SoylentNews

Well, it has been a good run. Some people had some principles, and stuck to them. But the end result is catastrophe. We have made, what? 6000 members? We should be orders of magnitude above that by now. Something is wrong. There is trouble right here in River City! (Music Man, for those too young to get the reference)

Just now, in the submission by butthurt, which I have been watching since it was in the queue, we have people defending the KKK. You know, this is silly. It is ridiculous. This is a farce! Why? Everyone knows the KKK is dead. Those claiming to be KKK are either federal agents or seriously mentally ill persons. That is the only reason that I can say the violence against the KKK was wrong. Although I do not think the violence marred the protest: KKK protests are self-marring. If it was me, no head stomping, just head shots, at an appropriate photo studio, with posting to the internet, a la Anonymous, so we do know who these crazy mentally unbalanced people, and can recognize them in our scopes at a later date. Reap the whirlwind, racists!

But you see, my concern is not with these despicable racists, it is with the false equivalency that SoylentNews seems to be granting them. And not only them, but the gamergater-can't-meet-women crowd, and the Sad Puppies-my-fascist-Futurist_fiction-gets-no-traction people. These people are not to be taken seriously, by anyone! Now I am not saying we should ban them, but just letting them in causes problems for the site as a whole. Yeah, Mighty Buzzard, I hear you, but just listen for a bit.

We are getting an online rep. And it is not a good one. Yes, Ethanol_fueled can be entertaining, but the fact that he posts his racist screeds, even when they are modded down (and they are not always!), hurt SoylentNews. Runaway1956 has similar issues. Not as much of an ass as Eth, but not a contributer of material that is likely to encourage the kind of debate on issues that will make SolylentNews the place to be on the Internets. We are failing to be the replacement for the other site, and this is why. Bad money drives out good, and bad posters drive out good ones. I, for one, welcome [no, scratch that] grow tired of constantly responding to fascist, racist, dominionist, libertarian, and other crap here. I may stop entirely, soon. So, you volunteers, give some thought to what we want to be. A lid on the crazy may not be such a bad idea.

Oh, and by the way, that is the other thing that kind of tipped me off! When we have a certifiable homeless crazy person (MDC), that regularly posts more coherent and interesting things than do these racist trolls, I fear for the existence of SoylentNews. Well. I have said enough. It is up to the site whether I and those like me continue to contribute. The irony is, butthurt did this to me! Ha!!

I've been in my current job for about a year and a half now, and it looks like I need to have a plan B. Things may improve, but it's unclear how and when they might.

It's about two and a half years since I started to look for the current job I have now. One thing I've noticed since then is the decline in the quality of recruitment agencies and consultants. In my previous role I was involved in recruiting, and so had to deal with them from the other end.

I registered with some agencies back then that never removed me from their database despite having been asked and during all that time I get daily spam for completely inappropriate jobs in completely inappropriate locations. The most absurd was for someone to operate an industrial furnace. I'm a software engineer (of sorts).

What is most incredible now is that I received a completely unsolicited email, out of the blue from someone I don't recall ever talking to inviting me to apply for a position, in the wrong location, with a major American company. He didn't hide the company name or the job details. He just emailed me the company name, location and job specs uninvited! I don't suppose that this supplier of very expensive printer ink would be too happy if they knew.

I did not furnish him with a reply.

There was a functionally-illiterate email a couple of days ago from an agency I registered with over five years ago. Spelling? Punctuation? Grammar? A sentence? Look and see.

Hi
Im looking for a couple of Software Engineers to work within a leading edge R&D organisation in Cambridge on long term contract. Im seeking experience of build, make file, GNU tools and C.
I was interested to know if you could be interested , please let me know

So I replied and he blurted out the name of the company, and would you believe I know people who have just run away from there screaming.

It's a small world, and shrinking.

Discuss. (25 marks)

The raving, foaming-at-the-mouth, ideologically-driven Conservatives, having all but ruined the state education system, virtually rendered social housing impotent, all but made access to lawyers impossible for everyone except the rich, gone back on their environmental commitments, gerrymandering the electoral constituencies (in their favour), ridden roughshod over the House of Lords, sent sick and dying people to work for large, rich corporations for free, are now about to eviscerate the National Health Service.

Stewart Lee has a very insightful column in the Guardian.

He gets in the Noam Chomsky one, "Defund, make sure things don’t work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital.

Why should money be used to do good for people? Money should only ever be used to make more money!

If the sick needed treating, the Market would see to their treatment. This is just the Market's way of ridding decent, honest, hard-working people of the dead wood who are just holding us back!

Is that clear?

Give him a blast. Make that hair fly.

Last night I met a lovely woman for drinks after work. We had great conversation, she was cute, and I think that both of us felt that spark. She took the bus downtown to work, so I offered to drive her home. Anyways, long story short she doesn't think that she is interested in dating a poly guy. I think that be being married was the final straw for her.

I don't really understand now why she went on the date in the first place. Maybe just a curiosity thing. It's pretty sad. Having a spark on the first date is pretty rare, so It's disappointing that it didn't work out. I understand and respect her position though. It sucks though.

On another topic, I started reading a new book called 'Open'. It was recommended to me by Kobo, and I thought I'd try it out. It's a story about a woman and her journey to an open marriage. I don't know if I can finish it though. It makes me feel sick to my stomach.

The book is written from a female perspective. It's basically about her sex life from teenager age onwards. Reading it makes be feel extreme envy. The thing I can't handle is how she is desired. I'm only 3 chapters in, and this woman has been hit on by 2 other women and countless men.

In my entire life, I've had two experiences where I have been 'hit' on my women. The first, was when I was maybe 16. It was at a party, and this girl literally fell into my lap and started making out with me. The shocking thing is that she wasn't drunk. I admire the courage that it must have took for her to do that. It was one of the best moments of my life.

The second time was at work, riding the elevator. Some girl said I was hot. Twice. I wasn't attracted to her, but I'll be damned if it didn't make me feel great.

Reading the book reminded me how little attention I actually get. I rarely/never catch girls checking me out. I certainly never get cat-called. I never really get the feeling that some random girl is flirting with me (although I am really dense when it comes to that stuff).

Women seem to be inundated with sexual attention, while men almost never get any sort of attention. I read somewhere that women rate 80% of men below average attractiveness. A woman can put on a low cut top and a short skirt and have men drooling all over her. Men (or at least I) don't have that ability. I can't go get some 'sexy' clothes and get attention from the opposite sex.

When I think about that imbalance, it makes me feel like shit. It makes me feel (even more) unsexy. Why am I not worth the attention of the other sex? Am I unattractive? Sometimes (frequently) I just feel invisible to the opposite sex.

Since this site has a primarily male readership, I'm curious to hear how others here feel? Do you ever feel sexy or desired? Is it just me that feels this way?

This topic has, perhaps, been discussed ad infinitum, ad nauseam. But I won't let that stop me. :)

I do understand that online forums aren't going to bastions of quality argument and rhetoric, especially given the temptation to go all GIFT when folks can be anonymous (or even pseudonymous). I've been guilty of that myself, from time to time.

One of the positives I've seen with Soylent (as compared with other places) is that, as a group, we tend to reward (via positive moderation) those who provide cogent, clear arguments and back them up with data to support those arguments.

AFAICT, there are a variety of motivations for submitting stories and posting comments:
An interest in discussing the topic;
An opportunity to promote their personal political bent/beliefs;
An opportunity to say things one wouldn't say in a meat-space conversation;
An opportunity to share one's sense of humor (such as it might be);
An excuse to troll (in the classical sense);
and many other motivations as well.

My focus is on the first two motivations I list. Making rational, fact-based arguments to support (or elucidate) a point of view often makes for interesting discussions which can illuminate a topic and create a positive environment for exploring a particular subject.

What's more, I suspect that expanding the pool of those who express arguments clearly and cogently could reduce the level of personal attacks and nastiness, at least among those who actually wish to engage with others.

One of the issues I've noticed with those engaged in this sort of discussion are arguments which rely upon faulty data, irrational arguments, unclear prose and poor rhetorical style.

Often, moderation causes the best arguments to rise to the top, which can elevate the discussion considerably. However, that can minimize the voices of those with useful and/or interesting things to say simply because they lack the skills to express those things effectively.

I wonder if a section on the site which contains articles, book references, discussions and other resources can help those with poor logic, writing and/or rhetorical skills to up their game?

It seems to me that while we likely wouldn't create any new Pulitzer Prize winners, we may be able to encourage those with a sincere desire to engage others in more cogent, coherent fashion.

I'm all for freewheeling discussion and am certainly not above poking fun at just about anything. At the same time, I believe it might enhance the level of discourse here by helping people to be better writers.

Am I just pissing in the wind here, or does any of this make sense to the rest of you Soylentils?

The Guardian reports that the Royal Bank of Scotland has advised its clients to:

“Sell everything except high quality bonds. This is about return of capital, not return on capital. In a crowded hall, exit doors are small.”

There is a warning that the current situation is strongly reminiscent of 2008 just before the collapse of Lehman Brothers.

In another report, there are more prophecies of doom.

What's going on?

So, I've been seeing this girl for about 3 months now. I don't really know if she qualifies as a 'girlfriend' or not. Probably not, but it's close.

Anyways, I've been seeing this girl for about 3 months now. We usually are able to get together every week or two, so I've seen her around 10 times. Before Christmas, I went over to her house and met her boyfriend (primary). I was pretty nervous to meet her boyfiend. You can never be sure that partners are fully on board, or not, until you actually meet them. There was a slight chance that I would get my ass kicked (I'm more of a flighter than a fighter), so I was pretty nervous to meet him. Anyways, he turned out to be a really cool guy that I liked a lot.

Last night was my turn to introduce her to my wife. She was nervous. I was nervous. We spent the evening together while my wife was at work, and they met as my wife got home from work.

It was a little awkward. My wife was tired from a day at work. My girlfriend was nervous to meet my wife. I was nervous for both of them. I didn't know what to do while they met. I didn't know if I should touch one (or both) of them or not. I ended up kind of standing between them in an awkward triangle in the kitchen of my house. Small talk ensued.

Yes, it was awkward, but it went well. As well as a meeting like that could go, I suppose. We chatted for about 10 minutes, then I saw her out.

Everything is still going well between my wife and I. She is still not pregnant yet, despite ~8 months of trying or so. I've looked at the stats, and 80% of fertile couples conceive within one year, so there is nothing to worry about yet, but it's hard not to go down that thought path. We will continue trying. It took my mom almost 3 years to get pregnant with me, so...

I'm also thinking of trying to line up more dates again. It's been really, really nice not getting depressed over dating (poly dating as a male is super, super depressing), but I think I might take another try anyways. I really like the girl I have been seeing the last few months, but we aren't able to see each other as much as I would ideally like (because of work or other obligations), so I'm tossing around that idea.

I'm not really sure what the protocol would be for that though... I already talked to my wife about possibly trying to line up another date with someone else, but should I have the same conversation with the new girl that I have been seeing? It's only been 3 months, so I'm not really sure... I think it's a courtesy to check in with your partners before looking for another, but, I mean, we've only had ~10 dates, so... I'm kinda leaning towards just looking and if I manage to find anything to let her know, but I'm not sure...

Anyways, after a year and a half, things are still progressing well. I haven't screwed everything up yet!

I'm not a railway enthusiast at all, but back in the olden days (1960s) there was a British Rail research project to develop a train that could travel at high speed on Birtain's 19th Century railway lines. The project became the Advanced Passenger Train.

The APT employed a tilting mechanism to allow it to go around curves up to 40% faster than conventional trains. It could achieve speeds of 160mph, when not held up by slower traffic. There were even gas turbine-powered prototypes, however in 1981 three electrical trains were built.

Unfortunately, the journalists invited to experience the first Glasgow to London run were plied with drink and reported that the tilting mechanism made them feel sick. Mechanical problems followed, and the trains were withdrawn from service.

They were reintroduced in 1984 but were withdrawn in 1986 for good.

The technology was adopted by other companies in France and Italy, and now Virgin Trains uses the tilting Italian/French Pendolinos on the West Coast Main Line.