I’m not associated with anyone in this thread or the situation being discussed. I’m interested how we understand and use cultural signals. Here’s some Pepe detail for the similarly curious:

The alt-right got wise to new media in the 2010s. They started meme-washing their hate mongering and trying to normalize coded hate speech in internet culture using Pepe memes and other popular formats. It snowballed and the Pepe meme = Nazi user association is a product of lasting trends from that time. It’s similar to clocking someone for wearing straight-laced Doc Martens or khakis and a white polo.

For those in the know one of those items is a small red flag. The wearer could be completely ignorant that these are known dog whistles/identifiers for members of hate groups. If someone is wearing a lot of small red flags then it’s less likely the wearer is accidentally serving white supremacist. That’s the point of stealing and manufacturing these kinds of symbols though: most people don’t know they exist or what they intend to mean so the user can feign ignorance with plausible deniability. They’re the inverse of modern progressive advocacy symbols. Wearers can hide in plain sight with just enough Nazi showing that other insiders see them. Pride icons for cowards.

The artist who created Pepe has publicly denounced the character’s use as a hate symbol and regressivist propaganda tool. Whether or not a community or individual “liberates” Pepe from the prison CHUDs built is up to them.

For what it’s worth: I lean toward liberate most of the time (fight against the thieving bigots) but in this situation, even given a permissive setting, adding “posts Pepe” as a mark against is sensible. It’s clear the user is either intentionally pushing hate propaganda or else under enough alt-right influence that their intentions aren’t relevant to the evaluation.

Toss a message at Scott Reeder (Scott Prop and Roll). I’d bet money he either knows folks who worked that set or knows someone who knows someone. I’ve no idea if he’d respond but he seems chill like that.

Your closing sentence hints at the root of the misunderstanding here. It also fails to strengthen your initial claim at all. This study’s Lay summary sets it out perfectly.

Many autistic individuals report feelings of excessive empathy, yet their experience is not reflected by most of the current literature, typically suggesting that autism is characterized by intact emotional and reduced cognitive empathy. To fill this gap, we looked at both ends of the imbalance between these components, termed empathic disequilibrium. We show that, like empathy, empathic disequilibrium is related to autism diagnosis and traits, and thus may provide a more nuanced understanding of empathy and its link with autism.

Autistic folks don’t always exhibit the socially defined traits of autism. Absence of evidence isn’t evidence of absence, right? So while your [claim] [double-down] [pre-emptive concession] [claim] ends with a claim that’s reasonable it is also fundamentally disconnected from the initial claim (which is, at best, half-true). Social and non-social traits are additional dimensions on a complex spectrum. Defining autism only by it’s more visible / stigmatized traits perpetuates the false equivocations of abnormal with disordered and disordered with diseased.

Sent with love ❤️

This is admittedly a bit pedantic but it’s not that the risk doesn’t exist (there may be quite a lot to gain from having your info). It’s because the risk is quite low and the benefit is worth the favorable gamble. Not dissimilar to discussing deeply personal health details with medical professionals. Help begins with trust.

There’s an implicit trust (and often an explicit and enforceable legal agreement in professional contexts (trust, but verify)) between sys admins and troubleshooters. Good admins want quiet happy systems and good devs want to squash bugs. If the dev also dons a black hat occasionally they’d be idiotic to shit where they eat. Not many idiots are part of teams that build things lots of people use.

edit: ope replied to the wrong comment

deleted by creator

That wasn’t the question, was unnecessarily rude, and not something you could possibly know. The only reason to post your comment is to wound a stranger. Your cruelty is obvious and you should be ashamed of yourself. Do better.

A speaker’s public record provides context for their current commentary. Trump’s tells us he is a bigot. Specifically a white supremacist. His recent rhetoric leans in to this. When pressed to clarify, justify, or recant these statements he either deflects or doubles down.

There is no reason to think he is suddenly well intentioned, operating in good faith, or otherwise deserving of some deference of judgement.

That used to be true. Speaking strictly constitutionally “invisible” is still a bit of an overstatement but not unfair. Regardless modern US VPs have some standardized additional roles (National Security Council member being the biggest one) and others assigned per administration which can and reportedly have impacted the administrations they’re party to.

I’m not sure I take your point about Harris’ invisibility in particular. She’s set a new record in her capacity as President of the Senate by casting the most tie-breaker votes in US history. On the flip side she’s drawn a lot of flak while working on the Central America Forward initiative (justified or not is a separate discussion). Her perceived invisibility isn’t because she hasn’t been getting publicly visible work done.

1. Her father is Jamaican.
2. Ultimately we all descend from African-born people. That doesn’t mean all humans are Black.
3. Charlize Theron is African. She’s not Black.
4. Black, as a label, is as much a shared cultural and countercultural identity as it is a familial heritage and racial identity.
5. Your position is misinformed at best, reads worse, and is a weird hill to die on either way.

How?

Because the only things the other side of the aisle wants to deliver are stillborn.

Crazy? No. The timing and optics would be wrong since Sanders wouldn’t help Harris’ campaign play to its advantages. Finding younger candidates with consistent and (hopefully) progressive records, who aren’t currently targets for the Right, and who hold little political baggage, is a better play.

By the same reasoning I think Newsom and Buttigieg aren’t good picks even though they’d do well in the role. The new Dem Pres campaign should make sure the Right’s propagandists have to work hard at effective attack ads. Running any Left-Wing Face misses this initiative.

For context: I’m still bitter about Bernie being pushed out of previous Presidential campaign runs, still think he was the best choice both times, and know he’d make a great VP.

Start here: https://nesslabs.com/how-to-think-better This isn’t an endorsement (though I do like ness labs). That article offers practical evidence-based starting points and additional resources at the end.

There are many people/systems/schools that will offer strategies and solutions. Some are practical and effective. None of them are a replacement for learning what it means to think well, learning how to think well, or actually thinking well.

The next step is learning the jargon of philosophy so you can ask meaningful questions and parse the answers (this is true for any new discipline). I recommend reading anything on the topics of epistemology, ethics, and aesthetics, which resonate with you. Then find others to discuss what you’ve read. You do not have to be right or knowledgeable to earn a voice in the conversation: only an interest in discovering how you might be wrong and helping others discern the same for themselves.

If you haven’t read any classical philosophy but are interested I recommend Euthyphro. It’s brief, poignant, and entertaining.

I hope this helps! Happy to discuss further as well.

I don’t immediately disagree with this. Reactionary decisions breed instability and progress requires a foundation. Though with the Nation’s already flawed fundaments being actively bulldozed I am compelled to ask: what calculated tactics may we reasonably trust are in play?

Biden has played politics well enough. I’ll grant that. Especially while navigating the obscenely successful obstructionist Republican strategies which strangle the Legislature. The fact he’s accomplished anything of note in this climate could reasonably be spun as impressive.

Is the bar for America’s “left-wing” set so low, and the expectation they’ll cow to corporate interest so common (and rightly so), that this spin, these accomplishments, are honestly lauded as the laurels on which the Biden administration may ride to a second term? Forgiving student debt. Ensuring fairer access to home loans. Expanding healthcare coverage for veterans. All good things! No doubt. Is it fair to expect the American people to think this is enough? While higher education, homes, and healthcare become increasingly inaccessible?

Addressing symptoms in this way placates the agitated while maintaining the status quo and setting precedent to, ostensibly, address root cause at a later time. It assumes that the wheel of progress turns slowly. That progress will win out if it is patient and persistent and noble.

The past twelve years have proven this is not so.

The religious right-wing has worked diligently over the last ~70 years to create the current theocratic zeitgeist on which the MAGA parasite is parading to victory. It is not a sudden and surprising uncoordinated incidental movement preying on the Bible belt’s misguided moral anxieties. Haphazardly funneling the reactionary rhetoric of today into a Four Years Hate to seize power and further the ideology of Paul Weyrich. No. It is a dedicated effort. A calculated tactic. Others are replicating it and fascism is on the rise world 'round.

Successful opposition to the oligarchy-backed, well organized, long-planned, and now popular out and proud American fascist hate campaign will not be found in treating symptoms or placating concerned citizens or maintaining the status quo. What, then, is the Progressive answer? What tactic is the Biden Administration, or the Democratic Party, or anyone anywhere deploying that we should “grow the fuck up” and wait to see the impact of? Why should I, or any concerned citizen, trust that this is so?