when I’d order it so that I was free and available to waste that time, so it didn’t impact my life.

For you this will be unique to your addiction.

I can now happily say I’m at a point where 80% of my addictive behaviours are dealt with. Where I am in control and weed is no longer my mistress. The balance has swung in my favour. But I still have some work to do :).

Secondly, I would advise you examine the reasons why you may have been attracted to weed in the first place.

The route cause of your issues will vary depending on your own individual history. But for me things like childhood trauma, ADHD and health issues formed the core parts of my need to use weed as a means to hide from the adult world.

Tackling these greatly helped alleviate the gut feeling of needing weed as a means to cope. Now it forms a part of my social life, as a means to accentuate and elevate a night, or a day at home, rather than a means to close off and hide.

I hope you find this helpful and I wish you the best of luck moving forward friend. Should you choose to go down this path, know that regardless of the slip ups, you’ve got this. As long as you can be gentle with yourself, you can always come back to it.

Peace and love :)

Yeah, let’s just ignore what’s actually good for the kids. What matters is appearing as close to our political enemies as possible.

Fucking honestly.

What portion of the tankie userbase do we think are Chinese intelligence assets? Or at best, shills?

The down vote shaping on this thread I think supports this notion. It’s something that I have seen and personally experienced on Reddit. And, it seems that liberal left wingers are invariably the target.

My experience has always been that tankies, regardless of community, are exceedingly rare in the wild of a western nation. With leftist views usually comes compassion, and that prevents the development of authoritarian views.

There is something wrong with the proportions on Lemmy. There’s more going on than fringe local western tankies. Perhaps Dessalines insistence that Signal was a honeypot, is a projection about Lemmy.ml?

I can’t comment on For All Mankind, I haven’t watched it yet, so I will take your word for it. I can only speak about what’s in my sphere of awareness, but it sounds like you’ve not had a good time with it.

I have to ask, did you not mean to level your criticism of BSG post season three, rather than post season two?

Three is arguably the best season of the series. It had so many highlights, from the devastation of New Caprica, to the climax at the end of the season that the series spent three seasons building towards. There’s so much to point towards in that season that was truly excellent sci-fi.

If you made a typo/mistake, and you actually meant post season three, I can understand your view point and completely agree that from then onwards it wasn’t quite the same. But where we differ is in regards to blame. I think you’re missing important context.

There was a writers guild strike at the end of season three, and it completely derailed the series from then onwards. In fact, it wasn’t the only series that suffered in such a fashion at that time. It’s worth having s read about it if you have the time:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effect_of_the_2007–08_Writers_Guild_of_America_strike_on_television

I don’t think it’s just to lay this particular criticism at Ronald D. Moore’s feet.

I am also struggling to reconcile what you’ve said about his weak portrayal of women in For All Mankind when he did such an incredible job on BSG. If that’s the case I’m heartbroken.

The reason why I am so enamoured with the idea of an RDM helmed Trek is because Trek has shown consistently that it thrives when it leans more into standalone series over serialisation.

Its current hybrid approach is a strength that SNW and SFA has shown works. This is something I feel RDM has shown he can do excellently in the past. BSG was an excellent example of hybrid serialisation until the strike. And for his series work, his writing credits in TNG alone are exemplary:

“Yesterdays Enterprise” “Data’s Day” “Ethics” “Disaster” “Tapestry” “Sins of the Father” “The Pegasus” etc…

You’re absolutely right friend.

But I also think there’s an argument for exploring the effects of trauma in modern Trek.

As a modern society, we are so much more aware of how trauma is perpetuated today. But there’s also so much room for depth in that understanding. This is narrative fuel. It’s definitely a topic rich with potential for exploration within Trek. But it needs to go deep and remain clever. Psychologically and philosophically grounded.

But, this is where their line of inquiry seems to stop in the writers room. Instead of coming up with novel and unique ways to create traumatic situations for our characters, that don’t challenge and eventually break the universe these stories inhabit, and that delve deeply into the nature of trauma and its effects, we find our characters living in a quasi-utopia that speaks more to our time period and asks questions but gives no answers.

This utopia is one that I could imagine might have existed more in Archer’s time. But in the 3100’s is, even with the burn taken into account, unbelievable and disappointing.

This is where a show runner with a bit more awareness, intellect and gut could create more believable and novel scenarios for our characters.

What I wouldn’t give for Ronald D. Moore at the conn.

I really would love Kurtzman to fuck the fuck off at this point.

He has never understood Star Trek at its core. The intricacies and nuances that never should have been messed with; and the superfluous excesses that could be. This is obvious in so many ways. But none more than how he has pushed the narrative in lazy directions repeatedly; yet consistently these were shown not to work. It took him the entire run of discovery to learn this lesson! And even then, never completely.

It has only been relatively recently, when the shows have embraced Trek’s historical strengths in order to create a new vision, that shows have started to truly excel and grab both fans and public attention. But even then, there’s a lack of bold vision and gut. These shows are timid when it comes to exploring ethics and philosophy in ways the 90s and 60s shows never were for their time.

For me, I think fundamentally it speaks to a dumbing down of story telling. It speaks to a lowest common denominator prioritisation by shown runners. It speaks to networks who never take chances.

With Kurtzman it has seemed that each iteration had a predictable path involving a big threat that must be extinguished by the end of season. High stakes with extreme predictability. Because of this prioritisation, so often it felt like the characters served the story, rather than the other way around. That’s not how you get people to care for characters on a show.

Trek was never about this. Historical Trek was about exploring modern ethical dilemmas in a safe sci-fi environment first and foremost. Secondary to that it was about showing how human beings could exist in balance with each other and other species. We need this positive vision now more than ever and yet modern trek feels like a shadow of its former self. It feels too often like skin deep lip service. But, it is improving iteration to iteration.

So please Alex, fuck the fuck off and give some other splendid bastard a shot in the big chair. Unless Ellison intends to replace younwithba fascist. In which case I’m your biggest fan.

PS (and slight SFA spoilers): Did no one else briefly turn off starfleet academy after they tased Nus Braka, even though he was in court, unarmed and only mouthing off? I was outraged that SFA began in such a manner, it didn’t serve the plot, and was wholly unnecessary and disporportionate. It made no sense in the context of the rest of the season.

SFA then ended with a slap and punch to Nus’s face. The casual brutality bookended an otherwise great series. It was a baffling choice, unless it is viewed as being a means of desentising the audience to unnecessary violence from the state. Then it makes perfect sense. That, that is perhaps the thin end of the fascist wedge.

It’s not even Blairism friend. It’s corporate light bullshit with a dash of authoritarianism thrown in. At least under Blair, services were well provided for. There was no NHS black-hole and social care wasn’t at breaking point. There was no laying authoritarian ground work for a incoming fascist frog by abandoning any pretense of personal freedom.

Whilst Blair never really challenged the status quo in any meaningful way, be that reform of either house, evolution to PR or tackling the wealthy’s grip on society, he didn’t actively seek to worsen it either. For many, his government levelled the playing field economically; and his funding of services benefitted generations of Britons.

Starmer’s government is a thinly veiled imitation. One that wraps quasi-austerity in a spending bow whilst making one authoritarian move after another. Lurching from age verification to increased powers to stop legitimate protest.

They are not the same. We’d be better off with a lettuce. But will probably end up with a fascist frog thanks to him betraying his mandate.

I dont mind the presence of these articles. I like to be in the know. I like the opportunity to engage in a constructive nuanced discussion that you can no longer find on Reddit, and can be found in abundance on Lemmy.

What effects me most is that, whether honest (human), not (bots) or covert (intelligence agencies), the defeatism, acceptance and obeyance in advance is the fundamental barrier to meaningful change. It catches, it spreads and it demoralises. It is the boot on our collective necks.

We need to be more mindful of spreading our nihilism to each other, unless we’re happy being part of the problem. More solutions, more raising each other up, less wallowing.

When pressed, he refused to declare Zionism racist in that interview. That’s quite different from saying zionism isn’t racist; he just wouldn’t say that it was. Also, he’s kind of right isn’t he? From a nuanced perspective, it’s Netanyahu and his party that have largely created the fascism at the heart of Israel, so I appreciate his point. But, I suppose theoretically, the fact he went to reflect before changing his position, could indicate a needed to gain permission from the person he is owned by before changing his stance.

This week he has said specifically, that zionism is racism under pressure from his party. I don’t see that as the act of a committed zionist, but then again is it just verbal buttering? He’s seemingly willing to go so much further than Starmer, Badenoch or Farage in his anti-Israel speech. If he was owned by Netanyahu like so many politicians are, he wouldn’t be able to say this freely surely? It also shows he’s willing to go with consensus of his party which is also a good sign.

That said I’ve been fooled before by music to my ears; so it comes down to a matter of trust doesn’t it? Do we trust him? There’s no telling before reaching power. He’s been transparent about his finances at least; and doesn’t appear to have been bought like many other politicians. But whether or not he’s a Trojan horse for the left, who has a hidden master, is impossible to see at this stage.

Here’s a paraphrased quote from Zack Polanski: “Zionism is Racism”

What are you even talking about? Israel owns all the other major parties, except the greens! That quote is 100% more than any leader of any UK party has ever said regarding Israel or Gaza.

Three very different sources on this:

• https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/polanski-indicates-support-for-greens-zionism-is-racism-motion/

• https://www.politico.eu/article/uk-green-zack-polanski-zionism-is-racism-motion/

• https://news.sky.com/story/israel-not-committing-genocide-in-gaza-but-casualties-and-destruction-are-utterly-appalling-says-uk-government-13427380

Concerning, it’s one of the few food stuffs with very high naturally occurring levels of Vitamin D. Other major sources of it are either a lot more expensive (like Tuna or Salmon - sardines being an exception but ewww) or are usually fortified and likely processed and refined.

We really need as much Vitamin D as we can get in the UK! Can’t just survive on chips, however much I wish that were the case.

It does seem to be a downward trajectory at least though. Let me cling to a little hope please :P. Perhaps the debates will swing it in Polanski’s favour; he is the only one who lays out a reasonable plan for working folks.

I hope the wider British public wakes up before the election. But, pretty much all of the mainstream media encourages their base instincts to blame immigrants at some level, rather than the wealthy. They are caught in a propaganda loop. Some of that influence is obvious (The Mail), some of it is very subtle (BBC, TheGuardian - editorship).

But I’m not overly optimistic. It took them way too long to realise the Tory leopards were eating their faces.

Americans coming over here is quite laughable. Good luck guys, you’d be better off somewhere that has a relatively young democracy and/or dictatorship in living memory (Germany and Spain look pretty good from where I’m sitting - but even Germany is a little bit O.o).

Ah yes, the great purge was so wonderfully kind.

In case you can’t tell, that is sarcasm.

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