Best posts made by dontpanda

My bosses - whom I love - brought in a guest speaker for the staff meeting yesterday without properly vetting him, who was going to talk about self-care (when you work with at-risk teens, this is important). This was, they admitted after, a mistake. I almost stood and interrupted him a half dozen times but I didn't, out of respect for my boss.

After the first...10 minutes or so, he lost the entire room (he didn't even have me for the first 10) when he said, "You can cure cancer with the right supplements. There's a cure out there, but the pharmaceutical companies are sitting on it." Rage mode on.... My colleague's dad didn't want to do chemo and died because of supplements. "Boys are physical, but girls aren't," and "everyone can overcome shyness," I'm sure were two sentiments the introverted woman who runs the gym we have for youth was thrilled to hear.

It was a dumpster fire. It was so bad that my bosses sent out an email to those of us in attendance denouncing the presentation, and apologising for it.

When people you otherwise respect and like reveal themselves to be among the paranoia-riddled, science-ignoring wacknuts who refuse to vaccinate their kids without a real doctor telling them they should not because of this specific medical condition this specific kid has.

I just want to make them go to the poorest places in India and Africa where kids don't get vaccines and wind up dead or permanently crippled because of a disease we all but wiped out 50 gorram years ago.

If my libertarian slant didn't preclude me from insisting children be vaccinated by rule of law... damn my conflicting principles.

@Misadventure said:

http://latining.tumblr.com/post/141567276944/tabletop-gaming-has-a-white-male-terrorism-problem

Comments?

I have mixed feelings, I think. While my experiences have been different from hers, that doesn't mean she's being untruthful in any way. Mostly, I don't like playing with other people I don't know, so my engagement in the community is very limited.

Because my engagement is limited, I don't see Gamergate and SadPuppies the same way many critics of them do, which is fine.

Mostly, I feel sad and angry that she's had these experiences. No one should feel as though they're at risk of bodily harm just because they walk into a store.

@silentsophia I said before, and I will continue to say: even if (and I'm allowing for a Jupiter-sized if) there was a chance that vaccines were linked to autism (there isn't. Not ever), I cannot wrap my head around the concept that I would put my child at risk of catching diseases like polio, measles, diptheria, etc., etc., AND EVEN MORE ETC.

I know kids with autism. Some of them are challenging. So what? Know what else is hard? - burying your gorram kid at 18 months old because he caught whooping cough and died.

I don't tend to yell at strangers. I yelled at a stranger over this. I worry that somehow I came off as the crazy person....

I have just... so many. I worked a barrel full of awful jobs to pay for university, because, well, university wasn't going to pay for itself, and I refused to get a loan.

I worked in the lumber yard of the worst local chain hardware store in the country. That had some good ones...

• A group of people were looking through the lowest quality studs we sold - they weren't suited for building structure, but were fine for supporting walls while you nailed them down, etc etc - and wanted me to open up a brand new lift of them because these were "all warped." Yes, that happens. But since this lift was pretty new, I wasn't going to. They made my life very difficult, and finally demanded to see my manager. He came out (this was one of the Managers I liked) and told them we wouldn't open a new lift for them. He looked at their order and realised they'd bought basically a garage package, but skimped on the 2X4s. He got a smile and then told me to open a new lift. They were pleased, and I was puzzled, until they were gone and he told me his plan. He was going to wait a few days and then call the City's building inspectors and rat them out. Sure enough, he did and they were inspected and - what do you know! - those 2X4s weren't up to code. They had to tear the building down (walls, really). So... then they showed up and wanted a refund from me. I politely informed them that we couldn't accept returns of lumber with holes in it... And then they had to buy all new studs and plywood. Good business decision.

• To this day I do not know why some children poop in the display toilets. I just don't. I have two. They don't poop in display toilets...

• A fellow came in and wanted us to load up his truck while he went in to pay. I told him I wouldn't. He called me racist names that didn't even apply to me (I'm pretty white, and my first name isn't one a Jewish person would have, so... piece it together from there) and used his truck to push the little dumpster (it was on wheels) into the racks of lumber before trying to drive off in a huff. Except he tried to leave through the entrance and got stuck there by an incoming customer, who politely left his truck there while we barred the first fellow from the store, including pictures and whatnot.

I've also worked as a security guard, at 7-11, and was a delivery driver for Office Depot. I seriously could be here all night...

I broke a cardinal rule regarding my mobile devices and turned on my location services, just to try this thing. I figured: people think it's fun and who am I to argue with the horde?

So I download it and use my throwaway gmail address to log in. It wants me to let it see who I am on google and... something else. I deny that. It takes me to the login screen again. I log in, and it wants the same permissions. I start to get the sneaking suspicion I won't be able to play unless I let it into my life.

Baleeted it is, then.

You came close, Pokemon Go... you came closer than my google maps app did to getting me to leave my gps on. But no, you had to get greedy and want access to my life that isn't relevant to the game.

I think it's a cool app idea. I'm happy to see people getting out and doing stuff. Almost hit a dude who was walking around not paying attention, but in my neighbourhood there's no guarantee he was playing Pokemon Go....

@ThatGuyThere I don't like to lie, even when it's harmless. Instead, I say, "No thank you," when I'm asked for information I don't want to share.

Not trying to stir anything up, just a rant...

I cannot understand why some people do not see the substantial and important difference between the challenges faced by lbgt* people in north America (legal rights, etc), and them being THROWN FROM ROOFS in Muslim countries.

I got into an argument about this, and she just would. Not. Admit that there isn't an lbgt person in the world who would choose to risk being thrown from a roof over maybe not being able to get married or whatever...

It's not to minimise anything people experience, but in straight comparison, it's no comparison.

@ThatGuyThere
Oh man. I hate receptions. I would totally love the chance to just go for the service and then bail. No gift? No boring speeches full of inane, inside jokes? No sitting around making small talk? I'll sign up for that every single day.

In fact, I'm usually the person in my circle who will say, "Listen, I know how weddings are. If you discover you have to choose between me and someone else, I want you to know I totally understand, and there's absolutely no hard feelings if you choose the other person." One bride-to-be teared up at that, once; I guess she felt incredibly stressed making the guest list.

I invited some people to the ceremony and not the reception, but the number of seats in my venue was limited (stupid gubmint fire codes). If people wanted to be hurt by that, I can't help it. If they liked me enough to get an invite to the ceremony, they hopefully know me well enough to know I don't run around trying to exclude people.

@Insomnia A real-person trainer?

Wait till he/she/it finds about about Newfoundland time...

@Admiral I decided I was tired of being accused of "mansplaining," so I demanded that the person not assume my gender, and decried the injustice of them doing so; it is assault and hate.

They fell all over themselves apologising and I never had to deal with their asinine complaints again.