The number of times Americans have told me “it isn’t chili if it has beans in it” …

I added the part about the floor-crossing for context, since his words are even more interesting knowing that he was a former Conservative.

It is not satire. It’s Canadian news, so I posted it in the Canada comm.

Does anyone have an archive? I’m getting 403 Forbidden on my safe browsing method.

So, I need to become goth? 🤔

I managed to buy groceries and cook for myself this week. It’s enough to make sure I always have dinner. I will still rely on someone for lunches, but this is a good step for me toward independence.

I am considering asking a local cooperative if I can buy a large batch of their chili each week as a way to make sure I always have a nutritious lunch available. I know I like the chili, and I know they do sell batches of it for organizations hosting events. It’s just a matter of initiating contact and discussing, and then logistics.

I’m extremely surprised that the text-only trials had results as good as they did. It’s been my experience that people can detect something “off” from text alone as readily as they can from audio conversations or in-person interactions.

Regardless of medium – email, instant message, forum post, fiction writing – I have received feedback that my communication style is offputting, robotic, unemotional, pompous, direct (negative connotation), and more. If I try to compensate for lack of emotion by including emojis in emails/messages, I’m told it comes across as inauthentic, performative.

I mean, people generally don’t say “he’s an autistic writer” unless they specifically want to reference the fact that this is an autistic person who writes, whereas they would say “he’s a gifted writer” when they mean that he’s very good at his job as a writer.

I think this is a case of a word being used in two different ways. There is gifted, meaning “good at”, and Gifted, as in the special categorization of giftedness. I think in your example, the former definition is being used.

It’s like stoic (unemotional) versus Stoic (specific philosophy).

I need an “autism mode” for applications that never changes anything.

Also, congratulations on the diagnosis.

I also personally think of “giftedness” mostly as a trait that is identified for the benefit of capitalists to exploit. The program had a heavy emphasis on how to become better than non-gifted persons in the domain of moneymaking, and the majority of the sessions were about becoming an entrepreneur. Very much trying to cultivate Tony Stark wannabes and such. And even if the students don’t become that, you know that capitalists are excited to identify potential workers who have increased productivity that they can pay the same hourly wage and exploit more surplus labour value from.

I don’t think I have ever met a “gifted” person who wasn’t autistic. I also haven’t seen that term used much in recent years, as I’m mostly familiar with it from the early 2000s where it was used to name a special education program in the school system. A program that was (as far as I can tell) 100% attended by students that were level 1 autistic (low support needs).

From my understanding, the term “giftedness” mostly describes a very particular, narrow kind of exceptional ability, mostly in processing speed and fact retention. While this is certainly nice, it doesn’t mean that someone is automatically poised to become a great leader or something, despite what the gifted program may have led us to believe. It is possible to be incredibly good at standardized testing and also to suffer from a lack of ability in other key areas, and I would say that the majority of the students I know from the program embody this.

Ultimately, my advice in general is that you don’t need to tell people unless they have similar experiences and it would be a positive thing to do. I find that neurotypical people tend to misunderstand the reason that we tell them such things, and it can ireverably change their perception of us. I have had people tell me that they think I am trying to brag when I so much as tell them that I am very good at math, so I can’t imagine how they would react if I used the term “gifted”, given its loadedness in the cultural context here. My personal approach is to be open about my ADHD with neurotypicals, because it is well-understood and accepted and doing so earns me some much-needed grace about certain things. But I only discuss autism with other autistics unless it’s online in a space like this which is demonstrably anti-ableist, because doing so with neurotypical people has only ever led to my social isolation once their perception of me changed. And giftedness is like the next step up in level of misunderstoodness. I have only ever discussed it with other “twice-exceptional” individuals, and all of them (us, in fact) have very much disliked the terminology and not identified with it.

IQ discourse and the generalized narrow focus of “intelligence” which sidelines all other kinds of intelligence definitely leads to communities that are focused around the topic becoming very and I understand very much why you are turned away by them.

I wonder if they’re called Delta Force because they’re used for regime change. (∆)

Rowling then retroactively implied that Hermione could be a black woman.

I hadn’t heard about this, but this somehow makes the four books’ worth of mocking her for her hair texture even worse.

the older generation that lived under really fucking hate communist.

I worked with an older man who lived in the USSR and he had nothing but good things to say about it. In fact, he used to get very angry whenever someone would say that it was a bad place to live, and he would start listing off all the ways it was better than where we live, and dress them down for being ignorant.

extended chimes at midnight,

Whoever designed that must have enjoyed causing mild suffering.

Anyway, the extra stuff you’re hearing lately is almost certainly because of Lent.

Sadly, this phenomenon persists all year. Many of the bell towers involved aren’t even attached to churches.

I have a memory of staying overnight at a relative’s home as a young child. They had a mechanical clock that would chime every half hour, even in the middle of the night. I could not understand how they slept with this racket. It is genuinely baffling to me that for some people, it’s “just background noise” and they don’t even notice it unless you point it out.

Mark Carney is the most conservative Liberal I can remember. And is that Starmer? What the hell is this shit?

I have severe sensory sensitivities.

I can’t imagine how a proponent of capitalism can defend the idea of unpaid firefighters. They are one of the most important professions, with a lot of training required, and it’s hard work. They should be extremely well-compensated. Do you not want to have a large, happy force of firefighters ready to protect your capital at a moment’s notice?

But then again, since for most of the day there aren’t fires or accidents happening, I suppose the capitalist line is that “you aren’t paid to lean.”