@davidarnell@mastodon.world @burnoutqueen@todon.nl My Great Grandma married a Native American (Canadian territory) and I have family in Canada. My Aunt is one of my me favorite people, who lives in Alberta.

@AutisticInnovator@autistics.life I've had a whole bunch of things mess with my life and routine this year, and honestly, have felt like crap. But have recently forced myself back to eating vegetables etc, cooking properly, at the same time each day, just for the last week or so, and feel so much better.

It's a thing that's easy to get out of when everything's okay, but hard when it goes out of routine, when events mess that all up.. But also easy not to realize it's gone out of routine too... but then hard to get back into it again. lol. But, then, realize it is worth it once you get properly back into it again. Urgh...

@burnoutqueen@todon.nl I remember back in 2008, sat in someones kitchen in Philadelphia. They asked me if I had ever seen a Microwave before, and went on to demonstrate how a Microwave worked. Despite the fact that microwaves first existed here in the UK in the 1960's, decades before I was even born. And this was after people had been quoting Mary Poppins too me. An American Disney Movie with American actors stereotyping the British.

There are many very intelligent Americans of course, some of which have been close friends of mine for 20 plus years. But just to illustrate how isolated and kept dumb many Americans actually are. And THAT is the general perspective that most Europeans have of Americans in general. I hope this is realized.

@burnoutqueen@todon.nl Sorry, I rambled completely off topic to your post. I think what I was getting at, is that such a majority of Americans have been oblivious to how their country has affected the rest of the world. How much damage 'Americanization' has done to world culture.

To use my own country again as an example. There is a massive difference between British culture in the 70's, and the 80's, because Britain, and Western Europe was bombarded with American Media and capitalism. The 'American Dream' even then had to eat into the rest of the world to continue to exist, because all it can do is consume, and turn all into consumers.

But yes. What is happening in America right now. All I see is an exacerbation of what it has actually always been. But it is also a mirror being put in front of people, and I can only hope people see how ugly the reflection actually is.

@burnoutqueen@todon.nl I'm British. 17 years ago, I was supposed to get married and move to America. I had spent a lot of time over there and made a lot of friends. This was Maryland. (I loved Baltimore, the diverse culture there, but I could never deal with how systematically racist and elitist the middle class suburbs were - it was alien too me). A few years after that, I realized just how much of a bullet I had missed. This year, I realize that If I had moved then, I would be back home in the UK already anyway.

I don't want to be insulting to anyone, as some Americans have been the most amazing people I've ever known. But that attitude of "we are the most important and powerful people in the world", alongside actually really being the most generally ignorant and isolated people in the world also, is exactly the reason why I'm so glad I didn't end up there.

(And that's not to say my own country is actually that much better to be fair).

@mpark@mathstodon.xyz @barefootrambling@autistics.life @actuallyadhd@a.gup.pe @actuallyautistic@a.gup.pe I think it's something to do with getting older. Possibly a mix of different things, but perhaps a big one is slowly caring less and less about the social politics and norms.

I used to be far more self conscious of what my body was doing, for example, and try and stay 'still'. Now I more commonly wave my arms around and act out with my body what I'm talking about, as it is more natural for me to do so.

It takes for less energy for me to be all over the place than it actually does to remain still. So there is probably an energy capacity reason here too.

Whilst many here in England fly their flags, proud to be British, I couldn't be any more ashamed. Whilst "White British" for me has only ever been a checkbox on form, for others it is their entire identity.
How boring, plain and empty does someone have to be for that to be the extent of who they are? To be so fearful of anyone even slightly beyond the basic, that it makes them hate with such passion? Creates such a desperate need within themselves to protect that, by pulling those people below themselves and trampling all over them.
I know these people well. They've bullied me at school. Bullied me in the workplace, and bullied me in the streets.
Yet for me, compared to others, I might first appear to be a "White British", just like them, but with a weirdness that doesn't pigeonhole easily, which always put me on the brunt.
I stand by trans. I stand by immigrants. I stand by homosexuals. I stand by neurodivergents. I stand by the creatives, and everyone who's existence offends them.
There are more of us together than there are of them. The fight has only just begun.

#uk #rights #ukpol #trans #immigrants #lbgtq #flags

In the UK, on Sunday the 7th of September at 3pm, the government will send a test emergency alert to mobile phones.
This is possible because Android and iOS allow for full access and control of devices by and governments and phone companies. It is how they remotely unlock phones.
The last time they did this test alert, I had turned my phone off and gone to sleep for a bit, yet the alert went off anyway, and then my phone was off again.
That's because a phone is never fully off whist it has battery, with the microphone, speaker and camera still remotely accessible.
So, on the 7th of September at 3pm, there will be a test to see how private your phone actually is.

#privacy #phone #uk

It is easy to see how many who are further right leaning never really properly understand the meaning of "freedom of speech".
Freedom by definition means freedom in equal measure, to not be restrained or controlled, and so freedom of speech also means the freedom not to listen.
It does not extend to the freedom to abuse. As, to force angry and hateful words upon another, and deny them their freedoms at the same time, is simply to violate them.
Yet, these vile people will still argue themselves to be victims of censorship, without understanding that they are actually demanding for the privilege to abuse. Demanding the freedom to imprison others in hell.

#freedom #rights #philosophy

One thing that has really surprised me about my move to Linux over the last year or so, is that there is not a single usable open source code editor for web development.
I can't stand VScode, because it is a clunky bloated piece of crap, and so many others just copy it for some reason. A few others looked promising, but are just too unstable and lacks development, or even look abandoned.
For the last few months, I have been trying to use ZED, as it seems to get hyped up, but it is absolutely awful, even if you ignore the AI functionality.
It kept messing with my code, despite trying to tell it not too, and it's syntax highlighting is so bad, that three quarters of the page is often just one colour. Then there is all these popups appearing in font of the code I'm trying to write.
I've ended up having to again just go back to Sublime Text, which unfortunately is propriety. But now I can see my code again, ZED has broken it by stripping out some closing tags and adding white space where I don't want it.
That means I have zero interest in Zedless either, which is going to be the upstream code with the AI and telementary stripped out.
I'm not one for usually grumbling about open source apps, as I understand it is people's own time, but I had expected a good open source IDE for Linux to be easy to find.

#linux #ide #codeeditor #opensource #webdevelopment