Imagine a porn site telling you to seek help because you're a filthy pervert. Thats gotta push some to get some help I'd think.

Heard a comedian crack a joke about that. Went something like, "well all the cool Boomers died of drugs or AIDS so now we're stuck with the hall monitors of the generation."

Hits a little to hard sometimes lol

I work at Apple in the Apple Care department, but not for the Apple Care yalls moms call for help. This has been happening for literally years and I've spoken about it before but no one really took it seriously but now here we are. We were told that we be in a hiring freeze for the foreseeable future and that hiring and promotions would only happen onsite. If we wanted to be promoted we needed to move to Austin or San Fran, the two most expensive cities in the country with no guarantee of a promotion, on our own dime, knowing we won't make a living wage there. Keep in mind that this meeting was being given to a massive department who's main workforce is and has always been WFH.

FFXIV

I don't PVP so I can't speak to that but the lore and PVE is solid. Gameplay is very classic MMO. The releases continue to be ranked and reviewed higher with each one that comes out. Players are strongly encouraged to help new players (sprouts) via the mentoring program. Community has been so good, very helpful, never seen anyone rage or get angry at a new person, or anyone for that matter. Very LGBTQ+ friendly. TONS of fun stuff to do on the side between chapters like glamour or housing for folks that want a chill experience or you can do savage raids or hunts for the more hardcore game play focused players. Me and a friend love to just run around to all the apartments and houses to check out everyone's place from time to time. Some are really amazing. I'll throw mine and my buddy's apartment in that ring we put a lot of work in and did some really cool tricks to make the space feel bigger and more unique. Some people turn their houses into cafes or dance clubs, some require RPing when you visit some don't. They are pretty fun to go to. From time to time they'll have giveaways for gill or items at the parties.

BONUS: It's totally free up to level 70 so you have plenty of time to figure out if the game is for you.

I'm not playing right now, taking a quick break but I'm in the NA server Sargatanas. The name is Obi-Bun Kenobi, I think I have the address to my place in my Adventurer Plate. I leave the apartment unlocked so people can use it for g-posing or just to have a nice place to hang. Come check it out sometime!

Fuckin preach. I'm 33 and have spent the last 8 years in near total isolation because I simply do not have time for anything other than work, chores, feed and bathe myself (if I have time), sleep. That's it. It's deepening my depression and sense of total desperation in ways that I'd never imagined. But hey, at least my company is making billions because that's the truly important part. I'm ready to just say fuck it and go the way of Gen Z. I've saved and saved and worked my ass off, played by the rules, got my degree and it's all been for nothing. I still have nothing. In fact I literally have less than when I was in my 20s. There's nothing I can do to stop another economic crisis and I'm no where near having enough to survive one so fuck it. I'm ready to just do what I want and if that gets me fired or Im in debt because I finally decided to just take the hit and travel wherever I want then so be it. There's nothing we can do, we're on the ride, the clicking of the chains has already started and we are buckled in. Time to just enjoy what we can I guess, even if it sucks the entire time.

Take the severance package. If they are offering a severance package then they are already planning a layoff and are just taking volunteers first. Trust me, this is exactly what happened in tech this year. Take the package or face layoffs / gatting managed out.

It's illegal almost everywhere in the US to have a "natural" burial. There are laws on containers, treatment, and where the deceased can be buried. Dead bodies, while very biodegradable are also toxic and tend to get dug up and parts drug around by animals, up rooted by trees, or dug up during construction after the property is bought out. I do agree that funeral homes are soulless vultures who fleece people in mourning though, the last "fuck you" from capitalism.

Minorities in these places are typically facing poverty levels that most people in the US can't imagine. How are they supposed to move when they can barely afford rent? As for the other women, the white women in these places genuinely don't believe that these laws will affect them. There is this sense that they think that their adjacency to white men will prevent them from being treated the same as others, that somehow it will make them immune. They are getting a massive wakeup call that white men in power only care about other white men. It's a tale as old as time. White women are and have always been our barrer to equality. Once things get bad enough for them they will jump on the side of minorities and equality again. They just don't usually view themselves as one of us, they always think that this time will be different.

There's not a clear and conscience alternative to "American." If you're trying to differentiate us from other people from the Americas you'd just say US Citizen. And while yes the entirety of this hemisphere is some variation of America be it North, Central, or South the other countries here have distinct names and we really don't.

At the risk of sounding like a typical US asshole, here goes nothing. This is how I've explained it to friends from Europe and it seemed to help.

If Brazil had decided to go by the name "United States of Brazil" we would still call them Brazilians because there is another country with the title "United States" that also exists. Similar to how we call people from the Peoples Republic of China, Chinese. We don't call them "People's Republicans" because that's a title not a unique identifier or name. What if that same country decided to go by the name the Peoples Republic of Asia instead, would we call them Peoples Republicans or would we call them Asians?

The title "United States" is telling you that this area is united together and the borders represent states, not country's. "America" tells you where those united states are, the continent of America. The term "American" is generalized and honestly doesn't accurately represent the vast cultural differences within the United States. The states often have their own rights and laws separate from the US government and also unique cultures. Ideally we would be called by our states name for its citizens like Californian or New Yorker, for example. Similar to how you would refer to people from Europe as European unless you wanted to be specific to Italy, then you'd say Italian. But sometimes you need a general term, hence "American."

All that being said, it is problematic and a massive reminder of this country's bloodthirsty and genocidal colonization of a large part of North America. Looking at the country's past shows that they were very much trying to also get central and south America as part of the United States. What better way to propagandize and make it look like they had every right to the rest of the Americas than to make it appear as though this country or that country already was America and therefore should be part of these United States? But however problematic it is this is the name we have now, for better or worse.

As an addendum of sorts. We Indigenous Americans would often much rather be called by the names of our sovereign Nations yet everyone calls us Native American. Why is that? Food for thought that might help with understanding the problematic struggle we have here. It's not simply us as citizens that perpetuate the issue, it's a global colonization effort whether the others realize they are participating or not. (Spoiler: they realize)

tldr: because colonization + United States is a title not a name

Well that explains that fetish.

Yes in the sense that they are housing but it's not affordable housing and I wouldn't call the massive expanse that these apartment complexes take up "high density." One of the complexes next to me has FOUR connected complexes that take up several entire city blocks. The buildings are two stories tall and most of them are one bedroom so these things are concrete hellscapes and they don't hold the same number of people as European style planned cities, not even close. Plus, these aren't apartment buildings in walkable and accessible areas, they are sprawling complexes built smack dab in the middle of the suburbs with NO amenities or public transport within walking distance. They are just tiny shitty fenced in neighborhoods with nothing going for them other than shelter. I'm sure they are much nicer than a lot of places but as someone that's lived in one for 10 years now, they are soul sucking wastes of space. Some of these apartments on the bottom floors could have been corner stores, boutiques, salons, restaurants, or shops. They could have gotten rid of one or two of the parking lots for a park since it's convenient to walk and you don't need a car. Instead we just get packed in here and hope we can keep up with the rent.

Bullshit