I don’t want to get dragged into a petty squabble but it must be said that there’s an enormous gulf between having an in-depth, contextual understanding of something as complex as governance/governmental structures; and simply being able to repeat a few top-line sound bites that encompass the general idea of any given subject taught to kids over a few Thursday afternoons.

An average kid won’t have any meaningful interest in the majority of subjects they are introduced to at school. They might find it interesting in the moment, but they’re not going to win many followers if asked to debate on anything with such a shallow introduction to a subject.

My knowledge of Israeli politics is not sufficient to join either side of your disagreement on this thread, though I have heard a couple of conflicting political commentators in agreement that the current state of affairs is not the result of a Netanyahu policy which is in isolation/contrary to the entirety of the rest of Israeli government.

I just found the comment about high school kids understanding the subject to be a bit triggering and unhelpful.

It’s nigh on impossible to know what media and/or commentators to believe. It is an unnerving time. The Hezbollah situation isn’t something that has just come out of nowhere, and the way it’s generally communicated by a lot of media outlets is unhelpful in it’s failure to scratch the surface, leaving readers in a state of helpless panic and fear. There’s a lot of very well informed opinion on the subject out there and it wouldn’t take much for journalists to at least link to some of it; be it books, past journalism, and commentators from all sides actually directly involved in the conflict. Instead we mainly get disjointed daily updates fanning the fear among readers who don’t have enough of an understanding.

We all spend far too much of our spare time as individuals, picking our phones up and doomscrolling. Whether the subject is climate, farming, the economy, health, sustainability, local/national governance, activism, education, neo-liberalism, you name it; rather than reacting to media headlines posted in our echo chambers on a daily basis, proclaiming our despair in disjointed comments sections that get buried every 24 hours: we need to find new ways to engage.

To truly understand a given situation it can take a lifetime of learning about it, yet we bicker between ourselves like we’re the leading authority on the subject. We have the technology available to us, to unite en masse in support of positive changes but we have no leaders. We’re bombarded with information and we all have our three-month-old, one-sided take on what’s going on. There’s got to be a better way.

I’m willing to go out on a limb and say that I’m not the only one who works so much of my time, that by the time I’ve eaten, slept and done basic chores; I’ve got maybe 1-2 hours a day after dark, plus Saturdays to “be myself”, or in my case; spend time with my wife. We don’t have kids and if we did, I can’t imagine how they would fit into my existing schedule. I feel worked to the bone, for little/no benefit to my own wellbeing. Being myself for an hour before bed each day is hardly what I would call having the freedom to disengage from the rat race and be productive for my own/my community’s gain.

It seems obvious to me that the way we live is the problem. There seems to be some very obvious solutions worth trying but we have no hope. We have our half an hour a day to comment online and that’s it.

And we’re the ones who have an opinion… There are hundreds of millions of people who the system have failed, and have no nourishment to their being at all, be that physical, mental, cultural, spiritual. There are entire blocks of society who just consume without conscience, completely disengaged from anything of merit. How do you tackle that?

We need to make small positive steps to communicate more thoughtfully, be less selfish; and consider ways that we can cooperate more both online and irl; as we’re not getting any help from our leaders any time soon.

Instead of saying “bless you” when someone sneezes, I quite like the alternative: “shut the fuck up”.

https://youtu.be/341Lv8JLLV4?si=iJXxGpEI2JFsxw01

The Bucharest palace looks architecturally appealing to me. Anyone know of any other examples of behemoth’s like this?

I can see it being hollowed out and converted into a huge shopping mall at some point.

Onkalo spent nuclear fuel repository in Finland ought to make the list if CERN is allowable.

Otherwise known as Choffolo.

I find this comment to be Jastorf the Mark.

History is yellow/awesome.

English is tan.

Not this again.

I’m squatting on the landing at the top of the stairs and now need to shuffle off in shame to get some TP for my bunghole.

No recommendations for broken sword 🧐

I’m not familiar with the games you’ve mentioned but I believe Fire Emblem: Three Houses might be relevant (on Switch). My sister in law was playing it one time we were staying at theirs. I was encouraged to give it a whirl. Had several very late nights honing my team.