The Donald vs Big Tech

[The Great Cull]

Between the autism/vax stuff and his beef dripping is better than seed oils, maybe this man is just a misunderstood genius?

I wonder has he considered if beef tallow could cure autism yet? I bet it does...

[Black Shepherd Carnage]

...more than 47% of the [US] public have a negative view of [Tesla]. Another 27% are positive on the electric vehicle maker. [...] "Where Tesla is strongest is among the people least likely to buy an EV," said Micah Roberts, partner at Public Opinion Strategies, the Republican pollster for the survey.

Reminded me of this 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYeLAwSpYus

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/04/22/about-half-of-americans-have-a-negative-view-on-tesla-and-elon-musk-cnbc-survey-finds.html

[Eoin McLove]

Yeah the vaccine thing is worth looking at. Which is precisely why it has been looked at repeatedly and no link has been found.

As for the pro-natalism thing, I don't think climate change is the big factor driving the birthrate down. It's more to do with the global housing crisis, cost of living, shit job prospects, childcare costs, etc. A lot of younger people see raising kids in such an unstable social and economic climate as a bad move, especially when they can barely navigate it themselves.

That's true, yeah, but the point still stands I think. Cost of living, cost of houses etc is surely an argument for partnering up sooner? That mightn't necessarily lead to people having kids sooner and having more kids in the end, but that would appear to be a more likely outcome than if people remain single for longer.

The pro-natalist argument (Louise Perry is good on this subject but no doubt is tarnished as a TERFNAZIERMERGERRRRD!) factors in the pressure women feel in the modern world to be go getters, CEOs,  career women... nothing wrong with that as such and everyone should be free to chase whatever their goals might be, but the trade off can be/ appears often to be that by putting off partnering up until later, and thus putting off having kids until later, populations in developed, progressive societies go into decline. Seems like a reasonable and not particularly extreme conclusion to me. I think that the so called meaning crisis must be linked to this. And I'm guilty of it myself. I had no intention of settling down when I was younger and so have ended up in a one and done situation. Totally delighted with the little dude, but delighted to the point that I'm kicking myself we didn't start sooner and have one or two more. Does the fact that I want to solve population decline one orgasm at a time make me a megalomaniac? Yes.

[Black Shepherd Carnage]

Want to have kids, grand. Pushing the notion that we need more humans on the planet? Not grounded in any concrete justification that I can make out. Sure, there are economic reasons to do with ageing populations, etc., but the fact that that is perceived as a problem is an artefact of an economic system that is already detached from concrete resource usage and distribution. An economic system whose strongest advocates, incidentally, tend to be those aligned with the pro-natalism movement. Curiouser and curiouser.

[Eoin McLove]

We need more young people in a society with an aging demographic. That seems sensible. We need a workforce, we need creativity, energy and new ideas to deal with the likes of climate change and to come up with solutions to any other myriad of problems. I imagine pro-natalism is a concept that can be scaled up or down depending on your objectives and as such is easy to dismiss as extremism because you can apply it to different social/ political movements to suit your own ends. I think that without pointing to the outliers who want to have a hundred babies to save the white race or whatever there is something valuable in it. I don't see any value in Western societies continuing to have fewer and fewer kids each generation.

[Black Shepherd Carnage]

Why do we need more young people in a society with an ageing demographic? The only concrete need I see relates to what is needed to maintain the current economic system. That may seem trite or clichéd or whatever, but it just happens to be true that we have more than enough young hands to provide for an ageing demographic. Were it not that so much of their energy goes into producing and consuming shit whose only purpose is to... maintain the current economic system. The value in there being fewer humans on the planet speaks for itself. Humans and animals whose existence is premised on humanity (livestock, pets, etc.) now accounts for a massive % of the mammalian biomass of the entire planet. If we were aiming to exist in better harmony with our habitat, we would be aiming to downsize, not upsize. Major obstacle there is that it would first require living in harmony with each other 

https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2204892120

[Eoin McLove]

Yes OK whatever. You win.

[Black Shepherd Carnage]

I'm not trying to win. I just can't see any other reasons--beyond what boils down to us not being collectively willing or bold enough to radically change our modes of living in a way that would benefit our planetary habitat as a whole--as to why we need to be having more kids.

[Ollkiller]

Needing more kids because of an ageing population is only needed because of the way humans/governments/corporations value money and the way money controls us. We could build a better civilisation but that's hundreds if not thousands of years away.

[Eoin McLove]

I don't think we could. I mean, how could we realistically build a better society? We are humans, we are therefore imperfect in many ways. We can imagine better, fairer systems but we could never bring them into existence because as soon as we were all equal and free and not killing each other, there would be sociopaths and psychopaths waiting to exploit us and emiserate our lives. This is the world we have, the only one. It's imperfect no doubt, but it's not a complete disaster. I think the West have got things largely right, and that's taking into account all of the glaring problems. I think that trying to slowly address and fix those problems to make things better is a more realistic option than ripping society apart and starting again. Imagine the devastation that would ensue in the process only to end up back where we are in a few hundred years... anyway... I think that having kids is a good thing, a great thing even. It's a gift you give to yourself and to the world. Simple as that really. More kids, they rule.

[Ollkiller]

I don't think we could. I mean, how could we realistically build a better society? We are humans, we are therefore imperfect in many ways. We can imagine better, fairer systems but we could never bring them into existence because as soon as we were all equal and free and not killing each other, there would be sociopaths and psychopaths waiting to exploit us and emiserate our lives. This is the world we have, the only one. It's imperfect no doubt, but it's not a complete disaster. I think the West have got things largely right, and that's taking into account all of the glaring problems. I think that trying to slowly address and fix those problems to make things better is a more realistic option than ripping society apart and starting again. Imagine the devastation that would ensue in the process only to end up back where we are in a few hundred years... anyway... I think that having kids is a good thing, a great thing even. It's a gift you give to yourself and to the world. Simple as that really. More kids, they rule.

Not giving out about having kids at all. And we don't live in a terrible civilisation at all. I'm just more on about what "money" is and how it defines our world. Take the example of pensions. We're told we need more young people to pay for the ageing population. But in the morning free money could be created to pay for pensions all over the world. Forever. Free money is created all the time. But not for us. It's for banks or quantitive easing like the EU did.

[Eoin McLove]

Well yeah, I agree with you that there is plenty of unfairness and corruption in the world and even in the best run parts of it. That's my point in a way. Even when you have a well run system, a mostly fair system, one that's at least pointing in the right direction and aiming to improve itself for its citizens you still can't get away from the shit parts of human nature. That's why I think this system is as good as it gets. Put in any other system and it will be rife with the same problems. It's just a part of being a member of the human race.

I am against the anti-natalist mindset because I think that life, despite its many and varied difficulties, is generally worth living. Especially if you're living in an imperfect but pretty decent society. I also prefer the option (because that's all any of these theories are) of allowing the geniuses of the future to figure out how to solve global warming, renewable energy, world hunger, the spreading of and improving of democracy etc etc etc. over the more apocalyptic option of reducing the numbers of people of the planet in an attempt to reduce suffering of human and animal life. I think it's a more realistic proposition. We aren't going back to nature. Nature doesn't want us back 

[Ollkiller]

Well yeah, I agree with you that there is plenty of unfairness and corruption in the world and even in the best run parts of it. That's my point in a way. Even when you have a well run system, a mostly fair system, one that's at least pointing in the right direction and aiming to improve itself for its citizens you still can't get away from the shit parts of human nature. That's why I think this system is as good as it gets. Put in any other system and it will be rife with the same problems. It's just a part of being a member of the human race.

I am against the anti-natalist mindset because I think that life, despite its many and varied difficulties, is generally worth living. Especially if you're living in an imperfect but pretty decent society. I also prefer the option (because that's all any of these theories are) of allowing the geniuses of the future to figure out how to solve global warming, renewable energy, world hunger, the spreading of and improving of democracy etc etc etc. over the more apocalyptic option of reducing the numbers of people of the planet in an attempt to reduce suffering of human and animal life. I think it's a more realistic proposition. We aren't going back to nature. Nature doesn't want us back 

Just on the point of future geniuses solving global warming. Yes technological advances will assist but everything you need to halt global warming is already there. It just does not have government buy in across the globe.
And also I get your point about no matter what system we have in place it will have to contend with the shit parts of human nature. Keeping the narcissists and dictators away from power would be a good start.

[Eoin McLove]

Keeping dictators out of power would be a great start, but it seems unlikely. Their narcissism and socio/psychopathy puts them at a massive advantage over everyone else. They have no qualms in taking everything and fucking everyone else over so our only hope there is to maybe try to tame them via the open market. Just a brain fart there, but maybe there's something in it. I think when dealing with mankind you have to deal with the devil. Or maybe there is no way of solving the issue of dictatorships through any other means that time and bloodshed. What system could conceivably incentivise tyrants to treat their subjects well and offer them a higher level of freedom?!

[Ollkiller]

Keeping dictators out of power would be a great start, but it seems unlikely. Their narcissism and socio/psychopathy puts them at a massive advantage over everyone else. They have no qualms in taking everything and fucking everyone else over so our only hope there is to maybe try to tame them via the open market. Just a brain fart there, but maybe there's something in it. I think when dealing with mankind you have to deal with the devil. Or maybe there is no way of solving the issue of dictatorships through any other means that time and bloodshed. What system could conceivably incentivise tyrants to treat their subjects well and offer them a higher level of freedom?!

Don't think there's any system where dictatorships won't want to subjicate the populous. Only way out of dictatorships is revolt or if enough countries formed a trading block that eliminated all trade with dictatorships and only traded with countries with free elections. Tis a pipe atm anyway.