jpn-langblr

[jpn-langblr]

of the stuff around ai that i Do think is a problem the one that absolutely fills me with the most dread is the unprecedented ease of being able to fabricate convincing evidence for disinformation. with the threat of jobs being lost to ai the path to combating that is pretty obviously via labor organizing and regulations. not to say this is like somehow a 'simple' or god help us easy fix but it's one where the solution is rather intuitive and makes sense. with disinfo it's really like... i can't even begin thinking of a way to meaningfully curb that. we would need like a mass-scale push for digital media literacy in the entire population the likes of which has never been seen. hopefully people who specialize in these sorts of issues have better ideas than i do because damn i am absolutely not looking forward to the days where image gen has advanced past having the distinct artifacting that makes it easy to spot

[jpn-langblr]

what made u anti zionist / helped u unlearn zionism

Unlearning is a work in progress, but basically finding out the information I was given wasn't true. I was taught the "a land without a people for a people without a land" - found out Palestinians, you know, lived here, actually. Was taught all the violence we committed was in self defense - found out we destroyed whole villages to take over the land. Was taught our military is very ethical and never violent without necessity - saw what we do to Palestinians even today (and by "today" I mean before the current escalation in Gaza, I have no idea how anyone can ignore this one now). Was taught we "made the desert bloom" - learned some about native and non-native plants, and about the colonialist nature of trying to transform a whole ecosystem to suit us instead of living with the land as it is. From "Israel vs the Palestinian territories" to learning that even the lands taken over in 48... were taken from them. From "this is our land because this is where we come from" to learning that we aren't the only people that originated in this land and we can't just override the claim of the people who lived here for generations.

None of this, like, inherently means you'll let go of zionism. I know zionists who would agree with me about many of these points. But, I suppose, for me it's a broader anti-colonialism and anti-isolationism thing, and... anti-exceptinalism?

Like, I had to unlearn the idea that antisemitism is a unique and singular kind of oppression that no oppressed group can ever relate to or have solidarity with. The idea that we're alone, we'll always be alone, we're destined to be hated and murdered in ongoing and repeated extermination attempts unless we segregate ourselves in our own state with our own military where we can double down on "kill or be killed" over and over. And because we're the only ones who are this completely rejected by the rest of humanity, anything we do to achieve that goal of safety is justified regardless of who we hurt. Or even that our unique state as victims means we can't actually cause harm in the ways that we were hurt.

Antisemitism is unique in the same way that anti-Blackness is unique and ableism is unique, they all have their own elements. That doesn't mean we can't fight together and form coalitions with other marginalized groups. Romani people are another example of how our experiences are both unique and not. They don't face antisemitism, but they were still part of The Final Solution. We're not The Ultimate Victims, we're one group among many.

All of this together, for me, meant going from "we're the only nation not allowed to have our own country, self determination," to understanding that the issue isn't the question of the right to self determination, it's the fact that we decided to exercise it at the expense of other people. Pretty sure Romani people would face the same reactions if they decided to displace another nation for the sake of their own self determination. This isn't a game of musical chairs, we can't just go "your turn in exile, get out" and expect that to be okay.

Some stateless nations live in a specific location under another country, and they can declare independence in that place without causing harm. It's unfortunate that we didn't have that. But Palestinians shouldn't pay the price.

And Jewish people should be safe everywhere, not just in the small patch of land where we're the oppressor.

Final thing is, had to read a bit about what Palestinians think of all of this. Which is complicated, no group is a monolith, and I don't think I'm qualified to break that down. But after unpacking all the "about us" things, I had to look at their goals from liberation, and now I try to do my best to stay informed and support those goals.

[jpn-langblr]

shoutout to everyone

[jpn-langblr]

if you're in Europe PLEASE consider signing the Stop Destroying Games initiative. the deadline is July 31st 2025. i've posted about it before; it aims to create legislation for publishers to stop killing the games you pay for and to provide an end-of-life plan for live-service products. thank you!!!

[jpn-langblr]

I think a truth I could benefit from internalizing better is that the reason procrastination is bad isn't just cos of "practical" stuff such as "if you leave the task too late you might not have enough time to finish it" or whatever (although, that too), it's that having an uncompleted task in the queue just unavoidably takes a non-trivial mental toll, you have to hold that task in your medium-term memory, your thinking about the near future always has to account for the fact that you need to slot this task in somewhere... even if this kind of stuff is being processed mostly unconsciously it's still mental resources being devoted to this thing, mental resources that could be doing something else! Even if it makes literally no practical difference what time of day the thing gets done, the day where you do it at 9am is just automatically much better than the day where you do it at 9pm. It's very seductive to put something off because "it doesn't really matter when this gets done" but I think that's almost always a fake idea.

[jpn-langblr]

Have you ever experienced an earthquake beyond magnitude 7 on the Richter scale?

[jpn-langblr]

i cannot keep quiet about this anymore.

if you're in the US or Canada and interested in learning a language using a free app please get a library card and download MANGO. it's very good and extremely free with a library card (there are many public libraries and universities using the service, so make an account and use the search feature here to find out if there's one near you).

mango currently has 72 available languages and dialects (that's right! different courses for french or canadian french! spanish or latam spanish!). it's set up basically like an audiobook with text. the idea is that the narrator explains the words while you read, and you repeat after them or say the translation out loud when prompted. there's a daily review where you go through flashcards. you can also use the flashcards at your leisure and create your own. at the end of each chapter there's a listening comprehension quiz and a reading comprehension quiz. i cannot emphasize how effective this all is. and it's free with a card.

if you're not in the US or Canada and/or looking for something more like duolingo (don't use duolingo btw tldr they fired translators and replaced them with "ai"), then try BUSUU! it only has 14 languages atm but the lessons are really descriptive and effective. it also has a feature where you can correct other people's open-ended speaking/typing exercises. you set your fluent languages, and exercises by people learning those languages will appear in your feed for you to correct. you can even add others as friends! and, much like duolingo, it has a streak and leaderboard system for you to strive for, minus the guilt-tripping owl.

busuu is free (you watch ads to unlock lessons and they're all skippable after like five seconds), although it also has paid premium/plus versions (i don't use the paid version—the language courses are available for free, and the ad system is Really unobtrusive).

so that's my wisdom for the day. mango and busuu. please check them out :)

[jpn-langblr]

honestly i think the most effective way to lead people away from this digitally-induced culture of self pity, and helplessness, and refusal to take responsibility, is the realization that this hurts no one but them and serves others

and also no one is coming to save you

like if you want to look at short form video or etc all day and deny that it's a problem or deny that you have any hand in it, that's fine. you have free will. if you want to respond to every problem in your life with "someone should intervene" that is your right. but the more you do that, the more you shift your locus of control outward and the more you undercut your own innate ability to change your circumstances

and you are going to fall behind people who aren't doing that. they are going to get ahead of you. they are going to date each other and get married. they are going to take your dream job and your dream opportunities. they are going to make the friends you would have otherwise made. while you lie there they are working to get the things you want and they are going to take your place in the real world. time is passing

the billionaires who have gotten you addicted to this shit are going to suck the life out of you for a little bit of money and you are helping them. they don't care if they waste 10 of the most important years of your life. they don't care if they steal your time. they're making money off of it. if anyone comes to stop them they're going to come too late. and you will pay. no one else is paying your specific price. if we killed them all tomorrow it wouldn't give you years of your life back. only you can do this

[jpn-langblr]

"Why is it a problem if students use AI to get through college"

Because if you demonstrate to me that you're willing to set aside concern for truth, evidence, and verifying things with your own eyes whenever it happens to be inconvenient for you, I have a solemn responsibility to make sure you don't get into medical school.

[jpn-langblr]

Why are you using chatgpt to get through college. Why are you spending so much time and money on something just to be functionally illiterate and have zero new skills at the end of it all. Literally shooting yourself in the foot. If you want to waste thirty grand you can always just buy a sportscar.

[jpn-langblr]

you mean to tell me there are people who don't make little creature noises on a daily basis? wild

[jpn-langblr]

Working on my wip and my japanese

[jpn-langblr]

to bomb apartment blocks in tehran while obsessively claiming you're only targeting nuclear sites is truly depraved

[jpn-langblr]

academic dishonesty is not something you can spin as moral lol i do not want to share a career field let alone a social sphere with a bunch of chatgpt using ass bitches

[jpn-langblr]

academic dishonesty is not something you can spin as moral lol i do not want to share a career field let alone a social sphere with a bunch of chatgpt using ass bitches

[jpn-langblr]

(x) id lose my fucking mind. imagine climbing nearly 10k ft of elevation thinking you're the first to ever do it n turns out someone beat you to it a millennium ago

[jpn-langblr]

Ok, loves, so we've all got the message that joking about suicide is bad for your mental health. Now we need to get on "joking that the planet/all of humanity has no future" is bad for societal health/encouraging resistance to bad shit."