The idea of “both-siderism” is anchored on 2D politics: you can’t have “both-siderism” where there are more than 2 sides, hence my point about viewing politics as 2D.

You’re living inside a box and only seeing what’s in that box, hence hyper-aware of the difference between those because they’re all that you know, whilst I’m outside the box and pointing out that compared to the rest of the Universe what’s inside that box you live in isn’t actually very different.

It’s like I’m talking about “the landscapes of the World” with an Eskimo - you keep insisting that “this icy landscape is very different from that icy landscape” (which I’m sure they are in the eyes of a person who has only ever known those landscapes and nothing else) even whilst I point out that they’re both icy landscapes and thus very similar to each other when compared to other kinds of landscapes that do exist in the rest of the World, such as sandy beaches or tropical forests.

Worse, your persistence in closing your eyes to the point I’ve made repeatedly that there are more sides than just two, leaves me with the feeling that I’m talking to a particularly provincial and simple minded Eskimo who thinks that those differences they’re so hyper-aware off between different kinds of icy landscapes are far more important differences that the vastly larger differences between those and the rest of the landscapes that actually exist outside the place they live in.

As a fraction of the total it’s still a small percentage, unless things changed a lot in the 5 years since I moved out of there.

I was thinking that the joke part was about the ciggie rather than the coffee.

Whilst you’re kind of joking (I hope!) on the health benefits, I would say that deriving some enjoyment from all manner of small pleasures is a pretty good way to keep one’s mental sanity.

In my experience that very much depends on the part of Europe you’re in: the “expresso in the morning” thing is mostly common in Southern Europe and France and back in the day when smoking was much more common and was actually allowed indoors in public venues, people having a ciggy and a morning coffee at a cafe was a pretty common sight.

Places in Europe without the whole tradition of coffee places serving expressos never really had this kind of “breakfast”.

On the “Europeans” side that’s at least 2 decades out of date.

The expresso coffee part is still true in a good part of Europe, but pretty much everywhere in it nowadays only a small fraction of people smoke and even those who do can’t actually do it inside a coffee shop because they’re not allowed to smoke there anymore, which spoils a great deal of the enjoyment of having a morning coffee.

You own post:

This bothsiderism is pretty thoughtless.

Your post starts with a sloganeering, hyper-reductive take of what I wrote.

As I wrote in response, “This is Politics, it’s not 1D or 2D”!

It is true that both contribute to a surveillance state but to equate both is to just ignore all policy differences, actions and more to pretend to be nuanced while painting everything as the same shade of grey, which is a downgrade to even black and white thinking.

In case you’re unware of it, two forests can be the same kind of forest even when the trees in each are different: demanding for others to focus on the details of the trees in each (otherwise they’re “painting everything as the same shade of grey”) is just a way to try to avoid that people look at the forest as a whole.

That said, you’re right. The details are different and I didn’t address that in my original post were I only talked about the main policy direction on these domains.

The broad policy direction on this subject is the same and the outcomes have been very similar and over time progressed in the same direction during the time in power of both parties, but things worsened in different domains at different speeds with different parties in power.

This is not even what many Americans call “the ratchet effect”, it’s actually worse because in this case it’s not one pushing in a certain direction and the other refusing to revert it, it’s actually both pushing in the same direction, with just some difference in details here and there which didn’t add up to much difference in outcomes.

So yeah, my point stands that in this domain both US parties are shit and my second point also stands that you’re trying to move the conversation away from criticizing parties for doing this shit by claiming that subtle differences in each party’s shit are more important that the overall shitty nature of their actions in this.

This is Politics, it’s not 1D or 2D, it’s N-Dimensional (with a very, very large N): it’s not just possible but pretty much a Mathematical certainty than in a country were there are only 2 parties they will match perfectly on some dimensions, even whilst not at all matching in others.

Trying to dismiss away that aspect of Reality (which is incoveninent for tribalists) with sloganeering like “bothsiderism” is just parroting propaganda meant for simpletons who see reality as having just one dimension where there is nothing more than 2 sides.

It’s pretty evident by their actual policies that strengthenning of police powers and the surveillance state are things in which both sides of the power duopoly in the US agree in the most, and it the face of both of those parties being shit on that domain your “yeah, but <tiny difference>” discourse is really just trying to distract away from the most nasty aspects of both of those taking big fat dumps on the face of every American, by talking about subtle details in the shape and consistency of each one’s shit.

Now, if you favorite party did start to diverge in that, you would have reason to celebrate, but it ain’t hapenning and discourse such as yours makes it even harder that it will ever happen - why would the tribe’s leadership change their ways when there’s a veritable army of tribalist peons going “yeah, but, bothsiderism” at any criticism of what they do, even those parts which are undeniably shit.

In case you haven’t noticed, the system in place now in the US became what it is today under both Republican and Democrat Administrations.

One has to be a tribalist useful idiot to deny that “their side” has done as much to create a Surveillance State as the “other” side - amongst those few things which have bipartisan support in the US are strengthening of police powers and erosion of privacy.

The comparison with most of Europe (with notable exceptions such as Britain and Russia) is very telling: it absolutely is possible to have low crime without reckless invasion of privacy, widespread civil society surveillance, draconian police powers and a pay-to-play Judicial System.

It has been my general experience over the years that with just about all electronics devices with “everything and the kitchen sink” in them, you’re actually better off buying functional elements separatelly as discrete devices.

For example, you’re better of with a “dumb” fridge plus a good tablet and something to hang it on the fridge door. Another example is how a “dumb” TV and a TV Media Box separatelly are a better choice than a Smart TV.

This is because those things usually have different technology life-cycles (i.e. the time period were a tablet is expected to remain useful and performant is much less than for a fridge) and some parts are useful on their own and hence are more flexible to use if they’re separate (i.e. a standalone tablet has many more uses than one integrated in a Smart Fridge).

It’s a way of showing one’s wealth (and peak dunnig-krugger status when it comes to technology) to visits?!

An alarm that beeps when the door is left open more than X minutes (say, 5 minutes) only requires a stupidly simple circuit and about $5 in parts.

No smarts needed (though it’s probably cheaper to make it with a microcontroller than have the timer circuit be done with discrete parts).

Receives a letter at home from Panasonic containing a message, a color printed sheet and a fridge magnet.

Message reads: “Dear costumer, please use enclosed fridge magnet to hang provided advert sheet on your Panasonic refrigerator”

The floor is the natural environment for babies, hence why they learn to craw before they learn to walk /s

That’s also what popped-up in my mind at that title: giving money and weapons to an ethno-Fascist nation to mass murder children of another ethnicity is also “pure evil”.

In pure ethic and moral terms letting people starve is actually less evil than helping murder children, simply because the former is mostly a passive action (doing evil by refusing to act) whilst the latter is active (acting to, or in this case to help, do evil).

If one sees the former as worse than the latter because the victims of the former are Americans and the victims of the latter are not, one being guided by something else than morals or ethics - most likely some form of tribalism such as Nationalism.

In summary this specific shit, whilst evil, isn’t actually morally and ethically worse than what American Administrations have already been doing: the people activelly helping mass murder Palestinian children clearly don’t have the morals or ethics to refrain from doing this not-quite-as-evil thing, so will do it (and keep on sleeping like babies at night) if they think they will gain from it.

This isn’t at all surprising and not even close to the depts of evil they’re capable of reaching.

I think a more subtle point is that even by the most Business-oriented, cold, calculating, empathy-devoid, mathematical take possible were humans are nothing more than wealth generating cogs, the system is still shit because it’s not using said cogs in the most optimal way (which requires the “cogs” to be healthy and at least somewhat content with life).

In other words, even by the criteria of the hardest of hard Right, the system we have is shit because the over-exploitation of those they see as wealth producing peons and sub-optimal allocation of resources for necessary auxiliary social system means the entire system is producing less wealth than it could if said “wealth producing peons” were kept in better shape and more content.

The rephrase it as a short(ish) metaphor:

• It would be like you’re marooned at sea in a sinking ship and choose to address the risk of not having a good place to anchor when you get to the harbour instead of repairing the hull.

Both things make sense together - people care more about not making a mess were they live than were they don’t and left-wingers also think about others rather than just themselves - “do to others what you would like them to do to you” - which in this case means don’t leave your trash behind to dirty up the place were others live, whilst rightwingers are all about what’s best for themselves and in a place were they don’t live simply dropping their trash on the ground and leaving it to dirty up somebody else’s streets is less hassle for them personally than carrying their trash to the nearest trash bin.

Ah, yes, New Labour - the Other Tory Party.

Here’s one which only works if you know BOTH Portuguese and English:

“In Portugal it’s very common for old ladies to go to a coffee place and ask for a big cock”

(Explanation: the Portuguese word for milk with coffee - “galão” - also means “big rooster”. Those are the only two meanings it has in that language. However when you translate it to English you can use a certain synonym for “rooster” which can be read as having another, very different, meaning)