Today is Sunday, March 2093rd, 2020.

Capitol Hill has been a magnet for right-wingers coming to Seattle this year - most notably an anti-trans rally by a Christian theocratic organization from Spokane that led to counter-protestors clashing with police.

It’s a pretty famous neighborhood for its queer population as well as the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone (CHOP/CHAZ) during the 2020 protests, which makes it a target for right-wing agitators despite its strong local community.

This is definitely part of it, parking is pretty hard to find in a lot of downtown. Depending on where you are, traffic can be really bad too, especially over some of the bridges. It’s a very hilly, coastal city limited by its geography in some ways. this video’s a cool explainer on it. The city only has flat land because it burnt down, was regraded, and built back up on top of the old city.

Seattle also just has a pretty good public light rail and bus system. It’s not perfect, but in places where coverage is good it’s great. The city should be leaning into it more, but it’s also very possible to move here and get by without a car. I also suspect (just from my own observation) more people move to Seattle who don’t own a car in the first place.

Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?

forreal, people have such low opinion of what kids can understand (because they think kids have all their own same biases automatically)

My partner teaches preschool, sometimes the kids ask her if she’s a boy. She says she used to be but she’s a girl now, the kids say “ohhh” and immediately move on. It only ever gets weird and confusing for the kids when the parents feel the need to argue that point.

One I haven’t seen in this thread yet: the last playable bit of Bastion, if you choose to take Zulf with you. An early example of Supergiant’s mastery of interactive storytelling, coming to a head with a recognition of humanity in the midst of apocalyptic war.

I won’t overhype it, as others are saying it changes up a lot and there’s a particular section near the end that a few people I know bounced off of. It will be a very different experience, built on the same bones, but trying to accomplish something different.

But holy shit, to me it’s an improvement on an already phenomenal game, and builds on its narrative and mechanics in ways I thought were really clever. It feels like the other side of the coin from the main game and bolsters its themes from another perspective. Can’t recommend it enough.

I gotta get around to the other games in the series sometime, To The Moon was incredible. It’s been so long and I don’t remember many specifics, but I do recall it being one of a few games that encouraged me to come to terms with mortality.

Same on both counts. TWD season 1 is absolutely masterful and got me to care for its cast incredibly quickly.

I genuinely can’t believe the renegade interrupt that can happen during that scene in ME3 is in the game. I haven’t gotten spoiler tags to work consistently across Lemmy so I won’t say it but you know the one. One of those times where being given a choice to kneecap an incredible story moment felt really weird. Maybe other players didn’t connect with him as much / had more desire to continue the genophage?

Outer Wilds got me too, for sure, and stayed in my thoughts long after I finished. The music from the slideshow at the end of the DLC still makes me well up a bit. Such an incredible game. I still think of “the universe is and we are” from one of Solanum’s logs all the time.

I was raised around a lot of “patriotism” (closet nationalism) and have had to adapt the feeling now that I understand better what America actually is and has been. I found that trying to abandon the feeling altogether was making me feel cynical and alone. The parts of America that I love in fact tend to exist despite our government and dominant culture, which steals and appropriates the things I love about us and turns them into the things people know about us and dislike for good reason. I love the source materials, not the end result. As a white person born into privilege on stolen land, my existence is not entirely apart from this, but all’s I can do with that is try to make something better of it.

There’s a salt-of-the-earth working-class segment of this country that’s getting screwed over, knows how and why they and others are getting screwed over, and has learned to survive together in spite of it. People that make families out of communities. Rail hoppers, union organizers, queer punks, the list goes on. That spirit is not unique to this country but there do exist uniquely American forms of it. I’m more proud of these people than words can express, and that’s about as close to patriotic as I can feel these days.

Maybe I just like seeing our shitty protestant labor worship turned to something more productive. Maybe I just spent too much time in the mountains to not fall in love with the land itself. Or maybe I just love banjos.

Maybe banning all men from the community is necessary, or maybe just efficient, to fulfill this purpose.

Yeah, that’s more or less how I see the rule too. Ideally it wouldn’t exist, but without something like it in place, the majority of comments in a women’s issues community would come from men, especially on popular/controversial posts, and the mod team would get bogged down trying to keep discussion on topic. The tradeoff is between creating a community where women can speak to each other on these issues, or including men, some of whom would positively contribute to discussion and have their own relevant experiences to offer. The former isn’t really something that exists otherwise on Lemmy and I do feel it’s important to have a community to fulfill that purpose. I don’t see a more inclusive mod policy that’s simple enough to communicate as a rule for WomensStuff, but other communities could definitely step up to fill that role.

The last two bullet points are good ideas and it’d be completely valid imo to respond to a post in WomensStuff in another community including men. (“Guys, how do we feel about this?” kinda threads) !mensliberation@lemmy.ca may be what you’re looking for, it’s primarily for men and masc people but it is open to everyone to comment. (though my impression is that the vast majority of people there are men)

There you’d find discussion of issues men face too, and discussion of women’s issues could be framed around how men can respond to them. I think it’d actually be cool to encourage discussion of women’s issues among men, without women necessarily being present - I have a feeling different opinions and feelings would come up in a men’s community that probably need to be processed and understood, among people with lived experience as a man. Back when I identified as such I personally benefited a lot from browsing /r/MensLib and engaging in those types of discussions. So long as it’s centered around productive discussion rather than blaming women, which I do see these types of communities do a good job of.

MESSSAAAA!! :D :D The Spin is awesome, was just coming here to post The Dress (still might tbh) really enjoying the Model/Actriz album too.

my favorites released this year so far, in no particular order:

• Messa - The Spin

• Model/Actriz - Pirouette

• McKinley Dixon - Magic Alive!

• key vs. locket - i felt like a sketch

• Viagra Boys - viagr aboys

• Honningbarna - Soft Spot

• Aesop Rock - Black Hole Superette

• Los Thuthanaka - Los Thuthanaka

• Nuvolascura - How This All Ends

• Rival Consoles - Landscape from Memory

• Bleed - Bleed

other albums I’ve fallen in love with this year:

• Gallows Bound - Rotting Oak

• Holy Locust - Beneath the Turning Wheel

• Chelsea Wolfe - She Reaches Out to She Reaches Out to She

• Elder - Innate Passage

• James McMurtry - The Horses and the Hounds

vegan communities might be a closer example. A community of people vastly outnumbered by carnivores that have strong feelings about vegans. Generally when a vegan post gets popular, the comments become a bit of a shit fest due to the influx of people with less positive views of veganism. /r/SeattleWA had a similar issue and without effective moderation, turned into a place for non-Seattlites to complain about Seattle.

AFAIK WomensStuff is open to trans women and nonbinary folks - pretty much anyone who identifies with womanhood on some level and can speak on it based on their own personal experience.

as a nonbinary person with lived experience across the gender spectrum I feel at home both in WomensStuff as well as MensLib type communities, so the “windows + linux” example definitely applies in these spaces too.

it’s definitely a thing for me too :) ideal deep squatting posture is one thing, but for me tight calves end up causing pain / other movement issues / difficulty sleeping too. if it ever ends up bothering you, standing calf stretches like runners do can help, or downward facing dogs, and if you have a resistance band you can do these:

https://www.rehabhero.ca/exercise/banded-active-dorsiflexion

https://www.rehabhero.ca/exercise/elevated-banded-ankle-dorsiflexion

(if it never bothers you feel free to ignore, also posting this for the benefit of anyone else in this thread)

If you’re falling over backward, your calves might be tight! Your ankles have to flex far enough for your feet to sit back far enough to be under your center of gravity.

the rule isn’t based on an immutable quality - the community accepts AMAB trans women and nonbinary folks. It’s in line with the goal of the community being to discuss experiences with womanhood - people that don’t identify with any aspect of it aren’t who the community is for.

Usually self-policing is good enough for this kind of thing. as an American, I don’t have much reason to comment in European centered communities, and while I do occasionally see Americans posting there, it’s pretty rare. (and even more rarely welcomed, lol)

That changes when it’s a community of people that are vastly outnumbered by those that have strong feelings about them. take vegan communities for instance. Check the comments of any vegan community post that gets popular, it’s often a shit fest due to the influx of carnivore opinions, and I can understand mods not feeling able to keep up when this happens. Without enforcing some kind of standard in line with the goals of the community, you turn into /r/SeattleWA, a place for non-Seattlites to complain about Seattle.

Ideally I think this rule doesn’t exist, ideally this could be like other communities where people recognize their opinion isn’t needed here and move on - but that’s absolutely not going to happen with a women’s community.

You can very easily block it if you don’t like the idea of a community that isn’t for you, but e.g. as an American I do like checking in on European communities to see what’s going on over there. Even if they’re clowning on us. That’s ok.

I’m definitely with you in that diet culture does much more harm than good and the weight loss industry overcomplicates it in favor of wacky diets and subscriptions and such.

That being said, just because grifters overcomplicate something, doesn’t mean it’s actually not complicated - especially psychologically, which matters a lot when eating disorders, sensitivities, and difficulties acquiring and preparing quality food, all are in the mix. The psychological aspects are what “weight loss solutions” try to sidestep and I think it really sets people up for failure even if they see some short term loss early on.

Knowing about energy balance could be enough for some, but it’s also definitely reasonable for someone to have further challenges and seek outside help for it. A good nutritionist, trainer, or even therapist can be invaluable for someone struggling to lose weight and keep it off.

imo nobody who is struggling to lose weight needs to be told about energy balance. Everyone knows what a calorie is, and that there’s a daily amount at which they will either lose or gain weight. They probably know they’re above that amount, and need to bring it down to lose weight.

Unfortunately either a lot of good advice or a lot of bad advice can follow that. Nutrition and the psychological factors that influence people’s diets are more complicated and no answer is complete without getting into that too.

the best way to make it stick is to take it slowly. Become more aware of the food choices you make - a food log is helpful here - without necessarily looking to correct them first. Just note the times when you think about food, the times you’re able to eat healthy and smaller portions and the times when it’s harder. Then try and inject some alternatives, make healthier options available for yourself at home, and gradually move your food decisions toward more nutritious food and smaller portions of comfort food.

Even then, thinking in nutrition has moved on from eliminating “bad foods” to eating “good foods” first, and finding a level of moderation with less nutritious food that fits with your goals.

“Stop eating” diets and “fast weight loss” as a primary goal are very good ways to sabotage yourself in the long term. The psychological costs of very restrictive diets are real and lead to losing adherence down the road. Maybe it works for some but the more gradual choice-focused approach worked a lot better for me. Just do what you’re capable of day to day, always trying to push that needle a little further, and you might be surprised at how fast noticeable progress comes!