He was only giving the orders?

I want to believe you’re joking, but I can’t quite believe it.

Surely the solution is to double down and take another round of special K to feel better?

It’s not massive, it’s just average sized.

Surely they just clicked the ‘X’ button and it closed itself down?

There’s an odd tendency amongst certain sections of society to immediately dismiss issues that other people are experiencing based on disgust at some of the people airing the issues. Just because someone unpalatable to you co-opts the issue doesn’t mean it’s a none-issue.

If we want to stop being surprised by things like Brexit and Donald Trump being elected then attempting to silence discussion like this above piece isn’t going to help.

I’ve been told that free markets are just as good.

Someone clearly hasn’t heard of dependency hell.

You reversed the polarity so definitely not gay.

Did it go off?

Is using nukes gay?

Are you asking for a friend?

It’s normally only considered gay if the nuke goes inside you.

How woke.

Where are you getting such questionably cheap steak?

No, Makefile syntax is more extreme.

So he just has to increase the tariff by -20%?

I feel entirely powerless to affect change too. But then at times I guess it’s because the vast majority of people don’t see the world in the same way that I do, and so unless I can convince them that change is important, then isn’t going to happen.

And how would I convince these people? How would I make them see the world in the way that I do? How do I communicate something that is so central to me but so subtle and peripheral to them? Why should they bother to listen?

And the conclusion that I come to is that in a world where we are generally free to express ourselves, but are constantly fighting for attention, it is always going to be an uphill struggle; but it’s the only thing that I can do to change anything.

Sorry that I don’t have an answer for you.

I can understand the desire to rationalise a path through what you’re facing at the moment. But sometimes change is outside of our hands.

As an aside, don’t forget that higher levels of organisation make it easier to decapitate a movement.

Yeah, and I mean, that’s great in theory, but do you understand how large the US is? If a protest started right now in DC, and half the country decided they wanted to attend, even if they all left right now, it would take days for them to even arrive, and then we’d have a hundred million cars trying to get into DC, and the majority wouldn’t even get close. Most probably wouldn’t even make it to West Virginia. It’s not like we can all just hop on a train and be there by dinner time.

Yeah, the point isn’t actually that they get there. The point is that they all dramatically change their behaviour in a fairly worrying way.

I think that sometimes the need for organisation is a little overrated. If 50% of Americans were so pissed off by Trump’s actions that they all just stopped whatever they were doing and converged on Washington DC just so they could stand as close as possible to the federal Government and stare at them in the face… I think something would change. You can do all the organisation you want, but sometimes it’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back that triggers change.

You sure he can keep it up for that long?