It depends. Location, race, social status, and luck determine what kind of experience someone gets

Relevant Key and Peele sketch

It’s a decent sized movement, so you’d have to look into what’s happening in your neck of the woods. Mine is planning a protest outside an ICE detention center this week

A lot more moisture farming and shooting womp rats. Occasional space wizards. That sort of thing

1. He’s a narcissist. People don’t get to his level of wealth by having compassion for the feelings of others. No billionaire ever gat there through their own hard work, they did it by taking advantage of the hard work of other people. He literally does not give a fuck. But narcissists aren’t typically born in a vacuum.

2. Do some research on his upbringing. His father was a narcissist and did all he could to make his son unfettered by compassion for others through constant power games and humiliation. He was raised in South Africa where there was a huge macho culture and it was expected that the strong took advantage of the weak. Elon himself was picked on mercilessly by his classmates, though so he literally had to cope by suppressing his own emotions and not caring about the feelings of most others. I say “most” because the exception would be the fact that he was constantly trying to earn the approval of his father because of his twisted upbringing. Even after his parents divorced when he was 9, he eventually went back to live with his dad despite the constant criticism. In short, Elon learned during his formative years that compassion was a weakness and you can’t just flip a switch to unlearn that.

3. He does copious amounts of drugs and sleeps with a constant stream of women to hide from any possible problematic feelings that would get in the way of his ambitions

Ask her to imagine the following: let’s say she ends up being really close to your spouse one day, like she couldn’t have imagined a better pick. The two of them become super close, but as the years go on, for whatever reason, you end up having an affair. Now ask her if she would go no contact with you because maintaining a relationship would condone your actions and ignore your spouse’s suffering.

If she says no, then maybe she could see a bit of where you’re coming from. If she says yes, well then I would wonder if a lack of empathy was part of the reason your dad sought a relationship elsewhere (not that that justifies cheating).

Sounds like it was the bees’ knees

I think we are reading it differently. From the article, emphasis added:

"[Their day] includes rising at 4:30 a.m., cleaning their room, keeping the public areas spotless. There are Alcoholic Anonymous meetings at 6 a.m. and work hours run from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. four days a week. Life on the farm involves grooming the horses, getting them out of their stalls and into the pastures daily, visits from veterinarians and farriers, and farm maintenance.

The other days the men attend therapy offsite or visit doctors in an effort to build their sobriety. Stable Recovery partners with an outpatient treatment program that provides classes and therapists and both sides keep in constant communication."

So work is a part of the program, not something that comes afterwards. I did not see anything saying they are not paid for the initial year. It says they are not paid until they start working (but neither are they charged). How soon they start working probably depends on going through some training and whether or not they have prior experience in the industry, but the point is that it doesn’t say anything about a year before they can work. It says the goal is to have them in the program for a year, but work is part of the program.

And as the second paragraph points out, they partner with therapists and doctors in outpatient treatment. It’s not just AA meetings.

One thing I missed until I reread this was that their work week is 4 days. Another reason I don’t think this is about taking advantage of anyone.

For what it’s worth 30 days of sobriety is a minimum standard for most sober living programs. It improves the odds of success and reduces the chances that someone will bring a substance into the community. It’s not like they are fine after 30 days, it is a bare minimum standard needed to make the rest of treatment effective.

Idk, seems like they are genuinely interested in the well-being of the participants.

They’re working and receiving room, board, and around $35k/yr. And a stable, supportive environment where they get transportation to outpatient counseling services, where the counselors stay in regular communication with the folks who run the program. You’re making this sound like it’s a grift

Geez, the cynicism runs deep with this one.

The wages you’re quoting is on top of the fact that they don’t charge anything for any of this until the men start working at which point it is $100 a week for food, shelter, clothing, and transportation. Do you know how much the average recovery program costs a patient? About $6k a month. The purpose, community, and stability these men are finding here is priceless.

If there’s one thing that the last 4 years proved its that the systems we have in place to check abuses of power are woefully slow to respond or to change. The only justice he might ever face is the Mangione variety.

“Sometimes I just like to be by myself and listen to my own thoughts. We can talk tomorrow though. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

No you have it backwards, it’s DOM. As in, “I was bad so my dom had to punish me.”

When you keep your eyes on the cross it makes the faces in the periphery seem distorted. Whenever you look at the faces they are normal though

It forces the administration to keep looking at the problem. They can’t pretend things are back to business as usual. The administration has to decide how to respond. Will their response continue to alienate students and faculty who have an ounce of empathy? Or will it begin to address their previous mistakes in a meaningful way. Either way, these students are forcing the conversation. Even if the administration does nothing at all, that is in itself a message.

Do whatever you can live with. That said, you have other options besides all or nothing. You can tell him that it’s taxing to be around him and ask for specific behavioral changes you’d like to see to make things more tolerable. Whether or not he agrees to them is up to him, but you’re at least trying for a workable relationship.

I emphasize behavioral change because he can’t just flip a switch on his beliefs. No one can. Our beliefs are a conclusion based a number of factors including our experiences, the information we are exposed to, our emotions, etc. He couldn’t switch his off and on any more than you could.

If you really want to affect his beliefs he will have to feel like you hear and understand them first. Be curious without expressing judgement. If he feels heard he might be more open to reciprocating that feeling and hear you out.

But you’re not obligated to do that. If you can’t take it then be honest with yourself and take care of you. Just don’t get stuck in black and white thinking

Well then Superman is going to have a bad time here

She wasn’t preaching at you, unless you’re a music executive

I think what Bernie is saying is that for decades Dems have paid lip service to working class concerns while not actually doing much. In reality Dems have been much more beholden to corporate interests.

By the time these plans came out, too many working class folk were already disenfranchised. They saw a party that was vocal about social issues that frankly were not high on the list of priorities for most of them. They were more concerned that inflation was out of control and they could not afford basic expenses. Sure Trump was racist but at least prices were lower when he was in office, or so they would conclude. If he could bring prices down, they would go with him.

Basically Dems were just out of touch with the most important part of their base until it was too late.

Is it too late to become a nurse practitioner?