• 5 Posts
  • 281 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
cake
Cake day: June 12th, 2023

help-circle



  • Je parle français my dude. J’ai étudié le français jusqu’au niveau universitaire comme mon mineur.

    What 22% of Canada is bilingual? I’m one of them.

    I made my effort. But as I said above you don’t win hearts and minds by angrily jumping down people’s throats on the issue.

    I’m just saying I disagree with the language laws I have Anglo friends living in Quebec, born in Quebec and it is very difficult for them - like the commenter said, they do feel like second class citizens at times. She’s gotta get updates from her kid’s daycare in French only and run them through Google Translate. It’s a lot. It’s like if you were sending your kid to daycare and the caregiver and the parent both spoke Dutch. I really don’t give a flying f if the daycare caregiver chooses to give an update to that parent in Dutch. It doesn’t concern me. But in my understanding they’re not allowed to - it has to be French. Happy to be corrected on that.

    I wouldn’t begrudge someone who serves Vietnamese clientele to have a menu and signage primarily in Vietnamese with English or French smaller on it (or even not at all). Things like this don’t seem to be allowed under the law but I’m happy to be corrected.





  • They’re making it harder and harder to do so apparently and to download the books that you buy from their store.

    I don’t trust that they won’t make a strong push to lock you into the Amazon ecosystem.

    And, bluntly, I don’t trust Bezos, especially after all of this election bullshit he pulled with WaPo where he personally got involved. The chances are now non-zero that Kindle could censor books. If a tyrannical regime told Bezos to remove a list of books from Kindle devices I think he’d roll over and do it. And that’s not right. They’re the customer’s books - they bought them and they get to decide what they read without censorship. And to be clear, I don’t care which way the censorship goes. We shouldn’t be censoring books - full stop.

    I used to be such a kindle Stan but I don’t think they will let me have full control over an expensive device that I buy and books that I buy on their platform.

    I de-drm every book I buy and side load it onto my devices because no company in the future should be able to tell me what books I can read. I’m currently using a Kobo but if they start fucking around too (no signs of this yet…) I’ll find a device that will respect my freedom.



  • Canadian commentary:

    I know it’s difficult with corporate greed and price gouging right now, I’m not debating that.

    I’m worried that the food that people gravitate toward is unhealthy, ultra processed and cheaper on purpose. You need to buy MORE of this kind of food to stay full.

    The US has, in my understanding, a lot of food deserts where healthier options are not available and people are pushed to eat empty calories.

    The late-stage capitalist system wears people so thin that the effort to find and cook cheap healthy meals can be overwhelming if you don’t usually do this.

    Portions in North America are HUGE.

    There are ways to eat for cheaper but I understand that takes effort. For example, I order a $23 CDN all in produce box to my door of oddly shaped/sized produce that feeds two adults for a week. The largest box at $49 easily feeds a family of 4. It takes effort to find and locate services like this. Only available in big cities too.

    I guess what I’m trying to say is it seems like the structure of society and capitalism makes the impact of corporate greed RE: groceries SO much worse.

    Not to mention the wars, gas, and housing prices.

    I know a lot of people are low information but since this issue in my perspective is aggravated and accelerated by so many factors, it still baffles me that people accept the solution is more Republican trickle down economics and tariffs which seem like they’re just going to make the problem worse for everyone.








  • “Historians have a word for Germans who joined the Nazi party, not because they hated Jews, but out of a hope for restored patriotism, or a sense of economic anxiety, or a hope to preserve their religious values, or dislike of their opponents, or raw political opportunism, or convenience, or ignorance, or greed.

    That word is “Nazi.” Nobody cares about their motives any more.

    They joined what they joined. They lent their support and their moral approval. And, in so doing, they bound themselves to everything that came after. Who cares any more what particular knot they used in the binding?”