Notices by Nowhere Girl (gwynnion@mastodon.social)

One of the things Americans fail to understand, because nobody tells them and politicians don't want them to know, is that the government can spend $10k on someone or something now (e.g., UBI, healthcare) and save itself hundreds of thousands in the future -- or even "profit" in the sense of higher productivity and tax revenues.

Instead, we live in a country that insists on spending $150 million on cops to prevent $104,000 in lost subway fares.

But the fundamental flaw of the American liberal, especially those who identify with the Democratic Party, is:

"I believe we should improve society, but not if it significantly changes the social hierarchy, or costs me anything, or affects my property values, or benefits the 'undeserving,' or offends my puritanical squeamishness, or goes against Israel, or gets in the way of successful businesses, or, or, or..."

The same is true of some white leftists, of course, who went MAGA when they realized that's where the money was.

Although some of those were always studiously libertarian or some secret third thing (i.e., fascists) like Glenn Greenwald, who were only mistaken for progressives by cherry-picking their opposition to certain US policies.

There's two kinds of liberals, I think: the kind who become leftists when they realize liberalism is full of bigoted hypocrisy, and the ones who become right-wingers when they decide that's good, actually.

I really wanted to play "Vampire: The Masquerade." I played "Werewolf" once but it didn't click. I wanted to be a femme fatale, you know?

But he suggested I play a Gangrel, the animalistic vampires. He thought that might be more of a stretch? I might learn something!

I was like, "Okay, sure, LOL."

So I created a character which, if you've read my stories, you might know as Katherine Ducote from "You Only Die Twice" and "Shadow Play."

And so much pain and rage gushed out of me like blood.

When I was first transitioning, I wanted to be a head-turner. You know? Just beautiful and delicate. Someone people could love.

(And I still do.)

But my not yet boyfriend recognized I had a lot of unprocessed anger at the way I'd been treated by my family and society.

My first TTRPG character, my namesake, Gwynnion, was -- if not virtue incarnate then at least a soft touch, someone who was willing to sacrifice herself to do the right thing.

But he suggested I dig deeper.

Katherine got better eventually, too.

I have a distinct mental image of her lying on a slab and giving a thumb's up for someone to chop her head off.

For science! The version of her that came back was like: "Okay, I think that's out of my system. Good job. Thanks."

One of the funniest things about that game was -- because Katherine had turned into something they didn't recognize or accept, almost all of her friends hated her and wanted to kill her.

Even the ones who were also vampires!

So metaphors. Yeah. Irony can pretty ironic sometimes.

I eventually found my level, I found that voice that's capable of speaking rage and righteous anger even as I still want to be Little Miss Princess, and I'm a saner person for it, I think.

I don't recommend using role-playing games as therapy.

It's an advanced technique.

I don't think anyone expected THAT.

And as metaphors go, being turned into an unholy monster with a dead heart sitting in your chest and a thirst for a life you can never have is an inexact metaphor for being trans.

Woof. For sure.

But girls don't get a lot of chances to work out their anger in a safe and accepting environment, you know?

Anyway, if you've followed me for any length of time, you can probably tell that's the big dividing line in my personality. I don't feel compelled to swallow my anger, especially at injustice.

And unfortunately, it sometimes feels like that's the only side of me I really show online because things are always terrible. But it's honest?

An LLM is not intelligent except in comparison to a human who thinks it is.

Cis person who is a hateful bigot toward trans people all day long gets called out for it: "Oh, I'm your enemy now? Noted."

Dude, you were always the enemy.

There's a reason almost every Democrat is a Third Way neoliberal conservative who thinks "the left" have gone overboard with this "woke nonsense." It's trickle down or nothing, basically, and having shut off other ideological avenues as "too far left," where else was there for them to go except Trump's doorstep?

American liberalism's alignment with knee-jerk anti-socialism, the wealthy, and a mainstream culture they perceive as straight and white essentially ensured they would become conservatives and ultimately enablers of fascism.

US global standing has collapsed and China's has risen because as terrible as the Chinese government is, it's at least rational and capable of long-term planning unlike the cranks and dementia patients running our government.

Billionaires are like neutrinos: they carry away energy, rarely interact with anyone else, and serve no useful purpose.

The anti-leadership particle is inherently unstable and inevitably decays into a fascist and a billionaire who runs off with all of the money.

"In Keir Starmer, Britain has discovered a new political quality called anti-leadership."

Supposedly smart liberals continue championing the lab leak conspiracy theory because "China bad," basically, which gives me a sense of how deep xenophobia and anti-scientific thinking have penetrated elite circles and the supposed intelligentsia.

"Germ theory, what's that?"