That’s the problem with racist bullshit. They scrape the racism off and peddle it everywhere until it’s widely accepted and not tied to it’s roots anymore.

Me, too. I hope Kate Beaton is happy. She brought me a lot of joy. Still does!

I always think about this comic when I see his name.

This was the one I was coming to add. It gets stuck in my head for weeks.

Yes, definitely see a different doctor.

In November, the boyfriend and I went ahead and pulled the trigger on replacing both of our aging laptops (even though it was a bit earlier than I’d like- I just play a lot of Stardew Valley, I don’t really need anything fancy).

Thank goodness for that. I’m sad other people won’t have been as fortunate.

Ah, but an argument doesn’t have to be shared in order to have merit.

My walking eye is so dirty!

Scratched my boyfriend’s back for the glory of the Empire!

I actually read a lot of these to him last week. “Strong hair, strong heir” was freaking inspired.

This reply got a laugh out of me. It was more effort than I deserved.

I honestly didn’t even know that. Thanks!

Weird. I thought replying to a comment to mug to the audience for their agreement with your assessment was reddit’s bread and butter.

Instead of contributing anything of value to a conversation, I mean.

I mean it says so right there.

this is not satire

I really don’t want to write “checkmate liberals” but maybe Chad does?

I’m from an entire instance that’s friendly to generative AI. I’m going to explain it like I always do; I used to sell my art for a living. I’m fair at it. But anyone with any computer knowledge can find and use an AI, now, this very minute, for free, and get results that are better than what I’ve ever been capable of producing. And why on Earth should I fight that? Why wouldn’t I embrace it?

There are millions of people in this world and each and every one of them deserves to have a visual representation of whatever they want. There’s some kid on in the internet right now with their weird Sonic OC who deserves to be able to use art of that character as their avatar on Discord, and they shouldn’t have to get a job or try their hand at drawing if they don’t want to, in order to share that image.

Ultimately, this is what made me leave the field entirely. The kind of people I wanted to help with my art were almost universally people with very limited income, who had a weird little song in their heart and no way of sharing it with the world. And that was my passion, as someone who grew up poor- being able to help someone who had no way of coughing up the money required to keep an artist from starving, to be able to see what they were dreaming in their head. Balancing giving art gifts to people with no means, and taking commissions from entitled assholes who were going to send me 8 revisions because they didn’t understand basic color theory no matter how fucking hard I tried to explain it to them, just so I could survive, was a nightmare!

So yes! I support AI art! I will support it til I die! The starvation of artists is a disgusting symptom of the system as a whole, but pretending that the solution is to turn our back on a useful bit of technology is treating the symptom, not the disease. Let SonicFan_2016 or xXxScEnEgUrLxXx or whoever have anything they need to express themselves. Maybe what we should be doing instead of posting pictures or words bitching about how the computers are stealing jobs, is find a way to fund the arts, and those who want to make them, so people like me can go back to making art without having to sell our souls every fifth image to some prick with a fistful of dollars!

Wait… did it wed them by race, or did it wed the 9 men, the 7 dwarves, the 3 elves, and Sauron all together? Because unless I’m mistaken, Galadriel is the only woman amongst them, and I would not envy her.

I’ll have to take your word for it. I struggle with podcasts.

I agree with literally every point you’ve made (especially the ‘had to be there’ notes, it’s so hard trying to explain that) but one.

Here comes a billion words on how I love Sun and Moon. Feel free to skip them, I’m just trying to add to the conversation.

Sun and Moon is on my list of faves because of the slow island vibes, the sun and moon motif… Oh. Let me take a moment and say, as a grass type trainer, I have gotten absolutely effed with starter choices. I love plants, I love flowers, and… It’s insane how often the grass-type starter is the weakest in design. So let me say when Rowlet hit the scene, I fell in love. This precious little floof who turns his head all the way around to look at me in battle, and then turns into a moody teenager when he becomes Datrix (if you’re petting him after battle, and you touch the feather in front of his face he gets so MAD!), finally turning into the extremely badass Decidueye? Grass/Ghost? Hell. Yes. After watching water and fire get bangers of starters for ages, only occasionally getting a starter that felt like it was “good enough” rarely, finally getting my owl was like a sword-in-the-stone moment.

I hear you on Z-Moves but I do really love the idea of doing a little Hawaiian-style dance with your Pokemon to power them up. It feels more like I’m contributing than pointing a rock at something. I actually enjoy that some of the dances look really stupid because you have to ask yourself, “Do I want to look cool right now, or do I want to look a little silly and absolutely destroy my enemies?” There’s also something excellent in facing a friend in battle, and watching them choose to do a dumb pose with mounting horror. “Hahaha, Chris is doing a dance and the background is pink and oh god no he’s chosen to destroy me.”

That was 21 years ago! And where others might expect someone to slow down, I think Jon Stewart’s spending all the time since then writing, interviewing, producing content, and fighting in Congress will suit him well. I think we’ll see a meaner, hungrier Stewart.

I really hope we get a chance to see it.

I shared this upthread but I think that you might enjoy knowing it also. Jon Stewart went, himself, onto Crossfire, Tucker Carlson’s show in 2004. And he just… destroyed him. Here’s a link to the wikipedia article of the incident.

I am so excited to tell you this.

When Tucker Carlson (right-wing shithead) was hosting a show called ‘Crossfire,’ and still wearing a stupid bow tie, he made the mistake of agreeing to have Jon Stewart on his show. Here’s a link to the wikipedia page. There is a whole page for this one incident.

Here is a line that might appeal: “Three months after the appearance, Crossfire was cancelled and Carlson was fired; commentators differ as to how impactful it actually was, but generally agree that Stewart was at least part of the reason.”

And one thing is for sure, Tucker Carlson may have kept his incredibly stupid “man just asking questions” expression… but he stopped wearing that stupid bow tie.