Posts made by GangOfDolls

Do you think western societies will adopt Universal Basic Income models?

Some may, but it will shock me if the United States jumps on that bandwagon. Everything about how our society functions from soup to nuts is about punishing the poor and getting the poor to agree that they deserve abuse. The compass alignment required for this to happen means a realignment of how employment, education, and health care functions in this country. It's possible to do this but I'm not sure it's probable given the buy-in required.

Major cities are getting the brunt of this but the majority of the population outside of these cities isn't going through the same experience. It's still abstract for these groups and most of this is, so far, just one big fucking inconvenience when it comes to businesses being open and life being able to roll on. There's no amount of escalating cases numbers in New York City that you can show a lot of these people to agree that it's their problem. Sure, it's a problem but that's all happening in New York, which is pointedly not Bible Thump, Mississippi to them. There's still a fair amount of denial that they're just weeks behind these places because magical thinking and prayers will exempt them.

Do you think industries which attract large crowds (sports, entertainment, etc) will stay the same?

Our capacity for forgetting is pretty impressive. Large crowds will prevail as the appetite for this kind of consumption will probably not abate. The average person at this point just wants to go back to normal and their sense of normal includes Las Vegas, arena tour sellouts, and EDM festivals.

Will traveling in general be affected? Not just in the political sense but for example how might tourism change after this?

There will probably more advisories about seasonal outbreaks of the virus and how people are allowed to enter and exit populations where exposure is likely but those restrictions will be per nation. However, unlike 9/11, we don't have a tangible enemy, so the idea of safety when traveling is a lot harder to traverse.

What about films, do you think there might be a shift away from major releases going exclusively to cinemas first?

I think that really depends on how well their market tests of in-home access really does. They're entering a particularly busy channel where being a blockbuster movie is not a standout because original programming on a number of paid app services are doing the same thing for content. Going to the movies is about the experience. They're going to have to find a way to market this experience that's different from just firing up Netflix and sitting on your couch.

The service industry in general took a major hit. What happens down the line, do things get back to normal?

Probably, yes? Certain kinds of services probably won't survive but new ones will rise in their place.

@Aria My mom got a similar result (she's married to an ED doctor and he's just on the rollercoster of constant exposure).

Generally, what means is that you tested negative but there is a very small percentage of incorrect results. These are mostly negative results, who later turn out to be asymptomatic carriers. It's meant to enable doctors to make treatment decisions that assume you are COVID-19 positive even if the test was wrong.

I would, if you can, attempt to seek out another test? I'm not sure where you live so I don't know the ease of that decision but re-testing might be worthwhile even if it's just for your own peace of mind.

My stepfather is a physician at a large public hospital. They've moved all ED operations to outside the hospital and are set-up in temporary modular tents.
He sees his getting as a when and not an if but he's pretty relaxed about it.

A lot of family friends, etc have been calling him and my mom trying to see if he can flex on getting them a test but the criteria for getting a test where they live is pretty stringent, so most people, for now, are just presumed positive.

On the upside, a clinical trial for a vaccine candidate has started. No idea if it will work or not, but it's something.

OKC is pile of jokes in the city I live in. It's mostly PoF, Tinder, and Bumble around here, even though of these three Bumble seems to be the worst of the three. The theory behind that is because Bumble only allows women to make first contact, it seems to be some kind of gilded invitation to show me your dick because I said: hi.

I have no problem talking to people in bars, personally but the bars I tend to gravitate towards are the kind where everyone is hunched over their drink with a look that threatens death if you talk to them. I travel a lot for work so I got over eating by myself at restaurants and it's actually kind of nice to be able to zone out and scroll through your phone while you stuff your face. For the record, I prefer going to the movies by myself, too.

The last few people I've dated - I met through volunteering at the USO Reception Room at the airport or hobbies. Honestly, the USO Reception room has been kind of fun in terms of unearthing the military people who are relatively well adjusted, into cool shit, and not xenophobic MAGA weirdos.

Raw cookie dough, fuck the chocolate chips. I'll actually eat around those.

I don't like sugar-y shit when I'm not depressed. My dad died over the summer so how the fuck I didn't get salmonella poisoning, I have no clue. I certainly ran up on it and punched in the face, like it needed to come at me.

I grew up near a Buddhist temple that had a lovely handcrafted set of iron fences around its property that had both prayer wheels that you would spin as you walked by and swastikas worked into the bars.

Aka manji.

They were really beautiful.

And on the regular some high concern troll, low cultural awareness jackwagon would stealth in middle of the night and cut the swastikas out of the fences. The monks were able to repair the fences a few times but it kept happening and there is no infinite budget for this kind of thing.

So after the final time, they just stopped having them in the fences.

Basically, how to spot the bad kind of swastika is it's the one that got tipped over.

I love this hobby when you find a PC or a group of PCs who just vibe on your RP style or story preferences and a certain kind of narrative magic takes over. The creative high for that is what I think a lot of people chase.

And why we put up with so much terrible behavior and poorly socialized players because the high when it happens makes all of that not necessarily worth it but... easy to ignore or tolerate.

For me, the pitfalls are all about real life. I got a real life jobby job that likes to make me travel in often far, often exhausting ways with no predictable cycle. I love my job to be clear (most of the time) but it doesn't owe to a lot of regularity. So, I have to find games that can work with players who can't be on all the time. And that is not the majority of games, and that's when I don't love this hobby very much - the exile like feelings are magnified by negative experiences with staffers and players and poorly run games.

@Arkandel said in Game of Thrones:

@Lotherio said in Game of Thrones:

Double ... For what its worth, I'm feeling over the abundance of comic genre and zombie genre and supernatural genre stuff on TV, if this heralds in a few more fantasy series in the end. Then I'm grateful they got in the dragon stuff and some of the magic and the general populace has taken to it in droves, could get a few more things out there I'd like to see in TV series format.

What worries me is this kind of stuff costs a lot of money and sooner or later there will be a bust. Probably sooner.

If you produce the next Vampire Diaries drama and it doesn't go well it's not a big deal because the fake fangs and colored contacts prosthetics aren't a big deal. Sink million dollars per episode into a Wheel of Time adaptation that doesn't work and suddenly the producers' narrative will shift wildly into 'oh, the public is tired of fantasy, let's go back to cop show procedurals'.

This is more or less what happened with Chronicles of Shannara on MTV. It wasn't all that good, MTV didn't know what to do with it, and then cancelled it after dumping a bunch of money into a show on a network that's audience wants to watch 'reality' shows featuring reasonably attractive people making terrible romantic decisions.

@SG

***=Bells, Entitlement, and Barbecues***

***=Talk To Your Kids About Bran***

@Ghost

***=Spoilers And Salty AF***

***=SPOILER SPOILER***

Their website has a rather ominous warning to not use it but in a very non-specific way. I'd say all signs point to an abandoned ghostship.

@Jennkryst

What kind of slow travel, wage slave, no bar RP game are you looking for?

This is actually a serious question.

I was not a nerd as a kid, at all. My parents were very norm core and as a result, my exposure to nerd stuff was pretty minimal. My dad liked scifi movies but that was kind of the extent of it. I was in theatre in high school but it was an extension of being a cheerleader and being on the dance team, because the musicals needed dancers.

I was aware of D&D and really high level stuff but only as it's portrayed in the media. I was in an improv theatre troop (Comedysports) because I enjoyed high school theatre and wanted something creative and active to do after work (I had already graduated college by this point). A few male members of the company invited me because we'd regularly grab beers after a show or a rehearsal. They invited me to a TT game that they were running because I was quick on my feet thinker and also I was a woman willing to come to their TT, to be honest about it.

From there, I just kept getting asked to keep playing and from there it transitioned into larp and online games.

@Bad-at-Lurking said in Sexuality: IC and OOC:

I will straight up admit to being pretty skeptical of women playing gay men because (and this is the part where I'm likely to get roasted), most of the examples I have personally seen have been, ah, problematic. I think that's the most diplomatic way to put it.

I have had this experience. A number of times higher than 1. My worst encounter with it was on Haunted Memories but most of the time since, it's been more often than not its been represented by straight or bi women primarily attracted to men who have a kink for gay male porn. Or that's how it reads to me - problematic fetishization of gay sex because it turns their player's crank.

That said, I'm quite certain that I've met some women playing gay men and had no idea because their efforts didn't come across the least bit squicky. Confirmation bias in action.