It's hard to pick with so many to choose from, but I really liked both A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith, and Stoner by John Williams. They're both good books where I really felt for the characters, I wasn't just waiting for things to happen to move the plot along. They also have some interesting themes, or at least themes which I'm sympathetic to. What's yours?

Climate change will be solved, inequality will be eliminated, peace will prevail, racism will go away, capitalism will be abolished

Hell even if we get one of the five I ain't complaining

On break from Uni so I'm finally letting myself play video games again. I miss a lot of the people back at school already though.

I've been musing about art a lot recently. I don't know, I like to write, both prose and poetry, and I want to make something bigger. I started writing a book of letters, roughly based on my experiences, but I'm worried it's a bit too self-centred. Oh well, I suppose I'll press on. Hopefully by the time I hit about 50,000 words, I like it more. I think I'm around 2,500 right now.

Other than that, I keep finding myself in strange situations romantically. I have a recurring pattern in my life where women who are in long distance relationships and whose name begins with C keep falling for me. My first relationship was like that, and then it happened at least twice more this semester, maybe thrice depending on how you count it. Just kind of rolling along with each of them at the moment, hoping one of them will somehow become single and I can start a relationship. It's kinda fucked, over the summer when I wasn't interested in anyone I was so mentally and emotionally stable, and now I am doing so much worse. Sometimes I wish I were aroace, it feels like that would be easier in my situation. Ah well, I just gotta make the best of it I guess.

Hey, so six months later I stumbled across this again. It was never a hatred for her, just, annoyance, I guess.

I read "peace is every step," after you recommended it. It was really good! I'm not sure if it's my favorite book or anything, but it's definitely one of the ones that has had the most positive impact on my life. It has really helped me. Thank you for recommending it.

New Vegans? No thanks, I usually go with the NCR

B12 is really annoying to remember, but you know what they say about B12:

Can't live with it, can't live without it.

Yeah to me this is kinda asking do the ends justify the means, but in the case the ends are another set of means. But it's still asking if the ends justify the means.

Anarcho-Luigist

I guess my biggest critique would be that a lot of what they ask for ($15 minimum wage, more vacation days and free time, etc.) are things that can relatively easily morph into what is in fact less exploiting the 3rd world; If people have the free time and start gardening, that's good! If they have the spare income and can afford to buy local food or whatever now instead of buying it from some huge corporation that has slaves, that's good!

Is a lot of it ultimately futile because of the way products are sourced in this day and age in the US? Yeah, probably, but if you buy into harm reductionism or whatever, it could reduce some harm. Granted, I would agree that many workers would simply use the new benefits to exploit harder (in the case of higher wages at least; more free time doesn't really give people ways to exploit, at least not super directly), but I think that for many people it would enable them to meet the basic needs of life, like financial security and not constantly fearing about bankruptcy and whatnot, not even giving them the opportunity to exploit more because from the beginning their spending with their new income is dictated by existing conditions. the difference between choosing between Rent and medicine or being able to get both, for example. But in general I agree with you.

I don't know who finds this surprising. Nobody drinks because it's healthy, those who say they do are literally just making an excuse to do so. People drink to feel better, temporarily, even knowing the long term consequences are bad, they don't really care.

The more I live, the more I realize that in an ideal world all those people who don't like to talk politics are right, and that that is especially true in an electoral system. Like why talk about something that makes you sad if you aren't going to do literally anything about it. What's the point.

Very clearly. I can picture the whole thing very clearly, but especially the color. Like I can picture the little spots some apples have, the kinda colored striped of a lighter or darker red, anything

I can picture specific parts or areas of the thing, but I have trouble with the whole thing. Like I can easily imagine an apple visually, but an apple sitting on a cluttered desk is a struggle for me

I started working forty hours a week recently. I was opposed to that many hours before, but now, knowing that I have a good job where I get paid lunch and 2 1/2 hours a day to do whatever, and still seeing how bad and tired I feel everyday, I don't understand how this has been the norm for so long, and how before that the standard was even longer. I hope that either the revolution comes soon, or that at least wages get raised and hours lowered.

Mostly I mean that in the end I regretted spending that time thinking about that friend, and I could have been doing something that I would not regret later, like read a book

Yeah, that's true, and a better way to see it. I guess I'm just still frustrated about it and letting that seep in more than I should. I think I'm having trouble accepting that I probably won't get anything close to closure, that I just have to let it go, which has always been hard for me. But I'm gonna do my best.

Hey, that's what my parents called me too!

Yeah that's fair. Nah, she was leading me on. We dated twice, on and off, and even when we were on different continents for Uni she said she wanted to cuddle with me and stuff like that, but then would change her mind two weeks later and say that she didn't really want to talk to me anymore, then want to be friends again after another two weeks. I probably should've realized that it was going nowhere, but oh well. There was definitely a time when I interpreted someone trying to be my friend as leading me on, and I regret that time, but it wasn't with this girl.

Never been there lol, and saying that I have doesn't strengthen your argument or take away from mine. You can try to ignore facts for as long as you like, but I guess if this really is becoming law then we'll see how it turns out in a year or two. For everyone's sake, I hope that you're right and that this is a good thing, but I remain extremely skeptical.

Did you miss the whole part where if six or seven parents choose to take part in this program, it changes class sizes from 25 to 40? While it is welfare, it's taking money away from others who probably need it more, who definitely need it more if you can afford to use $7,000 to send your kid to private school. I wouldn't say this is anti poor people getting welfare, I'd say I'm anti rich people getting welfare, and also anti poor people getting shafted by said rich people. Which is literally what teachers in the article are saying will happen.

Mate this isn't a "people need authority or they'll make bad choices" thing. That's not true. What is happening, that you seem to ignore, is that this results in people not just being given the option of making a bad choice, but being forced into it. So the alternatives are being forced to make a good choice, or forced to make a bad choice. Yes, in an ideal world they wouldn't be forced either way, but this isn't a matter of idealism. It's a matter of practicality, and personally, I prefer forcibly helping people rather than forcibly hurting them.

My personal stance is that I can see both sides of the argument. I won't shame anyone for voting, or for not voting. I personally don't vote, partially because where I live it wouldn't make any difference. But hey, if it makes people feel better about their life, or feel safer, I'm not gonna judge them for it.

I mean the whole idea of this program is to make kids even more white nationalist, as well as push non-white kids lower down on the social scale, because only the white families will have enough money to actually give their kid a good education. I agree that school has a lot of problems, but I think this is effectively the complete opposite of a solution

I'm comfortable sharing my views with almost anyone, but only have a few who share most of my views. A few is still better than none though.