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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: September 24th, 2023

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  • We scrolled through the feed every couple of weeks to check what was being served up.

    This is a critical flaw in the studies methodology. ‘loiter time’ is a metric used by algorithms to serve up new content, if the researchers where checking each post for signs of misogyny, then they were probably skipping by totally innocucus stuff whilst paying attention to misogyny. This (being the only feedback given) will have shown the researchers what they wanted to see.

    Three months later, The Office, Star Wars, and now The Boys memes continue to punctuate the feed, now interspersed with highly sexist and misogynistic images that have have appeared in the feed without any input from the user.

    It’d be good to know the actual ratios, given this was a guardian study there’s no reason to withhold data, nor a secondary source I can go and find the data. It’s possible that Facebook is simply serving up the entire spectrum of posts proportionately to their activity on the internet, or even favouring anti-sexist posts that are just not noticed/mentioned by the guardian.

    Does anyone genuinely believe banning this sorta stuff is going to “end violence against women and children in one generation”?



  • I would disagree that women who think this way ought be discounted any more that you should say “Don’t date a man that loves big boobs and can’t arrange furniture to save his life”.

    Ultimately we as a species are stuck with the sex drives we’ve got. Whilst some effort can be made to rise above them, (and to recognise potential partners who don’t) I think we also need to find healthy behaviours that can scratch the same itch as the toxic ones.

    Jealousy is fine if stated frankly and honestly, rather than manifesting in surviellance. Relentless pursuit is fine in the framework of formal flirtation, not on a street with stranger. You oughtn’t manhandle where uninvited, but it’s no sin to be physically fit enough to be capable of it.








  • It’s eye witness testimony (according to article) so technically good journalistic practice to quote rather than state. Elsewhere it talks about beatings, for which the journalists could see the wounds, so no quotations are used. If the i had evidence of gunshots (I.e. footage, bullet wounds) I suspect they would state rather than quote.

    I get that it seems awfully calous to cast doubt on the words of the vulnerable, but the fact remains there are those who mask lies behind a veneer of vulnerablility, it’s best practice for a reason.



  • I feel like a lot is being swept under the rug of “quality”, there.

    To make an analogy, I am reminded of when chirstians say a “true babtism” saves the soul, and then you look into their theology and it turns out they only believe 0.5% of babtisms to be genuine.

    A quality education could be a panacea for all things, that still wouldn’t be a good argument for paying for an extra three years schooling, unless you can actually guarentee those years will be a “quality education”.

    There’s a serious case of deminishing returns to education. I know plenty of people who’ve gone through a good high school and 4+ years of university only to come out of it with not a shred of curiosity or critical thinking skills. I couldn’t tell you why, sure it’s quite possible their teachers just weren’t passionate enough, or their class rooms small enough. It’s also possible they just don’t value ‘not being stupid’ enough to even try.


  • Would your parents have pulled you out of school if it had not been illegal?

    What punishment would you have desired to be put upon them if they had?

    Why stop at sixteen? Plenty of adults are stupid, children at least tend to still have some their natural curiosity, unstrangled by the world. I suggest mandatory refresher courses, each adult spends every other tuesday evening at a local community centre, learning the latest in medicine, ecology, queer theory, historical research etc… If they fail to attend they get a fine of two days wages. That’s hardly unreasonable? Afterall the current polycrisis is urgent! can we really afford to wait 40 years (first for the new education to be implimented) then for the children who go through it to reach positions of influence in society, the skills they’ve learned dulling against the grindstone of bloodless office jobs all the while?